The Glade 4.0

Define positive result? The overuse of antibiotics certainly is positive for bacteria. It's made them heartier. It hasn't helped our efforts in resisting them, but maybe we make more novel pharmaceuticals that protect us better. Maybe it'll weed our people with poor immune systems. Is that positive or negative?

By the way, the Earth isn't a living entity. It doesn't regulate us or evolve us, it just is. Unless you buy the Gaia Theory which has preposterous notions and evidence to back it up.

Silly Putty.

What else ya got?

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She lives in Canada +2-5 degrees is an improvement for her.

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That MIGHT explain why some scientists do it --Of course theres an equal amount of money for stating that its NOT happening, (and probably a lot of kickbacks from various groups such as the petrochemical industry)

I'll trust an academic over a politician or a Corporation any day of the week and twice on sundays.

Are you suggesting that the Earth controls your environment?

It doesn't. Over the past 400 years or so, and especially over the last 100 years, man has been altering the environment to his benefit.

We are no longer (completely) at the mercy of the environment.

Which I said. Policy or product.



To what end? There's always an end.



Again, to what end?



Grants from policy makers. Grants from drug companies.



Sometimes not. But rarely is it funded from a philanthropist. And there's always an end.

And the environment created man, so technically the environment controls the environment.

No definition. It's opinions. But I do mean overall, in terms of the Earth as a whole, and especially as it relates to human beings.



Um, no kidding?

As a whole, mankind has escaped the environment's control.

But that's not how the policy-makers present it. There is no risk vs. sacrifice measurement in the common dialogue. And if there is, it's hyperbolized beyond all semblence of the science that supposedly contributes to the predictions in risk. There's no discussion about how the risk is assessed, or whose judgement it reflects based on what assumptions and whether those assumptions are reasonable. It's "Sign this treaty in Kyoto or the planet dies." Which is horse ****.


When was the last time you saw a policy-maker talk about the uncertainty? Sure, the scientists might include it in their report (and that's a big "might", especially depending on whom you include in the scope of "scientists"), but when the policy makers get a hold of the report, it's all "consensus" this and "conclusion" that.


This is.. simply hilarious.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

We only have ourselves to blame for this, you know. On the one hand, people are gullible, so it works. On the other hand, other people hear any bit of uncertainty and they dismiss it.

So, if you're a politician, and you firmly believe that your new policy will save mankind, what are you going to do? What's a little bit of hyperbole TO SAVE MANKIND??

QFF (Quoted For Funny)

No, no it hasn't. The climate, the ecosystem...it's all fine with or without us. We are an insignificant blip on this planet's history. Even if the worst estimates of how much we are affecting the climate is correct (0.5 degrees kelvin over the last 40 years), you're talking about a 0.002% increase in the average amount of heat in the atmosphere of Earth during this time. And the earth has had a hell of a lot more CO2 in its atmosphere than it has now at various points throughout its lifetime, and it's been a hell of a lot warmer at various points throughout its lifetime. Mankind isn't really all that much more significant to this planet than the apes we evolved from. The collective arrogance our species displays in assuming we are somehow "special" here is far more alarming than anything we may have "done" to harm the ecosystem.

Newsflash: There is no fragile delicate balance of nature. The whole concept of a balance is garbage. Every species of plant and animal is out there simply struggling to survive and is quite willing to trample all over every other species to get there. More animals and plants have gone extinct than currently exist by factors of hundreds, perhaps thousands. The most adaptable continue to survive, those that cannot adapt to changing environments die out. That is the way of nature. If anything is new about humans, it's that we're the first species to give a damn about the rest of the environment around us apart from how we're affected by it.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

Says you?

Whatever you say. I'm definitely in the "anthropocene" camp. Regardless of whether we have a significant impact on global warming or not, we have had a tremendous impact on the overall planet. Very significant portions of the planet have been developed, fishing, forestry, etc have more of an impact on many, many ecosystems than any other influence, and there is definitely a question over the influence in the makeup of our atmosphere.



Canada is relatively un-impacted. You need to get out more.



Declaring your viewpoints "news" does not make them fact.

Positive impact is so hard to measure and it's really up to interpretation. For instance, was contracting the H1N1 flu worth it? Well, research now shows that for a contracting a moderate flu, you may have more innate resistance to other influenza strains. But it certainly sucks to have been a recipient of it initially. And it was highly thought it was better to be vaccinated against it. Was it?

I'm glad you don't buy the Gaia Theory. I think it's a bit on the crazy side, with very little evidence beyond faith to support it. But I would ask you to be careful how you phrase things then. The Earth doesn't make things happen. It's just a big rock with many layers, including a magma core on the inside, and water and land on the outside. It doesn't regulate anything. It just is. We have a tendency to assign living traits to things like the Earth.

As for your point about policy driving research, I think you are sorely misguided. I think you're an engineer if I'm not mistaken. I notice engineers have a tendency to try to always apply science. I've been a part of science projects (a lot of them done at universities) that had no ends but to further knowledge and learn more. It may help on research that does have an end in policy or product (by the way, two entirely different endeavors really), but initially it doesn't. That doesn't mean the research isn't valuable, though.


Agreed. Everyone has an agenda, whether it's to validate their existence, worldview, or product.

I've formed a theory that the ones speaking out so much about global climate change are actually trying to commit global climate change by keeping the cycles from happening by controlling human behavior in the belief this will, pardon the pun, freeze the cycle where it is. Is there any science to suggest that the cycle will not continue if we stop doing what we do that the scientists say is changing the climate?

Comments?

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The U. S. Constitution doesn't guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself. B. Franklin

"A mind needs books like a sword needs a whetstone." -- Tyrion Lannister, A Game of Thrones

When I refer to the Earth performing a task, I mean the Earth as a whole, everything on it. So, yes, the environments have regulated themselves (established ranges for "normal"), the flora and fauna have adapted, etc. These are activities that have gone on uninfluenced by man successfully for a long, long time. The balance between these ecosystems have developed in some cases over millenia. Humans altering the environment is not going to make things better overall. Maybe someday, but I haven't seen it yet.



Again, I said policy or product. Who funds you if not a product? A grant? Grant from where?

*Shrug* have it your way Kaffis. I've known all three types. Academics are 100x more trustworthy as a general rule.

People go into Academia because they love the subject. They love the knowledge. People go into business because they love money and the perks that go with it. People go into politics because either they see a change that needs to happen or because they like power & weath.

I'll just say this, TheRiov: It wasn't corporate executives, middle management, or politicians who coined the phrase "publish or perish."

Academics need relevancy, or their department atrophies and they lose/don't attain tenure.

That agenda colors their motives just as strongly as the quest for power or money.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

But NEGATIVE results are still publishable. People don't just publish papers proving things.

But if you disprove HIGCC, the grants stop flowing.

The point about publishing was to indicate that Academics are not somehow elevated above the baser concerns of everybody else who has to work to keep their job.

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"Aaaah! Emotions are weird!" - Amdee
"... Mirrorshades prevent the forces of normalcy from realizing that one is crazed and possibly dangerous. They are the symbol of the sun-staring visionary, the biker, the rocker, the policeman, and similar outlaws." - Bruce Sterling, preface to Mirrorshades

And then the researcher moves on to another area of the same field.

My primary concern with "academics" is that the perfect job-security provided by tenure means they aren't accountable for anything they say or do much like, ironically given the topic, weathermen.

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Tenure is not perfect job security. Its been sold that way, primarily by people who want to be able to censor teachers for voicing unpopular opinions.

You have been aware of the cabal that refuses to even publish findings that contradict HICC I hope. People who refuse to subject their findings to peer review yet are published anyway if they support HICC?

This has been going on, this continues to go on.

It is the modern Piltdown man.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville