In the Rush to Help - Global Warming

[melliedee]

I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way....

The EPA Climate Change Kids Site

[roni]

A consensus does not arise from a vote. It arises from a consensus decision process - and that is way different than a vote.

I hate consensus decision-making - way too freaking much processing, and I am ornery enough to block consensus - and it only takes one person to do so and bring the process to a halt.

You don't have to agree to everything, but you do have to refrain from blocking consensus even if you do disagree.

[kirbyfan]

As I say, Mark, then your view is so outside what I see as reality that it does not seem reasonable to try to proceed with discussion.

I think that there is a lot of common ground but there is also a wide chasm on some aspects of the global warming debate. I think maybe we should focus on the stuff we agree on and let the other stuff go, neither side is going to convince the other.

[Jacko]

Originally Posted by ryberg

Well see there we're just too apart to continue, I think. To me it's like saying that there's no evidence of poverty in the U.S. or something. It's just so outside what I see as reality that I don't think there's a point to any further discussion.
....

Steve

I certainly agree with this statement!

[Cosmo]

My comment was general and not directed at anyone, per se. We don't need to change climate moreso than nature to be a problem, we can be the tipping point with our our unawareness...

Originally Posted by PlayadelSoul

I have stated thousands of times that man hurts the environment in a variety of ways, and can do better in living cleaner. It takes a large leap of faith to go from that to man's changing the climate moreso than nature. A large leap of faith and an even larger ego.

[Seakony]

It's all over in 2012....that's when Little krakatoa is going to have a super eruption, bigger than in 1863..more like the one in 535 or 536 ad when the tthere was so much ash in the atsmosphere that there were no crops from the sun being blocked and people starved and were plagued with the plague. (this was worldwide)
There ain't nothein we can do about the earth splitting apart and spruting out holy hell.

HAVE A NICE DAY!!!!

[Just Lucky]

Thanks for the positive vibes.

[ryberg]

Originally Posted by melliedee

I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way....

The EPA Climate Change Kids Site

That is a refreshingly lucid site!

Can We Change the Climate?

It may seem hard to believe that people can actually change the Earth’s climate. But scientists think that the things people do that send greenhouse gases into the air are making our planet warmer.



Once, all climate changes occurred naturally. However, during the Industrial Revolution, we began altering our climate and environment through agricultural and industrial practices. The Industrial Revolution was a time when people began using machines to make life easier. It started more than 200 years ago and changed the way humans live. Before the Industrial Revolution, human activity released very few gases into the atmosphere, but now through population growth, fossil fuel burning, and deforestation, we are affecting the mixture of gases in the atmosphere.

Since the Industrial Revolution, the need for energy to run machines has steadily increased. Some energy, like the energy you need to do your homework, comes from the food you eat. But other energy, like the energy that makes cars run and much of the energy used to light and heat our homes, comes from fuels like coal and oil – fossil fuels. Burning these fuels releases greenhouse gases.

When Do You Send Greenhouse Gases into the Air?

Whenever you ...

# Watch TV
# Use the Air Conditioner
# Turn on a Light
# Use a Hair Dryer
# Ride in a Car
# Play a Video Game
# Listen to a Stereo
# Wash or Dry Clothes
# Use a Dish Washer
# Microwave a Meal

... you are helping to send greenhouse gas into the air.

To perform many of these functions, you need to use electricity. Electricity comes from power plants. Most power plants use coal and oil to make electricity. Burning coal and oil produces greenhouse gases.

Other things we do send greenhouse gases into the air too:

The trash that we send to landfills produces a greenhouse gas called methane. Methane is also produced by the animals we raise for dairy and meat products and when we take coal out of the ground. Whenever we drive or ride in a car, we are adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. And, when factories make the things that we buy and use everyday, they too are sending greenhouse gases into the air...

Reading that, it's almost impossible to guess you could get to so much arguing and controversy on the topic down the road! Well I mean unless the argument was what to do about human-generated global warming, not whether (or even really to what extent) it might exist in the first place.

Steve

[ryberg]

Originally Posted by Just Lucky

Thanks for the positive vibes.

Dude, that (cool!) Obama avatar, apparently of a visit by him to Austin, didn't even last a day, I don't think! What is with you and the avatars! You make Maggie look downright lethargic in changing hers!

But to stay on topic, check out this possibly interesting analogous story I just happened to see:

Official prototype of kilogram mysteriously losing weight

The 118-year-old cylinder that is the international prototype for the metric mass, kept tightly under lock and key outside Paris, is mysteriously losing weight -- if ever so slightly. Physicist Richard Davis of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures in Sevres, southwest of Paris, says the reference kilo appears to have lost 50 micrograms compared with the average of dozens of copies.

"The mystery is that they were all made of the same material, and many were made at the same time and kept under the same conditions, and yet the masses among them are slowly drifting apart," he said. "We don't really have a good hypothesis for it."

Nevertheless, there seems to be no suggestion that this challenges -- much less disproves or unseats -- laws of physics that hold that objects should retain their weight in such circumstances and this type of phenomena should not in fact be found. The implicit notion is that we're missing something, we just don't understand everything yet, or whatever, but not that the set of theories that we rely on to explain the world in such situations is all whacked and ready for the garbage can because of this apparent exception.

Same deal with that new Nessie video that cropped up not so long ago. Looks intriguing, but we don't throw out the scientific reasoning that tells us there can't be some sort of gigantic dinosaur race living in little Loch Ness all this time, even if we don't understand what made that speedy V in the water that that tourist caught on film.

Steve

[Just Lucky]

France is getting lighter? I was fascinated by the fact there were reference weights for the metric system when I was a boy. Mighty geeky eeh?

Yes, It was from Obama's visit to Austin in maybe February. He drew 20,000 folks to a week day rally. I think he's a bit conservative for my taste. Know who's in the current one?

Howzabout that socialized medicine?

[Jacko]

Originally Posted by melliedee

I believe the children are our future, teach them well and let them lead the way....

The EPA Climate Change Kids Site

Earth has warmed by about 1ºF over the past 100 years. But why? And how? Well, scientists are not exactly sure. The Earth could be getting warmer on its own, but many of the world's leading climate scientists think that things people do are helping to make the Earth warmer.

Greenhouse Effect, Climate Change,
and Global Warming

The Greenhouse Effect: Scientists are sure about the greenhouse effect. They know that greenhouse gases make the Earth warmer by trapping energy in the atmosphere.
Climate Change: Climate is the long-term average of a region's weather events lumped together. For example, it's possible that a winter day in Buffalo, New York, could be sunny and mild, but the average weather – the climate – tells us that Buffalo's winters will mainly be cold and include snow and rain. Climate change represents a change in these long-term weather patterns. They can become warmer or colder. Annual amounts of rainfall or snowfall can increase or decrease.
Global Warming: Global warming refers to an average increase in the Earth's temperature, which in turn causes changes in climate. A warmer Earth may lead to changes in rainfall patterns, a rise in sea level, and a wide range of impacts on plants, wildlife, and humans. When scientists talk about the issue of climate change, their concern is about global warming caused by human activities.

[ami]

Originally Posted by PlayadelSoul

Some other historical theories, many of which were accepted by the "consensus".

Superseded scientific theories - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hiya Mark from Croatia, hope all is well!!!

[PlayadelSoul]

Originally Posted by ami

Hiya Mark from Croatia, hope all is well!!!

Hey Anita. Hope you are well and having a good time. Is it hot, there?

[PlayadelSoul]

I did a little research on the article Steve posted regarding the melting of Arctic ice. The article claims that it is a "record" ice melt. What it fails to mention is that the records only go back to 1979. Remember that the 70's were one of the coolest decades in recent times. There was even fear of a global cooling (new Ice Age).

A quote from the article:

The decline in ice also raises the possibility of an ice-free "Northwest Passage," a shipping route north of the Canadian mainland that could provide a shortcut for transit between the Atlantic and Pacific.

The Northwest Passage has been navigated since a Norwegian did it in 1903. Records regarding the amount of ice in it have only been kept since 1972.

At best, the article misrepresents with terms like "record" and "in history". At worst, it is more scare tactics.

Question: What was the hottest year in "recorded history?"

[Just Lucky]

That's not what I remember about the Northwest passage:

En
RANDY BOSWELL, CanWest News Service

Published: Wednesday, August 29
One week after Canada and the United States agreed to disagree over the ownership of the Northwest Passage, this summer's record melt of Arctic sea ice has unlocked the fabled polar shipping route more completely than ever before, the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Centre announced.
"It's open," Mark Serreze, a senior scientist with the research institute based in Boulder, Colo., said in an interview yesterday. "It's unprecedented. Theoretically, you could take a ship from Tokyo through the Northwest Passage to Boston. Not an easy sail, not a Sunday cruise, but it has started to happen."
Describing the phenomenon as clear proof that global climate change in under way, the centre says on its website that "analysts at the Canadian Ice Service and the U.S. National Ice Centre confirm that the passage is almost completely clear and that the region is more open than it has ever been since the advent of routine monitoring in 1972."vironment Canada scientist Lionel Hache, senior forecaster with the Canadian Ice Service in Ottawa, says a navigable route across the country's Arctic archipelago has opened a few times since 1998. This year, he notes, "you could go through the Northwest Passage with a sailing boat without any problems, without seeing any ice."
And what particularly concerns scientists is that the thawing of Arctic ice typically continues until mid-September, virtually ensuring next summer's melt season will begin with a much-reduced base of what used to be called "permanent" ice.

The Northwest Passage: in dispute, and navigable