GMan,Gman wrote:Thanks FFC...I'm with you, G.
Bart, I would agree with you and most of what you said (thank you..), but how else can we get the point across? I don't necessarily call it a scare tactic, but I think we should be more aware (or concerned) about how we are addressing these CO2 levels. I agree this website... We do NOT have all the evidence in yet since our only real data goes back perhaps a few hundred years or so. To compond the issue, it's true, the earth naturally gets hotter and cooler thoughtout the thousands of years it's been around... However, this is the first time we've introduced our industrialized processses into this world. We really do not know how it effects the rest of the world as a whole. I think we can agree that what we are doing with the CO2 levels, componds the issue greatly. And that is what we should be controlling.. Maybe not chasing down polluters with shotguns, but making people more aware of it. And I think the government can be a vehicle for that, or any other group that wishes to get involved so that the government doesn't have to, (like this website).There is a left leaning political faction that ties their ideology to this issue and seeks to catastrophize the situation and scare people. These are the people who point to hurricanes like Katrina and try to convince people that they are the direct result of you not changing the catalytic converter on your car.
As far as Katrina, well ok, maybe there is no real evidence that global warming is a direct cause of that. However, there is some evidence that the intensity of the hurricane's strength has been pronounced since our study of CO2 levels... And if the temperature goes up by even one degree, that is enough to make it that much stronger. And if anything can be done to lessen those factors, then I think we should be for that as well.
Again, we might not be able to completely stop it, by we can perhaps control it or lessen it's punch...
G -
What? You think that just because I can see what I don't like that I can come up with a solution!
I think we are responding to the situation. Too fast for some and too slow for others.
I also think we have a media that likes to blare headlines and scare tactics sell and create their own news cycles.
The difference between the political right and the political left in terms of addressing the issues is not as divided as it is portrayed. Democrats by and large are not tree-hugging, capitalism hating, single issue people who want to protect snail-darters while all progress is halted. Republicans by and large are not corporate polluters who are willing to soil their own nest as long as it puts money in their pockets.
We all can see that there is a problem and that we are going to need to come up with a solution.
Emissions on a per capita basis have been declining in the west. The problem is that population is increasing and emissions are still going up. Further, the percentage of the world population that now has potentital access to services, utilities and the automobile is increasing almost exponentially.
Conservation and emission controls needed? You bet. But also new technology, international cooperation and a willingness to face the issue.
Unfortunately, human nature being what it is, we often don't take heed of this until there is a personal reason to do so.
For us in the West, what will it take to drive us from our cars to public transportation? It appears that it will take increased energy costs. Those are coming. I honestly think we haven't seen anything yet.
There seems to be an attitude that cheap energy is our birthright in the US. Our government hears us loud and clear and they respond to it. If they don't we vote them out.
The problem we are facing in the US now is not that the government is causing or not causing energy costs to raise. We are in a global market and China and India, are rousing like sleeping giants and not only keeping for their own use their own oil and petroleum output (they used to be net exporters) but they are now entering the world market and competing directly against the US and Europe for the surplus of other nations.
International competion will in many ways modify behavior that I think others are seeking to try and effect by the use of appeals to catastrophe and altruism.
The problem with magnifying the problem beyond what the data supports is that over time you introduce cynacism into the mix and you have to keep upping the ante until finally, you yell "Wolf!" and nobody listens or cares.
I think there will be some strong responses and developments in this arena soon. It will probably be tied more to human response to the raise in the cost of energy than it will be to a sense of environmentalism. The point is that it is happening and will happen more as the cost goes up and it undoubtedly will.
That's my opinion anyway.