global warming

[Impulse]

Im wondering if theres still anyone on this board that doesnt believe in global warming.After hearing all the arguments about it,seems theres very little that can be done to stop it.India and China are growing so fast and in need of so many resources.What right do the major industrialised countries have to tell these growing countries to curb their pollution.Thats how they became superpowers,by using resources and polluting the environment. What bothers me most is the rise of the sea level.What will happen to homes on the coast,the beach resorts,like Pattaya? These hot,third world countries will become hellholes. The earth has been here how many millions of years and all this change is happening at a comparatively lightning speed. Maybe the "rapture" is coming after all. :bonedemon:

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I understand the BBC aired a program recently about "global warming" vs "global dimming". The former heats the atmosphere and the latter cools the atmosphere by deflecting solar heat. I did not see the show, but thought that their point was that if global warming were seriously addressed and diminished, then we would have serious planetary cooling due to global dimming.

Did anybody here see the program, and was that the gist of it?

I don't think that anyone could possibly dent the fact of global warming. The only argument is what, if anything, can be done about it. The best option seems to be buy real estate in Siberia.

James Lovelock was on Private Passions this week on BBC Radio 3. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/classical/index.shtml to listen on your computer. Can someone work out how to make the topic about Thailand so that it does not get banished to the Global Forum Desert.


From The Sunday Times - May 6, 2007
Fiddling with figures while the Earth burns
The latest initiatives to stop global warming wonтАЩt save us, James Lovelock tells Jonathan Leake

If you want to get some idea of what much of the Earth might look like in 50 yearsтАЩ time then, says James Lovelock, get hold of a powerful telescope or log onto NasaтАЩs Mars website. That arid, empty, lifeless landscape is, he believes, how most of EarthтАЩs equatorial lands will be looking by 2050. A few decades later and that same uninhabitable desert will have extended into Spain, Italy, Australia and much of the southern United States.

тАЬWe are on the edge of the greatest die-off humanity has ever seen,тАЭ said Lovelock. тАЬWe will be lucky if 20% of us survive what is coming. We should be scared stiff.тАЭ Lovelock has delivered such warnings before, but this weekend they have a special resonance. Last week in Bangkok, Thailand, the worldтАЩs governments finalised this yearтАЩs third and final report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) setting out how humanity might save itself from the worst effects of climate change.

In it was a message of hope, albeit a faint one. The report set out a complex mix of political, economic and technological solutions. If they all worked, said the report, they could achieve huge cuts in the 25 billion tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) released by humanity into the air each year, thus keeping global temperature rises below 3C.

At the same time in Cologne, Germany, 4,000 sharp-suited bankers, lawyers and financial traders at Carbon Expo 2007 were congratulating themselves on the booming new markets in carbon credits that will, they boasted, save the world as well as making them rich.

тАЬI have a dream,тАЭ Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, told the delegates. He set out his belief that carbon trading will help stabilise greenhouse gas emissions and aid developing countries by transferring ┬г50 billion a year to these nations from the First World to support green development.

For Lovelock, however, such dreams are dangerous nonsense on a par with a drowning man clutching at straws. тАЬItтАЩs all ridiculous,тАЭ he sighed. тАЬThese new markets do some good in that they generate wealth and keep these people employed, but they and the IPCC are just raising false hopes. We have done too much damage to the world and now it is changing too fast for us to make much difference.тАЭ

LovelockтАЩs view is that the world has two stable states: the тАЬicehouseтАЭ, when ice covers both poles, sometimes extending far into lower latitudes in the form of ice ages; and the тАЬgreenhouseтАЭ, when all the ice melts. Both have already happened many times in the EarthтАЩs history.

тАЬHuman outpourings of greenhouse gases have flicked the switch that turns the world from its colder to its warm state тАУ and it is probably too late to stop it,тАЭ he said. тАЬThe warming impact of the carbon we have already released is such that the Earth has taken over and our greenhouse gas emissions are being amplified by nature itself.тАЭ

Lovelock believes that the transformation is happening far too fast for humanity to tackle, especially in a world that remains committed to economic growth and whose 6.5 billion population is predicted to reach more than 9 billion by mid-century.

For evidence, he points to Siberia where the melting of the permafrost, already widely reported in scientific literature, will enable bacteria to decompose organic matter that has accumulated in the soil over tens of millions of years тАУ potentially releasing billions more tons of CO2 тАЬI have just come back from Norway where the temperatures are even further above normal than BritainтАЩs. The climate is changing every year now. Everyone can see it тАУ as in this very warm April. By mid-century the heatwave [in Europe] that killed 20,000 people in 2003 will be a cool summer by comparison.тАЭ

At first sight LovelockтАЩs predictions seem wildly at odds with the IPCCтАЩs reports, but in many ways the only difference is in the vividness of the language. тАЬThe progressive acidification of oceans due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide is expected to have negative impacts on marine shell-forming organisms (ie corals) and their dependent species,тАЭ said the IPCC report detailing the impacts of climate change тАУ its careful language draining the drama from a warning that vast tracts of the ocean may turn so acidic that little life will be left in them.

It added: тАЬAt lower latitudes, especially seasonally dry and tropical regions, crop productivity is projected to decrease for even small local temperature increases (1-2C), which would increase risk of hunger.тАЭ What these measured tones imply, warns Lovelock, is that millions тАУ perhaps hundreds of millions тАУ of people living in equatorial lands will be forced from their homes, with most of them heading northwards. тАЬThe world will face mass shortages of food and water. That will lead to wars and the effective clearance of vast areas of land as the deserts spread,тАЭ he said.

LovelockтАЩs reputation as a scientific seer was founded four decades ago when he published his Gaia hypothesis. His idea, that the EarthтАЩs chemistry, climate and life were all closely linked into a kind of self-sustaining system, is now received wisdom. It has become clear that the first life forms on Earth transformed its early climate and atmosphere, generating the oxygen that allowed life to evolve тАУ eventually into us.

WhatтАЩs more, that process continues. Oxygen is a reactive gas that would vanish from the atmosphere were it not for the plankton, and plants that keep topping it up.

LovelockтАЩs warnings may seem remote (and he hasnтАЩt always been proved right) but with Britain basking in record spring heat he says our scepticism about the damage we can expect from global warming is understandable. тАЬBritain and Scandinavia are becoming green oases. In 2050 or soon after, most of the world may be scrub and desert and most of the oceans will be denuded of life, but temperatures here will remain very tolerable. The downside of that is that we risk becoming like a lifeboat with millions of refugees trying to settle here.тАЭ

He is not alone in predicting a huge northwards shift in human populations: in his new book, How the World will Change with Global Warming, Professor Trausti Valsson, an Icelandic academic, predicts how population centres will move north.

тАЬThe Arctic ice cap is melting. When it goes it will open up new shipping routes, new fishing grounds and new oil fields,тАЭ said Valsson. тАЬThe Arctic Ocean will become the new Mediterranean with Siberia and Canada as the centres for human culture and civilisation.тАЭ

Lovelock is fond of recounting how, on a recent lecture tour of America, he was accosted by earnest academics seeking advice on whereabouts in Canada they should buy their second homes.

Behind such comic anecdotes, however, lies the grim possibility that billions of people face a miserable life and death as humanity finds a new equilibrium with the Earth. At 87 Lovelock acknowledges that he is unlikely to be one of them. His concern is for the generations represented by his nine grandchildren. тАЬWhat we have lived through, the 20th century, has been like a great party. Adults now have the best time humanity has ever had. Now the party is over and the Earth is reckoning up" Sunday Times

I know this post is not going to sound good.
Some points:
1) the tropics wont get hotter, they will expand. The excess heat will be transfered to the water and atmosphere resulting in more rain and bigger hurricanes.
2) though areas that are not now dry will dry out, overall the earth will get wetter
3) yes, the biggest change will be in the high lattitudes which will become downright balmy, though I find it hard to believe Canada will become the cultural capital of the future world (Siberia will be a massive swamp so forget it)
4) all these changes are 50 to 100 years out so no one reading this will be alive - so don't worry
5) even if the industrialzed countries started a crash program to stop the growth of greenhouse emissions its already too late
6) the Chinese and Indians dont give a fuck. They don't have a clue about enviornmentalism. In 20 years they'll overtake the US in emissions. China is ALREADY the most polluted country in the world.

finally 7) the Earth has had much, much warmer climate phases in the past and survived quite fine.

ALL THE ABOVE SHOULD NOT BE CONSTRUED TO MEAN WE SHOULD NOT DO ANYTHING!
Personally I think pollution of any kind is a bad idea and our consummerist civilization is far too wasteful.
But that being said I've done about all I really can by selling my car and taking public transport to work (I live in a metropolitian area so it's easy for me) and voting for politicians that will enact stronger environmental laws. I suppose I could go the extra mile and change all 7 of my incandescent light bulbs to flourescent but to be honest I don't really think that will save one Polar Bear.

Of course I get my fat ass into a jumbo jet twice a year to fly to Thailand and that probably washes out all my efforts.
On second thought, fuck the Polar Bears, Im going to Thailand! :cheers:

I know this post is not going to sound good.
Some points:
1) the tropics wont get hotter, they will expand. The excess heat will be transfered to the water and atmosphere resulting in more rain and bigger hurricanes.
2) though areas that are not now dry will dry out, overall the earth will get wetter
3) yes, the biggest change will be in the high lattitudes which will become downright balmy, though I find it hard to believe Canada will become the cultural capital of the future world (Siberia will be a massive swamp so forget it)
4) all these changes are 50 to 100 years out so no one reading this will be alive - so don't worry
5) even if the industrialzed countries started a crash program to stop the growth of greenhouse emissions its already too late
6) the Chinese and Indians dont give a fuck. They don't have a clue about enviornmentalism. In 20 years they'll overtake the US in emissions. China is ALREADY the most polluted country in the world.

finally 7) the Earth has had much, much warmer climate phases in the past and survived quite fine.

ALL THE ABOVE SHOULD NOT BE CONSTRUED TO MEAN WE SHOULD NOT DO ANYTHING!
Personally I think pollution of any kind is a bad idea and our consummerist civilization is far too wasteful.
But that being said I've done about all I really can by selling my car and taking public transport to work (I live in a metropolitian area so it's easy for me) and voting for politicians that will enact laws to promote stronger environmental laws. I suppose I could go the extra mile and chang all 7 of my incandescent light bulbs to flourescent but to be honest I don't really think that will save one Polar Bear.

Of course I get my fat ass into a jumbo jet twice a year to fly to Thailand and that probably washes out all my efforts.
On second thought, fuck the Polar Bears, Im going to Thailand! :cheers:

Were we expecting the earth's climate to remain the same from now until eternity? I mean, a blink of an eye ago (in cosmological terms), it was a smoldering rock.

Anyway, I've got too much on my plate right now to worry about anything that's not going to happen in my lifetime.

.

Anyway, I've got too much on my plate right now to worry about anything that's not going to happen in my lifetime.

Boygeenyus, Do you have a brother called George Bush by any chance????

kenc "the Earth has had much, much warmer climate phases in the past and survived quite fine."

Sure the Earth will survive but human beings may not. Species come and species go! Ask the Dinosaurs.

kenc "the Earth has had much, much warmer climate phases in the past and survived quite fine."

Sure the Earth will survive but human beings may not. Species come and species go! Ask the Dinosaurs.

Aha! So, it's not the earth we're concerned about. It's US!

Yes and it's in your lifetime, as you will probably still be around in 2050 but I won't. Don't worry though there is nothing to be done.

Yes and it's in your lifetime, as you will probably still be around in 2050 but I won't. Don't worry though there is nothing to be done.

Cool! Then you'll shut up about it, then?