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Global warming.. are we really causing it? (pg. 3)
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| Domesticated |
| quote: | Originally posted by Arbiter
I can also tell you that the funny thing about fossil fuels is that they really are "fossil" fuels: all that nasty carbon we're putting into the atmosphere had to come from the atmosphere in the first place |
Not really. While everything 'came' from the atmosphere in the first place, the fossil fuels we burn now are the biological remains of other organisms, who were about 20% carbon when they were alive. The carbon we're releasing now was trapped in their bodies, not present in the atmosphere. |
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| Lira |
| quote: | Originally posted by jennypie
I noticed you say "moreover" a lot. |
She likes more and more, over and over. |
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| The17sss |
Haha nah man I'm not phased by that... it's a straw man argument. Nobody, especially this conservative, is against energy conservation or for raping/throwing away the natural world. We clean up our messes better than anybody.
Andrew Sullivan is to journalism as Eric Roberts is to acting. |
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| Nrg2Nfinit |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lebezniatnikov
edit: the question was "Do you believe man-made causes contribute to global warming?" |
Maybe i should rephrase the thread title.
The question is not whether or not we contribute towards it ( i think the evidence states that more carbon in the atmosphere creates a warmer climate).
We are now sitting at 384 ppm co2 in the atmosphere. our pre industrial level is only around 300ppm. We can also look at the jurassic period and see that the carbon dioxide levels then were 1900 ppm!. (also note that oxygen levels were 30 % higher at this time too) but this is during a time where land organisms were large and warm blooded (not lethargic and sluggish) and lived lavishly.
During the cambrian explosion (the period where life diversified and flourished the most significantly in all time) oxygen levels were only 17% of the current period and carbon dioxide levels were 4500 ppm.
So the issue that a warmer climate will extinguish life is nonsense. although a drastic climate change will definatley cause current organism extinction, warmer climate change correlates with a flood of biodiversity, floral and faunal change.
Sources are wikipedia and references breifly checked. |
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| netroM |
:thepirate |
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| R!CH |
| quote: | Originally posted by Arbiter
all that nasty carbon we're putting into the atmosphere had to come from the atmosphere in the first place; and, moreover, it had to have been there at a time when life thrived on our planet--the plant life whose remains formed the fossil fuels we now burn, at the very least. |
much of that carbon was vented over the eons from the under the crust through volcanos and slowly trapped in the chemical bonds that form all of life first through photosynthesis and then the carbon cycle. a small fraction of it ever exists freely in the atmosphere at any time.
you are falsely attributing the high levels of carbon with ideal life conditions. by prehistoric standards, sure high levels of atmospheric carbon benefited early plants and allowed early terrestrial life to take hold. it did so until there was an abundance of plant carbohydrates for early herbivores to flourish on and continued to provide a cool, shady, moist environment for early mammals and amphibians to incubate in. obviously the species that arose in that time were adapted to the environment. but adaptation occurs slowly, in small increments over dozens to hundreds of generations.
as the carbon in the atmosphere trended downwards, the diversity of life trended upwards. no one can say whether life would flourish better if that trend is reversed, but one thing is for sure--it's happening way too fast for nature to adapt, and if it continues at this rate for long, entire ecosystems will be shocked too hard to recover and you will see more and more extinctions of the life on this planet we're all familiar with. maybe it will rebound one day, but that will be long after our civilzation is gone and what emerges won't be anything like the life we have here today. if that's advantageous to you, please explain your perspective. |
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| R!CH |
| quote: | Originally posted by Nrg2Nfinit
During the cambrian explosion (the period where life diversified and flourished the most significantly in all time) oxygen levels were only 17% of the current period and carbon dioxide levels were 4500 ppm.
So the issue that a warmer climate will extinguish life is nonsense. |
you do know the cambrian explosion occurred underwater in the oceans right? |
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| R!CH |
| quote: | Originally posted by ToF
Why would it be considered foolish to dismiss a random who warns you of a dangerous situation if you stack it up against the facts and simple logic and it doesn't make sense? |
please, by all means explain these facts and simple logic. i am not aware of them.
the whole premise of the carbon tax is to account for externalities that aren't currently factored into the incredibly cheap cost of burning carbon. it will never been economically viable to develop clean power in lieu of coal you can shovel out of the ground until the external costs of burning it are included. |
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| Lews |
| This thread is so facepalm =/ |
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| Arbiter |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lira
She likes more and more, over and over. |
I've also been abusing colons lately... |
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| Nrg2Nfinit |
| quote: | Originally posted by R!CH
you do know the cambrian explosion occurred underwater in the oceans right? |
And your point? we know that evolution repeats itself and thus life on land would eventually proceed. Plants would definatly have a hay day with those levels of carbon dioxide and essentially reduce the carbon rich environment.
The devonian period experienced carbonde dioxide levels of 2200 ppm keep that in mind as well this is more then 5 times our current level (this is where terestrian animal life began to really flourish). And the proceeding mesozoic era averaged about 1800 ppm and during this era we had the most successful, with regards to size, terrestrial animals (dinosaurs). This shows that carbon dioxide levels do not inhibit vertebrate growth (that phyla of which we are a member of).
This is not to say we shouldnt reduce carbon emissions, but to say that we are solely responsible for a historically repeating phenomena would be untrue.
If anything carbon level increases would benefit floral diversity and amplificaiton. |
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