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global warming

This is where you can discuss your homework, family, just about anything, make strange sounds and otherwise discuss things which are really not related to the Lancer-series. Yes that means you can discuss other games.

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fleish guitar123

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 5:15 pm

global warming

The ozone layer is getting thinner and soon our summers will be so hot we will not be able to stand it. All the harmful rays of the sun are going on us. It only gets worse from here.

H.Q. Victor

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 5:42 pm

It already is to hot. 96 deg here in Ga. Regularly in the mid to low 80's Hate this hot stuff, and little wind too.

*Starts snow dance*

meezookeewee

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 6:44 pm

Forget it, Final. We're all doomed. WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!

Jagged

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 7:13 pm

Don't you get it?! It's game over man! Game over!

Stormtrooper112

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 8:46 pm

Oh well,it was fun while it lasted right?


J Dawg

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 9:47 pm

There's a positive attitude! Pass the sunscreen!

fleish guitar123

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 10:27 pm

Soon sunscreen won't be enough! I say we go to antarctica and live with the penguins. Move over penguins I'm coming!!!!!

Arania

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 10:33 pm

Then youll be right under the ozone hole!

I say we go to the arctic, or greenland, or somewhere equally cold... RUSSIA!

Accushot

Post Wed Aug 09, 2006 11:29 pm

The ozone layer is getting thinner and soon our summers will be so hot we will not be able to stand it. All the harmful rays of the sun are going on us. It only gets worse from here.

Oh dear God. Listen, you may have just been taught this in school but a lot of what you are taught in school is absolute cr@p. I've said it before and I'll say it again; there is absolutely NO proof that humans are causing global warming, or even that it's happening in the way the media makes out.

Ask any scientist in the field about global warming and there's a good chance they will laugh in your face. Perhaps unsurprisingly what you see in the media and what you are taught in schools is not the whole story; it's not even a part of the correct story. I'd imagine you've never heard of the regular-as-clockwork temperature fluctuations that have affected this planet for the last millions of years? You can model the temperature of the earth on a graph that looks a little like a sine wave:

We are currently on one of the upwards slopes, hence a significant increase in temperature. Sometime in the near future the temperature will peak, politicians will pat each other on the backs for beating global warming, and then it will start to decrease again. It's perhaps worth pointing out that in the last three times we reached a major trough in the graph the planet entered an ice age that each time very nearly wiped out all life on Earth.

Then there's about 300 million other counter-arguments. Ever heard about the buffering capabilities of the sea, and the fact that through periodic excessive acidifcation they release gigatonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere? How about the role of swamp and marsh land as a carbon sink, and the fact that they are currently spewing thousands of times more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than the human race has ever done? I'd expect you haven't taken into account the proliferation of cities around atmospheric measurement sites either which essentially renders the data useless? Volcanic activity? The death of quadrillions of photosynthetic algae due to seas that are getting colder , thereby reducing CO2 uptake?

I could go on for hours, but I think you get the picture. There is no concrete proof linking humans to global warming, and there is no concrete proof that this so-called "warming" is anything other than a periodic fluctuation in temperature. In 1998 more than fifteen thousand scientists signed a petition against the Kyoto accord, which aims to combat global warming. Here's the full text of the petition:
"We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.

There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth."


And here is the list of signatories if you want to see a lot of the words "PhD" and "Prof.". Scientists aren't just opposing this theory because of it's fundemental incorretness, but because of the harm it's doing around the world. They argue that the billions upon billions spent every year on global warming could be better spent combatting world poverty or malaria for example, not feeding a media frenzy and furthering political agendas.

If you're going to listen to someone, I'd say 15,000 scientists are a better bet than the daily newspaper and your high-school science teacher.

Edited by - Accushot on 8/10/2006 12:47:33 AM

The Evil Thing

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 2:28 am

Ok, Accushot, I assume you don't believe in global warming. Fair enough, maybe there is no evidence but that point is academic. (Maybe lay off the Crichton, eh ) But you still agree that there has been a massive increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels above what occurs naturally? As concentration increases the oceans will acidify owing to the enormous amounts of carbonic acid created as the CO2 dissolves into the sea. This outstrips the natural buffering effect caused by slow release of various mineral carbonates etc. so the ocean's going to go up a pH or two. I'm sure I don't need to say how disastrous this would be for corals, plankton and any other organism that needs their environment to be 'just so'.

Regardless of whether Earth is getting warmer, the world's largest ecosystem is set to have a very bad day. Surely that's incentive to try and reduce carbon emissions?

EDIT: Oh, and thanks for raising the tone. Here we were having a nice, tongue-in-cheek discussion about the best place to escape an imaginary catastrophe.

EDIT 2: I checked out the link you provided to the petition. From what I can see the man who wrote the 'foreword' (for wont of a better term) is past president of the National Academy of Science. The same organisation who fully endorsed the idea of global warming along with the Academia Brasiliera de Ciencias, Royal Society of Canada, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Academie de Sciences, Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher, Indian National Science Academy, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Science Council of Japan, Russian Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society. But anyway, I just found that slightly ironic.

EDIT 3: The petition was signed in 1998. The document in question was signed in 2005. Presumably they had decided that the evidence was now sufficient to warrant action.


People who take drugs are bad.

Damn customs agents

Edited by - The Evil Thing on 8/10/2006 3:29:15 AM

Edited by - The Evil Thing on 8/10/2006 3:49:57 AM

Edited by - The Evil Thing on 8/10/2006 3:50:33 AM

Fear Factor

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 3:14 am

Accushot has made some very good points about why global warming is probably misguided. While I am also skeptical about this global warming thingy, I do agree that humanity should cut energy usage, drastically. At least unrenewable ones, for these reasons.

1. While global warming itself is probably a big hooey, a future of energy scarcity is most probable. And while humanity-induced global warming is perhaps impossible, local warming is a verifiable fact. Cities that have higher concentrations of factories and motor vehicles create 'heat islands' and have higher temps than suburbans and countrysides, which in turn induce city dwellers to purchase and run airconditioning and put additional strains on energy supply.

2. More research into alternative fuel and energy sources can only be beneficial for 1st world countries - less oil dependence on (terrorist) nations.

3. More walking and biking will translate into fewer motor accidents, and less respiratory problems for local citizens. Less motorways and more railways, I say. Hike up taxes and toll fees and fuel prices for personal motor vehicles. Then use all these additional state incomes to subsidize better public transport system and nicer pedestrian facilities.

4. A little more trees and parks will not hurt anyone. They look and smell nice, their shades are a welcome respite in the scorching summers (human-induced scorching summers or otherwise ) and persuade people to bike and walk instead of drive.

The Oregon Petition itself has spotty reputations at best, consisting name repetitions and liberal use of the word "scientist".
Oregon Petition in Wikipedia

My point is, we need not concern ourselves with global warming. Such arrogance! The planet will keep on going long until we're gone. We need to concern ourselves with our own asses - plant those trees for your convenience and your own sense of aesthetics and your own respiratory health, not for the planet. Walk and bike and bus more for your own patriotic reasons, not for the planet. And the Human-Induced Global Warming is probably misguided, some measures against global warming are certainly nothing but beneficial for various economic, patriotic, and (lesser) environmental reasons. I do not see how some limitations against greenhouse gases can be damaging to anything.

Edited by - Fear Factor on 8/10/2006 5:20:00 AM

Killa

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 6:15 am

I do not see how some limitations against greenhouse gases can be damaging to anything.


I do. But that's not the point of this post. Didn't the sun go through some kind of major change in the 90s that had everyone freaking out? (Please correct me if I'm wrong.) Didn't something happen where now we recieve more radation from the sun than we did before? I'm more worried about North Korea or Iran starting a nuclear war than I am about global warming. (Even you hippies have to agree. That is MUCH more important than a 5 degree temperature increase every year.) The Earth is just on a natural cycle, and we're in one of those climbs. It's the same thing with hurricanes, we just happened to be in the more active cycle right now. Now, an ice age is something we really need to be worried about. With our current systems, within ten years of the beginning of an ice age, we'll have a world wide famine. Possibly even worse than the one engulfing Africa right now. Imagine that, multiplyed by four and spread over the entire world.

We're taught these things in school, on the news, etc. Usually the media or someone who doesn't really know what they're talking about. They try to tell us to recycle as much as possible, as it'll save humanity from extenction one day. One problem with recycling that they don't tell us. It actually makes more pollution than just throwing things away and letting them safely decompose in landfills. However, there is one thing that recycling isn't all BS about, and that's recycling aluminum. That's the one time where it actually doesn't make more pollution and is cheeper than making new ones. Recycling is an industry that'll feed BS to anyone willing to believe it, so they can make a profit. They want to tell us that exhaust from cars is what is causing the polar ice caps to melt, it's what's causing all these hurricanes, it's causing the temperature to increase, more sever weather, etc. To all of them that say this, I ask one thing of you, and that's proof. No, I don't want to hear what your high school science teacher told you, I want uncontradicted, reliable, concrete proof.

Most environmentalists I've met, you can tell they've never listened to both sides of the arguement. Most of them hold a grudge against some kind of corporation, and that's their main reason for joining. They're hoping to be able to bring corporate America to its knees by forcing the government to pass ridiculous new laws regarding the environment. Such as the Endangered Species Act, that was signed by that asshole Nixon. Penn & Teller did one of their famous BS! experiments on their Environmental Hysteria episode of Bullsh(yougetthepicture). They went to a hippie rally in Washington D.C. and started a petition to ban a chemical called Dihydrogenmonoxide or something like that. I don't remember the exact name they used, but the chemical was just water. What did they get? How many thousands of signatures? All because they gave water a complicated name, the hippies thought it was something bad. These guys that are flipping out about global warming, they have no friggin idea what they're talking about. If you want to save the environment, don't recycle and don't get all your information from your local newspaper or news station.

The Evil Thing

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 7:56 am

For the record, my stance on climate change is officially undecided but erring on the side of caution, but I enjoy playing Devil's advocate to an extent.

Watch as my retorts become steadily more sarcastic as Killa gets steadily more angry and aggressive.

I'm more worried about North Korea or Iran starting a nuclear war than I am about global warming. (Even you hippies have to agree. That is MUCH more important than a 5 degree temperature increase every year.)

So worry about that too To be honest, though, NK won't be nuking anybody because then everyone in the world (even China, probably) would openly condemn them. Ditto for Iran. Nuking people is pretty bad for your economy and continued government.

We're taught these things in school, on the news, etc. Usually the media or someone who doesn't really know what they're talking about. They try to tell us to recycle as much as possible...

Killa, I too have seen that episode of Penn and Teller. I ask only that you cite some kind of source other than some big guy with an overpowering urge to scream the F word every 10 seconds. You're pretty much summarising their show. As it happens, the Swedes agree to a certain extent.

I want uncontradicted, reliable, concrete proof.

The only scientific 'proofs' are purely mathematical and thus restricted to theoretical work. I guess you'll just have to go with reliable, peer-reviewed, thoroughly researched evidence. I'm not saying such evidence exists, mind, but that's what you'll have to look out for.

The trouble with this debate is the very nature of global warming. By the time it can be actually demonstrated to be happening, the process will be essentially irreversible (unless we come up with some very creative technology). That's the crux of the issue: can we afford to take a gamble and wait for evidence supporting or to the contrary.

Such as the Endangered Species Act

*Gasp* Surely not the same Endangered Species Act which is designed to protect animals from becoming extinct? You are right, it is the animals' job to die out, so that we have more room to expand and slap down more of those huge concrete monstrosities we insist on building.

Ok, fine, so they screwed up in it's execution, but I fail to see how their intentions were somehow wrong.

enn & Teller did one of their famous BS! experiments on their Environmental Hysteria episode of Bullsh(yougetthepicture). They went to a hippie rally in Washington D.C. and started a petition to ban a chemical called Dihydrogenmonoxide or something like that. I don't remember the exact name they used, but the chemical was just water. What did they get? How many thousands of signatures? All because they gave water a complicated name, the hippies thought it was something bad. These guys that are flipping out about global warming, they have no friggin idea what they're talking about.

Ok, now that is a load of BS. Are you trying to tell me they went up to random people at a 'hippie' rally and said "Will you sign a petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide?" and left it at that? Would you sign a petition to ban dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane if someone just randomly asked you that in the street? Or what if you were attending an environmental protection rally where as far as you were concerned they had the same idea as you. (After all, not just hippies attend environmental protection rallies).

Why are you so determined to deride people like that? These 'hippies' (for whom your contempt is thinly veiled) are getting up off asses to stand up for what they believe in. What they believe in happens to be protection of the environment and the planet in general. I fail to see what is so wrong with their intentions, even if they are misguided in their methods, yet you portray them as willfully ignorant extreme left wingers.

don't get all your information from your local newspaper or news station.

No, get it from an entertainment television show brought to you by Rupert "Let's install Bush as President" Murdoch that prides itself on bias, ad hominem attacks and misrepresenting information (and people). And don't even think about picking up one of those dreadful scientific journals. Seriously, I can't believe what I'm reading.

Killa, I can't tell if you wrote your post ironically or if you are genuinely furious about the situation but it hardly seems calm and collected.

Accushot

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 3:02 pm

@TET
Apologies for raising the tone, but I assure you I can bring it crashing down again if required.

I haven't read very much Crichton, mainly because I find his books a little too melodramatic and deliberately contentious, and I certainly haven't read any of his stuff on climate change. Besides, quoting facts out of a work of fiction - even one based on fact - doesn't really lend any credibility to an argument. Right Killa?

You're absolutely right about cutting carbon emissions though. Not to combat "global warming" (Note the intentional quotation marks...) but to preserve our environment, particularly as you say the marine environment. Acidification is a real issue and if we want to preserve the aquatic life as we know it we need to do something about it. Whether or not we should do anything about it is another very interesting debate completely, but perhaps worthy of another thread to keep this one on topic.

@FF
Alternative fuel is another important issue, with or without the added incentive of "global warming". We're going to run out sooner rather than later, and right now the only feasible solution on the horizon appears to be nuclear power. There are of course the agenda-laden politicians and activists who argue that we should be building giant wind farms to generate power (just not near them), but that's impractical in the extreme. As well as the huge number that would be needed, wind power is very unpredictable and today's aging power grid is incapable of withstanding the fluctuations it would bring.

There was a very interesting article in New Scientist a few weeks ago about a hydrogen-cooled "super grid" to replace the current power grid in the US. Obviously this would be a project on a mammoth scale, predicted at well over one trillion US dollars, but the benefits would be huge. The new cables would be dual-lines carrying electricity and liquid hydrogen; as well as providing a way to transport H-fuel around the country the supercooled hydrogen would act as a nationwide heatsink and reduce the energy leakage to almost nothing. Consider that currently only around 50% of the energy from power stations reaches your home and, without building a single new power station, you've got twice as much power available.

You're right about the planet looking after itself as well. Suggesting that human beings could destroy the planet is absolutely absurd; we could certianly destroy ourselves and those around us, but we've demonstrated our proficiency at that time and time again anyway.

@Killa
I'm more worried about North Korea or Iran starting a nuclear war than I am about global warming. (Even you hippies have to agree. That is MUCH more important than a 5 degree temperature increase every year.)

I assume your use of "hippies" there was intended as a derogatory term for those people who care about the environment. Misguided or not they're doing more about it than you are.

And I wouldn't say that everyone "has" to agree. I certainly wouldn't. I'd be far more terrified of an annual 5 degree temperature hike than any number of rogue countries with nuclear arsenals. You can always revert to standard US foreign policy when it comes to North Korea and bomb the sh!t out of them (sorry...), but at 5 degrees a year the entire human race would be wiped out without question within the decade, probably far sooner.

H.Q. Victor

Post Thu Aug 10, 2006 4:44 pm

I have heard so much over the years, that Freon, refigeration gas, does so much damage, yet there is a greater vandle to the air than all the freon leaked to date.
Chlorofluorocarbons
Organic compounds made up of atoms of carbon, chlorine, and fluorine. An example is CFC-12 (CCl2F2, used as a refrigerant in refrigerators and air conditioners and as a foam blowing agent. Gaseous CFCs can deplete the ozone layer when they slowly rise into the stratosphere, are broken down by strong ultraviolet radiation, release chlorine atoms, and then react with ozone molecules.



Volcanoes
Volcanoes

Atmospheric pollution from major volcanic eruptions can influence the global climate over one to two years. Explosive volcanic eruptions can inject large quantities of dust and sulphur dioxide, in gaseous form, to an altitude of over 10 miles into the atmosphere (the stratosphere), where the sulphur dioxide is rapidly converted into secondary sulphuric acid aerosols. Whereas volcanic pollution from smaller eruptions, ejected only a few miles into the atmosphere, is removed within days by rain, the volcanic dust and aerosols in the stratosphere may remain for up to two years, gradually spreading over much of the globe by winds.

Volcanic pollution results in a 5 to 10% reduction in direct sunlight, largely through scattering as a result of the highly reflective sulphuric acid aerosols. Large eruptions, such as the Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines which occurred in 1991, can bring about a short but noticeable global cooling of up to 0.3°C.

It is possible the longer term changes in the amount of volcanic activity on the Earth may explain incidences of longer term climate change during Earth History. 66 million years ago, at about the same time as the extinction of the dinosaurs, massive amounts of lava were being erupted on the Indian sub-continent, at that time drifting North towards Asia, having separated from Australia and Antarctica. These immense lava flows, now known as the Deccan Traps, released huge quantities of gases, including sulphur dioxide and carbon dioxide. Theories concerning the climatic impact of such emissions vary. Some suggest that an initial severe global cooling may have occurred as result of a reduction in the amount of incoming sunlight, scattered and reflected by the secondary sulphuric acid aerosols. Others suggest that the extra volumes of carbon dioxide enhanced the Earth's greenhouse effect, causing a longer term global warming. Whatever the climatic effects were due to, it is likely that they were responsible for the mass extinction of living species that occurred at this time, including not just the death of the dinosaurs, but many other living organisms on land and in the oceans.
Referancece point

I for one, do not belive we will win the war on greenhouse gases. Even here in the US, the work on more effectian cars, yes you reduce gases say 25%, yet increase the number of cars by that amount or more, you gain nothing. Civilization is gowing too fast. Too many big cities crowding more people in, more creators of the CO2 gases, we make our on problems, in the name of progress. I say, let the gases go, eventually, man will be reduced to basic terms, lose thier progress and tech, and have to retune to basic way of living.

Edited by - Finalday on 8/10/2006 5:47:56 PM

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