Who would like to Discuss ENVIROMENT/climate change in a rational way!?

I started this thread mainly in response to recent threads, and posts, which i feel have been conducted in a way that makes a mockery of this whole issue. So im starting this thread with the intention of sparking a debate VOID OF POLARITY. Or to put it simply, a debate with more than two opposing perspectives.

Climategate has hanged a lot, especially perspectives. One of which worries me more than anything else though; the association pepole are starting to make between enviromentalism and climate change, which i think is just dangerous.

For me, despite the lack of evidence to prove MMGW, there are massive amount of evidence to show we are having an impact on the global enviroment. Beware of the distinction im making between Climate and Enviroment though, two seperate things, but still closely related.

Our impact on the enviroment can be illustrated from sattelite imagery alone, showing how vast our agricultural development has been, which has impacted the enviroment in many ways. Forests are being cut down at dramatic rates, species are becoming extinct, and our pollution and other biological waste levels are destroying entire ecosystems!

Radioactive nuclear waste, pharmaceutical toxins, domestic cleaning products such as bleech - never degrades! - and various other toxic plastics we consume then throw away, are all messing this planet up in ways we're only just beggining to understand. Then when you add on top of this what we're doing to the climate you start to see the bigger picture.

And what exaclty are WE doing to the climate i hear you skeptics ask. Well again forget the scientific studies and lets focus on some undeniable facts, then see if we can draw any logical conclusions from there.

Fact no.1: Our industrial complexes accros the globe emit huge amounts of chemical waste products into the enviroment, without any consideration for the affect this might have on the surrounding enviroment. These waste products come in many different varieties, but we know this much: the majority are unnatural. In other words, the delicate balance of our global enviroment cannot effectively deal with these chemicals.

Fact no.2: Infrastructure, in the form of roads, cities, oil pipelines, power plants, dams, airports, trains - overground and underground, factories, commercial buildings (supermarkets for example), ports, car parks etc etc will all have permanent impacts on the surrounding enviroments, long after we as a species cease to exist in this planet.

Fact no.3 Natural emmisions of green house gases are far greater annualy than human emmisions. So much so that ours are almost insignificant. Vocanoes produce massive amounts of Co2 each year, along with various other natural sources of green house gases. And Earth (our home) is still perfectly capable of sustaining the natural ecosystems of the world (has done for a very very very long time) with these emmisions, which are actually an indispensable part of this natural balance. However, only a tiny fraction of the green house gases we emit can be dealt with by this natural process, and the rest are effectively poisoning the planet.

So for me the question of whether or not these facts have led to global warming or climate change, is irrelevant. What I beleive is relevant is the notion of personal responsability as the most intelligent species on this planet to care for, and AT LEAST acknowledge how beautifully complex the Earths natural order is. We still don't even properly understand our earths magnetic field for example. As i read recently that the ocean currents could infact be responsable for the magnetic fields, and not the earths core. So rising sea levels could have far more implications than previously imagined. Im not saying the ocean is definately responsable for the magnetism of the earth, its still only a theory, but my point is we could be messing around with all kinds of different aspects of the planets natural order and not even know until its too late.

[edit on 12-1-2010 by DizzyDayDream]

And what really drives me crazy is the so called MMGW skeptics making all kinds of assumptions about the health of our planet based on their beleif that we aren't making a significant enough difference to the Earths climate to justify events such as copenhagen.

So directly addresing those who want to call themselves MMGW skeptics; Our impact on the climate may not be something you beleive in yet, but beleive this, we are having massive impacts on the ENVIROMENT as a whole, and we are effectively poisoning the planet. So to consistantly undermine our governments attempts to change this for the better is in my opinion something you should be ashamed of, both as members of a site proclaiming to "deny ignorance" and as members of this species, suuposedly the most intelligent.. im sure our dolphin friends might disagree if they were to realise what were doing to their home too.

Edit to say: thanks to replies further down in this thread ive been made more aware about the Carbon Tax scandal, so even though i wanted to edit this post i thought twice about it, and realised in some wasy i still feel copenhagem was a good idea. Not all countries supported the carbon tax anyway, so despite it's clearly flawed outcomes, IMO copenhagen was a landmark in bringing countries together to discuss our enviroment.. lets just hope next time they all meet, cardon dioxoide doesnt hold centre stage and other apsects of our impact on the enviroment can be given the attention they deserve.

I look forward to you comments and repsonses.

[edit on 11-1-2010 by DizzyDayDream]

[edit on 12-1-2010 by DizzyDayDream]

About 1% of ATS users are rational so good luck.

Well put friend!

I was honestly surprised the way people have totally gone against global warming and the human effect on our planet since climate-gate, and even before!

It is a known fact that the temperature of the earth- for whatever reason- is rising. The polar caps are melting. There irrefutable proof for this; I have even been taught this in my Earth Atmospheric Sciences class at University. We looked at climategate in class: the only thing it proves is that maybe carbon dioxide isn't to blame for the rise in temperatures. You still have many other gasses, such as methane, which are WAY worse than CO2.

I really don't understand how global warming is the only problem that people are focusing on right now. I don't even think that global warming is even close to being the biggest environmental threat.

The biosphere is such a complicated system that we really have NO idea what the long term consequences of our pollution are. It can be comparable to kindergarten students playing around with high-school chemistry.

Entire ecosystems are being destroyed; the food chain could be seriously disrupted. If a pollinating insects bite the dust in any part of the world, there is going to be some SERIOUS food shortages.

However, as long as profitable quarterlies take priority in the world, its going to be very hard to change.

As usual, it seems to me that this problem isn't going to be tackled any differently than any other big problem in the history of humanity: We aren't going to act until the severe consequences are staring us right in the face.

reply to post by Monts


Its a climate change with Geo ingineering pushing the envelope. The earth always corrects any issue it comes against. Chemtrails are really pushing the issue to a boiling point. www.geoengineeringwatch.org...

[edit on 11-1-2010 by saralee]

reply to post by Monts


Thank you for being able to see the biggerpicture.

I can't understand why so many people tend disregard the other affects we have on the planet, and instead choose to focus purely on the global warming/climate change issue. I mean sure thats a massive part of it, but as you said, one pollonating insect becomes extinct (like the humble bumble bee - rapidly declining in the UK at least) and starvation no longer becomes something we feel embarrased about during christmas dinner, it becomes something feel physically within our stomachs, as we stare longingly out our windows into the unpollenated ecosystem, that used to feed us.

Im curious about that course you said you were taking at uni, care to explain more about it?

Look, most of us have no idea if Global Warming is real or not because of the false data.. and there is a ton of false data that has been put forth.

What we do KNOW and everyone with half a brain KNOWS including the crazy die hard environmentalist and conservatives alike is that the CARBON CREDIT SCAM is a scam. The biggest most costly scam in history to enrich wall street traders and the financial sector.. not to mention has FAILED everywhere it has been implemented... but that of course is the idea, to implement the largest taxes in history and NEVER solve the problem, less we loose the tax.... get it? The rest of us do.

None of the climate models have been right. There is no proof that all of this disaster is going to happen except the "speculation" and "computer models" based on false or fudged data given to us by the people who stand to make enormous profit from pushing this speculation.

And the primary push for Pro Global Warming arguments is based on implementing the CARBON CREDIT SCAM.

Watch This: The Story of Cap & Trade... FROM the FAR LEFT. They even know CAP & TRADE is a bogus SCAM. Seriously, watch the vid, the explanation is in the beginning and will only take 5 mins of your time... and it is well worth it because these Lefties are right on the money describing the scam for what it is.
links.org.au...



[edit on 11-1-2010 by infolurker]

reply to post by DizzyDayDream


I took a beginner course to Earth Atmospheric Sciences in my last fall term; I decided to take it as one of my science electives for my bachelor of arts degree.

It was all about the natural processes and cycles of Earth: Rock cycles, carbon cycles, nitrogen cycles, fossil fuels, earthquakes, volcanoes, ice ages, the sun, the oceans and ocean currents, plate tectonics and human impact on the environment were all topics we studied.

One of labs I did focused entirely on human impact on the environment; one experiment we did had to do with filling 2 cups full of water; 1 cup was black/blue, and the other was white(representing the ocean) and placing them in front of a light (representing the sun). We left them there and took temperatures to find out that the blue cup's water had a temperature of almost twice the same degree as the white one. This was supposed to represent how the ocean absorbs more heat energy than ice; hence the idea of positive feedback (where changes to a system causes amplifications of the same effect to the same system).

We then took temperature charts of the earth's temperature of the last 25 years, and used math to predict what the temperature would be in 25/50 years from now. Of course it was all speculation, but nonetheless it was a little scary.

One cool thing I learned about global warming was that it also produces a negative feedback (where the system tends to balance itself out): An increase in global temperatures means an increase in evaporation, which causes more cloud formation. Clouds are white, and like ice, they reflect sunlight back into space. Although the clouds come no where near to compensating for the lost ice, it is interesting to note that there are some positive feedbacks that occur from global warming.

All in all it was a pretty interesting class; definitely an area of study I would pursue if I wasn't so interested in philosophy and political science.

reply to post by infolurker


Global warming is a fact my friend; the facts are irrefutable: The temperature is rising and the ice caps are melting, which are going to increase the temperature even more.

The only debatable thing about global warming is what is causing it? Climategate seems to shed doubts on the idea that it is carbon dioxide, which, as you said, is the main source of taxation and economic focus.

However there are many other ideas as to why the earth is warming up: It could just be a natural process, it could be due to a combination of many greenhouse gases, including CO2 AND Methane. It could be the sun is getting hotter, the solar system itself could be passing through some kind of highly energized area of our galaxy; the reasons could be limitless, and I have a feeling that we really have no idea as to what the whole factual reason behind global warming is.

Good luck with the rational debate. There are fanatics on both sides, and that's why there will never be progress. Very few polarized issues ever manage to meet in the middle ground. That's the nature of humans unfortunately.

Personally, I think there are holes in both sides of the argument as are there liars with no other motivation than personal gain (which has many manifestations) through their own agendas.

For instance, if there was no subterfuge, "Global Warming" wouldn't have been re-dubbed as the more ambiguous "Climate Change". What's up with that?

In any case, I'm happy to sit in the middle until either side can produce irrefutable evidence that cannot be debunked. At the moment, that clearly is not the case!

IRM

Okay, lets make this real easy to understand. In bullet point format.

-The Earth has gone in and out of ice ages, regularly, long before mankind existed on this planet.

-We have no idea why.

-Pollution is bad for the environment.

-The NWO is using a lot of utter tripe, and fudged numbers, and propaganda to convince people that we need this carbon credit system. In reality it will do absolutely nothing to "save the planet", but it will enslave us all, and fund the birth of a one world communist government.

-Ice ages are bad.

-The opposite of an Ice age is the interglacial period. Which thankfully we are in now. When we go back to another ice age, agriculture becomes more difficult. People starve to death. So basically, global warming is actually good. It is much better than an Ice age.

-We are along for the ride at this point, and no matter how much CO2 we pump into the atmosphere, mother nature will do as she pleases.

So in conclusion, we should take care of our planet, so our kids have fresh air to breath and clean water to drink. We should not however be taxed into slavery for breathing. And we should not give away our national sovereignty to a UN sponsored climate police force that has godlike powers to tell you how to run your business.

Oh, and I already started a thread for some rational debate on this matter.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 11-1-2010 by downtown436]

Yeah I feel a bit responsible since I got Al Gore on his whole global warming schtick back in 2000:

naturalresonancerevolution.blogspot.com...

reply to post by DizzyDayDream

Originally posted by infolurker
Look, most of us have no idea if Global Warming is real or not because of the false data.. and there is a ton of false data that has been put forth.

What we do KNOW and everyone with half a brain KNOWS including the crazy die hard environmentalist and conservatives alike is that the CARBON CREDIT SCAM is a scam. The biggest most costly scam in history to enrich wall street traders and the financial sector.. not to mention has FAILED everywhere it has been implemented... but that of course is the idea, to implement the largest taxes in history and NEVER solve the problem, less we loose the tax.... get it? The rest of us do.

None of the climate models have been right. There is no proof that all of this disaster is going to happen except the "speculation" and "computer models" based on false or fudged data given to us by the people who stand to make enormous profit from pushing this speculation.

And the primary push for Pro Global Warming arguments is based on implementing the CARBON CREDIT SCAM.

Watch This: The Story of Cap & Trade... FROM the FAR LEFT. They even know CAP & TRADE is a bogus SCAM. Seriously, watch the vid, the explanation is in the beginning and will only take 5 mins of your time... and it is well worth it because these Lefties are right on the money describing the scam for what it is.
links.org.au...



[edit on 11-1-2010 by infolurker]

So to add, the Debate Is Over! The Science is Settled! The CAP & TRADE SCAM Deniers can no longer even debate that Cap & Trade is not a scam. Usually when this is brought into the picture the GW crowd goes running for distractions.... because most of them still support the insane Cap & Trade scam. (mostly because they have no idea how much of a SCAM it really is.)

But now you have both the Left, The Right, and anyone not directly making a profit telling the truth about the carbon credit / cap and trade scam. Don't let them sucker you into supporting it because "they say" they are helping the environment... they are helping themselves at mine, yours, and everyone else's expense.

[edit on 11-1-2010 by infolurker]

reply to post by infolurker


Thank you for your post and that link... i just can't beleive how f''ked this whole situation is.

Okay, perhaps there is some legitimacy to the claims that this global warming issue has been manipulated for the benefit certain organisations, or individuals even.. how deep does this rabbit hole go?

But to be honest i always thought that whole carbon footprint thing was a huge joke anyway, even before climategate. Infact it made me sick to hear news headlines about the annual carbon footprints of whatever individuals the MSM was focusing on at that time. But that aside, this new tax thing does scare me a little. Not just because it clearly suits a hidden agenda (okay no so well hidden to us), also because it's become a massive distraction in peoples minds when they think about global warming or climate change. Have people actually forgotten about all the other messed up things we are doing to this planet, aside from carbon dioxide emmisions?

Thats where i get most frustrated i think. When a tiny aspect of a massive issue suddenly takes centre stage, and everything else is simply fogotten about. There is still the possablity we are contributing to global warming as Monts pointed out, but more so than that there has been a dangerous neglect of our other impacts on the enviroment.

Solutions:
www.abovetopsecret.com...
www.abovetopsecret.com...
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Just plain funny: www.youtube.com...

LOL...

reply to post by downtown436


ah downtown. i was wondering when you would post. Im glad you did too, some good bullets in point form. Im not sure about your aim though...was i the target?


Im already aware of what you posted thanks to infolurker though. He's informed me of the carbon tax scandal. Very messed up i agree. However, i think i should have made the intention of my thread a little clearer. It was to rebroaden the scope these debates, because i got the impression too many people had learned of climategate and interpreted that as the final nail in the coffin for the MMGW theory. Which i felt was a very dangerous reaction, because a lot of people associate climate change or global warming with Enviromentalism in general. And that for me is very messed up, because regardless of climate change, our enviroments is still being damaged without any regard for the consequences of that damage.

But anyway, i also wanted to apologise about my reaction when i fist came accross that link to your hilarious thread (yes i did read the whole thing in the end, great stuff.... bit scary too though... is sarcasm something that alien so many!?). But i hope you can see why i reacted in the way i did. I took it personally you see, as someone who actually cares about this planet, thinking your thread OP was launching an attack on enviromentalism in general, not realising who you were truly targetting. I see now though, and in hinsight like i said, great thread, and infact i welcome the link posted for it in this thread.. despite your true intention in posting....rational debate my ass! lol.

Anyway back on topic. Monts, thanks for that, seems like a very interesting area of study.

Given what i've learned as this thread progressed check out my edit to the two original threads. Changed the tone slightly, but still i emphasize how the enviroment has been neglected, but the climate seems to always be the centre of attention.

[edit on 12-1-2010 by DizzyDayDream]

[edit on 12-1-2010 by DizzyDayDream]

I can't help but think most of this debate is semantics of some kind or another.

I have always thought we as a species miss uses its home and resources. In the words of Agent Smith. We are a cancer out of control and out of balance with its ecology. The only species that can not sustain itself naturally.

Loss of habitat and depletion of resources seems more the immediate problem. Our rates of consumption and expansion are way out of proportion with any other organism.

The honey bee demise issue is a great indicator of how we are impacting the web we are a part of. Commercial fishing moratoriums, rain forest burnings, contamination of fresh water, desertification all signs that we are in trouble.

I was kinda upset when I read a news article about how polar bears are starting to cannibalize their young because they are starving to death. I can't buy that somewhow our actions are not tied to these trends.

Poalr bears, the USGS has estimated that their are 25,000 of them, so I presume they are eating too much of their own food supply.
posts/articles I have archived recently:-
Telegraph co.uk 'britain facing one of the coldest winters 100 years, experts predict.
daily tech, 'rapid growth spurt leaves amount of ice at levels seen 29 years ago'
daily tech, 'japanese report disputes human cause for global warming'
science daily 'no rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide fraction in past 160 years, new research finds'
daily tech, myth of consensus explodes'
mailonline 'could we be in for 30 years of global cooling?'
the australian 'climate facts to warm to'
mailonline 'the mini ice age starts here'
worldnetdaily' global cooling documented in last decade'
worldnetdaily, 'look who's erasing history of climate'
I think that is enough for now.

Originally posted by DizzyDayDream
...
Climategate has [c]hanged a lot, especially perspectives. One of which worries me more than anything else though; the association pepole are starting to make between enviromentalism and climate change, which i think is just dangerous.

For me, despite the lack of evidence to prove MMGW, there are massive amount of evidence to show we are having an impact on the global enviroment. Beware of the distinction im making between Climate and Enviroment though, two seperate things, but still closely related.

I applaud your intentions, but must take issue with your premise.

I think dt436 summed it up quite well, but if you expect reasoned debate, you must accept that fact that "environmentalism" and "anthropogenic global warming" are only peripherally related.

The former recognizes man's stewardship for his place in nature. The latter ascribes far greater powers to mankind than we warrant.

I believe that we should take every reasonable step to minimize our impact upon our local environs, over which we have significant influence, and sometimes, control. Water and air pollution are two factors within our immediate control that have equally immediate impact upon our health and well-being. We should focus much of our resources and ingenuity upon local preservation and remediation. This, of course includes our marine environment, which we are gradually turning into a global dumping ground.

This is not to say that I concede man's purported overriding ability to influence global conditions or climate. I also believe that Gaia, mother nature, or the Earth possesses remarkable resilience, tenacity and self-healing capacity, beyond our expectations or understanding.

Witness her reclamation of Chernobyl, Russia, or Prudhoe Bay, Alaska; areas we believed we'd destroyed, but which she is actively reclaiming in our absence.

Our influence is passing, at best. Our entire biomass can be fit into an area of less than 400 square miles (calculate it yourself, giving each of 8,000,000,000 people 2' X 1' of spaces). The biomass of the Antarctic spring krill bloom, of of insects, far outweigh that of mankind. We are truly insignificant in a global perspective.

That being said, while I believe we can have severe negative impact locally, any belief in AGW is the ultimate in hubris. Climate "Projections" based upon distorted or manipulated "data" are not so much supportive of a "scientific consensus" as they are of overriding agendas for control of the masses by the few, and for fearmongering by the "keepers of the data," whatever their motivations.

When you look at the AGW "consensus," none of its advocates propose local or short-term measures as remediation or mitigation. Rather, they speak of calamitous consequences absent a surrender of national or global autonomy and self-determination.

I have complete faith in my fellow man. Not so much in mankind.

jw

I really don't understand how global warming is the only problem that people are focusing on right now. I don't even think that global warming is even close to being the biggest environmental threat.

I do - it is called scaremongering.

Who? Politicians/big business/environmentalists.

Why? Money.

Look up pollution in India and China, and the effects on the local populations.

Which is worse? CO2, or poisonous chemicals that result in rivers of froth (India) and of Mercury and other nasty stuff in the Yellow River in China, that leads to blindness, birth defects and even death every year?

Thing is - there is no money in cleaning up the environment. There is money in Cap and Trade and taxes though.