washtimes.com — Sen. James M. Inhofe, in one of his final actions as chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, yesterday held a hearing to investigate whether press accounts have "over-hyped" predictions of global warming. Boxer promises extensive hearings on global warming, & yesterday chastised Mr. Inhofe for scrutinizing global-warming coverage.
Dec 7, 2006 View in Crawl 4
zunipusDec 8, 2006
Let's get down to the bone here. Inhofe is an ignorant oaf who only blethers on because reality will damage the value of his and his neo-con job crony pals' stock portfolios. Short term profit is the only goal in their mind. Let the long term reality be damned. Witness the Federal deficit. Forget the future, spend now, spend stupid, spend recklessly. The same goes for correcting the mess we humans leave at our backsides as we trot around the Earth doing what we like without being mature enough as a species to take responsibility for the results.I see no possibility of our species waking up to the point of actually solving its impending problems. What I see is more Inhofe dopes trashing science until their coastline home is under water. Then hear them complain!I also see the likelihood that our species will, after the fact, realize what a hopeless dump we have made of our only home, the Earth, and go into a collective depression. At that point mankind won't care any more. That's when the lunatics take over the asylum. And you thought the madmen of the 20th century, and George W. Bush were whack jobs?Meanwhile, over in the Green camp: There is nothing more challenging than being a 'Casandra'. She was the princess of Troy who predicted its downfall in Homer's Iliad. It didn't matter that she was quite detailed, level-headed and assertive in her prediction. Not a soul paid her any heed. And Troy fell to the Greeks. Prescience can be a curse. Knowing what is coming down the road, bad news from the future, how is one supposed to respond? Scientists do their best to be rational in their collection of data, analysis and conclusions. They are the most reliable voices of reason in these situations. The worst trouble from the Greens comes from those who become emotional. They are the prime target of the Luddites who will never face what's coming without a fight, a smear campaign, or outright lying. 'Controversy' ensues and the facts of the matter become obscured. The Luddites win, the future arrives, the Luddites drown in their own stupidity, the futurists get to say 'I told you so', and people like me shake their heads in sadness, realizing that their cynicism regarding mankind was well-founded.Despite all the negativity, I believe the most important thing any one person can do is to find something positive that they themselves can do, in their small local world, to help the situation. And after they learn to help themselves they are prepared to then help others. I believe that even in the midst of the collapse of Western Civilization (which the Bush League is certainly hurrying along) we can all find aspects of life worth living, good aspects of mankind worth valuing, respect for our planet worth learning. In order to survive, our species has to WANT to survive.
simpleblobDec 8, 2006
I think some arguments for Global Warming is hilarious.From what I have read here, some of you tried to convince others by reasoning that Global Warming is "true" because it has "a scientific consensus"? (ie. 99% of scientists believe in global warming)WTF is that? Since when does science become a congress -- Voting on which issues are real and which are not?This is precisely why the earth used to be flat.The supporters of Global Warming should do some further research and make a more valid argument. (Maybe linking to some reliable scientific journals?) (BTW, I'm still investigating so I am taking an "agnostic" stance about this issues)
repinsDec 8, 2006
The gas that contributes most to the green house effect is WATER VAPOR, and humans do not applicable effect the amount of water vapor in the air. CO2 only represents 0.0360% while water vapor can be as high as 4% Has anyone measured the amount of water vapor in the air over the same period? If CO2 emissions have increased in concentration by 25% how much has water vapor changed? It would take a much smaller movement in the concentration of water vapor to completely overwhelm any change in CO2read the wikki<a class="user" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas</a>
redstateDec 8, 2006Submitter
Global warming attacks as a Chill Grips America<a class="user" href="http://vortex.plymouth.edu/uschill.gif">http://vortex.plymouth.edu/uschill.gif</a>Confused yet?Between1998 & 2005 Global temperatue was Flat (no change) although CO2 was still pumped into the atmosphere at record rates..hm?Now NASA & Russian Academy of Sciences believe that there is a downturn coming in the energy from the sun which will produce a 50 - 60 year ice age.<a class="user" href="http://science.monstersandcritics.com/news/printer_1225169.php">http://science.monstersandcritics.com/news/printer_1225169.php</a>Dr. Bob Carter of James Cook University says you can't change the climate, you can only adapt to it while it changes.<a class="user" href="http://www.climatechangeissues.com/files/PDF/conf05carter.pdf">http://www.climatechangeissues.com/files/PDF/conf05carter.pdf</a>
47f0Dec 8, 2006
Why don't you get this? Water vapor is an amplifier in the circuit. Warmer air holds more water vapor, which is an even better reason not to warm the atmosphere. Was your high-school science class scheduled too early in the morning?
repinsDec 8, 2006
Does Water Vapor follow a rise or proceed the rise? if the air is at 4% water vapor and it goes to 4.1% the effect would be an order of magnitude worse that a 25% rise in the CO2 levels because CO2 is 360 ppm of the atmosphere and water vapor is 40,000 ppm. Plus all the measured increase in CO2 levels reported are from a single set of ice cores and a single monitoring station, the data set is not large enough. What is the CO2 level globally not just at one place, the atmosphere is constantly mixing and variable.You can make all the claims you want, but show me proof that CO2 has a greater impact on global warming that water vapor, then i will listen to you.Could it be that there is no way we as humans can do anything about the amout of water vapor and so they pick CO2 and claim that it has the most effect to make people afraid.
arrheniusDec 8, 2006
Water vapor follows and amplifies the rise. Looking at raw concentrations is a starting point, but you also have to consider that different substances have different efficiencies as a GHG. Another poster made the mistake in the opposite direction - hyping methane as a GHG even though its concentration is much lower than CO2. (Methane does have a total effect that's enough to notice, but its less than CO2).Did you notice the following line in the Wikipedia article - "human activity does not directly affect water vapor concentrations" ? That's due to the ocean (main source of the water vapor) and precipitation (sink of the water vapor). If you magically removed all the water vapor from the atmosphere, it would be quickly replenished by ocean evaporation and CO2 would be unchanged. If you magically removed all the CO2 from the atmosphere, the effect would last much, much longer and water vapor levels would be lowered by the subsequent cooling.
knightmareincDec 9, 2006
How about the huge spike of co2 much higher than anything seen in 400k years which just happens to be after the industrial revolution?Or how about the pattern of higher co2 = higher temps in the last 400k years?
tehnicoDec 11, 2006
@ Muyoso,That article has already been dubunked.
joachJan 20, 2007
Global Warming is certainly not "over-hyped"! It might not be of deadly consequences for our generation, just shake up the weather a little bit. But we need to remember that more greenhouse gases are emitted year after year. In a few decades time we will be facing what scientists call the point of no return. You can read more what this is about at <a class="user" href="http://www.healingday.org/vision.html">http://www.healingday.org/vision.html</a>