The State of Fear: Global Warming

Global Warming & Fearmongering:
According to many, the main problem facing today's world is manmade global warming, or eve just plain darned natural global warming and how the ice caps are melting, the rainforests are getting to much rain, and the ski slopes are .5 degrees warmer. Much of the public belief in this is thanks to the fearmongering, both in the media, and the evirofacist groups. Here are some samples.

Rueters
"In an issue of the journal Science focusing on global warming, climate scientist Jonathan Overpeck of the University of Arizona reported that if global trends continue, Earth could ultimately see sea levels 20 feet higher than they are now.

By the end of this century, Earth would be at least 4 degrees F (2.3 degrees C) warmer than now, or about as hot as it was nearly 130,000 years ago.

Back then, significant portions of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets melted, pushing the global sea levels to about 20 feet higher than current levels.

A similarly dramatic, and in some cases catastrophic, rise in ocean levels could happen by the year 2500, Overpeck said in a telephone interview, but he noted it could come sooner."

Gee, this sounds awful.

The Herald:
"A technological revolution is needed if the world is to tackle climate change, Tony Blair said yesterday.
During a visit to New Zealand, the prime minister said hi-tech innovations in the private sector were vital in tackling the problems of security of energy supply and rising greenhouse gases.
He also told a climate change conference in Wellington that Britain wanted to exceed its commitments under the international Kyoto agreement on climate change.
...
The much-delayed climate change review, published by the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs yesterday, predicted that carbon emissions would be reduced to only 15% or 18% of 1990 levels, instead of the 20% promised. High economic growth and the rise in global energy prices were blamed."

Odd isn't it, how world leaders are placing economic security of their country after that of the 'carbon dioxcide' emmissions? How economic growth and High energy prices were to blame? I thought low energy prices were to blame!!!

And now onto the nutcase showcase:
Kansas City:
"Your favorite TV show has ended. You've just seen the ads for Lipitor and light beer, and here comes another:
"Tick. Tick. Massive heat waves.
One after another, the faces of small children appear.
Tick. Tick. Severe droughts.
The kids look serious, maybe even upset.
Tick. Go to www.fightglobalwarming.com. While there's still time."
Yikes - did some ad exec get lost on a horror movie set? Not quite.
Fred Krupp, president of Environmental Defense, has teamed with the Ad Council, which has challenged social norms with public service campaigns like "Friends don't let friends drive drunk" and Nancy Reagan's "Just say no."

In a series of TV and radio spots that one publicist termed "edgy" - and that a global warming skeptic called "the ultimate triumph of propaganda over science" - the group is hoping to spawn a massive shift in social awareness that will send millions rushing to turn down their thermostats, inflate their car tires and recycle their plastic."

Thats acctualy and extreamly well written article, and a great informative read. As for the ads, what are they supposed to be accomplishing? Another article about this.

A leftist page, with charts illustrating computer charts.

Time:
"No one can say exactly what it looks like when a planet takes ill, but it probably looks a lot like Earth. Never mind what you've heard about global warming as a slow-motion emergency that would take decades to play out."

Yes, I did just consider Time a nutcase organization. It is. Read it! The fearmongering in that article is insane, as is the cover. "Be worried. Be very worried."


The Effects of all this fearmongering?
Drudge report
POLL: VAST MAJORITY OF AMERICANS (88%) THINK GLOBAL WARMING THREATENS FUTURE GENERATIONS
Sun Mar 26 2006 10:41:53 ET

Eighty-five percent (85%) of Americans say global warming is probably happening, according to a new TIME magazine/ABC News/Stanford University poll, out Sunday, March 26th. A vast majority of respondents (88%) think global warming threatens future generations. More than half (60%) say it threatens them a great deal. About four-in-ten (38%) feel that global warming is already a serious problem, 47% feel that it will be in the future. TIME's special 26-page cover story, 'Be Worried. Be Very Worried,' hits newsstands Monday, March 27th.

Half of Americans (52%) say weather patterns in the county where they live have grown more unstable in the last three years and half (50%) feel that average temperatures have risen in their county. A majority (70%) thinks weather patterns globally have become more unstable in the last three years and more than half (56%) feel average temperatures around the world have risen.

Almost half (49%) say the issue of global warming is 'extremely' or 'very important' to them personally, up from 31% in 1998. When asked about the causes of rise in the world's temperatures, about three-in-ten (31%) feel it is caused by the things people do, almost one fifth (19%) feel it is caused mostly by natural causes; almost half (49%) feel it is a combination of the two. Almost seven-in-ten (68%) Americans think the government should do more to address global warming, according to the poll. More than six-in-ten respondents (64%) think scientists disagree with one another about global warming.

Two-thirds of Americans (66%) say President George W. Bush's policies did little or nothing to help the environment in the past year. More than half (54%) feel American businesses did little or nothing to help. Three-quarters want to see Bush and others-Congress, American businesses and the American public-take action to help the environment in the year ahead. However, about one-third (35%) of Americans say that in the past year they have personally given a lot of thought to the impact they were having on the environment.

Six-in-ten Americans (62%) think much can be done to curb global warming and 52% favor government mandates. Six-in-ten (61%) say they would support a government mandate on lowering power plant emissions, and 87% support tax breaks to develop water, wind and solar power. Eighty-one percent oppose higher taxes on electricity, 68% oppose higher gasoline taxes and 56% oppose giving companies tax breaks to build nuclear power plants.

The partisan gap on global warming seems to be shifting, according to the poll. In 1998, 31% of Republicans and Independents alike were sure that global warming was happening; it was not a distant 39% among Democrats. Today, 46% of Democrats and 45% of Independents are certain, and 26% of Republicans feel that way, according to the TIME/ABC News/Stanford University poll."

The Reality:
Palm beach temps:
"Sunday morning's temperature was about 16 degrees cooler than normal for this time of year, forecasters said. The cool temperatures will return again Monday morning."
Rober D. Novak
"Basketball junkies watching March Madness on CBS March 19 may have been enticed by promotions for ''60 Minutes'' to stay tuned for a tale of impending global doom that the Bush administration was suppressing. A senior government scientist apparently risked his job to at long last reveal that only 10 years remained before global warming would ruin planet Earth. But the impression given on the broadcast did not square with reality..."

Gee, this sounds awful. One of the Best novels I've read is State of Fear by Michael Crichton. If you ever get the chance read it. A lot of science, interwoven with a great story.

Global temps, 2005.
Not one of the states list last year as the warmest year on record. If we're having such a problem, whats with this? Although many of the high temps are recent, most of them are from 1998, which was when we had el nino making so much havok.

While some warming is certainally occouring, how much is man made, and how much is natural? According to the same Ruerters article, "The climate warming we're in now is global and it's year-round and it's due to human influences on the climate system," he said. "That will be more damaging to the ice sheets than the that warming we had 130,000 years ago.". Question: Was man around 130,000 years ago during this warming trend? No. Is man around this time? Yes. Whats different? Nothing.

So this moves onto the next topic. Is global warming a bad thing? If the glaciers are melting, we've got more fresh water. Good thing. If the poles are melting, then they're just putting more water into the ocean, which is one of our most valuable reasources. If the tropics warm up, who cares? Just means more vacationers.

Ok, so in the event that global warming is a bad thing, we've got the next issue. Could we cause it, and can we stop it?
Heres a question. If we wanted to, how would we melt the poles? If we wanted to, how would we make the sea level rise? Quite simply, we couldn't. We could nuke the poles, but what would that accompish? Melting about 50 square miles of the poles, out of 2 entire contienents of them? And in the next several weeks, they would just refreeze.
How about the sea level? Considering 98% of the water in the world in salt water, we've got precious little fresh water to raise it with.
So if nukes can't melt the poles, we certainally aren't going to do it with cars and barbecue pits.

If we can't cause it, with our most powerful implements, then how else would we do it? Well, the answer generally comes in the form of greenhouse emissions, which is really code for Carbon dioxide. Well, how much CO2 is caused by nature, and how much is caused by mankind?
Volcanoes it spew forth 5x10^11 kg of CO2 per year. How much comes from all mankind? 17.6X10^12 kg of CO2, or slightly more then all the volcanoes. And volcanoes aren't the only ones that make CO2, termites and cows do as well, each of them more so then all cars in the world, combined. So mankind makes less then half of the greenhouse gases in this world. How can we be causeing the problems, an how much can we do to fix it?

I believe many of the global warming beleivers are exceedingly arogant, in thinking that man can change the entire world's enviroment, either for the better or worse. We cannot alter the cycle of the earths enviroment, and to think so it the hight of arrogance.
Much of the reason that envromental groups have latched onto this, is to have an excuse to try to halt industrial production, which for some reason, they are on a crusade against.

If you've read this far, thats incredible. :D Love to see the comments.