Global Warming, CO2...

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Mr. Oragahn
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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Fri May 15, 2009 2:17 pm

Jedi Master Spock wrote:
Mr. Oragahn wrote:
MYTH 2: The "hockey stick" graph proves that the earth has experienced a steady, very gradual temperature increase for 1000 years, then recently began a sudden increase.
Not at all true, nor all that relevant to the global warming models. What is more relevant is that the sharpness of the temperature increase is quite unusual.
They say:
The "hockey stick", a poster boy of both the UN's IPCC and Canada's Environment Department, ignores historical recorded climatic swings, and has now also been proven to be flawed and statistically unreliable as well. It is a computer construct and a faulty one at that.
There's little chances they'd dismiss the graph on such basis if they didn't have read some form of evidence to back up such claims.

Here's an example of sudden peaks within a few years, when we observe global temperature since 1900.
What is interesting is that it provides values beyond 2000, and we can see that it's perfectly in line with what has happened before. The ups and down -- although occuring a notch higher since on the average, global temperature raised slowly -- show no oddity.
MYTH 9: Receding glaciers and the calving of ice shelves are proof of global warming.

FACT: Glaciers have been receding and growing cyclically for hundreds of years. Recent glacier melting is a consequence of coming out of the very cool period of the Little Ice Age.
... i.e., warming up since then. Ice turning into water pulls heat out of the rest of the system, and when there's a substantial period of change in one direction or another, it is one of the indicators of global warming or cooling.

In this particular case, reduction in ice levels have been predicted by global warming models, and those predictions have been precisely fulfilled as the years have passed.

It's been warmer - for example, in the Cretaceous. And transitioning to something like a Cretaceous climate in the course of a mere couple centuries would be catastrophic for us.
This global warming, precisely recognized by the source, has nothing to do with the anthropomorphic one, which is the point of controversy.
FACT: The earth is variable. The western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer, due to unrelated cyclic events in the Pacific Ocean, but the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder.
Unrelated cyclic events? Not exactly.

The reason why northern Europe - from Greenland on down - is starting to cool I linked you to earlier in the other thread - Gulf stream changes. It's a prediction dating back at least fifteen years as part of the global warming models. The fact of the matter is that global warming models do not project all of the Earth becoming uniformly warmer at the same time.
It says unrelated to whatever happens in the Pacific Ocean. Considering where the Pacific Ocean is, I don't even get what they were thinking about here.
Besides, it replies to the claim that ice poles are warming up, as warming up per your standard alarmist (dramatic warming instead of minor natural warming).
It says that's incorrect as far as the Arctic is concerned.

The Gulf Stream "cooling" is addressed here, and literally suggests, based upon data, that the current has not weakened, but on the contrary has likely strengthened within the last decade.
The small Palmer Peninsula of Antarctica is getting warmer, while the main Antarctic continent is actually cooling. Ice thicknesses are increasing both on Greenland and in Antarctica.
In parts of Greenland and parts of Antarctica. Other parts are shedding ice like nobody's business. Overall? Both the arctic and antarctic systems are losing ice on the whole.
Antarctic ice is growing, not melting away, By Greg Roberts, The Australian, April 18, 2009 11:52am.
[...]
Dr Allison said there was not any evidence of significant change in the mass of ice shelves in east Antarctica nor any indication that its ice cap was melting. "The only significant calvings in Antarctica have been in the west," he said. And he cautioned that calvings of the magnitude seen recently in west Antarctica might not be unusual.

"Ice shelves in general have episodic carvings and there can be large icebergs breaking off - I'm talking 100km or 200km long - every 10 or 20 or 50 years."

Ice core drilling in the fast ice off Australia's Davis Station in East Antarctica by the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Co-Operative Research Centre shows that last year, the ice had a maximum thickness of 1.89m, its densest in 10 years. The average thickness of the ice at Davis since the 1950s is 1.67m.

A paper to be published soon by the British Antarctic Survey in the journal Geophysical Research Letters is expected to confirm that over the past 30 years, the area of sea ice around the continent has expanded.
This has to be opposed to the late January 2009 study.
Obviously the issue is certainly not settled. This page offers an explanation about the various reports.
There's also the difference between sea ice and land ice, and land ice is what is prone to change sea levels.
Also, several sources agree on the average steady and very slow warming of Antarctica, that makes is almost negligible in reality, especially over a few years only, and that despite spectacular China's increase of CO2 emissions since 2000.

- note: That said, what we see is that China has joined up with the USA in the per-capita CO2 emission. What this tells us is that the US have the highest values of CO2 emissions compared to other large territorial ensembles, and that China is likely going to continue going up. So I'd mitigate the author's comments and point out that a reduction of the per-pinhead CO2 emissions in the SUA, and later on in Europe, could be welcomed... but ONLY if proven to be detrimental to the planet, which is not a given at all.

As for the Arctic, tree samples analysis over 1500 years in Sweden shows that there are indeed strong ups and downs, but the average is still the same.
Sea level monitoring in the Pacific (Tuvalu) and Indian Oceans (Maldives) has shown no sign of any sea level rise.
The sea does not rise all places at the same rate at the same time, curiously enough - according to some measurements - but there's no question that it's rising overall. And rising, moreover, faster than we expect from ice melt alone - some of the sea level rise is due to thermal expansion rather than ice melt. Water does expand a little bit as you warm it up.
The alarmist rise faster than expectations seems to be bollocks of the highest order. :)
There's a global phenomenon that is evolving at a steady and natural pace. Not a forced and unatural one.
Run the actual statistical correlation between CO2 levels and global average temperatures and you'll get a remarkably high figure. It's noncoincidental.
I just happened to do that with one of the first links I provided above, and I'm at pain to find any increase of temperature that would mirror the increase of global CO2 emissions, notably around the time China increased its CO2 emissions in 2000.

So globally we see that a large number of alarmist predictions were both erroneous and caused by the fractional observation of the data.
Not to say that sea levels are obviously going to rise as top water inflates due to global warming, but this global warming would prove to be natural.
The most dangerous effect of carbon overload, IMO, is ocean acidification, which I don't think you'll find mentioned on any "global warming myths" website, but it's a key feature of some of the most catastrophic projections, e.g., those involving a crash of the ocean's ecology. Ocean acidification alone is worth being worried about, regardless of whether you're living in a hurricane prone area, or a low-lying area, or anywhere else potentially impacted directly by global warming.
Try "ocean acidification myth" in a SE, you'll see.
Reading This short page and its comments will show that, again, yes, there is a slow and steady acidification, but it's occuring so slowly that there's nothing to fear here, and the corals act as perfect buffers for this (along more vigorous and dense plantlife worldwide).

And the fact that on such models and above all, observation of empirical data, the oceans are never going to turn "acid" anytime soon.

This one addresses the alarmist claims with a spot on cartoon strip.

What I agree on is that cutting large swathes of forests is not smart, whether the release of CO2 is either done by rotting or consumption as firewood.
But this CO2 will be absorbed by other plans and corals.

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Post by Jedi Master Spock » Fri May 15, 2009 6:52 pm

Mr. Oragahn wrote:There's little chances they'd dismiss the graph on such basis if they didn't have read some form of evidence to back up such claims.
Sure there is. It's called "I like my funding from the coal/oil/gas industry."
Here's an example of sudden peaks within a few years, when we observe global temperature since 1900.
What is interesting is that it provides values beyond 2000, and we can see that it's perfectly in line with what has happened before. The ups and down -- although occuring a notch higher since on the average, global temperature raised slowly -- show no oddity.
And what's also interesting is that it provides no explanation for the trends it draws on the graph.
This global warming, precisely recognized by the source, has nothing to do with the anthropomorphic one, which is the point of controversy.
Twenty years ago, it was plausible to say that we weren't sure global warming was manmade, and hold out for a higher correlation.

Fact of the matter is, we know that carbon dioxide increases are driven mainly by human activity. In fact, we have a pretty good idea how much comes from cars, factories, power plants, et cetera.

We know that temperature and CO2 concentrations are very solid. It's a highly statistically significant correlation over the entire record (1850 on), and the correlations show that in the more recent era, CO2 has become more strongly correlated, i.e., accounts for a greater part of the variation in temperature than it does at a lower concentration.

We know the exact mechanism by which CO2 can increase temperature. CO2 lets light through, but absorbs a certain amount of longer-wave radiation - result being that it lets in solar irradiance better than it lets out the re-radiated heat.

So. We know there is a strong relationship; we know exactly how it could be that increased CO2 would cause increased temperatures; and we know, finally, exactly where the increased CO2 comes from.
Besides, it replies to the claim that ice poles are warming up, as warming up per your standard alarmist (dramatic warming instead of minor natural warming).
It says that's incorrect as far as the Arctic is concerned.
It replies badly - by pointing to the very few parts that are adding ice, as if they somehow counterbalance the fact that the large majority of the Arctic losing ice. It doesn't. Both the polar regions are in a net ice loss period.
The Gulf Stream "cooling" is addressed here, and literally suggests, based upon data, that the current has not weakened, but on the contrary has likely strengthened within the last decade.
My apologies, I see there has been new data on the Gulf stream dynamics. I'll put that on the shelf with the hurricane increase.
Antarctic ice is growing, not melting away, By Greg Roberts, The Australian, April 18, 2009 11:52am.
[...]
Dr Allison said there was not any evidence of significant change in the mass of ice shelves in east Antarctica nor any indication that its ice cap was melting. "The only significant calvings in Antarctica have been in the west," he said. And he cautioned that calvings of the magnitude seen recently in west Antarctica might not be unusual.

"Ice shelves in general have episodic carvings and there can be large icebergs breaking off - I'm talking 100km or 200km long - every 10 or 20 or 50 years."

Ice core drilling in the fast ice off Australia's Davis Station in East Antarctica by the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Co-Operative Research Centre shows that last year, the ice had a maximum thickness of 1.89m, its densest in 10 years. The average thickness of the ice at Davis since the 1950s is 1.67m.

A paper to be published soon by the British Antarctic Survey in the journal Geophysical Research Letters is expected to confirm that over the past 30 years, the area of sea ice around the continent has expanded.
This has to be opposed to the late January 2009 study.
Obviously the issue is certainly not settled. This page offers an explanation about the various reports.
There's also the difference between sea ice and land ice, and land ice is what is prone to change sea levels.

Also, several sources agree on the average steady and very slow warming of Antarctica, that makes is almost negligible in reality, especially over a few years only, and that despite spectacular China's increase of CO2 emissions since 2000.
If you read your own links carefully, you'll see that they're saying the same thing I'm saying. Some parts of Antarctica - such as the eastern shelf - are gaining some ice; others, such as the western shelf and the land, are losing more ice. It's a subtle distinction in the data.
- note: That said, what we see is that China has joined up with the USA in the per-capita CO2 emission. What this tells us is that the US have the highest values of CO2 emissions compared to other large territorial ensembles, and that China is likely going to continue going up. So I'd mitigate the author's comments and point out that a reduction of the per-pinhead CO2 emissions in the SUA, and later on in Europe, could be welcomed... but ONLY if proven to be detrimental to the planet, which is not a given at all.
I think that the CO2 is creating rather dramatic effects with >99% confidence. Exactly what level of statistical confidence that anthropogenic CO2 is causing global warming would you like to see before acting?
As for the Arctic, tree samples analysis over 1500 years in Sweden shows that there are indeed strong ups and downs, but the average is still the same.
Again, over the whole Arctic, the picture is fairly significant, showing that overall, Arctic ice is declining and likely to change from perennial to seasonal soon.
The alarmist rise faster than expectations seems to be bollocks of the highest order. :)
There's a global phenomenon that is evolving at a steady and natural pace. Not a forced and unatural one.
Expectations have been all over the place. It's not surprising that the highest sea level rises predicted haven't panned out - but sea levels have continued to rise at an accelerated rate.
I just happened to do that with one of the first links I provided above, and I'm at pain to find any increase of temperature that would mirror the increase of global CO2 emissions, notably around the time China increased its CO2 emissions in 2000.
That's funny, I don't see anywhere where they're talking about - let alone reporting - statistical correlations or statistical significances.
So globally we see that a large number of alarmist predictions were both erroneous and caused by the fractional observation of the data.
Not to say that sea levels are obviously going to rise as top water inflates due to global warming, but this global warming would prove to be natural.
In spite, in other words, of the known mechanism by which the greenhouse effect works, the high statistical significance of the relationship between CO2 and temperature, and the known cause of elevated CO2?
Try "ocean acidification myth" in a SE, you'll see.
Reading This short page and its comments will show that, again, yes, there is a slow and steady acidification, but it's occuring so slowly that there's nothing to fear here, and the corals act as perfect buffers for this (along more vigorous and dense plantlife worldwide).
Interesting that the page you link to claims without any data that coral will somehow compensate for the CO2 increase.

The confusion between brief shocks and sustained changes is in particular almost amusing... except that we've been noticing coral reefs dying off for quite some time now, and see no signs of them turning around and accelerating their growth in response to increased CO2. As a matter of fact, laboratory studies on the effects of increased CO2 on marine organisms - which page's author seems to think haven't been done - have been ongoing for quite some time.
And the fact that on such models and above all, observation of empirical data, the oceans are never going to turn "acid" anytime soon.
Ideal pH for most ocean organisms isn't far from 8. Moreover, ocean pH changes are not uniform across the entire ocean, and we're talking a logarithmic scale. A pH shift of -0.1 represents a 25% increase in the acidity of the water.
This one addresses the alarmist claims with a spot on cartoon strip.

What I agree on is that cutting large swathes of forests is not smart, whether the release of CO2 is either done by rotting or consumption as firewood.
But this CO2 will be absorbed by other plans and corals.
Corals and phytoplankton are one of the buffering forces in these models.

"Buffering" is key. As evinced by the continually rising CO2 levels themselves, humankind is pumping out CO2 much faster than it is absorbed. Which brings us back to square one. Ocean pH is dropping and CO2 levels are rising because humankind is putting it into the system faster than plants can absorb it.

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Post by Jedi Master Spock » Fri May 15, 2009 9:36 pm

I should actually probably go on a little bit about the acid bit.

See, while CO2 is a basic building block - the carbonate part of the calcium carbonate that makes up shells, coral, et cetera - calcium carbonate is a particularly pH sensitive substance. It dissolves into solution roughly proportionate to the square of acidity, i.e., when we're looking at a change of 0.1 pH and nothing else changes, that's a change of ~25% in acidity, we're looking at a ~60% increase in how much calcium carbonate you can dissolve into the water.

Marine animals that rely on shells (e.g., coral, some kinds of phytoplankton, et cetera) generally build them slowly, so an increase in the rate at which calcium carbonate dissolves can be problematic for some types of phytoplankton, even though they feed on CO2. Also, of course, most types of aquatic life are adapted to a specific pH, so a change of several tenths of a point outside the 8.1-8.3 "normal" range can get catastrophic; some creatures, of course, being more sensitive than others.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Tue May 19, 2009 10:44 pm

I think that for the moment, I'm just going to reply to one comment;
Jedi Master Spock wrote:
Mr. Oragahn wrote:There's little chances they'd dismiss the graph on such basis if they didn't have read some form of evidence to back up such claims.
Sure there is. It's called "I like my funding from the coal/oil/gas industry."
This is quite a stretch here. The blog shows nothing special more than some random blog with some ads, analyzing data from other sources.

More importantly, your remark would apply if as the carbon taxes were enforced, fuel price would not change for the consumer, but the car builders and oil industries would pay the taxes.
As we can safely guess, those who are going to pay for the taxes are the consumers, not the producers of anything that consumes that much fossil fuel.
From this perspective, the blog's owner and author would surely have an interest, as a random consumer, in showing that the alarmist calls are over blown (although it doesn't mean to become deaf at all).
Last edited by Mr. Oragahn on Wed May 20, 2009 2:05 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by PunkMaister » Wed May 20, 2009 12:20 am

Mr. Oragahn wrote:I think that for the moment, I'm just going to reply to one comment;
Jedi Master Spock wrote:
Mr. Oragahn wrote:There's little chances they'd dismiss the graph on such basis if they didn't have read some form of evidence to back up such claims.
Sure there is. It's called "I like my funding from the coal/oil/gas industry."
This is quite a stretch here. The blog shows nothing special more than some random blog with some ads, analyzing data from other sources.

More importantly, you remark would apply if has carbon taxes were enforced, fuel price would not change for the consumer, but the car builders and oil industries would pay the tax.
As we can safely guess, those who are going to pay for the tax are the consumers, not the producers of anything that consumes that much fossil fuels.
From this perspective, the blog's owner and author would surely have an interest, as a random consumer, in showing that the alarmist calls are over blown (although it doesn't mean to become deaf at all).
Mr. O sometimes like in this case you sound like an outright conservative while on others you sound like a bonafide liberal. Is like you have very liberal stances on some issues while having very conservative stances on others...

Anyway I totally that thee is a lot of alarmists in the enviromental movemtent especialyl in thje most radical elements of the movement that go as far as burning or blowing up houses to protect their "mother earth".

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Wed May 20, 2009 1:58 am

PunkMaister wrote:
Mr. Oragahn wrote:I think that for the moment, I'm just going to reply to one comment;
Jedi Master Spock wrote: Sure there is. It's called "I like my funding from the coal/oil/gas industry."
This is quite a stretch here. The blog shows nothing special more than some random blog with some ads, analyzing data from other sources.

More importantly, you remark would apply if has carbon taxes were enforced, fuel price would not change for the consumer, but the car builders and oil industries would pay the tax.
As we can safely guess, those who are going to pay for the tax are the consumers, not the producers of anything that consumes that much fossil fuels.
From this perspective, the blog's owner and author would surely have an interest, as a random consumer, in showing that the alarmist calls are over blown (although it doesn't mean to become deaf at all).
Mr. O sometimes like in this case you sound like an outright conservative while on others you sound like a bonafide liberal. Is like you have very liberal stances on some issues while having very conservative stances on others...

Anyway I totally that thee is a lot of alarmists in the enviromental movemtent especialyl in thje most radical elements of the movement that go as far as burning or blowing up houses to protect their "mother earth".
I'd say the trap is to sit in a given group. That said, I'm probably more on the human, nature and technology side of things than on the religion and patriotism one.
Still, I'm moving towards the defense of national values, families, work and liberties, but I don't think if this is truly a right thing anymore.
The reality is far more blurred than the political schemes enforced by most Western nations to trap people into apathetic political groups.

PS: it's a luck you could understand what I typed. I'll edit my former post to make it more intelligible.

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Post by Jedi Master Spock » Thu May 21, 2009 4:29 am

Perhaps an unjustified comment, in speaking of a blog; there are all sorts of folks out there with all sorts of opinions.

However, in general, I've found that the public face of global warming denial tends to be industry funded, increasingly as time goes by. The fact of the matter is that there was, once upon a time, room for reasonable doubt that the Earth was in a sharp warming trend; was, for a good while longer, room for reasonable doubt that it was manmade.

Now, the data is orders of magnitude better, and the models orders of magnitudes better as well - and where there remains room for doubt is in how dramatic the changes will be. How much will the sea rise? Will ocean currents change - and if so, how quickly? Will hurricane season get worse? What will the price tag be?

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu May 21, 2009 1:35 pm

There's no denying that oil companies would, at first glimpse, want to tone the alarm signal down, unless they got a deal with governments so they would not be affect by carbon taxes.
Then, on the other end, you have the official authorities having the highest interests in proving that global warming is man made, to get support for the taxes, which in the end would not impact much on the oil companies which are not only pouring money into other industries and technologies, but as I said, would have "deals" with the government, which is just as likely considering the crap governments allow to happen about all major industries, food, drugs, music, etc.

PS: the blog makes no reference to Friends of Science btw, as far as I've looked and scanned.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu May 21, 2009 4:54 pm

And perhaps, again troubling waters, this website's page, with some more links at the end.

EDIT: On the topic of the carbon tax, it had been a topic in the most secretive high ranking meeting in Greece this year.
British Petroleum’s Peter Sutherland attended this meeting.

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Post by Mr. Oragahn » Sat Jul 11, 2009 1:40 am


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Re: Global Warming, CO2...

Post by Roondar » Mon Jul 20, 2009 3:26 pm

Regardless of wether or not it exists, isn't ignoring the possibility (or at least refusing to even try to change our behaviour) the worst possible action to take?

Suppose the global warming thing is false. Worst case scenario (i.e. we go along with the environmentalists all the way): we lost a quite bit of cash, but we're still basically a-ok as a species and as a bonus now have a more energy efficient economy (which, in the end, will make us more money anyway as energy costs will go down that way).

Now, suppose the global warming thing is true. Worst case scenario (i.e. we say it isn't so, ignore the warnings and go on like we always did): we'll have to react to the earlier predicted changes as they come along late, losing us quite a bit of cash (probably a lot more than when we start now), have lots of nasty problems to deal with and need to make a relatively bigger change to our economy.

Seems to me that any unbiased, sane, person will have to admit that taking chances with the long term future of our only habitat is well, a very bad idea. Or a bit more blunt: it doesn't actually matter if the environmentalists are right or nutjobs. Earth (our only home) is too important to play with so we really have no choice but to act. Besides, the end result of taking action against Global Warming (regardless if it's real or not) will not be nearly as earthshattering as when it all turns out to be true and we conveniently forgot about it.

Just like the whole peak-oil thing. It doesn't matter if peak-oil is now, in ten, a hundred or a thousand years. Knowing we'll run out some time in the (possibly) near future should be enough to start thinking about and implementing alternatives that don't run out or at least won't run out anywhere near now. Not because it's convenient or cheap. But because it's damn smart and will get us in the situation where we no longer have to worry about the geopolitical stability of a rather small region on Earth.

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Re: Global Warming, CO2...

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Fri Jul 24, 2009 10:47 pm

It's not a question that we should dismiss our ways of living as having a dire influence on the environment, but that the situation is completely blown out of proportions and the financial, corporatist and political powers surf that giant bubble wave to cram more taxes, a new systems of derivatives that gamble on pollution and which many believe won't help the environment much and will, in the end, only allow the richest companies to buy rights to pollute more while giving governments a way to curb the people into repentance because of their sins --yet we the lowly people never were given a true capacity to live differently.

This is also to boost, perhaps artificially, the use of new ecofriendly building materials, heating and recycling systems and so on, because if you do not buy this, and if you do not comply, you're both a dirty bastard, hurting the planet, and you're primitive because you don't want to use the green high technology.

Never mind the fact that this has a cost.

Also, the media campaign that puts the onus of the world's pollution on humanity as a whole --instead of pointing fingers at greedy corporatists who care about profit first and themselves next-- as you shift towards those less energy-hungry lightbulbs. But these new lightbulbs emit a shit load of radiations, and I don't consider this healthy in the slightest. As I think I said in this thread, I got a rather unpleasant experience the first time I used one. I switched a lamp on, after screwing one of those new bulbs into the slot, and it completely fucked up the radio, having it blasting horrifying noise. And this has been confirmed, yet you don't hear about the effects on your body at all. There's no study. These things are rushed on the market, old lightbulb companies are bombing because of this.

And if it wasn't bad enough, you have to finally add the whole government poking its nose into your house. Your domestic electric box will be linked up by satellite, everything about your consumption is planned to be sniffed and managed. There even was that crazy plan which dealt with monitoring your consumption and have the government cut the power supply, or raise the bill dramatically or do something just as bad, if you were seen to consume in untolerable ways.
And you know why people will slowly and meticulously be driven to accept such an intrusion of their private life? Because the eco-propaganda will take care of making you feel absolutely guilty, in pretty much the same way all the media culture defines the way you live and think.

Of course, none of the eco-crusaders of this new millenium, so quick to label humanity as the virus of this planet, will ever lift a finger and denounce the Brasilian and Peruvian governments for example, in the way they sign deals a dime a dozen with large corporations which, in the end, are behind the whole deforestation of the Amazon forest, because of their activities, either directly or indirectly, or fight against the ever increasing use of chemicals on crops for all sorts of reasons (chemicals produced with good old oil of course).
In the same vein, as part of having the government take care of Mother Nature, you probably heard about it taking control of absolutely all water spots

We can come back to the Amazonian forest topic, and speculate a bit about it: I think we should not come as surprised if one day, the "great leaders" of this planet would suddenly consider that the Amazonian forest to be the rightful property of humanity (read the property of the usual suspects, the same countries which have turned this world into flames and ruins coutless times) to force South American governments, through public and economical pressure, to accept this or that agenda and even deprive them of their sovereignty in a way or another, simply because they proved incapable of managing the lungs of this planet, see?

It's very easy to push it that far.

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Re: Global Warming, CO2...

Post by Roondar » Fri Jul 31, 2009 9:31 am

Mr. Oragahn wrote:It's not a question that we should dismiss our ways of living as having a dire influence on the environment, but that the situation is completely blown out of proportions and the financial, corporatist and political powers surf that giant bubble wave to cram more taxes, a new systems of derivatives that gamble on pollution and which many believe won't help the environment much and will, in the end, only allow the richest companies to buy rights to pollute more while giving governments a way to curb the people into repentance because of their sins --yet we the lowly people never were given a true capacity to live differently.
This is not really true. We don't have to use a big-screen TV, a tumble drier, an airconditioning unit or even a car. We don't need to eat meat every day or drive to the grocery store when it's a five minute walk. We don't need to buy crap that we use once and then fills up our house until we throw it away. We don't need to leave the TV (or PC or lightbulb or <random appliance>) on for hours while we're not using it. We want (or choose) to. Not that this is necesarilly wrong (or evil), but lets not pretend we need half of the stuff I named. We can live differently. But we don't really want to. And why would we? We're in an age of plenty and this is just the result of it.

And no, I'm not saying that I am oh so different there. But I can point out that we are choosing to live as we want for a large part (which, considering we have the resources to do so is to be expected). There's no law that says I need a newer, bigger TV every two years, yet there are plenty of people who buy one every two years just the same.
This is also to boost, perhaps artificially, the use of new ecofriendly building materials, heating and recycling systems and so on, because if you do not buy this, and if you do not comply, you're both a dirty bastard, hurting the planet, and you're primitive because you don't want to use the green high technology.

Never mind the fact that this has a cost.
Recycling (and downcycling) is a good thing. We'd be out of some materials altogether by now if we didn't recycle. Heating your house using the same heat that would otherwise be pumped into the local water supply and accomplish nothing except some warmer fish is likewise, a good idea.

And yes, it costs money to recycle. The real question is: does it pay off. I'm leaning towards 'yes' so far.
Also, the media campaign that puts the onus of the world's pollution on humanity as a whole --instead of pointing fingers at greedy corporatists who care about profit first and themselves next-- as you shift towards those less energy-hungry lightbulbs. But these new lightbulbs emit a shit load of radiations, and I don't consider this healthy in the slightest. As I think I said in this thread, I got a rather unpleasant experience the first time I used one. I switched a lamp on, after screwing one of those new bulbs into the slot, and it completely fucked up the radio, having it blasting horrifying noise. And this has been confirmed, yet you don't hear about the effects on your body at all. There's no study. These things are rushed on the market, old lightbulb companies are bombing because of this.
The effects of EM radiation on the body have been researched over and over and over and over again. There is still no evidence it's bad for you. There is plenty of evidence about what it doesn't cause though. In fact, the latest I heard was the study where they proved that people who had 'trouble' with EM fields (such as headaches, dizzyness, nausea and the like) miraculously didn't have any such complaints at all if they where unaware there was an EM source. Even more fun, if they thought there was an EM source (a scientist pushes an unwired button and claims there is now plenty EM radiation while there is none) they got their symptoms back.
And if it wasn't bad enough, you have to finally add the whole government poking its nose into your house. Your domestic electric box will be linked up by satellite, everything about your consumption is planned to be sniffed and managed. There even was that crazy plan which dealt with monitoring your consumption and have the government cut the power supply, or raise the bill dramatically or do something just as bad, if you were seen to consume in untolerable ways.
And you know why people will slowly and meticulously be driven to accept such an intrusion of their private life? Because the eco-propaganda will take care of making you feel absolutely guilty, in pretty much the same way all the media culture defines the way you live and think.
The goverment will only get away with what the people let them get away (for a good example: see copyright laws. No one gives a <explit word> about those, regardless of all the laws). Besides, if the goverment wants to abuse people who use more electricity they don't need satalites. The data on how much you use is already available. Heck, over where I live the local police uses said data to find people who grow weed in the atic. No need for satalites.
Of course, none of the eco-crusaders of this new millenium, so quick to label humanity as the virus of this planet, will ever lift a finger and denounce the Brasilian and Peruvian governments for example, in the way they sign deals a dime a dozen with large corporations which, in the end, are behind the whole deforestation of the Amazon forest, because of their activities, either directly or indirectly, or fight against the ever increasing use of chemicals on crops for all sorts of reasons (chemicals produced with good old oil of course).
This is false. There have been many quite critical reports and quite a few protests over the way the South American goverments abuse the forests and land in general there. Most of those by people like Greenpeace or the WWF (I hope I got the abbreviation right here, I don't mean the wrestlers :P). Some by less biased parties and some of these (at least in Europe) where aired on public radio or TV.

The reality is that the 'eco crusaders' (and a whole bunch of other people) have been very vocal about the mess that is Brazil (and other countries nearby). First I ever heard about the problems in the Amazon area where through a TV ad by... Greenpeace.

Heck, there is currently a series of goverment paid ads on TV telling us we don't actually have to eat pesticide sprayed food if we don't want to, we could eat 'biological' food instead (silly name, I know). But then, people don't buy the non-pesticide sprayed stuff. It's more expensive see and they'd rather eat the poison and pay less.

Oh... Before you ask: I am not supporting Greenpeace. They are 'a tad' too militant for my liking.
In the same vein, as part of having the government take care of Mother Nature, you probably heard about it taking control of absolutely all water spots
As opposed to the 'better' way of letting the -as named so earlier- greedy corporatists control them?
We can come back to the Amazonian forest topic, and speculate a bit about it: I think we should not come as surprised if one day, the "great leaders" of this planet would suddenly consider that the Amazonian forest to be the rightful property of humanity (read the property of the usual suspects, the same countries which have turned this world into flames and ruins coutless times) to force South American governments, through public and economical pressure, to accept this or that agenda and even deprive them of their sovereignty in a way or another, simply because they proved incapable of managing the lungs of this planet, see?

It's very easy to push it that far.
It's also very easy to not push it that far. If only because the 'great leaders' of the world have been utterly incapable of changing even a single thing about what any country really does. It's one thing to claim something. It's quite another to enforce it. And I for one don't think the US, EU, et al are looking for Vietnam 2.0.

Jedi Master Spock
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Re: Global Warming, CO2...

Post by Jedi Master Spock » Fri Jul 31, 2009 5:28 pm

Roondar wrote:The effects of EM radiation on the body have been researched over and over and over and over again. There is still no evidence it's bad for you. There is plenty of evidence about what it doesn't cause though. In fact, the latest I heard was the study where they proved that people who had 'trouble' with EM fields (such as headaches, dizzyness, nausea and the like) miraculously didn't have any such complaints at all if they where unaware there was an EM source. Even more fun, if they thought there was an EM source (a scientist pushes an unwired button and claims there is now plenty EM radiation while there is none) they got their symptoms back.
One minute here to make a point here - you have a bit of an overgeneralization.

The effects of EM radiation have been researched many different times with many different results - because there are many different types of EM radiation, from gamma rays to visible light all the way down to microwave and radio frequencies.

In general higher levels of total radiation mean a higher risk. Specifically different frequencies have different effects. High-band EM - cosmic, gamma and x-rays - increase general cancer risk throughout the body as they can cause damage directly to genes and easily penetrate through the body. Ultraviolet radiation is also ionizing, but since it is easily blocked, it only interacts with the skin, and thus specifically causes melanoma. The risks of high-band EM radiation are fairly well understood, and the primary risk mechanism is simple - ionization.

Low-band EM radiation - microwave and radio frequencies - also penetrates through the body, but unlike high-band EM, it's not ionizing. However, that's not to say it has no effect on the body. Microwave radiation, for example, has a very dramatic effect on male fertility - sperm counts and motility go down sharply. In the laboratory, I believe one or two specific types of tumors have been shown to have increased growth rates under certain frequencies of RF exposure. That isn't to say that RF radiation can cause genetic mutations, but it can affect cellular mechanisms.

There's a lot that remains to be determined about long-term RF and microwave exposure in various commercial bands; trying to understand everything about how various types of EM radiation interact with biology is quite tricky, because you have to examine almost every different phenomenon with regard to each of the common commercial frequencies. While the microwave-sperm health connection is very well statistically founded, I'm not sure the exact causal mechanism is well understood, for example; I certainly couldn't tell you, even though I'm familiar with some of the relevant studies that pointed it out.

That is not to say there are no placebo effects, or no unwarranted panic, but to say that there's no effect of EM fields on the human body is not particularly accurate.

And now I really should get to fixing the hover-over flashing effect in the stylesheet. It's bugging me, too.

Roondar
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Re: Global Warming, CO2...

Post by Roondar » Mon Aug 03, 2009 3:22 pm

Jedi Master Spock wrote:
Roondar wrote:The effects of EM radiation on the body have been researched over and over and over and over again. There is still no evidence it's bad for you. There is plenty of evidence about what it doesn't cause though. In fact, the latest I heard was the study where they proved that people who had 'trouble' with EM fields (such as headaches, dizzyness, nausea and the like) miraculously didn't have any such complaints at all if they where unaware there was an EM source. Even more fun, if they thought there was an EM source (a scientist pushes an unwired button and claims there is now plenty EM radiation while there is none) they got their symptoms back.
One minute here to make a point here - you have a bit of an overgeneralization.

The effects of EM radiation have been researched many different times with many different results - because there are many different types of EM radiation, from gamma rays to visible light all the way down to microwave and radio frequencies.

In general higher levels of total radiation mean a higher risk. Specifically different frequencies have different effects. High-band EM - cosmic, gamma and x-rays - increase general cancer risk throughout the body as they can cause damage directly to genes and easily penetrate through the body. Ultraviolet radiation is also ionizing, but since it is easily blocked, it only interacts with the skin, and thus specifically causes melanoma. The risks of high-band EM radiation are fairly well understood, and the primary risk mechanism is simple - ionization.

Low-band EM radiation - microwave and radio frequencies - also penetrates through the body, but unlike high-band EM, it's not ionizing. However, that's not to say it has no effect on the body. Microwave radiation, for example, has a very dramatic effect on male fertility - sperm counts and motility go down sharply. In the laboratory, I believe one or two specific types of tumors have been shown to have increased growth rates under certain frequencies of RF exposure. That isn't to say that RF radiation can cause genetic mutations, but it can affect cellular mechanisms.

There's a lot that remains to be determined about long-term RF and microwave exposure in various commercial bands; trying to understand everything about how various types of EM radiation interact with biology is quite tricky, because you have to examine almost every different phenomenon with regard to each of the common commercial frequencies. While the microwave-sperm health connection is very well statistically founded, I'm not sure the exact causal mechanism is well understood, for example; I certainly couldn't tell you, even though I'm familiar with some of the relevant studies that pointed it out.

That is not to say there are no placebo effects, or no unwarranted panic, but to say that there's no effect of EM fields on the human body is not particularly accurate.

And now I really should get to fixing the hover-over flashing effect in the stylesheet. It's bugging me, too.
I probably should have clarified this. I'm speaking specifically about the level of radiation received and type (i.e. low power consumer-frequency range EM) that is comming from stuff like cellphones, radio's (and lightbulbs). I've never seen a credible source (at least one which was not refuted later) that actually managed to find health issues with that. All research I saw that referred to health issues used either unrealistically high levels of exposure/exposure time or reached inconclusive results.

Not about high powered microwaves or gama rays or some such ;)

However, if you want to pick at the power-saving lightbulbs, a far better angle of attack is the chemical junk inside. Now, that is nasty ;)

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