A Completely Unrelated Series of Thoughts... Part 6

[Sirgin]

It's fine to complain about global warming, but if you are going to believe in it at least know what the risks are. The way I see it, we should really just enjoy the warmth before we are all covered by thirty feet of ice.

I do know what the risks are but I also know what the short-term effects can be. Don't act like you know it all and others are dumb concerning this subject; I studied Geography last year so I probably know more about it than you do.

[The Metamorphosing Leon]

I just dislike the term "global warming" because it is so often used in complete ignorance.

I'm glad if you are aware of how the climate really works. I cannot stand the people that believe because of "global warming" we, in the next few decades, will either all be under-water or inhabiting some sort of toxic wasteland.

[Tan]

The proper term is "climate change". Change that while completely natural in a slower limited form over many millennia, is being accelerated by human influence beginning drastically during the industrial age when the population boomed and factories began polluting on a mass scale worldwide.

Change beyond what nature can change and adapt to on it's own, hence the problems we are having.

The best analogy to this would be milk. You know that it will go bad on the counter if left long enough (global warming), but if someone picks it up and places it outside in the sun (anthropogenic greenhouse gas), it will curdle and sour faster than it would have otherwise because of their negative intervention. Same result, but in a quicker time frame. If your fridge is broken, it's inevitable that it will go bad and you can't change that, but that doesn't mean you need to complicate the issue and speed things along when you may still have time (allow nature to adapt) to salvage something of it and allow it purpose, possibly in a new improved form adapted through evolution.

[logical123]

Nice analogy Tan! In other news, blarg. I feel like crap tonight.

[Feechy]

Care to expound on that?

[The Metamorphosing Leon]

EDIT: I don't really want to get into this dance again, but I am much more open-minded and educated than from our last debate on this matter. I acknowledge a warming, I simply don't see the threat in it.

The proper term is "climate change". Change that while completely natural in a slower limited form over many millennia, is being accelerated by human influence beginning drastically during the industrial age when the population boomed and factories began polluting on a mass scale worldwide.

Change beyond what nature can change and adapt to on it's own, hence the problems we are having.

The best analogy to this would be milk. You know that it will go bad on the counter if left long enough (global warming), but if someone picks it up and places it outside in the sun (anthropogenic greenhouse gas), it will curdle and sour faster than it would have otherwise because of their negative intervention. Same result, but in a quicker time frame. If your fridge is broken, it's inevitable that it will go bad and you can't change that, but that doesn't mean you need to complicate the issue and speed things along when you may still have time (allow nature to adapt) to salvage something of it and allow it purpose, possibly in a new improved form adapted through evolution.

Except for the fact that milk is not a 4.5 billion year old spherical planet hurtling through space at thousands of miles a minute that has been 'curdling' and 'un-curdling' itself for multiple reasons since it has had an atmosphere.

The idea of the human element being crippling to the natural cycles is a valid one, that the slow speed in which we are emitting gases will be catastrophic to the earth, but the fact of the matter is that time is not on our side for proving this. We will all be dead before anyone knows if we caused anything, and even if we did--barring complete irradiation--the earth will recover.

[Tan]

We will all be dead before anyone knows if we caused anything, and even if we did--barring complete irradiation--the earth will recover.

Good thing too, I hate to see my friends and family devoured by the Morlocks.
Those pasty-faced bastards...

[blcklblskt]

Did you get a snow day, or what exactly happened?

No, sadly we didn't.  It snowed for like 2 hours, but it didn't stick.  And no delayed opening either

[James]

We'll have a new (used) car in an hour! Mum signed for it last night so that we could pick it up today. I'm getting excited about it.

On a scale of 90-100, how nerdy is it that I had a dream where the car ran on Windows? 

[Sirgin]

EDIT: I don't really want to get into this dance again, but I am much more open-minded and educated than from our last debate on this matter. I acknowledge a warming, I simply don't see the threat in it.

If the sea water temperature rises with even just one degree (which already happened), the effects on coral reefs are tremendous. They basically die because of it, which I find a serious threat.

And I know what you're going to say: "Nature changes constantly and many species have become extinct long before mankind."

True, but just like Tan said, the speed that these changes happen in are downright alarming.

Studies have proven that CO2 levels have remained relatively constant over the last 600,000 years, with a maximum of about 250ppm. Currently the CO2 sits at 387 ppm. That's about 120ppm more than 100 years ago!
For the atmosphere to gain 120ppm CO2 in 100 years would be like you gaining 50 pounds in one second. I wonder how your body would react to that. So if you still call that "natural", I'll call you an idiot.

I realise that many people talk about this subject when they actually know nothing about it and that that bothers you. But when the entire scientific world acknowledges the problem, I suggest you do so too.

[logical123]

We'll have a new (used) car in an hour! Mum signed for it last night so that we could pick it up today. I'm getting excited about it.

On a scale of 90-100, how nerdy is it that I had a dream where the car ran on Windows? 

Umm... 102.9, or MEGA NERDY!!!

Don't worry... I would be at about 198.7, so yeah... Heh...

[NES_Rules]

EDIT: I don't really want to get into this dance again, but I am much more open-minded and educated than from our last debate on this matter. I acknowledge a warming, I simply don't see the threat in it.

If the sea water temperature rises with even just one degree (which already happened), the effects on coral reefs are tremendous. They basically die because of it, which I find a serious threat.

And I know what you're going to say: "Nature changes constantly and many species have become extinct long before mankind."

True, but just like Tan said, the speed that these changes happen in are downright alarming.

Studies have proven that CO2 levels have remained relatively constant over the last 600,000 years, with a maximum of about 250ppm. Currently the CO2 sits at 387 ppm. That's about 120ppm more than 100 years ago!
For the atmosphere to gain 120ppm CO2 in 100 years would be like you gaining 50 pounds in one second. I wonder how your body would react to that. So if you still call that "natural", I'll call you an idiot.

Corals will be fine if the water levels rise. They live and grow at a specific depth from the ocean surface, but as the levels increase, they will grow upwards to accommodate this. The global temperature may have risen 1 degree, but that's over the past 100 years or so. And what I find crazy, about that is, how the hell do you take the temp of the entire Earth? It's essentially impossible and the numbers they come up with are all guesses and estimates based on assumptions. And 120ppm in a 100 years isn't even close to gaining 50 pounds in a second. Maybe 5 pounds in a year would be closer.
And really, as far as the Earth as a whole goes, who cares about the last 600,000 years, that's nothing in geologic time. 4 billion years ago, the atmosphere was almost entirely Carbon Dioxide with very little Oxygen.

So, the truth is, yes the Earth is slowly changing, but it's perfectly natural. May we be increasing the frequency of the cycle, it's possible, but likely not by much, we simply don't have enough info from the past to make that call.
And are we fucking up this planet? Yes, but it's not from over-warming, it's all the other pollutants that are destroying it.

[Sirgin]

And 120ppm in a 100 years isn't even close to gaining 50 pounds in a second. Maybe 5 pounds in a year would be closer.

Obviously you're not too good at maths.

Let me explain:

(I'm using round numbers to make calculations easier)
Age of earth: 4,000,000,000
Age of human: 80
Difference: 5,000,000

100 years = +/- 3,000,000,000 seconds

3,000,000,000 / 5,000,000 = 630 seconds.

So the correct statement would be: "The earth gaining 120ppm CO2 (about 50% of the normal maximum) in 100 years time would be like a human gaining 50 pounds (about 50% of a normal maximum) in 10min (=600 seconds)."

Thus, my metaphorical statement was much closer to the truth than yours.

And really, as far as the Earth as a whole goes, who cares about the last 600,000 years, that's nothing in geologic time.

So you think it's normal that CO2 levels remain fairly constant for 600,000 years but suddenly increase by 50% in 100 years? And it isn't going slower either, it still rises every year. So in 50 years time we'll maybe have 500ppm, twice the amount of 100 years ago. Nature changes, yes, but not at those speeds. Rather at speeds about 100,000x slower.

So, the truth is, yes the Earth is slowly changing, but it's perfectly natural.

Lol?

[NES_Rules]

And 120ppm in a 100 years isn't even close to gaining 50 pounds in a second. Maybe 5 pounds in a year would be closer.

Obviously you're not too good at maths.

Let me explain:

(I'm using round numbers to make calculations easier)
Age of earth: 4,000,000,000
Age of human: 80
Difference: 5,000,000

100 years = +/- 3,000,000,000 seconds

3,000,000,000 / 5,000,000 = 630 seconds.

So the correct statement would be: "The earth gaining 120ppm CO2 (about 50% of the normal maximum) in 100 years time would be like a human gaining 50 pounds (about 50% of a normal maximum) in 10min (=600 seconds)."

Thus, my metaphorical statement was much closer to the truth than yours.

You're going by years, I was thinking more of mass. And I didn't do any kind of math, I just don't see how those numbers can relate to each other at all. It's kind of like of a 1,000 pound man lost 50 pounds for a while and then gained it back, to a normal 150 pound person, that's a lot of weight but for him, it was nothing.

And really, as far as the Earth as a whole goes, who cares about the last 600,000 years, that's nothing in geologic time.

So you think it's normal that CO2 levels remain fairly constant for 600,000 years but suddenly increase by 50% in 100 years? And it isn't going slower either, it still rises every year. So in 50 years time we'll maybe have 500ppm, twice the amount of 100 years ago. Nature changes, yes, but not at those speeds. Rather at speeds about 100,000x slower.

What is "normal" I understand it was constant for a number of years, but whose to say that period of time wasn't also abnormal? The CO2 concentrations fluctuate all the time, it may just be a coincidence the levels are rising rapidly in the last 100 years, we just don't know. For all we know, there may be more plants on the Earth now that are doing cellular respiration than there were 100 years ago, which would be a natural source of CO2. Or maybe there's more volcanoes spewing out CO2?

So, the truth is, yes the Earth is slowly changing, but it's perfectly natural.

Lol?

You can lol if you want, but it's just natural for the Earth to go through cycles, we don't know what time cycles are "natural" as we have only been around for such a tiny amount of time.

Also, no one knows if an increase of CO2 will result in an increased temp, yes it's a greenhouse gas, but on a molecule by molecule basis, it's the worst at trapping heat. Water vapor is much, much more efficient at that.

I believe the average temp of the Earth at the time of the dinosaurs was something like 80-90 degrees Fahrenheit, and today it's considerably cooler than that (I think something like 50-60). So for all we know we could just be going back up to that, 80-90 degrees may be the "normal" temp for Earth and the temps we have today are still a result of the last ice age.

[Tan]

I acknowledge a warming, I simply don't see the threat in it.

The threat isn't in the temperature itself, it's it speed of increase and the snowball effect it has on other factors. A good example is the melting of the methane ice. Because the temperature is rising faster that it otherwise would naturally, it's de-stabilizing the methane ice reserves underwater and under the permafrost. Methane is 30 times more potent than CO2 as a greenhouse gas and it's potential thermal energy is estimated to be greater than all of the fossil fules on earth combined. Because it can't stabilize, it's rising to the surface instead of reforming into methane ice which doesn't release it into the atmosphere on the same scale as pure released methane from methane hydrates.

In the last couple of decades the Arctic temperature has risen 4 degrees alone, in the last couple of years because of the huge city-sized chunks breaking off and the rapid melting caused by the human factor, methane is rising so fast it's even being recorded with seismic equipment.

Every year there are another 100 million people added to the world population that increase the human factor. Farming, livestock, deforestation, human waste etc increase because of it. That in turn melts the ice faster and faster which releases this methane which is 30 times more potent. A vicious cycle that repeats over and over again. I believe that's what they call indirect consequences.

That's only one of the snowball or "domino" effects that compound the issue further but it's one of the worst.