Thursday, May 25, 2006

Global Warming on Slate

Not much time to write today. But there's a good article on Global Warming over at Slate Magazine. Good ammo for when you meet a anti-Kyoto kook at a cocktail party.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Of course Al Gore is right, after all he invented the internet.

Anonymous said...

Global warming is an inevitable process. The Earth goes through a cyclical process in which it cools (hence the ice age) then warms up again over and over again. It’s similar to that of the polarization and reverse polarization of the Earth’s core except that magnetic field does so more rapidly.

I think all the finger point should stop whether it’s being directed towards big oil or world governments. If people are pointlessly worried, engineers at car manufacturing companies are already working on methods in reduction emissions period from automobiles. We may be accelerating it but we're not the cause.

There are millions of different factors contributing to why CO2 levels are so high, it's not just emission. For example, rapid urbanization causes deforestation and that leads to less plants absorbing CO2 gas.

Anonymous said...

Come on wom, don't most of the records indicate a warming trend over a short period of time when the warming/cooling cycle is over a long period?

All I have to say about fuel efficiency is that my 1974 Volvo got 23 MPG new and the new Volvo S40 gets 24MPG-virtually no difference in over 30 years of 'improved' technology. If they can put a microchip in a cell and send a man to space, what's the hold up on a truly efficient engine?

bigcitylib said...

Remember though in the late 70s? early 80s? when the VW rabbit was getting 50 mph. Those advances were allowed to erode in the years of cheap oil after the crisis of the 70s.

Anonymous said...

Yes, God bless Ronald Reagan and his Jelly Belly eating soul...

Anonymous said...

Kyoto is as dead as socialism.

Author is the head of "grist.org, so maybe just a wee bit one sided

google this for a laugh

"grist.org" + "funding sources"

Anonymous said...

In the late 1960s and 70s we had a string of colder than normal years. Most climate scientists were of one voice back then too, except it was 'global cooling' they were hand ringing over. "The next ice age is coming" they cried, "we're over due" they assured. Governments called for 'studies' on global cooling and the grant money flowed like water. Australian realestate shot up, schemes to combat the coming ice age abounded, one I remember called for coating the ice caps with coal dust to prevent sunlight from being reflected back into space.

Fast forward a generation and we see a similar 'group think' at work . Weather human activity is responsible for all, some, or none of the warmer temps experienced in recent years, one thing is certain: Kyoto will do nothing to reduce CO2 emissions. The fastest growing emitters (China etc) are not bound and will never let themselves be bound. The de-industrialized countries of the former Soviet Union will profit from the sale of 'carbon credits' to the west. This was the only ' Kyoto plan' the Liberals ever had, spend hundreds of millions buying carbon credits.

Anonymous said...

Maybe we will adopt the "Made In Alberta" solution where companies can follow voluntary emmission standards that a genius like Lorne Taylor pulled from the sky and implement them, if they wanna. As we all know, there's nothing more important to oil companies than the environment.

bigcitylib said...

I think I will write a post on the whole "global cooling" meme. But, briefly, for a short time in the 1970s, a conjecture was put forward by the climate scientists of the time that temperatures might be headed downwards, perhaps (I don't remember the details) because of pollutants reflecting sunlight. The conjecture was rejected as more evidence was gathered. A simple case of science progressing.

Global warming was put forward as a serious theory of what was happening to the planet in the late 1980s. Since then the evidence for it has accumulated. Again, science progressing.

To use the whole global cooling theory as a means of refuting global warming is like refuting the theory that the Earth circles the sun by pointing out the fact that scientists once believed that the Sun circled the Earth, so they're probably wrong this time too.