The claim of a 97% consensus on global warming does not stand up

[Weegle777 78]

People thought that those who believed against the consensus that the world was flat, were considered loons and should be put to death as well.

[Weegle777 78]

66 million years ago, may or may not have been caused by an asteroid impact. Even science hasn't defenitively concluded what caused this. And because it happened that long ago, they can't know for sure. Even they said that it could have been caused by volcanic activity. The earth is much more capable of reversing supposed damage than you are giving it credit for.

Great. Earth can fix the supposed damage. Have you any idea what said damage would do to us?

Nothing. We will all be long gone before anything would overcome the earth. What's the big deal?

[AUDub 11,784]

People thought that those who believed against the consensus that the world was flat, were considered loons and should be put to death as well.

Galileo gambit.

But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

And no one here is advocating putting Dr. Mercola to death.

[AUDub 11,784]

Nothing. We will all be long gone before anything would overcome the earth. What's the big deal?

That's some rather twisted logic to advocate ignoring what could be the mechanism of our demise.

[Weegle777 78]

People thought that those who believed against the consensus that the world was flat, were considered loons and should be put to death as well.

Galileo gambit.

But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

And no one here is advocating putting Dr. Mercola to death.

Cool, you can Google the cute little "scientific" names for ridiculous scenarios. Explains nothing, but entertaining for you guys I suppose. And no one said anything about putting Mercola to death.

[Weegle777 78]

Nothing. We will all be long gone before anything would overcome the earth. What's the big deal?

That's some rather twisted logic to advocate ignoring what could be the mechanism of our demise.

Not really, because it won't be.

[AUDub 11,784]

Cool, you can Google the cute little "scientific" names for ridiculous scenarios. Explains nothing, but entertaining for you guys I suppose.

I can't help that your thoughts on the matter stem from logical fallacies.

[AUDub 11,784]

Not really, because it won't be.

More fallacious thinking. Google "argument by assertion."

[homersapien 12,172]

Science also says that aspartame is bad for us, yet no one is taking it off of the market.

Science doesn't say that. Some studies may have indicated that, but there's a lot of misinformation out there concerning aspartame.

Let the planet warm! Why should we care?

The rapidity of the change is the issue. Extremely rapid changes tend to coincide with mass extinctions.

When was the last mass extinction?...

Right now. http://en.wikipedia....cene_extinction

Humans are nothing more than the contemporary equivalent of an asteroid.

Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?

[Weegle777 78]

Nothing. We will all be long gone before anything would overcome the earth. What's the big deal?

That's some rather twisted logic to advocate ignoring what could be the mechanism of our demise.

Fallacy of Suppositional Fear Based Logic. See, I can do it as well.

[Weegle777 78]

Science also says that aspartame is bad for us, yet no one is taking it off of the market.

Science doesn't say that. Some studies may have indicated that, but there's a lot of misinformation out there concerning aspartame.

Let the planet warm! Why should we care?

The rapidity of the change is the issue. Extremely rapid changes tend to coincide with mass extinctions.

When was the last mass extinction?...

Right now. http://en.wikipedia....cene_extinction

Humans are nothing more than the contemporary equivalent of an asteroid.

Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?

It doesn't matter, because according to the crazies on the history and science channels, we will be living on other planets with the greys in 66 million years.

[AUDub 11,784]

Right now. http://en.wikipedia....cene_extinction

Humans are nothing more than the contemporary equivalent of an asteroid.

Who says God doesn't have a sense of humor?

Rats

Missed the most obvious one!

[quietfan 233]

People thought that those who believed against the consensus that the world was flat, were considered loons and should be put to death as well.

Are you referring to something that happened perhaps in ancient Egypt, when their religion believed in a flat earth? I don't know how people who didn't accept a flat earth were treated back then and won't argue the point. I'm not even sure when the notion of a round earth first entered a human mind.

However, as I mentioned in my earlier post:

By the time of Aristotle, Eratosthenes, Hipparchus, and Ptolemy, scholars knew the earth was round. And that knowledge not based on consensus, but on fact and evidence. (Such as: a ship sailing over the horizon could be seen descending, as if over a curved surface; the view of the constellations changed with latitude, as it would only do on a curved surface; and the earth's shadow as seen in a lunar eclipse was round)

By the time of Galileo, the Church had not only accepted Ptolemy's model of a round earth at the center of the universe, but had incorporated it into church dogma and considered it heresy to argue otherwise. Copernicus was not questioned and Galileo was not put on trial for saying the earth was round, but for saying it was not the center of the universe. Arguing in favor of a flat earth in opposition to Ptolemy's model would have been just as heretical at that time.

I wish all text books and all elementary school teachers would get over the myth that people of Colombus's time thought he might sail off the edge of a flat earth. The Church, all scholars, and most people--other than perhaps a poor illiterate serf who only knew the local environs in which he toiled the soil--knew the earth was round. I don't know when the "fears that Columbus might sail off the edge of a flat earth" fallacy entered our educational mythology, but it completely erroneous. No scholar, nor Queen Isabel herself who financed his voyage, was worried about him "sailing off the edge". They only worried about only about the length, and therefore feasibility, of a voyage to reach Asia by sailing west.

[AUDub 11,784]

Fallacy of Suppositional Fear Based Logic.

Srsly?

See, I can do it as well.

You could, but you sure as heck didn't.

[japantiger 4,104]

People thought that those who believed against the consensus that the world was flat, were considered loons and should be put to death as well.

Are you referring to something that happened perhaps in ancient Egypt, when their religion believed in a flat earth? I don't know how people who didn't accept a flat earth were treated back then and won't argue the point. I'm not even sure when the notion of a round earth first entered a human mind.

However, as I mentioned in my earlier post:

By the time of Aristotle, Eratosthenes, Hipparchus, and Ptolemy, scholars knew the earth was round. And that knowledge not based on consensus, but on fact and evidence. (Such as: a ship sailing over the horizon could be seen descending, as if over a curved surface; the view of the constellations changed with latitude, as it would only do on a curved surface; and the earth's shadow as seen in a lunar eclipse was round)

By the time of Galileo, the Church had not only accepted Ptolemy's model of a round earth at the center of the universe, but had incorporated it into church dogma and considered it heresy to argue otherwise. Copernicus was not questioned and Galileo was not put on trial for saying the earth was round, but for saying it was not the center of the universe. Arguing in favor of a flat earth in opposition to Ptolemy's model would have been just as heretical at that time.

I wish all text books and all elementary school teachers would get over the myth that people of Colombus's time thought he might sail off the edge of a flat earth. The Church, all scholars, and most people--other than perhaps a poor illiterate serf who only knew the local environs in which he toiled the soil--knew the earth was round. I don't know when the "fears that Columbus might sail off the edge of a flat earth" fallacy entered our educational mythology, but it completely erroneous. No scholar, nor Queen Isabel herself who financed his voyage, was worried about him "sailing off the edge". They only worried about only about the length, and therefore feasibility, of a voyage to reach Asia by sailing west.

Thanks for interjecting some sanity into this. Even in my little backwoods north Alabama school we tried to calculate distances the same way Eritosthenes (2400 years ago) calculated the Earth's circumference; just on a smaller scale.

[Weegle777 78]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

[homersapien 12,172]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

[TheBlueVue 177]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

Everyone "knows" passing a carbon tax will put an end to AGW. I mean the carbon pollution the US puts into the atmosphere is already FAR less than that of China and India. As those 2 emerging economies continue to pollute, passing a carbon tax in America would definitely whip mother nature into line stop any warming trend and put an end to rising sea levels no matter what the rest of the world is doing.

Make no mistake, the end game its all about control and tax revenues. Nobody in their right mind honestly believe a carbon tax is going to impact natural cyclical weather patterns but if politicians can use scientists to scare enough people, they'll get their tax revenues and THAT is their ulterior motive anyway.

[homersapien 12,172]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

Everyone "knows" passing a carbon tax will put an end to AGW. I mean the carbon pollution the US puts into the atmosphere is already FAR less than that of China and India. As those 2 emerging economies continue to pollute, passing a carbon tax in America would definitely whip mother nature into line stop any warming trend and put an end to rising sea levels no matter what the rest of the world is doing.

Make no mistake, the end game its all about control and tax revenues. Nobody in their right mind honestly believe a carbon tax is going to impact natural cyclical weather patterns but if politicians can use scientists to scare enough people, they'll get their tax revenues and THAT is their ulterior motive anyway.

And in return, the scientists get rich on research grants from the politicians. Right?

[homersapien 12,172]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

Everyone "knows" passing a carbon tax will put an end to AGW. I mean the carbon pollution the US puts into the atmosphere is already FAR less than that of China and India. As those 2 emerging economies continue to pollute, passing a carbon tax in America would definitely whip mother nature into line stop any warming trend and put an end to rising sea levels no matter what the rest of the world is doing.

Straw man argument. No one has ever made the argument that passing a carbon tax would put an end to AGW.

[TheBlueVue 177]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

Everyone "knows" passing a carbon tax will put an end to AGW. I mean the carbon pollution the US puts into the atmosphere is already FAR less than that of China and India. As those 2 emerging economies continue to pollute, passing a carbon tax in America would definitely whip mother nature into line stop any warming trend and put an end to rising sea levels no matter what the rest of the world is doing.

Straw man argument. No one has ever made the argument that passing a carbon tax would put an end to AGW.

Then why even discuss it? Underneath all the scare tactics is the implicit understanding that a carbon tax looms large on the horizon as if that is some kind of silver bullet that will solve the "doomsday" problems of AGW. Its fascinating watching the whole drama unfold as the "end of times" as we know them deadlines continue to quietly come and go the politicians ramp up their "settled science" rhetoric. Its painfully obvious its all about justifying a tax policy.

[homersapien 12,172]

At least you guys make me laugh. Just live, stop being so freaked out about something you can do nothing about.

What makes you so sure nothing can be done about it?

I thought we were suppose to be made in the image of God.

Everyone "knows" passing a carbon tax will put an end to AGW. I mean the carbon pollution the US puts into the atmosphere is already FAR less than that of China and India. As those 2 emerging economies continue to pollute, passing a carbon tax in America would definitely whip mother nature into line stop any warming trend and put an end to rising sea levels no matter what the rest of the world is doing.

Straw man argument. No one has ever made the argument that passing a carbon tax would put an end to AGW.

Then why even discuss it? Underneath all the scare tactics is the implicit understanding that a carbon tax looms large on the horizon as if that is some kind of silver bullet that will solve the "doomsday" problems of AGW. Its fascinating watching the whole drama unfold as the "end of times" as we know them deadlines continue to quietly come and go the politicians ramp up their "settled science" rhetoric. Its painfully obvious its all about justifying a tax policy.

Because there is several times more carbon in the earth than we can burn without producing catastrophic climate change. We cannot afford to simply burn it all.

I suppose it is possible that China and India could simply ignore the problem and cutbacks on our part would simply delay the inevitable. But, since their scientific community is telling them the same thing and assuming their government will eventually act in a more or less rational manner, there is no reason to assume they will do nothing, especially if we take the lead.

On the other hand, if the United States deliberately chooses to ignore the problem, it's much less likely they will do anything based on the same nihilistic reasoning you exhibit.

Now as someone who doesn't accept the premise that AGW exists, I don't expect you to accept the logic, but that's what the science is telling us. If AGW is a "scare tactic" at least it's based on science instead of ignorance or denial.

http://www.theguardi...urn-interactive

http://insideclimate...l-oil?page=show

http://www.rollingst...20120719?page=2

http://library.wur.n...7d6414d_001.pdf

https://www1.ethz.ch...hausen09nat.pdf

....etc.

[Weegle777 78]

So why not just fix it instead of taxing corporations?

[autigeremt 7,133]

Here's the thing, homer....the U.S. hasn't been denying it! And that didn't start under Obama, either.

[quietfan 233]

...

I wish all text books and all elementary school teachers would get over the myth that people of Colombus's time thought he might sail off the edge of a flat earth. The Church, all scholars, and most people--other than perhaps a poor illiterate serf who only knew the local environs in which he toiled the soil--knew the earth was round. I don't know when the "fears that Columbus might sail off the edge of a flat earth" fallacy entered our educational mythology, but it completely erroneous. No scholar, nor Queen Isabel herself who financed his voyage, was worried about him "sailing off the edge". They only worried about only about the length, and therefore feasibility, of a voyage to reach Asia by sailing west.

Thanks for interjecting some sanity into this. Even in my little backwoods north Alabama school we tried to calculate distances the same way Eritosthenes (2400 years ago) calculated the Earth's circumference; just on a smaller scale.

I applaud your "backwoods" teacher!

Have you noticed that on ads for the new Samsung curved screen ultra HD TV, they even include a quick clip of Carl Sagan (I assume from his original "Cosmos" series) demonstrating Eratosthenes' method with a small placard to which two pegs are attached? The more he bends the board, the more the two pegs diverge, as he says "The greater the curve, the greater the difference".

[**Let me now apologize to any that care for my semi-hijack of a global warming thread. Having reached the point where this thread (much like discussions of gay marriage, creationism/intelligent design, abortion, gun control, etc.) has become a tedious battle between two irreconcilable and unchanging mindsets, I return those interested to the pointless debate. And I admit, based on the preponderance of current evidence, my "AGW is real" mindset isn't going to change either. But I'm always open to new evidence.]