How Bad Is Global Warming?

[23]

skeptics of anthropogenic climate change say that even if the climate is found to be warming, we are not contributing,
ergo the release of vast amounts of CO2 is not in any way affecting climate, therefore CO2 is not a forcing agent

I've never met a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change. I've met countless people who differed on the degree of effect that we have on the environment (from minimal to maximal), but I never met a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change.

To be a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change is to doubt that we have any effect on our environment. I haven't personally met that species of caveman yet.

I think that most people differ on the degree of effect that we have on our environment.

Personally, I'm leery about many ideas which emanate from an anthropocentric mindset. And we certainly possess one, IMO.

Our anthropocentric mindset... or the presumption that we are the superior species and everything else is here for us... is the source of many ills.

[Cosmic Cowbell]

Leading climate scientist challenges Mail on Sunday's use of his research

Mojib Latif denies his research supports theory that current cold weather undermines scientific consensus on global warming

David Adam, environment correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Monday 11 January 2010 16.47 GMT

A leading scientist has hit out at misleading newspaper reports that linked his research to claims that the current cold weather undermines the scientific case for manmade global warming.

Mojib Latif, a climate expert at the Leibniz Institute at Kiel University in Germany, said he "cannot understand" reports that used his research to question the scientific consensus on climate change.

He told the Guardian: "It comes as a surprise to me that people would try to use my statements to try to dispute the nature of global warming. I believe in manmade global warming. I have said that if my name was not Mojib Latif it would be global warming." He added: "There is no doubt within the scientific community that we are affecting the climate, that the climate is changing and responding to our emissions of greenhouse gases."

A report in the Mail on Sunday said that Latif's results "challenge some of the global warming orthodoxy's most deeply cherished beliefs" and "undermine the standard climate computer models". Monday's Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph repeated the claims.

The reports attempted to link the Arctic weather that has enveloped the UK with research published by Latif's team in the journal Nature in 2008. The research said that natural fluctuations in ocean temperature could have a bigger impact on global temperature than expected. In particular, the study concluded that cooling in the oceans could offset global warming, with the average temperature over the decades 2000-2010 and 2005-2015 predicted to be no higher than the average for 1994-2004. Despite clarifications from the scientists at the time, who stressed that the research did not challenge the predicted long-term warming trend, the study was widely misreported as signalling a switch from global warming to global cooling.

The Mail on Sunday article said that Latif's research showed that the current cold weather heralds such "a global trend towards cooler weather".

It said: "The BBC assured viewers that the big chill was was merely short-term 'weather' that had nothing to do with 'climate', which was still warming. The work of Prof Latif and the other scientists refutes that view."

Not according to Latif. "They are not related at all," he said. "What we are experiencing now is a weather phenomenon, while we talked about the mean temperature over the next 10 years. You can't compare the two." He said the ocean temperature effect was similar to other natural influences on global temperature, such as volcanos, which cool the planet temporarily as ash spewed into the atmosphere reflects sunlight. "The natural variation occurs side by side with the manmade warming. Sometimes it has a cooling effect and can offset this warming and other times it can accelerate it." Other scientists have questioned the strength of the ocean effect on overall temperature and disagree that global warming will show the predicted pause.

Latif said his research suggested that up to half the warming seen over the 20th century was down to this natural ocean effect, but said that was consistent with the 2007 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "No climate specialist would ever say that 100% of the warming we have seen is down to greenhouse gas emissions."

The recent articles are not the first to misrepresent his research, Latif said. "There are numerous newspapers, radio stations and television channels all trying to get our attention. Some overstate and some want to downplay the problem as a way to get that attention," he said. "We are trying to discuss in the media a highly complex issue. Nobody would discuss the problem of [Einstein's theory of] relativity in the media. But because we all experience the weather, we all believe that we can assess the global warming problem."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... ojib-latif

"In the hotly contested competition to see who are the biggest tossers in the british newspaper industry there has been an early entry this year by the Daily Mail: The mini ice age starts here based mainly on the fact that, oh, it has snowed a bit. And not helped by the UKMO pratting around with seasonal forecasts they know full well are worthless to the general public. Whether or not this makes the Mail more stupid that the Torygraph I leave for you to judge (incidentally, for you Johnny Foreigners lucky enough not to know what the Mail is, its a tabloid rag somewhat above the Sun but well below the Broadsheets, but with pretensions to respectability)."

~ Stoat

The equivalent of getting your daily dose from Fox News...

[smiths]

absolutely standard stuff on this subject,

scientists work is quoted as evidence against climate change

scientist then comes out upset and angry about the way his/her views have been mis-represented to say the opposite of what scientist actually believes

[Hammer of Los]

Honestly, you people. I could go back and quote out some of the silly things that have been said in this thread, but I dont really want to, it would be mean of me, and that's where conversations derail into flame wars.

I do apologise to smiths for the True Believer jibe though, capitalised even. That was mean of me, and also a wholly unfair characterisation. Gosh I have been naughty. But (ah there's always a but) what you have added to this thread (not that my contribution is either pertinent or useful) is a great deal of detail about how exxon mobil and the north american petroleum whoever use shady lobbying techniques, and generally lie, dissemble, litigate, threaten, blackmail, hustle whatever it takes to support their perceived interest. This comes as no surprise to me whatsoever. But it tells me precisely nothing about "how bad is global warming?"

Cosmic Cowbell's links I have read through, absolutely fascinating material. But the understanding I drew from it was that climate science is essentially in its infancy, and basic assumptions are being challenged all the time. That stuff about an ice age coming on in as little as 2-3 years was astounding.

Why don't we review what we know;

We agree the climate is constantly changing to greater or lesser degree, and well within the human timescale eg the large variations in the climate of europe throughout its recorded history, mini ice ages and so on. Many factors are acknowledged as being possibly responsible. Furthemore, such study of the climate is in its infancy, and therefore very much in flux as it ought to be. We know of the Greenhouse Effect, a well established scientific theory concerning the warming of the earth due to the accumulation of "greenhouse gases." Although to be honest I know little of the details of the theory, and ought to undertake a little further research. I understand it has also been theorised that gases and/or particulates in the atmosphere might deflect the sun's rays away from the earth, resulting in a net cooling. In fact, I have read quite a lot about such theories. You'll have to thank Et for making me get rigorous on that one.

What we don't know is how accurate our climate models are. I would suggest most of the evidence indicates they are less than reliable. Scientists essentially agree that the extent of the warming influence of a man-made greenhouse effect in the last 50 or 100 years is unknown.

The Latif material was also revealing. And I don't mean the revelation that the Mail sometimes spins a story a little (in fact I thought the Guardian's hit piece quite threadbare, and demonstrated their own partisanship. We really really ought to have a thread on the Guardian sometime.)

I think I might like to expand on some of these things so I might add to this post later.

ps I think cutting down all the forests is a really bad idea. We ought to move quickly to sustainable logging which manages the resource wisely without clear-felling, in addition to replantation schemes. Put the price of burgers up.

[smiths]

Is the science settled?

The Mistake of Rhetoric

Environmentalists and climate scientists have made a huge tactical error when they started using terms like 'consensus' and 'settled' to describe the wide agreement among them about the basic hypotheses regarding global warming and its consequences.
They left themselves wide open to criticism from the ideologically driven right (arch conservatives in the libertarian and republican parties mostly). Specifically, having no real science of their own to point to, these ideologues have attacked the improper characterization of the scientific process itself by the scientist, especially those who have contributed to the IPCC (International Panel on Climate Change, a UN sponsored body) reporting process.
Now with the revelations of poor judgment (in e-mails 'liberated from a private server) among some scientist involved in the work at the University of East Anglica, the right wing critics are further motivated to denounce the whole enterprise as bad science.

This is extremely unfortunate.
But the arguments that are made by the ideologues hinge not directly on the science itself.
Every time they try to attack the science they get soundly demolished. Rather they focus on a much more fundamental aspect of the whole process of science and its communication to non-scientists. Namely, they attack the process of science at its most vulnerable spot in the eyes of laymen — uncertainty.

When a scientist uses phrases like, "the science is settled" they don't mean that there is a 100% certainty that the explanations given for a phenomenon are absolutely correct. Similarly, when they describe the general state of agreement among scientists about those explanations as a "consensus" they don't mean that everybody in the field agrees on all points. Nor do they imply that there was some sort of vote taken and a vast majority raised their hands in agreement with the proposition. The choice of words to describe the real state of agreement within the scientific community regarding a particular proposition is poor because it assumes that whoever is hearing those words is sufficiently familiar with the process of science (I don't mean just the scientific method, which is but one tool in the scientific process' armamentarium) to understand the pragmatics and semantics being conveyed. The fact is that a large majority on non-scientists have a very vague notion of what the scientific process really is (this article on Wikipedia combines descriptions of the process, background philosophy and the scientific method in one read — you will need critical thinking skills in high gear to make the distinctions.) I blame the sorry state of science education in the US for some of this, but I also blame the lack of sufficient sapience in the population. They don't seem to have the wherewithal to discriminate between the sociology of science and the conduct of scientific work. How many people have actually read Thomas Kuhn's book The Structure of Scientific Revolution and fully appreciated the nuances?

To understand what it means to say that the science is settled you need to have a working appreciation of probability theory, statistical inference, and statistical significance tests. Very few people in the non-scientific world actually even take a rigorous course in statistics, let alone have used statistics in the way science uses it. Sports stats don't count, I'm afraid. Most people are conditioned to believe in something called 'truth' as if there is a black and white answer to every question. If something is said to be true, the non-scientist interprets this as 100% certain, no ifs, ands or buts. But in science there is no such thing as absolute truth. There are degrees of truth regarding any proposition. Scientists do not talk about 'proof'. That is the domain of mathematicians and logicians. Scientists have long ago realized that truths are provisional. They have learned to attach likelihood values to each proposition's truth claims. They are fully cognizant that no proposition can ever be thought of as settled in the sense that it is absolutely certain. It is only the lay person who already has difficulty dealing with ambiguity who thinks that science proves this or that fact — end of story.

So what does it mean when someone says the science (of anthropogenic global warming, AGW, and climate change) is settled? In the scientist's mind it means that the vastly larger weight of evidence supports the proposition (that human generated CO2 is causing an unprecedented rate of rise in global mean temperature). Indeed, in the current example, of global warming, there have been no substantive demonstrations of evidence sufficient to seriously call the proposition into question. And that isn't because many climate scientists haven't been trying; they have.

A valid scientific challenge to the current accepted hypothesis will produce some verifiable evidence that some portion of the causal model is not able to explain the phenomenon according to that hypothesis. For example, one of my readers, David, asks the question "...do we really know that CO2 is a forcing mechanism?" The implication is that should we find that, in fact, CO2 is not an adequate forcing mechanism (i.e. it absorbs re-radiated long wave light radiation and increases its own kinetic energy) to explain the observed heating, then we will have to conclude that there is some other, currently unknown forcing that is at play causing the empirically measured heating. It would imply that mankind is off the hot seat in terms of being guilty of causing the warming, at least insofar as burning fossil fuels is concerned (unfortunately there is another aspect of FF burning that may be contributing to GW — soot!).

Fortunately this question is a good empirically answerable one. All sorts of lab and field experiments have been done to verify that CO2 does produce a pronounced greenhouse gas heating effect. The original understanding that the gas would absorb long-wave radiation and increase its translational and vibrational modes of kinetic energy was derived from physical-chemist's understandings of the quantum effects of said absorption. And field testing (in large chambers) has confirmed this effect. Now in the open atmosphere there are many other phenomena that might mitigate or moderate CO2's effects, such as various particulates that derive from human and volcanic caused pollution. That is a little harder to souse out from a modeling standpoint (along with the ultimate effects of cloud cover which may change with a warmer climate). Nevertheless, the effects attributable to CO2 based on the theoretical model hold up well as a forcing function for warming.

So the reasonable question should and does lead to further testing. That is what science is all about. Never take something for granted. Always question authority until the weight of evidence provides reasonable substantiation of what that authority says. At that point economics takes over and funding for further questioning starts to diminish as the returns on investment diminish.

The science of AGW is settled only in the sense that the majority of evidence points to it and no convincing counter evidence has been presented (that is no scientifically verifiable evidence has). Lots of thoughtful people have raised questions based on their understanding of the way the world works. For example, people who have read something about how the Sun's radiation goes through cycles and has, in the past, had an impact of Earth's climate, will reasonably seek to propose that as an explanation for what is being observed. Others will point out that we are in an interglacial period and may still be warming (with a brief, in geological time, period of relative stability). But these questions are not based on scientifically produced evidence. They are, rather, based on scientifically informed conjecture. They need to also produce testable hypothesis and empirical evidence before they can be taken seriously. Do the research and write the papers! What you can't do is use some lame example, such as Mars' climate is also warming so it must be the Sun(!) in some faux logic to bolster the case. It isn't science and it doesn't work.

As for the notion of consensus: the term is wildly overused and grossly misunderstood. In Kuhn's view a paradigm exists when the majority of scientists accept a proposition as provisionally true because no convincing counter evidence has come to light. It is true that some scientists become personally invested in certain 'emotionally charged' paradigms and work hard to thwart attempts by upstart scientists to overturn their theories. Stories of such abound in the literature of the history of science. So what? People are people and we all try to protect our turf. But that strategy only works in economics and politics (until a revolution occurs!). In science you can defend your territory all you like, but if there is even a hint of countervailing evidence you cannot keep the edifice erect forever. Remember? Science is self-correcting. There are always too many young, eager assistant professors out there looking to gun down the top dog. And they will always succeed because science is about always finding better approximations of the truth. Practice it according to the algorithm and we will always get a better vision of reality. So far it has worked pretty well.
Economics Has Not Been Very Scientific

As something of an aside I want to take an opportunity to take another kick at a not-so-dead horse, economics as practiced in the mainstream.

The simple fact is that neoclassical economics, for all its trappings as a science, has not really lived up to its supposed image. Originally called the dismal science because it dealt with the problems of distribution of scarce resources, I think now I would call it dismal because it has failed to be scientific.

For starters it has no general theory that derives from biophysical reality. It works on a closed system (firms and households) without regard to physical constraints, energy flows, or the impacts human activity have on the natural world. Without a general, physically-based theory, there is no there there!

But beyond that mainstream economists do act as if the 'science' is settled in exactly the same way that the layperson thinks real scientist mean by that phrase. The act politically rather than scientifically to bolster their pet theory which isn't a real theory at all. Moreover, they form what amounts to a real consensus, just as the layperson thinks that term implies. They spend way more time and energy in research that is basically guaranteed to show that their non-theory is valid rather than pick at the edges where the frays can be found.

Of course, I don't want to over generalize. There are a growing number of individual economists who, though 'trained' in this mold have behaved more like true scientists and questioned authority when the evidence didn't match the model. Read about the whole realm of behavioral economics which questions a central assumption required by neoclassical econ for its theory to 'work', namely that human agents are hardly rational (Homo economus) in their economic decisions. Behavioral economics is starting to tear down the edifice of neoclassical econ in a more valid scientific process. Between this and biophysical economics where there is work to produce a true general theory, there is hope that one day we will have a science of economics and not a politics of economic conjectures.
Politics and Ideology Trump Reality

With regard to the science of global warming we have a very odd situation. If the scientific paradigm is in fact a very good approximation of reality then there is only one conclusion that you can draw. In order to avoid the worst consequences of climate change due to global warming (due to human generated CO2) then you must stop whatever it is that is causing the global warming. And, unfortunately, that is very simple. You have to stop burning fossil fuels.

But therein lies the conundrum. We burn fossil fuels to derive energy to run our economy. There is nothing else in our energy production infrastructure that comes anywhere close to producing the amount of high powered energy needed to run our machines as fossil fuels. So stopping the burning means literally stopping (or seriously reducing) the economy as we have come to understand it. We are wealthy, in the sense of possessing much material goods and having elaborate services, because we burn fossil fuels. Indeed, we exist in huge numbers only because of the bountiful energy supplied by fossil fuels. Stop the burning and the majority of us cannot even exist anymore, let alone will we produce wealth in the future.

Libertarians were quick to pick up on the implications. Even a reduction in fossil fuel burning would result in an end to economic growth, which for them goes hand in hand with personal freedoms. The conservatives caught on to this implication immediately. And this is where the ideological and political start to trump science and sapience. If you are personally committed to the notion that your freedom to make unlimited profits, which depends on a growing economy, is sacrosanct beyond all else (in the Randian sense), then naturally you will rebel against the notion that burning fossil fuels is causing the planet to warm and threatening civilization and all other living species on the planet. You will be forced into the position of denying the science in any way you can in order to protect your ideology. You will attack it in any way you can, trying rationality (what about the sun?), trying to claim that the scientists are in on a giant hoax, or whatever excuse you can conjure up to destroy the threat to your fundamental beliefs. I actually don't blame you, if you are in this group, for doing so. It is entirely natural. It is part of the grieving process that we all suffer through when we lose someone or something dear to us. Remember Alan Greenspan's tortured look as he testified before Congress about his 'surprise' that bankers weren't honest based on self interest, the old 'invisible hand', libertarian belief?

Unfortunately the majority of liberals are equally in denial, but with a twist. Conservatives have taken to calling them 'warmists' to respond to the left's accusations that they are denialists. They recognize the implications and call for cessation or serious reduction of burning fossil fuels to save the planet and humanity (their major concern). But they believe deeply in the magic of technology somehow producing a saving way out. Green technology is the clarion call to reduce our carbon footprint and still go on producing wealth at the current clip and lefties are no different from righties in wanting their god-given rights to more wealth. This is just another version of denial though. It is just another belief system that will be our undoing. Anyone who has taken the time to deeply investigate the potential of green technology will soon realize that there is no feasible way it can scale up to the magnitude of the problem of supplying adequate power to an energy voracious populace. Just take a hard look at carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) if you dare. It isn't a hopeful picture in spite of all the publicity and political posturing.

But when the reality is obvious, meaning that the science is 'settled', denial is supposed to eventually give way to acceptance (maybe we are in the anger stage right now). Rational people will finally accept the evidence and go on with picking up the pieces. I expect that will be the case eventually with AGW. Unfortunately this is more like a case of being told that you personally have an inoperable cancer that will end your life in one month. You grieve for yourself. We humans have an incurable disease in our reliance on fossil fuels for existence. Can we voluntarily give up our wealth generating machinery in an attempt to avoid the grim reaper? Hard to say.

The reality is a little more complicated than that. The limits to extraction of fossil fuels is close at hand. We may not have the option of giving up voluntarily. We are more likely about to be forced into involuntary submission. And that won't be pleasant. The end of the fossil fuel age without any viable alternatives to replace the power density of fossil fuels is going to change everything. It won't matter if some people are still in denial or not. The consequences will happen no matter what we want. Reality has a habit of forcing its way into our lives.

So in the end it won't matter whether the science is settled or there is a general consensus over global warming. We will run out of high powered energy. And if the science is right, we will do so just as we will actually need more energy in order to do the work of adapting to the climate scenarios projected. Can you imagine moving New York City inland to compensate for sea level rises without fossil fuels to power the move? What a travesty that will be.

I know this vision is grim. I understand that this leaves little in the way of hope for a future that is somehow better than the past, at least with respect to material wealth and sustainable existence. But it is a reality that you had better consider while you are pining over the loss of your freedom to make huge profits because the economy is no longer growing. You had better get with reality as it actually is instead of how you wish it were.

http://questioneverything.typepad.com/q ... ttled.html

[smiths]

and since i cant remember the name of the thread that the population argument happened in i shall post this here

The Population Myth

People who claim that population growth is the big environmental issue are shifting the blame from the rich to the poor

By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian, 29th September 2009

It’s no coincidence that most of those who are obsessed with population growth are post-reproductive wealthy white men: it’s about the only environmental issue for which they can’t be blamed. The brilliant earth systems scientist James Lovelock, for example, claimed last month that “those who fail to see that population growth and climate change are two sides of the same coin are either ignorant or hiding from the truth. These two huge environmental problems are inseparable and to discuss one while ignoring the other is irrational.”(1) But it’s Lovelock who is being ignorant and irrational.

A paper published yesterday in the journal Environment and Urbanization shows that the places where population has been growing fastest are those in which carbon dioxide has been growing most slowly, and vice versa. Between 1980 and 2005, for example, Sub-Saharan Africa produced 18.5% of the world’s population growth and just 2.4% of the growth in CO2. North America turned out 4% of the extra people, but 14% of the extra emissions. Sixty-three per cent of the world’s population growth happened in places with very low emissions(2).

Even this does not capture it. The paper points out that around one sixth of the world’s population is so poor that it produces no significant emissions at all. This is also the group whose growth rate is likely to be highest. Households in India earning less than 3,000 rupees a month use a fifth of the electricity per head and one seventh of the transport fuel of households earning Rs30,000 or more. Street sleepers use almost nothing. Those who live by processing waste (a large part of the urban underclass) often save more greenhouse gases than they produce.

Many of the emissions for which poorer countries are blamed should in fairness belong to us. Gas flaring by companies exporting oil from Nigeria, for example, has produced more greenhouse gases than all other sources in sub-Saharan Africa put together(3). Even deforestation in poor countries is driven mostly by commercial operations delivering timber, meat and animal feed to rich consumers. The rural poor do far less harm(4).

The paper’s author, David Satterthwaite of the International Institute for Environment and Development, points out that the old formula taught to all students of development - that total impact equals population times affluence times technology (I=PAT) - is wrong. Total impact should be measured as I=CAT: consumers times affluence times technology. Many of the world’s people use so little that they wouldn’t figure in this equation. They are the ones who have most children.

While there’s a weak correlation between global warming and population growth, there’s a strong correlation between global warming and wealth. I’ve been taking a look at a few superyachts, as I’ll need somewhere to entertain Labour ministers in the style to which they’re accustomed. First I went through the plans for Royal Falcon Fleet’s RFF135, but when I discovered that it burns only 750 litres of fuel per hour(5) I realised that it wasn’t going to impress Lord Mandelson. I might raise half an eyebrow in Brighton with the Overmarine Mangusta 105, which sucks up 850 l/hr(6). But the raft that’s really caught my eye is made by Wally Yachts in Monaco. The WallyPower 118 (which gives total wallies a sensation of power) consumes 3400 l/hr when travelling at 60 knots(7). That’s nearly one litre per second. Another way of putting it is 31 litres per kilometre(8).

Of course to make a real splash I’ll have to shell out on teak and mahogany fittings, carry a few jet skis and a mini-submarine, ferry my guests to the marina by private plane and helicopter, offer them bluefin tuna sushi and beluga caviar and drive the beast so fast that I mash up half the marine life of the Mediterranean. As the owner of one of these yachts I’ll do more damage to the biosphere in ten minutes than most Africans inflict in a lifetime. Now we’re burning, baby.

Someone I know who hangs out with the very rich tells me that in the banker belt of the lower Thames valley there are people who heat their outdoor swimming pools to bath temperature, all round the year. They like to lie in the pool on winter nights, looking up at the stars. The fuel costs them £3000 a month. One hundred thousand people living like these bankers would knacker our life support systems faster than 10 billion people living like the African peasantry. But at least the super wealthy have the good manners not to breed very much, so the rich old men who bang on about human reproduction leave them alone.

In May the Sunday Times carried an article headlined “Billionaire club in bid to curb overpopulation”. It revealed that “some of America’s leading billionaires have met secretly” to decide which good cause they should support. “A consensus emerged that they would back a strategy in which population growth would be tackled as a potentially disastrous environmental, social and industrial threat.”(9) The ultra-rich, in other words, have decided that it’s the very poor who are trashing the planet. You grope for a metaphor, but it’s impossible to satirise.

James Lovelock, like Sir David Attenborough and Jonathan Porritt, is a patron of the Optimum Population Trust (OPT). It is one of dozens of campaigns and charities whose sole purpose is to discourage people from breeding in the name of saving the biosphere. But I haven’t been able to find any campaign whose sole purpose is to address the impacts of the very rich.

The obsessives could argue that the people breeding rapidly today might one day become richer. But as the super wealthy grab an ever greater share and resources begin to run dry, this, for most of the very poor, is a diminishing prospect. There are strong social reasons for helping people to manage their reproduction, but weak environmental reasons, except among wealthier populations.

The Optimum Population Trust glosses over the fact that the world is going through demographic transition: population growth rates are slowing down almost everywhere and the number of people is likely, according to a paper in Nature, to peak this century(10), probably at around 10 billion(11). Most of the growth will take place among those who consume almost nothing.

But no one anticipates a consumption transition. People breed less as they become richer, but they don’t consume less; they consume more. As the habits of the super-rich show, there are no limits to human extravagance. Consumption can be expected to rise with economic growth until the biosphere hits the buffers. Anyone who understands this and still considers that population, not consumption, is the big issue is, in Lovelock’s words, “hiding from the truth”. It is the worst kind of paternalism, blaming the poor for the excesses of the rich.

So where are the movements protesting about the stinking rich destroying our living systems? Where is the direct action against superyachts and private jets? Where’s Class War when you need it?

It’s time we had the guts to name the problem. It’s not sex; it’s money. It’s not the poor; it’s the rich.

www.monbiot.com

References:

1. Optimum Population Trust, 26th August 2009 Gaia Scientist to be OPT Patron.
http://www.optimumpopulation.org/releas ... 6Aug09.htm

2. David Satterthwaite, September 2009. The implications of population growth and urbanization for climate change. Environment & Urbanization, Vol 21(2): 545–567. DOI: 10.1177/0956247809344361.

3. http://www.foei.org/en/publications/pdf ... igeria.pdf

4. For example, Satterthwaite cites the study by Gerald Leach and Robin Mearns, 1989. Beyond the Woodfuel Crisis – People, Land and Trees in Africa, Earthscan Publications, London.

5. http://www.ybw.com/auto/newsdesk/20090802125307syb.html

6. http://www.jameslist.com/advert/5480

7. http://machinedesign.com/article/118-wa ... -boat-0616

8. 15 US gallons/nm = 56.775l/nm = 31 l/km.

9. John Harlow, 24th May 2009. Billionaire club in bid to curb overpopulation. The Sunday Times.

10. Wolfgang Lutz, Warren Sanderson and Sergei Scherbov, 20th January 2008. The coming acceleration of global population ageing. Nature. doi:10.1038/nature06516

11. UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2005. World Population Prospects. The 2004
Revision. http://www.un.org/esa/population/public ... lpart1.pdf

http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2009/09 ... tion-myth/

[compared2what?]

HoL --

Does this article do anything for you?

[nathan28]

skeptics of anthropogenic climate change say that even if the climate is found to be warming, we are not contributing,
ergo the release of vast amounts of CO2 is not in any way affecting climate, therefore CO2 is not a forcing agent

I've never met a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change. I've met countless people who differed on the degree of effect that we have on the environment (from minimal to maximal), but I never met a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change.

To be a skeptic of anthropogenic climate change is to doubt that we have any effect on our environment. I haven't personally met that species of caveman yet.

I think that most people differ on the degree of effect that we have on our environment.

Personally, I'm leery about many ideas which emanate from an anthropocentric mindset. And we certainly possess one, IMO.

Our anthropocentric mindset... or the presumption that we are the superior species and everything else is here for us... is the source of many ills.

Come on, man, drop the stoner-philosophizing crypto-apologism ("anthropocentrism is bad. global warming theories are anthropocentric. therefore global warming theories are anthropocentric.") disguised as "lateral thinking" or "fuzzy logic" or "creativity" or "reality tunnels" or whatever depoliticizing mask they use for motivated mind-numbing horseshit these days.

The chemtrailheads would rather face a world where the government or aliens or something spray Morgellon's disease-causing nanoparticles into the atmosphere in massive amounts--when in all likelihood they live in a world where so many jets fly through the freaking air that's already saturated with exhaust that the trails they leave actually effect the weather pattern. I've seen it happen, too. It starts off as a clear day and then jet trails cloud the sky. It's fucked up. But it was fucked up on the face of it, enough so that I don't need to tear out dental nerves I mistake for Morgellon's parasites.

The global warming deniers are the slightly-more fashionable cousins of the chemtrailer-park dwellers. You earnestly expect us to believe that industry pouring massive amounts of toxic shit into the air isn't going to affect things? It'd be one thing if you so much as voiced the near-truism that "consumers" switching to fluorescents and hybrids was only going to have minimal impact as long as the current industrial regime flourished. Or if you said, "well, gee, you know, without unlimited growth the basic process of capital accumulation falters and the economic system would collaspe so environment action could be dangerous." But instead it's some warmed-over high-school debate team crap that's deader than my grandfather and you don't even believe the lines you try to feed us yourselves. And really, it's not surprising. Because unwittingly shilling for vested interests is nothing new. But WTF do I care? The closest to a solution anyone's going to get ***without a general strike*** is "cap-n-trade", the biggest fucking cronyist nepotist boondoggle in the foreseeable future.

[23]

You earnestly expect us to believe that industry pouring massive amounts of toxic shit into the air isn't going to affect things?

Nope, I don't expect you to believe that at all.

Simply because, and as I stated earlier, I never met a single person who believed that man had no effect on his environment (including pouring massive amounts of toxic shit into the air).

But I have met legions of people who disagree on the degree of effect that we have.

Why you equate the two escapes me. At least for the moment.

Your juxtaposition of "no effect" with "minimal effect" reminds me of another juxtaposition that many folks enjoyed making a short time ago.

The one where Ralph's words, "the Dems are not different enough from the Repubs" got juxtaposed with "the Dems are not different from the Repubs".

Can I assume that he was practicing stoner-philosophizing crypto-apologism, in your eyes, as well?

[smiths]

from c2w's link

There is, I saw, a fine line between the hard-head and the bone-head. The denialist hard-head swaggers his way through life hearing only what he wants to hear, that warmism is either a hoax, a gross error or just another End-of-the-World scare story. But if you suspend your prejudices and your vanity for a moment, everything changes. You find out that the following statements are true beyond argument.

The climate is warming. It is almost certain this is caused by emissions of greenhouse gases caused by human activity. Nobody has come up with an alternative explanation that stands up. If the present warming trend continues, nasty things will probably start happening to humans within the next century, possibly the next decade. Something must be done. If nothing is done, then the benign climatic conditions that have sustained human civilisation for 10,000 years are in danger of collapse to be replaced by? well, write your own disaster movie.

You will note that there is some wiggle room in these statements. It is “almost certain” that humans are responsible; nasty things will “probably” happen. That is because all science can ever be is the best guess of the best minds. Also, the climate is a complex system, meaning it can behave in ways that are opaque beyond our most sophisticated calculations. But, as I have often been told, those statements are as true as any scientific statements can be, and nobody — I repeat, nobody — has been able to refute this. In short, to deny any of these statements is to put yourself beyond the bounds of rational discourse.

[smiths]

23, there are a large group of people in all walks of life who dont think humans have anything to do with the warming,

that you havent heard of any or met any i find unbelievable

[23]

23, there are a large group of people in all walks of life who dont think humans have anything to do with the warming,

that you havent heard of any or met any i find unbelievable

Given the fact that I talk with peeps of various political ideologies on a daily basis, I have met nary a one.

Like I said, they differ on the degree of effect (minimal versus maximum).

They either drive or take the bus or ride a bike, and they all experience some effect of vehicle pollution on a bad smog day (and we sure get 'em here).

No one, that I've met, denies that we have an effect. Their differences lie in the degree of effect.

But since we're on the topic of hoaxes, I'll tell you one area that both my libertarian and leftist friends agree on:

that placing our troops overseas, for the good of our national security, is a grander and costlier hoax.

Stop funding this much larger hoax, and use the money to provide universal health care to everyone.

[wintler2]

Hottest night ever in Melbourne yesterday, three record heatwaves in southern Oz last year. But I'm a little bit chilly right now, global warming is obviously a plot by the Illuminati. Am i dumb enough for US citizenship?

I used to think there was hope for the mainstream and i spent many many hours posting solid information and argument. i'm so much happier (and time-richer) since i realised most people are simply incapable of thinking and choose their views on purely selfinterest.

As the planetfuckers have sown, so we all shall reap.

[smiths]

i wish you would keep wasting your time by posting what you are reading and thinking wintler

[Hammer of Los]

I know none of those jibes about illuminati-spouting hicks are being directed at me, but nonetheless;

But I'm a little bit chilly right now, global warming is obviously a plot by the Illuminati. Am i dumb enough for US citizenship?

Quite possibly, but what I do know is that you are dumb enough to spit out that ludicrous strawman, which is in no way a representation of either the Daily Mail article, which I read and actually found quite informative, or any of the comments on this thread (with the possible exception of DeltaDawn's somewhat ill-considered first post - sorry DeltaDawn!) The implied characterisation of folk here who simply would like to know the true degree of warming caused by the greenhouse effect of man made carbon emissions is appalling. Not to mention the prejudice against people who live in caravans. Absolutely appalling I tell you.

Can anybody tell me then, what is the true degree of warming caused by the greenhouse effect of man made carbon emissions? I doubt you can because a senior member of the IPCC has stated that they don't know. And it is a fact that there are other factors influencing the climate which are being seriously studied, solar cycles and oceanic cycles amongst them.

I will dissect c2w's article when I have the time.

And before anyone gets on my back, I dont vote for warmongers who feed petrol into their crazy war machine, I dont make money from any shares in large corporations who are despoiling the planet for profit, I don't drive, I avoid flying and walk or use the bus or train to get where I need to go, and I have a very small flat which is economical to heat. I also believe that we should act now to curb emissions. So you know, save any ire you got for where its deserved. Me, I don't need it, I'm just trying to do a little research into the current state of climate science. Thank you.

But by god I hate those powersaving light bulbs.