"John D. Giorgis" wrote:
>
> At 09:10 PM 5/4/01 -0700 Doug Pensinger wrote:
> >> You're wrong on so many counts here, Doug, I hardly know where to
> start......
> >>
> >> 1) *NOBODY* is arguing for oil exploration in the entire Arctic National
> >> Wildlife Refuge. Indeed, I've seen one figure that suggests that the
> >> entrie area slated for exploration would consist of @60 acres. (1 acre <~
> >> 1 sq km) We are talking aBout a tiny slice of a huge reserve.
> >>
> >etc. etc.
> >
> >Leave it to you, John, to so completely misconstrue what I write.
>
> Oh really?
>
> Allow me to refresh your memory:
> "That would make the reserve about one half of one percent of the total land
> mass of the U.S. One tenth of one percent of North America. Three hundredths
> of a percent of the worlds total land mass. In one of the most remote
> locations on the globe. Is it really asking so much that we preserve such a
> small fraction of the globe so that our children and theirs can witness
> pristine wilderness?"
>
> You opposed drilling on the ANWR because you wanted to preserve 0.5% of the
> US landmass. My point, however, is that we are already preserving much
> more than that- and development on a mere 60 acres would not substantially
> affect our efforts to preserve pristine wilderness.
>
OK John, you said I was "wrong on so many counts here, Doug, I hardly know
where to start......" then you pulled 60 acres out of a hat and used it as
gospel only to find out that it's probably orders of magnitude off (not the
first time you've made up data to bolster your arguments). Then I went to one
of the web sites you cited as evidence in your lengthy argument that the ANWR
wasn't a wilderness area* only to discover that, in fact, over 8 million acres
of it _is_ designated as wilderness. In fact it's the country's largest
wilderness area. So you cited a bunch of web sites to bolster your argument
apparently without reading them yourself. Then you jumped on my statement
above. Now my point was supposed to be that preserving a half percent of the
U.S. land mass in a remote area was probably not that big of a sacrifice, and
would be looked upon with favor by future generations, but I messed up the
last sentence which should have ended "can witness _its_ pristine
wilderness." But we've both been on this list a long time and I find it
difficult to believe that you really think that I believe that "the ANWR as
practically the only 0.03% of the world's land mass that the world is
currently preserving" I know I've posted to the list about my annual
backpacking trips to the wilderness and there's a picture of me up at Steve's
site on one of those trips.
In any case, it seems that, in fact, you were the one that was wrong on so
many counts. Care to redeem yourself by backing up your claim that "there is
little evidence that oil exploration elsewhere on the North Slope has severely
disrupted the wildlife there"?
Doug
* though that didn't have much relevance to my argument
