Resisting Climate Hysteria

[Smurf1976]

I find that chart interesting in that it's almost linear. A bit of a curve, but not much. It's almost a straight line.

In contrast there's been a huge surge in coal use since 2000 whilst gas and oil consumption has gone up too. So CO2 emissions have soared, whilst atmospheric concentration seems to be increasing at roughly the same rate as before.

That being so, if we were to cut emissions by, say, 30 or even 50% then it seems plausible that for reasons I won't claim to understand, this may have no effect at all on atmospheric concentration compared to continuing with the current level of emissions. That's essentially what the chart says.

 

[noco]

No warming? really! polar ice caps not in historic retreat? Atmospheric C02 levels not at an all time 'modern' high and trending upwards for the last half century...global carbon and H20 cycles not functioning?

The denial of reality demonstrated by some people is amazing...must drive the Noalition CC deniers crazy that 1 vote Tony is spending 2.5 billion on a reduction target.
~
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
`

That chart sure looks ugly and to the naive it probably is.....The Earth is quite safe at even 550 ppm CO2 and 800,000 years ago it was 7000 ppm...Perhaps that is when we had massive forests in Australia and when the CO2 dropped to below 180 ppm or less, the forests began to die creating massive coal deposits....that is my theory although I will probably be proved wrong.

 

[sptrawler]

I find that chart interesting in that it's almost linear. A bit of a curve, but not much. It's almost a straight line.

In contrast there's been a huge surge in coal use since 2000 whilst gas and oil consumption has gone up too. So CO2 emissions have soared, whilst atmospheric concentration seems to be increasing at roughly the same rate as before.

That being so, if we were to cut emissions by, say, 30 or even 50% then it seems plausible that for reasons I won't claim to understand, this may have no effect at all on atmospheric concentration compared to continuing with the current level of emissions. That's essentially what the chart says.

The problem is Smurph, you aren't brazen enough to make outlandish statements.
You would have no chance of pushing yourself to the fore in a green/labor forum, you are too honest and don't like fabricating or manipulating data, for your own ends.

 

[So_Cynical]

I find that chart interesting in that it's almost linear. A bit of a curve, but not much. It's almost a straight line.

In contrast there's been a huge surge in coal use since 2000 whilst gas and oil consumption has gone up too. So CO2 emissions have soared, whilst atmospheric concentration seems to be increasing at roughly the same rate as before.

That being so, if we were to cut emissions by, say, 30 or even 50% then it seems plausible that for reasons I won't claim to understand, this may have no effect at all on atmospheric concentration compared to continuing with the current level of emissions. That's essentially what the chart says.

As we all should know by now, Australia cutting emissions by XYZ will have almost no effect on global emissions and thus PPM measurements in Hawaii, all we can do is our bit, play our part and live up to our responsibility to cut emissions by XYZ, thus having an impact on global emissions.

 

[sptrawler]

As we all should know by now, Australia cutting emissions by XYZ will have almost no effect on global emissions and thus PPM measurements in Hawaii, all we can do is our bit, play our part and live up to our responsibility to cut emissions by XYZ, thus having an impact on global emissions.

Absolutely, if we can all get rid of the second car, beer fridge, second third and fourth computer, remove the airconditioner and use blankets instead of gas heating, we will indeed play our part.

But then, you are going to have everyone screaming that it is inhumane and no one should have to live like that.lol
Hard to reconcile what's good for the world, with what people are prepared to forego.

 

[So_Cynical]

Absolutely, if we can all get rid of the second car, beer fridge, second third and fourth computer, remove the airconditioner and use blankets instead of gas heating, we will indeed play our part.

But then, you are going to have everyone screaming that it is inhumane and no one should have to live like that.lol
Hard to reconcile what's good for the world, with what people are prepared to forego.

The carbon tax was working, significant reductions were being funded, industry got on with business while people got on with their lives.

Now reductions are NOT being funded, reductions are being made at about half the old scale, people are getting on with theirs lives and business continues.

Difference is that now we have a Govt back flipping and winding back as opposed to a Govt being forced into deals to get anything positive done at all...one Govt does to much while the next struggles to do anything meaningful while trying to keep up political appearances to both sides.

 

[sptrawler]

The carbon tax was working, significant reductions were being funded, industry got on with business while people got on with their lives.

Now reductions are NOT being funded, reductions are being made at about half the old scale, people are getting on with theirs lives and business continues.

Difference is that now we have a Govt back flipping and winding back as opposed to a Govt being forced into deals to get anything positive done at all...one Govt does to much while the next struggles to do anything meaningful while trying to keep up political appearances to both sides.

It will be as it will be, globally the problem will be addressed, it won't be solved by Australia.
Unless we all move to the Phillippines then we can live the high life, but who will keep the money coming in?

 

[Trevor_S]

Reading some of the stuff posted here is insightful in terms of the Dunning Kurger effect. Speaking of which I thought this a fascinating article by Professor Dunning about Confident Idiots. Seems apt enough in describing the general populous and the belief their knowledge is superior to the climate scientists.

As to being wrong, one can only assume a lack of understanding of what Science is... A quite famous Professor of Biochemistry had this to say on the matter of The Relativity of Wrong

Perhaps that's why the level of certainty over global warming among the experts has gone from 60% in the 80's to 99.99% now...

 

[sptrawler]

Reading some of the stuff posted here is insightful in terms of the Dunning Kurger effect. Speaking of which I thought this a fascinating article by Professor Dunning about Confident Idiots. Seems apt enough in describing the general populous and the belief their knowledge is superior to the climate scientists.

As to being wrong, one can only assume a lack of understanding of what Science is... A quite famous Professor of Biochemistry had this to say on the matter of The Relativity of Wrong

Perhaps that's why the level of certainty over global warming among the experts has gone from 60% in the 80's to 99.99% now...

Trevor, can you tell us what you are doing to reduce global warming? I think all of us can help and any ideas will enlighten us further.

If we all were self sufficient on electricity and rode bicycles instead of driving cars. The carbon footprint would be much smaller.

 

[basilio]

Trevor, can you tell us what you are doing to reduce global warming? I think all of us can help and any ideas will enlighten us further.

If we all were self sufficient on electricity and rode bicycles instead of driving cars. The carbon footprint would be much smaller.

And exactly how relevant is Trevors personal commitment to reducing global warming to his observations on how confidently stupid and utterly inane most posters here are with their rejection of the 97% of climate scientists who know we are in deep trouble on global warming?

By the way great article on Confident Idiots Trevor. Well worth the post.

 

[Weatsop]

That chart sure looks ugly and to the naive it probably is.....The Earth is quite safe at even 550 ppm CO2 and 800,000 years ago it was 7000 ppm....

What the hell?

Look, even if you were right, hundreds of thousands of years of climate change in less that 100 years is NOT GOOD. Even if you were right, think about what you're saying.

I keep hearing these things from people arguing against climate change happening, and the figures are BOTH wrong AND don't seem to consider the context. Like people who (wrongly) think that it was warmer than today globally a thousand years ago - again, even if that was true to have gained 1000 years of climatic change in 50 years is the sort of trend that leaves us in some pretty serious trouble.



...and you are NOT right:



Where on earth did you get that figure?

 

[Weatsop]

Trevor, can you tell us what you are doing to reduce global warming? I think all of us can help and any ideas will enlighten us further.

If we all were self sufficient on electricity and rode bicycles instead of driving cars. The carbon footprint would be much smaller.

Well you can do it with the free market, by putting a price on carbon and leaving it to the vast energy and ingenuity of the entrepreneurs of the planet of earth...

...or we can do some weird early-20th-century soviet-style command economy thing where the government tells business how to do things.

Which is more efficient?

Instead of paying for the police and army and hostpitals out of compulsory taxation, do you think we'd do better if people were just left to their own devices, if we just let people pay for those things directly if they want them?

Governments EXIST to enact policies that effect everyone, to embark on projects that are in the common interest.

And yeah, what Balilio said. IF Trevor turns out to be a sentient mung-bean with a negative carbon footprint, that would make no difference to the science.

 

[Tisme]

Because Newscorp is in lockstep with the LNP (it actually is the parent company of the LNP I think) it shouldn't be used as any kind of authority on anything really, except as a journal for rat cunning and deception.

What we need to do is look at climate change dispassionately and factually. So to corroborate one team:

in my previous life at Julius Caesar things were much more environmentally pleasant. Sure I was a short legged hairy SOB, but the weather was much cooler and much cooler again when I was Napoleon Bonaparte. I don't like to talk about the time I was the local brothel madam back when the pyramids were being built as markers for the randy spacemen.

 

[Smurf1976]

Well you can do it with the free market, by putting a price on carbon and leaving it to the vast energy and ingenuity of the entrepreneurs of the planet of earth...

...or we can do some weird early-20th-century soviet-style command economy thing where the government tells business how to do things.

Climate change aside, I never thought I'd see the Coalition promoting the idea of a command economy whilst Labor and the Greens advocate markets. Never, ever thought I'd see that.

 

[Weatsop]

Climate change aside, I never thought I'd see the Coalition promoting the idea of a command economy whilst Labor and the Greens advocate markets. Never, ever thought I'd see that.

Exactly! One more example of why humans make me so angry - people don't have an ideology, they just have teams. The two sides swapped policies, and none of the rabid supporters on either side seem to have even noticed.

Same-same: the so-called "Right" against removing fuel subsidies for miners. Anyone else, you'd say "they're getting welfare that they don't need any more", and they'd say "cut if off". But somehow plenty of people in the right think conservatism means "pro-business", because the details are just too hard.

Or environmentalism, even. It's mostly an exercise in cost-benefit analysis. Climate change especially. We're talking about a long-term investment - some expense now to prevent a great expense later. But noooo, environmentalism got the "lefty" tag, and now all lefties support it and all righties are agin' it. And no-one thinks.

 

[Calliope]

Abbott's direct action climate plan is one of his supreme stupidities. If anyone has any doubts about the effectiveness this inane, unnecessary and expensive plan consider this;

It is supported by PUP.

 

[explod]

Or environmentalism, even. It's mostly an exercise in cost-benefit analysis. Climate change especially. We're talking about a long-term investment - some expense now to prevent a great expense later. But noooo, environmentalism got the "lefty" tag, and now all lefties support it and all righties are agin' it. And no-one thinks.

 

[Logique]

Looks like we're all gonners, soon after the Melbourne Cup. Thanks for the warning Chief Scientist Penny Sackett

Tim Blair
Monday, November 03, 2014
http://blogs.news.com.au/dailyteleg...hp/dailytelegraph/comments/one_month_remains/

I don’t mean to frighten anybody, but we’re all about to be destroyed. Our time is almost up.

Back on December 3, 2009, the Rudd government’s chief scientist Professor Penny Sackett claimed that the planet had just five years to dodge disastrous global warming. “The leading climate scientists from the world over warn that we have about five years to avoid the dangerous climate change that would be generated if average global temperatures increase by more than 2 °C above pre-industrial levels,” Sackett said.

Check the date, people. Former chief scientist Sackett’s five-year doomsday prediction is now upon us. We have but a single month remaining to get our affairs in order prior to the Deadly Warmening. Tomorrow’s Melbourne Cup will be our last. May as well put everything on Signoff and hope for a cashed-up final 30 days.

Or maybe not. After all, a number of previous cutoff dates for global warming doom have already come and gone. Call me a crazy climate-denying optimist, but I’m prepared to bet that the majority of us will survive December 3 and possibly even a few weeks beyond............

 

[Weatsop]

Looks like we're all gonners, soon after the Melbourne Cup. Thanks for the warning Chief Scientist Penny Sackett

Uh, you understand that we ARE locked into 2 degrees now, right? The time frame all the projections run on is "by the end of the century". When they give projections for temperatures, they're talking about what we expect it to be in 2100.

It will now be at least 2 degrees hotter by 2100. We can't stop that.

If we'd acted fast, we could have avoided 2 degrees, but now a bunch of feedbacks are kicking in, and there's pretty much nothing we can do to avoid it, and the significant costs that will go with it.

We CAN still avoid some of the top-end projections, like 5 degrees, but the boat has sailed for avoiding 2.

Do you think Tim Blair honestly doesn't understand what he's talking about, or does he just like to watch his readers rage?

Is he grossly incompetent, or a liar?

I don't blame the people at home for not understanding this stuff - it's not their jobs to understand it. But it IS the job of Bolt and Blair to understand it. Their readers have a reasonable expectation that Blair read the reports well enough to understand what the scientists are actually saying, and then WON'T LIE about it.

Either he has failed to understand something that I could explain in a forum post in about 5 minutes, or he knows, and is intentionally misleading his readers.

 

[basilio]

I don't blame the people at home for not understanding this stuff - it's not their jobs to understand it. But it IS the job of Bolt and Blair to understand it. Their readers have a reasonable expectation that Blair read the reports well enough to understand what the scientists are actually saying, and then WON'T LIE about it.

Either he has failed to understand something that I could explain in a forum post in about 5 minutes, or he knows, and is intentionally misleading his readers.

And exactly which world are you living in Weatsop? Andrew Bolt and Tim Blair have absolutely no interest in understanding what scientists are saying. Never have. Never will.

They are willfully ignorant deniers. The bigger issue is that the papers that employ them allow such lying distorted rubbish to be printed.