View Full Version : Global Warming - it's coming
Franconicus
08-07-2006, 15:40
If memory serves scientists predicted the Global Warming for the first time in the 70ies. Politicians are still discussing wheatther this is just a theory and if they should care about it.
Lately I heard and saw a couple of reports that sounds as if mother nature does not care about the politicians and started the implementations.
- in the Alps: glaciers are melting, the frontier of permafrost is changing; some hills already broke down because of that, there will be less snow and ski tourism will collaps within 10 years;
- more and more plants and annimals from Italy cross the alps and settle in Germany. They are in competition with the natives.
- in the Mediterranean fishes and plants from the Carribean pop up, for example the hammerhead shark.
What are the events related to the GW in your country?
Pat Robertson has decided that our recent heat wave is proof positive of global warming (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14171691/), which I find hilarious. Climate change is measured in fractions of degrees, but one heat wave has our local insane people declaring that now they're believers.
“We really need to address the burning of fossil fuels,” Robertson said on his “700 Club” broadcast. “It is getting hotter, and the icecaps are melting and there is a buildup of carbon dioxide in the air.”
This week the heat index, the perceived temperature based on both air temperatures and humidity, reached 115 Fahrenheit in some regions of the East Coast. The 76-year-old Robertson told viewers that was “the most convincing evidence I’ve seen on global warming in a long time.”
Strike For The South
08-07-2006, 15:48
If you look at the stizats you wonder why we arent doing anything. We have men We have rockets We have foil LETS FIX IT.
Note: I believe climate change is occurring, don't get me wrong. We are in an inter-glacial period, and in time Earth will be a lot hotter. This will happen with or without human intervention.
It is also likely that we are accelerating the process.
However, I find it amusing when people take a seasonal variation (a heat wave in the U.S., for instance) and read it as proof positive for a global, multi-century trend. It just kinda shows that they have done low to no reading on the subject.
Seamus Fermanagh
08-07-2006, 16:00
Pat Robertson has decided that our recent heat wave is proof positive of global warming (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14171691/), which I find hilarious. Climate change is measured in fractions of degrees, but one heat wave has our local insane people declaring that now they're believers.
“We really need to address the burning of fossil fuels,” Robertson said on his “700 Club” broadcast. “It is getting hotter, and the icecaps are melting and there is a buildup of carbon dioxide in the air.”
This week the heat index, the perceived temperature based on both air temperatures and humidity, reached 115 Fahrenheit in some regions of the East Coast. The 76-year-old Robertson told viewers that was “the most convincing evidence I’ve seen on global warming in a long time.”
"Local insane people?" I'd assumed from your locale tag-line that you were somewhere in France or a Wisconsonite. Pat is local for me -- I actually taught a class or two at his Univ -- but I think I have to agree with you that lifting all of those 1-ton leg presses must have stressed his system a bit.
The problem with all the GW stuff is the lack of historical perspective -- detailed observations stretch back only a dozen decades or so. Climatologists and others work to interpret "fossil" data to provide points of comparison, but such data is inherently limited. We know so little about major climactic shifts and just how much of a role humanities techonologies play. Scientists can't even tell you why we warmed up from the "Little Ice Age."
Now, Pat Robertson using his broad knowledge of the weather and climate to evaluate things, THAT is funny.
There's been some good work done with ice cores (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3792209.stm) to help estimate previous climates. Anyway, it's the best metric I've yet seen.
If anything, it looks as though our civilization has been living through a period of unusually stable temperatures. Things maye get very interesting in the next couple of centuries ...
Over the last 800,000 years the Earth has, on the whole, been a pretty chilly place. Interglacials - or warm spells - have come every 100,000 years and have generally been short-lived.
Over the last 400,000 years, interglacials have lasted about 10,000 years, with climates similar to this one. Before that they were less warm, but lasted slightly longer.
We have already been in an interglacial for about 10,000 years, so we should - according to the pattern - be heading for an ice age. But we are not.
The Epica team has noticed the interglacial period of 400,000 years ago closely matches our own - because the shape of the Earth's orbit was the same then as it is now.
That warm spell lasted a whopping 28,000 years - so ours probably will, too.
EDIT
Oh, right, by "local" I mean here in the U.S., not down the street from me. Sorry for any confusion that caused.
There's been some good work done with ice cores (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3792209.stm) to help estimate previous climates. Anyway, it's the best metric I've yet seen.
If anything, it looks as though our civilization has been living through a period of unusually stable temperatures. Things maye get very interesting in the next couple of centuries ...
Over the last 800,000 years the Earth has, on the whole, been a pretty chilly place. Interglacials - or warm spells - have come every 100,000 years and have generally been short-lived.
Over the last 400,000 years, interglacials have lasted about 10,000 years, with climates similar to this one. Before that they were less warm, but lasted slightly longer.
We have already been in an interglacial for about 10,000 years, so we should - according to the pattern - be heading for an ice age. But we are not.
The Epica team has noticed the interglacial period of 400,000 years ago closely matches our own - because the shape of the Earth's orbit was the same then as it is now.
That warm spell lasted a whopping 28,000 years - so ours probably will, too.
EDIT
Oh, right, by "local" I mean here in the U.S., not down the street from me. Sorry for any confusion that caused.That's pretty much where I stand. The world may be getting warmer- like it has before -but to think that a 10% cut in fossil fuel consumption will have any impact at all is just silly imo.
Oh, and Pat Roberston is a jibbering idiot. :laugh4:
Seamus Fermanagh
08-07-2006, 18:42
Oh, and Pat Roberston is a jibbering idiot. :laugh4:
He does not jibber! And he's not an...oops, well, better stop while I'm ahead.:laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4:
He does not jibber! And he's not an...oops, well, better stop while I'm ahead.:laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4:
Of course not- I meant "gibbering" idiot, not "jibbering". :oops:
My apologies to all who were hurt by my comments. :laugh4:
Rodion Romanovich
08-07-2006, 18:49
It's so hot in here that I can't think anymore, so I forgot what I was going to write :fainting: :thumbsdown: :dizzy: :bomb: :sick2:
No matter where you stand on the issue, I think it's safe to say that the emphasis on cars is not based on any real science. Coal-burning electrical plants are a much bigger, and more dangerous pollutant. I remember when we had the East Coast blackout some years ago, I was still living in New York.
All the cars were still running. None of the East Coast coal plants were running. The air was crystalline and pure for over a day.
It's a single data point, admittedly, but it changed my thinking. The cars really aren't the problem. But who's got the guts to tell the American public that (a) we should build a whole lot more nuclear plants, and (b) the coal industry needs to slink away quietly into the night?
Seamus Fermanagh
08-07-2006, 18:58
It's a single data point, admittedly, but it changed my thinking. The cars really aren't the problem. But who's got the guts to tell the American public that (a) we should build a whole lot more nuclear plants, and (b) the coal industry needs to slink away quietly into the night?
I'd like to shift cars to alcohol to decrease dependence on foreign oil, but that is political more than environmental.
Nukes = YES!!!!!
Coal industry would not slink away as it can be used for any number of things aside from combustion -- but the reduced market would axe a lot of the more marginal operations anyway. Appalachia would take a hit.
Don Corleone
08-07-2006, 19:09
I agree that climatic data indicates that the world is warming up. The data on it is incontrivertible. From what I understand, even the most biased scientific think tanks place human contribution at 5% (most place it at around 1%). The nice thing about human-accelerated global warming is that it gives the rest of the world to really stick it to America... all the blame for it just happens to fall on the one pollutant that the US happens to lead the world on. Mr. Clinton was very wise to turn his back on the sepuku knife he was handed in Kyoto, and Mr. Bush was wise to follow his lead.
I agree with Seamus, that ending on our dependance on fossil fuels must happen now. But again, this is more about depriving Hugo Chavez & Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the tools they need to continue to wreak havoc and mayhem around the globe.
I also, oddly enough, am a pretty strong environmentalist. There's plenty of damage that actually IS being done around the globe. Deforestation is a huge issue, and it didn't go away when human-accelerated global warming came into style. The release of hyrocarbons, aerosols and other ozone depleting chemicals still continues in parts of the world. As some have already pointed out, sulfides from coal plants cause all sorts of problems.
One of the reasons I get so angry at the whole Kyoto crowd is this very phenomemon... they lost sight of the bubble. "Let's get the US" became more important than actually improving the environment, and as a result, many REAL threats have worsened in the past decade. :shame:
Rodion Romanovich
08-07-2006, 19:12
@Lemur: Also don't forget the cows and their methane farts. I know it doesn't sound serious to speak about farting cows in a political debate, but it's a big cause of pollution by the methane they produce. Obviously, human overpopulation is the reason why there are so many cows in the first place. ~:) So a genocide of cows isn't really the sollution - cows have the right to live and we have the right to eat them. But do we have the right to breed like insects when we're mammals? No matter what people say, people will always strive for high living standards and room to live.
=============================
IRT topic: I think it's better to limit population size by contraceptives than post-natal abortion, also known as murder/mass-murder/genocide. The right to live and not be ill is greater than the right to breed. Nobody can say they have greater right to get some ugly, drooling, shitting infant over my right to eat decent food rather than some stinking disease-infected vegetables that lose all it's nutrition value if you heat it but you need to heat in order to not get diseases. When breeding, the act of creating a new life to this world, has in fact become the cause of our own destruction, then things have certainly gone far. The act of creating life is no longer the act of creating life, when it creates death and suffering too. End the overpopulation! Overpopulation is an act of murder and causing suffering of those that live! As such, it should be considered an as great sin as murder and rape!
Here's my solution to the problem:
- imprison all people who believe contraceptives are a sin, unless they're impotent or have sex very seldom, in which case they shouldn't be punished at all.
- all aid money sent to the third world should go to pensions for the old, and contraceptives. The reason for overbreeding in those areas is that many children is the only way of getting money after retiring. Remove the cause of the problem, and the problem is removed. If it isn't, recall the aid money to countries who won't limit the reproduction, and don't give them a new chance until after having suffered from 10-15 years of no aid money at all. Let UN make sure this principle is followed by all aid giving western countries.
- also in western countries, put a limit on breeding. Max 2 children per person is good enough, causing a slow decrease, which is needed (remember that western countries cause most of the pollution with our living standards, so if we are to live with these standards we need to be fewer). Breaking that law should result in sterilization of the guilty, and of all his/her children.
And here's the more popular solution:
- fight more wars with heavy civilian casualties
- use concentration camps to kill innocent groups of people
- let overpopulation continue untouched so it also makes environmental problems worse, so that when the response comes, it needs to be harsher, with heavier bloodshed
- let third world people kill each others with primitive farming tools - spades, rakes, and stones.
- let the poor survivors, after being traumatized by war, have no other food than salad and vegetables, if at all such things can be eaten when pollution and poisonous substances have made them disgusting, and diseases have made heating of food necessary. Let them have food you wouldn't give your dog and let many die from diseases.
- let rich people live as close together as the citizens of the favelas do today, and let the poor people live as close together as the hens in an egg production factory.
I leave it to others to decide which alternative is better.
Here's my solution to the problem:
- imprison all people who believe contraceptives are a sin, unless they're impotent or have sex very seldom, in which case they shouldn't be punished at all.
- all aid money sent to the third world should go to pensions for the old, and contraceptives. The reason for overbreeding in those areas is that many children is the only way of getting money after retiring. Remove the cause of the problem, and the problem is removed. If it isn't, recall the aid money to countries who won't limit the reproduction, and don't give them a new chance until after having suffered from 10-15 years of no aid money at all. Let UN make sure this principle is followed by all aid giving western countries.
- also in western countries, put a limit on breeding. Max 2 children per person is good enough, causing a slow decrease, which is needed (remember that western countries cause most of the pollution with our living standards, so if we are to live with these standards we need to be fewer). Breaking that law should result in sterilization of the guilty, and of all his/her children.
Uhh no. I like being to chose how many kids I would like to have. People should also be free to think/speak as they like as long as it doesn't hurt other people.
Rodion Romanovich
08-07-2006, 20:41
Uhh no. I like being to chose how many kids I would like to have. People should also be free to think/speak as they like as long as it doesn't hurt other people.
I'm for free speech, so people should be allowed to say anything they want. But if they don't use contraceptives and breed like rats, they should be put with their likes below the earth surface. Overreproduction DOES hurt other people. Just like pressing the trigger of a gun kills people. Just because it's indirect doesn't make it better.
Ironside
08-07-2006, 22:18
It's a single data point, admittedly, but it changed my thinking. The cars really aren't the problem. But who's got the guts to tell the American public that (a) we should build a whole lot more nuclear plants, and (b) the coal industry needs to slink away quietly into the night?
Does the US got a good terminal storage place for the nuclear waste yet?
I also, oddly enough, am a pretty strong environmentalist. There's plenty of damage that actually IS being done around the globe. Deforestation is a huge issue, and it didn't go away when human-accelerated global warming came into style. The release of hyrocarbons, aerosols and other ozone depleting chemicals still continues in parts of the world. As some have already pointed out, sulfides from coal plants cause all sorts of problems.
Hydrocarbons = fossile fuels BTW. And planty of aerosols comes from combustion. There's more than global warming that's the downside of fossile fuels.
Uhh no. I like being to chose how many kids I would like to have. People should also be free to think/speak as they like as long as it doesn't hurt other people.
I agree with you, but I don't think argument will work on someone claiming that you having many children will hurt other people.
Ok, ok I'm in "finicky" mode by some reason today :inquisitive:
I think I know the cause but I don't get the effect. :stupido2:
Does the US got a good terminal storage place for the nuclear waste yet?
Yep--strapping big burlap bags filled with the spent rods on the top of rockets and shooting 'em to the moon! :2thumbsup: I really think our idiotic gov't should do this--the only thing we'd have to worry about is a bit of premature Fourth of July fireworks...
And don't forget concrete: the world's massive cities contribute to increasing the average atmospheric temperature as much as anything else. Not easily remedied as say, cutting CO2 emissions, but urbanization is another key ingredient to the overall warming trend. Just look at the recent heat waves as an example: in New York city last week it was over 120 degrees a couple of times (go Yankees :D ). Warm, yes, but much warmer than the rest of New York state was. All those extra degrees have to go somewhere...
Does the US got a good terminal storage place for the nuclear waste yet?
We've got a pretty nice place (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_mountain) selected, but it's been held up by controversy. Silly Nevada doesn't want all of our nuclear waste ...
Our Department of Energy even created a mascot, Yucca Mountain Johnny (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_Johnny), to spread information and goodwill about nuclear waste.
How can you say no to Johnny?
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v489/Lemurmania/Yucca_Mountain_Johnny.jpg
discovery1
08-07-2006, 22:52
We've got a pretty nice place (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_mountain) selected, but it's been held up by controversy. Silly Nevada doesn't want all of our nuclear waste ...
Our Department of Energy even created a mascot, Yucca Mountain Johnny (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_Johnny), to spread information and goodwill about nuclear waste.
How can you say no to Johnny?
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v489/Lemurmania/Yucca_Mountain_Johnny.jpg
Sorry about that. Irrationality aside our economy does depend on tourisms, although I suppose that is just an extension of it. I wish they would build a rail or road especially for the waste, that it it won't need to go through our city.
I should be working right now, on stuff relating to solar power no less.
Oh my gods, Lemur, I didn't even know that. Fo' sho', seriously funny.
They probably paid a company hundreds of thousands of American dollars to "develop" Johnny...good ol' bueraucratic [sic] waste.
Crazed Rabbit
08-08-2006, 00:18
Well, my views on this have been pretty much stated by Lemur, Don, & co.
I just wanted to address one thing:
If memory serves scientists predicted the Global Warming for the first time in the 70ies.
I think they were still talking about how a new ice was going to come by now unless we listened to the environmental-whackos.
Crazed Rabbit
thrashaholic
08-08-2006, 09:04
@Lemur: Also don't forget the cows and their methane farts. I know it doesn't sound serious to speak about farting cows in a political debate, but it's a big cause of pollution by the methane they produce. Obviously, human overpopulation is the reason why there are so many cows in the first place. ~:) So a genocide of cows isn't really the sollution - cows have the right to live and we have the right to eat them. But do we have the right to breed like insects when we're mammals? No matter what people say, people will always strive for high living standards and room to live.
=============================
IRT topic: I think it's better to limit population size by contraceptives than post-natal abortion, also known as murder/mass-murder/genocide. The right to live and not be ill is greater than the right to breed. Nobody can say they have greater right to get some ugly, drooling, shitting infant over my right to eat decent food rather than some stinking disease-infected vegetables that lose all it's nutrition value if you heat it but you need to heat in order to not get diseases. When breeding, the act of creating a new life to this world, has in fact become the cause of our own destruction, then things have certainly gone far. The act of creating life is no longer the act of creating life, when it creates death and suffering too. End the overpopulation! Overpopulation is an act of murder and causing suffering of those that live! As such, it should be considered an as great sin as murder and rape!
Here's my solution to the problem:
- imprison all people who believe contraceptives are a sin, unless they're impotent or have sex very seldom, in which case they shouldn't be punished at all.
- all aid money sent to the third world should go to pensions for the old, and contraceptives. The reason for overbreeding in those areas is that many children is the only way of getting money after retiring. Remove the cause of the problem, and the problem is removed. If it isn't, recall the aid money to countries who won't limit the reproduction, and don't give them a new chance until after having suffered from 10-15 years of no aid money at all. Let UN make sure this principle is followed by all aid giving western countries.
- also in western countries, put a limit on breeding. Max 2 children per person is good enough, causing a slow decrease, which is needed (remember that western countries cause most of the pollution with our living standards, so if we are to live with these standards we need to be fewer). Breaking that law should result in sterilization of the guilty, and of all his/her children.
And here's the more popular solution:
- fight more wars with heavy civilian casualties
- use concentration camps to kill innocent groups of people
- let overpopulation continue untouched so it also makes environmental problems worse, so that when the response comes, it needs to be harsher, with heavier bloodshed
- let third world people kill each others with primitive farming tools - spades, rakes, and stones.
- let the poor survivors, after being traumatized by war, have no other food than salad and vegetables, if at all such things can be eaten when pollution and poisonous substances have made them disgusting, and diseases have made heating of food necessary. Let them have food you wouldn't give your dog and let many die from diseases.
- let rich people live as close together as the citizens of the favelas do today, and let the poor people live as close together as the hens in an egg production factory.
I leave it to others to decide which alternative is better.
How very Malthusian..... (although he didn't advocate contraception, just morals)
The global climate is changing we can't stop it but we can slow it down. But that's something no government will do untill it's to late. Look at Kyoto. The countries who particpated can't make it so buy clean air and those who make it don't have to do much truoble and can increase their Co2 without even worrying. And alot countries just even didn't participate. SO the overall C02 emitting has only gotten worse.
THe climate is going to change that's for sure but scientists don't even know if it's going to heat everywhere. Western Europe for example would get about the climate of Alaska according to some scientists. (So don't start worrying about the glaciers just yet!) Just found out the same will probably hapen in North America.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3266833.stm (BBC, Uk)
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/writing/2004/02/global_warming_.html (New York Times, US)
http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/01/21/climate.cooling.ap/index.html (CNN, about US and Europe)
Rodion Romanovich
08-08-2006, 10:50
Fixing the environmental probelms is a Pareto-optimal decision. Destroying the environment and killing ourselves is a Nash equilibrium.
thrashaholic
08-08-2006, 21:41
Fixing the environmental probelms is a Pareto-optimal decision.
Not for all those people for whom you advocate sterilisation, prison, and limiting chilldren to two when they may want more in order to fix the environmental problems. Plus the income redistribution involved in giving aid isn't really Pareto-efficient either.
Mind you, the current state of affairs isn't Pareto-efficient either: externalities through pollution etc.
Marshal Murat
08-09-2006, 05:16
Lucky for all CO2 problems, new process to send CO2 into the silt below the deepest part of the ocean, where is soldifies under pressure and temperature.
America is still trying to get over the whole 3-Mile Nuclear Explosion and Chernobyl. There was once a project, MHD I think, built by Ben Bova's friends, that could have replaced coal.
Rodion Romanovich
08-09-2006, 09:22
Not for all those people for whom you advocate sterilisation, prison, and limiting chilldren to two when they may want more in order to fix the environmental problems. Plus the income redistribution involved in giving aid isn't really Pareto-efficient either.
Yes it is, most people getting 2 children is very good for everyone. People getting too many children and then killing each other because it caused problems with so many is certainly a worse thing. I only advocate sterilisation for those who abandon the Pareto-optimal solution - thus maintaining the Pareto optimal solution causes no sterilisation for anyone. The aid giving is also good for everyone (even for the givers) - better that than having the third world feel west are all evil colonialists and build up their industry and war machine and try to conquer the west later. And probably just as important, along with fixing environmental problems, it's a good way of preventing massive immigration of millions of people from the third world, something that our countries, with it's already great domestic problems, can't handle effectively without seeing the economy breaking apart. Sending aid to the third world rather than accepting immigration is also better for the third world - it saves the lives of 100-1000 people for virtually the same amount of money it costs to aid ONE immigrant in our own countries. Please tell me how this solution could be improved without making the situation worse for one of the parts, because I consider it a Pareto optimal decision set. It makes for the best situation for both the third world, for the western world, and even for people who like overpopulation. Because if they would continue their overreproduction they would soon out-compete others and then there would be nobody left to save them from their own destruction through fundamentalism (by the way neither the bible nor the alcoran says you should overreproduce, only time God calls for "filling up earth" is after the flood when only a handful of humans remained, and judging from the rest of the bible that goal had been achieved in the coming chapters of the bible, where the world population was a few million people, which means God's definition of filling up earth would be some million people, not 6.5 billion like we have today, so at this time there's no need for massive overreproduction to please God).
thrashaholic
08-09-2006, 11:03
Pareto efficiency is achieved when there is no other possible allocation of resources that would make some consumers better off without making others worse off. This means that for any family who would have greater utility by having 3 children than 2 limiting their ability to have more than 2 children is Pareto inefficient because their welfare is being sacrificed to increase your own.
However, Pareto efficient outcomes are not always desirable, for example: if a paedophile is torturing a child, in order to increase the welfare of the child (by arresting the paedophile, or what have you), one would have to reduce the welfare of the paedophile. This is Pareto innefficient, but society would say it was a more desirable outcome.
It's all swings and roundabouts I'm afraid: those who like to drive big polluting cars reduce the utility of environmental lobbyists and environmental lobbyists reduce the utility of people who like to drive big polluting cars.
Oh, and on the issue of aid, it cannot be Pareto efficient because it involves the removal of my potential-utility (money) and the giving of it to someone else: I lose out to make someone better off. The best model anyone can have for the future is the past, and in the past aid has proved utterly useless in reducing poverty in the third world for a myriad of reasons. The foremost of these reasons is the fact that economic performance is related to the social environment in which that economy resides. In the developing world there is a massive culture of corruption: governments act more as crime syndicates than responsible governments. The entire international aid culture grew from the misguided principal of the social democratic era that governments, if they embark on extensive planning, state ownership and capital accumulation (financed for developing countries by forced saving and substantial foreign aid) they would grow. In fact the opposite was true, because developing economies didn't have societal structures that allowed for growth, unlike the West. No amount of planning by development economists could solve this either, central-coordination has played almost no role in these structures occuring in the West. I know it's a cliche to say this, but most of the money just ends up in the pockets of despots and not in the hands of 'the people', and even if it did there'd be nothing they could do with it. Debt works as a regulator of future debt, so the only good thing to come out of international aid is that some developing countries now have so much debt that they can't take on any more.
Back on topic:
The fishermen round here seldom get the cold water catches any more. Mackerel are all year and the sardine season is extended. Likewise Mediterranean jellyfish and warmer water sharks are spotted more regularly.
Don Corleone
08-09-2006, 15:02
Idaho, nobody is disputing that the climate is trending upwards (well, nobody that can read a scientific journal, that is). The question is why. This isn't even the warmest the Earth has been in recorded history. By all estimates I've seen, the Middle Ages were several degrees warmer then it is on average now.
Now maybe I've gotten some bum information, but if all of manmade emissions is impacting the warming trends by at most 2%, how can we really slow it down in any noticable manner? Ironside, I don't argue that Hydrocarbons and aerosols are man-made pollutants. My point was that Kyoto, the great salvation for global warming, failed to even address these pollutants. It focused exclusively on CO2 emissions, even though there's no conclusive proof that it's CO2 that's the mechanism for accelerating the warming trend. Why then focus on CO2? Because it's the one emission category where the US leads the world. I don't think that's a coincidence.
If we're really interested in fixing the environment, and not using global warming as a trojan horse for handicapping the American economy, then let's look at the primary causes of pollution and address them. Let's go tackle ozone, flurocarbons (yes, they are still floating around some parts of the world), sulfides, hydrocarbons and, in an appropriate fashion, CO2.
Rodion Romanovich
08-09-2006, 17:11
Pareto efficiency is achieved when there is no other possible allocation of resources that would make some consumers better off without making others worse off. This means that for any family who would have greater utility by having 3 children than 2 limiting their ability to have more than 2 children is Pareto inefficient because their welfare is being sacrificed to increase your own.
No, if some person decides to overpopulate, he'll be a threat to me/my group/my country/whatever, and it's very likely I/my group/my country/whatever will be scared of that person/that person's group/nation/whatever and start killing them in self-defense. War makes the weakest and most cowardly of both groups survive, while it kills the best men of each nation.
I know what the word means, I read about it recently and found that it very well described a concept I reinvented many years ago independently of and without knowing of the other guy. The disagreement lies in what we claim is the "utility function". I claim long-term well-fare to be central to high utility, while you seem to concentrate only on medium-long-term consequences of the different options.
However, Pareto efficient outcomes are not always desirable, for example: if a paedophile is torturing a child, in order to increase the welfare of the child (by arresting the paedophile, or what have you), one would have to reduce the welfare of the paedophile. This is Pareto innefficient, but society would say it was a more desirable outcome.
I think you misunderstand the concept pareto optimal or misunderstand what the most sensible utility function in a biological and political perspective is - if the paedophile stops torturing the child he'll be better off because he has nothing to gain from paedophilic acts - prison is the usual consequence and if he doesn't get caught he'll live in constant fear of ending up in prison, and if he keeps encouraging his own paedophilia behavior he has smaller chances of developing a normal sexuality and get an offspring. If he ends up in prison there are greater chances that he'll get rid of his problems with himself. Similarly the paedophile stopping his assaults would ALSO improve the situation for the child, who has then less risk of developing depression, committing suicide, dying from the wounds, or developing a sick sexuality. Only if you only care about a VERY short term perspective can pareto optimality mean such a thing as you suggest. Remember that the utility function determines exactly what the Pareto optimality means. Try to think for a while which utility function you used when making this example - that utility function is, I think you'll understand too, not very sensible in a political perspective.
Oh, and on the issue of aid, it cannot be Pareto efficient because it involves the removal of my potential-utility (money) and the giving of it to someone else
Again you make the fallacy of assuming a short term, not very well-defined utility function. If we'd be instinct-driven animals without rational thought ability in a strange universe where our instincts misfire because key triggering stimuli combinations appear in odd and unnatural situations, what you say would be sensible. Unfortunately we are that, to some extent, but we still have a little bit of rationality. And even if our other players act without rational thought, ourselves acting with rational thought will increase our utility. See above for my explanation why the form of aid I suggested is indeed Pareto optimal. I'll give you another example which should teach you how it works (not again you probably have got the concept of Pareto optimal right, but your choice of utility function is very odd):
A forms an alliance with B. C attacks B. A can now decide to break the alliance with B and easily conquer half of B's territory, or not breaking the alliance. A NOT breaking the alliance is Pareto optimal if a utility function taking into account the long-term outcomes is used - because an alliance breaker is not trusted and is more likely to be backstabbed etc. etc. It might also be that B will respond with heavy partisan activity and break down the economy of A's empire/nation. A NOT breaking the alliance doesn't give the profit of pillage during conquest and the natural resources B has. But it's more efficient in a long term perspective. And a historical example - I'm currently reading about the 80 years war - Spain's decision to fight the Netherlands was for instance not a high-utility decision - the Netherlandic resistance drained the Spanish economy, and economy which was strengthened by an almost endless flow of silver from America at that time, and also owned several key trade regions all over the world, had a strong fleet and probably at that time the best army in the world. On the other hand, not fighting the Netherlands would have lost Spain much territory for no gain in the short term perspective. It turns out that accepting those land losses in the short term, and withdrawing immediately, would have been more benefitial for Spain at that time, even though in the short term it looked like the least benefitial alternative. The long-term result of Spain fighting the Netherlands at that time was a total destruction and ruining of Spain, transforming it from the leading world power into a state of almost no importance for several centuries. Thus - politically and biologically - a VERY long term perspective is normally a more sensible approach to forming a utility function after which Pareto optimality is measured. We could for instance say we measure the utility for our own group after say 300-1000 years as a proper measure of utility. Measuring our own utility in five minutes from now, as the paedophile example you gave above does, isn't a very good idea. A lot of things turn out different then - if you only measure five minutes ahead, killing, raping, stealing - EVEN destroying the environment - can be made to look Pareto optimal.
and in the past aid has proved utterly useless in reducing poverty in the third world for a myriad of reasons.
That's because aid is done in a careless manner - it has been a flow of money from the poor of the rich countries to the rich of the poor countries. As you can see above I suggest a completely different form of aid, that takes into account the cultural and political situation of the target countries. As you can see, your own examples only speak against the previous forms of aid, but is no argumentation against the form of aid I suggested above.
Idaho, nobody is disputing that the climate is trending upwards (well, nobody that can read a scientific journal, that is). The question is why. This isn't even the warmest the Earth has been in recorded history. By all estimates I've seen, the Middle Ages were several degrees warmer then it is on average now.
Now maybe I've gotten some bum information, but if all of manmade emissions is impacting the warming trends by at most 2%, how can we really slow it down in any noticable manner? Ironside, I don't argue that Hydrocarbons and aerosols are man-made pollutants. My point was that Kyoto, the great salvation for global warming, failed to even address these pollutants. It focused exclusively on CO2 emissions, even though there's no conclusive proof that it's CO2 that's the mechanism for accelerating the warming trend. Why then focus on CO2? Because it's the one emission category where the US leads the world. I don't think that's a coincidence.
If we're really interested in fixing the environment, and not using global warming as a trojan horse for handicapping the American economy, then let's look at the primary causes of pollution and address them. Let's go tackle ozone, flurocarbons (yes, they are still floating around some parts of the world), sulfides, hydrocarbons and, in an appropriate fashion, CO2.
Oh please Co2 isn't going to destroy the American economy. But yeah let all the other poor suckers do the work to get CO2 down.
CO2 isn't the real cause of the global warming but it fastens it and probably will make it even worse. CO2 is one of the strongest greenhous gasses (or however you call it in English). And there's already much more then there should. A lot of gasses emmitted by the industry also are bad for the O3-layer wich protect us againt radiation (UVA,UVB). And not only the climate is changing, also the magnetic field of the earth is getting less strong. Wich will also increase radiation ( see the South Atlantic Anomaly.) Tough this is not going as fast. We can't put all the problems in the hands of a few next generations. Can we? And that's not all of it either.
Franconicus
08-14-2006, 10:30
Idaho, nobody is disputing that the climate is trending upwards (well, nobody that can read a scientific journal, that is). The question is why. This isn't even the warmest the Earth has been in recorded history. By all estimates I've seen, the Middle Ages were several degrees warmer then it is on average now.
Sorry, Don, but I have to contradict. Although the disput so far is very interesting, the question in this thread is:
What are the events related to the GW in your country?
I know it, because I started it ~:)
As Gertgregor pointed out in his post, global warming doesn't necessarily mean the end result will be warmer temperatures for everyone in every location.
Our relatively stable weather patterns are a direct result of the ocean conveyor currents. As pointed out deep in some of the articles Gertgregor linked, the Atlantic Conveyor portion of those ocean currents, the north-travelling warm part known as the Gulf Stream, is particularly susceptible to temperature and more importantly salinity.
The conveyor current is a pretty simple mechanism really. Warm water at the surface, heated by more direct sunlight in equatorial regions, travels north (or south below the equator) into colder regions where it cools and sinks. It sinks because colder water is more dense than warm water. Simple physics. The colder water is thus forced to the bottom and then south to warmer water where it warms back up and rises to start all over again. This is oversimplified, since the currents actually split in places and the cycle reaches all the way around Africa into the Indian Ocean for part of the conveyor. The warm water travelling north brings with it a warm air mass. This warm air mass, dependent entirely upon the warm current, is what keeps the Northeastern USA and Canadian seaboard and the UK, and Ireland and Western and Northern Europe relatively warm compared to similar latitudes without the effects of the current, like Western Canada, Alaska and Eastern Siberia and Northen China.
How does global warming affect this? As more Arctic sea ice melts, and more of the Greenland ice sheet melts, the resulting fresh water decreases the salinity of the North Atlantic. Lower salinity makes the water less dense. Remember, it's increased density which causes the cooling conveyor current to sink and then turn south. The decreasing salinity and thus decreasing density of the cooler water slows the conveyor belt. A slower Gulf Stream means less of the warm air mass delivered to those places I mentioned above. Enough fresh water, fast enough, and the current shuts down altogether.
This last happened shortly after the end of the last Ice Age. As temperatures rose, a large lake of trapped fresh water near what is now Hudson Bay broke through an ice dam and entered the North Atlantic. This shutr down the North Atlantic conveyor. The result was what is known as the Younger Dryas. A short return of the Ice Age conditions for those areas I listed above, which lasted about 1000 years, from about 12.5 to 11.5 K years ago. And the Younger Dryas only took a few years, perhaps as little as a decade, to swing from warm stable weather to a new small Ice Age.
The Younger Dryas affected climates all over the world. Glaciers reforming in Europe and New England were just part of it. The change in distribution of warm and cold air masses led to massive changes in moisture-driven weather systems. Centuries-long droughts in South Asia and South America and Africa also resulted from the shifts.
Why does this matter? The entirety of human civilization from the end of the Stone Age to today has taken place since the Younger Dryas. We have had the benefit of stable climate for all of our history. And that may be about to change. And it may already be too late to do anything about it. Current estimates place the end of sea ice in the Arctic during summer as early as 50 years from now. There is no way all that fresh water can be released without having a massive affect on the North Atlantic. And we already know what kind of effect so much fresh water last had.
Why does this matter? The entirety of human civilization from the end of the Stone Age to today has taken place since the Younger Dryas. We have had the benefit of stable climate for all of our history. And that may be about to change. And it may already be too late to do anything about it. Current estimates place the end of sea ice in the Arctic during summer as early as 50 years from now. There is no way all that fresh water can be released without having a massive affect on the North Atlantic. And we already know what kind of effect so much fresh water last had.
bye, bye Venice? ~:(
Vladimir
08-14-2006, 20:28
I don't think so. The low countries are protected by their dykes so I don’t see why Venice couldn’t be as well.
Kralizec
08-14-2006, 23:59
Yet in America they talk about banning gay marriage. Suicidal nuts.
There is also the Gaia theory, in which whatever happens to the planet it will correct itself in time. The planet has been MUCH hotter and MUCH colder than it is at the moment. There have been several ice ages and in between those ice ages the planet got extremely hot.
This diagram will help explain (I scanned it from my school textbook)
https://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l182/Hepcat_2006/TWF/th_glacialperiods.jpg (https://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l182/Hepcat_2006/TWF/glacialperiods.jpg)
The top one is a large scale and the bottom is the last 80,000 years.
All the temperatures are relative to the worlds current temperature. The odd thing is that my science teacher emailed one of the NZ scientists in Antarctica asking him if it was getting any warmer there, he replied saying that it was actually getting COLDER!
He believes that this is due to the planet countering the effects of the increasing temperature by reaching two extremes which will eventually even out and the planet will normalise. How long this will take and how bad it will get before it happens nobody knows. But it will not be the end of the world, just the end of us :sweatdrop:
So global warming is not an unnatural thing. But I doubt there is much we can do about it that will make a significant difference. In New Zealand there was a big scandal about cows farts damaging the atmosphere and how we should tax farmers for it. Another example of how wacky this country is.
Gregoshi
08-15-2006, 05:52
https://img151.imageshack.us/img151/4535/globalwarningwt1.jpg
Rodion Romanovich
08-15-2006, 09:06
There is also the Gaia theory, in which whatever happens to the planet it will correct itself in time
Yes, for many years our pollution has only been a fraction of the natural circulation, and then things seem to have corrected themselves, albeit slowly. No we're for some elements polluting more than the natural circulation does, which disrupts most systems. Earth and nature has no agenda to remain inhabitable, it ends up what it ends up. If earth had had an atmosphere of say nitrogen and carbon dioxide instead of nitrogen and oxygene mostly, then life would have developed to such an atmosphere instead. It's not nature that adapts itself to species, but species that adapt themselves to nature. We're at the mercy of nature, nature isn't at the mercy of us. We're not in a position to negotiate in this matter.
Vladimir
08-15-2006, 13:49
This diagram will help explain (I scanned it from my school textbook)
https://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l182/Hepcat_2006/TWF/th_glacialperiods.jpg (https://i96.photobucket.com/albums/l182/Hepcat_2006/TWF/glacialperiods.jpg)
The top one is a large scale and the bottom is the last 80,000 years.
Look at the trend of the large scale graph. Global warming seems obvious to me. :laugh4:
I don't think so. The low countries are protected by their dykes so I don’t see why Venice couldn’t be as well.
Venice already has a lot of floods every year. Also it is build on medieval or rennaissance supports (or somthing like that.) Tough I believe they are constructing something (or recently have).
CO2 is one of the strongest greenhous gasses (or however you call it in English).Actually, in terms of warming, methane is said to be 100x more powerful than CO2.
The warm water travelling north brings with it a warm air mass. This warm air mass, dependent entirely upon the warm current, is what keeps the Northeastern USA and Canadian seaboard and the UK, and Ireland and Western and Northern Europe relatively warm compared to similar latitudes without the effects of the current, like Western Canada, Alaska and Eastern Siberia and Northen China.It does have a warming effect on Northern Europe & the UK, but not the US Northeast. As Im sure you know, air masses move generally west to east across the US. The extreme heat we feel in the summer and the cold winters all travel across parts west.
Here's (http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/51963?fulltext=true&print=yes) a good read on the Atlantic conveyor, for those interested.
Actually, in terms of warming, methane is said to be 100x more powerful than CO2.
But it isn't the gas wich is responsible for most of the the greenhouse effect. (A long long time ago it used to be the gas controlling the earth's temperature. But then O2 (photosynthesis (spelling?)) came and CO2 (vulcanes,...)).
(there's been another thread about it with much more info. I remember posting in that one too.)
It does have a warming effect on Northern Europe & the UK, but not the US Northeast. As Im sure you know, air masses move generally west to east across the US. The extreme heat we feel in the summer and the cold winters all travel across parts west.
Here's (http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/51963?fulltext=true&print=yes) a good read on the Atlantic conveyor, for those interested.
:2thumbsup:
EDIT:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=62491&page=2
a previous thread. ALl the numbers are in there with some strange calculations of mine I can't remember.
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