......the large chunk of US citizens that are stupid enough to believe the very expensive oil company propaganda campaigns, only worry about what Al Gore makes on the side and are actually moronic enough to doubt climate change. AFP sez:
Meanwhile, here's a photo or two from what the sane amongst us call "reality".
The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found 57 percent of Americans see "solid evidence of warming," compared to 71 percent in April 2008, and 77 percent in August 2007.
This is the Chacaltaya glacier in Bolivia. Its waters are vital (no other word suffices) for the continued wellbeing of the people living around it. But maybe that should now read "were vital". Abiding in Bolivia, reference source on the country par excellence, has the details, the links, the works.
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17 comments:
Otto
I am not a US Citizen but do not believe that the Industrial Revolution-induced fossil fuel action has contributed to rapid climate change. While I am against the moronic Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck types who bash environmentalists and such, I must say that having a strong background in science and math, the evidence is not there to support this theory that any planetary changes related to climate are necessarily related to fossil fuel emissions.
I recommend you check out this blog featuring posts by some pretty erudite people.
The crux of my objections are 1) there is not a lot of solid reliable scientific support of many core claims that blame emissions for changes in climate and 2) climate change is the only constant here. The climate has always been in flux in the geological history of Earth.
There is a serious possibility here that the Industrial Revolution has coincided with another period of rapid temperature changes (if that is even true).
The science behind the popular "theory" is flimsy, and when the BBC begins outright censoring alternative viewpoints and challenges to orthodox, and dated, climate theory, then I get very suspicious.
I actually believe there is more money to be made by multinational corporations and northern hemisphere and western governments from the climate story than the truth that this might be just the way the Earth works and we cannot do anything about it.
Private money is pouring into Geoengineering, which is supposed t to reverse the ostensible warming effects of greenhouse gases, any biologist worth his or her salt would know, is an ecological nightmare for the planet.
I really believe the contra story is being actively blocked by the media, FOX News notwithstanding.
abbass,
Read that AFP quote again. What is going on here is that people are denying the existence of climate change. There no mention of the blame/reasons/culprits in that survey question, just that photos such as the one from Chacaltaya (and you know there are a ton of other examples) are not "solid evidence of warming". Doesn't that make your scientific nose twitch, even a little?
I suggest you read the Pew survey. Abiding has the link.
Sure, there is evidence of warming in a lot of places. But what about the evidence for cooling in different places around the world? I am not denying that climate change exists. But I don't agree we are smart enough yet to have discovered a big human factor or cause driving such change.
The Earth's climate system is much more inscrutable than economic systems and markets.
My point in my earlier comment obviously is that I am not so sure we can blame greenhouse gas emitting nations for melting glaciers. The way I, a quintessential anti-imperialist, look at it is that this planet is always in flux, and there could be myriad other reasons for climatic changes around the world that have nothing to do with our own industrial and automobile emissions or deforestation.
Having said all of that, I fully accept that human activity has had devastating effects on biodiversity (ecological damage).
Look, all I'm saying is that let's be a little more investigative and discriminate before accepting the current dogma about what drives changes in climate around the planet. This issue is not even analogous to the acceptance of "the theory of evolution" since the theory that greenhouse gases are "fueling" climatic changes is based on very weak science and has hardly been supported empirically, unlike Evolutionary Theory.
There's a lot of good work out there refuting "common knowledge" about climate but being actively blocked from the mainstream media because this has become a pecuniary matter for some big money.
There was no money to be made from evolutionary theory.
Paleoclimatologists laugh at concern of melting ice around the world because this planet has seen radical changes around the eons.
The problem is that what they have to say is not very interesting at this juncture to the mainstream.
I have no vested interests in making a few comments here. I'm just saying...
Otto,
great blog you got here, but is there any reason why there is not a comment count on your blog posts? I discovered some people's comments by accident only a few days ago.
For some reason the comment link/count on the main page disappeared a few weeks ago. I've tried to fish it back and haven't managed to do it...some Googly thing.
As you note, the comments option is still available when you open the specific post page.
I fail to see how the fact that the earth has had periods of warming/cooling should be any relief to the people of El Alto right now as their glaciers melt away.
I definitely sympathize with the people of El Alto, as I do with people all over the world who have to deal with a generally nasty planet all the time (like in Bangladesh). Abiding in Bolivia seems to blame the US for climate change, but like I said, as much as I am generally anti US and anti big business, I cannot accept the popular dogma that humans have an impact on climate. Humans destroy the planet in all kinds of other ways that are unsustainable... mainly through the devastation of land (actual ecosystems)
Thanks, and good night.
No doubt receding glaciers are an important issue in the Andes.
But on climate change, the only thing I'm convinced of is that science is being prostituted for big money. Think Goldman and "cap and trade". If the powers to be were really worried about CO2 ending the world as we know it, why not make it "carbon cap" instead of "cap and trade"?
Finally, in a sense it shouldn't matter whether global warming is real. Why should it be that we only decide to live in an environmentally friendly way when the world is about to come to an end? Why not protect the environment just because it's the right thing to do.
"...Why not protect the environment just because it's the right thing to do."
Precisely, Ward. Precisely.
abbass,
Climate Change deniers like to use the complexity of climate science to argue against it being the result of industrial pollution.
I am not doubting your intelligence, but within the academy of climate science there exists no debate as to whether CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the ahistorical (in relative geologic time) amount of CO2 in the atmosphere as a result of man made industrial activity, or whether the average earth atmospheric temperature has been steadily rising over the past 150+ years in step with increasing CO2 emissions. The three most reliable measures for the last claim are measures of retreating glaciers and tree ring measurements.
If anyone refutes anything I have said above they are as loony as the flat earthers. Period.
The last time the earth had atmospheric levels of CO2 being projected in the next 100 years without massive retardation our ancestral fore bearers all lived on one continent, giant alligators roamed the north pole, and the polar ice sheets did not exist. If that does send a chill down your spine, I don't know what should.
Our current atm. temp. averages are already well above the Medieval "Warm" Period (the last near geologic "high" in the current Ice Age cycle). According to the current geologic cycles we should in fact be moving towards a new relative "small ice age"- not the evident case.
The relative "coolings" in certain regions are the result of the Earth's entire climate system being thrown into chaos (extreme weather patterns) as the average GLOBAL temperature rises. The most serious of these is concern that the northern Atlantic subduction current could stop, ending the Gulf stream on which Europe relies for its warm weather. Serious shit.
Lastly, any money being thrown into geoengineering or any other anti-climate change endeavor is a pittance in comparison to the most profitable and powerful global economic sector (hydrocarbons!) racks in each week.
And of course those fat cats don't give a shit about what happens because those suffering are the poorest, those closest to the land, who cannot just buy their water from Fiji if nothing comes down from the Cordillera this year.
El Duderino,
Call me loony, but 3 doesn't equal two. Fail!
Speaking of environmentalism & conservation...
Remember when Hugo BOSS urged '3 minute showers'?
Simon Romero reacted by standing in the shower an extra thirty minutes.
Patriotic [unemployed redneck] Americans took to the blogosphere & moaned:
It's GROSS!
It's IMPOSSIBLE!!
Only UGLY people do that!!!!
Scientists from NASA studied the issue.
They concluded that while dirty hillbillies required extended showers...
The beautiful people did just fine with 3 minutes:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1171347/Friend-planet-Jennifer-Aniston-gives-Beverly-Hills-mansion-15m-eco-makeover.html
Friend of the planet: Jennifer Aniston
And despite installing a swimming pool in her Beverly Hills mansion, the actress revealed she is keen on conserving water.
Aniston said: ‘I take a three-minute shower. I even brush my teeth while I shower. Every two minutes in the shower uses as much water as a person in Africa uses for everything in their life for a whole day.’
Hollywood & Hugo screw you again, bitches!
Props to Al-Jazeera's Teymoor Nabili, for exposing this hot left-wing water-preserving cabal: http://blogs.aljazeera.net/americas/2009/10/24/its-not-about-singing
El Duderino,
thanks for your response.
You wrote:
" there exists no debate as to whether CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the ahistorical (in relative geologic time) amount of CO2 in the atmosphere as a result of man made industrial activity, or whether the average earth atmospheric temperature has been steadily rising over the past 150+ years in step with increasing CO2 emissions. The three most reliable measures for the last claim are measures of retreating glaciers and tree ring measurements."
No, there actually exists a very big debate regarding the points you have made. You might want to check out the blog I linked to in my first comment.
You write:
"If anyone refutes anything I have said above they are as loony as the flat earthers. Period."
No, you are plain wrong. No one is loony for questioning the premises of the assumptions and questioning the data sets a handful of alarmist climatologists. The massive problem here for science is that this notion, not theory, that human industrial activity and deforestation have caused climate change has ludicrously turned into dogma. That's a big no no in science.
And before anyone compares this to acceptance of the theory of evolution, let me tell you that there is a great body of empirical evidence and actual experiments done to support the theory. To actually EXPLAIN biodiversity.
To repeat:
1) I am a natural environmentalist, so I do not need a questionable and dubious so-called theory to make me love my planet.
2) I am a natural opponent of the US government's foreign policy and pro-big business stance
BUT
blaming the USA for melting glaciers in Bolivia , or the constant floods and natural disasters in Bangladesh or anywhere else does not make sense to me.
There needs to be some basic factchecking done before we accept alarmist claims about the climate.
Just like I don't trust PR / Financial news reports about miners. DYODD about climate "theory".
t
I deleted the comment because it looks like my comment in which I responded to abass got lost.
Rather than rewrite it, let me just say that I am familiar with Anthony Watts and his "criticisms" of climate science, a charlatan plain and simple.
abbass,
It would benefit you to source the "experts" you cite.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/jul/30/climate-change-deniers-monbiot
There are other bloggers you might want to read.
http://greenfyre.wordpress.com/denier-vs-skeptic/denier-myths-debunked/climate-denial-crock-of-the-week/
abbass...........As many times as I read and re-read your position....culling your distractions, obfuscations, contradictory protestations of core beliefs, the basic premise of your position becomes "Climate change exists but it is normal, so let it be. The business of Business is business and business has nothing to do with climate change, so let business be Business." Is abbass possibly Christopher Monckton or are you just a mini-shill for "Free Trade"?
Could Steve please explain his calculations, and what they have to do with the price of tea in China, as well as EXACTLY how anything El Duderino said (which IS based on solid science, not petroleum-industry greenwashing) is a "fail"?
What's that I hear...crickets?
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