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Message |
    
Nancy - LibraryLady
Supporter
Username: Librarylady
Post Number: 3618
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 6:11 pm: | 
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Save your money Tom, I'll sit for free. PL me, SLK and we can work out a mutally convenient time. |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14827
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 6:14 pm: |
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But Nancy, if my kid gets the gig, she gets richer. I like her to earn money. 
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Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 15
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 6:16 pm: |
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http://www.atmos.colostate.edu/dept/facmembers/gray.php
http://www.marshall.org/experts.php?id=44
http://www.marshall.org/experts.php?id=38
I could go on if you like. There are many more. But I guess they all work for "big oil".
Here is another good read:
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/ |
Nancy - LibraryLady
Supporter
Username: Librarylady
Post Number: 3619
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 6:18 pm: |
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Even if it's from your own pocket?? |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14828
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 6:19 pm: |
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Thank you, Spinal Tap. Can you point me to a peer-reviewed scientific article which disagrees with the theory of global warming?
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Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 16
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 7:39 pm: |
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I'm sure that the scientists I listed and many others have published their work in peer-reviewed journals. I'm sure that many of their peers agreed with their methodology and conclusions and equally sure many did not. I also don't think they are questioning if the Earth is warming slightly, but rather, are questioning the reasons for it, the effectiveness of the proposed solutions, and if the people pushing this are not actually pushing a political agenda.
The point is that the notions that the movie puts forth, that not only is global warming happening but that it is due to human activity, that this is an irrefutable fact, and that if we don’t spend hundreds of billions of dollars immediately addressing it, life as we know it will end, is nonsense.
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Rastro
Citizen
Username: Rastro
Post Number: 3438
Registered: 5-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 9:25 pm: |
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Spinal Tap, I assume you did not see the movie. Based on that assumption, how do you know that that the movie says "that if we don�t spend hundreds of billions of dollars immediately addressing it, life as we know it will end... " |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14830
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 10:10 pm: |
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I'd go a step farther than Rastro and infer that Spinal Tap hasn't seen the movie but still feels fit to say it's nonsense.
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1595
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 10:59 pm: |
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Spinal Tap-
..........as far as Mars is concerned..... From the article YOU LINKED TO.....
"The polar cap is receding because the springtime sun is shining on it."
""Remember, though," adds Smith, "there are two polar caps on Mars--north and south. While the south polar cap is vaporizing the north polar cap is growing. It's a balancing act."
Both from here:
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2003/07aug_southpole.htm
SO this claim is completly and utterly BOGUS............ BS ...... JUNK.....
Did you bother to read what you linked to? Are we to assume that your other cites are slightly more accurate. Or are your other cites also garbage.
See my fellow MOLers, this is what Spinal Tap thinks of you... Spinal Tap thinks you wont bother to read.... what Spinal Tap linked to, either that or Spinal Tap is the kind of person who doesnt read what Spinal Tap posts, before posting it.
Very sloppy work, there, Spinal Tap.
SLK, you got your free sitter, free tickets, do want me to buy you the popcorn too?
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1596
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, June 28, 2006 - 11:52 pm: |
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Spinal Tap--
........this link is to a resume..........
http://www.atmos.colostate.edu/dept/facmembers/gray.php
The Doctors website:
http://typhoon.atmos.colostate.edu/
Wont let me search for "GLobal warming".... so unless you got some thing else......................................
In this article:
http://www.marshall.org/article.php?id=91
The Author states that he has data that goes back to 1980.....actually the chart has 1978 on it..
"http://www.marshall.org/article.php?id=91"
Woods Hole researchers have data that goes back
650,000 years....
I think my baseline is way the fook bigger than yours... LOL.
hmmmmm...........
28yrs...
650,000 yrs....
Ok now this link is really funny... they claim there is no greenhouse effect, which made me wonder...... how does the earth stay warm?
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/
Basic misconceptions that must be addressed include:
Does the Earth's atmosphere primarily behave like an actual greenhouse?
No. The term "greenhouse effect" is unfortunate since it often results in a totally false impression of the activity of so-called "greenhouse gases." An actual greenhouse works as a physical barrier to convection (the transfer of heat by currents in a fluid) while the atmosphere facilitates convection. So-called "greenhouse gases" in the Earth's atmosphere do not act as a barrier to convection so the impression of actual greenhouse-like activity in the Earth's atmosphere is wrong.
........................
This does not adress the premise that greenhouse gases trap infrared radiation.
.............
Do greenhouse gases trap the sun's radiation/'heat'?
Not to any great extent.
..............
If the global average temp goes up 2 degress or so - we are in deep poo poo.
"In what could be the simplest explanation for one component of global warming, a new study shows the Sun's radiation has increased [b]by .05 percent[/b] per decade since the late 1970s."
[b]by .05 percent[/b] is the key to me, how much of that is hitting the Earth, very little.
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Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 17
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Thursday, June 29, 2006 - 8:41 pm: |
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I realize that is what the Mars article states and I think that is the point of the article. There are natural phenomena that cause these events, not necessarily human activity.
Yes, it is a link to a resume in response to a request for skeptics of human induced global warming. Dr. Gray is one of the leading skeptics in the country. A Google search of his name and global warming will produce many hits which will show you his work, as well as what his critics say.
No one has yet answered my fundamental question – If there were periods in our pre-industrial history during which the planet was as hot or hotter than it is today, what caused that? What about all the experts in the 1970’s who insisted that we were headed into another ice age?
As far as the Greenhouse Effect goes, we must be reading two different articles. The one I am reading reads that there is a greenhouse effect and that is how we have an atmosphere. They write that the Earth would be like the moon if not for it. What they contend is that the Greenhouse Effect and global warming are two different things and then go into some detail to explain the differences.
No, I haven’t seen the movie. But I haven’t seen Debbie Does Dallas either and I have a pretty good idea of what the content of that film is. For the record, I also haven’t seen Fahrenheit 911, JFK, or The Motorcycle Diaries (all staples of global warming enthusiasts’ DVD collections I'm sure). I guess that means I can’t comment on Iraq, the Kennedy assassination, or maniacal mass murderers who convince New York Times correspondents that they are really freedom fighters – but I digress.
Vice President Gore’s position on this subject is pretty well established going back to Earth in the Balance (which I did read long ago when I believed this stuff. However, I then read Environmental Overkill and it just made a lot more sense to me)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0060975989/sr=8-1/qid=1151626688/ref=pd_bbs_1/0 02-4843677-5498430?ie=UTF8
And as far as the cost goes The U.S. Department of Energy estimated that implementation of the Kyoto Protocols, of which the Vice President is an ardent supporter, would have meant a $397 billion lower gross national product in 2010. Kyoto would have boosted electricity prices by 86.4% and other energy costs accordingly.
At any rate, we could go back and fourth for a long time. Again, the point I am trying to make is that this is not a settled matter or worth the cost of the actions proposed to stop it. In reality, there are few things in science that are certain and conventional wisdom is constantly being turned on its head. There is far more that we don’t understand that that which we do. So when I hear people saying, with absolute certainty, that global warming is human caused and that if we don’t implement very economically damaging measures to stop it the planet is doomed, and that anyone who disagrees with them is a benighted ignoramus, it gives me even more reason for skepticism.
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1601
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, June 29, 2006 - 9:19 pm: |
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"Did you know that the Mars’ polar caps are receding?"
ya see, to me this reads as BOTH ICE CAPS, but of course thats not true. And misrepresenting your argument might cause some folks to disregard evrything else you post. Which is not a very productive way to make friends, or make your case.
AS far as the sun getting hotter, the work you cited claims data as far back as 1978. Ice core data goes back 450,000 yrs. While the author claims the sun is heating up over the last 100 yrs, but has no data to back up the claim. That is JUNK science.
GO ahead ST, make your argument, but I would suggest organizing your thoughts before posting. Because your 2 posts upthread didnt do squat to boost your creds in my view, while your most recent post does. Please take whatever it was that made sense in your most recent post and build on it. |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1582
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 9:38 am: |
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Gee ST says it would cost money to protect the environment and it would hurt our GDP.
He presents no evidence of that however. It just may create jobs and create new opportunities as well and that would add to the GDP.
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Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 1969
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 9:41 am: |
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Global warming doesn't matter because God will protect us (well, at least He'll protect the Red States and any part of Iraq we control). |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 274
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:08 am: |
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One reason I get apprehensive when I hear about a scientific consensus is that the consensus can turn out to be in error. The ban on DDT is a good example. While I wouldn't want to sprinkle DDT on my corn flakes, it seems pretty clear that the DDT ban has killed millions of people. If global warming is a problem, I would not trust a government bureaucrat to straighten it out. It's more about gaining power over people's lives than saving the enviroment.
I am reminded of one of my favorite H. L. Mencken quotes:
The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.
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Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14846
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:27 am: |
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3ringale, how can you tell when a danger is real and when it's a hobgoblin?
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Robert Livingston
Citizen
Username: Rob_livingston
Post Number: 1970
Registered: 7-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:34 am: |
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Tom: The simple answer is that if the danger is being played up by Bush via Rove, it's a hobgoblin. Like the recent "attack" on the Sears Tower. Terror alert color codes. Terry Schiavo's husband. WMDs. The list goes on...
Those bastards needs the country cowering in fear. Otherwise, people like Southerner might start to notice the emperor has no clothes. And we couldn't have that. |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14847
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:40 am: |
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I'm asking 3ringale specifically how he tells the difference.
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notehead
Supporter
Username: Notehead
Post Number: 3528
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:41 am: |
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No one has yet answered my fundamental question – If there were periods in our pre-industrial history during which the planet was as hot or hotter than it is today, what caused that? What about all the experts in the 1970’s who insisted that we were headed into another ice age?
This is false. These questions/issues have been dealt with thoroughly on many threads here and in a great many places elsewhere online. The mechanisms that caused previous temperature fluctuations are pretty well understood, and have been FULLY factored into the thousands of peer-reviewed studies collected by the IPCC and every other major national and international climate science organization. The speculation about an "imminent ice age" in the 70's didn't ever get much traction. One guy has attempted to answer the question of whether or not the threat of a new ice age was ever really accepted by scientists and scientific institutions by gathering everything he can find on the subject on this website. The short answer is: NO. (How many times must the same tired questions be refuted? Sheesh!)
3ringale, I appreciate very much the quotation you posted, but it is not the government that is raising the alarm for this issue. Rather, the government is creating hobgoblins in part to draw attention away from the alarm raised by science. It would be naive to say that science is free from all political machinations and motivations, but while the "winners" of politics are those who manage to acquire the most power by whatever means possible, the "winners" of science are those who provide the most insight and accuracy.
Please, please, please, all you people out there who have heard some sort of "explanation" of why there is no anthropogenic global warming or why it's nothing to worry about, take ten minutes to get a better understanding of the issue. One place you might want to start -- a website which lists a great many of the questions people have about the subject and deals with them clearly and with a lot of source material cited -- is here. |
Hoops
Citizen
Username: Hoops
Post Number: 1584
Registered: 10-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 10:45 am: |
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more then that 3ringale is propagating a dangerous myth. DDT is a very dangerous pesticide and its ban was a very good thing. The claim that it could eradicate malaria is overstated and as stated patently untrue.
http://info-pollution.com/ddtban.htm
---
snip
Quote:The eradication program ended not because of any environmental concerns, but because it did not work. The mosquitoes had grown resistant to insecticides, and the microorganisms that cause malaria had become resistant to the drugs used against them. In many areas the numbers of cases of malaria greatly exceeded what it was before the effort was started. If events had been different, if DDT had not been used heavily in agriculture and there was no shortage of funds the outcome might have been different. Malaria might have joined smallpox as a disease that had been eliminated from the face of the earth. Unfortunately, such was not the case. As early as 1967 it was clear that the effort had failed, and in 1972 the official policy shifted from eradication to control of malaria.
---
There are hundreds, maybe thousands of articles on the net about DDT containing disinformation and promoting the position that 3ringale has taken but they are false.
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1608
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 11:25 am: |
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If GM made a 55mpg world class car, it could compete in the world market and maybe dominate. SO US cars dont sell too well in the EU, or in Asia. That is bad for the bottom line of GM, and US jobs, and the US GDP.
If the US were the worlds leading manufacturer of PV solar panels, that would be good for the US, and US jobs, and the US GDP.
I would offer that the US policy over the last 25 yrs has hurt US jobs, and the US GDP. I think its clearly time to have a policy that puts these leading edge sectors in a position to lead the world. Current policy leaves the US without the tools to lead, and relagates us to being followers.
Petroleum is a SUNSET industry, its time to recognize that, and to move on. |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 275
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 12:16 pm: |
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Tom Reingold,
You are asking the $64,000 question. I don't have a definitive test to tell a real danger from a hobgoblin, but no one else does either, which is why a prudent skepticism is my default position. I would venture to say that there are fewer real dangers than we are led to believe. One indication of a hobgoblin could be the use of the word "War", as in war on poverty, drugs, terror, et al. If some ambitious pol declares war on global warming, that would about clinch it for me.
notehead,
I think the government is raising the alarm on this issue, via the NAS report, but it is also sending mixed signals for political reasons. Mixing science and politics can be just as bad as mixing religion and politics. Granting that global warming is a real problem and the dominant scientific paradigm, I would like to see it addressed through market solutions, not by governmental diktat. I would also like to see someone have the opportunity to challenge the dominant paradigm a la Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions. No doubt some will wince at the prospect of a market solution, given the influence of big oil, etc. But if the peak oil people are even half right, the market will
even things out, making us all uncomfortable. Personally, I hope that Thomas Gold's "deep hot biosphere" theory is right, but it doesn't seem too popular outside of Russia.
Hoops,
I'm not so sure I'm propagating a dangerous myth. Some people have been rethinking DDT and it may make a comeback. There are certainly many articles about DDT available on the web. Who has time to read them all? I did find this one to be worthwhile:http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/11/magazine/11DDT.html?ex=1151812800&en=9749afbf6 ab5ad92&ei=5070
What the World Needs Now is DDT by Tina Rosenberg
You have to register for this, but www.bugmenot.com will probably work.
Cheers
PS Richard Lindzen had a piece in the WSJ on June 26 about the NAS report. I was unable to scavenge the paper at work and it is by subscription only online.
I still would like to read it and if anyone could post it, I would be most grateful.
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1610
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 5:10 pm: |
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Isnt DDT a Chloronated hydrocarbon? |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 278
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 6:17 pm: |
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Foj,
If you mean Chlorofluorocarbon (CFC), it isn't. According to Wikipedia, DDT boils at 260 C, which makes it useless as a refrigerant.
Cheers |
notehead
Supporter
Username: Notehead
Post Number: 3529
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 11:15 pm: |
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FWIW, Lindzen is really, truly backed by the oil industry. He used to get $2,500 a day to consult for them. Nice gig. Too bad his reputation has gone down the pipes with his funding. |
notehead
Supporter
Username: Notehead
Post Number: 3530
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Friday, June 30, 2006 - 11:31 pm: |
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Also... Spinal Tap, welcome to MOL and I love the screen name, but have you ever taken a few minutes to look behind the sources you apparently trust on the global warming issue? Rather than say you assume that we think all your sources are industry shills, you might want to check for yourself. For example, you might be interested in the real story behind Steve Milloy -- the guy behind junkscience.com. Here's just one of many articles about him, this one from the non-partisan Center for Media & Democracy...
---------------------------
JunkScience.com is a website maintained by Steven J. Milloy, an adjunct scholar the Cato Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute - right wing think tanks with long histories of denying environmental problems at the behest of the corporations which fund them. Milloy is also a columnist for FoxNews.com.
Milloy defines "junk science" as "bad science used by lawsuit-happy trial lawyers, the 'food police,' environmental Chicken Littles, power-drunk regulators, and unethical-to-dishonest scientists to fuel specious lawsuits, wacky social and political agendas, and the quest for personal fame and fortune." He regularly attacks environmentalists and scientists who support environmentalism, claiming that dioxin, pesticides in foods, environmental lead, asbestos, secondhand tobacco smoke and global warming are all "scares" and "scams."
Milloy's attacks are often notable for their vicious tone, which appears calculated to lower rather than elevate scientific discourse. That tone is noticeable, for example, in his extended attack on Our Stolen Future, the book about endocrine-disrupting chemicals by Theo Colborn, Dianne Dumanoski and Peter Myers. Milloy's on-line parody, titled "Our Swollen Future," includes a cartoon depiction of Colborn hauling a wheelbarrow of money to the bank [1] (her implied motive for writing the book), and refers to Dianne Dumanoski as "Dianne Dumb-as-an-oxski." [2]
Prior to launching the JunkScience.com, Milloy worked for Jim Tozzi's Multinational Business Services, the Philip Morris tobacco company's primary lobbyist in Washington with respect to the issue of secondhand cigarette smoke. He subsequently went to work for The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC), a Philip Morris front group created by the PR firm of APCO Worldwide. [3]
Although Milloy frequently represent himself as an expert on scientific matters, he is not a scientist himself. He holds a bachelor's degree in Natural Sciences, a law degree and a master's degree in biostatistics. He has never published original research in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Moreover, he has made scientific claims himself that have no basis in actual research. Following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, for example, he claimed that greater use of asbestos insulation in the World Trade Towers would have delayed their collapse "by up to four hours." In reality, there is no scientific basis for claiming that asbestos would have delayed their collapse by even a second, let alone four hours.[4].
-------------------
Original is here. |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 279
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 9:08 am: |
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notehead,
Lindzen may well be a tool of big oil, but I would still like to hear his argument. I bookmarked the site about how to talk to a GW skeptic and will read it as time permits. I assume the guy who wrote it has an agenda also, but I'll try to get past it. Even the Gore family has had oil connections, but I wouldn't hold that against Al, it was mainly his father's deal with Armand Hammer. I don't know who Hans von Storch is really working for but I agree with his concluding paragraph in this article about exaggeration and politicization of climate research:
The principle that drives other branches of science should be equally applicable to climate research: dissent drives continued development, and differences of opinion are not unfortunate matters to be kept within the community. Silencing dissent and uncertainty for the benefit of a politically worthy cause reduces credibility, because the public is more well-informed than generally assumed. In the long term, the supposedly useful dramatizations achieve exactly the opposite of what they are intended to achieve. If this happens, both science and society will have missed an opportunity.
The whole article is worth reading:
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,342376,00.html
Cheers |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 18
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 10:42 am: |
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I don't deny that many of the skeptics have connections to the energy industry. But as I wrote earlier in the thread, the environmental movement has become a global multi-billion dollar industry in its own right, with its own agenda at heart. Far from being purely altruistic, as they would have people believe, its agenda tends to be anti-growth, anti-capitalist, and anti-Western. |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 14850
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 1:29 pm: |
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... anti-growth, anti-capitalist, and anti-Western
 Sounds like the beginning of a wonderful strawman argument.
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3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 280
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Saturday, July 1, 2006 - 6:51 pm: |
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I would qualify Spinal Tap's argument by saying there are two kinds of enviromentalism. One is conservationist, incremental, non-utopian, pragmatic and reformist. The other is the "deep ecology" movement, which has affinities with German Romanticism and is indeed anti-growth, anti-capitalist and anti-Western. Anti-human would not be too strong a charge. This is ably explained by Sorbonne philosophy professor Luc Ferry's book, The New Ecological Order. This is one French egg-head who knows what he's talking about.
Cheers |
Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1612
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Sunday, July 2, 2006 - 9:47 pm: |
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3ringale, I am not talking about CFCs, which were banned recently. Along with the refrigerant FREON.
DDT is a Clorinated Hydrocarbon. IIRC made from oil & Chlorine.
DDT is stored in fat cells and does not leave the body. If you eat an animal that has lots of DDT in its fat cells you can die from organo-something poisoning. I used to be a Certified Pesticide Applicator in NY & NJ.
Clordane & Deildrin are 2 other Clorinated Hydrocarbons, that were banned more recently (1980's-?), DDT was banned in the early 1970's, a popular book on DDT, at that time, was Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring".
Since Clorinated Hydrocarbons don't really break down in the enviroment, they still presist.
SO just to be clear, DDT useage has caused massive bird kills, can kill humans, it is acumalitive-so low doses will build up. Just the Kind of Stuff Tom Delay would want to keep around.
Tom R.:
SO you want to leave a decent environment for you kids...Does that make you:
"... anti-growth, anti-capitalist, and anti-Western".
Heres some more of that "thinking" from 2 Doctors. Both doctors are Harvard-trained diagnostic radiologists. And yet they write about Global Warming, Pesticides, plastics,"Myriad industrial chemicals" in what is obviously a politically oriented article.
This is one that really gave me a good laff:
"As we've remarked before, every harmful substance or agent is harmless in low doses."
Whats a low dose of Anthrax?
Heres another example od said brilliant hinking:
"Today, "pollution" means anything you want it to – even if it is good for you (or the world) in the right dosage. True, even now, some dictionaries carry the outdated definition of "pollution" as "the introduction of harmful substances or products into the environment." The key determinant was harm. No injury, no harm – no harm, no pollution. "
In the Final paragraph the 2 STUPID Doctors finish the article off with:
"We would suggest that the agenda goes far beyond using pollution "scare labeling" to advance political power and anti-capitalist, anti-growth, anti-Western policies"
Read it for you self:
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=29237 |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 282
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Monday, July 3, 2006 - 8:00 am: |
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Foj,
The American DDT ban was copied in many other countries and the casualties from Malaria have been high. Spraying DDT in houses is likely not to cause significant health problems. Did you look at the article by Tina Rosenberg that I mentioned in my June 30 post? The article you cite from World Nut Daily is right about one thing, science has become very politicized. In my opinion, this is largely because government has gotten heavily involved.
Cheers |
Twokitties
Citizen
Username: Twokitties
Post Number: 448
Registered: 8-2004
| | Posted on Monday, July 3, 2006 - 9:06 am: |
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Nice work Foj.
"anti-capitalist, anti-growth, anti-Western policies" ranks among the dumbest things said on this board. |
Spinal Tap
Citizen
Username: Spinaltap11
Post Number: 19
Registered: 5-2006
| | Posted on Tuesday, July 4, 2006 - 7:55 pm: |
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Resolution 98 passed in 1997, expressed the Senate’s reservations regarding the Kyoto Protocols. It passed the Senate 95-0. It reads in part:
The United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto in December 1997, or thereafter, which would -- (A) mandate new commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for the Annex I Parties, unless the protocol or other agreement also mandates new specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for Developing Country Parties within the same compliance period, or (B) would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States; and (emphasis mine)
2. any such protocol or other agreement which would require the advice and consent of the Senate to ratification should be accompanied by a detailed explanation of any legislation or regulatory actions that may be required to implement the protocol or other agreement and should also be accompanied by an analysis of the detailed financial costs and other impacts on the economy of the United States which would be incurred by the implementation of the protocol or other agreement (emphasis mine)
Knowing that Kyoto was unamously DOA, President Clinton never bothered sending it to the Senate for ratification.
Sounds to me like 95 senators shared my concerns to one degree or another. Even the ones who strongly believe in human induced warming. Or are they all stupid as well? By most accounts, Kyoto, one of the cornerstones of the environmental movement, is dead around the world, collapsing under the weight of its economic consequences.
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1618
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, July 4, 2006 - 11:33 pm: |
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HOw many hundreds of US cities have adopted Kyoto like rules? |
Oregon gal
Citizen
Username: Oregon_gal
Post Number: 39
Registered: 6-2006
| | Posted on Tuesday, July 4, 2006 - 11:53 pm: |
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I know that Portland, Oregon has (lived there for 35 years) and if anything it has boosted the local economy. Green building, mass transit and alternative sustainable food companies have created a ton of new entrepreneurs and jobs.
I think that the discussion could go in circles both on this board and in this country until some common sense is knocked into everyone and fear is taken out of the equation.
Putting global warming aside, would anyone argue that our dependance on a primarily foreign, finite resource in the hands of volatile nations is a good long term strategy? Does anyone NOT want to leave the cleanest air and water they can to their kids and grandkids? Does anyone want to make the necessary changes in a way that puts our entire economy at risk? Of course not.
I have made a conscious effort in my life as of late to lighten my footprint on the world. Will it make a difference? I hope so. And if I'm being naive, I don't care. |
3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 283
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 5, 2006 - 7:36 am: |
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What is the world coming to? The next thing you know, the New York Times will run an article advocating spraying DDT. Oh, wait a minute, they already did.
Global Warming's Real Inconvenient Truth
By Robert J. Samuelson
Wednesday, July 5, 2006; Page A13
"Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the next century, but -- regardless of whether it is or isn't -- we won't do much about it. We will (I am sure) argue ferociously over it and may even, as a nation, make some fairly solemn-sounding commitments to avoid it. But the more dramatic and meaningful these commitments seem, the less likely they are to be observed. Little will be done. . . . Global warming promises to become a gushing source of national hypocrisy.''
-- This column, July 1997
Well, so it has. In three decades of columns, I've never quoted myself at length, but here it's necessary. Al Gore calls global warming an "inconvenient truth," as if merely recognizing it could put us on a path to a solution. That's an illusion. The real truth is that we don't know enough to relieve global warming, and -- barring major technological breakthroughs -- we can't do much about it. This was obvious nine years ago; it's still obvious. Let me explain.
From 2003 to 2050, the world's population is projected to grow from 6.4 billion people to 9.1 billion, a 42 percent increase. If energy use per person and technology remain the same, total energy use and greenhouse gas emissions (mainly, carbon dioxide) will be 42 percent higher in 2050. But that's too low, because societies that grow richer use more energy. Unless we condemn the world's poor to their present poverty -- and freeze everyone else's living standards -- we need economic growth. With modest growth, energy use and greenhouse emissions more than double by 2050.
Just keeping annual greenhouse gas emissions constant means that the world must somehow offset these huge increases. There are two ways: Improve energy efficiency, or shift to energy sources with lower (or no) greenhouse emissions. Intuitively, you sense this is tough. China, for example, builds about one coal-fired power plant a week. Now a new report from the International Energy Agency in Paris shows all the difficulties (the population, economic growth and energy projections cited above come from the report).
The IEA report assumes that existing technologies are rapidly improved and deployed. Vehicle fuel efficiency increases by 40 percent. In electricity generation, the share for coal (the fuel with the most greenhouse gases) shrinks from about 40 percent to about 25 percent -- and much carbon dioxide is captured before going into the atmosphere. Little is captured today. Nuclear energy increases. So do "renewables" (wind, solar, biomass, geothermal); their share of global electricity output rises from 2 percent now to about 15 percent.
Some of these changes seem heroic. They would require tough government regulation, continued technological gains and public acceptance of higher fuel prices. Never mind. Having postulated a crash energy diet, the IEA simulates five scenarios with differing rates of technological change. In each, greenhouse emissions in 2050 are higher than today. The increases vary from 6 percent to 27 percent.
Since 1800 there's been modest global warming. I'm unqualified to judge between those scientists (the majority) who blame man-made greenhouse gases and those (a small minority) who finger natural variations in the global weather system. But if the majority are correct, the IEA report indicates we're now powerless. We can't end annual greenhouse emissions, and once in the atmosphere, the gases seem to linger for decades. So concentration levels rise. They're the villains; they presumably trap the world's heat. They're already about 36 percent higher than in 1800. Even with its program, the IEA says another 45 percent rise may be unavoidable. How much warming this might create is uncertain; so are the consequences.
I draw two conclusions -- one political, one practical.
No government will adopt the draconian restrictions on economic growth and personal freedom (limits on electricity usage, driving and travel) that might curb global warming. Still, politicians want to show they're "doing something." The result is grandstanding. Consider the Kyoto Protocol. It allowed countries that joined to castigate those that didn't. But it hasn't reduced carbon dioxide emissions (up about 25 percent since 1990), and many signatories didn't adopt tough enough policies to hit their 2008-2012 targets. By some estimates, Europe may overshoot by 15 percent and Japan by 25 percent.
Ambitious U.S. politicians also practice this self-serving hypocrisy. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a global warming program. Gore counts 221 cities that have "ratified" Kyoto. Some pledge to curb their greenhouse emissions. None of these programs will reduce global warming. They're public relations exercises and -- if they impose costs -- are undesirable. (Note: on national security grounds, I favor taxing oil, but the global warming effect would be trivial.) The practical conclusion is that if global warming is a potential calamity, the only salvation is new technology. I once received an e-mail from an engineer. Thorium, he said. I had never heard of thorium. It is, he argued, a nuclear fuel that is more plentiful and safer than uranium without waste disposal problems. It's an exit from the global warming trap. After reading many articles, I gave up trying to decide whether he is correct. But his larger point is correct: Only an aggressive research and development program might find ways of breaking our dependence on fossil fuels or dealing with it. Perhaps some system could purge the atmosphere of surplus greenhouse gases?
The trouble with the global warming debate is that it has become a moral crusade when it's really an engineering problem. The inconvenient truth is that if we don't solve the engineering problem, we're helpless.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/04/AR2006070400789. html
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mjh
Supporter
Username: Mjh
Post Number: 640
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 5, 2006 - 8:05 am: |
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3ringale:
Re: Your comments about DDT.........This is an interesting counter argument from the LA Times summarizing a very recent study.
DDT Study Finds New Hazard to Young Children
Babies born in the U.S. to mothers emigrating from Mexico show mental and physical impairment, a UC Berkeley survey finds.
By Marla Cone, Times Staff Writer
July 5, 2006
Babies and toddlers of California farmworkers exposed to the insecticide DDT have neurological effects that are severe enough in some cases to slow their mental and physical development, according to research by UC Berkeley scientists published today.
The federally funded research involving the children of women who recently emigrated from Mexico to the Salinas Valley is the first in the United States to indicate that the pesticide harms human brain development.
"This suggests that … DDT has effects that no one even thought to test for back when it was in use," said Dr. Walter Rogan, an epidemiologist with the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. He was not involved in the new study, published in the journal Pediatrics.
Because DDT was banned more than 30 years ago in the United States and most developed countries, the findings have particular relevance for the ongoing, controversial use in Africa to combat malaria.
UC Berkeley scientists measured levels of various pesticides in 360 pregnant women, nearly all of whom were born in Mexico, and tested the mental and motor skills of their infants and toddlers, who were born in the Salinas Valley.
For every tenfold rise in DDT exposure, the children's scores on mental tests dropped 2 to 3 points. Their motor skills were also reduced. In the worst cases, the highest DDT doses were associated with a 7- to 10-point drop in the mental scores of 24-month-old children compared with those who were not exposed.
Those drops are significant, because the average score in the study was 86 at that age and anything below 85 indicates a developmental delay and potential learning disability. The tests measure the children's ability to learn and think, including memory and problem-solving skills.
"If you had a whole population with a downward shift like this, you'd be seeing more kids with developmental problems," said Brenda Eskenazi, a UC Berkeley professor of maternal and child health and epidemiology, who directed the project.
The Salinas Valley women had very high exposures, eight times higher than average levels in the U.S. population reported recently by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They were probably exposed in Mexico, because most of them had lived in the United States for less than five years. Mexico allowed the use of DDT on farms until 1995 and for mosquito control until 2000. All uses in the United States ended in 1972.
"These women probably received very little exposure while here in the U.S.," said Asa Bradman, associate director of UC Berkeley's Center for Children's Environmental Health Research and coauthor of the study.
Virtually every human body on Earth still carries traces of DDE, a compound formed as DDT breaks down. But the effects in the Salinas study were mostly associated with DDT, rather than the DDE that is found in most animals and people.
Rogan said that means that the babies' brain development was mostly affected by relatively new spraying, not the residue that remains in the environment from spraying decades ago.
"This finding is mostly relevant to the current debate about new use of DDT, or any place that still uses DDT, and is less important to places with historical use," said Rogan, who studied DDE's effects on children in the 1980s.
"The take-home message," he said, "is that this is not an entirely benign compound even though the great advantages of its use when you're saving lives with effective malarial control are very important."
Under a United Nations pact, the Stockholm Convention, DDT is used only for killing mosquitoes that transmit malaria, which claims nearly 1 million children and pregnant women in sub-Saharan Africa annually. President Bush's year-old Malaria Initiative, the new chief of the World Health Organization's malaria program and some environmental groups support continued use of DDT as one of many strategies until safer options are found.
In Africa, small amounts are squirted on interior walls, unlike the broadcast spraying of the 1940s and 1950s that contaminated most of the world's food, soil and wildlife.
Eskenazi and her colleagues caution in their new report that "the benefit of using DDT to control malaria should be balanced carefully against the potential risk to children's neurodevelopment. Whenever possible, alternative antimalarial controls should be considered, especially in areas where pregnant women and children may be exposed."
Nobody knows if the effects found in the Salinas toddlers will persist. The UC Berkeley team plans to study the same children until they enter school.
"It remains to be seen whether it's a lasting effect or not," Rogan said.
Because DDT and DDE are so similar, scientists were surprised that DDT seemed to harm brain development while the other had little impact. That suggests that the mental abilities of U.S. children born between World War II and the early 1970s — when DDT was routinely sprayed — could have been affected, but not those born years later and exposed to old residue in the environment.
Nevertheless, the researchers reported that breastfeeding is beneficial to babies even when the milk contains large doses of DDT. The children's test scores increased with every month of nursing even for the most contaminated mothers.
Doctors know that breastfeeding boosts a baby's intelligence, yet they have long wondered if contaminants in the milk erase that benefit. The new study "provides additional evidence that breastfeeding may help to compensate for the subtle perinatal insult associated with DDT/DDE exposure," the authors wrote. The insecticide's damage probably occurs in the womb, not during breastfeeding.
The researchers tested the women for other pesticides, but only DDT was connected to neurological effects.
The study is part of a federally funded UC Berkeley project that assesses whether agricultural chemicals in the Salinas Valley, one of the world's most intensely farmed areas, are harming children.
Although animal tests have repeatedly shown that DDT causes neurological damage, the new study is the first in the United States to find such effects in humans.
In North Carolina and New York, large studies in the 1980s and 1990s detected no effect on babies' mental abilities, but they tested for DDE, not DDT. A smaller study in Spain did report some neurological effects.
The insecticide, which mimics estrogen, also affects reproduction. California women exposed in the womb are more likely to experience delays in getting pregnant decades later, according to a 2003 UC Berkeley study. Again, the effect was predominantly found with DDT, not its older residue.
Developed as an insecticide in 1939, DDT was popular because it killed insects but wasn't acutely poisonous to people or animals. But by the 1950s, it was accumulating in food chains, nearly wiping out eagles and other birds.
Canadian scientists recently reported that DDT still contaminates farm soils and will seep into the air for another generation.
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3ringale
Citizen
Username: Threeringale
Post Number: 285
Registered: 1-2006
| | Posted on Wednesday, July 5, 2006 - 2:44 pm: |
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mjh,
Thank you for pointing this out to me. The NY Times article I cited is 2 years old, and I guess that can be a long time in science terms. I hope this gets consideration in future Malaria fighting plans.
This statement caught my eye:
Because DDT and DDE are so similar, scientists were surprised that DDT seemed to harm brain development while the other had little impact. That suggests that the mental abilities of U.S. children born between World War II and the early 1970s — when DDT was routinely sprayed — could have been affected, but not those born years later and exposed to old residue in the environment.
I wonder if there are implications here for us aging baby boomers?
Cheers
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Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1623
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Thursday, July 6, 2006 - 9:52 pm: |
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Cousin to DDT:PCB's
"Also included in the organochlorine chemical group are polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB's) which are not insecticides but are present in the environment as industrial pollutants"
fromhttp://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0,1607,7-153-10370_12150_12220-26633--,00.html
Also "Absorption by the lung is rapid when DDT is present as an aerosol."
Organochlorine poisoning, as with all pesticide poisoning, occurs most easily thru the mouth/lungs. eyes, armpits, groin, and between the fingers and toes.
SO... if one chased the DDT truck.. playing in the mist... you are screwed. |
Foj
Citizen
Username: Foger
Post Number: 1625
Registered: 9-2004
| | Posted on Friday, July 7, 2006 - 4:48 pm: |
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This post is about the idea that the SUN is responsible for at leaset some part of Global Warming.
Remember the Suns 11 yr cycle? I did, and wondered if there was a correlation.
Here are some charts that show global temps:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/
This chart show solar activity. Note the peak in jan. 01.
I really dont see an effect that is possibly caused by the Sun. Neither do they:
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20060124/
I think it is safe to say that the 11 cycle is not a significant contributer towards global warming..
solar irradiance may have varied by approximately 0.6 % from 1910 to 1960 in phase with the 70-90 year cycle (the Gleissberg period) of solar activity. He found that the necessary range of variation in the solar constant during the total 130 year period is less than 1%. Satellite measurements over approximately one solar cycle have shown that the irradiance is not constant, but model calculations show that it varies too little (less than 0.1 %) during a solar cycle to be of major importance for climate.
From:
http://www.tmgnow.com/repository/solar/lassen1.html
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