Global Warming...New Report...and it ain't happy news

There are as many complaints leveled at the pro-AGW group in that they redact and/or omit scientific opinion that disagrees with the conventional consensus of the day, not to mention that they also attempt to otherwise stifle the opinions of those who disagree with them.

Even on this thread, there is far more verbage expended by the pro-AGW group on attempts to discredit, ridicule, or trash the skeptics than there is any effort made to discuss their scientific opinions.

So what do you think is more important? Tracking asteroids that we know are out there and we will not survive if they hit us? Or combating global warming that a fair number of scientists consider not to be problem we can do anything about and we will need to adapt to climate change as humankind has always done?

blatham wrote:

US specific... report from Union of Concerned Scientists

I always thought UCS stands for "Union of Con Scientists", this bunch of binocculared anti-nuclear IRrationnalists who took the street in the 70s with slogans like "Rather Red Than Nuked". :wink:

Quote:

So what do you think is more important? Tracking asteroids that we know are out there and we will not survive if they hit us? Or combating global warming that a fair number of scientists consider not to be problem we can do anything about and we will need to adapt to climate change as humankind has always done?

So, what should medical science bother with? Cancer or heart disease? Clearly, it must be one or the other.

Foxfyre wrote:

There are as many complaints leveled at the pro-AGW group in that they redact and/or omit scientific opinion that disagrees with the conventional consensus of the day, not to mention that they also attempt to otherwise stifle the opinions of those who disagree with them.

Even on this thread, there is far more verbage expended by the pro-AGW group on attempts to discredit, ridicule, or trash the skeptics than there is any effort made to discuss their scientific opinions.

The same seems to be happening on the Bush-was-behind-9/11 threads, where there is often far more verbiage expended by the official-story group on attempts to discredit, ridicule, or trash the sceptics than there is any effort made to discuss their "scientific" opinions.

Really? I was of the opinion that the I Hate Bush group are as disinterested in any facts that discredit their emotional, kneejerk response to that as much as they are disinterested in any facts that discredit their emotional, kneejerk responses here.

Foxfyre wrote:

Really? I was of the opinion that the I Hate Bush group are as disinterested in any facts that discredit their emotional, kneejerk response to that as much as they are disinterested in any facts that discredit their emotional, kneejerk responses here.

I don't know about the "I Hate Bush group", as they seem to take a variety of positions. Which is not a big surprise, as with the current approval ratings, there should be a fair number even of Republicans opposing Bush's policies. Internationally, the "I Hate Bush group" is probably as heterogeneous as it can get.

Personally, I am kind of a fan of conspiracy theories, even if I find it odd that some people actually seem to believe that stuff. And that goes for all the theories about how Zionists or the Bush administration were behind 9/11 as well as for the "the WMD have been moved to Syria" conspiracy. Apparently, it doesn't seem to be that difficult to find "experts" to dispute every well-researched report out there, and equally easy to find people to believe in those experts and their quickly written-up "research papers".

The difference between you and me is that I can criticize somebody or think they made a mistake or a wrong choice without having to hate him or her and/or assume that everything s/he does or has done is wrong. You liberals could learn a lot from conservatives there.

As for conspiracy therories, I enjoy them too going all the way back to old presidential assassinations up to JFK, the Roswell incident, and Area 51 coupled with various UFO sightings, etc. I know better than to start believing manufactured crap though, and it is just plain scary when some among our leadership begins to believe the stuff and incorporate it into legislation or policy.

That will be true as well if we do wind up bowing to policy developed from junk science re global warming or any other global phenomenon.

Foxfyre wrote:

The difference between you and me is that I can criticize somebody or think they made a mistake or a wrong choice without having to hate him or her and/or assume that everything s/he does or has done is wrong. You liberals could learn a lot from conservatives there.

If that is a fact on your side, then I can happily report that this is no difference between us at all. I did not look up all of your posts here, but I just did a search of all my posts here on A2K, and I can state that I have never said that I hated Bush.

Actually, I think that you have to be really emotionally involved in order to hate something, and I'm definitely not emotionally involved with Bush. I think he is a complete failure as a president and that his actions had and will have negative consequences for the entire world, but I don't hate him.

Foxfyre wrote:

As for conspiracy therories, I enjoy them too going all the way back to old presidential assassinations up to JFK, the Roswell incident, and Area 51 coupled with various UFO sightings, etc. I know better than to start believing manufactured crap though, and it is just plain scary when some among our leadership begins to believe the stuff and incorporate it into legislation or policy.

Apropos conspiracy theories: I seem to remember that we still have a bet going on the fate of all those Iraqi WMD. I think you supported the claim that they had been moved to Syria. Can you remember what the bet was about?

Foxfyre wrote:

That will be true as well if we do wind up bowing to policy developed from junk science re global warming or any other global phenomenon.

I agree absolutely. Especially concerning climate change, I would hate to see policy shaped according to the junk science purported by a few lobbyists rather than according to scientific findings.

Luckily, America has some of the best universities and a lot of bright scientists as well as lots of intelligent citizens.

Climate change: scientists warn it may be too late to save the ice caps

David Adam, environment correspondent
Monday February 19, 2007

Guardian

A critical meltdown of ice sheets and severe sea level rise could be inevitable because of global warming, the world's scientists are preparing to warn their governments. New studies of Greenland and Antarctica have forced a UN expert panel to conclude there is a 50% chance that widespread ice sheet loss "may no longer be avoided" because of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Such melting would raise sea levels by four to six metres, the scientists say. It would cause "major changes in coastline and inundation of low-lying areas" and require "costly and challenging" efforts to move millions of people and infrastructure from vulnerable areas. The previous official line, issued in 2001, was that the chance of such an event was "not well known, but probably very low".

Your view (crops will move towards polls) is a long term view which seems to make no accounting for disruptions to human communities and disruptions to existing ecological balances. It is not enough to surmise that equilibriums will be achieved generations from now.

blatham wrote:

Your view (crops will move towards polls) is a long term view which seems to make no accounting for disruptions to human communities and disruptions to existing ecological balances. It is not enough to surmise that equilibriums will be achieved generations from now.

Why not? If global warming happens on the timescale of generations, why isn't it enough to point out that equilibrium will be reached on the timescale of generations?

I'm not denying that global warming causes serious problems for low-lying places like Bangladesh. I believe I said as much when you asked me about it in an earlier post. But the problem has a straightforward engineering solution that I presume is cheaper than avoiding the problem. The solution is dikes and drainage, similar to what the Netherlands have done for centuries. Bangladesh cannot afford this engineering solution because it's poor. So, while global warming is a problem for it, lack of development is a bigger problem, and should take precedence as the country sets its policy priorities.

PINE FALLS, Manitoba -- Here on the edge of the silent and frozen northern tier of the Earth, the fate of the world's climate is buried beneath the snow and locked in the still limbs of aspen trees.

Nearly half of the carbon that exists on land is contained in the sweeping boreal forests, which gird the Earth in the northern reaches of Canada, Alaska, Scandinavia and Russia. Scientists now fear that the steady rise in the temperature of the atmosphere and the increasing human activity in those lands are releasing that carbon, a process that could trigger a vicious cycle of even more warming.

The prospect of the land itself accelerating climate change staggers scientists, as well as woodsmen such as Bob Austman, who stopped recently in a quiet stand of birch on the edge of the boreal forest to examine a jack rabbit's tracks.

"There are big forces out there," he said succinctly

McG

Aside from being seven years old now, this reference is not to an objective scientific organization, yes? Cato has as its mission...

" The Cato Institute seeks to broaden the parameters of public policy debate to allow consideration of the traditional American principles of limited government, individual liberty, free markets and peace..."

If you are willing to accept that industry-sponsored research and think tanks are less than satisfying sources for our data, I'll go to some trouble here. Willing to go that far?