Man Made Climate Change

Jonny · 2011-02-18, 05:48 AM

I got this PM from Livefire after we got talking about global warming on a PSN thread and it got off topic. I'm posting my response to try and help any other climate change skeptics understand the point of view of the proponents. Thats why i'm bothering posting on a Planetside forum I guess, this issue matters to everybody.

Originally Posted by Livefire

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zeGY...eature=related

I should watch if I want to be brain washed by Oil Company propaganda. (And i did watch your video - trust me i'd love to believe it) You can tell yourself what you like, but there IS scientific evidence that man made climate change is happening. Don't think you can just deny it and then, oh its fine to just pollute as much as you like and drive a gas guzzling SUV. Everyone needs to be taking steps to help the planet and reduce their personal carbon footprint. I plan to do as much as I can in my life, and so should you because every individual counts.

Check this site out for a graph showing our C02 parts per million being the highest for 650,000 years. http://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/

Or this for a video example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9ob9...eature=related

Bear in mind that oil companies are big and powerful, they are going to lose out on a transition to greener ways of living. Also look inside yourself and ask if you think its morally acceptable to go on polluting this planet you live in, destroying rainforest, animals and environments.

I like to think, if it couldn't be argued any way, why not want to create a cleaner, more healthy and naturally abundant world for our children, instead of going on destroying it and polluting it blindly and unconsciously?

raw · 2011-02-18, 06:33 AM

Firefly · 2011-02-18, 09:00 AM

Every time some fucking idiot tells me we're enduring global warming, I resist the urge to rape his asshole with my size 12 Doc Martin boot, stare at the three-foot pile of snow that is sitting outside, and ask him how he can explain that, as well as the enormous amount of snow we got last year in this area, oh and the previous year, OH and the year before that.

He usually stammers and says something like "Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um... Uh. Well. Um..."

And then he tries to sell me on some more bullshit. And then I resist the urge to rape his asshole with my size 12 Doc Martin boot, stare at the three-foot pile of snow that is sitting outside, and ask him how he can explain that, as well as the enormous amount of snow we got last year in this area, oh and the previous year, OH and the year before that.

Livefire is one of those fucking idiots. That kid is a fucking dolt. Read his posts. Someone should invent a time machine and send that guy back to the 60s so he can be a peacenik hippie conspiracy theorists with the rest of them.

raw · 2011-02-18, 09:30 AM

Originally Posted by Firefly

Every time some fucking idiot tells me we're enduring global warming, I resist the urge to rape his asshole with my size 12 Doc Martin boot, stare at the three-foot pile of snow that is sitting outside, and ask him how he can explain that, as well as the enormous amount of snow we got last year in this area, oh and the previous year, OH and the year before that.

He usually stammers and says something like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nJuAslQPaY

And then I realize what a tremendous fool I am, that prefers violence over actually understanding my own arguments.

fixed.

Firefly · 2011-02-18, 09:33 AM

I stopped listening as soon as I heard his Sassenach "I'm a wanker" voice.

raw · 2011-02-18, 09:55 AM

Originally Posted by Firefly

I stopped listening as soon as I heard his Sassenach "I'm a wanker" voice.

Yeah. Except that he has 30 years of experience in the field as scientific journalist. But I completely agree with you, we should just listen to people with the right tone of voice. I mean if we don't like his voice, he can't have important or correct things to say, right?

Rbstr · 2011-02-18, 04:58 PM

Firefly....and really...half the country that has no idea what they're "debating" about:
Ahem.

GLOBAL CLIMATE DOES NOT MEAN THE SAME THING AS LOCAL WEATHER.

Thank you,
Person who has environmental chemistry and modeling experience.

The snow in Texas or Florida or where-the-fuck-ever does not in any way provide evidence against global warming.

Global average temperature doesn't mean you can't have some extremely cold, as long as there's more extremely hot elsewhere. Do remember the southern hemisphere is in the middle of summer now....and the northern hemisphere just had a very hot summer.
Though, we actually have a theory about the current spat of severe winters in development: The jet stream typically provides a barrier to the arctic air attempting to come south from the pole. But the jet stream is weakening, presumably because of different surface temperature differentials (which have bearing on pressure differentials that drive the winds). This allows arctic air to move south more readily. Yes, that's just a theory, but it makes sense. There's no real way to test on systems like the earths except for extremely complicated computer models, and those require much more funding that we're often willing to give (though recently things have been better).

Asides from that bit:
There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that we, human beings, have significantly impacted the atmospheric concentrations of CO2. We've more than doubled them in a century. The source of the "new" CO2 is us, not natural processes, we've got good records.
Even if we stopped all CO2 emissions tomorrow it would be on the order of centuries before atmospheric CO2 went back to pre-industrial levels, and even longer for oceanic concentrations.

We also know for a fact that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. More of it means less heat escapes our atmosphere.

Additionally, we know for a fact that the earth is currently warming, without any attention paid to the cause.

The debate on climate change, in scientist circles, mostly has to do with two things:
How much warmer a given amount of CO2 makes things.
What the warming will do to global weather patterns.
NOT if it's happening or not.

This should be very concerning because there are a number of situations where we hit CO2 runaway. That is at certain, fuzzily-known CO2 concentrations the ability for the Earth to sequester it naturally gets FUBARed. For instance, higher CO2 means more acidic oceans. At a certain pH shellfish can no longer make shells (this already happens in some places). Shells are make of calcium carbonate, which makes them one of the largest sinks of CO2 that exist. So once we reach that point, CO2 concentrations will go up even faster.

The fun is that when you look at the dynamics, its very possible we're beyond that point of no return, and nothing we do will keep us from hitting the "oh shit we done goofed" CO2 threshold.

I can post a couple of book chapters on climate modeling if you guys really want to see it. Unfortunately none of the modeling programs will work because I can't distribute the installer. They also require some differential equations knowledge to really understand.

Now, is Global warming "bad"? That's an entirely different question. "Bad" is more likely than not. It could actually expand the amount of arable land. A benefit in the face of a rapidly growing population.

To sum it up in a sentence: People should be extremely concerned about what we're doing to the atmosphere.

Jonny · 2011-02-18, 10:19 AM

Firefly, really what are you talking about?

Even if you don't like his voice, you can still watch the video and give an intelligent answer about your opinion and not something about kicking someone up the ass.

Also what happens (ie snow) in your back garden/town isn't whats happening in the whole world. Or even if it happens in your whole country.

Check out this article if your interested in more about that point: http://blogthechange.wordpress.com/

Hamma · 2011-02-18, 10:32 AM

Climate Change is an interesting debate, when really there isn't a whole lot of debate needed. One might argue that the crazy cold and storms we have seen this winter are in fact caused by global warming because the "Change" is also measured in unusual weather patterns.

Food for thought..

Jonny · 2011-02-18, 10:41 AM

Originally Posted by Hamma

Climate Change is an interesting debate, when really there isn't a whole lot of debate needed. One might argue that the crazy cold and storms we have seen this winter are in fact caused by global warming because the "Change" is also measured in unusual weather patterns.

Food for thought..

Good point. OM NOM NOM

Edit: Did America have huge snow storms lately then?

Firefly · 2011-02-18, 10:48 AM

Originally Posted by Jonny

Firefly, really what are you talking about?

I think the whole fucking debate is stupid, honestly. One side insists the one thing, another side insists quite the opposite. Everyone provides their own compelling arguments and empirical evidence. Then they decry the other side as being corporate tools, or they denounce Al Gore's video because he's a liberal Democrat who lied about inventing the internet, or some other stupid politically-motivated argument. Meanwhile conspiracy theorists abound on the left and the right. Then you've even got people on both sides saying "I lied and fudged data to make it look legit, because my paycheck was on the line". And then you get some pleb party-liner asshole who wants to come ram his opinion down your throat like we should bow to his superior mouth-piece skills. I fucking hate zealots, particularly ignorant zealots who can't be arsed to do their own bloody homework first. Now, in defense of the Englishman in the video, I admire his ability to put two and two together. Research is always a good thing (take note, Lifefail, and stop copying shit from wikipedia).

So my entire point in this whole goatfuck of a forum post was to poke fun at the entire issue. I like how raw edits his posts and gets all butt-hurt that I can't take the damned thing seriously. Sorry I offended you, home skillet. Cheers, raw! Seriously - who really knows what's going on? Every single side has their own opinion and their own conclusive "shocking" evidence. The whole damned environment has become a single political issue and every side wants to think they're right. It sickens me to my core. Jesus... I sound like a fucking hippie.

Originally Posted by Jonny

Even if you don't like his voice, you can still watch the video and give an intelligent answer about your opinion and not something about kicking someone up the ass.

A) the comment about kicking someone up the ass came before the video.
B) If the old chap is talking the entire video, and I don't like his voice, wouldn't that mean I couldn't really watch the entire thing unless I just sucked it up and drove on? In spite of my mockery of all things English I did bother to watch the video. I just didn't admit it, for the sake of comic relief, because I'm an asshole.

Originally Posted by Jonny

Also what happens (ie snow) in your back garden/town isn't whats happening in the whole world. Or even if it happens in your whole country.

Duh. I've never seen snow in Hawai'i. I've never seen snow in any other tropical location, though funnily enough I've seen snow in West Texas and other desert climates. I just find it ironic and intensely funny that people spout off at the mouth about global warming in the middle of a nation-wide blizzard.

Originally Posted by Jonny

Check out this article if your interested in more about that point: http://blogthechange.wordpress.com/

Contrary to my cavalier attitude toward the farce of global warming or global cooling, I am keenly interested on what happens to my planet. Nobody's invented a wormhole to Auraxis so for the time being I'm stuck here and at the utter mercy of the jackwagons that are ruining this planet.

Thanks for the link. I appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Jonny

Edit: Did America have huge snow storms lately then?

Yes, nationwide. Every state in the nation (except Florida) had snowstorms, and then Florida got a bit of snow so it was every state. Though I doubt they included Hawai'i, so most probably they meant the contiguous US.

Jonny · 2011-02-18, 11:03 AM

Originally Posted by Firefly

I think the whole fucking debate is stupid, honestly. One side insists the one thing, another side insists quite the opposite...

So my entire point in this whole goatfuck of a forum post...

...Contrary to my cavalier attitude toward the farce of global warming or global cooling, I am keenly interested on what happens to my planet. Nobody's invented a wormhole to Auraxis so for the time being I'm stuck here and at the utter mercy of the jackwagons that are ruining this planet.

Thanks for the link. I appreciate it.

Yes, nationwide. Every state in the nation (except Florida) had snowstorms, and then Florida got a bit of snow so it was every state. Though I doubt they included Hawai'i, so most probably they meant the contiguous US.

Well thanks for your post, you made me laugh at least

Sorry to hear you've been snowed in so long with no PSN.

I can understand you being fed up with it. I get fed up with the world every day and all the corruption and horrible stuff humans do to each other. If I was living in the UK and didn't know about the scientific evidence, I'd probably slap someone who told me the earth was warming up, considering the last 2 winters here.

However, I know about the evidence, those co2/temp graphs and all those other signs of a warming planet, and it worries me - as i'm sure it does to you too as you say you care about the planet.

I also know that the mega rich oil companies got mega rich from oil (duh) and therefore it's in their greedy interests to keep oil going as long as possible. I also know that some naughty oil companies fund organisations (and set them up) to discredit and deny man made climate change. Now people on the other side of the argument are trying to create a cleaner and better world. Those who profit from that, thats on their concience - but I believe with a positive attitude and a realisation of whats really important in life, we can all make afew sacrifices so we don't have to make the biggest sacrifice of all - losing the only world we know has life on it.

and planetside.

And don't worry about mocking english people because i'm english. I'll probably agree with you. (as long as i can mock americans a bit)

Firefly · 2011-02-18, 11:08 AM

Originally Posted by Jonny

And don't worry about mocking english people because i'm english. I'll probably agree with you. (as long as i can mock americans a bit)

As a generic ethnic people, I <3 English people. The reason why I mock the English from time to time is its government (much the way you'd mock an American, when in actuality it's their government you mock). I'm somewhat of a Scottish nationalist.

Traak · 2011-02-27, 01:33 AM

Originally Posted by Firefly

Yes, nationwide. Every state in the nation (except Florida) had snowstorms, and then Florida got a bit of snow so it was every state. Though I doubt they included Hawai'i, so most probably they meant the contiguous US.

Hawaii has snow, each and every year. It's why there's skiing on Mauna Kea in the winter, each and every year.

Lonehunter · 2011-02-27, 11:26 PM

I really love seeing someone use "It's cold outside" to argue against "Global Warming" lol. It only proves ignorance prevails, I just hope I get to see some even bigger and more frequent natural disasters before my next generation. I don't want them taking all the apocalypse fun.