An Inconvenient Truth

<p>why would you ever listen to some one who claimed they invented the internet?</p>

<p>Right...now, where were we? Ah, yes, Hitler. Because global warming is HIS fault. whew. Glad we got that one settled. Now, please move on with your lives...</p>

<p>in any case global warming was clearly caused by humans.
becaues of the precipitous decline of pirates from the 19th century onwards....</p>

<p>I'm pretty sure Al Gore didn't say he invented the internet.</p>

<p>"why would you ever listen to some one who claimed they invented the internet?"</p>

<p>Have you even considered that the X-Veep might be a superhero? Like Batman or Wonderwoman? That's the rumor.</p>

<p>I just wanted to chime in and thank Shang for making a thread about a movie everyone should watch. I've seen it and An Inconvenient Truth is wonderful and inspiring. I don't think anyone should critisize a movie that they haven't seen.</p>

<p>Shag - Let's make a deal. I will re-watch An Inconvenient Truth, in its entirety, with a completely open mind...</p>

<p>BUT...</p>

<p>You have to do the same with this: <a href="http://www.guba.com/watch/2000760169?duration_step=0&fields=7&mst=63&pp=40&premium=0&query=cbc&sb=5&sf=0&size_step=0&o=14%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.guba.com/watch/2000760169?duration_step=0&fields=7&mst=63&pp=40&premium=0&query=cbc&sb=5&sf=0&size_step=0&o=14&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p>

<p>When you're done, you can comeback and retract your position on global warming.</p>

<p>Cool documentary, Chris C2! Looks like this thread is finally getting back on track.</p>

<p>I'm reposting this since it got buried a few pages ago and feel like sharing again...</p>

<p>put me firmly in the "global warming as junk science" camp. i did two papers on this very topic for two classes last summer (extinction theory and oral communication), and have come to the conclusion that all this hyseria is just that...hysteria.</p>

<p>yes the world is getting warmer, but that trend has been going on for over a thousand years. antarctica is not melting, its getting larger and thicker. the calving of ice videos that gore likes to show is completely normal as the ice expands into warmer waters and falls off.</p>

<p>if anyone had any understanding about what the greenhouse effect really was, you would notice that the majority (>90%) of greenhouse gases are natural like water vapor, and that human contributions have been negligible given the sheer enormity and complexity of global climate.</p>

<p>no climate prediction given has ever been "proven" accurate. a prediction cant be true because it hasnt happened yet. we cant predict whether it will rain or not two hours from now, how the hell can we claim to know what will happen in a thousand years? climate and weather forecasting is a risky and vague area, and does not lend credence to any claims of "global warming"</p>

<p>i somehow doubt anyone is going to be in much of a rush to buy a hybrid car, start hugging trees, or change their lifestyle out of fear of global warming.</p>

<p>i dont have a problem with the issue of global warming. i respect it for what it is: a theory. what i do have a problem with is those who would use it to further their own causes whether political (katrina is bush's fault!), economic, or personal, and those who would put the "planet" and "environment" over basic human rights and needs.</p>

<p>in my opinion, legislation and politics based on global warming theory (ie: kyoto) will prove to be more detrimental to the world economy and developing countries that any potential benefit that we will never truly see if we "prevented" it from happening in the first place.</p>

<p>there is no purely "beneficial" action. someone will always suffer for the "good" of the whole. example: banning CFCs to save the ozone. (there remains a great deal of dispute over how strong the correlation is). the ban on CFC's eliminated cheap refrigeration, making it more difficult for third world countries and developing nations and leading to increased famine and starvation.</p>

<p>another example: banning DDT. again the correlation between DDT and cancer was shaky, and its ban lead to a surge in malaria cases and millions of deaths/year:</p>

<p>"To only a few chemicals does man owe as great a debt as to DDT... In little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million human deaths, due to malaria, that otherwise would have been inevitable."</p>

<p>[National Academy of Sciences, Committee on Research in the Life Sciences of the Committee on Science and Public Policy. 1970. The Life Sciences; Recent Progress and Application to Human Affairs; The World of Biological Research; Requirements for the Future.]</p>

<p>once again, there is no action without consequence, good or bad.</p>

<p>The argument begins and ends right here: In 1850, right around when we first started officially recording temperatures, the Earth was at its coolest in the past 8,000 years. Is it really a surprise that Earth is getting progressively warmer when we're using the coolest point in the past 8,000 years as a reference point?</p>

<p>
[quote]
yes the world is getting warmer, but that trend has been going on for over a thousand years.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>like the IPCC graph i displayed before, the temperature rise in the last 30 years is significantly more pronounced than that of the last 300 years, and does not correlate to any natural terrestrial or extraterrestrial process.
such a surge is never seen in any geological cycle, and thus isolates the source of the warming upon human processes.</p>

<p>
[quote]
there is no purely "beneficial" action.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>bull**** argument. by extension we should have never settled the Americas, become an agricultural society, or believed in Newton's laws of gravity.
of course there is no action with consequence. nobody here rejected that basic fact of life.</p>

<p>the necessity of consequence does not allow us to convenience ourselves by doing nothing.</p>

<p>this is why al gore named his movie "an inconvenient truth." of course, it is a piece of media, and thus holds in itself exagerations and falsehoods. this does not, however, allow us to simply ignore the issue and dismiss the gist of the movie, which I see MANY people doing here.</p>

<p>Xe - Either watch the documentary I linked earlier on this page, or, simply put, shutup.</p>

<p>regardless of the imminent (on non-imminent) impact of global warming, it is advisable to still do what we can to reduce pollution. it's not wise to crap all over the environment just because doing so doesn't have immediately visible effects. as xe stated, we can't just ignore the issues of the movie, even if some of its points are exaggerated. i mean, fahrenheit 9/11 was exaggerated propaganda, and yet held a few valid points about the horrors of the war in iraq... even if it was blown slightly out of proportion.</p>

<p>"When you're done, you can comeback and retract your position on global warming."</p>

<p>Spoken like a person with an open mind.</p>

<p>Here's the very simplified way I see the arguments:</p>

<p>Those who believe in global warming believe so because of data, research, logic.</p>

<p>Those opposed say that the data is inconclusive.</p>

<p>Even if the data is inconclusive (because, after all, we <em>can't</em> know what's going to happen in the future--most any prediction can be said to be inconclusive) should we not take great precautions against what could happen? I haven't seen the movie, but I get the vibe that it uses shock and awe tactics. The movie isn't a scientific study so criticizing what you see to be exaggerations made in the movie is fruitless in my opinion. Do you think Al Gore's message would have gotten across to the extent that it did if he didn't purport that catastrophic consequences would be the result of a world that ignores the possibility of global warming.</p>

<p>To me, reason suggests that everything we have done to the planet would increase the temperature. Maybe this is where the problem lies--that reason suggests humans are increasing the earth's temperature, but the evidence does not. I resent that people call global warming junk science simply because there is more evidence suggesting human actions are increasing global temperatures than that global warming is in itself junk science. </p>

<p>I think I recall reading somewhere that particulates or greenhouse gases take a decade or more to reach the upper levels of the atmosphere, which is where they must be to actually increase the temperature. What if the warming of the planet has a delayed effect of a few years to a few decades. (Sorry, I don't know much about the science behind global warming so hopefully I'm not mistaken in thinking that it may take awhile to see the results of increased greenhouse gases.) I can't help but think that we will all agree on this issue that we wish we'd "only known" if this were the case. That is why global warming seems to be a real concern for me.</p>

<p>There's plenty of evidence in that documentary that I linked above...</p>

<p>Taking a stance against the politicized agenda of global warming as we see it today is not going against all kinds of environmental controls. I can be against the death penalty but still advocate crime prevention.</p>

<p>Yes, we all need to respect and conserve the environment. We should all reduce reuse and recycle, and, if you can afford it, drive a hybrid. But is the cost of legislation and action in the name of preventing global warming worth the cost when we dont know if its true or not?</p>

<p>exactly what precautions would decrease the level of greenhouse gases or slow the rise in global temperature? kyoto? controlling emmision levels? driving hybrids? i'm not saying we should completely ignore environmental issues, and i admire what gore is trying to say with his movie, but i dont see anyone coming forward with any feasible or fair solutions.</p>

<p>of course if florida is underwater in 50 years ill gladly submit to the "if only we had done something" camp.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Xe - Either watch the documentary I linked earlier on this page, or, simply put, shutup.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>haha, your open-mindedness simply amazes me.
looks like you don't have much else to support your shaky defense.
in any case, the link is down.</p>

<p>Chris:</p>

<p>In the link you provided, the consensus to me seemed to be that the IPCC made conclusions too hastily. I don't recall anyone actually saying that human actions did not affect global temperatures at all. The documentary didn't prove anything for me, it simply showed the evidence that global warming as a result of human actions isn't as severe as some people say. The question becomes how much of the increase in temperature in the last 150 years can be attributed to humans? This seems to be the crux on the argument over global warming and the answer seems to be that humans have affected the temperature somewhat, but that the majority of the change in temperature can be attributed to natural cycles.</p>

<p>pb32:</p>

<p>I agree with you that we should not compromise the quality of life for millions of people over science that isn't (yet?) definitive fact. At the same time, there are certain things we should or shouldn't do "just in case."</p>

<p>I think at the very least one has to acknowledge that it is possible that human actions have (or will) increased global temperatures somewhat and that an increase in global temperatures could be devastating.</p>

<p>if your documentary was meant to discredit the IPCC, i find that a bit too conspiratorial for me. The IPCC is supported by 98.5% of scientists; only a small vocal majority claim that it is too biased.
in any case, graphs are data. Any sort of bias for the IPCC would be resident in their conclusions. I drew my own conclusions from the temperature graph, and it is scientifically sound.</p>

<p>I do not doubt that humans are not alone. Maybe they account for perhaps only a third of what we have seen in terms of global temperature rise. Perhaps the natural processes are providing a majority of this changeThe point is that global warming, no matter how natural or unnatural, is threatening to inundate 15% of the global landmass, melt all of the worlds glaciers (a significant source of fresh water), displacing millions of people from their homes, and causing all sorts of other inconveniences that we must answer to within the next half century</p>

<p>The real question is: What should we do about it?
We have a responsibility to minimize the role we have in global warming.</p>

<p>any costs that we can avoid now (not signing emissions treaties, conitnuing to use fossil fuels instead of funding research in other renewables, etc) will be more than doubled and doubled again later when we realize that half of the worlds ports will have to be relocated and rebuilt, millions of people must rebild their homes on higher ground, and more facilities for the desalinization of water have to be constructed to combat the loss of freshwater contained in ice around the globe.</p>

<p>And if our climate cooling triggers an end to our little window of warm weather in the 1.8 million year old ice age that we are in?</p>