On Mon, Jan 11, 2010 at 1:30 PM, Scott Stroz <[email protected]> wrote: > I have not seen any good evidence that man is causing the 'warming' we > are experiencing, and neither has anyone else, its all supposition.
Right and I'm questioning your credentials as a climate scientist to say that they don't have any good evidence and that it is all supposition. I see plenty of people on the web who "prove" Einstein's General Theory of Relativity wrong every year as well and I don't tend to believe them either. Maybe one of them is right. I'm not qualified to say. I'll wait on the scientific establishment to weigh in. Just like with climate science. > And, since you did not answer my first question in my reply, I will > take it to mean that you agree that the other periods of warming in > earth's history were NOT based on human activity. We can then use that > 'repeating pattern' 'theory' that was presented earlier, and assume > that the current 'warming' is NOT caused by human activity. On the contrary, I specifically stated that I was talking about observations, not causation. The situation was Larry saying that he would bet that it will be warmer 20 years from now than it is today. That seems reasonable because of the trend, which he noted, of a sustained increase in warming since 1890. I happen to think there are anthropogenic reasons for the current increases because the science, as I understand it, makes sense and there is a pretty broad consensus on the matter. However, I am not a climate scientist, so I don't go weighing in on the side that says solar cycles have nothing to do with it. It makes sense to me that solar cycles would be involved. My scientific intuition is that carbon dioxide and methane trap heat. Solar maximums and minimums change the influx of energy into our atmosphere. A large part of the variance in carbon dioxide and methane levels are produced by variations in vegetation, ruminant animals and the burning of fossil fuels. My guess would be that significant changes in temperatures are going to involve combination of those items. As humans, we are most comfortably adapted to conditions similar to what we are currently experiencing. Large changes one way or another are likely to be unpleasant. Therefore I would like to keep things as close as possible to current conditions. We don't have control over whether or not something is a greenhouse gas, nor do we have control over solar energy influx. We do have greater influence over vegetation, animals and fossil fuels. But, like I said, climate science is not my area of expertise. Current broad consensus fits in well with my scientific intuition and seems to match the available data well. That is the basis of my current opinion but it goes no further and is easily subject to change. >>>> "Maybe we should think about how we do things." >>> >>> Like buying and selling carbon credits? I still don't understand how >>> that is supposed to help..at all. >> >> Well, the theory is pretty straight forward. If you believe that >> carbon dioxide is a main component of the greenhouse effect (trapping >> incoming solar energy and warming the planet as a whole) then a key to >> alleviating that effect would be to try and maintain some sort of >> control on the amount of carbon dioxide entering the atmosphere and/or >> being sequestered. If X carbon credits represents Y net change in >> atmospheric carbon dioxide, then the market comes into play by capping >> the overall net change (Y) by allowing units of X to be exchanged >> between groups so that those who are able to reduce their carbon >> emissions are able to trade part of their quota to a company that is >> having a more difficult time, thus keeping the overall net change at >> the desired level Y. There are problems with this system but that is >> the basic theory. > > Translation, you can pump as much carbon dioxide as you can afford. That would be part of it, yes and the part that many people in the environmental community really dislike. As I said, it is a system with problems no doubt. But the primary point of the system is to keep the net change in atmospheric carbon dioxide low or negative. The details of the system, the trading schemes, are an attempt to make it a business-friendly "marketplace" solution. I have my doubts about the whole thing, but this is one of those areas where the environmental dudes decided to let the capitalism dudes have a go of it. We shall see. Juda ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:310232 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
