@kennethamy,
kennethamy wrote:And it also lessens credibility.
Unless some sort of ban on free speech is implemented regarding the discourse what you will find is that there are kooks on both sides.
That's the problem with people - some of them are kooks - some of them are even right, and still kooks.
So Caroline's "Sewage is destroying the Earth" thing is kooky.
But Glenn Beck's applauding of thieves is also kooky.
And - in my opinion - Caroline's kookiness is perhaps less malign than Glenn's, because:
1) Seems motivated by compassion.
2) The salient facts seem to support caution over willful ignorance.
Quote: There has also been a lot of spin over whether scientific data have been fudged, and the outcome is not at all clear, as would be expected it would not be.
If you're willing to learn about the salient facts it is actually quite cut and dried that:
1) CO2 absorbs more of the spectrum of infrared radiation than (i) most other atmospheric gasses and (ii) the average of atmospheric gasses taken as a whole (in other words there are atmospheric gasses that absorb more - such as methane - but they aren't very common atmospheric gasses compared to CO2).
2) Molecules which absorb infrared radiation vibrate, and this vibration generates heat (or, more accurately, IS heat).
3) Stands to reason that more CO2 in the atmosphere equates to more heat.
4) Taking carbon that has been sequestered in the ground for millions of years and burning it will increase the % of CO2 in the atmosphere.
5) That's what many human industries do.
6) So we might well expect to see a corrolation between rising temperatures and periods of human industry involving burning previously sequestered carbon.
7) That is apparently the case.
What climate scientists try to work out is whether or not there is a warming trend (clearly according to even the most conservative data sets) and whether other factors might be causing it (it doesn't seem so, though the solar cycle, and patterns involving heat loss from el Nino-la Nina events causes short term disruption of the pattern).
This is all known with confidence by most people with an interest, and it matches all the datasets recorded, whether they derive from bodies accused of fudging or not (and what's more - I repeat that no body has had accusations of fudging upheld against them - people seem pretty sure that fudging goes on until it comes to proving it - then they shut up).
Quote:In any case the view of scientists is my no means as unanimous as you and others make it sound.
This is a common canard and I think it's easy to illustrate why its a logical fallacy.
It isn't the job of scientists to reach unanimous consent on a given issue - what is considered apt is for those scientists within a field to reach consensus.
So a chemist has no more authority on climatology than a pest controller or a politician or a journalist. It is climate scientists who have the training and knowledge to act as the best authorities.
It's also the mark of a good scientist to remain skeptical, even if things do reach consensus. Otherwise they can't move forward can they?
That said, within the climate scientist community I understand that it is something like 99% who support the notion that the current warming trend (which even the 1% acknowledge) is forced or outright caused by human industrial processes.
That is consensus by scientific standards. As to the reasons behind the doubts of the 1% I am not sure - I suspect it is easier to buy 1% than 99% myself.
The genral scientific community is propbably less convinced - but why would a paeleontologist's opinion of climate change matter any more than John Doe's?
Assuming that scientists tend to respect each other's methods we might expect the number of people within the scientific community to tend towards support that climate change is affected by industry to be greater than that of the general public.
Which is what we do see.
Quote: By the way, as long as I have your attention: you presented a list of measures environmentalists are plugging. What the hell has not killing whales to do with saving the planet? How would the destruction of whales lead to the destruction of the planet? It is this kind of thing which I find annoying and somewhat idiotic.
Ken.
Go back to that post.
Read it again.
Try to understand all the words and the order they are presented to you.
Tell me where I said killing whales would lead to the destruction of the earth or supported such a notion.
What I actually said was that different people would be effected by different reasons to different degrees. In the case of species destruction I even admitted that the reasons involved were mostly aesthetic in nature.
Nothing to do with planetary destruction.
You're so keen to project your prejudices regarding anyone that sticks up for an environmental issue that you don't seem to be able to actually understand the point.
