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Your thoughts on Global Warming . . . (pg. 6)
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| Lilith |
| 30% of the great barrier reef is bleached and dead apparently due to changes in the climate, not an insubstantial amount of coral there either. |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| quote: | Originally posted by Arbiter
I really don't believe things will get so bad that we will not be able to cope with them. I mean, even at the rate that greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere have gone up in the last hundred years, we'd have to continue the trend for several more centuries to begin to get them up to the level that they have been in the distant past (by which point we'll be seriously hurting for fuels to burn to produce more CO2), and there's no evidence of global temperatures being so high during those periods that it would be a significant detriment to our ability to survive. |
i think your narrow focus on the human race in this context to be a pretty major fault in your normally logical framework. surely the protection of the world's bio-diversity is an end in itself, and as such we owe the other species on this planet a duty of care?
| quote: | Originally posted by Arbiter
The biggest problems would be rising sea levels and likely some dramatic changes in regional weather patterns... but I think those are things we ought to be able to adapt to. And personally, I think we as a people would benefit from having to face a little more adversity, so I don't see it as entirely negative.
I guess it's hard for me to answer because it's so speculative when it comes to how to balance the detriments of the problem itself against the benefits we stand to gain from the process of learning to deal with it. I mean, on the surface a lot of people would say it's good not to have any problems and for everything in your life to always go smoothly... but at the same time, it is by dealing with problems and adversity that we grow as individuals - and as a society as well. |
i think the slow destruction of life on this planet is hardly a speculative problem, nor are the so-called gains anything to speak of when compared to all those species that cannot learn to adapt. it is a far better idea to learn how to prevent more global warming than it is to learn to live with it. |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| Some respected scientists do disagree with global warming theories, Freeman Dyson being one of them. |
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| DarkAngel |
| quote: | Originally posted by Clovis
off. Thats not something you with. |
I write the rules. |
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| Nrg2Nfinit |
| quote: | Originally posted by dallastar
:rolleyes: I wouldn't expect any other answer from you, seriously!:rolleyes: |
sorry im just speakign the truth.. what are you going to do hang me :p |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| quote: | Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles
Some respected scientists do disagree with global warming theories, Freeman Dyson being one of them. |
who is known for
| quote: |
is an English-born physicist and mathematician, famous for his work in quantum mechanics, nuclear weapons design and policy, and for his serious theorizing in futurism and science fiction concepts, including the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. He is a lifelong opponent of nationalism, and proponent of nuclear disarmament and international cooperation. Prof. Dyson is a member of the Board of Sponsors of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.[1]. |
not environmental sciences.
he disagrees with the scientific models, NOT with global warming per se
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The good news is that we are at last putting serious effort and money into local observations. Local observations are laborious and slow, but they are essential if we are ever to have an accurate picture of climate. The bad news is that the climate models on which so much effort is expended are unreliable because they still use fudge-factors rather than physics to represent important things like evaporation and convection, clouds and rainfall. Besides the general prevalence of fudge-factors, the latest and biggest climate models have other defects that make them unreliable. With one exception, they do not predict the existence of El Niño. Since El Niño is a major feature of the observed climate, any model that fails to predict it is clearly deficient. The bad news does not mean that climate models are worthless. They are, as Manabe said thirty years ago, essential tools for understanding climate. They are not yet adequate tools for predicting climate.[13] ”
While he acknowledges the reality of climate change due to anthropogenic causes, such as the burning of fossil fuels, he regards the term "global warming" as a mis-nomer |
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| Arbiter |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
i think your narrow focus on the human race in this context to be a pretty major fault in your normally logical framework. surely the protection of the world's bio-diversity is an end in itself, and as such we owe the other species on this planet a duty of care?
i think the slow destruction of life on this planet is hardly a speculative problem, nor are the so-called gains anything to speak of when compared to all those species that cannot learn to adapt. it is a far better idea to learn how to prevent more global warming than it is to learn to live with it. |
Am I to assume then that you think climate change will necessarily lead to a decrease in biodiversity? That hardly seems a certainty. Natural climate shifts have occurred many times in the history of the planet and while they have resulted in extinctions they have also resulted in further speciation as various species adapt to new conditions. Overall biodiversity has, as far as we can tell, increased over time not only in spite of but in many cases because of changing conditions - climatic and otherwise.
It's difficult to project how biodiversity will respond to climate change, but global warming seems to me to offer a net benefit - climatic regions which tend to give rise to the highest biodiversity (tropical regions) will expand, while those regions that tend to give rise to the least biodiversity (boreal and polar regions) will occupy a smaller section of the Earth's surface. I would speculate a short term decrease in biodiversity followed by a greater increase is the most probable outcome. Most (all) of the research I've read suggesting that biodiversity would be adversely affected by climate change focused only on the immediate impact, which is an inherently biased measure of the complete effects of climate change on biodiversity, so I don't find it credible personally. |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
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I know what Dyson is known for, thank you, and that he does not disagree that the world is warming. Does anyone at all still disagree with that?
He disagrees with the models being used to predict climate, and therefore thinks that the dire predictions that get trotted out are not very reliable. |
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| dallastar |
| quote: | Originally posted by Nrg2Nfinit
sorry im just speakign the truth.. what are you going to do hang me :p |
nope,:p
p.s. Anyone here know when Nostradamus said that the world would end? did he even ever say that? He was pretty precise with the falling of the twin towers! |
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| chach |
| quote: | Originally posted by dallastar
nope,:p
p.s. Anyone here know when Nostradamus said that the world would end? did he even ever say that? He was pretty precise with the falling of the twin towers! |
:stongue: |
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
| quote: | Originally posted by dallastar
nope,:p
p.s. Anyone here know when Nostradamus said that the world would end? did he even ever say that? He was pretty precise with the falling of the twin towers! |
Nostradamus never predicted anything correctly. |
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| dallastar |
| quote: | Originally posted by chach
:stongue: |
glad to amuse you! carry on. . . . |
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