Question for Global Warming skeptics

[alexey]

This is a question for people who do not think that Global Warming is a problem and we need to do something about it.

What kind of evidence would you need to change your mind?

[blue collar]

Honestly, I don't think there's nothing we can do to stop global warming. The Earth has gone through these warming cycles before. Recently, they've found evidence of palm trees in the arctic. We won't be around to see it, but I believe we're in the beginning stages of seeing that again.

[alexey]

Honestly, I don't think there's nothing we can do to stop global warming. The Earth has gone through these warming cycles before. Recently, they've found evidence of palm trees in the arctic. We won't be around to see it, but I believe we're in the beginning stages of seeing that again.

I am asking what kind of evidence you would need to change your mind and think of GW as a big manmade problem.

[Reic]

I would need to see evidence against the Earth's warming and cooling trends during the Earth's few billion years of existence, to which there is none and never will be any.

I don't see it as a problem, but an inevitable situation that humanity has no control over. Sure cleaning up our environment and cleaner air is great, I'm all for that, but we won't win out against nature.

[Burgold]

Honestly, I don't think there's nothing we can do to stop global warming. .

Freudian double negative

[alexey]

I would need to see evidence against the Earth's warming and cooling trends during the Earth's few billion years of existence, to which there is none and never will be any.

What kind of evidence would show that current trend is not a part of "business as usual"?

[VaSkinsNut]

I am asking what kind of evidence you would need to change your mind and think of GW as a big manmade problem.

Evidence from reliable sources that man-made pollution contributes more to the "greenhouse" effect than volcanoes and other forms of life on earth, then combine that data with clear and reliable evidence that solar activity plays no part in warming/cooling patterns on earth.

Then prove that the earth temperatures remained perfectly stable before 1900.

[mcsluggo]

I would need to see evidence against the Earth's warming and cooling trends during the Earth's few billion years of existence, to which there is none and never will be any.

I don't see it as a problem, but an inevitable situation that humanity has no control over. Sure cleaning up our environment and cleaner air is great, I'm all for that, but we won't win out against nature.

so... if you were on the jury in a case where the defendent <allegedly> shot someone in teh head, all the defense would have to do is demonstrate convincingly that OTHER people had died of circumstances unrelated to bullets in the brain? really?

[DCsportsfan53]

Honestly, I don't think there's nothing we can do to stop global warming. The Earth has gone through these warming cycles before. Recently, they've found evidence of palm trees in the arctic. We won't be around to see it, but I believe we're in the beginning stages of seeing that again.

I agree with this and honestly, even if we are causing/accelerating it (which I feel is likely) I just don't see what the solution is. As long as the technology is there, people are going to use it. There's no such thing as 100% renewable or clean energy in a realistic, applicable sense. In my mind we ought to start focusing on finding out what changes are going to take place and how we can best adapt to the coming changes instead of wasting time looking for magic bullets. Sure we should take steps to make our energy cleaner and find cleaner, less Middle East dependent fuel sources but within the scope of staying economically competitive and realistic about the way we impact our enviornment.

[Reic]

What kind of evidence would show that current trend is not a part of "business as usual"?

The kind not making it a trend.

We are caught in a natural warming period, though our output of greenhouse gasses are adding onto that period is not helping much. Regardless of our output, the warming would still be happening.

[Burgold]

Evidence from reliable sources that man-made pollution contributes more to the "greenhouse" effect than volcanoes and other forms of life on earth, then combine that data with clear and reliable evidence that solar activity plays no part in warming/cooling patterns on earth.

Then prove that the earth temperatures remained perfectly stable before 1900.

This is one of those ones I don't get. Why does it need to contribute "more?" What if there's a threshhold level that the Earth can easily handle and polution above that point creates a mess. Well, we can't turn volcanoes off, but we can limit the stuff we produce and how we produce it. If we only produce 20% of the gunk that's out there, but the world is being damaged... well, reducing our output or cleaning up our own room will help. It's not an all or nothing scenario.

[Reic]

so... if you were on the jury in a case where the defendent <allegedly> shot someone in teh head, all the defense would have to do is demonstrate convincingly that OTHER people had died of circumstances unrelated to bullets in the brain? really?

If someone shot someone in the head, they shot someone in the head. Other people have died of other circumstances unrelated of bullets to the brain.

I'm not sure what you are trying to say here.

[alexey]

Evidence from reliable sources that man-made pollution contributes more to the "greenhouse" effect than volcanoes and other forms of life on earth, then combine that data with clear and reliable evidence that solar activity plays no part in warming/cooling patterns on earth.

This was already done in numerous studies that looked at both historic and current greenhouse effects.

Then prove that the earth temperatures remained perfectly stable before 1900.

Of course temperatures were not stable. We are talking about anthropogenic warming vs natural variation.

[alexey]

The kind not making it a trend.

We are caught in a natural warming period, though our output of greenhouse gasses are adding onto that period is not helping much. Regardless of our output, the warming would still be happening.

What kind of evidence would you need to conclude that man made contributions are a significant factor that is making current warming significantly faster, stronger, etc?

[alexey]

I agree with this and honestly, even if we are causing/accelerating it (which I feel is likely) I just don't see what the solution is. As long as the technology is there, people are going to use it. There's no such thing as 100% renewable or clean energy in a realistic, applicable sense. In my mind we ought to start focusing on finding out what changes are going to take place and how we can best adapt to the coming changes instead of wasting time looking for magic bullets. Sure we should take steps to make our energy cleaner and find cleaner, less Middle East dependent fuel sources but within the scope of staying economically competitive and realistic about the way we impact our enviornment.

We are talking about what evidence it would take to agree on what's going on. "what, if anything, we can do about it" is an interesting topic that requires it's own thread.

[mcsluggo]

If someone shot someone in the head, they shot someone in the head. Other people have died of other circumstances unrelated of bullets to the brain.

I'm not sure what you are trying to say here.

My point isn't clear? really?

you state that the only convincing evidence of man-made global warming would be to demonstrate that warming never has nor could arise from any other reason.

I would need to see evidence against the Earth's warming and cooling trends during the Earth's few billion years of existence, to which there is none and never will be any.

which seems remarkably equivelent to my capital murder analogy. In your post you aren't asking for evidence for/or/against human-induced global warming... at all.

[VaSkinsNut]

This is one of those ones I don't get. Why does it need to contribute "more?" What if there's a threshhold level that the Earth can easily handle and polution above that point creates a mess. Well, we can't turn volcanoes off, but we can limit the stuff we produce and how we produce it. If we only produce 20% of the gunk that's out there, but the world is being damaged... well, reducing our output or cleaning up our own room will help. It's not an all or nothing scenario.

Well it sounds you believe without man we'd be at this "threshold" and in the last 100 years man's contribution to air pollution has pushed things over the top. Does this mean if 1 or 2 volcanoes had formed naturally in the last 100 years earth wouldn't be able to handle it? Or how about if a couple had simply erupted more?

I'm sorry but I tend to believe the natural forces at work on the planet and inside the solar system have much more impact on Earth's climate than what powers homes and propels cars down the road.

[DCsportsfan53]

We are talking about what evidence it would take to agree on what's going on. "what, if anything, we can do about it" is an interesting topic that requires it's own thread.

What I am trying to say is it doesn't matter whether it's man made, natural, ect. Clearly something is happening with global weather patterns. The politics of it and who believes what is of no concern to me, what is of concern is trying to figure out what will happen in regards to rising oceans and the like and what we plan to do to adapt, as opposed to the pipe dream bull**** idealism of how we prevent it.

[Burgold]

Perhaps, but that doesn't necessarily speak to the incredible rise in the rate of asthma, cancer and other environmentally induced illnesses since the 1950's. If you look at the pattern of man made pollution and human illness the correlation is incredible. More, we know humans impact the world. Heck, we've created deserts, we've eliminated entire species, we've changed the course of rivers or made them unusable. So, why is it so hard to believe that man can't harm the world when we can see his imprint on it every day?

You are correct that a few additional volcanoes or a meteor of a certain size hitting the planet would be catastrophic, but those are things we have limited ability to impact. We should study these things as well, but to ignore the things we can control because there are things outside of our control seems foolish. I can't stop a terrorist from attacking America, does that mean we should disband all intelligence agencies. People get killed by lightning. Does that mean we should disband every police homicide division?

[alexey]

What I am trying to say is it doesn't matter whether it's man made, natural, ect. Clearly something is happening with global weather patterns. The politics of it and who believes what is of no concern to me, what is of concern is trying to figure out what will happen in regards to rising oceans and the like and what we plan to do to adapt, as opposed to the pipe dream bull**** idealism of how we prevent it.

In order to inform decisions on how to adapt, you need to understand what is happening, why it is happening, and what to expect.

[Hubbs]

My first problem is that I'm skeptical about how perfectly we're assessing the sum total of human activity. I remember reading a few years ago about some gas that a lot of old factories used to belch out which tended to stay in the upper atmosphere. No one factored this into any climate analysis for a while. Then we discovered that the gas reflected sunlight a lot more than we thought it did, which means that it would have contributed to cooler temperatures. (My next thought was, "Well, ****, if global warming gets bad, why not just crank out some more of this stuff?" But I don't know about what other effects it has. Could be very toxic. I'll try to find out what gas it was.)

In other words, there are trillions of factors which determine a planet's climate, and each of those factors have a different weight. Humanity contributes countless factors on its own, each of them with a different weight. And each of those factors interacts with all of the other factors. I haven't seen a study which convinced me that we'd conclusively managed to measure every factor, how every factor changes every other factor, and how the sum total changes when those factors change other factors, assuming our original assessment of the factors was indeed correct.

[Hubbs]

Perhaps, but that doesn't necessarily speak to the incredible rise in the rate of asthma, cancer and other environmentally induced illnesses since the 1950's. If you look at the pattern of man made pollution and human illness the correlation is incredible. More, we know humans impact the world. Heck, we've created deserts, we've eliminated entire species, we've changed the course of rivers or made them unusable. So, why is it so hard to believe that man can't harm the world when we can see his imprint on it every day?

You are correct that a few additional volcanoes or a meteor of a certain size hitting the planet would be catastrophic, but those are things we have limited ability to impact. We should study these things as well, but to ignore the things we can control because there are things outside of our control seems foolish. I can't stop a terrorist from attacking America, does that mean we should disband all intelligence agencies. People get killed by lightning. Does that mean we should disband every police homicide division?

I would point out that if you look at the pattern of advances in both medical science and access to that science, the correlation to the diagnosis of specific diseases is also quite incredible.

[DCsportsfan53]

In order to inform decisions on how to adapt, you need to understand what is happening, why it is happening, and what to expect.

I agree completely and our scientists should be investigating that. My problem with much of the global warming crowd and it's discussions publically and in terms of politics seem to based around preventing the inevitable. I'm probably off topic since this thread wasn't really directed at me since I think, just from a common sense standpoint, that all the chemicals we dump into the atmosphere have to have an effect. I just could care less about how you define it, who's at fault, how to prevent it, ect, it's immaterial to me. What's material to me is will DC be under water in 30 years and if so do we need to build dykes or gtfo? I hope that sometime in the future the conversation can progress to those types of questions and move away from the repub v dem, enviro nut v oil company political debates that mire the subject down in something other than reality and progress.

[Burgold]

I would point out that if you look at the pattern of advances in both medical science and access to that science, the correlation to the diagnosis of specific diseases is also quite incredible.

Possible, but they've done studies looking at the probability of misdiagnosises and it can explain a fraction, but certainly not the whole... besides, you're certainly not arguing that human pollution doesn't have a significant impact on human health, are you? You really want to start adding more lead in the water, arsenic in your pottery, and asbestos in your insulation or playgrounds. You really want to breathe exhaust laden air 24 hours a day?

[Veretax]

Perhaps, but that doesn't necessarily speak to the incredible rise in the rate of asthma, cancer and other environmentally induced illnesses since the 1950's. If you look at the pattern of man made pollution and human illness the correlation is incredible. More, we know humans impact the world. Heck, we've created deserts, we've eliminated entire species, we've changed the course of rivers or made them unusable. So, why is it so hard to believe that man can't harm the world when we can see his imprint on it every day?

You are correct that a few additional volcanoes or a meteor of a certain size hitting the planet would be catastrophic, but those are things we have limited ability to impact. We should study these things as well, but to ignore the things we can control because there are things outside of our control seems foolish. I can't stop a terrorist from attacking America, does that mean we should disband all intelligence agencies. People get killed by lightning. Does that mean we should disband every police homicide division?

Burgold, Not wanting to discount your 'stats on Asthma, etc.' but are those stats pure numbers of incidents diagnosed, or are they based on population? I find that a lot of medical studies, simply telling me that 100 people out of 200 in the study are diagnosed with say, lung cancer, doesn't tell me very much, but if you tell me, that's among people who say worked in mines for 30 years or less, then we get context. One thing I object too, is the showing of graphs and stats, without giving us the full context. In fact, that's my biggest gripe out the GWA is that I never seem to see a complete open discussion of the VAST number of inputs that could possibly be affecting climate of our world. I mean do we really think we have all of the variables in the equation? I don't think we've reached that level, we can't even tell where a Hurricane will go more then a week out, or whether it won't dissipiate on its own because of model inaccuracy.

Are we sure they are actually species and not actually subspecies or varieties? One area I also find a lot is a lot of discussion about well this species is extinct, yet lately I've read a lot in the news about how maybe our definition of 'species' isn't understood well enough. So when I hear anecdotes citing these things, I am left wondering, do we really know that these things are that we say? or we putting a bit too much faith in someone's explanation without understanding all the terminology involved.

Now I'm also a Christian, so I have certain beliefs about the fundamental nature of man, and very often it is destructive not constructive. It has always been easier to destroy creation, then to maintain it, so I am always in favor of discussing conservation ideas, and how to better the environment. I'm not necessarily concerned about car emissions (for example) causing global warming, but I am concerned about them perhaps being toxic for us to breath. Having worked in a 'city' environment for a couple of years, where I walked a good distance, I noticed, particularly on hot days how much the emissions from cars really affect your quality of breathing. So rather then arguing over whether GW is happening or not, I feel the system is too large to totally understand, so we need to find ways to focus in on particular areas where we can have discussions, debates, and make changes to improve our quality of life.

Does that make sense?