Climate change

[Federberg]

Not that I have anything specific to contribute right at this moment, it makes sense to have a thread dedicated to this specific issue.

I think the Koch brothers have done great damage to the cause of climate change. There was a time when senior republicans advocated things like carbon taxes, now it's difficult to find leaders who have solutions. It's all about denial. Even libertarians, and these are the folks that really confuse me. Think about it... a company produces green house gases causing environmental damage but there's no explicit cost for doing this, even though it's established fact that carbon pollution is a public "bad". Yet these same companies complain if greener technologies are subsidised. The simple fact is that if carbon polluting companies are not paying the cost of their pollution they are in effect receiving an implicit subsidy. It would be great if this debate evolves in America. They are in danger of being left behind by even countries like China...

 

[Horsa]

I've got something to say but it's more extensive & includes points you haven't covered, asks questions & doesn't involve some points you've covered. It's quite extensive like an essay & school-teacherish so thought I'd check to see if you wanted to see it 1st. I've been told I can sound school-teacherish sometimes.

 

[Federberg]

ha! Go for it. Always interested to hear other views. By the way I wasn't putting forth my complete view, just starting off the debate

 

[Horsa]

ha! Go for it. Always interested to hear other views. By the way I wasn't putting forth my complete view, just starting off the debate

O.k. Thank you very much. You were trying to get a few cogs turning then. Lol. It might take a while.

 

[Horsa]

I'll write it when I have time. I've just got back off my holiday & have a lot of washing to do.

 

[Horsa]

My response part 1

In order to consider the subject of climate change we don't have to think about whether it is happening because it is very obvious that it is but also whether it is a new thing completely or whether our climate has changed in the past & to what extent, whether it is completely caused by man or whether it is partially natural & to what extent & what we can do if anything to stop it getting worse, whose responsibility it is to do this & what pros & cons are in each possible solution, whether these solutions are feasible or not & whose responsibility it is to put these solutions into place.



Although human activities are making climate change worse it is partially a natural occurrence or else we wouldn't have had ice ages before humans came to be. It isn't just humans who've damaged the earth. When cattle break wind, methane is released into the air. It's not even a new thing. Since the beginning of time men have made fires which have polluted the atmosphere & until around 30 years ago smokeless areas didn't exist which meant fires were lit in both houses & factories. To make things worse people chopped down trees which inhale carbon dioxide & exhale oxygen. Except for when William the Conqueror founded some forests in England, trees weren't planted to replace those chopped down. (Though he planted forests like the New Forest because he was fond of hunting). Some people think that England was almost all forest naturally but it wasn't. During the industrial revolution things became worse because Britain went from a mainly agricultural country to an industrial country & smoke came out of factory chimneys, steam trains & ships were invented which polluted more of our air & machinery was brought into factories & it was made of wood. The spread of literacy caused more books & newspapers to be printed which caused even more trees to be chopped down. Luckily today recycling is wide-spread & a lot of new books & newspapers use recycled paper. Later on aerosols & refrigerators were invented which let off C.F.C.'s (chloroflourocarbons) which also let greenhouse gases into the air. These then cause global warming. The advent of electricity made things even worse because coal had to be pulverised before being burnt in order to power turbines & generator. Though water mills & wind mills were about a long time ago to generate power for the mills they weren't used to generate larger areas until recently. The new hydro-electric (water power generators) though have a disadvantage. The propellors dismember fish that get too close. The new wind power generators also have a disadvantage. They dismember birds that get too close. Some people have solar panels on their roofs which generate electricity from the sun. Nuclear power stations were established which seemed a good idea at the time but later on people realised that they produced waste which could not be disposed of safely. The advent of cars also caused a lot of pollution from the exhaust fumes coming out of the exhaust pipes. I think that from this information we could say that climate change is not a new thing & that although some climate change is natural a lot of it has been caused by humans throughout history sometimes unwittingly.

 

[Horsa]

Part 2.

Now we come to the question of what can be done about climate change. Green taxes could be enforced for doing things which aren't environmentally friendly but rich people would do what they want anyway without thinking because they'd just think why not do what I want when I can get away with it just by paying a fine. Recycling could be made compulsory everywhere but people still break laws when they can get away with it & would they do it correctly. If not done correctly, recyclable materials get spoilt & have to be thrown. We've started to plant more trees but with the amount of land needed for more houses still more trees have to be pulled down because of the growing population.

N.B. This is a global issue but I've looked at it from a British point of view because I'm British & that's what I know. If anyone who isn't British would like to put a different point of view across please feel free.

 

[Federberg]

Thanks for your thoughts. To your first concern - is climate change human caused or just the natural larger climate cycle that has always existed - I would respond that there is a greater consensus from scientists on this issue than for a host of phenomena that no one disputes. It’s always fascinated me when this discussion is aired that so little work has been done to get the science out there to the public. Somewhere considerably in excess of 95% of the specialised scientific community agrees that humanity is wholly responsible and climate change is man made. Perhaps because I have a background in aeronautical engineering and I have always dipped into scientific journals so to me I’ve moved beyond the question about whether it’s real to.. how do we fix this? Even in the US where the climate discussion is so politicised you only have to look at the work the Pentagon is doing in preparation for the consequences of climate change to appreciate the level of seriousness and realness of this topic. From their perspective the concern is the destabilising impact of climate inspired immigration on geopolitics.

There are some positive signs in the area of technological innovation, I’m not sure they’ll become mainstream quickly enough but renewable energy is finally getting close to competitive and would in fact be cheaper than more polluting current power generation if they were costed properly. One of the most exciting things over the last decade has been the advance in battery technology. In fact Elon Musk has founded a company that is now using a combination of solar and battery storage to present a serious challenge to conventional power generation. I’ll stop here for now, but I think this is a hugely consequential topic that needs to be debated more in public

 

[Horsa]

Thanks for your thoughts. To your first concern - is climate change human caused or just the natural larger climate cycle that has always existed - I would respond that there is a greater consensus from scientists on this issue than for a host of phenomena that no one disputes. It’s always fascinated me when this discussion is aired that so little work has been done to get the science out there to the public. Somewhere considerably in excess of 95% of the specialised scientific community agrees that humanity is wholly responsible and climate change is man made. Perhaps because I have a background in aeronautical engineering and I have always dipped into scientific journals so to me I’ve moved beyond the question about whether it’s real to.. how do we fix this? Even in the US where the climate discussion is so politicised you only have to look at the work the Pentagon is doing in preparation for the consequences of climate change to appreciate the level of seriousness and realness of this topic. From their perspective the concern is the destabilising impact of climate inspired immigration on geopolitics.

There are some positive signs in the area of technological innovation, I’m not sure they’ll become mainstream quickly enough but renewable energy is finally getting close to competitive and would in fact be cheaper than more polluting current power generation if they were costed properly. One of the most exciting things over the last decade has been the advance in battery technology. In fact Elon Musk has founded a company that is now using a combination of solar and battery storage to present a serious challenge to conventional power generation. I’ll stop here for now, but I think this is a hugely consequential topic that needs to be debated more in public

You're welcome. I definitely think that most climate change is caused by humans but although I find science interesting I was better & more interested in history. There has been a lot of historical evidence found that proves ice ages have occurred before we existed so think that this needs to be taken into account. I've thought about fixing this too but my solutions wouldn't be feasible in such a technologically advanced society like we live in.

I agree. I'm looking forward to seeing a wide range of opinions & facts. Everyone should be bothered about this because it's going to affect everyone.

 

[Federberg]

You're welcome. I definitely think that most climate change is caused by humans but although I find science interesting I was better & more interested in history. There has been a lot of historical evidence found that proves ice ages have occurred before we existed so think that this needs to be taken into account. I've thought about fixing this too but my solutions wouldn't be feasible in such a technologically advanced society like we live in.

I agree. I'm looking forward to seeing a wide range of opinions & facts. Everyone should be bothered about this because it's going to affect everyone.

Yes but my point is that scientists of accounted for historical cycles. By the way these cycles, ice ages in particular have a specific cause, which is the wobble of the earth's rotation around the sun. There is a lot of extensive research on this. And as the polar ice cap melts this will impact the earth's rotation, because the poles having less ice will result in a mass redistribution. There are some truly fascinating studies. One of the things that the public seems unaware of, is that a lot of what we are seeing now have been predicted accurately by climate change models. So I'm not saying history isn't important - it's extremely important - it's not only accounted for but they are extrapolating successfully to predict the impact on weather patterns

 

[Horsa]

Yes but my point is that scientists of accounted for historical cycles. By the way these cycles, ice ages in particular have a specific cause, which is the wobble of the earth's rotation around the sun. There is a lot of extensive research on this. And as the polar ice cap melts this will impact the earth's rotation, because the poles having less ice will result in a mass redistribution. There are some truly fascinating studies. One of the things that the public seems unaware of, is that a lot of what we are seeing now have been predicted accurately by climate change models. So I'm not saying history isn't important - it's extremely important - it's not only accounted for but they are extrapolating successfully to predict the impact on weather patterns

Ha! I get you. I wasn't saying that climate change wasn't happening or that it was caused by nature entirely but that I didn't think it was caused by human-kind 100% of the time. I'd have put the figure down to 98% of the time climate change is caused by human-kind. I didn't see the evidence for scientists taking history into account. It sounds fascinating. Please feel free to tell us more. I knew the causes of ice ages but because I gave you a lengthy piece decided to condense things. I also write spontaneously & from memory so sometimes miss things. Oops, I forgot to mention about the polar ice cap melting!

 

[Federberg]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...s-1030a:homepage/story&utm_term=.48ef97ca9985

 

[Horsa]

That's fascinating. Thank you very much for sharing. I get what you mean when you said scientists took history into account when they formulated their theory on climate change now. I hadn't seen this before & the information that I had access to & had been taught was all science & no history was taken into account.

 

[Horsa]

I got what you meant when you said scientists considered history when coming up with their accounts of climate change. I know you prefer to have conversations but thought you might find this video interesting.

 

[Horsa]

I also see your point about scientists taking history into account when coming up with their theories of climate change on this web page.

https://climate.nasa.gov/evidence/

It also states most recent climate change has been caused by humans like I suggested but it has the figure at about 95% where I had it at around 98%.

 

[Horsa]

Thank you very much for the constructive criticism. It's much appreciated. I like to know what other people think too.

 

[Federberg]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...g-alternative-explanation-for-climate-change/

 

[Horsa]

I'll look at that later. It's not responding for me.

 

[britbox]

I find the whole thing mildly ridiculous to be honest. We've had several ice ages which have changed the entire global makeup of the planet, formed oceans, changed land masses, wiped out species... we have science with hardly any knowledge of the universe outside of the planet we live on... weather and climate is naturally chaotic not linear... and these top scientists can barely predict tommorow's weather. Climate change happens with or without the interference of humans.

But for all that, I'm in favour of green energy, conservation, reducing pollution and protecting the environment... so the current kidology is all good IMO.

 

[Federberg]

I find the whole thing mildly ridiculous to be honest. We've had several ice ages which have changed the entire global makeup of the planet, formed oceans, changed land masses, wiped out species... we have science with hardly any knowledge of the universe outside of the planet we live on... weather and climate is naturally chaotic not linear... and these top scientists can barely predict tommorow's weather. Climate change happens with or without the interference of humans.

But for all that, I'm in favour of green energy, conservation, reducing pollution and protecting the environment... so the current kidology is all good IMO.

I think you need to study the research first before critiquing it