Right-wingers who think global warming is a lefty plot

[El_Machinae]

This thread is really cute. It's all about science. Science is peer-reviewed. Science can't possibly be about "the monies" no? Yet, if you criticize global warming in academia, you're summarily booted from it, and you never recieve research money again. Global Warming studies are all peer reviewed? The IPCC studies are all peer reviewed? Oh, well gee, nevermind the fact that the IPCC has forced out members who disagreed or criticized their publications internally. Nevermind that numerous figures within the IPCC have left because the IPCC refused to publish internal criticism. How about the notorious hockeystick graph? No manipulated data there at all right? I'm sure the IPCC had some incredibly hard internal peer review on that jammy. Scientists surely would never lie nor manipulate data to forward a cause the brings in BILLIONS of dollars. No way... The only people that are greedy and manipulate politicians and political agendas are oil tycoons. Scientists are pure of heart. Surely this is the case.

In regards to "Science" and "scientists." How can anybody possibly say that this "science" is seemless and truly reviewed when the people producing the articles are pocketing money and forwarding their own way of life, while at the same time anyone who actually criticizes global warming "science" is labeled as a holocaust denier and immediately expunged from academia and forcefully shut up? Seriously people. Listen to yourselves.

This edgy skepticism would be cute if it was shown to be useful at a personal level. But despite your knowledge of all the ways that An Inconvenient Truth is wrong, you were still falling for the "Volcanos are WORSE!" lies recently.

People think they're being so useful by being skeptical, but then they go and embrace Creationist levels of science in order to be skeptical. Your edgy skepticsm just lead you down an even worse garden path. Some urge to find any reason why AGW is false, since you associate it with some partisan faction you disapprove of.

And in the last year, the data around AGW has just gotten better and better. Tipping points have been better defined. Mechanisms are better understood. Etc.

 

[Neonanocyborgasm]

What do you think is our motivation is for making this phenomenon up?

Greed mostly. Without environmental concerns to mitigate profit, there would be more money to be made. It could also be a general scoff at intellectual pursuits.

 

[Narz]

It could also be a general scoff at intellectual pursuits.

If it's too complicated for "Joe-six-pack" (on his sixth can) to understand it's automatically suspect.

 

[knez]

My point, again, is that there is no point in not believing in it. Even if it turned up to be a giant scam, what would be the consequences?

"Oh no we learned to use our energy in better ways! We reduced agricultural pollution and now make intelligent and diverse tree plantations instead of monocultures!"

OH NOES!

the consequences would not be "Oh no we learned to use our energy in better ways!", but rather… interesting

1) generally, future economic output of the world would be lower than potential – because of increased taxation and stimulation of uneconomical production/products

2) (some types of) uneconomical production could actually increase pollution above what is potential with current world economy (solar energy, hybrid cars batteries!!!)

3) also generally speaking, role of government(s) in developed society's life would increase

4) UN and similar organizations would gain more power

5) rich countries would be relatively better of – economic power (and with it are coming all others) shift that is currently on the way in the world would be severely slower – fighting man made global warming policies often aims to reduce development in poor countries (Kyoto!!!)

6) global warming etc. is becoming more and more (for some ) base to decide what is good (moral) and what is not – with governments fighting it, that kind of thinking becomes institutionalized

The IPCC is a scientific organization just like any other.

This is a common tactic of ___ denyers. If you don't like a fact, you demand the source. Once you have the source you blow it off and demand more. There's no way to win.

The graph is a simple depiction of well established data. There's no way to spin it politically. You asked for a clear correlation between CO2 and temperature; there it is. You can hate the organization, but data is data.

IPCC is a joke when it comes to science...

 

[Merkinball]

This edgy skepticism would be cute if it was shown to be useful at a personal level. But despite your knowledge of all the ways that An Inconvenient Truth is wrong, you were still falling for the "Volcanos are WORSE!" lies recently. - El Mach

Volcanoes have a much more abrupt impact on global climate than humanity does. I don't see how that is a lie in any way shape or form. An Inconvenient Truth on the other hand...

People think they're being so useful by being skeptical, but then they go and embrace Creationist levels of science in order to be skeptical. Your edgy skepticsm just lead you down an even worse garden path. Some urge to find any reason why AGW is false, since you associate it with some partisan faction you disapprove of. - El Mach

Creationist levels of science? Am I really in that boat? Come on. Gimme a break. You can point out creationist level science all you want, but it's not driving global political policy is it. Nope. Sensationalist scienceis at the wheel there.

And in the last year, the data around AGW has just gotten better and better. Tipping points have been better defined. Mechanisms are better understood. Etc. - El Mach

That's fine, but let's be honest, we still don't have a clue. We really don't. We have no grasp on how many of the major factors that influence are climate relate and effect one another. We don't truly understand whether temperature lags CO2, or CO2 lags temperature. We still don't have a finite grasp of just how much increased CO2 will raise the earths temperature. We don't understand...AT ALL the relationship that things such as solar storms, electromagnetic activity from the sun in general, and our own electrical field has on our planet.

It's amazing, to you, we have refined our data better and better. The doom and gloom reports get worse and worse. The earth is gonna end sooner and sooner on that refined data...yet...global warming has not been accelerating over the last ten years. And according to recent reports, we're slipping into a colder and colder state. And if I recall correctly, the Pacific decadel oscillation ended a few months back. Yet the earth has continued into its chilling phase.

Keep pretending like this is anything other than politics. We have much bigger fish to fry than the idea that the earth MAY be warming because we drive our cars and watch TV.

 

[Gustave5436]

So because a strawman somewhere in the world says global warming is going to be the end of the world, all of global climate change is nothing but "sensationalist science," global temperatures are not increasing, and even if they are, human activity has absolutely nothing to do with it?

 

[Bigfoot3814]

That's a fight you're not gonna win, buddy.

 

[Cutlass]

The issue here is that the quorum of climatologist who have no interests other than to report what the science says think global warming is real and caused by humans. The meteorologists are less convinced of this. And most of the people who are actively opposed to the idea are bin paid to actively oppose the idea.

The insurance model says that when the risks are very very high, and the costs of ameliorating those risks is modest, you go head and do it.

 

[Berzerker]

The issue here is that the quorum of climatologist who have no interests other than to report what the science says think global warming is real and caused by humans. The meteorologists are less convinced of this. And most of the people who are actively opposed to the idea are bin paid to actively oppose the idea.

The insurance model says that when the risks are very very high, and the costs of ameliorating those risks is modest, you go head and do it.

What risk? And whats with the notion that people getting money makes them dishonest when they're on the other side of the debate? Are the environmentalists lying because they get money? I'm not so sure climatologists are that unified, paleo-climatologists are the people who keep telling us how miserable it was during the ice age and those ice cores they keep drilling are the best evidence for the cyclical nature of our climate.

I sure hope all the stuff we pump into the atmosphere helps warm us but I strongly suspect climate is out of our hands, the mechanism(s) driving the ice ages dont care about us and we'll be lucky to fend off the more devastating effects of a new ice age. When that time arrives we'll be looking at ways to pollute our atmosphere even more with greenhouse gases.

 

[Berzerker]

So because a strawman somewhere in the world says global warming is going to be the end of the world, all of global climate change is nothing but "sensationalist science,"

Sorry for that inconvenient truth

global temperatures are not increasing, and even if they are, human activity has absolutely nothing to do with it?

I believe the holocene was warmer, that was the beginning of this interglacial period we're enjoying...ENJOY IT I cant imagine our activity doesn't influence climate, we should have a warming effect. I sure hope so, we're gonna have to start terra-forming if we wanna avoid a mile thick slab of ice covering NYC while making sure sea levels dont rise much (or there wont be a NYC to save).

 

[Berzerker]

Volcanoes have a much more abrupt impact on global climate than humanity does.

The "year without summer" followed the Tambora blast in 1815... and it inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein set in an ice age environment.

 

[Death_Machine]

If it's too complicated for "Joe-six-pack" (on his sixth can) to understand it's automatically suspect.

What is so hard to understand that the planet has been hot before and had ice ages long before anything we are doing now was around. If the planet gets warmer or more cool it is because of what the sun is doing, not anything we're doing down here.

So because a strawman somewhere in the world says global warming is going to be the end of the world, all of global climate change is nothing but "sensationalist science," global temperatures are not increasing, and even if they are, human activity has absolutely nothing to do with it?

See above comment.

 

[AngryZealot]

What is so hard to understand that the planet has been hot before and had ice ages long before anything we are doing now was around. If the planet gets warmer or more cool it is because of what the sun is doing, not anything we're doing down here.

Saying the climatologists forgot about the sun is like saying the rocket scientists forgot about gravity.

 

[Death_Machine]

Saying the climatologists forgot about the sun is like saying the rocket scientists forgot about gravity.

All I'm saying is that nobody has been able to explain to me why what mankind is doing now is responsible when these things have happened in the past long before we started industrializing.

 

[ainwood]

The issue here is that the quorum of climatologist who have no interests other than to report what the science says think global warming is real and caused by humans. The meteorologists are less convinced of this. And most of the people who are actively opposed to the idea are bin paid to actively oppose the idea.

So the people who disagree with the AGW 'consensus' are being paid to disagree, and those who are receiving billions in scientific funding through research grants are purely objective?

 

[Gustave5436]

All I'm saying is that nobody has been able to explain to me why what mankind is doing now is responsible when these things have happened in the past long before we started industrializing.

Because the rapid increase in atmospheric concentration of certain greenhouse gases can be directly traced to human activity, particularly involving the widespread use of fossil fuels.

 

[Death_Machine]

Because the rapid increase in atmospheric concentration of certain greenhouse gases can be directly traced to human activity, particularly involving the widespread use of fossil fuels.

Ok, so why did the planet get hot & experience ice ages before we as humans industrialized?

 

[Gustave5436]

What is so hard to understand that the planet has been hot before and had ice ages long before anything we are doing now was around. If the planet gets warmer or more cool it is because of what the sun is doing, not anything we're doing down here.

See above comment.

It is the rate of change which is so unusual, not the fact that change is happening. A rapid increase in greenhouse gases accompanied by a rapid increase in global temperatures.

On another note, main sequence stars (like Sol) increase in luminosity as they age, yet Earth was hotter in the past, during the Mesozoic, when there was significantly more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, among other things (like Antarctica not being at the south pole, blocking ocean currents)

 

[Death_Machine]

It is the rate of change which is so unusual, not the fact that change is happening. A rapid increase in greenhouse gases accompanied by a rapid increase in global temperatures.

On another note, main sequence stars (like Sol) increase in luminosity as they age, yet Earth was hotter in the past, during the Mesozoic, when there was significantly more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, among other things (like Antarctica not being at the south pole, blocking ocean currents)

That's a nice theory, but I'm still not sold. I maintain it is the sun that causes global warming & cooling. The sun is the root cause, everything else is just a symptom.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

What is so hard to understand that the planet has been hot before and had ice ages long before anything we are doing now was around. If the planet gets warmer or more cool it is because of what the sun is doing, not anything we're doing down here.

Great logic.

If it gets warm in my house in the winter, it must mean that winter took a walk and is replaced by summer every time I get home from work, because it was just as warm in my house as it was in the summer. It wouldn't be because I turn the heater on when I get home.

Ok, so why did the planet get hot & experience ice ages before we as humans industrialized?

http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn11647