Climate Change

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqxENMKaeCU -- Watch it by itself. It has a bit of a slow start, but you should watch it all, don't just pass it off as a waste of time. Yes, you need one hour and thirty three minutes.

Global warming scare is over now... NASA has declared that actually going through a global cooling now... (Source) Global Warming was due to the sun's activities. Another way this is proven is because Global Warming started happening before the 1700s. If we think about this objectively it would mean BEFORE industrialization meaning it was not man's fault. I'm not saying we're totally innocent of the climate change, but just stating a few facts.

I've always held a similar opinion, or at least believed the evidence for this over all else: we have been coming out of a small ice-age for centuries. We sped the process up a bit but humans are not totally responsible, and animals will adapt or die as they always have.

The only thing that gets me are the sheer amount of people who still don't believe global warming exists and the affect it is having on climates across the planet. How much carbon emissions do we have to spew into the atmosphere before everyone understands that?

Reminds me of the new ad campaigns in the United States about natural, clean coal and using less oil refineries, but new techniques into obtaining more "bang for our buck" as it were. I love that they are sponsored by the U.S. oil industries, but what upsets me is how many people support it. It is not the answer! Why can no one understand that delaying the problem does not equal finding a solution. It is like some people seriously don't care abut the generations ahead. "Oh well, as long as the oil crisis is subsided during my lifetime to hell with the future."

... *breathes in; breathes out*

Wow, that was only slightly tangential wasn't it? XD

There is an added, hilarious twist to climate change.
I think we can agree that in the medium run, we (globally) have an energy problem.

But one cannot particularly refute the idea that there are, after all, too many humans on Earth. There is a natural geological ebb and flow of heat and cooling, I can remember this from high school discussions on the ice age. However, like someone else has raised in this thread, haven't we sped it along? Won't we eventually do some serious damage? All these sensationalist ideas may be placing the 'due dates' rather close, but wouldn't you agree that our eventual demise is chartered by ourselves and that proper organisations need to come into effect? None of this wishy washy carbon credits stuff, more about energy consumption and population numbers.

Pssst! "One cannot refute" is a nice rhetoric device, but does not make for a particularly compelling argument.
Perhaps there's too many humans. Perhaps it's a case of bad logistics and distribution. Who knows? Dys- and utopias aside, we have plenty little hard evidence on the case.

I would agree though that the earth cannot support all humans enjoying the same, western standard of civilization.


No on both counts. I am not an optimist.
I think that humanities' numbers would dwindle for a time, but I think that humanity (as in, homo sapiens, or even more generally our branch of hominids) will survive for some time longer.
Secondly, no amount of proper organizations can come into effect, because that is contrary to the way rulership works.
Thirdly, even if they were to come into place, I do not think there is yet a rational way out of the dilemma. Either we all (not just the western world) abandon our lifestyle entirely and all go back to manual subsistence farming, and a huge part of humanity dies off, because manual subsistence farming can only feed so many.
Or we maintain our lifestyle and a part of humanity dies off due to its consequences.

Haha, crap, I left that organisation bit in. Sorry, I'm a little sick at the moment. I agree that there isn't a good way to govern this [nor anything]. I like to think that thinning out the population would be very convenient, by reducing the number of births in a totalitarian way.
I do think that we quite happily by just existing and expanding do harm ourselves in a long term manner, easily shown by things like wars over oil, something that some officials affirm as the cause behind the Iraq war started by USA. Our hard work to maintain the status quo appears to be harming the environment.
I think I'm spiralling off-topic in an attempt to save my argument. I don't have any concrete proof of climate change since there are groups heavily for and heavily against the idea, each citing flimsy records.

One cannot refute may not make for a compelling argument. It wasn't particularly there for that. No need to be sarcastic about it. No one can give hard evidence that the amount of humans on the Earth is good nor bad. Just their effects on the face of the planet. Can't even use past statistics as a good determinate since technological advances modify how we use things.

Oh well, whatever. Ignore this post.

I'm guessing you didn't click the link... Global Warming is only plausible if the average temperature were going up, but as I pointed out, the temperature is actually dropping. Also, if your argument was directed at my post, notice I didn't rule out the fact that humans have contributed. I just pointed out that humans haven't been damaging the environment as bad as many would like to think.

But I guess in 15 to 20 years you won't have to worry about it as it's expected that we'll be running out of fossil fuel by that time.

PS: There is a high probability you're using a device powered by these coal industries you're upset about. >_>


As for the discussion gibbous and Hibia have been having:

I do think there is a limit to how many people the Earth can support since we're sucking resources like a bunch of parasites. I don't think there really is a good way for humanity to manage this for themselves because Hibia's method of staving the human population will not be a popular among the people (as already proven evident by the reaction of people to how the Chinese government is handling it). I think what gibbous said about how it'll turn out is quite accurate except I don't think farming will be the answer humanity will go to as the answer.

No I didn't. I hate sitting at my computer to watch a video that is that long. >.<

As for only applying when the temperature is going up is just crap. I don't buy that for a second, it is only just used as a convenient excuse to not see the larger issue, and actually no that wasn't directed at you. This is generally the biggest reason why I hate the general views of the Republicans, far too many of them think Democrats somehow made up the entire concept of global warming.

Oh, and if you can get me a computer that runs on grass and fairy dust then let me know, and I'll get it straight away.

DISCLAIMER: I am not an adherent of the "fuck all, nature will solve everything for us :--D" faction. However, I think there's a very easy and natural way to counter overpopulation.
You know how in the overwhelming majority of industrialized nations, as comfort increased, birth rates have declined and in fact in some of them reached the point of negative growth.
If our politicoes would finally wake up and let go of the idiotic nineteenth-century concept of MANPOWER > ALL, there wouldn't even be the NEED for any totalitarian measures there. And that's why I misspoke when I said very easy, because wake up they won't.

There's also a harsher, and more callous side to it:

The question is always whether we truly want that. What price are we willing to pay to save some distant, future generations?


I wasn't. I just pointed out that if you had to convince me of your hypothesis, that would not suffice.


Oh I do agree to the fullest. I was just arguing that self-caused climate change might not be necessarily the one final nail in our coffin.


I do think there's a strong, convincing case to be made in favor of climate change and I do believe it to be real, and influenced (however not entirely made) by humans.


Moreover:

Did you actually click the link of the original NASA article the examiner writeup was based upon? ;p As usual, the journalist couldn't be bothered to read the original source beyond page 2, when on page 3 it is made unmistakably clear that

and also:

Well, I was talking about the link I provided, but as gibbous pointed out, it is now invalid. :/

I'll tell you what I hate... When people don't give others the right to speak out against what they believe. What's wrong with questioning global warming? It's human nature to do so. Questions brought about the discovery of global warming and questions are brining the discovery of anti global warming theories. There will always be two sides, and I hate it when one side doesn't recognize the others.

Though gibbous has pointed out a flaw in one of the evidence that supports the claim to anti-global warming, there are still many out there that still raises the question if global warming is that big of a threat. I know it's happening, but I just think it's over hyped. As for how the Republicans believe the Democrats made this up, it might be because the ICCP when it started anyway were made up of 2,500 scientists. Come to find out, they weren't and they were people who used to be environmental activists. Gore isn't a scientist either, yet everyone laps up what he says.

Also petition project like these where real scientists sign petitions saying global warming isn't that big of a deal SHOULD make you question the theory of global warming.



Hmmm... I guess that's one evidence out the window.

In your bottom quote it says "Global warming deniers cited the results as proof that global warming wasn't real and that scientists didn't know what they were doing."

Going back to the petition project I linked, it has over 9,021 Ph.D.s, 6,961 at the master's level, 2,240 medical doctors and 12,850 carrying a bachelor of science or equivalent academic degree signing off on this. If there are certified scientists opposing global warming who's to say that anti global warming theorists are wrong?

Fair enough, I did go pretty overboard there. I just can't fathom how some people don't see it.

Perhaps I'll actually fight it when I'm not fighting my nasal cavity. Doubt it though.

Damn that's gotta be the longest video I've ever seen on Youtube. As for Global Warming, it's there... no question about it..., but if humans are ultimately the start of it? I doubt it, I think we just contribute to what was already there...