[er1kksen]

I agree that the effect of humankind on the eco-system is undeniable however, most of the clear cutting and things of such occur in third-world countries. This being said, why is it that we think it would be a good idea to allow the populations in these areas to flourish? Would it not make more sense (logically) to consolidate our assets in the areas that are thriving and allow nature to diminish those civilizations that cannot make it. This obviously is hypothetical. I am all about all natural, organic, hormone/drug free food, small farming, Distributist economy, and as I am Catholic, helping as many people as I can. When people start talking about global climate this or that, and human impact on the world, they do not follow their logic out which would be, if you really think we as humans are fighting for survival of the planet, and we are causing ALL of these problems, then we need to REDUCE, not INCREASE humankind. I reiterate that this is NOT my stance, but just a conversation. What do you think?

Would that make sense? Yes. But I really don't think we humans are "fighting for the survival of the planet" or causing all the problems we see. Instead I see a pattern: A successful species in nature fills its environment to the point of overutilization (not the same as overpopulation; we could fit the world's human population comfortably in the state of texas), putting stresses on the environmental systems that keep them alive. Sometimes changes from the outside (such as climate cycles or natural catastrophes) also add pressure. This causes a crash of the established biological system which leads to migrations into new territories and adaptations to changes in the environment. It's a sort of high-power natural selection process. The human species has been through this cycle numerous times, each time expanding into new environments and developing new adaptations. We're headed for it yet again. However, with humans, we have a new factor thrown into the mix: rather than being driven by purely biological and genetic factors, we sentient animals are driven by "memes," a new form of replicator that binds together groups with ideas, rather than genes. As much as we like to think of ourselves as a society of individuals, the majority of the human population is more of a collective organism, behaving in ways remarkably similar to the way the cells in a body do and yet necessarily different as well. We're stuffing ourselves into the evolutionary pressure cooker, and while physical evolution will no doubt continue, what we're going to see truly rapid evolution of is the memes that tie our society together. We've far overstepped the bounds of sustainability, and the result will not be pretty. There's going to be a lot of death and suffering, sooner or later. And hopefully the memes that emerge and survive will tie our society into something more sustainable. It's not a pretty picture, but it's the observable pattern. As much as we'd like to think our lives are controlled by rational ideas, the memes of our own culture are so strong simply because they WORK. That doesn't mean they're right. If they were right, we wouldn't all be having kids and buying cars and driving everywhere because we'd recognize how that harms us in the long run. The human mass is still essentially an instinct-driven animal.

As far as the survival of our planet, we'd have to be really trying hard if we wanted to render the planet completely uninhabitable to life. It would be a bit easier to wipe ourselves out, but still no easy task. I'm not worried about that. I'm just saying if we wanted to avoid that inevitable crash and the human death and suffering it will entail, there are steps we could collectively take to do so. And like you said, reducing population would be a vital aspect of that. Consumption of resources per person would also have to be reduced. Not to mention that it might alleviate much of the human death and suffering we already see. But I'm a bit of a pessimist on that front. I don't really consider myself a pessimist though, because like I said, it's a natural pattern that's gotten us where we are today and I wish I could live a few thousand more years so I could see where it takes us in the future.

[wildman]

What's the problem?

It's clear to any, well most, fools that the unregulated free market capitalist system has been ordained by God and is perfect and complete in all respects.

Just let it do it's thing without hinderance and all will be well. Hell in another century or two and it might even cure hemorrhoids.

[Duplo]

I did a Master of Science degree studying Paleoclimatic fluctuations in the Canadian Rockies. I don't tend to engage in discussions like this because its about as much fun as cleaning up after my dog 3x/day but I will add this. After measuring 250,000 tree rings and studying climate data from every weather station in the pacific northwest I can convey to you that everything I have read or seen in the press from either side is very close to complete BS. I would describe understanding climate change (I'm talking historic climate change here because nobody denies that it has changed frequently in the past) as far more of an art than a science. In fact in a lot of ways its like photography. Photography is really very simple - once you understand light, shadow, film speed, aperture and shutter speed then taking a good picture is simple right? In climate studies you start to recognize that things which are statistically significant are in fact meaningless and visa versa. The only way to begin to recognize this is by spending WAY too many hours staring at raw data and trying to extract some sense out of it. Listening to Fox News or NPR will get you nowhere in your understanding of climate.

There has been increasing pressure placed on those who study climate to be more assertive in their statements. I refused to play that game which made my opinions (cautious statements supported by fact) pretty much useless. Since this is a photography forum - and some might be interested in some "expert" opinion here is my statement on climate change

1. "Global warming" is a political term - not a scientific term. The correct expression to use is "climate change"
2. Sunspot activity cannot be accurately modeled - ironically scientists have been tracking these phenomenon for decades but it wasn't until "global warming" became an issue that someone miraculously discovered the solution to this multi-variate regression analysis. The solution is complete BS. You cannot predict sunspot activity with anywhere near the level of certainty that you can predict tomorrow's weather and we all know how well they do that!!
3. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) should be coming through its "cold" cycle for the next several years. This will fuel the "global warming is a load of crap" arguments (in North America) for the next 5-10 years. Of course there I am predicting the weather - I might be totally wrong but it is my best guess anyway. After this cool cycle we should be back into a warm cycle... who knows what will happen then
4. On 9-12 the climate models all over the world failed because air traffic came to a sudden stop. Conclussion - humans influence climate
5. Urban heat islands do exist (temperatures in Down Town Manhattan are affected by the fact that the landscape is sky scrapers instead of forest. Conclussion - humans do influence climate.
6. Humans influence the distribution and abundance of various gasses in the atmosphere which in turn most likely have an affect of some sort down here on terra firma. For this debate there is no need to quantify this affect but simply acknowledge that atmospheric gasses have the ability to impact climate. This is the argument that gets re-hashed so often and again it usually comes down to the use of the term "global warming" because it implies that the effect is understood. When it comes down to the specifics of the scientific debate there is a lot less disagreement. CO2 and H20 concentrations are leading contributers to the earths climate and humans influence both to AT LEAST a small extent.
7 No matter how many hybrid cars we produce we are not going to stop influencing anything listed above so we better learn to live with the new realities. The earth has been both historically warmer and colder than it is right now. Arguing over how much warmer we might have made it seems futile. A more useful way to expend resources is learning to adapt to our changing environment.

You just abosolutely made my day with that statement.
That is perhaps the most sensible thing I have read on the subject for years.

I am by no means a climate experte, but over the last 3.5 years i have been living in one of the hotspots in this global warming debate, Greenland.

All kinds of politicians have been travelling to Ilulissat to be photographed next to the huge Icefiord glacier (the most productive in the world)
From here they make comments like "Global warming exists, just look at all that melting ice..." sure but that glacier has been producing ice like that for thousands of years, and global warming is not the main reason the 1000km wide and 1800km long icecube in the middle of Greenland is

The climate in Greenland has been changing in cycles over time.
studies of ancient inuit culture suggests that the climate in Greenland has been significantly warmer than it is today and water levels higher.
The Inland ice and the glaciers has retracted a lot since around 1920, it is now at roughly the same place as they were in the 1820ies.

Winter last year was the strongest in more than 20 years.
This one has not been bad either and we did have snow yesterday and the landscape are still snowcovered all the way to sea level.

A recent study by Danish climatologists (?) has shown a great deal of uncertainty about the "hockey stick" (a direct translation from danish) model that has been used to fuel a lot of the global warming debate.

Sure climate changes are real and from what I have seen up here been occuring on a regular basis far longer than we have been poluting our planet.
I do not doubt that we are in for a change, but I am seriously questioning how much of this is change is due to us and how much is part of a natural cycle.

[cwood]

A recent study by Danish climatologists (?) has shown a great deal of uncertainty about the "hockey stick" (a direct translation from danish) model that has been used to fuel a lot of the global warming debate.

Sure climate changes are real and from what I have seen up here been occuring on a regular basis far longer than we have been poluting our planet.
I do not doubt that we are in for a change, but I am seriously questioning how much of this is change is due to us and how much is part of a natural cycle.

Ah - The hockey stick. The media has been stuck on that one like a fat kid on a candy bar. People think the "hockey stick" was some pivotal moment in climate research which it was not. The Bush administration dragged that scientist before a congressional committee in an attempt to discredit his "ground breaking research".

All he did was run a regression model on a limited set of data to forecast future temperatures (you would be shocked to learn the statistical reliability of such a model - which I will not share because it will be misunderstood and used for evil purposes). For the uninitiated: Regression = Prediction (y=mx +b). It was a perfectly valid scientific exercise that could be used to advance the state of knowledge in a broader context but instead it was held up as the "be-all end-all" scientific model for a climatological catastrophy. It gained momentum in the media (both sides) and the political parties because it was an easily describable "sound bite"

Rest assured "Man" is influencing climate but IMHO it will be a much more interesting exercise to look at historically (from about 200 years in the future) than it will be to try to predict the next 200 years. Imagine the temps in Greenland are warming (for the sake of argument)... but picture a Sine Wave oscillating on a 20yr frequency with a slightly increasing trend. For many cycles of this pattern the "warm present" will intersect the temperatures of the "cold future" so this circular argument is doomed to continue until these intersections no longer occur.

On a completely different subject also covered in this thread (stupid politicians) if the Liberals can just agree that Biden's an idiot can the Republicans PLEASE stop selling "Palin 2012" bumper stickers. I think it would be a really great thing if the people in charge of this country spoke with grammatically correct English and had a valid passport no matter which party they represented.

EDIT
You all can ignore this but for the sake of accuracy (since I took this rare occasion to go on the record) I wanted to correct myself and say it is actually a "boot strapped response function analysis" not a "simple linear regression" that was conducted on the data. The results are basically the same but the method changes because climate data are not independent variables. [/nerd]

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Last edited by cwood; 05-08-2009 at 08:27 PM.

[Ira]

I say err on the side of caution. We sure don't NEED more carbon emissions.

Sorry I said it in only 15 words, but those 15 words have summed up my philosophy on this for the past 15 years.

Turning the subject into a Republican versus Democrat issue is as about as disgusting and ignorant as it gets, and makes the United States, rightfully so, look like total a-holes.

[Duplo]

Ah - The hockey stick. The media has been stuck on that one like a fat kid on a candy bar. People think the "hockey stick" was some pivotal moment in climate research which it was not. The Bush administration dragged that scientist before a congressional committee in an attempt to discredit his "ground breaking research".

All he did was run a regression model on a limited set of data to forecast future temperatures (you would be shocked to learn the statistical reliability of such a model - which I will not share because it will be misunderstood and used for evil purposes). For the uninitiated: Regression = Prediction (y=mx +b). It was a perfectly valid scientific exercise that could be used to advance the state of knowledge in a broader context but instead it was held up as the "be-all end-all" scientific model for a climatological catastrophy. It gained momentum in the media (both sides) and the political parties because it was an easily describable "sound bite"

You do make a lot of sense to me.
What I found interesting from the study was the length they went through to show just how uncertain and inaccurate it was.

Rest assured "Man" is influencing climate but IMHO it will be a much more interesting exercise to look at historically (from about 200 years in the future) than it will be to try to predict the next 200 years. Imagine the temps in Greenland are warming (for the sake of argument)... but picture a Sine Wave oscillating on a 20yr frequency with a slightly increasing trend. For many cycles of this pattern the "warm present" will intersect the temperatures of the "cold future" so this circular argument is doomed to continue until these intersections no longer occur.

Makes sense and I agree

On a completely different subject also covered in this thread (stupid politicians) if the Liberals can just agree that Biden's an idiot can the Republicans PLEASE stop selling "Palin 2012" bumper stickers. I think it would be a really great thing if the people in charge of this country spoke with grammatically correct English and had a valid passport no matter which party they represented.

No comments from me on that part of the subject.

[Blue]

I say err on the side of caution. We sure don't NEED more carbon emissions.

Sorry I said it in only 15 words, but those 15 words have summed up my philosophy on this for the past 15 years.

Turning the subject into a Republican versus Democrat issue is as about as disgusting and ignorant as it gets, and makes the United States, rightfully so, look like total a-holes.

No one is really arguing whether we NEED "more" CO2 or methane emissions. However, for gore to call for 80% reductions based on the 2005 levels by 2050 is pure science fiction.

Kunik: Another interesting thing about Iceland is that it thawed out enough for Eric the Red's people to settle there and establish settlements. These settlements eventually failed as the ice caps expanded. Another interesting thing here in Florida is that the peninsula was twice as large as it currently is around 8-10,000 years ago. There are springs in the Gulf of Mexico off the cost near me that used to be inland at that time! The commercial citrus belt for grape fruit and oranges has been pushed farther south in the peninsula due to harsher winters in certain years. For example, Citrus County no longer grows grape fruits and oranges even though it is a rural county.

Aside from all the crapulus of the Obama Motor Company and the hysteria of the Global Warming Hoax the EPA now wants to implement a Cow Fart Tax. Hey I know some humans that need that tax.

[Blue]

Aside from all the crapulus of the Obama Motor Company and the hysteria of the Global Warming Hoax the EPA now wants to implement a Cow Fart Tax. Hey I know some humans that need that tax.

Actually, that should be a fine for toxic waste dumping!

However, this cow flatulent cows have been an EPA target since Nov.

EPA's Air Pollution Target: Flatulent Cows - CBS News

http://news.sierrawave.net/eastern-sierra-news/2162-flatulence-tax-for-cows-...om-crop-report

FOXNews.com - European Farmers Protest Proposals to Tax Cow Flatulence - Science News | Science & Technology | Technology News



The British Gov has forced a lot of restaurants to limit lamb because sheep burp. Plus, Europe has been chasing cow fart taxes as well.

Burping Sheep Cause Global Warming


I propose a $10 m per year license fees on politicians and $1.5 M on bureaucrats.

Actually, that should be a fine for toxic waste dumping!

However, this cow flatulent cows have been an EPA target since Nov.

EPA's Air Pollution Target: Flatulent Cows - CBS News

Flatulence Tax for Cows Wafts From Crop Report

FOXNews.com - European Farmers Protest Proposals to Tax Cow Flatulence - Science News | Science & Technology | Technology News



The British Gov has forced a lot of restaurants to limit lamb because sheep burp. Plus, Europe has been chasing cow fart taxes as well.

Burping Sheep Cause Global Warming


I propose a $10 m per year license fees on politicians and $1.5 M on bureaucrats.

And $3.6 m on SloMo

[slomojoe]

And $3.6 m on SloMo

That wouldn't even cover my pre-breakfast emissions.

[slomojoe]

By the way, for people who still naively desire to cling to this outdated concept we used to call "reality" in their daily lives, you should be aware that the ideas that "the EPA now wants to implement a Cow Fart Tax", that "flatulent cows have been an EPA target since Nov", that "The British Gov has forced a lot of restaurants to limit lamb because sheep burp" and that "Europe has been chasing cow fart taxes as well" are entirely a figment of some conservatives' allucinatory imagination. No such thing is true, has been true, or has even remotely been proposed. Not that it matters to them, of course.

[Blue]

By the way, for people who still naively desire to cling to this outdated concept we used to call "reality" in their daily lives, you should be aware that the ideas that "the EPA now wants to implement a Cow Fart Tax", that "flatulent cows have been an EPA target since Nov", that "The British Gov has forced a lot of restaurants to limit lamb because sheep burp" and that "Europe has been chasing cow fart taxes as well" are entirely a figment of some conservatives' allucinatory imagination. No such thing is true, has been true, or has even remotely been proposed. Not that it matters to them, of course.

Ignorance is bliss. I guess the EPA shouldn't have released the report and Europe shouldn't have started implementing things like this.

[slomojoe]

Ignorance is bliss. I guess the EPA shouldn't have released the report and Europe shouldn't have started implementing things like this.

The EPA report has nothing to do with "farting taxes", and Europe has implemented nothing of the sort. Other than those minor details, I guess you have your facts just about right.

[Blue]

The EPA report has nothing to do with "farting cows", and Europe has implemented nothing of the sort. Other than those minor details, I guess you have your facts just about right.

EPA - Ruminant Livestock - Frequent Questions

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/downloads/GuideAgricultureLivestockSectors.pdf

Then why the push for mandatory reporting by livestock producers?


For the EPA not to have anything to do with cow farting, they certainly have their heads up some asses.


http://www.extension.org/pages/Proposed_EPA_Rule_Would_Require_Some_Large_Li..._Gas_Emissions

What we are seeing is Big Gov trying to spin and lie its way out of this one.