[memason]

Originally Posted by gamby

Just in today NBC news;


Scientists More Certain Than Ever on Climate Change, Report Says


Clear evidence and uncertainty

Concentrations of carbon dioxide, the document notes, increased by 40 percent between 1880 and 2012 and are now higher than at any time in at least 800,000 years. As a result, global temperatures are 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than in 1900, Arctic sea ice is shrinking, sea levels are 8 inches higher, ocean acidity is on the rise, and the geographical ranges of many plants and animals are shifting.

"The evidence is clear," reads the report.

It's comments like the above that kill any semblance of credibility for me. Scientists in 1800 were still trying to figure out if the earth was flat or not... They were certainly not measuring the effects of carbon dioxide on the atmosphere.

[Golfingnut]

Originally Posted by memason

It's comments like the above that kill any semblance of credibility for me. Scientists in 1800 were still trying to figure out if the earth was flat or not... They were certainly not measuring the effects of carbon dioxide on the atmosphere.

It's comments like this that convince me that most do not know silence. You don't have to have been born in the 1800's to know what the climate was made up of.

[memason]

Originally Posted by Golfingnut

It's comments like this that convince me that most do not know silence. You don't have to have been born in the 1800's to know what the climate was made up of.

Yeah well, whatever.... Most reasonable people don't respond well to "the sky is falling" BS...

[Golfingnut]

Originally Posted by memason

Yeah well, whatever.... Most reasonable people don't respond well to "the sky is falling" BS...

Those that understand that the sky is falling was and is a fairy tale, where climate change is a very serious matter do respond to it quite well.

[Arctic Fox]

In a word: dendrochronology:

By looking at tree rings, scientists can tell how much carbon dioxide was in the Earth's atmosphere during each year of a tree's life, and since some trees are over 5,000 years old they can look back five millennia.

They can go back even further by looking at long-dead trees and working out, using radio-carbon dating, how long ago the trees died.


And paleoclimatology:

If you want to go back 1.5 million years, the study of ice cores will tell you how much of each atmospheric gas was present in each period's precipitation.

[TexaninVA]

Originally Posted by memason

Yeah well, whatever.... Most reasonable people don't respond well to "the sky is falling" BS...

Agree with you ... some people just like to be in on the latest left wing fad and whereby they can feel better about themselves and the world.

The climate has been "changing" for eons. Cutting back on one's carbon footprint yadda may make one feel morally superior but the impact will be n/a.

[JP]

The thing that gets me about all this climate change stuff is when people say carbon dioxide is the most in 800,000 years. What?

The last time I checked people weren't around 800,000 years ago to cause the earth's atmosphere to have so much carbon in it, the earth for what ever reason DID IT ON ITS OWN.

So, what was the rest of the world like back then? How high were the oceans, how big were the ice caps, how big were the deserts, what flora was where, what where animals ranges, what animals existed and how many, where were the continents located, what tilt did the earths magnetic poles have?

There is no doubt mankind is contributing CO2 to the atmosphere but I don't know and I don't think anybody knows how much the earth is also contributing and if it is part of a cycle and/or if it is good or bad.

[eweissenbach]

Originally Posted by TexaninVA

Agree with you ... some people just like to be in on the latest left wing fad and whereby they can feel better about themselves and the world.

The climate has been "changing" for eons. Cutting back on one's carbon footprint yadda may make one feel morally superior but the impact will be n/a.

Labeling climate change as a "left wing fad", makes me believe the right wing propoganda machine is working. Does anyone care to review history and understand how badly this country's rivers and lakes were polluted in the the nineteenth and early twentieth century? The industrialists and their political pawns maintained it was no problem and fought against any regulation,which was eventually overcome thankfully, and our waters have largely recovered. The same goes for air pollution, and asbestos and any number of pesky problems that corporations fought because they didn't want to have to spend any money to fix them, despite the human cost. Yes they too were left-wing fads I suppose.

[Golfingnut]

I am ok with saying so what to the weather. I can also accept not believing in the possible severity of what it will do, but to say it is a hoax shows a lack of knowledge. So sad.

[Golfingnut]

Originally Posted by JP

The thing that gets me about all this climate change stuff is when people say carbon dioxide is the most in 800,000 years. What?

The last time I checked people weren't around 800,000 years ago to cause the earth's atmosphere to have so much carbon in it, the earth for what ever reason DID IT ON ITS OWN.

So, what was the rest of the world like back then? How high were the oceans, how big were the ice caps, how big were the deserts, what flora was where, what where animals ranges, what animals existed and how many, where were the continents located, what tilt did the earths magnetic poles have?

There is no doubt mankind is contributing CO2 to the atmosphere but I don't know and I don't think anybody knows how much the earth is also contributing and if it is part of a cycle and/or if it is good or bad.

The sad thing about this thinking is, WE DO KNOW THE STATISTICAL FACTS OF THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO.

HOW CAN ANYONE POSSIBLY THINK WE DONT.

[Moderator]

Please address the topic and not each other and try to avoid political references and name calling.

This thread, by and large, has remained a thoughtful discussion. Let's try to keep it that way.

Moderator

[Polar Bear]

Originally Posted by Golfingnut

The sad thing about this thinking is, WE DO KNOW THE STATISTICAL FACTS OF THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO.

HOW CAN ANYONE POSSIBLY THINK WE DONT.

We do have knowledge about the way things were thousands of years ago. But to the level of detail that we have about today's world? Not even close.

[buggyone]

Originally Posted by Golfingnut

The sad thing about this thinking is, WE DO KNOW THE STATISTICAL FACTS OF THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO.

HOW CAN ANYONE POSSIBLY THINK WE DONT.

Look at the people who believe that Earth is only 6,000 years old. The Creation Museum in Kentucky (of course) sponsored a "debate" a few weeks ago between their founder and Bill Nye to debate evolution ever happening and that the Young Earth Creationists are right.

It really is scary to see how many supposedly educated people ( and not all are from Kentucky or West Virginia) believe that despite actual scientific proof to disprove their ideas.

[billethkid]

Originally Posted by Golfingnut

WE DO KNOW THE STATISTICAL FACTS OF THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO.

I believe there may be a terminology issue as don't really have "statistical facts" from the past thousands of years. The following might be of some use as to differing types of evidence over differing historical periods:

http://www.windows2universe.org/eart...e_climate.html

With these and many other evidences those qualified to do so can conclude, speculate, extrapolate, conjecture, opine, et al what it all means and whether or not it has any application to the topic at hand that far too many are trying to capture in a finite terms such as global warming, climate change or what ever is the latest hot button.

The real key is the bold underscore above. And politicians certainly do not fit this group in any way, shape or form....I do not care what party, religion, race or what ever category.

Way too much biased parroting to suit me.

[eweissenbach]

Corporations exist to make money for their shareholders and there is nothing wrong with that. They often will place profit above ethics or morals, and there is something wrong with that. That is why the government has to intervene occasionally, as Teddy Roosevelt understood, to make sure the citizens interests are looked out for. Corporate interests are constantly crying about "burdensome regulations", but look what happened a few years ago when banking and finance regulations were relaxed. Sure regulation costs corporations money, which will be passed along to the consumer, but isn't that better than having a financial system collapse, costing a trillion dollars, or worse yet a catastrophic environmental disaster? Corporate interests have spent a LOT of money to insure that their interests are represented by politicians, talking heads, and even quasi researchers and "think tanks". Climate change is the latest environmental issue that has attracted huge sums of corporate money in an effort to convince people that it is not a problem that corporations should have to address. Ask yourself who benefits financially from lack of regulation designed to control emissions that affect the atmosphere. It is not us who will suffer the consequences of doing nothing, it will be our grandchildren and their grandchildren.