What are your thoughts and views on global warming?

This is a very hot issue at the moment and will be for the next 10 or so years, however global warming is only a theory and although it is most probably true. Anyway I am reading a book on it at the moment so I will be sure to post my views at a later stage.

I think it's real and happoning, I just don't agree we are completly to blame.
We are a factor yes, but there are others too.

Global warming... Hmm.. I do think there is things happening, my town is like, well the winters have been different. But then again, written history only goes back so far so maybe this is all about the natural cycle of things. Sure, I think humans do have an effect on this earth, I mean, it's bound to happen, all that exhaust fumes from your car don't exactly disappear does it? I think the planet may eventually right everything but then again, there might be one stupid idiodic human who will press that giant red button and BAM! oblivion is seconds later.

I could add more or less and actually make it see sense but it's 3:27am and I am finally getting tired.

I think people just like to pretend its not happening, so they can continue with their lifestyle.

I believe we are in a global warming cycle. The planet does go through such cycles periodically. As a species, I'm not convinced our activities have caused this rise, but they may contribute somewhat.

People look for simple solutions,and find it easy to believe that greenhouse gases from human activity are the cause, so undoing all such activity is the answer. I think that is wishful thinking.

This is a very hot issue

Hehe. Punlarious.

My understanding of global warming is that the earth gradually goes through warm and cool cycles and that the thickening of earth's atmosphere may have accelerated the process. I don't know though I'm not an expert.

Look at the bright side. Scientists say that at the worst, if the ice caps melted the sea level would only rise 57-64 feet. That's a disaster but its not the end of the world right? I also saw the theory of The Day After Tomorrow on Mega Disasters and apparently most scientists don't think it could really happen. So we're not going to end up in Water World.

People look for simple solutions,and find it easy to believe that greenhouse gases from human activity are the cause, so undoing all such activity is the answer. I think that is wishful thinking.

How is that wishful thinking?????

Because they think that if we could cut our greenhouse gas emissions, eveything would return to what it was before.

What are your thoughts and views on global warming?
I like it. In the south-east of England we've had milder winters and warmer summers than we tended to a few years ago. The water shortages are bad news, but I'm sure that can be addressed.

I like it. In the south-east of England we've had milder winters and warmer summers than we tended to a few years ago. The water shortages are bad news, but I'm sure that can be addressed.

We've had some harsh water shortages state side too. I can't drive by the local lake (Where our wtaer comes from) without noticing how little water there is in it. I hear Raleigh has it really bad. A few years back they needed to send water in trucks to keep it going.

We've had some harsh water shortages state side too. I can't drive by the local lake (Where our wtaer comes from) without noticing how little water there is in it. I hear Releigh has it really bad.
Parden my ignorance, where is Releigh? (Is that a typo for Raleigh, North Carolina, or somewhere different?)

Parden my ignorance, where is Releigh? (Is that a typo for Raleigh, North Carolina, or somewhere different?)

Raleigh, North Carolina sorry :rolleyes:

Raleigh, North Carolina sorry :rolleyes:
The only part of the US I've been to, spent a week there on business some years ago.

it's a fact of life we will have to adjust to... and, whether or not it's a natural occurrence that we couldn't have kept from happening, if steps aren't taken to lessen our species' impact on it, it will have its way with us, eventually...

political/commercial agendas make a mess of all that is real, allowing those who profit in some way to turn truth into doubt, or fiction and worse... the global warming football is no exception... but, at some point, the games will all be played out and mama nature will do her thing, regardless of what any of us 'ants' want/think/need...

Because they think that if we could cut our greenhouse gas emissions, eveything would return to what it was before.


Surely it's wishful thinking to assume its natural and continue polluting as before.

People look for simple solutions,and find it easy to believe that greenhouse gases from human activity are the cause, so undoing all such activity is the answer. I think that is wishful thinking.

As do I. I believe that our greenhouse gas emitions etc etc have some sort of impact on the whole global warming saga, but i also believe that it's something quite natural. What caused the ice age? It couldn't have been us, we didn't know much about technology back then. So surely it must have been a natural occurance. Is it so hard to believe that this is to, but mildly worsened because we all love our cars and computers so much?

Surely it's wishful thinking to assume its natural and continue polluting as before.

Indeed, this is true as well. It would be pretty stupid if we just kept on burning up gasses like there's no tomorrow (which there may not be :p), but again, it's also wishful thinking to assume that the situation will stop once we do stop polluting. We might alleviate a little bit of pressure but I dont really think we'll stop it all together.

Indeed, this is true as well. It would be pretty stupid if we just kept on burning up gasses like there's no tomorrow (which there may not be :p), but again, it's also wishful thinking to assume that the situation will stop once we do stop polluting. We might alleviate a little bit of pressure but I dont really think we'll stop it all together.

'Once we stop polluting' - do you know how difficult that will be. I mean the kyoto protocol is a joke. I really don't see pollution going down in my lifetime.

I mean the kyoto protocol is a joke.

I knew there was a reason th US didn't sign it. :p

I knew there was a reason th US didn't sign it. :p

well actually -i believe- Bill Clinton did, then along with the UK they lowered the original targets - but George Bush pulled out of it when he became president. But Global warming does need a global agreement, but just not the one they have just now, with no US, China or India, and not very challenging targets it's unlikely to do much.

'Once we stop polluting' - do you know how difficult that will be. I mean the kyoto protocol is a joke. I really don't see pollution going down in my lifetime.

Yes love, I know how difficult that will be. Preciscley why it's all founded on wishful thinking.

well actually -i believe- Bill Clinton did, then along with the UK they lowered the original targets - but George Bush pulled out of it when he became president. But Global warming does need a global agreement, but just not the one they have just now, with no US, China or India, and not very challenging targets it's unlikely to do much.

Clinton signed it or really wanted to, but Congress said if it came before them they would never support it. So it was never voted on and thus the US is not a signatory. And China and India do support Kyoto. Because they don't have to do anything. As developing countries the Western world pays them money even as they continue to do whatever they want.
Thats why Kyoto's a joke. Canada, some European countries, and a few other developed countries stupid enough to sign on do all the heavy lifting and destroy their economies by moving hundreds of billions to countries that produce 5 times as much pollution as they do.

As for Global Warming in general. Its one of the biggest, most useless frauds in history that has done more to hurt the environmental movement then nearly anything else.
Mars is suffering from global warming in the last decade. Its icecaps have retreated farther then Earths. Unless the Mars Rover is producing a lot of carbon dioxide this should be impossible following the ideas of the biggest proponents of global warming.
The sun is currently going through a particularly active phase right now, that coincidentally started about the time that temperatures started to rise. In the sixties and seventies when temperatures were cooling off, and people were worried about global cooling, the sun was not as active, having a lot more sunspots then solar flares.
From 1200ad to 1850 we actually had something called the little ice age. Priests in some mountainous areas of Europe held mass prayers, asking God to stop the glaciers from destroying pastures and fields. Witches were held accountable for the lengthening winters, and at about that time witch hunts started to become popular.
Look at the painting of Washington crossing the Delaware theres a lot of ice chunks on the river. There hasn't been anything like that in the last 150 or so years. And it couldn't be entirely artistic license for the painter to put that much ice on the river.
The world occasionally heats up and then it cools down.

Now here is why I call global warming a massive fraud, and an environmental disaster.
Right now the global warming activists want the first world to transfer 180 billion US dollars to various carbon credit companies and developing nations to counter act global warming.
Do you know who controls the biggest carbon credit companies? Al Gore, and the other big name global warming activists.
Where will most of the money go to. China, India, and a few other growing economic powerhouses.
Why?
Because they are developing countries, and can't be held responsible for any pollution they create. So these countries throw their money around and get support from various politicians and people who want to make money and gain popularity as environmentalists, hoping to get serious gains from environmental initiatives around the world that only help them.
Europe which is a big supporter of Kyoto, has a sweet deal in regards to Kyoto. There Carbon production is based on the individual country.
But their carbon credits can be shared throughout the European Union as if it was a single country. So France has a lot of nuclear reactors. They get excess carbon credits because of that. But they lose carbon credits from not having a lot of forests. Germany has excess carbon credits for having more forests but lose credits for their energy production. Since they are both in the E.U. they can swap the excess carbon credits with each other with none of the fees or annoyances that other countries suffer. They then go to Kyoto and say they have a zero balance emissions, and don't have to do one gosh darn thing.
Whereas if the US had signed on, and Canada which has signed on, don't have that deal. We have to cut back our industries to the bone to achieve the Kyoto goals, or in Canada's case, pay approximately 50 billion dollars to China to get the necessary carbon credits.
Do you see the problem here.

Now why is the global warming debate an environmental disaster?
Easy, its drawn focus away from everything else.
In Ontario, we use a lot of coal burning energy. Its not the cleanest, and it does produce a lot of harmful chemicals, and carbon dioxide. Now for a few million dollars, these plants can be made extremely clean. With the proper filters an entire day of energy production would create as much smoke as a few hundred cars.
Thats really, really good. It will help ease pressure on the environment, Ontario keeps producing electricity, and it buys us some time to create cleaner ways of producing energy.
The environmentally friendly government refused to do this. Why?
The filters wouldn't prevent carbon gases from entering the atmosphere.
Since it didn't stop global warming, it's considered useless.
Tens of billion dollars have been placed into initiatives to stop greenhouse gases (such as creating fuel from plants, which is actually a horribly bad idea). Tens of billions have been promised. And an unknown number of potentially useful projects have been stopped because they would produce greenhouse gases.
If this money had been placed into developing cleaner technology, cleaning up water supplies, reforestation, stopping soil erosion, building and protecting nature reserves, improving farming in poor countries to prevent the horribly wasteful agricultural practices used in Africa and South America, and countless other projects, the world would be a healthier place right now.
But all the attention is put on global warming, so if anyone says that maybe global warming should be secondary, they are shouted down, accused of working for the oil companies, and not caring about the future.
I'm really glad that global warming is now coming under fire. It needs to be desperately rethought before we do anything truly stupid and start destroying our way of life needlessly, and ignoring many other much more dire situations.

Domoviye, your pretty much my hero at the moment.

Thank you, Domoviye. Very well put. I didn't want to put my neck out that far, but I agree with what you have said 100%.

We as a species are pretty arrogant, even when it comes to thinking we have more impact on the global balance than we do.

Especially since cows farting produce more methane a far worse greenhouse gas than all of mankinds industry combined.

Now here is why I call global warming a massive fraud, and an environmental disaster.
Right now the global warming activists want the first world to transfer 180 billion US dollars to various carbon credit companies and developing nations to counter act global warming.
Do you know who controls the biggest carbon credit companies? Al Gore, and the other big name global warming activists.
Where will most of the money go to. China, India, and a few other growing economic powerhouses.
Why?
Because they are developing countries, and can't be held responsible for any pollution they create. So these countries throw their money around and get support from various politicians and people who want to make money and gain popularity as environmentalists, hoping to get serious gains from environmental initiatives around the world that only help them.
Europe which is a big supporter of Kyoto, has a sweet deal in regards to Kyoto. There Carbon production is based on the individual country.
But their carbon credits can be shared throughout the European Union as if it was a single country. So France has a lot of nuclear reactors. They get excess carbon credits because of that. But they lose carbon credits from not having a lot of forests. Germany has excess carbon credits for having more forests but lose credits for their energy production. Since they are both in the E.U. they can swap the excess carbon credits with each other with none of the fees or annoyances that other countries suffer. They then go to Kyoto and say they have a zero balance emissions, and don't have to do one gosh darn thing.
Whereas if the US had signed on, and Canada which has signed on, don't have that deal. We have to cut back our industries to the bone to achieve the Kyoto goals, or in Canada's case, pay approximately 50 billion dollars to China to get the necessary carbon credits.
Do you see the problem here.

Yeah, I see the problem. The problem is, you're talking about it as though it is a political problem, and you're taking a stance which is pretty much, "Everyone else wants to benefit from global warming, while the (poor old) USA comes out worse off," which is so far from what's really going on that it's incredibly funny. It's probably the worst argument put forward in any discussion on global warming that I can remember.

We as a species are pretty arrogant, even when it comes to thinking we have more impact on the global balance than we do.

Arrogant? Really? I think most people and groups like greenpeace, wwf would wish they didn't believe it.

Yeah, I see the problem. The problem is, you're talking about it as though it is a political problem, and you're taking a stance which is pretty much, "Everyone else wants to benefit from global warming, while the (poor old) USA comes out worse off," which is so far from what's really going on that it's incredibly funny. It's probably the worst argument put forward in any discussion on global warming that I can remember.

Actually I don't care about the US. I'm worried about Canada.
Now why is worrying that a few countries are suppose to take up 95% of the burden, while countries that produce more greenhouse gases take up 5% of the burden a bad argument?
If China had to do more under Kyoto I'd have less problem with it. But as it stands China which produces more greenhouse gases then the US, and will likely double the amount of greenhouse gases it produces in less then 5 years, does not actually have to do anything under Kyoto. In fact they get the lion share of the money that will be transfered from developed nations to developing nations.
They're effectively being paid to pollute.
Isn't that a problem?
Would you care to dispute anything else I've written?

Especially since cows farting produce more methane a far worse greenhouse gas than all of mankinds industry combined.

ok, so who made there be so many cows?... if humans didn't eat meat and want to wear others' skins, there wouldn't be the great herds of animals bred and kept only for that purpose... their species would instead, be in balance with all the others, and not producing all that methane!

ok, so who made there be so many cows?... if humans didn't eat meat and want to wear others' skins, there wouldn't be the great herds of animals bred and kept only for that purpose... their species would instead, be in balance with all the others, and not producing all that methane!

This is true, very true. But with that said, humans have got to eat. Unforunately, our population is a little too big nowdays to be fed with animals that are simply naturally breeding. We have to mass breed them, or risk running out of cows completely.

Also, note that I am aware that in many places outside the west, that people live in poverty, and something as expensive as beef would be never really thought of. But for the sake of argument, our western population is too big (or too greedy) to simply live off the cows and their natural breeding.

(double post sorry guys)

Yeah, I see the problem. The problem is, you're talking about it as though it is a political problem, and you're taking a stance which is pretty much, "Everyone else wants to benefit from global warming, while the (poor old) USA comes out worse off," which is so far from what's really going on that it's incredibly funny. It's probably the worst argument put forward in any discussion on global warming that I can remember.

Thats because alot of it is in fact political man. Seriously, you cannot believe that Kyoto would exist if it didnt benefit some countries over others? That's incredibly naieve. Kyoto isn't just some sort of good-willed fight against global warming, it's a massive political tool for a lot of people.

In regards to it being a bad argument, I dont think it is at all, especially considering as you dont seem to have much to say about any of his other very well put out points.

ok, so who made there be so many cows?... if humans didn't eat meat and want to wear others' skins, there wouldn't be the great herds of animals bred and kept only for that purpose... their species would instead, be in balance with all the others, and not producing all that methane!

Fair enough. That was silly of me. :redface:

a most gracious admission, dom!... kudos to you for having sense enough to see when you weren't making any... ;-)

Originally Posted by mammamaia
ok, so who made there be so many cows?... if humans didn't eat meat and want to wear others' skins, there wouldn't be the great herds of animals bred and kept only for that purpose... their species would instead, be in balance with all the others, and not producing all that methane!

This is true, very true. But with that said, humans have got to eat.

...and they can just as well be vegetarians, but choose not to...

Unforunately, our population is a little too big nowdays to be fed with animals that are simply naturally breeding. We have to mass breed them, or risk running out of cows completely.

...again, the simplest solution is to just stop eating our fellow animals or killing them for other uses... the elephant is a vegetarian and it's the largest, most powerful of all the land animals... one of the longest-in-existence current species, as well...

Also, note that I am aware that in many places outside the west, that people live in poverty, and something as expensive as beef would be never really thought of. But for the sake of argument, our western population is too big (or too greedy) to simply live off the cows and their natural breeding.

...and too foolish, for thinking they need to eat their own kind, when maintaining a natural balance between animal/vegetable/mineral would work best and is what was originally meant to be... crossing the line and eating/killing off its own kind is what put everything out of whack... regardless of whatever invalid reasons the meat-lovers put forth, it's not impossible to go back to the balanced state... wouldn't even be hard... but of course i don't expect them to... wrongdoing of all kinds is sadly too popular to ever be stopped voluntarily...

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2007/12/03/jonathan-kay-dump-kyoto-save-lives.aspx A column talking about some of the problems with Kyoto.

...and they can just as well be vegetarians, but choose not to...

Very true. Just out of interest, I'm assuming you're vegetarian yourself?

..and too foolish, for thinking they need to eat their own kind, when maintaining a natural balance between animal/vegetable/mineral would work best and is what was originally meant to be... crossing the line and eating/killing off its own kind is what put everything out of whack... regardless of whatever invalid reasons the meat-lovers put forth, it's not impossible to go back to the balanced state... wouldn't even be hard... but of course i don't expect them to... wrongdoing of all kinds is sadly too popular to ever be stopped voluntarily...

Got me there...

yup!... i'm what i call a 'moral vegetarian'... having been a dumb but happy eater of nearly anything that moves in my old life, i'm now a vegetarian only because i finally realized how wrong it was to, as one of my sisters put it, eat anything 'that had a mother'... as we're animals ourselves, it makes sense to not eat of our own kind, when the plant kingdom provides all we need to be as healthy as--well, elephants... ;-)