What is Digg?Sponsored by Sony Pictures
Watch a scene from 2012, in theaters November 13 view!
whowillsurvive2012.com - Get ready for the biggest event in history - the end of time. How will you survive? 2012- opening 11/13
455 Comments
- Alchemist11, on 01/27/2009, -28/+194Just because it may not be reversable doesn't mean we should continue polluting when it's pretty easy not to.
- geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -29/+80'Tis a sad day when it's proposed that ignoring the world's top climate scientists is "getting your head out of the sand."
You may be surprised to learn that modern science is well aware of this "ICE AGE" thing you speak of.
It's time to put away the tinfoil hats and get to work, folks. - jehan60188, on 01/27/2009, -13/+61also, oilspills are not bad, that oil was around for millions of years, humans just put it in a different place. if animals can't adapt, then they should go extinct!
- JasPruett, on 01/27/2009, -69/+114I agree that we should stop polluting, but we should also consider the possibility that this is just a natural cycle and that the weather may get worse over the next few thousand years no matter what we do.
- inactive, on 01/27/2009, -14/+59By that logic, there's no such thing as pollution.
- 07dcolem, on 01/27/2009, -114/+158Get your heads out of the sand. There is no such thing as global warming. This is earth's natural cycle. How do you explain the ICE AGE. We are probably expediting the warming of our planet by polluting, but it's inevitable that something drastic will happen eventually.
- nem0, on 01/27/2009, -10/+54That's like asking "Why should I take care of my body? I'm going to die anyway."
- ZakColeman, on 01/27/2009, -86/+130Woa! Really?! No way - oh wait its called environmental cycling - ITS BEEN HAPPENING SINCE EARTH WAS FORMED! GET OVER IT!
- wrathchilde, on 01/27/2009, -33/+74"...but we should also consider the possibility that this is just a natural cycle"
What do you mean "we"? Because this possibility has been considered, by many, and the preponderance of evidence suggests that humans have influenced the observed changes.
Now, if by "we" you mean people who disagree with the conclusions of the scientific community, feel free to do so. However, equal weight to your conclusions will not be given without equivalent scrutiny of your evidence. Please feel free to provide references. - WasabiBomb, on 01/27/2009, -10/+47Cyanide is not a poison. It was here long before humans and it will be here long after we're gone.
- natters, on 01/27/2009, -14/+47I totally agree. It may not fix the problem tomorrow, but it's important to limit carbon emissions asap.
- tsaylor, on 01/27/2009, -13/+45I think I agree with what you mean, but do you realize you said
1) there is no such thing as global warming,
2) the globe is warming, due to a natural process, and
3) humans are contributing to the warming of the globe.
If that's not global warming, I don't know what is. I think what you mean is that anthropogenic global warming is negligible, if it exists at all. - Diggrock, on 01/27/2009, -7/+38@ 07dcolem: he ignorance in your comment is astounding. Do you actually believe that you are the first person to realize that the earth goes through a natural heating and cooling cycle? Or that all of the climatologists that study this for a living just forgot about this fact? It is known that this process happens, and we can tell from ice samples in the antarctic that this has a direct correlation with the CO2 in the atmosphere. It follows a pretty direct pattern for the past 600,000 years, which is as far as we can measure.
The planet is used to these cycles. They happen slowly enough for it to adapt. Unfortunately, our current CO2 readings are drastically different than before. They are much higher than have ever been observed, and the rise correlates perfectly with the burning of fossil fuels around the industrial revolution. Don't believe me? look at this graph
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c ...
We are polluting too quickly. The earth may not be able to adapt. This is not the natural cycle. - inactive, on 01/27/2009, -4/+32It's the argument that it's not pollution because it's naturally occurring. It's really damn near impossible to find any chemical that doesn't occur in nature somewhere, so I can only conclude that no chemical can be considered pollution.
- twigzz, on 01/27/2009, -7/+33I thought we established that it was irreversible a long time ago.
- sethworld, on 01/27/2009, -27/+52Thanks for saying that. I had this theory years ago and people just don't seem to get it. The Glaciers and ice caps melting are just signs the ice have is officially over. Yes, humans my have accelerated the process a bit, but the ice would of melted with or without us. Our only concern should be to maintain clean air, soil and water. Try to minimize our destruction of wildlife habitats. To ensure our survival on the planet. Stopping the ebb and flow of the Earth's climate is not within our power, nor should it be.
- fastguyrules, on 01/27/2009, -5/+30NPR is a more credible source than any mass media establishment in this country.
- r0g3r, on 01/27/2009, -8/+27You should play with some Uranium. It's been here long before humans.
- AndrewMoyer, on 01/27/2009, -13/+32We should also consider that space pirates could be to blame for this rise in temperature...
...or maybe it's Jesus trying to warm things up a bit so he'll be comfortable walking around in sandals again.
/s
Or maybe when you increase the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, it holds more ***** heat.
Maybe it's the result of a natural process that would have occurred without the influence of man, but we sure as hell have been producing our fair share of the CO2, and there isn't much evidence to suggest that it will ever start to decline on its own. - inactive, on 01/27/2009, -5/+22One word: balance. Anything becomes pollution when there is too much of it.
- richmondphotog, on 01/27/2009, -11/+28This is NOT the earths natural cycle. Its the rate of acceleration that is different. Those periods of heating and cooling were more gradual in the past. What does this mean if it happens in a historic blink of the eye? Who knows. But the one thing I do know is,... since when has putting ***** into our thin fragile atmosphere been a good thing? And who cares if it MIGHT be good? Is there another planet to go to if we ***** this one up?
- JaseFace, on 01/27/2009, -7/+23I don't think any of you even read the article, much less comprehended it. The study says that warming is due mostly to human influence, but that it is irreversible for the next 1,000 years. It provides no succor to those who would deny the reality of global warming.
- pagemap, on 01/27/2009, -7/+23Global warming is not irreversible, but merely difficult to reverse. Remember, if we can change our climate for the worse, it's possible to make it better again. The downside is that it's going to take a lot more work to clean things up compared to what it took to damage our climate in the first place.
- Alli3388, on 01/27/2009, -10/+25You nut sack. If you knew anything, you'd know that global warming causes some warm places to become colder and verystormy, cold places to become warmer, and so on. Glabal warming causes CLIMATE EXTREMES. It doesn't automatically make every place warmer, douche bag! Try reading about it before spewing that garbage.
- had3l, on 01/27/2009, -1/+16Well, it is reversible. It will just take thousands of years. Before people thought it would take "only" a few hundred to clean things up. For our generation though, it has always been irreversible.
- Tyrghast, on 01/27/2009, -4/+18There most certainly is a cycle of temperatures that swings wildly from hot to cold and back again, however it is highly likely humanity has accelerated the process. Therefore, it's up to us to be a little more responsible in the future. It may be to late in this stage of the cycle to change much, but as it is proof that our recklessness has taken a toll on the global equilibrium we need to be a little more self-conscious in the future.
- chompsky, on 01/27/2009, -1/+15'Get your heads out of the sand.'
This doesn't mean what you think it means, and you don't know nearly as much as you think you do. - Moisgreat, on 01/27/2009, -18/+32They always say that just before an Ice Age. You would think we would learn by now.
- L0C0loco, on 01/27/2009, -6/+20Dr. Solomon was on my Ph. D. thesis committee and I learned early on not to argue with her unless you had things well thought out. That won't stop me here (God, I hope she does not DIGG!). The assumption she/they is/are basing everything on is that we will never have the technology required to shorten the lifetime of CO2 in the oceans. 1000 years is a very long time when you consider how fast technology advances. It is not implausible for planetary scale terraforming to become a reality in 1000 years. In particular, I would like to draw attention to the possibility of electrolytically converting the dissolved CO2 in sea water to CaCO3 on a very large scale. The by-products would be fresh water (the shortage of which will be our next global crisis) and excess energy (hydrogen). A direct removal of the dissolved CO2 at a sufficient rate would shorten its lifetime (to something less than 1000 years), decrease the oceanic acidity, and allow the vast surface area of the oceans to interact with the CO2 in the atmosphere and lower its abundance there.
Science fiction? Maybe. But anything is possible given the desire and time to pursue it. A thousand years is a long time indeed. Wondering where all of the energy required to perform such a feat might come from? You'll have to wait for a future post/announcement. - geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -7/+20The notion that moving to clean energy sources will cripple the economy is false. Quite the opposite.
Also, you don't "let" technology develop, you develop it. - Ninh, on 01/27/2009, -25/+38Well in that case we shouldn't cripple our current economies with restrictions that won't do any good and just let technology develop a way to combat global warming over the next couple decades.
- geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -3/+16You are confusing "weather" and "climate." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate
- sigg14, on 01/27/2009, -3/+16what industries? America has not been an industrial nation for a long time. We produce nothing but debt
- SirBruce, on 01/27/2009, -1/+14That's what makes it so funny.
- geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -2/+14fastguyrules wins. This is true.
- pln2bz, on 01/28/2009, -4/+16Science by poll is truly the end of science. We should be analyzing evidence as best as we can ourselves and thinking about what's going on -- not just asking "the experts". By dismissing the scientists that disagree with conventional wisdom as fringe, we pass on an opportunity to test the very theory that we're talking about acting upon. That's a dangerous approach. Everybody needs to be heard out, and all worthwhile leads need to be pursued.
Let me explain to you something very important. Liquids, gases and solids are exceptionally rare in space. 99.999% of what we observe in space is matter within the plasma state. Here is your reference:
http://www.plasma-universe.com/index.php/99.999%25 ...
Think about that for a second: how you model the plasma's behavior in space is the most important factor, by far, in determining what your cosmology says. If you model the plasma as a fluid, as astrophysicists prefer to do, then your cosmology is gravity-based. The problem with this though is that plasmas conduct current with only 1% ionization. And not only that, but we have observed electromagnetic plasma structures with THEMIS connecting the Earth and the Sun. Here is your reference:
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/11dec_them ...
""The satellites have found evidence for magnetic ropes connecting Earth's upper atmosphere directly to the Sun," says Dave Sibeck, project scientist for the mission at the Goddard Space Flight Center. "We believe that solar wind particles flow in along these ropes, providing energy for geomagnetic storms and auroras."
A "magnetic rope" is a twisted bundle of magnetic fields organized much like the twisted hemp of a mariner's rope. Spacecraft have detected hints of these ropes before, but a single spacecraft is insufficient to map their 3D structure. THEMIS's five satellites were able to perform the feat."
Magnetic ropes are what you get with plasma when it conducts electricity within the laboratory. It's a product of the right-hand rule and these ropes are in fact called Birkeland Currents by laboratory plasma physicists.
Bear with me here. This is really friggin important.
What this means that, at least as far as the heliosphere is concerned (the bubble that surrounds the Sun, which extends out about 100x past Earth's orbit), the plasma is frequently observed to behave as an *electromagnetic* phenomenon. Not only that, but the solar wind that the Sun spits out is not a "wind" at all. What wind do you know of where the particles go faster and faster, the farther away they are from the source? In fact, the solar wind fails to appreciably decelerate even as it passes the orbits of the planets, all the way to the edge of the heliosphere (the bubble). If you want to model it as a fluid, you need to explain this. Thus far -- and it ain't for lack of tryin! -- nobody has been able to come up with a reasonable explanation for that. It's all really quite silly though because if you ask a plasma physicist how to accelerate positive ions, they will tell you to subject them to an electric field. In other words, if we are to believe the people who spend their time studying plasmas in the laboratory, in the absence of astrophysical dogma, they would tell you that the heliospheric plasmas appear to be electromagnetic. Not fluids.
But they should have already known that because the man who invented magnetohydrodynamics (MH), Hannes Alfven, and who received the Nobel Physics prize for that invention, disowned the way in which MH was being applied to astrophysical plasmas by astrophysicists within his acceptance speech. He actually called their use of MH "pseudo-pedegogical" (Google "hannes alfven pseudo-pedagogical" ...). They ignored him. That was 40 years ago!
Now, you probably already know this, but when you pass enough electricity through something, you can heat it up. You might have seen Mr Wizard cook up some hot dogs a long time ago.
Now, consider that we can also see planets and moons in our solar system whose temperature profiles appear to be completely impervious to the Sun's radiation. I would point specifically to both Uranus and Io. One would not be "guessing" if he said that the solar wind is responsible. We are closer to the Sun than those planets, so the Sun's radiation appears to us to be the dominant factor. But, it would be completely reasonable to assert that the Earth is being electrically heated by the Sun's solar wind just like Uranus and Io appear to be. In fact, here are your references:
V. Zubov et. al. Modeling of the Joule heating influence on the
circulation and ozone concentration in the middle atmosphere. Journal
of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics, Volume 67, Issues 1-2,
January 2005, Pages 155-162
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jastp.2004.07.024
L.N. Makarova et. al. Parameterization of the heating in the middle
stratosphere due to solar wind-induced electric currents. Journal of
Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics, Volume 66, Issues 13-14,
September 2004, Pages 1173-1177
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jastp.2004.05.008
Dig deeper, people. Deep, deep, deep. Question all assumptions. Don't trust the friggin polls of scientists!!!
http://www.thunderbolts.info - wrathchilde, on 01/27/2009, -8/+20Thank you for the reply, MrFunStuff, allow me to retort:
No one represents that all the scientists agree. In fact, only 97% of climatologists feel that climate change is, in part, caused by human activity: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/09011 ...
You see what I did there? I provided an independent way to verify the claim, that is a reference. When a statement is attributed to an individual, it is useful to supply a way to evaluate the context in which the statement was made. Your list of quotes has no source, so one is left to wonder if there is more to story than the sound bite. For example, perhaps our esteemed colleague, Dr. Allegre, continued his comment with "However, it seems from the evidence that anthropogenic activity is likely to be responsible for some of the observed changes". Without a reference, it is impossible to evaluate objectively. Also, it is helpful to stay on subject. I have no idea why you included a quote about mosquitos.
My point was, in part, that you are entitled to your opinion. However, the impact of that opinion will be evaluated based on the quality of the input that helped to create it.
A good example:
"Few challenges facing America and the world are more urgent than combating climate change. The science is beyond dispute and the facts are clear. Sea levels are rising, coastlines are shrinking; we've seen record drought, spreading famine, and storms that are growing stronger with each passing hurricane season. Climate change and our dependence on foreign oil, if left unaddressed, will continue to weaken our economy and threaten our national security."
That is a quote from our President. In my opinion, he has the benefit of very good advice from well-informed scientists. the quote can be found here: http://www.pri.org/science/environment/obama-clima ...
I have no way to evaluate the quality of your opinion, therefore, until more evidence is provided, I will continue to believe that the preponderance of evidence suggests that human activity has contributed to the current observations of climate change. - geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -3/+15Zach, as far as I know, the consequences of global warming would include entire ecologies collapsing, millions of lives lost, cities destroyed, etc.
The solutions disrupt old industries, create new ones, create infrastructure, and move jobs around. How horrible! - doctechnical, on 01/27/2009, -19/+31Don't worry, in four years he'll give us another four or five years. Lather, rinse, repeat, socialize.
- bjornski, on 01/27/2009, -1/+12@skipdog172
Yup. Too bad it took re-classifying fast food workers as "manufacturing" to keep those numbers up. - angryredplanet, on 01/28/2009, -3/+13Read. Learn.
Without a healthy environment, THERE IS NO ECONOMY. - sonoran, on 01/27/2009, -6/+16I think this points out a fact that ought to be obvious. Reducing and/or eliminating CO2 emissions is not enough, even ignoring the ocean heat sink, the natural carbon cycle is way too slow at remove CO2. We need to begin actively removing CO2 from the atmosphere. I know this is opposed by some environmentalists on the grounds that it will be seen as a offset that encourages further emissions, but I think we have to do it. The technology is not that difficult. It's the only thing that can get us to the CO2 levels we need to correct some of the heat issues that this article mentions.
- RoboHobo, on 01/27/2009, -3/+13Regardless of whether this story is complete BS or not, you clearly don't understand global warming. An especially cold winter aside, it is indisputable that the last 150 years or so have shown a significant increase in temperature. Significant on a global scale means changes measured in fractions of degree, which can translate into much more observable effects in the environment. I'm not a climate scientist, so I don't make any claims about the extent of these changes or about man's roll in bringing them about, but I do know enough to say that your Texas ice storm is not an intelligent rebuttal to the concerns raised.
- geoffp, on 01/27/2009, -1/+11LOL
- askantik, on 01/27/2009, -6/+15CO2 isn't the only greenhouse gas... Why doesn't anyone ever point this out? And nothing is irreversible, just for the record.
- had3l, on 01/27/2009, -26/+35phew, that's a relief - good to know all those scientists are wrong. It's nice that I came to digg and finally found out the truth in a random comment by someone with no authority in the issue.
- Specializedone, on 01/27/2009, -1/+10Quaint ... one digger telling another to die due to differing beliefs.
- inactive, on 01/27/2009, -7/+16in the words of the great bender "we are boned"
- AirRaven, on 01/27/2009, -1/+10When faced with such a coherent parent, what more does it warrant, may I ask?
When trolling, expect nothing else in return. - FeloniusMonkey, on 01/27/2009, -6/+15What ever happened to Bush's proposal that everyone should keep their refrigerator and freezer doors open between 5:30pm and 6pm every day? This didn't work?
-
Show 51 - 100 of 461 discussions
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is 