I don’t get all these debates on whether the global warming is man-made or not. Who cares? We all know there is global warming. We all know it is already resulting in horrible things. Doesn’t it make sense to do something about it irrespective of what or who caused it?
Let’s say global warming is in no way influenced by human activity and is a result of periodic changes in the planet’s temperature that happen for reasons beyond our control. The last major one took place around 1,000 AD, if I remember correctly (I’m not an expert, so I might be wrong on the dates.) It doesn’t matter for the moment if you agree with this. For the sake of the argument, let’s assume this is the truth***.
Doesn’t it make sense to do something to counteract the detrimental consequences of this non-human global warming? The glaciers are thawing, that’s an incontrovertible fact of objective reality. The planet’s temperature is rising. That is also an incontrovertible fact of objective reality. All we can control is our human influence on the planet’s temperature. So why wouldn’t we control it if it could prevent further negative things? Isn’t the attitude of “We didn’t cause the problem so we will do nothing about it even if we have to die in the process” completely childish?
Even if we can all agree that the global warming is nothing but horrible, rotten luck we have encountered for absolutely no reason whatsoever, how is that a reason to do nothing to reverse its consequences? If your house gets infected with termites, will you pay for an exterminator, or will you sit there, repeating like a parrot, “I didn’t cause this, so I won’t lift a finger to address the problem” as the house crumbles down around you?
*** I don’t think it’s the truth. I’m just making an argument.
Clarissa's Blog 
Because some people’s world views are entirely morally defined, rather than being materially defined. They literally can’t shift into a different perspective.
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Global warming is not harmful for many countries. Russia no doubt benefits as does Canada. Northern parts of the United States benefit. Scandinavia may well benefit, Almost certainly global, warming is preferable to a return to the ice age!
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No, Russia and Canada are suffering badly. Remember last summer’s forest fires in Russia? And the inundations? And in Canada, bears fail to go into hybernation.
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Meanwhile, hundred of millions of people in equatorial countries will probably starve as a result of desertification of formerly arable lands. But who cares about them, right?
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It’s all about money. Global warming has been stated by ‘experts’ to be human in origin and so huge resources have been made available to do further research, develop new solutions, do carbon trading, investigate carbon trading abuses, go to expensive conferences, and live the high life on all the money that’s washing around.
No one living this high life wants it to end, so they have been trying to maintain pressure on governments to pursue expensive alternative energy solutions. This has the unfortunate result of pushing up energy prices and thrusting the poorest into energy poverty.
Unfortunately the research that ‘proved’ global warming to be human has been discredited completely and so militant global warmists have got even more desperate to convince everyone that humans are responsible. But in these troubled times of austerity, governments have decided that they don’t have the means to indulge a programme that seems to be going nowhere and is detrimental to many, from the poorest in the west to communities in Africa and elsewhere.
This is why it’s important.
The website http://www.wattsupwiththat.com is excellent for boning up on global warming.
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So you agree that if this is not man-made nothing should be done?
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What would say about a volcano? A volcano is erupting! What can we do? Turn off the lights, that would help… wouldn’t it?
Doing research on finding alternative energy is one thing, global warming, which, if it has nothing to do with human activity, is something completely different and setting up a few costly inefficient wind farms will make not the slightest difference.
The subject has become ridiculously emotive. Just using the term ‘denier’ shows the level of argument of those who support man-made global warming against those who don’t. In what other context is the word ‘denier’ used? The Holocaust. Those who use it immediately try to associate those who do not agree with them with those evil bastards who deny the Holocaust happened. Rational? I think not.
Even the BBC, greatest most biased supporter of man-made global warming ever made a statement recently that the models used that created the hysteria had not proved to be reliable and that which had been predicted had not happened so they were no longer supporting it.
This has nothing to do with Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Disney or Big Bart Simpson, but everything to do with flawed science, biased research, lobbying, pressure groups forcing governments to send money their way to find ways to support their obsession. The truth is out, man-made global warming is not happening, but that doesn’t mean that research cannot be made into alternative energy sources.
But the point is, these alternatives are highly inefficient, highly costly and for the moment serve little purpose beyond pushing up energy prices to the highest they’ve ever been and forcing millions into energy poverty. Those who cannot keep warm in winter don’t give a flying f*ck about windmills, they just want to be able to afford to heat their homes. Forcing money towards the wrong research is not helping them.
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“What would say about a volcano? A volcano is erupting! What can we do? Turn off the lights, that would help… wouldn’t it?”
– Since the time of the Pompeii, people have learned to avoid being buried en masse by volcanoes. 🙂
“The subject has become ridiculously emotive. ”
– I agree and I’m trying to have a reasonable calm discussion on the blog about it. Precisely because, as you say, it isn’t easy to have a tranquil discussion of this in RL. I’ve already had a close friend flip out on me and accuse me of being a climate-change denier, even though I believe in human causes of global warming.
“The truth is out, man-made global warming is not happening, but that doesn’t mean that research cannot be made into alternative energy sources.”
– Is non-human-made global warming happening, in your opinion?
“Forcing money towards the wrong research is not helping them.”
– For me, the solution is not research (although research is always good) but, rather, looking at why we in the US and Canada have driven ourselves into an existence that is disastrous environmentally and health-wise. The air in downtown Montreal is unbreathable in summer. It looks like a huge orange cloud. The traffic has exploded. And that, in a city with a phenomenal public transportation system where nobody really needs to drive. (And now I will prepare to the outburst of rage from Montrealers). So I’m saying, why don;t we try to change these things, at least somewhat. The worst thing that can happen, these measures will do nothing for global warming but we will all get healthier and the air will be more breathable.
“This has nothing to do with Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Disney or Big Bart Simpson”
– Big Bart Simpson is hilarious. 🙂 🙂
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“- Is non-human-made global warming happening, in your opinion?”
My opinion is based on the findings of over 125 scientists who wrote an open letter to Ban Ki Moon refuting his global warming assertions, here:
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2012/11/29/open-climate-letter-to-un-secretary-general-current-scientific-knowledge-does-not-substantiate-ban-ki-moon-assertions-on-weather-and-climate-say-125-scientists/
“The U.K. Met Office recently released data showing that there has been no statistically significant global warming for almost 16 years. During this period, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations rose by nearly 9% to now constitute 0.039% of the atmosphere.”
“The NOAA “State of the Climate in 2008” report asserted that 15 years or more without any statistically-significant warming would indicate a discrepancy between observation and prediction. Sixteen years without warming have therefore now proven that the models are wrong by their creators’ own criterion.”
My favourite:
“Rigorous analysis of unbiased observational data does not support the projections of future global warming predicted by computer models now proven to exaggerate warming and its effects.”
I knew about this letter because I follow Anthony Watt’s website, “the world’s most viewed climate website” (Fred Pearce The Climate Files: The Battle for the Truth about Global Warming).
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That’s ridiculous. You want to follow the money, follow the money to the enormous multinational oil companies who are literally investing billions of dollars into climate denialist “research”
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“All we can control is our human influence on the planet’s temperature” – that is the crux of your argument… In order to convince people that they should help control human influence on the planet’s temperature, you have to convince them that human activities do have an influence on temperature. Vicious circle.
And yes, I agree with you – everything says “the planet is warming”, ergo, we should be doing stuff about that. The planet has warmed drastically in the past. It’s been super warm in the past. It’s been cold in the past. What we’re doing is a full order of magnitude faster and more extreme than anything we’ve seen in the history of the planet. And we should at least be prepared. Though that just implies “save the human species” and quite frankly, the planet would be much better off without us. 😛
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So the counterargument here is that humans are completely impotent in the face of this phenomenon and should just sit by waiting for fate to resolve this?
I’m simply trying to understand what seems an incomprehensible position.
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It is completely incomprehensible… that’s part of the frustrating bit… but yes, the counterargument is basically “I didn’t cause this, therefore, I have no responsibility to help fix it. Not my problem, suck it world” – which, to me, is completely ridiculous. Sadly.
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Aha, so the termite mentality I described in the post. I’ve heard of immature positions but this one is just too bizarre.
Thank you for explaining this. I don’t think like other people, so it’s hard for me to believe that there are those who really, truly think this way. So I need confirmations. 🙂
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yes, if global warming is happening irrespective of carbon emissions and other human activities, then cutting those activities down is not going to help. the argument is something along the lines of: ever since we hired the new employee, the weather has begun to get colder (winter is approaching). so we should fire the employee to stave off cold weather. if we see that the two are unrelated, there’s no need for the firing.
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“yes, if global warming is happening irrespective of carbon emissions and other human activities, then cutting those activities down is not going to help.”
– This is complete absence of formal logic. I don’t get this at all.
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Even if carbon emissions have nothing to do with global warming, I fail to see how improving fuel efficiency and weaning ourselves off of the world’s dwindling supply of fossil fuel could not be good idea.
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“Even if carbon emissions have nothing to do with global warming, I fail to see how improving fuel efficiency and weaning ourselves off of the world’s dwindling supply of fossil fuel could not be good idea.”
– That’s exactly what I’m saying!! Whether we caused this or not, just to be on the safe side, why not do something to address the issue?
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And I totally have to mention my own pet peeve: the cars! We are drowning in cars. Every inch of land is paved over to make parking space.
A colleague of mine lives next door with his wife. He frives an SUV. She has a regular car. She doesn’t work. He works at the university that I have been reaching cheaply and unproblematically for 4 years by bus. I simply don’t get the logic behind moaning about enormous student loans all the time yet maintaining 2 brand-new cars that are not even needed.
I know everybody is sick and tired of me saying this but I just have to: we have a really phenomenal public transportation system in my area. Phneomenal. But nobody uses it. Recently, another colleague called me a hero for doing so. I’m yet to figure out what’s so heroic about this easy, cheap choice. Even in the busiest times, I spend $24 per month on transportation. How can that be bad?
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People have the same illusions about public transport in Perth. Apparently I live in a dangerous area (there’s a higher proportion of Aboriginals here than elsewhere) and the line that goes past my stop is very dangerous at night. Mike has never noticed any unrest travelling on that line sometimes late at night.
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I agree with everything in your OP and in everything the Venerable Corvex has said. I think it’s fairly well proven that humans have had an impact on climate change. Every scientist worth his/her salt agrees. But fine…..let’s just accept the “climate change deniers” argument and go with the idea that the vastly rising temperatures we are experiencing are somehow natural. Does that matter? We know that the rising temperatures are destructive. And we know that we have severely polluted our air and water and we know that our fossil fuels will one day run out.
So, given all this, we should still a) find some way to combat the rising temperatures and b) we should still try to reduce air and water pollution and c) we should still be trying to wean ourselves off of fossil fuels and find ways to create and maintain “clean energy.” What’s the controversy?
I am far from a conspiracy theorist. But I think that this fake “global warming controversy” is almost completely manufactured by oil companies. I would venture to say that oil interests drive many many domestic and international policy decisions.
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A colleague has traveled to the glaciers and photographed them. They are disappearing so fast that, by the time he finishes the art book that will contain the photos of the glaciers, they will not exist any longer. 😦 This is an incontrovertible fact of objective reality. The glaciers are melting. My question is: why do people refuse to at least make an effort to preserve the glaciers? Because they have decided from the start that the venture is hopeless? Because they believe that doom or fate or God or whatever want the glaciers to melt and nothing can be done? Because they don’t believe the glaciers are melting? Because they don’t believe that the disappearance of the glaciers will have any impact on their lives?
I want to understand the logic behind the refusal to do anything but I’m failing.
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I think it’s a combination of everything you say. I think the “deniers” believe a couple of things 1) It doesn’t matter that the glaciers are melting. This is “natural” and if it’s “natural,” it’s not a bad thing. 2) They believe that since humans didn’t cause this, there is nothing that humans can do to combat this. Any effort to combat climate change or the melting glaciers are futile and caused by out of touch academics and scientists who want to destroy industry and the American economy.
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“They believe that since humans didn’t cause this, there is nothing that humans can do to combat this. ”
– This logic is completely ridiculous. Human beings didn’t cause the median lifespan being under 25. But we managed to change this dramatically. We didn’t cause our teeth to be of very short duration, yet we managed to deal with this, too. We didn’t cause raw food to be very difficult to digest, yet we changed that. We didn’t cause the distances separating us to be so huge, yet this has been resolved by humans, too.
“This is “natural” and if it’s “natural,” it’s not a bad thing.”
– All we do as human beings is combat the “natural” all day long. Can anybody remember the last time they spent a single day “naturally” or even ate anything “natural”? There is nothing natural about shoes, houses, chocolate, the Internet – everything pretty much.
There are many positions I don’t share but at least I get where they are coming from. This one is a complete mystery. There is no logic, no reason behind it.
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Urban heat islands are a well-documented type of man-made heating. I don’t know about other sources of heating, but the fallacy of “consensus science” is not an answer to this question.
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What we do about the warming is different depending on the cause.
If humans caused it through carbon dioxide emissions, an appropriate response is to lower emissions to slow the warming and to deal with the consequences such as coastal flooding as best we can.
If the cause is completely natural and unrelated to carbon dioxide emissions, then we could respond to the warming by responding to the consequences and by influencing the natural cause (whatever that is), but cutting carbon dioxide would not help because it was not the cause.
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“If the cause is completely natural and unrelated to carbon dioxide emissions, then we could respond to the warming by responding to the consequences and by influencing the natural cause (whatever that is), but cutting carbon dioxide would not help because it was not the cause.”
– People are in real desperate need of learning at least the basics of formal logic. It makes me feel deep vicarious shame to read such childishly silly things.
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Peak Oil as seen through the eyes of Arab oil producers
Also, I loved this post:
http://harmoniaphilosophica.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/the-german-who-didnt-give-a-fuck/
The picture says all.
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And on my eternal topic – Israel / Palestinians. Kerry said recently :
“I am intensely focused on this issue and the region because it is vital really to American interests and regional interests to try and advance the peace process and because this festering absence of peace is used by groups everywhere to recruit and encourage extremism.”
Rubin claims that “Resolving the conflict in some way will encourage even more extremism and regional instability.”
http://pjmedia.com/barryrubin/2013/04/10/why-progress-toward-israel-palestinian-peace-is-more-likely-to-bring-regional-instability/
Do you think Rubin is right? If yes, why doesn’t Kerry / Obama see it? Or they do see it, but it’s politically better not to say so? The latter seems to be refuted by Kerry deciding to visit Israel every 2 weeks to work on the conflict & possible renewal of negotiations.
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As I said before, both sides have a passionate need for this conflict as their only way to solidify a tenuous collective identity. Of course, the US knows that and is very happy about that. The US needs this conflict to fester in order to have an excuse to meddle in the region to its own benefit. Israel intelligently exploits, and I would even say milks, this need on the part of the US.
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How did all this end up in global warming? Is my app glittching?
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No, it isn’t glittching. I began reading blogs, saw an article on global warning and the 1st comment I left above is with that link. Then I immediately saw a post on Middle East warming and left 2nd comment.
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My technology is going crazy on me today.
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