An Inconvenient Truth

[--Pete]

Hi,

. . . On the other hand, if their paycheck and it's continuance is based solely on whether they return the "correct" results that would be pretty questionable research.
. . .

And there in lies the failure of science in the modern world. If a person is working in science outside of an academic institution, then that person is almost always expected to support the institution's agenda. Failure to do so will often result in dismissal or at least lack of advancement. There are a few exceptions to this, but they are steadily disappearing or getting away from research and focusing on development.

For people in academia, the situation is almost as bad. The 'publish or perish' requirement to get tenure (and failure to do so in a 'reasonable' time often means dismissal) combined with the lack of financial support from the academic institution itself, means going to outside sponsors. While many of these sponsors have had axes to grind in the past, the situation has become much more severe under the present administration. As with scientists hired directly by government and industry, those doing research paid by those two entities are pressured into giving the 'right' answers. The penalty for failing to do so is simple, no renewal of funding for existing projects, no funding for new proposals. And, eventually, dismissal from the academic institution for failing at the principle job -- bringing in money.

After tenure is granted, one can at least try to be independent. Of course, with no source of funding not much research can be done. Some experimentalist have turned theoreticians or numerical modelers for lack of funds. Many schools do give a small sum to tenured scientists for 'independent research'. By pooling these funds, four or five scientists *might* be able to get one experiment completed a year, and publish a paper (not cheap in a good archival journal) every few years. Not exactly what most of them dreamed of when they decided to devote their life to science and forgo the financial benefits that their abilities would have probably granted them in business or management.

Back on topic. Global warming is a fact. Besides the temperature record there are numerous other indications. Such as the mismatch of the arrival of migrating birds (whose clues to migration is the length of the day, since they cannot tune in to CNN and see what the weather at their destination is) and their primary food supply (which did know what the local weather was like (being there), and hatched, came out of their cocoon, mated and died, flowered and wilted, or flew away when the weather cues were right). Has the earth been warmer in the past? Hell, yes. Both much warmer and much colder. Has the change been so abrupt as it is now? No real good evidence. Over the period where we can resolve decades long change, no. But that is only a blink of an eye in geologic times. The further back we go, the poorer the temporal resolution (unless we have something like the K-T boundary, and even with the Iridium evidence, there are still people who thing the transition took millenia).

How much of the global warming is caused by the activity of humans? 'None' and 'all' are idiotic standpoints, and yet are what most people that are vocal on the subject seem to embrace. Of course, since most of these people have a vested financial interest (i.e., keeping their job) in one or the other extreme answers, their statements should be ignored. But since the media would rather have a chicken little story than anything reasonable, it is only the extremes that the general population hears and must select from when the question comes to the vote.

Indeed, most pollution question have issues that should drive technology into cleaner directions. Fuel efficiency, and sustainable fuels should reduce vehicle pollution. The low yields and short lifespans of hack and burn fields should reduce this practice as the cost-benefit ration gets too high. The increase cost of property for landfills and the increase value of raw recyclable materials should encourage recycling and eventually landfill mining. Especially as the technology for material separation gets better and cheaper. And the health issues, and costs, resulting from particulate emission should drive the way to cleaner diesels, smokestacks, etc.

So, while the 'global warming' issue is what politicians on both sides have chosen to focus on, many of the steps that should be taken for other reasons (and that are *not* debatable in their effects) would automatically take care of the bulk of the global warming (if any) that can be attributed to human actions.

--Pete

[Griselda]

Of course, with the cuts in higher education funding, academia is also needing to find corporate sponsors. Here in Oregon, a grad student recently published a study with results that suggested that salvage logging does more harm than good. Unfortunately for him, OSU's forestry department gets a lot of funding from the logging industry. There was a pretty substantial effort to silence him from within his own department.

[Concillian]

Thank you for the information. It appears that the quote you cite was indeed misleading. Does that mean the scientists critical of the movie are not to be trusted since they take sides? If so, I imagine that the contributions of the scientists in Al Gore's movie are likewise suspect.

Scientists who take sides should not be trusted... they should not be considered scientists.

Such a 'hot topic' has so much political interest that I personally feel it's impossible to convey truth. NASA research that is publicized is highly edited by whatever administration is in power. Republicans squelch the issue, democrats amplify it. Politics have tainted the issue to the point that science has little meaning anymore in the discussion of global warming... it's like if little green men landed in your backyard. You could have pictures of them and their craft, but all the evidence in the world will not convince the skeptics.

If there is an issue, I believe it will only be adequately conveyed once it is too late, beacuase of the poitical taint to the issue. My standpoint is that it really doesn't matter whether the hypothesis is correct in this scenario. I demonstrate this by looking at the actions each "side" would take and consider the case where their hypothesis was incorrect.

Consider the case that global warming is not a true issue, but we take appropriate steps to counter it anyway:
- increased usage of alternate energy sources (this is probably a good thing, even if global warming is not an issue... it will have to happen at some point)
- increased importance of preserving vegetation for increased capacity of CO2 --> O2 conversion
- Overall increased air quality

Then consider the case where global warming is a real issue but we do not take any steps to counter it:
- potential disaster that may or may not happen even if we did take preparations
- Lesser emphasis on environmental impacts, which could potentially cause other unforseen issues, but are not likely to have beneficial side-effects.

I ask people to add to these lists. As things get added, I think my point will become apparent. The conequences for preparation, even if the scientists predicting human influence on global warming is a significant problem are totally incorrect, are not really all that bad in the long term.

I honestly don't know which "side" is correct. But if you take a "side" you are already looking at the issue from a perspective that one "side" needs to be correct. I don't think it matters whether one side is correct or not. If there is a correctible issue, the earlier we work to help correct it, the cheaper it will be and the happier we will be as a society as a whole. Even if the corrections are not necessary to fix the issue, they still have overall beneficial side-effects, when looked at from the perspective of vision for the long term.

[Occhidiangela]

You're going to teach your kids about propaganda by showing them how to approach things with pre-existing conclusions, and not listen to anything that doesn't support them?

I agree with you that nuclear power is a necessary precondition to an environmentally sustainable civilization. But I don't think it's fair to say that anyone saying otherwise shouldn't be listened to. It is, after all, a far from ideal solution.

-Jester

We agree that no solution is ideal, all solutions have risks that must be soberly accounted for and mitigated.

Jester, my advocacy for nuclear power as an energy source is 30 years old. It hasn't changed, even though the risk mitigation of nuclear power is no trivial matter, is a real cost, and must be aplied to the total system cost. The energy crunch of 1973 and its aftershocks were rendered as background noise in all the idiotic hysteria over Three Mile Island and CHernobyl, as though these two data points were proof to not use nukes, rather than to use nukes more intelligently and safely. Enter Al Gore and his Green Machine attitude, which is very old news.

Gore plays Ostrich and CHicken LIttle with nukes.

In the time period of my awareness of nuclear electrical power as a viable option (what is it, 70% of the French electrical load is provided by reactors?), Mr Gore and his crowd have been the sound and fury signifying nothing in UNREASONED, HANDS IN THE EARS, opposition to nukes.

Pardon me for knowing the kind of propagandist I am dealing with. :P

I don't doubt for a minute his sincerity in wanting to make America greener, and cleaner: he's been reasonably consistant in that stance for some years, and in principle I agree with him. But I don't forget the line of crap he's been selling for the same time period.

I hope to be pleasantly surprised by the film.

If a better answer for low emissions energy sources are presented, I'm all over it like a big dog, based on practical application. Until then, smart consuming of energy, rather than wasteful consumption, is one of my few paths to making such difference as I can.

PS to Concillian: We should all also floss everyday, but do people do that? Good post in any case.

Occhi

[Zippyy]

As to the film, I will be taking my children to see it because I am trying to teach them about propaganda.

That reminds me... let me add another thing to my "didn't like" category.

Gore took a sample of 10% of all peer reviewed articles on global warming, then asserted that they all supported the fact that global warming is occuring. Well, of course. He skimmed over whether or not they had anything to say about why that warming is occuring.

I would really like to see an expert go over the movie and explain the data Gore presented objectively. I'm sure there were other irresponsible omissions I wasn't sharp enough to catch (or remember).

[the Langolier]

I went to the wiki and checked many of the references they gave. Here's what I found (organized by wiki-category):

Introduction - general Global Warming

Reference 1 quotes the SAR report by the IPCC as such: “The balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate”. "Also: In the light of new evidence and taking into account the remaining uncertainties, most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations."

What are vague terms like "most", "suggests", "discernable" and "likely" supposed to convey? What percentage do the facts say "most" is? How much is a "discernable" amount, and mind you, it is only "suggesting" that there is a discernable amount. How do you take into account uncertainties if they are, well, uncertain? The second statement mentions greenhouse gases in general, not only CO2. It doesn't address the sources of green house gases, including water vapor (which has the most significant effect on the greenhouse affect BTW). The percentage of Carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is less that .05%, and ESTIMATES on its effect as a greenhouse ranges from 9-25%. Note only is a data range of +-300% scientifically meaningless, no one knows how much of that CO2 is directly attributable to human activity. And finally, the greenhouse gas effect is only one LIKELY cause to global warming as the report says.

There's no facts. There's no numbers. There's no clue. When you boil it down, those statements by the IPCC are scientifically meaningless.

EDIT: Holy #$%&, the whole middle part of my post (references 2-5) dissappeared aparently. Well I'm not going to re write it now. Consequently, the following is taken out of context as it specifically refers to contents of one of the articles:

<blockquote>The relationship between the total and the human influence, however, is undetermined. It doesn't give any data about what percentage of the total is anthropogenic, nor does it report by what percentage anthroprogenic emissions has increased.

Despite all of this, however, there is no fact, number or statement that CO2 is a definitive cause of global warming. (EDIT: In said report)</blockquote>

Reference 6: CO2 concentrations are increasing at the ocean surface. Nothing about the causes of such increaes nor how much is natural phenomenon.

I've getting tired so I will continue this later, but as of yet I have seen no facts that demonstrate the quantitative effect of human activity on the climate. There's possibilities and trends, and even some consensus, but I'm not interested in that.

The opinion of Michael Crichton is insignificant. There are four groups of critics to the thesis of global warming. Each of them is, like he said, more or less guessing. Some of them just ignore the measured data.

The critics are guessing. So are the advocates. There's measured data, but no scientific data about 1) our measured influence on greenhouse gasses or 2) the measured influence of greenhouse gasses on global climate. Really, the IPCC report should be sufficient to realize this. I included the two quotes from their report that I have seen referenced by many of the pages in the Wiki, and they contain no fact - are those really the strongest arguements?

The opinion of Michael Crichton is based upon three years of study. He is an author second, a researcher first. In fact it is as valid as any other person, entity or website that did not perform the research themselves, which would be most. His main argument is that we really just don't know enough about our complex environment to be able to say what the affects of our actions would be. The consesus of the public is that reducing our emissions, alternative fuels, yada yada yada will prevent global warming. There is absolutely nothing scientific that will support this. A second main argument of his is that oftentimes our actions have unexpected consequences, especially when applied to complex systems. Most especially when we can't even be sure what every factor is and how it affects the system.

BTW all of what I have quoted/paraphrased by Michael Crichton was from

[Fragbait]

The opinion of Michael Crichton is based upon three years of study. He is an author second, a researcher first. In fact it is as valid as any other person, entity or website that did not perform the research themselves, which would be most. [...] The consesus of the public is that reducing our emissions, alternative fuels, yada yada yada will prevent global warming. There is absolutely nothing scientific that will support this.

Hi,

Michael Crichton makes money selling his fictional books. Don't give me any s** that he's a researcher or even scientist.
Dan Brown for sure doesn't inquire his backgrounds badly, either. That doesn't mean there's any relevance to his opinion.


It's not a consensus of the public (the public is a dumb, stupid mass drooling over flesh), but a consensus of the scientific world.
I must however tell you that the "There is absolutely nothing scientific that will support this" fits perfectly on your p.o.v.: nobody can support the opinion that mankind had/has no influence on greengas emissions and the heating up of the world climate. I'm linking a few more sources. You can also read the sources I linked in my lower post.

link 1 - Oak Ridge National Laboratory

link 2 - National Center for Atmospheric Research

link 3 - longish from the National Academic Press

>>For more than 420,000 years the CO2 abundance in the atmosphere was bounded, oscillating between about 180 and 280 parts per million (ppm) over the glacial and interglacial periods. However, since the Industrial Revolution, the CO2 abundance has risen to 375 ppm and continues to rise according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2001). Research suggests that most of the observed global warming of the past 50 years, including the increase in atmospheric CO2, can be attributed to human activities (IPCC, 2001; see Box 1-1)<<

- from the last link, the national academic press


To me, it seems like many of the citizens of the U.S. (due to bad information and a certain human 'it can't be that bad. That would be tragic, so it can't be that bad.'-attitude that preserves mental sanity) are unwilling to accept new scientific research findings.
Too bad that the last people that firmly stated 'the earth is a disk' looked like a bunch of dumb monkeys later.


Greetings, Fragbait

[Concillian]

PS to Concillian: We should all also floss everyday, but do people do that? Good post in any case.

Well, I floss since I had to spend a significant sum of money at the dentist on bettering my gum health.

This brings up another aspect of human nature: We learn best from mistakes. This reinforces my belief that humans will eventually destroy themselves... it's just a matter of how and when.

[Chesspiece_face]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BjrOi4vF24

[Vandiablo]

I think that Al Gore is trying to carve out a niche for himself in order to make another run at the presidency.

In the movie, he says "I *was* in politics for so many years." (emphasis mine)

On "The Tonight Show", Jay Leno asked Gore if he was thinking of running again. The reply was that he was through being a candidate, he said he'd "been there, done that."

I believe him. I think he has moved his focus to this one issue, the one that he cares about.

[Alram]

Well he did create the internet.

Denying that you are going to run for the presidency is an an old ploy of candidates. I'm not sure why they do that, but they should be taken with a grain of salt.

[kandrathe]

I'm pretty sure the Earth will heal itself. But it would be a shame if our descendants were exterminated by a vengeful planet due to our careless greed.

The carbon cycle is a complicated system of causes and effects that are not completely understood, but researchers have long suspected that the oceans are the main regulator of the Earth's atmosphere, said Hales. For example, during the ice ages more of the Earth's water is locked up in glaciers, creating arid, windy conditions and a lot of dust. This iron-rich dust is blown out to sea, stimulating productivity of phytoplankton throughout the world's oceans and reducing CO2 levels.

[Occhidiangela]

I'm pretty sure the Earth will heal itself. But it would be a shame if our descendants were exterminated by a vengeful planet due to our careless greed.

They assumed the Cod population off the Grand banks would heal itself, but its healing rate was overwhelmed by Man's ability to efficiently harvest Cod at ever increasing rates over a period of decades.

It took very pro active conservation measures and controls to repair the Cod's looming demise, and they really have not made a strong comeback.

The healing rate isn't something you and I can adjust with a rheostat. In some of Fragbait's links, I found the treatment of CO2 and its dissolution into sea water, as well as its release, very revealing.

Plant more trees. Can't hurt. :D

Occhi

[--Pete]

Hi,

Well he did create the internet.

Yes, he did. And so did all the politicos that voted to fund it. Which is all he ever claimed, until the lying scumbag ('Family Values', but only when it suits us. Otherwise, it's OK for US to lie.) put their dirty political spin on it.

Go get the Right Stuff (book if you know how to read, but the movie will do). Search for the dialog:

"Do you know what makes these things fly?"

. . .

"Funding makes these things fly. No bucks, no Buck Rogers."

When I pay to have a house built, *I* build the damned thing, the others just push materials around.

If I hear that damned 'Al Gore claimed to have built the Internet' horse-crap one more time, I swear I'll go postal!

--Pete

[--Pete]

Hi,

I'm pretty sure the Earth will heal itself.

I'm not. The Earth has a large but limited ability to heal itself. Past that point, it needs help, either by reducing the rate of damage or by increasing the amount of damage *we* repair for it. I don't trust the second option much, given the history of both civilizations and political consistency. And the only pretty sure way of accomplishing the first is to reduce the world population to a reasonable point, say 1 to 10% of the present population (pre 1800's numbers). This, like global warming, does not need a panic approach -- working these things out over a few generations (say starting a hundred year program in the next decade) would probably be sufficient to avoid the 'runaway' effect.

And if we do kill ourselves off, so what?

"The story of a briefly abundant hairless primate originating in Africa is but a footnote in the history of life, but in the history of the hairless primate it is central." -- Matt Ridley in Genome

We may care, but neither the Earth nor the Universe gives a good damn. And if animals can reason, they (or the few that survive) will probably have the worlds biggest party when humanity finally croaks. In the larger scheme, we (humanity) are insignificant. If we fail, then all that has happened is that it has been shown that above a certain point intelligence is not of much survival value. If we kill ourselves off in a few million years, we just prove that a bunch of dumb reptiles were better equipped (they just needed meteor defenses) to survive than we are.

--Pete

[Vandiablo]

Thank you, Pete.

Alram: when "candidates" don't announce on talk shows, they always say something to the effect of they haven't decided yet, or at the very most that they are not running (which means they are not running at that time).

This time was different in that he was basically saying he was THROUGH with all that.

I think he wants to be Ralph Nader. I think he'd be a better Nader than Nader ever was.

I would be very very surprised if he were to run again -- his number of "lost years" exceeds those of Bush, tho at least he wasn't drunk during them. He did grow a beard, which in the public mind seems to be worse than <strike>killing someone while under the influence</strike> being a lush.

-V
ABC Manager
The Forsaken Inn

[Occhidiangela]

I think he wants to be Ralph Nader. I think he'd be a better Nader than Nader ever was.

Not bloody likely. He has half of Nader's wit and a tenth of Nader's penchant for self sacrifice. Al still thinks its about him. John Fogarty wrote "Fortunate One" about men like Al.

I would be very very surprised if he were to run again -- his number of "lost years" exceeds those of Bush, tho at least he wasn't drunk during them. He did grow a beard, which in the public mind seems to be worse than killing someone while under the influence

2. Oh, you mean like Ted Kennedy? When Ted retires, this absence of his hot air output will alleviate global warming somewhat. If we could just get Rush Limbaugh to STFU, we'll have a milder hurricane season this year. :rolleyes:

Occhi

[Vandiablo]

Of course not, really it's about VANDIABLO!!

Not bloody likely. He has half of Nader's wit and a tenth of Nader's penchant for self sacrifice.

Nader: Self-sacrifice?? In the 1980's I might have agreed with you. Not after 2000.

Al still thinks its about him.

Sounds like you have not seen the movie yet.

The movie IS a lot about him, but it's in context. He says he's trying to get the (environmental) message out. He says he has failed (he has, as have many of us). So he is trying different ways to get the message out. Running for president would interfere with this, as it would with anyone who is pushing a single issue (unless it's immigration and the year is 2006, hrmm).

He includes his son getting hit by a car, because he says that makes him see more clearly what is unimportant. He includes the death of his sister, because of the guilt his family went through-- she was a smoker who died of lung cancer and they were tobacco farmers. They stopped growing tobacco, and he says sometimes it takes a jolt to get you to take action rather than continue the status quo (my paraphrasing). Later he compares the disinformation campaign of Big Tobacco to that run by those in favor of unlimited CO2 emissions, using leaked documents. The "we've got to create and seize doubt" line runs strong in both.

The 2000 election is montaged for about a minute, but the context is only that is was part of his failure with regard to this cause. (Not that he could have done all that much with a GOP House anyway.) Okay, there's too many scenes with him in front of a computer screen, and that gets old quick. Argh.

Most of the film is him trying to get the issue across. The parts about him are primarily to give you a break in the lecture, but a lot of it is still relevant.

so YES it IS about him. But this issue is about ME too. I've got three kids, and it's about THEM TOO. I have to prioritize all the threats against them and their potential children. I think the biggest is themselves, they have to learn how not to do stupid things (like drive over a very narrow wooden bridge after you've been drinking -- or drive at all in that case). Next biggest threat is their stupid friends. Third is car accidents. Fourth ... uh ... gangs coming to our area .. but somewhere in the top 20 or so is global warming.

Global warming may not seem bad, but the resulting local catastrophes will directly effect tens of millions of people, if not more, and that will effect everyone one way or another. And those are just the ones that are definitely coming, no matter what we do or don't do. (A big part of that though is our population spike.) Some of these will be in slow motion, like the loss of water supply in certain inland areas, and the rise of sea levels for anyone near a coast.

But, please, don't think about him. Just listen to what he is saying. Please. This is stuff I've been following for decades and it really really p's me off that the treatment it gets is the same reception evolution gets from a Kansas Republican. No, there's no PROOF, but there are high correlations.

Some of the skeptics are partly right - the prediction models are all wrong. What the models are all wrong about, unfortunately, is how fast this stuff is happening. So far there has been no hoped-for dampening effect. There have only been accelerating effects. So now I'm really p'd off. So what do we get? "Oh Al Gore, haha, invented the internet, haha, witless piece of wood, haha, and yeah, he descended from a monkey!! HAH!"

Oh well, we'll be burnt to a crisp in a billion years anyway, so who cares. (... anyone? ... anyone? ... that's when the sun will expand to giant phase, give or take a week or two.)

John Fogarty wrote "Fortunate One" about men like Al.

Hey don't go all hippie on me. Take a shower, okay? Use soap.

If we're going retro I'd like to ask the DJ to play "American Woman" a good song to play when surrounded by jingoistic crap, or in times when your patriotism is questioned when you speak out against corrupt administrations and their lackeys.

But that's a time period you know better than me. My main interests from those times would be more "Fool On the Hill". Unfortunately, the time that I would have been most musically aware was during the disco era, so instead I turned to de-evolution. The most apropos lyrics for the current time might be the chorus near the end of "It's a Beautiful World" (ahem)

It's a beautiful world
It's a beautiful world
It's a beautiful world
For you
For you
For you
Not me

2. Oh, you mean like Ted Kennedy?

Thank you for helping my point. (You must know the Bushes' histories, to so blatantly counter with a Democrat.) My point, though: if Ted, or George, or Laura had grown a beard, they'd never be have been elected senator/pres/FirstLady.. but dangerous behavior is okay.

-V
Barber
The Forsaken Inn

[Occhidiangela]

Of course not, really it's about VANDIABLO!!

Well, at least someone important is involved. Oh, wait, did I pronounce that correctly? You know how we red staters tend to elocute. :lol:

Nader: Self-sacrifice?? In the 1980's I might have agreed with you. Not after 2000.

From the mid 1960's to his first election run. That's a career of putting who first? Sure, he's a bit of an attention whore, most public figures are to one degree or another. Did you see his act during the protests against globalization in Seattle, late 90's? Only guy who had anything to say that made any sense. The rest of the panel and meat puppets were full of crap.

Sounds like you have not seen the movie yet.

No I haven't, though I will. I have, however, been watching the political career of Al Gore since the mid 1980's. I have also been a conscientious recycler and "use cars with high gas mileage" guy since I bought my first home. (Early 80's.) I have not gone completely earthy, I still buy regular food at the store.

By the way, Van, you seem to mistake me for a Republican. Don't make that mistake again. :angry:

As to the historical record, Ted Kennedy, had he driven a Volkswagen (they float) would have been elected president in 1972 or 1976. The "driving causes the death of a person when drunk" and Ted Kennedy go together perfectly, they have since 1969. The dude is long past his "sell by date" as was Strom Thurmond some years before he retired. Ted's reputation for hot air is built on a long and distinguished career of being completely full of crap on any topic other than patronage for Massachusettes. On that, he is an artist.

As to rock 'n roll lyrics, I'll point to Living Color, and Cult of Personality.

When the mirror speaks
The reflection lies.

I used those lyrics as a springboard into a conversation with my daughter on politics some weeks ago.

-V
Barber
The Forsaken Inn

Short back and sides, please. ;) Yes, of course I am wearing a flannel shirt!

Occhi

[kandrathe]

Hi,
I'm not. The Earth has a large but limited ability to heal itself. ...

--Pete

I'm basing my view upon the huge geologic cataclysms that have caused global climate change that we've survived, such as asteroid strikes, or volcanic eruptions like Krakatau, Vesuvius, and other older bigger super volcanos. They show that Earth has the capability to pump huge amounts of ash and green house gases (CO2, SO2, HF, HCL, H2s04) directly into the stratosphere. There is evidence that these events can instantly impact global climate for decades, and perhaps even bring about an ice age.

I agree with you that the Earth will shed some of its human load, due to frequent weather catastrophe's and famine.