American debt is like that.
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Article: Climate change- What the experts say
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American debt is like that.
Y'know, it's funny. You won't accept that 200+ years of industrialisation may have affected global temperatures, but you're perfectly happy to believe that one man's killing spree could affect global CO2 levels.
What's the difference between the two? Ah - reversing the effects of global warming would require cleanup operations and innovations in industry which will hit your wallet!
I don't know what to say, dude. Cleaning up after yourself does cost money. But that's not a good enough reason to object to cleaning up after yourself.
Nor does the science! (if it can be called one) .. its based on extrapolated fudge values that are created to suit a purpose
You clearly have never looked at the data.
Yeah, that pretty much sums it up. Its the usual crowd. They denied evolution and now they are denying anthropogenic climate change. Whats worse, is these denialists are too stupid to realize that theyre wrong.
Humanities dredges really try bring the rest of us down to their level
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Ekstasis
Honorary Master
Don't really get the point you're trying to make. I'm not denying anthropogenic climate change plus I'm a Creationist - so what?
Wrong. I'm just saying you and no scientist has demonstrated the degree of the effects on warming - they have stats that support their theory, but again unless you can compare it to stats demonstrating the conditions in man's absence, you cannot demonstrate the degree of mankinds effect. That's logic and common sense.
A - B = The degree to which A exceeds B.
Temperature A (Man's influence included) - Temperature B (Excl. our influence) = Demonstrates the degree of man's influence.
You have temperature A, that is what we measure now. You do not have temperature B as it is not possible to measure. It is just a guess/estimate, thus you cannot demonstrate with certainty the degree of man's influence. But you are using the idea that mankind has an ENOURMOUS influence (Which is not demonstrable) to justify all these so called "solutions".
The fact that something so SIMPLE is not understood is baffling.
Any half-wit knows we impact our environment. The degree to which we do is not proven.
The other point I made was the short-sightedness in the solutions presented thus far. For example...
The degree as to which acts harm the environment has not been demonstrated.
The point I quite clearly made, is that maybe industrialising a piece of land and making it more productive, is MORE benficial than NOT industrialising and utilising the land without said industrialistion.
So the current "solution" to simply prevent industrialisation, might contribute more to the problem.
I.E. If you have a choice between using land that has an area of X for farming, industrialising it with modern machines and making it extremely productive, and a choice between using land that has an area of 10x and not industrilising it, no machines, just simple labour (Like the ye old days), the solution presented by people like you (Not specifially but you understand), is to choose the latter.
However the latter choice may do more harm than good. What has been done to measure the effects of both choices and compare the 2? The third option would of course be to do nothing, but since in this case its food, that potentially means starving people.
So which choice do you make, A, B or C.
As for correcting wrong-doing.
You have to justify what I did wrong before you can punish me for it. If people made mistakes in the past, it is not right to punish future generations. Fault has to be demonstrated before punishment is meted out. I see no difference in principle between what you want done, and if say your father killed someone, got away with it, eventually died and then the authorities decided to put you in jail. Yes, there is a case for justice, but punishing you? Come on.
That is one of the reasons I have a problem with limiting the growth of 3rd world countries via carbon taxing. I understand perfectly that in the future they may become big industrialised players. But right now, the 1st world nations have benefitted from industrialisation and raised standards of living previous generations couldn't even dream about. Now we are trying to justify why other people aren't allowed this same privilage.
That is not right. In fact for the quasi socialists around here, it is downright hypocracy. I also cannot see how returning humanity to pre-industrialised standards is of benefit to humanity overall.
One of the big issues around climate change is specifically the effect of burning fossil fuels... however there is a "natural" solution that helps to discourage burning of fossil fuels. Ironically if the state/legislation didn't get involved, the solution would happen a lot quicker. Remember fossil fuels are limited, the more we use, the less there is. Demand won't change. Prices rise, meaning if you can find an alternative you make money. So for environmentalists, when the oil price rises, and the sheiks get richer, you should be cheering. The more this happens, the more incentive there is for people to find alternatives. Trying to limit fossil fuel use now, actually lowers the incentive for natural investment into alternatives (Since there is less supply constraints).
This is one of the reasons the state then has to get involved again. It realises the mistake it made to discourage investment in alternatives, so now it has to intervene even more to correct its mistake by providing other incentives to people to provide "green" solutions. Such as less taxes if you are a company providing "green" alternatives (So you get richer). Making loans cheaper for "green" startups, and cheap loans below the natural or market interest rate result in bubbles (Like the Dotcom and housing bubble).
Which creates even more problems.... do you see why I see what is being proposed as short-sighted, illogical and can potentially do a lot of harm.
It is basic economy understanding such as this which is overlooked. The issue and solution is extremely complex, far more complex than, "Blah you fuel guzzling industrialist plant destroying bastardo!" would suggest.
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Well, there are temperature records we can generate which go back thousands of years. They show gradual changes in temperature, except over the past century or so where suddenly temperature started increasing exponentially.
We also have records of estimated number of humans on the planet. Between 1900 and 2000 we went from 1 billion people to 7 billion people.
We know that technology used by humans create heat and toxic emissions which affect the environment and the climate.
Put those three things together and you have exponentially increasing temperatures caused by exponentially increasing numbers of people using exponentially more forms of technology.
Long story short, Yes, Wildcat, the current rise in global temperatures is attributable to mankind.
What you are doing is 1) trying to cast doubt on human influence in global temperatures and 2) criticising proposals to limit that influence because they involve that dreaded word 'tax'. It's kind of predictable and not very interesting, so I think I'll just say the word 'tax' a few more times until you end up in a frightened, quivering heap hiding under the bed. ;-)
TAX! TAX! TAX!
(Don't worry: I get just as scared by the idea of wealthy corporations bribing politicians not to enforce environmental laws. So I understand your fear at least, if not its source.)
Lightscribe
Banned
I read a book, cannot remember the name, but was about the way the El Niño and La Niña, has caused chaos on earth throughout history. Amazing how many countries resorted to cannibalism.
Lightscribe
Banned
Lol, doesn't change the fact you have no actual point of reference. You only have historical records and your best guess going forwards.
And no it aint taxes, its almost everything you are trying to do from restricting certain kinds of investment to incentivising others. From trying to prevent many people all of the world from enjoying the benefits of the 1st world industrialised nations, to transfering wealth from person A to person B.
Laws of economics doesn't change because you think they should due to the nature of the situation. Nor does ethics my man.
The fact you have to go back to attacking an anti-tax only shows the lack of an intelligent response to the valid points I raised.
"Tax tax tax", sounds a lot like I imagine those religious nutters back in the day sounded when someone disagreed that the earth was not the centre of the univers "Heretic, heretic heretic!" as if repeating the term long enough would somehow get people to go against the "heretic".
All I am saying is, we have to be absolutely sure that you are 100% correct and man's exact effect, before taking any drastic measures, the kind you feel entitled to force on everyone through legislation.
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If that's all you're saying, then let's concentrate on that. How would we prove this with 100% certainty?
Quite simply, we would do it like this. We would observe two sister planets in identical situations to ours; one with sapient animals and one without. We would observe relative CO2 levels, relative temperatures, and relative long-term effects on the environment. We would be able to do this because we would be able to fast-forward time on the sister planets to see what was happening at any point in their entire 10 billion+ year lifetimes.
Obviously, you can't do that in reality. So you use scientific processes instead. We create a model of our world using as much information about it as we can gather. That information is the data, or 'statistics' that you are so wary of. We can then simulate different situations on the model, and depending on how accurate the model is, we'll get an indication of what might happen in the real world.
This is the process which has created virtually every single thing we as humans have built or discovered since even before the scientific method was defined. You could say it's a tried and tested model.
And it's the process that is used by the scientists quoted in this article. Because our model is only as accurate as the information we can gather about real situations, we can't trust that the projections we get from our model are entirely accurate. As you will note, the scientists make this completely clear. "We cannot say that with any certainty", they say. They're not giving you gospel. They are merely saying that some received information is implying a certain outcome.
It's maybe worth investigating what the effect on the global economy would be of that outcome. It may make you consider dropping your price for accuracy to 95% or so instead...
At the moment, it's impossible to prove even that global warming is responsible for current changes in weather patterns - let alone prove it could cause long term negative effects. But never in all the time that we have been able to observe have temperatures risen this fast this rapidly. It could be completely normal. It could be one of those hiccoughs that just happens every hundred thousand years or so, and we just haven't been able to look that far back yet.
But dude, when something starts changing so much so fast, that's usually cause for concern. The scientific process predicts trouble if it isn't effectively addressed. That's the scientific process which has driven every bit of human development and got us where we are today and hopefully where we'll be tomorrow. It seems disingenuous to suddenly want the unobtainable 100% rock-solid irrefutable indisputable unquestionable assurances of accuracy now.
Point is, we do have the skills and intelligence and faculties to create solutions to this global warming problem. They need to be developed. As is evidenced by the complete and utter disregard many people have to the pursuit of these developments, it is sometimes necessary to use legislation to protect and champion those pursuits. The strength of the legislation should ideally be proportional to the proposed losses that retarding those pursuits could cause: be they anything from the loss of the solar-powered car to irreversible climate change.
Sorry, buddy. If people were 100% perfect then sure - we wouldn't need any laws and legislations. But then, I don't think we'd be people any more either.
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Pitbull
Verboten
Don't you just love it when "experts" have data to their disposal, they look at 1 certain part of it just to prove their agenda but then leave out all the relevent data :wtf:
Pls look at the Greenland ice core data project.
It has data for the last 65 million years of temps. Earth is actually in a cold cycle heading towards the next 10 000 Ice age. Do you guys know what will happen if earth was to reach an Ice Age again? The human diet contains about 80% of grown crops. This would be impossible if we have an Ice age. So take 80% of the world population and remove them. Then you sit with 20%. Out of that 20% prob about 10% will die because of the cold, illness and so on. Throw in a few other things and you can say with ease that 95% of the global population will not make it through an Ice Age.
Anyway, read the data and decide for yourselves.
Pls look at the Greenland ice core data project.
It has data for the last 65 million years of temps. Earth is actually in a cold cycle heading towards the next 10 000 Ice age. Do you guys know what will happen if earth was to reach an Ice Age again? The human diet contains about 80% of grown crops. This would be impossible if we have an Ice age. So take 80% of the world population and remove them. Then you sit with 20%. Out of that 20% prob about 10% will die because of the cold, illness and so on. Throw in a few other things and you can say with ease that 95% of the global population will not make it through an Ice Age.
Anyway, read the data and decide for yourselves.
"War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. Oh, and Pollution is Good for You."
;-)
I agree that that is our best bet, but remember the solutions are, well taxation and forced legilsation, I feel they are unethical in principle by themselves, and when you justify them based on "our best guess based on all data we have obtained", I am very hesistant to say that is ok.
Let me put it another way, do you think it is ok to send someone to jail for a crime you are 90% sure they are committed?
I don't.
I feel in priciple we have an effect on the planet. As to the exact degree and results of that effect, long-term, lets say 20 years, 50 years, 400 years, etc. I am unsure.
The solutions proposed are fairly drastic, and it seems the more drastic the better. Without greater assurance I feel the measure should be less drastic. As we are more sure of the outcome, we can introduce more solutions, hopefully some which take a lot more thought into account than now.
Unfortunately I feel the law should be neutral and should NEVER promote interests that benifit person A over person B. Although the problem we have in economics is generally called the tragedy of the commons.
Tradedy of the commons results when there is a lack of property rights and property boundaries. You see if I am able to isoleate my house my property and the air around it (Think a giant perspect bubble) and all air/climate had this, then if one person pollutes the air, it would only be their air and thus their problem, the minute their pollution goes into someone else's air they have the coourts to sort out basic destruction of property.
This is also the reason why we have diminishing fish etc. in the sea.
No owners, therefor it is no ones problem, but becomes everyone's problem regardless if they polluted or not.
In principle I am sure you agree that punishing person A if they have not done something wrong, is unethical.
In the context of AGW, which is the long-term destruction of the human race, it becomes far more emotional and complex.
And I don't think it is possible to overcome the problem of the tragedy of the commons...which leaves legislation. But in principle I am still against this.
This is why I am demanding greater accuracy, and when the data used as reference is our "best" guess based on previous models, it could be off or wrong, we would be making decisions based on information that is possibly wrong.
I don't think we should be taking drastic measures when there is uncertainty involved.
And I certainly don't appreciated being insulted when I want to stop and ask more questions and demand more, before literally putting a ball and chain on human development.
I want to ask a seperate question.
A big thing about global warming is the role of CO2 in warming. In the past, using historic data, the initial increase in temperature preceeded the increase in CO2. I'm sure you have heard of the skeptic CO2 lag argument.
Now I think I understand this, but it again, even if AGW is correct, leads me to question the proposed solutions.
The fact that CO2 initially lags temperature is explained in this way. Water/Ice holds more CO2 in it than regular air. You warm water and ice, it evapourates and you get more CO2. CO2 then has a warming effect, which resultings in more melting/evapourating, which releases more CO2 etc.
So in the end result you have a positive feedback loop, more CO2 = more warming = more CO2 = more warming etc. In other wards, if some event such as the sun increases in temperate or you get massive volcanoes or something happens that triggers a great enough rise in temperature, leads to the initial release of CO2 in the atmosphere which then starts the feedback loop.
So in nature, you have something that happens that increase temperature, which starts the feedback loop. So this explains the lag of CO2 in historic data.
AGW says that we, manking are the triggering event. We released CO2, which leads to warming, which leads to more CO2 etc.
Now my question is this, if we have indeed started this feedback loop now, then no matter what we do, CO2 will increase and global temperature will increase. You could kill ALL humans and all oour machines and plants today, the fact the feedback loop has already started, means we have CO2 = warming = CO2 = warming etc. I don't know exactly how long the last CO2 cycle lasted but I am guessing a couple to a few hundred years.
Now if the theory of the feedback loop explaining past lag of CO2 is correct, then none of the solutions we implement will prevent increasing CO2 and warming from occuring naturally, it will steadily increas regardless of what we do. Of course if we increase emmisions ourselves (Which is what we do best) then it will possible result in a longer period of warming, instead of 200 years, perhaps 400 or 800 years etc or whatver the case may be.
The point is if the feedback cycle has started we can't change the next how ever many years of warming no matter what we do.
For me the best solution is to basically help nature do its thing. More CO2 means more plants, which absorb and convert CO2 to oxygen. This is how nature does it, long-term and I mean long term, generations and generations into the future, it will be plants that reduce CO2 levels. If we want more land devoted to plants and plant life, and still maintain our current lifestyles, we will need to increase the productivity of land in smarter ways. More advanced machines wherever possible to produce as much from smaller pieces of industrialised property.
Of course this means we need to encourage growth in "industrialisation" to make us more productive with less space. Generally the best way to do this, is the free market. No government can plan an economy. It is just far too complex, it doesn't matter what you do unfortunately.
Its a bit of a catch 22 situation.
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If it were me in charge, what I would do is not increase taxes or put more burderns on people, I would try change the way people think and use what I have in better ways. E.G Nuclear plants produce more power and long-term I believe require FAR less resources than coal plants.
So we INCREASE productivity, by using less space (Less coal mines) and better tech (Of course in SA we don't have the necessary skills. I would take away Eskoms monopoly on power, and will allow any company to produce power and sell it to the grid and to consumers (Including the average joe). The average guy won't have a coal plant on his property. But if you allow him the oppertunity to sell excess back to the grid and make money, you might see a lot of people using simple methane and solar and other kinds or green energy and selling the excess whenever they can. This helps.
Unfortunately current legislation does NOT allow for someone to sell excess electricity they may have BACK to the grid.
I know I am baised against government in any case and encourage people not to look at the state for solutions, but in this specific case with Eskom I am right. Government power and legislation enforcing Eskom's monopoly is PART OF THE PROBLEM.
When that is the case, I don't think we should be looking to the state for the solution.
Hell, once you have many massive nuclear plants, you can use sea water to make hydrogen fuel and start sticking that into our petrol pumps instread of petrol. But it defeats the point to use coal to do this. Pebble-bed was unproven tech and a waste of tax money, just get the South Koreans in to help built us some damn plants and train some people for petes sakes.
What you need to give people is more options. The free market, even if you are a socialist gives us more options. Then it is up to us to encourage people to use the more green options.
If you are a greeny as such, the abundance of coal in SA is a problem as it makes Coal power cheap and affordable, I still believe that we should be building lots of nuclear plants in principle. And greanpest (or greanpeace if u must) can get lost on that issue.
But thats me.
So we INCREASE productivity, by using less space (Less coal mines) and better tech (Of course in SA we don't have the necessary skills. I would take away Eskoms monopoly on power, and will allow any company to produce power and sell it to the grid and to consumers (Including the average joe). The average guy won't have a coal plant on his property. But if you allow him the oppertunity to sell excess back to the grid and make money, you might see a lot of people using simple methane and solar and other kinds or green energy and selling the excess whenever they can. This helps.
Unfortunately current legislation does NOT allow for someone to sell excess electricity they may have BACK to the grid.
I know I am baised against government in any case and encourage people not to look at the state for solutions, but in this specific case with Eskom I am right. Government power and legislation enforcing Eskom's monopoly is PART OF THE PROBLEM.
When that is the case, I don't think we should be looking to the state for the solution.
Hell, once you have many massive nuclear plants, you can use sea water to make hydrogen fuel and start sticking that into our petrol pumps instread of petrol. But it defeats the point to use coal to do this. Pebble-bed was unproven tech and a waste of tax money, just get the South Koreans in to help built us some damn plants and train some people for petes sakes.
What you need to give people is more options. The free market, even if you are a socialist gives us more options. Then it is up to us to encourage people to use the more green options.
If you are a greeny as such, the abundance of coal in SA is a problem as it makes Coal power cheap and affordable, I still believe that we should be building lots of nuclear plants in principle. And greanpest (or greanpeace if u must) can get lost on that issue.
But thats me.
Ronjay
Expert Member
This I agree with but Nuclear has it's own concerns. But if many people do have alternate power sources that can provide excess power that can be fed into the grid and these people can earn a little from it, well it would be encouraging to others to also do the same. It would work, especially if there is a Govt campaign to encourage it. If the ordinary man on the street is a power supplier, then less power stations would have to be built in the long run. Of course, the average Joe would not produce much excess but a few million average Joe's can make quite a dent in a power requirement for a country, I think. The biggest problem with this though is the cost of alternate power systems like solar, these are quite expensive (I know because I was looking into this for myself and, well, it's a little restrictive). However, if costs could be augmented through subsidies, then it could become worthwhile for people to do this. Win, win for the man on the street and government.
My main concern would be your idea of Nuclear. Nuclear as you say uses less resources, but the problem is waist materials. Anyway, it is a little better then coal at least.
You are right, states reliance on state controlled service providers is an outdated idea. Semi-private means vested interest from government which curbs expansion and development. Look at the Eskom fiasco.
Unfortunately, our govt doesn't think Green, it thinks blue (R100 notes) and so the idea of people generating power for the grid wont happen. Taxing people generates pilfer-able money for corrupt govt officials so be sure this will always be the way govt will go. I don't think govt really cares about the problem of environmental impact, none of them do.
You know very little about the reality of modern nuclear power.
"Compared to coal and hydroelectric dams, nuclear power is the safest and cleanest way, from an environmental standpoint, to produce electricity. And the fuel it uses, uranium, is more abundant than fossil fuels (or rivers left to be dammed).
Compared to nuclear power, coal is a much less safe source of energy. In addition to the pollutants and carcinogens coal delivers into the atmosphere when burned, 100 coal miners are killed each year in the U.S. in coal mine accidents and another 100 die transporting it. Per amount of electricity produced, hydropower causes 110 fold, coal, 45 fold, and natural gas, 10 fold more deaths than nuclear power. As Petr Beckmann, founding editor of Access to Energy, shows in his book The Health Hazards of Not Going Nuclear, nuclear power is the safest source of energy in all aspects, not excluding terrorism and sabotage, major accidents, and waste disposal.
From an environmental standpoint, nuclear power is far superior to coal or hydropower.
Nuclear energy (that uranium 235 and uranium 238-derived plutonium produce) emits no harmful gases or toxic metals into the environment. And, unlike hydroelectric dams, it does not alter a region's ecosystem. Furthermore, despite what activists and the media say, the wastes nuclear power create are far less of a problem than those produced by coal, or the silt that builds up behind dams. One pound of uranium produces 20,000 times more energy than one pound of coal. A nuclear power plant generates (high-level) radioactive wastes the size of one aspirin tablet per person per year (a plant's yearly wastes fit comfortably under a dining room table). Coal-fired plants generate 320 lbs. of ash and other poisons per person per year, of which 10 percent is spewed into the atmosphere. Disposal personnel encapsulate nuclear waste in (fireproof, water-proof, and earthquake-proof) boron-silicate glass or ceramic and then bury these now effectively non-radioactive artificial rocks. In the U.S., these "rocks" will (in 2010) be buried deep in extremely arid ground in a remote part of Nevada, in a repository at Yucca Mountain (where nuclear weapons tests were once conducted). The chance that this encapsulated waste will ever harm anyone is virtually zero (especially given that the linear no-threshold hypothesis now disproved). Waste disposal is not a disadvantage of nuclear power; it is one of its advantages.
Yet another advantage of nuclear power is the relative abundance of its fuel, as this illustration, put together by Petr Beckmann, shows. Uranium is the heaviest of all naturally occurring elements and is present in most of the earth's crust. There is enough uranium 235 (box C), the fuel for current-day U.S. nuclear reactors, to keep them operating through most of this century. But uranium 238 (99 percent of natural uranium), fuels breeder reactors. Breeder reactors turn uranium-238 into plutonium. As Bernard Cohen points out in his book, The Nuclear Energy Option (in Chapter 13, which is available online), the supply of uranium 238 on the planet to run breeder reactors will last thousands of years.
What about solar power and windmills as an alternative source of energy? California is the leader in developing solar power. Its Solar Two Plant in the Mojave Desert has a peak output of 10 megawatts. In order to produce as much energy as a 1,000-megawatt nuclear reactor, its mirrors would have to occupy 127 square miles of land. The Solar Electric Generating System in Kramer Junction, CA has a higher output — 100 megawatts. This system currently generates 90 percent of the world's direct solar electricity. (It has rows of mirror-like shiny surfaces that focus sunlight onto tubes filled with therminol fluid running along the top of the array, which turns water into steam to power the turbines.) Its mirrors have to be washed every five to ten days to maintain a reasonable (70 percent) optical efficiency. It requires 33 square miles of mirrors for this system to produce as much electricity as one nuclear power plants. Also, solar plants require substantial government subsidies and tax credits to make the electricity they produce economically feasible.
The Nine Canyon Wind Project in my state completed its Phase II expansion last year, adding 12 new wind turbines to the previously existing 37. With the wind blowing hard, they have a peak output of 64 megawatts. Based on the average wind speed there it would take 50,000 wind turbines of this size, in a 300 square mile area, to generate the same amount of electricity one nuclear power plant produces. (If they were made to the height of a 20-story building, it would take only 1,000 windmills to produce that amount of power.)
Windmills kill a lot of birds. They act as bait and executioner for birds because rodent populations multiply rapidly at their base, and the birds get killed trying to get at them. The windmills on Altamont Pass east of San Francisco, for example, kill eight times as many bald eagles each year as those that died in the one-time Valdez oil spill in Alaska. This is also a problem with solar energy. Bird deaths per megawatt of electricity generated by solar plants are higher than at Altamont Pass, a result of their flying into its mirror-like surfaces. Despite the enthusiasm politicians and the media exhibit for solar and wind power, these sources of energy, compared with nuclear power, produce tiny amounts electricity; and they harm the environment. They cannot replace fossil fuels, or nuclear power."
http://www.lewrockwell.com/miller/miller13.html
Ronjay
Expert Member
Did you not read that I said it's better then coal. It still is not a wholly clean energy source.