Global Warming Revisited

[bono_212]

I don't feel like posting in the Donald Trump circle-jerk thread, but I do want to talk about this:

Even if you don't believe in climate change, what is this 11-point war on the environment? Like why actively remove all precautions? Aren't we to a point where we at least WANT clean air for ourselves, even if you believe that has no impact on the next generation's climate?

This is baffling. Absolutely, mind-numbingly baffling.

[Irvine511]

but tax cuts.

[LuckyNumber7]

I'd be careful about saying "even if you don't believe." I agree in your sentiment, but it sort of suggests belief versus fact.

Not trying to be a semantic-arguing dick, but I feel that's such an enabling word to use. Belief.

[bono_212]

Well, like it or not, to some people it's a belief I have no desire to belittle how someone else feels. I want to have a conversation.

[LuckyNumber7]

A conversation about what though? It seems like your argument you're putting forward to a skeptic is "but just in case, why not?"

I don't believe in god. If someone tells me "well you should pray just in case," I'm not going to pray just in case. To a climate change skeptic, they're going to happily save the money and chuckle at the idea of spending money just in case. So sure, it might be a belief to them, but fundamentally speaking I believe the only way to fix their belief is to show that it's not a belief. It's something that's supported with hard scientific evidence.

If they don't respond to that, I can't imagine there's much of a way to convince them.

[bono_212]

I'm not talking about climate change, that's why, I'm talking about clean air. Anyone of our relative age should be well aware of how bad LA was and how much better it is now. That's change you can SEE. There's no theory, no lack of surety. Clearly, we were able to reverse the heavy smog issue in LA.

[LuckyNumber7]

Sorry, I misunderstood the point of your original post.

Yes, that's a valid point. Something that you can directly understand and be impacted by. It doesn't require the hardcore scientific attempt to look at it or to feel the effects, or to even imply long term personal effects are possible.

[bono_212]

No biggie, I am not always as clear as I would like to be. So I'm glad I was asked to explain myself.

[anitram]

Originally Posted by bono_212

I'm not talking about climate change, that's why, I'm talking about clean air. Anyone of our relative age should be well aware of how bad LA was and how much better it is now. That's change you can SEE. There's no theory, no lack of surety. Clearly, we were able to reverse the heavy smog issue in LA.

My guess, and at best it's a guess, is that most of these people have never seen/experienced smog as bad as LA or worse even, Shanghai. Many of them live in rural, semi-rural or suburban environments which probably have polluted air and water but not obviously so and therefore they don't see the need in that same desperate way nor would they "see" the results. To them it's all very abstract.

[bono_212]

I guess I just think back to my middle and high school science classes. Even when I lived in Indiana, I knew LA was plagued with smog, but they'd been working on it.

Though tbf, I was unaware how much better it was til I moved here, that's true.

[kiwilad]

I think this is a really interesting discussion, as there now are really tangible differences between the fumes/soot of old and the muskville of the present/future. In my town coal is still burnt in residential fireplaces in winter. Regardless of climate change I just don't want to breath it in. But... it's cheap, it's available, these families have a coal burner installed, it's cold outside and there are people, often kids and elderly shivering inside.
There's no doubt most people would agree breathing fumes isn't fun. But at night when you're broke and your kids are shivering, what matters is protecting them in the now.
It's just a small and very specific example but the same dichotomy runs right through this issue. We're trying to switch one of the most fundamental aspects of our society feom one thing to another. And it's really hard and really slow. But it is happening.
I'm a greenie environmentalist and I consistently vote that way, but it's a mistake, I think, to ignore the power of immediate need and familiarity.
My convoluted and inarticulate point is that perhaps there is too much dogmatic fundamentalism from the greenies such as myself. Populations have to be led, not forced, to change. And Trump's stance on climate change, and the fact his stance seems to gel with millions, is not really so hard to understand.
I myself know nothing about climate change. And I'm a fairly clever chap who spent some years as a science journalist.
And I don't KNOW about it. I've accepted the views of all those scientists I've interviewed, of the data they've shown me, and decided their research is far better than any I'll ever do.
So I believe it is true. Others don't. And I think we risk this sort of current pushback if we don't treat their scepticism with enough respect.

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[Oregoropa]

In the the Earth is at the mercy of Solar Activity Cycles.


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[bono_212]

Originally Posted by kiwilad

I think this is a really interesting discussion, as there now are really tangible differences between the fumes/soot of old and the muskville of the present/future. In my town coal is still burnt in residential fireplaces in winter. Regardless of climate change I just don't want to breath it in. But... it's cheap, it's available, these families have a coal burner installed, it's cold outside and there are people, often kids and elderly shivering inside.
There's no doubt most people would agree breathing fumes isn't fun. But at night when you're broke and your kids are shivering, what matters is protecting them in the now.
It's just a small and very specific example but the same dichotomy runs right through this issue. We're trying to switch one of the most fundamental aspects of our society feom one thing to another. And it's really hard and really slow. But it is happening.
I'm a greenie environmentalist and I consistently vote that way, but it's a mistake, I think, to ignore the power of immediate need and familiarity.
My convoluted and inarticulate point is that perhaps there is too much dogmatic fundamentalism from the greenies such as myself. Populations have to be led, not forced, to change. And Trump's stance on climate change, and the fact his stance seems to gel with millions, is not really so hard to understand.
I myself know nothing about climate change. And I'm a fairly clever chap who spent some years as a science journalist.
And I don't KNOW about it. I've accepted the views of all those scientists I've interviewed, of the data they've shown me, and decided their research is far better than any I'll ever do.
So I believe it is true. Others don't. And I think we risk this sort of current pushback if we don't treat their scepticism with enough respect.

Sent from my SM-G920I using U2 Interference mobile app

These are very fair points, and I respect where you're coming from on a lot of it.

Again, though, my confusion is with how AGGRESSIVE this plan is. It's just straight up backtracking on decades of progressing away from our dependence on fossil fuels in the name of bringing back jobs, I guess? It's insane, to me, that some seem willing to throw out quality of life in exchange for a job.

[Dfit00]

Stephen Hawking just made a prediction that humanity will be extinct in less than 1,000 years, catastrophic global warming effects being one of the main reasons of this extinction.

When Is The World Going To End? Stephen Hawking Says Humanity Won’t Survive 1000 Years On Earth

[LuckyNumber7]

Stephen Hawking says a bunch of sensational crap and since people view him as a voice of scientific authority they'll believe anything he says.

He's become part of the problem. That's not his field, and while that doesn't mean he can't talk about it, take his theatrics with a grain of salt.

[LuckyNumber7]

Well, I don't even know if it's Hawking or who reports Hawking. It's hard to tell and I should probably note that it might not be his fault.

[Dfit00]

Yes of course, it is a prediction after all.

Thousands have predicted mass extinction and the end of the world countless times, and they were not even scientists nor physicists.

And their predictions failed anyway.

[LuckyNumber7]

Double post

[gump]

Not a joke, somehow:

China Tells Trump That Climate Change Is No Hoax It Invented - Bloomberg

[Kieran McConville]

Originally Posted by LuckyNumber7

Stephen Hawking says a bunch of sensational crap and since people view him as a voice of scientific authority they'll believe anything he says.

He's become part of the problem. That's not his field, and while that doesn't mean he can't talk about it, take his theatrics with a grain of salt.

There's a lot of theatrics to go around on this topic. Climate change unfolding in a manner which at some point fatally disrupts global civilisation would/will be quite bad enough. And the people who talk in terms of species extinction are doing nobody any favours. It invites ridicule.

Leaving aside an asteroid strike, I would put the chances of the total extinction of technological civilisation in all places, much less the extinction of the species (we are pretty resilient, even if forced back to some kind of neo-hunter-gatherer-scenario, albeit one from which there would likely be no return), at about zero. Talking about timeframes of hundreds of years here, of course. On scales of millions of years, we become unrecognisable.

Hawking may well have been misreported, but in either case, not his area of expertise.