Global Warming

[PBI]

Seems everyone's a scientist these days.

Quite what makes people think that holding a strong political opinion qualifies them to know more about science than the actual scientists escapes me.

Yet whenever I want to discuss any theory which doesn't step on anyone's political philosophy everyone seems strangely shy. Merits and flaws of string theory, anyone? Copenhagen interpretation of Quantum Mechanics versus many worlds hypothesis?

Hmph. Suffice it to say I will not be buying a house on a flood plain any time soon.

[Viking]

Seems everyone's a scientist these days.

Quite what makes people think that holding a strong political opinion qualifies them to know more about science than the actual scientists escapes me.

Yet whenever I want to discuss any theory which doesn't step on anyone's political philosophy everyone seems strangely shy. Merits and flaws of string theory, anyone? Copenhagen interpretation of Quantum Mechanics versus many worlds hypothesis?

Hmph. Suffice it to say I will not be buying a house on a flood plain any time soon.

Amen, I voted the first option as it appears to be the mainstream take within scientific institutions.

[Xiahou]

Hmph. Suffice it to say I will not be buying a house on a flood plain any time soon.

They're called flood plains for a reason- they flood. If you choose to live on a flood plain, you have to be willing to accept the risks.

Quite what makes people think that holding a strong political opinion qualifies them to know more about science than the actual scientists escapes me.

Do you think most scientists believe that man-made global warming is a looming disaster?

That doesn't really have much to do with global warming though. The area I live in experienced it's worst floods in the 1970s, back when we were concerned with global cooling.

I voted the last option- I don't think any of them exactly square with my views, but it's probably closer than the others. I'll allow for the possibility that CO2 is having a significant impact on our climate, but even still I don't think it's catastrophic, nor is there anything we can do to meaningfully impact it.

[LittleGrizzly]

I don't much care what politicians have to say on the matter, scientists seem to mostly support the theory therefore i support the theory...

I went for option 1 but i didn't quite want something that extreme, something close to 1 but less further from 2, put me down as going for option 1.2 or 1.3

[Devastatin Dave]

What ended the last Great Ice age? Cavemen farts? How did the Romans grow grapes in Britain? We thing too highly of ourselves to think we can have such an effect on nature. Green is the new Red. All the commies and anticapitalist socialists have hidden their agenda behind this fraud because the Soviet Union failed. Green is the new Red, and like the Reds, the very few PROFIT from the miseries of millions. The truelly poor will be truelly ####** if these clowns get their way...
My favorite Bull **** episode (warning foul language)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAu68OsFggw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3InQzsLltHE

[TevashSzat]

Voted 2nd option here. Think its a real threat, but not gonna be a very imminent threat

Edit: I think this kind of topic will really never get anywhere online since it is near impossible to change the opinions of anyone who is really set on it through this medium. Best way to do things is to wait out a decade, take a look back, and then promtly set out to flame the side that lost(as in true internet fashion)

[Motep]

I voted 2. Though I think it is a major problem, it wont kill us all so it does not fit into the "holy crap, here it comes, run for the hills" category.

[Marshal Murat]

are you saying there is no global warming trend, or that that trend is not anthropogenic to any significant degree?

I'm saying that there is no 'global warming trend'. There is global climate change, and while some is no doubt derived from humans, I think we still don't understand this world we live on and there could be hidden factors at work here that we can't explain or even identify at this juncture in time.

I don't believe that we can, right now, correctly identify humans as the main source of this global climate change. I don't believe this because humans still don't know everything. My prime example is from when I went to Crete.
At Knossos, have the Minoan Linear A script, a script of human language that has not yet been deciphered by modern humans. How are we to say that we understand the great world we live on, while we cannot yet identify what these symbols meant to an ancient human civilization? We don't know everything, and we probably never will. So, I'm going to say a 'cautious skeptic'. I'd rather die a Christian and go to Heaven than die an Atheist and go to Hell.