There is only one goddess Gaia and Al Gore is her only prophet...

[kandrathe]

Tomatoes? We can't live on tomatoes.

That about sums up your ability to discuss this rationally.

Of course the moon contributes to the energy of the Earth. When it was closer, it contributed more. Did it cause global warming? Some, and depending on what the Sun, and the Earth's atmosphere were doing, it may have been a factor in some temperature maximums. In these complex global systems, you cannot isolate one part. All the parts work together, otherwise you end up like the blind men and the elephant.

Yes, Zenda, chemical reactions involving carbon tend to remove it from the atmosphere and fix it into hydrocarbon compounds. Yes, methane is produced from methanogenic bacteria, which is another way in which carbon is fixed as long as it remains as submerged hydrates. It does not invalidate the link I posted earlier which describes how precursors to kerogens are formed in modern sediments.

As for your links on CO2 in plants, I think the most salient statement from the articles was "Predicting the world's overall changes in food production in response to elevated CO2 is virtually impossible." I don't think that food supply is our biggest worry. I'm more concerned about understanding the cycle of CO2+H2O --> H2CO3 --> H+ & HCO3- --> H+ & CO3 both in localized and global limits. Generally, the way these systems work is that as one particular chemical becomes abundant it results in favoring a different type of organism who thrives. But, there are times when mass extinction is the only possible result. So, as a life long "green" advocate, I'm concerned we are past the point of corrective balance. The problem is that environmental cycles are very long, and the consequences for 200 years of CO2 emissions maybe a forgone conclusion, and there is no possible way for us to now stop the chain of events already in motion.

Yet, we have the Kyoto and Copenhagen type political forums where the "developing nations" like China get to hold the US hostage for green-mail to bribe these nations into stopping their clear cutting of rain forests and burning fossil fuels. If they are smart they'll grab the loot and use it to build their industries anyway, while Europe and the North America go bankrupt. This is why Copenhagen failed. No one wants to have real verifiable compliance. They just want their share of the 100 billion dollars, that we would end up borrowing from China anyway. No one is willing to just do the right thing.