We previously saw a Fox News pie chart that had a couple extra slices (here). Now, fair and balanced math adds up to 120 percent of voters indicating that they view the science on global warming to be rigged.
This is an interesting Rasmussen poll when you add up the number and discover that you are in a parallel universe.
The question is: “In order to support their own theories and beliefs about global warming, how likely is it that some scientists have falsified research data?” According to the poll, 35 percent thought it very likely, 24 percent somewhat likely, 21 percent not very likely, and 5 percent not likely at all (15 percent weren’t sure).
This rather dubious poll is offered to show that people are dubious about the science and math of global warming experts.
For the full story, click here
lottakatz: “Well BobE, ARE you SATAN?”
I reject Lord Scalia in every form.
BobE, here’s the link to the scene- I don’t think the thread will take an embed at this point.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4F9RzLqKu2g
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Slartibartfast, changes in planting recommendations: I never bother to check those guides anymore because they (the old ones) weren’t working for me for a few years now. I’ll check them again with a more critical eye when I order my seeds to see if I can spot the changes. Thanks.
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Byron, I know there are different, broadly predictable climate expectations for different regions and that a change in one area- specially when you talk about something like your 1/2 acre kingdom- can be extrapolated to prove a global trend. If you add up all of the anomalies happening everywhere I would think 99% of people could agree that something is happening. I’m just saying that whatever is it’s noticeable at a scale that doesn’t require a billion dollar scientific study or a trek to a glacier to monitor.
Elaine:
that does not sound very good. But then that doesn’t surprise me, we don’t drill for oil in most of our backyard either. So I suppose it makes sense. Don’t soil your nest.
Not exactly ethical.
Buddha:
things are cleaner today because of better technologies. Granted some of that is the EPA pushing industry but the other part is improved technology.
This entire thread has been very thought provoking, thank you all for an interesting conversation.
That should say “hold on the bull” although I suspect holding on to ride a gull for that time period would be difficult as well.
Byron–
Sorry to be so slow in responding to you. I needed to take a break!
You wrote: “I don’t know if you are aware but the old Soviet Union was an environmental nightmare and China is as well.”
I am especially well aware of the pollution problem in China. Our country has exported tons and tons of electronic scrap to that country.
My husband was a co-founder of three electronics recycling companies. He was interviewed on Maryland Public Television in 2000 regarding the need to recycle computers. He was also interviewed by Jim Puckett of the the Basel Action Network (BAN) for a report prepared by BAN and and Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition (SVTC) in 2002 titled “Exporting Harm: The High-Tech Trashing of Asia.” My husband provided Puckett with information about the amount of scrap/E-waste from the US being exported to Asia. (My husband is noted in the report’s footnotes.)
Excerpt from Exporting Harm”
Electronic waste or E-waste is the most rapidly growing waste problem in the world. It is a crisis not only of quantity but also a crisis born from toxic ingredients – such as the lead, beryllium, mercury, cadmium, and brominated flame retardants that pose both an occupational and environmental health threat. But to date, industry, government and consumers have only
taken small steps to deal with this looming problem. This report reveals one of the primary reasons why action to date in the United States has been woefully inadequate. Rather than
having to face the problem squarely, the United States and other rich economies that use most of the world’s electronic products and generate most of the E-Waste, have made use of a convenient, and until now, hidden escape valve – exporting the E-waste crisis to the developing countries of Asia.
http://www.ban.org/E-waste/technotrashfinalcomp.pdf
Bob,Esq: …dancing with the devil, in the pale moonlight …That was a twist on Byron’s ‘minuet’ with global warming and not an allusion to me being an agent of Satan; right?
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Well BobE, ARE you SATAN? 🙂
No. It wasn’t about you being Satan but the line regarding dancing with the devil in the cold moonlight was the Jokers line from a Batman movie and I couldn’t resist seeing the word ‘minuet’ used. I have no authority to comment on anyones spelling but I just couldn’t restrain myself.
“just pointing out that technological improvements are better for the environment”
Except for Love Canal.
And Chernobyl.
And Bophal.
Technology does a lot of things Byron. Improving the environment isn’t one of them as a general rule. There are some things to be certain, like oil spill containment systems. The neglects the obvious point that we wouldn’t need this “good for the environment” if we hadn’t been letting drunks pilot inadequately hulled ships to transport oil, but what the Hell! It’s cheaper that way. Sure, we could also make new technology to help improve the environment like carbon scrubbers. Can’t exactly get those at Ace Hardware at the moment. Seems like a lot of corporations are really interested in keeping us on the Oil Teet and are fighting alternative energy – unless they can figure out how to screw us for that first too.
Technology gives us a higher quality of life but that quality comes at a price. It has since the first wheels dried out a lowland with ruts, since the first food creature was hunted to extinction with an atl or a bow or a sling. Technology impacts the environment. We have to try REAL HARD to make not be a negative impact. We also fail miserable at it. We always have as a species. We won’t always continue though. This ride has a stop and the indications we are not going to be successful in holding on a gull eight seconds. Unless you count success as living in a world where a river could EVER catch on fire ANYWHERE. Cleveland. 1969.
Do you have any idea how toxic electronics are? Tin. Lead. Antimony. Mercury. Arsenic. Silicon. All required to build modern circuitry. All toxic to humans. Very. And don’t get me wrong. A properly built reactor is a thing of beauty. Does not change one damn bit that they produce radioactive waste that you can’t exactly put in Hefty and leave in a ditch. Not like that hasn’t stopped industry from trying shit like that. Saves money don’t you know.
Ask the Aztec about this topic. They built highly advanced pyramids. Very nice technology. Made the contemporaneous European builders look like chumps. They built them over all their arable land. The price they paid was starvation. Same with the Nazca. New studies show that arid salt pan they drew giant line drawings on used to be a vibrant forest with trees that kept the salinity of the soil in check and could support agriculture and robust fauna. Now it’s a desert.
Technology is a lot of things. It’s a destructive process though. And you should know better than this. You are speaking as if products appear like magic and then the trash just goes away to Happy Fun Trash Land. You are speaking as if you are an engineer who has never been to a job site too.
That timber used to be a forest and what’s wasted in the process of construction ends up as trash or burnt, neither of which are “good for the environment”.
That was a very ill thought out statement. Not even close to correct.
Bdaman 1, December 9, 2009 at 9:23 pm
Twenty seben years bees a mighty long time, bout a third if ya make it ta eighty. But ya see, what you think is an eternity aint but a small little tick on a hound dogs ass.
*****
I know that- bugs eye view, not a birds eye view. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen or is divorced from greater patterns. What caused it is obvious to me: increasingly disorganized seasons culminating in this year when discernible seasonal changes were virtually non-existent in my little corner of paradise. The question is what is our part in it and what can/should we do to about it?
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Bdaman: Earth been around a long long time. Question is, in the next twenty seben if ya see it all comeback then what ya gone say.
Different posting: Bdaman: It dont’t matta FFLEO, why ah 100 years from now, we all gonna be dust anyways, that is unless there’s some type-a de-vine entervention.
*****
Ask me again in 27 years, though you shouldn’t hold your breath, I’ll most likely be dead of old age/disease by then. I will mercifully escape the climate change horror if blind faith and a lack of planning doesn’t work. I know that just because my own universe ends does not mean that everyone elses will and that knowledge acts to motivate my concern and many of my actions. It’s the difference between a moral (conservative) position on acting in ways that affect the future and amorality IMO. This is America, you get to pick and advocate for your side. God bless America.
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Bdaman: Right now you probly feelin like them poor peeple back in the GREAT AMERICAN DUST BOWL, it only lasted for bout ten year or so. But don’t worry it all came back.
*****
You do know that the dust bowl horrors were a combination of a prolonged drought and the total misapplication of conventional tilling to a prairie environment over many years. You do know that? You do know that your question is it’s own indictment of ignorant land use practices don’t you?
No, It didn’t ‘all come back’. The millions of tons of topsoil (most precious resource on earth) that was carried away on the wind didn’t come back.
Bob Esq:
I like this topic just fine.
“Byron, we were discussing man’s activities as they affect nature; not economics. Why twist the metaphor as you did other than as an expression that you don’t want to engage the argument?”
not evading anything, just pointing out that technological improvements are better for the environment. And that wealthy countries are typically cleaner than poor countries. I think that we can extrapolate and suggest that a very advanced economy would probably be cleaner than ours.
Lottakatz:
it’s that friggen Bush brewery.
Good thoughts and good eye. I live in Virginia and it is getting colder. When I first came here in 1986 the winters started in December with most of the snow in late December or January and February. Once in awhile it would snow in April and summer started in early May or late April.
It has been getting more moisture as well and summer isnt starting until the end of May or the first part of June.
There are weather patterns for different parts of the country. A few years ago we had a drought but the rest of the country had more water than they knew what to do with. I dont think you can extrapolate a local change to an overall global change. There are too many factors at play.
I am not denying that earth’s climate changes, I just want to make sure we can actually do something about it before we spend billions and billions.
lottakatz: “Byron, you are dancing with the devil, in the cold moonlight. (BIL will get the allusion.)”
lottakatz,
That was a twist on Byron’s ‘minuet’ with global warming and not an allusion to me being an agent of Satan; right?
Byron: “Industry is trying to reduce it’s energy costs so that it can be more profitable. It is not trying to maintain equilibrium (0 sum profit) it is trying to reduce energy costs. They do this by capturing waste heat and recycling it. There is a physical limit on efficiency but the less energy used the more profitable.”
Byron, we were discussing man’s activities as they affect nature; not economics. Why twist the metaphor as you did other than as an expression that you don’t want to engage the argument?
Byron: “As I said above the more technological advancements the cleaner the planet.”
Ah yes, the similarities between nuclear waste and Irish Spring soap is astounding.
“If you are going to do something with GW you better make darn sure you aren’t going to screw something else up, the law of unanticipated consequences.”
Seems to me that damn near all of the “somethings” proposed by people who are playing this more conservatively than ‘You’ are predicated upon a ‘decrease the impact’ design.
You don’t like this topic; do you Byron?
Byron be careful on your name callin, these peeple got that down pat.
Speakin of Pat, how she doin, I herd them children of hers turnt out mighty fine.
Speakin of the GREAT AMERICAN DUST BOWL,
was that Global Warmin or Climate Change
I’m still tryin ta figur that one out
Slarti:
“You, sir, are taking an immoral, unethical, and dysfunctional point of view.”
Because I believe in free markets and free people?
Why is government the answer to everything? Do you think government is any more ethical than the market? I know you and Buddha and Mike S and Mike A and Gyges are very smart people but you think government is moral and industry is not. What is the difference? They are both only made up of individuals with human failings.
Why do you give government a higher moral standing than markets? Do you think that government workers are super-moral agents only doing good? That they can only do good because profit is not their motive?
I don’t think profits are evil. If it wasn’t for profit we would be living in mud huts gathering nuts and berries with a life expectancy of 35.
Do you actually think I want bad air and water, harmful chemicals in peoples food, unsafe cars, workers being killed on job sites? Or that any of my free market friends want those same things?
We want exactly what you want a safe, friendly world with global prosperity and individual freedom. We just think the evidence doesn’t give a ringing endorsement to government fixing much of anything. And you feel the same way about free markets, which aren’t really free. But you don’t believe the problem is a mixed economy, you think it is the lack of regulations that causes the harm. Me and my brothers think it is the mixture that is harmful and a cause for the trouble you see.
Maybe there is middle ground, Aristotle’s “Golden Mean”, but I doubt it because each side is so sure they are right.
I cant rebut your argument, our epistemologies are different. And that, I think is why people who believe in government and people who believe in free markets will never see eye to eye on anything. My world is green, your world is blue and neither one of us can see yellow.
Twenty seben years bees a mighty long time, bout a third if ya make it ta eighty. But ya see, what you think is an eternity aint but a small little tick on a hound dogs ass.
Earth been around a long long time. Question is, in the next twenty seben if ya see it all comeback then what ya gone say.
Right now you probly feelin like them poor peeple back in the GREAT AMERICAN DUST BOWL, it only lasted for bout ten year or so. But don’t worry it all came back.
lottakatz,
A friend of mine pointed out that you can get a pretty good idea of global warming by looking at the recommended planting locations from the seed companies and how they’ve changed. They clearly believe that climate change is happening (they’re betting their businesses on it anyway). Thanks for the empirical evidence.
Right there with you, FFLEO…
It dont’t matta FFLEO, why ah 100 years from now, we all gonna be dust anyways, that is unless there’s some type-a de-vine entervention. No what I mean, pot-ner, gotcha Vern
you take care now, ya hear.
Blouise at 1, December 9, 2009 at 5:54 pm. re: Personal actions to conserve energy.
Call me simple but this is exactly the frame of mind that needs to be encouraged. There are simple strategies that every one of us can take to control our own energy footprint and it will put money in our own pockets. Good on you Blouise.
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Byron at 1, December 9, 2009 at 7:45 pm
bOB Esq:
Why do we need to act right this very minuet? There is an honest difference in opinion.
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Byron, you are dancing with the devil, in the cold moonlight. (BIL will get the allusion.)
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I have a ‘wonder’ and some personal observations. I wonder if any of the climate change deniers have as part of their lives spending time outdoors on a regular and reoccurring basis? I do. I see the ‘climate change’ as it affects my little plot of land and the things planted on and living on it. It was bare when I moved here so I have spent a lot of time over the last 27 years planting and cultivating it to be compatible with the local environment and beneficial to local wildlife. That was my starting point. It’s 1/2 acre, nothing in terms of the kind of land masses we generally envision when we talk about climate change but as a thumbnail it may be valid.
Over the last 5-6 years the warm/cool cycles that were routine and consistent the first 18-20 years I lived here have been changing to the point that almost every one of my trees is dying because the winters are no longer cold enough for long enough to kill boring insects and diseases that invade them as a matter of course. This year the seasonal beginnings and transitions that were normally obvious to me (but increasingly out of their place in time and subject to unusual reversals and stall-outs) disappeared entirely as the warming/cooling – dry/wet spells entered a pattern that I can only describe as destructively chaotic. The effects of the last several years of my close scrutiny of my plants (Veges, trees, bushes, flowers, mosses and likens.) the bird population and even insects (I like bugs and like to watch and follow the life cycle of ‘my’ bugs) has been destructive to the point of becoming devastating. Literally devastating.
5-6 years:
I’m seeing new bugs, new bird species attracted to the new bugs with large fluctuations in the existing populations;
This year:
Trees (a type of Japanese cold-bearing plum) that were sold and behaved as decorative trees ‘tricked’ into producing THOUSANDS of plums each instead of the 1-2 hundred each normally produced each year (Broke every major limb on every tree. Killed them all.);
All other trees obviously ill enough (even with yearly maintenance) that I hired an arborist to give me a prognosis. “Start replacing them now…3 years.”
All fruiting bushes and trees dropping their leaves in early AUGUST and killing a 15 year accumulation of mosses on the rocks placed near and normally shaded kept moist by them;
Fruit production from all fruiting bushes virtually non-existent;
Seed production on about half the flower species planted to attract butterflies failed.
This was a ecological ‘crash’. I observed this in a small environment that had done well, flourished in fact, for almost 20-21 years. It was a direct result of changes in the (micro) climate in my immediate locale. It took about 6 years to reach this point.
WTF! SOMETHING is going on. I live in South Saint Louis County. That’s Missouri. I live in a small part of the breadbasket of the country and if my little – tiny, minuscule, infinitesimal really – bit of the Midwest ecosystem is reflective of greater and long lasting change we here in the Midwest/Prairie states are in serious trouble for the future. I see it right here; don’t the deniers ever get out of their offices or homes?