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sugar
Guru
Joined: 07 Aug 2004
Posts: 579
Location: Morrinsville, New Zealand
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 Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 3:02 am Post subject: Hug the monster |
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| Quote: | Climate scientists have been consistently downplaying and underestimating the risks for three main reasons. First, their models tended to ignore the myriad amplifying carbon cycle feedbacks that we now know are kicking in (such as the defrosting tundra).
Second, they never imagined that the nations of the world would completely ignore their warnings, that we would knowingly choose catastrophe. So until recently they hardly ever seriously considered or modeled the do-nothing scenario, which is a tripling (820 ppm) or quadrupling (1100 ppm) of preindustrial levels of carbon dioxide over the next hundred years or so. In the last 2 or 3 years, however, the literature in this area has exploded and the picture it paints is not pretty (see “An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Global Warming Impacts: How We Know Inaction Is the Gravest Threat Humanity Faces“).
Third, as Blakemore (and others) have noted, the overwhelming majority of climate scientists are generally reticent and cautious in stating results — all the more so in this case out of the mistaken fear that an accurate diagnosis would somehow make action less likely. Yes, it’d be like a doctor telling a two-pack-a-day patient with early-stage emphysema that their cough is really not that big a deal, but would they please quit smoking anyway. We live in a world, however, where anyone who tries to explain what the science suggests is likely to happen if we keep doing nothing is attacked as an alarmist by conservatives, disinformers, and their enablers in the media.
Back in 2005, the physicist Mark Bowen wrote about glaciologist Lonnie Thompson: “Scientists have an annoying habit of backing off when they’re asked to make a plain statement, and climatologists tend to be worse than most.” |
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/05/07/478984/hug-the-monster-why-so-many-climate-scientists-have-stopped-downplaying-the-climate-threat/
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pjp
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Joined: 16 Apr 2002
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Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 3:55 am Post subject: |
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No point in doing more studies if we're all gonna die.
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lolgov. 'cause where we're going, you don't have civil liberties.
In Loving Memory
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sugar
Guru
Joined: 07 Aug 2004
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Location: Morrinsville, New Zealand
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mcgruff
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 28 Dec 2004
Posts: 137
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 12:23 pm Post subject: |
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I don't think there's ever been the slightest doubt that we'd do anything about climate change. We won't even do anything about our vanishing energy supply.
The only real dynamic in human civilisation is this: "what can we do to make a ton of money in the short term?" That's a pirate's charter: rape all the women, drink all the rum, and die young.
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pjp
Administrator
Joined: 16 Apr 2002
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Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 1:50 pm Post subject: |
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Kind of like Pirate Bayers.
@sugar: Seriously. Either we've got time enough to fix it, or we don't. And that includes moving bureaucracies. Excluding the US, how many other governments are doing anything meaningful about it?
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lolgov. 'cause where we're going, you don't have civil liberties.
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sugar
Guru
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Old School
Apprentice
Joined: 20 Nov 2004
Posts: 231
Location: The Covered Bridge Capital of Oregon
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 7:54 pm Post subject: |
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Golly, gee whiz! Trading schemes. 
Doesn't do squat.
Scheme as in: underhanded plot.
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zixnub
n00b
Joined: 27 Dec 2007
Posts: 64
Location: Brasschaat, Belgium
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 9:33 pm Post subject: |
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Oh well, even if the right wing media is wrong, it's too late to do anything about it now anyway. At least the people of Iraq are free, liberated and happy now.
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pjp
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Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 11:20 pm Post subject: |
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| sugar wrote: | | 35 or so countries are now operating some kind of emissions trading schemes. |
Ignoring whether or not it is actually useful, then what's the problem? China has one under development. California has one as do several populous states in the US, and California is working on another with Canada. If they prove to be useful, I bet you'll see more states adopt what others are doing, after they've been proven to be useful.
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lolgov. 'cause where we're going, you don't have civil liberties.
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aidanjt
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Joined: 20 Feb 2005
Posts: 1101
Location: Rep. of Ireland
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 11:25 pm Post subject: |
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Carbon credits are like fiat credits, you can create as many as you want to get whatever you need done. It's just a tax, and if you're going to carbon tax, you may as well do it at the point of sale.
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| juniper wrote: | | you experience political reality dilation when travelling at american political speeds. it's in einstein's formulas. it's not their fault. |
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energyman76b
Advocate
Joined: 26 Mar 2003
Posts: 2022
Location: Germany
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| Posted: Mon May 14, 2012 11:34 pm Post subject: |
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thank you USA for sabotaging all tries to do anything at all.
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| AidanJT wrote: |
Libertardian denial of reality is wholly unimpressive and unconvincing, and simply serves to demonstrate what a bunch of delusional fools they all are.
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Satan's got perfectly toned abs and rocks a c-cup. |
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Prenj
n00b
Joined: 20 Nov 2011
Posts: 7
Location: Mostar, BiH
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 1:17 am Post subject: |
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| mcgruff wrote: | | I don't think there's ever been the slightest doubt that we'd do anything about climate change. We won't even do anything about our vanishing energy supply. |
Most of the people think its pain in the ass enough to do laundry. |
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pjp
Administrator
Joined: 16 Apr 2002
Posts: 16029
Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 2:02 am Post subject: |
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| energyman76b wrote: | | thank you USA for sabotaging all tries to do anything at all. |
lol, cause if we don't, nobody else can.
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lolgov. 'cause where we're going, you don't have civil liberties.
In Loving Memory
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BoneKracker
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Joined: 14 Mar 2006
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Location: U.S.A.
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 4:14 am Post subject: |
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| energyman76b wrote: | | thank you USA for sabotaging all tries to do anything at all. |
Never fear. Obama is going to fix it. No really, just re-elect him, and this time, he really will.
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Oldthinkers unbellyfeel INGSOC.
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pjp
Administrator
Joined: 16 Apr 2002
Posts: 16029
Location: Colorado
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 4:21 am Post subject: |
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Oh, great idea!
Let's elect Obama the first Global President. Then he can decide what's best for Europe too!
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lolgov. 'cause where we're going, you don't have civil liberties.
In Loving Memory
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Old School
Apprentice
Joined: 20 Nov 2004
Posts: 231
Location: The Covered Bridge Capital of Oregon
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 3:48 pm Post subject: |
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| energyman76b wrote: | | thank you USA for sabotaging all tries to do anything at all. |
You forgot China and India, not to mention your heroes in the Kremlin.
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I am not young enough to know everything.
- Oscar Wilde |
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notageek
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 05 Jun 2008
Posts: 78
Location: Bangalore, India
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 3:56 pm Post subject: |
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What? We're poor.
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What looks like a cat, flies like a bat, brays like a donkey, and plays like a monkey? |
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zixnub
n00b
Joined: 27 Dec 2007
Posts: 64
Location: Brasschaat, Belgium
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notageek
Tux's lil' helper
Joined: 05 Jun 2008
Posts: 78
Location: Bangalore, India
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| Posted: Tue May 15, 2012 4:22 pm Post subject: |
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White man, make up your mind. Do we feed ourselves or do we spend money on German engineered wind-turbines?
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