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Global Warming -- How to Talk to a Skeptic

All government is bad. We must not submit to anything because it's a conspiracy to destroy our lives. Ron Paul 2008.
 
babe said:
Go hang out in Boston for a while. . . You didn't refer to Bostoners. You refered to this thread as containing "hate speech" that's dramatic or some other not-so-isolated outpost of progressive superiority. . . . and see if there aren't some folks so wound up in their fist-clenching visions of how the planet must be saved. . . . by having everyone do what they know must be done. They are ready to round up the dissidents and cleanse the earth of divergent and non-conforming thought, and they have no time for "re-education" camps. There is no margin of tolerance at all, and our crises are so clearly imperative we just can't allow "careless morons" to run loose or draw oxygen. . . . or emit carbon dioxide.

anyone who thinks "evolution", "vaccinations", or "quantum mechanics" are beyond reasonable dispute is a victim of an illusion of certainty that is premature, and that is such an understatement that it is practically useless as a statement of opinion. If we are not in that illusionary frame of mind, we can see that all the facts.. . . far from settling the issues of our understanding. . . are still raising questions that merit further thought, and more investigation. . .
Our level of understanding of evolution and quantum mechanics are not comparable. We understand much more about one than the other.

I don't think for an instant that what little we know, factually speaking, about evolution, vaccinations or quantum mechanics are not facts. . . . it's the extrapolated conclusions or implications that are politically useful that should scare the sh*** out of normally reasonable folks.
I agree, but I find extrapolated conclusions or implications that are politically useful that are thrown out without a shred of scientific evidence to be even more alarming.

In it's beginnings, our planetary atmosphere was pretty extreme in terms of pressure and carbon dioxide dominating it's composition. This planet does have a hot, and heat-generating core, and has a dominant trend of "cooling", as well as losing it's atmospheric carbon dioxide to carbonate rock, principally under semi-tropical seas. It was only when photosynthetic life flourished that "life" as a whole helped to augment that process. . .. and only after we began to use fire. . . and later internal combustion engines. . . that we have been a factor in increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide. We are still a minor contributor, in scale far less significant that autogenous decomposition of plant material, and not off the scale in comparison with volcanic releases. ... which do cycle on a millions-of-years scale, or wildfires which will occur whether we try to make use of fuels or not.
We account (my recollection) for roughly 3% of yearly co2 emissions. While that sounds insignificant at first glance 3% year in year out adds up fast.

Our planet has existed without polar ice or significant glaciers before, and has had epochs warmer than our present one. Right but we are not talking about the planet. We are talking about our existence on it. I could go on about how there is a natural ice age cycle that will result from an increase in ocean level and ocean surface temps generating extreme storms. . . . enough of them. . . . to re-establish an ice cover over the higher-lattitude land masses that will not melt in summertime. . . . and how it will last for millions of years. . . . and this trend has been augmented over millions of years by plate tectonics that is moving more land surface further north. . . .
So you're saying that human caused global warming will cause an ice age? Wouldn't that be bad?

In the seventies it was the coming ice age that was being touted as justification for synchronized world action by all nations and all responsible individuals. Our survival, we were told, demanded that we submit to management. It was a political tool in the "management toolbox", and it turned out to be directly out of phase with a twenty-year spike in global surface temps. Every ice age has been preceded by a five to ten degree spike in surface temps that lasted oh maybe twenty to fifty years. . .. This fact just wasn't something that could be useful in persuading a skeptical public. Here they were, crying "ice age" and it was hotter than anyone could remember. . . they just looked like idiots.

But nevermind. It's not the facts that are useful, it's the fear. You can make just as much a case for consolidation of power and expanding management whether you argue global warming or ice age. And once you are given the power, you don't have to be "right" about anything.

I'm not nearly as fearful of global warming as I am of global management.
I don't think switching large portions of our energy infrastructure over to renewables will result in a totalitarian new world order. Actually the opposite is true. Fossil fuels focus power into the hands of the few. I would think you would appreciate this point. To me you're argument sounds like it is coming right from the mouth of the people you claim to fear.
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Bostoners suck
 
babe said:
religionists who insisted a "God" who is essentially all-powerful who made the earth in a few days, or even a few thousand years look almost as stupid to me as evolutionists who say any of their facts preclude the existence of all conceivable beliefs in a "God" at all.
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I agree when it comes to "god"

but I do wonder Why people believe in the bible.
 
babe said:
Our planet has existed without polar ice or significant glaciers before, and has had epochs warmer than our present one.
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It's also been without humans before, for billions of years.

babe said:
In the seventies it was the coming ice age that was being touted as justification for synchronized world action by all nations and all responsible individuals.
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For someone who rants about others making too much of facts, it's surprising how easily you swallow media-induced fictions.

https://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/02/they-predicted-cooling-in-1970s/

babe said:
I'm not nearly as fearful of global warming as I am of global management.
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You fear a myth over a reality. That's very human.
 
babe said:
religionists who insisted a "God" who is essentially all-powerful who made the earth in a few days, or even a few thousand years look almost as stupid to me as evolutionists who say any of their facts preclude the existence of all conceivable beliefs in a "God" at all.
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Who are these evolutionists? I know many who say belief in God is unneeded and we have better explanations, but I'm not aware of any who say (generic) God's existence has been proven impossible, unless you mean some specific notion of God.
 
One Brow said:
Who are these evolutionists? I know many who say belief in God is unneeded and we have better explanations, but I'm not aware of any who say (generic) God's existence has been proven impossible, unless you mean some specific notion of God.
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Ssshhhhhhh! You know better than to question hyperbole!
 
One Brow said:
Who are these evolutionists? I know many who say belief in God is unneeded and we have better explanations, but I'm not aware of any who say (generic) God's existence has been proven impossible, unless you mean some specific notion of God.
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9/11 inside job
 
heyhey said:
Bostoners suck
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Well, hey hey, when you insert your responses inside my "quote", even though you bold them so we can tell who said what, almost, the problem is all I can quote is the part outside my quote. . . .

so, in broad terms, I don't think global warming has any chance of destroying our planet or the human race, or even substantially changing our way of life, as long as we just individually cope with it as we see fit, personally. On the other hand, permitting government agencies to do what they claim they need to do, will change the quality of life. Unmitigatibly for the worse.

I think the cause, while the global warming we may have measured since the huge reliance on combustion for energy began in spades with the internal combustion engine coming online, along with the availability of oil and natural gas is the expected result we could predict from the outset, is a political convenience. Like I said, if it were an advancing ice age as was the prediction in the 1970s, it would serve just as well as an excuse to give a special class of managers all the power in the world.

I think we are going into an ice age, and I think our little carbon dioxide blanket might reduce or delay it a very little bit, but if as I suspect, warm oceans are the necessary condition to set an ice age into motion, it could very well make our next ice age a little worse.

My general sentiment is that people will always solve their own problems somehow, and usually can do so better without totalitarian governments. Neither global warming nor an ice age is a threat to life on earth.
 
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