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I'm sure we also destroyed Mars and Venus, who we know used to have vastly different climates.

That might be an interesting new "man's ancient roots" conspiracy theory, complete with lizard men and beings from other dimensions... it'd be just as valid, too!

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However, I'm shocked that the man-haters should be so explicit as to say that even "ancient man," [...] didn't live up to their expectations.

Where does the article "blame" the ancient man for some evildoings?

The article merely suggests that "activities of ancient man contributed to global warming". But, it is completely silent on whether global warming is good or bad. Ruddiman's hypothesis is that activities of ancient man caused an increase in CO2 due to burning of forest. That is a purely scientific issue, and has nothing to do with ethics or politics. The error that Ruddiman as well the article commit is associating CO2 increase with global warming - a completely unfounded claim. But that is a separate issue.

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Where does the article "blame" the ancient man for some evildoings?

[...]

The error that Ruddiman as well the article commit is associating CO2 increase with global warming - a completely unfounded claim. But that is a separate issue.

Granted--it doesn't actually say "ancient man may have contributed to global warming, and global warming is bad."

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Granted--it doesn't actually say "ancient man may have contributed to global warming, and global warming is bad."

Yes it did. Also, it's the journalist who's hedging with 'may,' not Ruddiman.

Ruddiman said that starting thousands of years ago, people would burn down a forest, poke a hole in the soil between the stumps, drop seeds in the holes and grow a crop on that land until the nutrients were tapped out of the soil. Then they would move on.

"And they'd burn down another patch of forest and another and another. They might do that five times in a 20-year period," he said.

That slashing and burning on such a large scale spewed enormous amounts of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and warmed the planet, the study says.

JJM

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Maybe someone alerted them to the fact that just because we suddenly noticed its existence, does not mean it hasn't always been there, and they shut the hell up.

You are assuming they have enough brain cells to realize they've been pwned on this issue, and are honest enough to drop it having been so convinced. I think most of them are lying sacks and will spout this nonsense until they die.

Steve

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  • 2 months later...

Anyone who has read a little about the Global warming debate would probably have heard of Dr. Lindzen of MIT, who has written articles criticizing the pro-GW lobby. Here is a more recent series of slides from Lindzen, posted on the "Watts up with that?" blog of Antony Watts (I think Watts is associated with the Climate Audit site that has been such a thorn in the side of the GW-lobby.)

HT: Titanic Deck Chairs

Edited by softwareNerd
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Anyone who has read a little about the Global warming debate would probably have heard of Dr. Lindzen of MIT, who has written articles criticizing the pro-GW lobby. Here is a more recent series of slides from Lindzen, posted on the "Watts up with that?" blog of Antony Watts (I think Watts is associated with the Climate Audit site that has been such a thorn in the side of the GW-lobby.)

HT: Titanic Deck Chairs

Wow, you've resurrected the post that got me temporarily blocked for intellectual dishonesty! Not one of my finest times, but climbing down from the AGW altar was difficult.

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That's an excellent talk! The graph at about 8 minutes into the second part is one I've never seen. What it says is that there has been no warming since 1987, so far as we know. The data is statistically insignificant in the range of the trend line.

But, there are many great points made by Lindzen, from philosophical to scientific. At the very end, in the Q&A, he says that he never calls himself a "climate skeptic", because that leaves room that there is a basis for the AGW scare. He calls himself a "denier". That's great! :)

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  • 2 months later...

The Times (U.K.) reports another little IPCC-related story that shows the shoddy way in which these so-called scientists put together their report.

  • Some so-called scientist gave an interview in which he said that Himalayan glaciers might melt by 2035
  • The IPCC guys writing the relevant section of the report, put this claim in, based on that published interview

Then,

  • A 'skeptic' questioned the inclusion of a something as factual, when it was based on an interview rather than on being based on whatever research paper ought to have been behind the claims made in the interview
  • Turns out there was no such research; the so-called scientist now says he was merely speculating
  • Why did the editor let it in? He says he's not an expert on glaciers. (Why is he in that role? Well, my guess is he played the right politics in his government-run institution and was rewarded with the IPCC role where he gets to make junkets abroad and fill out his resume.)

Edited by softwareNerd
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  • 2 weeks later...

My views on global warming are as follows:

1. Proving that global warming exists doesn’t make it moral for politicians to sacrifice the freedom and rights of citizens to save the planet or even the future of the human race. Sacrificing my life for the lives of people who don’t yet exist is no different than sacrificing my life for other people who are currently alive. Sacrificing my life to save bugs, trees, rocks, blocks of ice, etc is even worse.

2. The very act of forcing citizens to fund studies to determine if global warming exists is a form of government forced redistribution of wealth which is immoral.

3. I find it very difficult to believe that the average temperature of the surface of the earth can be measured accurately. Where are all the temperature measuring devices? Even if high tech thermometers covered every square inch of every land mass on earth, that still represents only 30% of the surface of the earth. And I don’t see billions of thermometers floating around on the surface of the ocean either.

4. Even if it was currently possible to accurately measure the average temperature of the surface of the earth, I’m pretty sure that the data available from 10, 20, 50, 100 years ago was not as accurate. Temperature measuring devices of the past were not as accurate as they are now and even if they were, there weren’t as many in existence years ago as there are now, so there can’t possibly be enough data to create a statistically significant trend.

5. If the globe is actually warming and continues to warm where it actually becomes difficult for the human race to survice, then productive people will have all the incentive they need to produce solutions. No government force will be necessary.

6. Some people are dishonest. Some people are willing to lie for money, because they value material wealth more than honesty, integrity and pride. Some of these people are scientists. This is very difficult for many people to believe. Politicians realize that most people trust scientists and therefore provide research funding to scientists. Scientists publish reports that tell the world what politicians want the world to hear, and scientists get more funding. People fear that the globe is actually melting and happily pay more taxes and happily allow government to become more powerful and create more laws and rules and regulations. Scientists get their money, politicians get their power and citizens lose their freedom and don’t realize it until it’s too late.

That’s all I have to say about that.

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My views on global warming are as follows:

1. Proving that global warming exists doesn’t make it moral for politicians to sacrifice the freedom and rights of citizens to save the planet or even the future of the human race. Sacrificing my life for the lives of people who don’t yet exist is no different than sacrificing my life for other people who are currently alive. Sacrificing my life to save bugs, trees, rocks, blocks of ice, etc is even worse.

2. The very act of forcing citizens to fund studies to determine if global warming exists is a form of government forced redistribution of wealth which is immoral.

3. I find it very difficult to believe that the average temperature of the surface of the earth can be measured accurately. Where are all the temperature measuring devices? Even if high tech thermometers covered every square inch of every land mass on earth, that still represents only 30% of the surface of the earth. And I don’t see billions of thermometers floating around on the surface of the ocean either.

4. Even if it was currently possible to accurately measure the average temperature of the surface of the earth, I’m pretty sure that the data available from 10, 20, 50, 100 years ago was not as accurate. Temperature measuring devices of the past were not as accurate as they are now and even if they were, there weren’t as many in existence years ago as there are now, so there can’t possibly be enough data to create a statistically significant trend.

5. If the globe is actually warming and continues to warm where it actually becomes difficult for the human race to survice, then productive people will have all the incentive they need to produce solutions. No government force will be necessary.

6. Some people are dishonest. Some people are willing to lie for money, because they value material wealth more than honesty, integrity and pride. Some of these people are scientists. This is very difficult for many people to believe. Politicians realize that most people trust scientists and therefore provide research funding to scientists. Scientists publish reports that tell the world what politicians want the world to hear, and scientists get more funding. People fear that the globe is actually melting and happily pay more taxes and happily allow government to become more powerful and create more laws and rules and regulations. Scientists get their money, politicians get their power and citizens lose their freedom and don’t realize it until it’s too late.

That’s all I have to say about that.

But...but...but... what about the children? :pimp:

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Great reply!

So the market basically responds after the fact, correct? Now let's say that the oft-cited "tipping point" or "point of no return" situation is incontrovertible as well. How would a free market stop us from reaching a point of no return predicted to occur in 5 years when the weather outside is not going to get nearly bad enough for people to care for another 25 years?

This is why I think the free market system is not without failure. Such a hypothetical situation could actually occur, and the free market could not do anything about it. As we get closer to the tipping point, the experts will seem more fanatical (justifiably so) but the free market will not have any of the environmental pressures necessary to make the changes in time. Does this make any sense?

I am trying to think about a similar hypothetical scenario:

Say, it becomes objectively certain that if CO2 increases by 20 ppm, earth will irretrievably become a snowball within 10 years (hardly any time to "adapt"). Would it then be moral for the government to treat smokestacks as WMDs? :P If no, then does my confusion lie in misapplication of the concept "adapt"?

I raised this issue again because I noticed that Brian's scenario was only partially addressed. ('fletch' was the last one to respond, but I think he was off-target). Please don't respond by saying that my scenario is highly unlikely (I know that it is). However, if you would like to argue that scenarios of this kind would be impossible, I'll more than welcome that.

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Say, it becomes objectively certain that if CO2 increases by 20 ppm, earth will irretrievably become a snowball within 10 years (hardly any time to "adapt"). Would it then be moral for the government to treat smokestacks as WMDs? :P If no, then does my confusion lie in misapplication of the concept "adapt"?

[...] Please don't respond by saying that my scenario is highly unlikely (I know that it is). However, if you would like to argue that scenarios of this kind would be impossible, I'll more than welcome that.

It is impossible because it reverses cause and effect. CO2 doesn't drive temperature, temperature drives CO2. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is a function of the temperature of the earth and its oceans. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is a response to, and lags behind, the rise or fall in temperature. The opposite view is just the first in a long line of lies perpetrated by the Viros.

Furthermore, the actual causes of the earth's climate (which, in itself, is a misnomer since all climate is local) are beyond our control. The sun's energy output, the earth's orbit and its wobble cannot be changed by man. Even the amount of CO2 put into the atmosphere is beyond our control since well over 90% of it comes from non-manmade sources.

Freedom, as opposed to force, is the only way to live a civilized existence. And the idea that free men pursuing their rational self-interest would ignore actual evidence of their imminent demise when they could actually affect the outcome is a malevolent view of man. But it really shouldn't surprise me since it is what the altruists, demagogues, and tyrants have been saying for the last 2000 years.

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It is impossible because it reverses cause and effect. CO2 doesn't drive temperature, temperature drives CO2.

Oh, by "scenarios of this kind would be impossible", I was not referring to the CO2-global mean temperature relationship. Being a meteorologist, I am already familiar with the falsehoods perpetrated by the alarmists.

Rather, what I was trying to ask is: is it physically possible (in general) to have a scenario where seemingly harmless actions of some individuals are suddenly proven to be contributors to a trigger for global catastrophe? If yes, then under such circumstances, would it be moral for the government to use force to curb such actions?

And the idea that free men pursuing their rational self-interest would ignore actual evidence of their imminent demise when they could actually affect the outcome is a malevolent view of man.

I agree that rational men will act in accordance with reality. But the very function of the government is to protect the rational from physical threats by the irrational. That is why in my hypothetical scenario I compared smokestacks to WMDs.

Thanks for responding.

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  • 2 months later...
For a long while, Steve McIntyre has been saying the that so-called "hockey stick" is faulty, based on statistical techniques used. Now, the president of Britain's Royal Statistical Society is saying the same thing.

He appears to have hedged himself out of any firm conclusions though. :)

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With the recent explosion of massive quantities of particulate matter into the atmosphere, I think research should be done into whether we need to increase CO2 production to compensate for the blocking of solar energy caused by said particulate matter.

Or in other words - a volcano exploded - do we need to run our cars more? :)

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