Global Warming

Re: Global Warming Scaremongering

Just heard some "expert" on RTE news stating that Bangla Desh has just had a very big flood for the second time in six years. Normally, he tells us, these would happen every twenty years, ergo we are all doomed!

Did he use the words "we're doomed" or was he merely stating a fact?
You can draw any conclusion you like if it suits your perspective.

Forgot to mention that other scare-story that we all got hooked on and which turned out to be a complete non event - Y2K. It simply emphasises our collective gulllibility for these apocalypse theories from the experts who become veritable junkies to the new theory to the great unwashed who accept a few plausible pseudo scientific arguments as gospel.

I see. You're comparing climate change to a computer bug. That really stands up well :rolleyes

Try dealing with facts instead of dreaming up barely connected events to prove some non-point.
 
Clarificationj

Now, now piggy, I do hope we are not counter-trolling.

Giving you the benefit of the doubt let me explain what points I was making.

You cannot deny that this GW thing has become to some a doomsday prediction. I was simply pointing out that this so called expert was using the most flimsy of statistical evidence in support of the theory.

Of course I am not comparing computer bugs with climate change nor with epidemic diseases. I am simply using probably the clearest demonstration yet of our collective capacity to indulge in some plausible catastrophe theory. With Y2K we have the clearest example of where the theory was quite off the wall and yet we spent trillions (except the Italians) in worrying about it.

Someday we all will be doomed, no doubt about that. It is pretty obvious how that will happen - by nuclear self annihilation. We have had that capacity for about 40 years, a drop in the historic ocean, can we restrain ourselves for another 40 years? 100 years? 1,000 years? Only a matter of time. Let's stop chasing illusions like GW and enjoy the unique era of peace we now have before we inevitably press the self destruct button.
 
Re: Clarificationj

I was simply pointing out that this so called expert was using the most flimsy of statistical evidence in support of the theory.

In support of what theory? What theory did he state as a conclusion from this disaster?

Of course I am not comparing computer bugs with climate change nor with epidemic diseases. I am simply using probably the clearest demonstration yet of our collective capacity to indulge in some plausible catastrophe theory

I see, so you're using human nature's ability to get something wrong and say the sky is falling to prove the point that global warming is nonsense. Well, thanks for that scientific clarification. I'm sure once you point this out to the "experts" you'll put their minds at rest :rolleyes

Let's stop chasing illusions like GW and enjoy the unique era of peace we now have before we inevitably press the self destruct button

Again, more wishy washy YD theory with absolutely no scientific evidence of any kind to back it up...merely your own personal blinkered view on the subject.

So, what we can take from your clarification is that we should stop chasing the GW illusion...because mankind has a tendency to get things wrong sometimes? :\
 
far from trolling

Wrong to give piggy the BOTD

Instead of resorting to your usual childishness perhaps you'd care to answer *any* of my points.

What theory was the "expert" making?
What proof have you provided that global warming is an illusion and we should all stop worrying about it? Maybe for this post you could make an exception and provide us with some facts and some real theories to back those assumptions up?

Or...can I draw similar conclusions and call them fact too? The house price doomsayers will never be right because we all got it wrong for Y2K? There's really no such thing as terrorism. It's all an illusion. Y2K is my argument for knowing that it's all just doomsayers. Can I do that too and try to pan it off as some sort of valid point?
 
Why do I bother?

Jayz, piggy, what theory? GW - isn't that what this thread is about? The expert was saying that two floods in Bangladesh in six years was further strong evidence of the GW theory.

I have no proof at all that GW is an illusion, (apologies I see that I did suggest that I thought it was). It's just that I am old enuff to have seen so many of these theories and one by one they have been off the wall to some degree or another. Maybe GW is the real bizz. I don't know, but I do think it's too early to be overreacting to it and I don't think the evidence is at all proof. As a betting man - it's well odds on that GW will "flop" just like all its predecessor "talking horses".

Piggy, you are deliberately twisting my arguments, some would call it trolling. :D I am not saying that because the Temperate Zone Famine ('50s hobby horse), the Population Explosion ('60s), AIDS ('80s, early '90s), Y2K (late '90s) have all been discredited, that GW is certain to be wrong. Just pointing out that every era does seem to need its apocalypse demon, balance of probability is that this one will go the way of all the others.

Here's a doomsday theory I do support - all of my own - no scientific evidence whatsoever. In 20 years time China will be richer and more powerful than the US which itself will be twice as powerful as today. The planet just ain't big enough for both them - wait for the mushroom clouds, now that'll be a climate change. :x
 
Re: Why do I bother?

The expert was saying that two floods in Bangladesh in six years was further strong evidence of the GW theory

By "the expert was saying" do you mean that he actually said 'this is proof that...' or you've just decided that that's what he said? Because from over here that's unfortunately what it looks like.


I have no proof at all that GW is an illusion, (apologies I see that I did suggest that I thought it was)

Fair enough.

There is ample scientific evidence from a vast range of experts (see the BBC report I posted a few posts back) to suggest that climate change is a very real phenomenom, and one we need to start taking more notice of.

And I'm not twisting your arguments at all. You were very clear on the point you made. The fact that some theories never came to fruition does not (in any way) prove that other theories won't. Did you not understand the point I was making about house prices and global terrorism? Are past mis-guided world theories proof that future ones won't happen? Not always.

As for AIDS...I only have to scroll back a few pages to see that your theories on that subject were way off the mark.
 
Anybody else out there?

Piggy, you have a bee in your bonnet on my interpretation of what this expert was saying. Maybe what he said was "this GW thing is for real, see what happened in Bangladesh, 2 floods in 6 years". He wasn't saying that this was proof. I think we should leave it at that, don't you? :D

Nobody can "prove" any of these apocalypse theories, unlike say proof that the world is round. I am just arguing that we have a capacity to wallow in them and in the past they have been proved to be OTT.

Maybe I am misreading your argument. Maybe all you are arguing is that there is climate change and scientific evidence to that effect. I'm prepared to accept that, but when the populist doomsayers then have us all frying or drowning or freezing to death, I say "oh here we go again".
 
Re: Anybody else out there?

YD, I have no problem with anyone who doesn't want to believe doomsayers. I do have a bee in my bonnet with sweeping generalisations and vague notions. If you're going to make a point about something fair enough...but I'm not sure you've really listened to the argument (and I'm not talking about the one on AAM). I tend to think that you're not well versed with the facts (and I don't mean offence by that). I point to your theories on AIDS within this thread as some proof that perhaps your ideas on what is fact is somewhat short of the mark or perhaps that you tend to make the argument too simplistic sometimes.


The expert was saying that two floods in Bangladesh in six years was further strong evidence of the GW theory

He wasn't saying that this was proof. I think we should leave it at that, don't you?

I think it's fair enough to question someone about what they allegedly heard when they try to use it in their argument to prove a point. You seem to be contradicting yourself above. He either said it was proof of global warming or he didn't!
 
Re: Anybody else out there?

I heard the guy on the radio as well and I he did say that two floods in six years (or whatever) was evidence of global warming. I kind of agree with YD on that point.
Global warming may cause the end of civilisation, but it may not. There is no hard and fast proof for it, that's why they call it a theory. The question is do we take the chance.
 
There is somebody else out there and very sensible too

I guess, piggy, I have been a bit imprecise with by arguments, you do seem to demand absolute precision. :D

If the scientists say there is climate change then there is climate change and I admit to being quite ignorant on the facts of the matter.

But when the doomsayers extrapolate from this scientific evidence to predict the most alarmist calamities then I admit to being truly sceptical. A scepticism not borne of a scientific critique of the theory but of long experience of similar populist obsessions, as listed above.

On AIDS, I accept that this is yet another calamity to be visited on the Third World. But in 1990 it was highly predicted that the First World would face an AIDS meltdown. This has not and is very unlikely to happen - not because we took preventitive action - but because the extrapolation from the then known scientific evidence was unsound in the first place. That's my point, we have a collective capacity to make this error - my strongest instinct is that the worst prognosis for the consequences of GW are similarly way OTT.

Purple says we can't be sure. I agree, but I think it is far too early to be overreacting on a "just in case" basis.
 
when to react

When should one put on the safety belt-before or after the accident?
Does one have to suffer leukemia before he/she is allowed to make up his/her mind about nuclear power use?
Do you have to get lung cancer before stopping to smoke?
 
Re: Planet under Pressure? Put politicians under pressure

marie, your description of what's happening with the ozone layer is off base. while there are big fluctuations from year to year, it is believed that the ozone hole is actually getting smaller. the work of scientists and western governments through the montreal treaty has been a huge success in eliminating the production and consumption of ozone destroying substances. current predictions suggest the hole will close completely by 2050 and even sooner if third world countries follow the lead of the first world in achieving the goals as specified in the treaty.
 
Re: There is somebody else out there and very sensible too

www.globalwarming.org/
www.climatehotmap.org/
[broken link removed]

YD,

In relation to global warming, I think you need to differentiate between what people might have told you, or you heard on the TV or in your newspaper in relation to some event in the past with experts in the field of meteorology and the facts of global warming. You can read through a few of the sites above if you like.

The media does not accurately portray a true figure of what is happening anywhere at most times. So, you might have been led to believe that x was going to happen in the past, but that's merely because that's what you were hearing from the media at that time.

my strongest instinct is that the worst prognosis for the consequences of GW are similarly way OTT

So is mine. I don't believe that we'll be living in an ice age in 50 years, but I do think it's prudent to take the issue in general very seriously. Most governments are beginning to sit up and take notice these days.
 
Scare mongering again

Lets link up YD's position that global warming is more or less populist paranoia of a kind s(he) has experienced many times before, with darag's information that contrary to what I said in my last post, the hole in the ozone layer is actually being reduced through actions currently being taken......to purple's who points out that there is a theory ("Global Warming and its farreaching consequences) which may or may not be correct and which we can pay heed to and adjust behaviour "as if it were true", thus heading it off.........or ignoring it, thus risking the far-reaching consequences. YD is it not feasible that far from being under the thrall of a collective deathwish the catastrophic events you list may have lessened or been headed off as a result of collective adjustment when the dangers became apparent?
 
Were they for real?

Marie says:
(catastrophes)...may have lessened or been headed off as a result of collective adjustment...
Click to expand...
I still jibe my IT friends about the great Y2K con job but to this day they actually beieve that they saved the world. I retort that the Italians ignored the bug and I don't recall any reports of Zanussi fridges packing it in on the stroke of midnight 1999. Yes there was an issue, these theories can't be based on a complete fallacy, but when the popular press and the auditors got in on the act and other dates such as 9/9/99 and the leap day that wasn't in 2000 and airplanes and lifts and fridges all entered the stage it was clear that we had all lost the run of ourselves.

On AIDS, I have no doubt that the extensive campaigns of the early '90s have had an impact. But I remember projections which took account of such behavioural change but on the basis that because of a long incubation period the timebomb was already planted the epidemic would peak just about now before fading out around 2010. Definitely way OTT.
 
Were they for real?

YD - The Y2K hype was - as your post hints - a situation where the ignorance of the masses about I.T. was used to the advantage of the I.T. profession who made a great deal of money checking and adjusting systems so they wouldn't "crash". This "urban myth" seems to have originated in newspaper articles referring to unsubstantiated "fears" of a global computer crash. That international banks and national power-generating facilities ensured the safety and compatibility of their systems coming up to 2000 was appropriate and necessary; what was NOT appropriate was every little business queueing for the I.T. experts to ensure they would not lose valuable data, and this was to the enormous benefit of computing technicians. I knew a couple who both worked on "the Millenium Bug" - a term they used with a smile and a wink - who retired on the proceeds in 2001 in their mid-40's having bought a 12-bedroom Victorian villa outright. I don't think Y2K comes into the same category as AIDS or Global Warming, neither of which is imaginary or speculative but observable measurable fact.
 
Facts and Fantasies

Marie, the Millenium Bug was a Fact. Planes falling out of the sky, lifts suspended on the 100th floor, deep freeze contents ruined - these were a Fantasy.

Climate change is a Fact. Ireland turning into Siberia some time soon is a Fantasy.
 
Facts and Fantasies

YD I don't wish to continue to argue about the "real" or imaginary nature of millenium computer issue; it is not an area of expertise. Mine is a lay-person's knowledge of events from media and from friends and acquaintances who are more literate in this area than myself and am sure there are experts on this forum who have more precise knowledge about the real nature etc. which I think moves away from the issue of global warming.

Does anyone else remember the colourful, detailed charts Shell produced in the 1950's for schools, showing marine, bird, plant and animal life from many different strata, types of seabed, kinds of terrain etc.?.....source of information and wonder for a generation of primary-school kids.

Experts on ornithology, biology, and every other -ology report the "accellerating rate of decline in the population of" this or that bird or mammal, and there is factual information on the reduced number of species (startling stuff, figures like "number of distinct species of spiders has reduced in the past 20 years from 5 million to less than 100,000" sort of stats).

Formerly extinction from your ecological niche was due to one of four factors (a) your species lost interest in reproduction (b) your predators or competitors were stronger or (c) your species developed susceptibility to specific plague (such as myxomatosis in rabbits) (d) your environment changed dramatically e.g. the ice-age.

Apart from notable exceptions such as the red squirrill's demise due to introduction of the grey squirrill, myxomatosis, "killer super-worms" it is difficult to think of changes under the first three categories. News of another species dropping to unsustainable numbers, or disappearance of dozens of species "in the past decade", is in the experts' view attributable to climatic changes "as a consequence of global warming".

Of course "climate change" is a "fact". The SPEED of change and the EFFECT of the change feeds back into the system and you have cladistics theory in motion. The changes produce EXPONENTIAL change. The accellerating changes introduced by global warming (which is produced by a combination of human activities on a planet which has never, ever housed so many people!) appears (according to the experts) to be reducing diversity and narrowing gene-pools. These phenomena have never been observed on this scale before. This is not to say they haven't happened before; they have but were not caused by us.
 
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