Trump: “Those oceans are real losers. Completely low-key performances. I’ve got the top guys working on this problem. These a Grade-A Classy expects when it comes to oceans. If the seas rise, I’m the only candidate who can make a deal with them. I promise you this, put me in a room with the seven seas and I’ll hammer out such a deal that they’ll be paying us to be a solid gold wall along the coasts. And all the oceans do is send us their jelly fish to rape and murder white women who are bleeding out their you know what. Vote for me and those seas will learn a lesson on who’s boss.”
I will make a $100 bet with any and all of you lefties that the sea levels won’t rise in the next ten years, but they will stay the same or lower. any takers?
Redman: correction, if it’s supported by data, experiment and consistent results, peer reviewed and found corrrect, even if some variables may still occur that don’t change the actual totality of evidence, it’s science. If you pull it out of a book of myths and kill people for thousands of years to support the myths, that’s “faith” and religion.
I’m not impressed by the argument that we shouldn’t take global warming seriously because science is never settled. Yes, in some sense, science is never settled, but it’s settled enough to provide a basis for making computers and cell phones and GPS devices and nuclear reactors and so on and so on and so on. Are you going to give up your computer because we don’t have a full understanding of quantum physics?
As far as your “settled” comment is concerned – “they (scientists) mean that the fake debate over whether climate change is a vast hoax is finished. They don’t mean there’s no work ahead.”http://time.com/3445231/climate-denier-settled-science/
This all gets very complicated, but I will try to make just a few points.First, the principle that “science is never settled” seems to be applied by skeptics to climate science when they would never apply it to other areas of science. Do you seriously doubt the heliocentric model of the solar system? Do you doubt (some sufficiently sophisticated version of) the atomic theory? Do you smoke? After all, the science about smoking and lung cancer isn’t settled.Second, do I gather from your post that you grant that things are getting warmer, but you question if the cause is human activity?Third, it’s true that correlation is not causation, but when the correlation is to something that on other grounds does have a causal link, then there is at least a smoking gun. If I turn the gas on under the tea kettle and the water starts to boil, well, there’s a correlation but we also know that heat is exactly what causes water to boil, so we can have a lot of confidence that the water is boiling because I turned on the gas. As it happens, we have good reason to believe that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, so if CO2 levels go up and temperatures go up, there’s a plausible connection. My understanding is that there is no other causal mechanism which can explain the rise in temperatures.Fourth, the claims published by the IPCC always come with a “level of confidence”. That is, they grant that there is room for disagreement (“science s never settled”), but they also try to measure how big that room is. Sometimes the room is pretty small.Fifth, at what point would you be willing to say that with a high level of confidence the planet is getting warmer and that human activity is a significant part of the cause? Not certainty, but a high level of confidence? What kind of evidence would you find convincing?I’m not a scientist, and I don’t make claims on my own; I have to depend on other people’s work. I try to understand the science as much as I can. I have been open, and I remain open, to counter arguments, but so far I have found as much as I can understand that the arguments in favor of climate change are better than the counter arguments.
Just continuing with my thoughts. Once we have agreed that the global temperatures are rising rapidly and that the climate is changing rapidly, then it’s very important to figure out why. If it’s some temporary phenomenon that will go away soon, then we don’t have to worry. If it’s something natural (that is, not caused by human beings), then it still could be serious, but our ability to change it may be limited, and we should work on learning how to deal with it. But if human activity is a significant cause, then we have the ability to change the situation. So it’s very important to figure out why it’s happening.We can proceed by working on Sherlock Holmes method: eliminate everything that’s impossible, and whatever is left, however improbable, is the truth. (Of course there can be more than one cause.)Is the cause some temporary natural process? For example, a temporary increase in solar output maybe could cause an increase in our temperatures. But so far as I know, that’s not it. The sun’s energy output is not increasing right now. Could it be a change in the orbit of the earth? Evidently not, and certainly not enough to explain the rapidity of the change. Could it be a sudden increase in volcanic action? Not that I’m aware of. Have you got any other good candidates?If not, is it at all possible that human activity somehow correlated with increased temperatures? Some kinds of human activity are irrelevant. Global warming is not caused by rock and roll; there’s no causal mechanism that could link them. But there is one kind of human activity that looks like a good candidate. We have been pumping a whole lot of CO2 into the atmosphere, and there is a good correlation between the increase in temperatures and the increase in atmospheric CO2. And we also know, both from theory and from laboratory experiments, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. So not only do we have a correlation, we also have a plausible causal mechanism.In the absence of any other good explanation, it looks pretty likely that the increase in atmospheric CO2 caused by human activity is the cause of global warming.I am open to discussion. If you have a better candidate for the cause, please spell it out. Or it there are flaws in my reasoning, please let me know. I’m not a scientist, I just try to make sense of things as best I can.
This topic gets complicated quickly, so I’m going to try to keep to one line of thought as much as possible. I think we’ve established, to my satisfaction at least, that the general argument “Science is never settled” has no particular relevance here. The question is “Is this particular science settled to a high degree of confidence”. That is, “Is it settled to a high degree of confidence that temperatures are rising rapidly and the climate is changing rapidly?” I think we have agreed that the answer is Yes.So the next question is “Why?” I have proposed that the only plausible scenario includes human activity as a significant contributor, again to a high degree of confidence. I asked for other candidates, and I didn’t get any, so again I will assume that we are agreed, “Yes”. Stop me if I’m wrong.Next you raise the question, “Is that so bad?” Well, I would say yes. Even an increase of a few degrees C in average temperature will have pretty big effects. Some people hear that the temperature may rise 2 degrees C. within the century, and they say, so what? If the temperature today is 15 C. or 17 C. it’s no big deal. But of course we’re not talking about one day. We are talking about 365 days each year, year after year. If you think of the heat energy increase over a period of years if every day in those years you’re adding 2 degrees of heat, that’s a lot of energy. It’s going to mean a lot of ice melting, a lot of snow pack not forming in the winter, droughts, heat waves, crop failures, and so on. To say nothing of changes in the chemistry of the oceans. So I would argue that even a few degrees change in average temperature over a long time could have serious negative effects.As for population, yes, there have been people concerned about population since the 1960s. It would be very good to bring the population down. We need world wide population control. Tell that to the Pope.
Flash Gordon over 8 years ago
“Yeehaaaaaaaa!”(kaboom)♫ We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when ♫♫ But I know we’ll meet again some sunny day. ♫
Richard Howland-Bolton Premium Member over 8 years ago
King_Shark over 8 years ago
You’ll have to answer to the Coca Cola company.
Thomas R. Williams over 8 years ago
Polluting Mother Nature’s precious bodily fluids.
Darsan54 Premium Member over 8 years ago
Yeah, I can think of a couple of dozen places to throw the Rumpman.
dre7861 over 8 years ago
Trump: “Those oceans are real losers. Completely low-key performances. I’ve got the top guys working on this problem. These a Grade-A Classy expects when it comes to oceans. If the seas rise, I’m the only candidate who can make a deal with them. I promise you this, put me in a room with the seven seas and I’ll hammer out such a deal that they’ll be paying us to be a solid gold wall along the coasts. And all the oceans do is send us their jelly fish to rape and murder white women who are bleeding out their you know what. Vote for me and those seas will learn a lesson on who’s boss.”
ZomVee over 8 years ago
I will make a $100 bet with any and all of you lefties that the sea levels won’t rise in the next ten years, but they will stay the same or lower. any takers?
Dtroutma over 8 years ago
Redman: correction, if it’s supported by data, experiment and consistent results, peer reviewed and found corrrect, even if some variables may still occur that don’t change the actual totality of evidence, it’s science. If you pull it out of a book of myths and kill people for thousands of years to support the myths, that’s “faith” and religion.
lonecat over 8 years ago
I’m not impressed by the argument that we shouldn’t take global warming seriously because science is never settled. Yes, in some sense, science is never settled, but it’s settled enough to provide a basis for making computers and cell phones and GPS devices and nuclear reactors and so on and so on and so on. Are you going to give up your computer because we don’t have a full understanding of quantum physics?
VT8/VF84 over 8 years ago
Where is Slim Picken’s when we need him?
Nantucket Premium Member over 8 years ago
As far as your “settled” comment is concerned – “they (scientists) mean that the fake debate over whether climate change is a vast hoax is finished. They don’t mean there’s no work ahead.”http://time.com/3445231/climate-denier-settled-science/
lonecat over 8 years ago
This all gets very complicated, but I will try to make just a few points.First, the principle that “science is never settled” seems to be applied by skeptics to climate science when they would never apply it to other areas of science. Do you seriously doubt the heliocentric model of the solar system? Do you doubt (some sufficiently sophisticated version of) the atomic theory? Do you smoke? After all, the science about smoking and lung cancer isn’t settled.Second, do I gather from your post that you grant that things are getting warmer, but you question if the cause is human activity?Third, it’s true that correlation is not causation, but when the correlation is to something that on other grounds does have a causal link, then there is at least a smoking gun. If I turn the gas on under the tea kettle and the water starts to boil, well, there’s a correlation but we also know that heat is exactly what causes water to boil, so we can have a lot of confidence that the water is boiling because I turned on the gas. As it happens, we have good reason to believe that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, so if CO2 levels go up and temperatures go up, there’s a plausible connection. My understanding is that there is no other causal mechanism which can explain the rise in temperatures.Fourth, the claims published by the IPCC always come with a “level of confidence”. That is, they grant that there is room for disagreement (“science s never settled”), but they also try to measure how big that room is. Sometimes the room is pretty small.Fifth, at what point would you be willing to say that with a high level of confidence the planet is getting warmer and that human activity is a significant part of the cause? Not certainty, but a high level of confidence? What kind of evidence would you find convincing?I’m not a scientist, and I don’t make claims on my own; I have to depend on other people’s work. I try to understand the science as much as I can. I have been open, and I remain open, to counter arguments, but so far I have found as much as I can understand that the arguments in favor of climate change are better than the counter arguments.
lonecat over 8 years ago
Just continuing with my thoughts. Once we have agreed that the global temperatures are rising rapidly and that the climate is changing rapidly, then it’s very important to figure out why. If it’s some temporary phenomenon that will go away soon, then we don’t have to worry. If it’s something natural (that is, not caused by human beings), then it still could be serious, but our ability to change it may be limited, and we should work on learning how to deal with it. But if human activity is a significant cause, then we have the ability to change the situation. So it’s very important to figure out why it’s happening.We can proceed by working on Sherlock Holmes method: eliminate everything that’s impossible, and whatever is left, however improbable, is the truth. (Of course there can be more than one cause.)Is the cause some temporary natural process? For example, a temporary increase in solar output maybe could cause an increase in our temperatures. But so far as I know, that’s not it. The sun’s energy output is not increasing right now. Could it be a change in the orbit of the earth? Evidently not, and certainly not enough to explain the rapidity of the change. Could it be a sudden increase in volcanic action? Not that I’m aware of. Have you got any other good candidates?If not, is it at all possible that human activity somehow correlated with increased temperatures? Some kinds of human activity are irrelevant. Global warming is not caused by rock and roll; there’s no causal mechanism that could link them. But there is one kind of human activity that looks like a good candidate. We have been pumping a whole lot of CO2 into the atmosphere, and there is a good correlation between the increase in temperatures and the increase in atmospheric CO2. And we also know, both from theory and from laboratory experiments, that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. So not only do we have a correlation, we also have a plausible causal mechanism.In the absence of any other good explanation, it looks pretty likely that the increase in atmospheric CO2 caused by human activity is the cause of global warming.I am open to discussion. If you have a better candidate for the cause, please spell it out. Or it there are flaws in my reasoning, please let me know. I’m not a scientist, I just try to make sense of things as best I can.
lonecat over 8 years ago
This topic gets complicated quickly, so I’m going to try to keep to one line of thought as much as possible. I think we’ve established, to my satisfaction at least, that the general argument “Science is never settled” has no particular relevance here. The question is “Is this particular science settled to a high degree of confidence”. That is, “Is it settled to a high degree of confidence that temperatures are rising rapidly and the climate is changing rapidly?” I think we have agreed that the answer is Yes.So the next question is “Why?” I have proposed that the only plausible scenario includes human activity as a significant contributor, again to a high degree of confidence. I asked for other candidates, and I didn’t get any, so again I will assume that we are agreed, “Yes”. Stop me if I’m wrong.Next you raise the question, “Is that so bad?” Well, I would say yes. Even an increase of a few degrees C in average temperature will have pretty big effects. Some people hear that the temperature may rise 2 degrees C. within the century, and they say, so what? If the temperature today is 15 C. or 17 C. it’s no big deal. But of course we’re not talking about one day. We are talking about 365 days each year, year after year. If you think of the heat energy increase over a period of years if every day in those years you’re adding 2 degrees of heat, that’s a lot of energy. It’s going to mean a lot of ice melting, a lot of snow pack not forming in the winter, droughts, heat waves, crop failures, and so on. To say nothing of changes in the chemistry of the oceans. So I would argue that even a few degrees change in average temperature over a long time could have serious negative effects.As for population, yes, there have been people concerned about population since the 1960s. It would be very good to bring the population down. We need world wide population control. Tell that to the Pope.