Somebody:
You wrote:
"If global warming is that bad of a problem, don't you think more people would take this seriously? Wouldn't people hear more about it now? Many people sure made a big deal about the Y2K bug but why not global warming? You say it's a scientific issue and the whole ice-cap-melting-and-mass-flooding sounds like a global problem. AFAIK, this is something everyone would take seriously. It's not like we're talking about some religious rapture or end-of-the-world thing with no science backing it up. This is like a world-wide natural disaster."
Let me get this straight. On a website devoted to the airing of thousands of people's statements of literal and absolute belief in such things as creationism (a view held by almost half the U.S. population), in outright defiance of mountains of scientific evidence to the contrary and with absolutely none to support their own beliefs, you have to ask, "Wouldn't more people take this more seriously if there were solid scientific backing for it?"
Dude, the simple fact is: No, they wouldn't necessarily be more inclined to believe it in greater numbers than they currently do. People, as a rule, are stupid, and vast numbers of them believe whatever they want to believe, regardless of the evidence. Heck, many of them are proud of defying the evidence and holding to their beliefs, some of them even after learning that evidence intimately and in great professional detail. That applies to anything that might threaten their beliefs (or possibly just their comfortable position in life), whether it's heliocentrism, evolution, the dangers of tobacco smoke, or global warming. More importantly, however, the only consensus needed here is scientific; when it comes to matters of scientific importance that potentially affect the whole planet, I don't really care about the opinions of the man on the street.
Are we going to form extermination squads and end some lives just to prevent the ice caps from melting and possible heat storms?
No, that would be immoral -- but reducing births would be a VERY good idea. And if you meant ending lives of animals, dude, we do that already in staggering quantity, often just incidentally by habitat destruction. And I wasn't suggesting a bovine pogrom, either, though we should look into ways to improve the situation. If cows make methane in disproportionate quantities because of some bad digestive genes they've acquired in our few millennia of breeding them, or even if we just can do something to make them less egregiously flatulent, then we should work to correct this and/or try to find substitutes for them that won't do this. (I once heard from a chemist who told us how he and his group managed to do this with some cows, turning their methane into hydrogen and oxygen even before it was expelled; the only problem, as he put it, was that they "turned a potentially flammable beast into a potentially explosive beast" -- so they had to drop that approach. It so happens that within a few years, we may be able to grow beef without cows, which might solve a lot of problems of this sort -- but large-scale employment of that technology is quite a ways off yet.) My point was to say that we don't get to ignore cows as a methane source for which we are not responsible; we most certainly are, and there might be something we can do about it. We certainly should try to find out.
You do realize that the Earth's climate always changes? Back in the Middle Ages, it was considerably warmer than it is in these times. There were no reports of any global disaster. There was also a "mini Ice Age" between 1350 and the 1800s.
Yes, I do know this. That doesn't mean that we should just "lie back and enjoy it," especially if we are partly responsible for it. I doubt the same could be said of the mediaeval folks regarding the Little Ice Age.
The ice caps are melting? Then why are there are others that are being formed?
The only other "ice cap" being formed is the one in Antarctica, and it's growing right now because it's winter; but a few months ago, it also was losing ice at a record pace. You can't just look at this stuff seasonally -- you have to view it over a longer time frame. As for glaciers and such, yes, some are getting larger, but many more are getting smaller; as with the ice caps, there is a net loss. "Global warming" is not a phenomenon that necessarily applies to all of the globe equally -- it is a NET effect that hits some areas harder than others.
You say global warming is a manmade problem but explain to me why there are others who say it's caused by the sun's increased radation? So, which global warming group is right here?
These are not mutually exclusive. Even if the sun's heat is increasing, that doesn't mean that it's the only factor, and we most certainly are another. Even if we cannot do anything about the sun, we CAN do something about ourselves.
Also, I never said that global warming was "a manmade problem" -- I said it was a problem to which human activity is a contributor. I'm not trying to lay blame; I'm trying to encourage people to do something to fix the problem, at least to whatever extent we can.
Global Warming seems more like a myth someone made up and it has its holes. Notice this started when the claims of the Second Ice Age were put to rest?
Many of those "holes" come from spurious claims made by oil industry scientists -- about as trustworthy as the claims from Phillip Morris scientists that smoking was harmless. Some other "holes" are admitted gaps in our understanding of the phenomena. So what? Because of the enormous time lag and momentum involved in climate issues, it makes sense to react quickly and constructively on this to minimize the problem, rather than wait until we first find out exactly how bad the problem is; otherwise, it may be too late for ANY action on our part to fix it. If you can see a car speeding in your direction, do you wait to find out exactly how fast it's moving before you decide to get out of its way, or do you try to move before you need the assistance of stunt training?
If you want to continue believing in global warming, feel free. You have the will to do so. I won't stop you.
Gee, that's big of you. As if I needed your permission.
And I will encourage you to consider all sides of the problem, but most importantly to consider the consequences if you are wrong, versus the consequences of doing something about global warming even if you are right. There is far too much at stake on this to be gambling with it.
~David D.G.
