[Solvay_1927]

quote:Originally posted by ukmicky
HEBREW The given name Michael or Micha'el (îÄéëÈàÅì / îéëàì "he who is like God" or "likened unto God",

ARABIC Michael in aramaic means: who is like God?, Michael->"Mi[n] Cha el"

ISRAELI MICHAEL is the only angel given the highest rank of archangel; he appears as the guardian angel of Israel

Michael means god in latin.

The story of my life! Other people get a name that means "god-like", but all I get is a name that means "small"! []

[Andrew K Fletcher]

Aside from the millions of people that never bothered to question the data in the science books on the topic of trees and their relation to green house gas.

When is someone going to check out the data on the supposed greenhouse effect causing global warming?

Global warming is caused by exposing naked soils to the energy of the sun, preventing rain from falling by inducing a thermal barrier on the coast lines, which further dries out the forests inland causing huge problems with forest fires, which in turn adds to the global temperatures.

Put the trees back on the land and prevent the sun from drying out the soils and turning them into deserts the size of continents and we may well see a massive reduction in global temperatures. Furthermore, we may also see enough food produced on the reclaimed lands to solve the world food crisis. Furthermore, the deserts can be used to grow oil producing crops to solve the impending fuel crisis.

What does god think about the return of the promised land?

Andrew

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."
K.I.S. "Keep it simple!"

[Bass]

Causative factors for global warming may be a bit more complex than just the loss of vegetation along coastlines.  Paleoclimate data from the past several hundred thousand years indicate a dynamic range of temperatures, and continuous swings from ice ages to warm periods.  Dendrology, ice cores, isotopic, benthic paleontology, atmospheric gas concentration and other studies all suggest a complex, dynamic system is responsible for these swings.  Deserts have existed throughout geologic time- even without man stripping coastlines of their vegetation.
No doubt, planting trees along denuded coastlines may prove beneficial (more firewood for local residents)- but probably not the sole solution to global warming.

Subduction causes orogeny.

[VAlibrarian]

"Trees and plants are not as good for the environment as we once thought"- wrong, trees and plants ARE the environment.

Every time some researcher re-measures something and discovers a 1% error it seems to cause an enormous opinion ripple around our planet with millions of people seizing onto the information as a way to believe "things are really okay, there is no danger that natural systems will ever collapse under the pressure of human over-use".
The problem with this is that the cumulative evidence that we are doing real damage is simply too clear at this point. We live on a planet that we still consider large, but in fact every major oceanic fishery is over exploited, and animals living in the Arctic region are endangered by the accumulation of toxic materials in their bodies even if they never in their lives see a human.
I recall a few years back many people refused to believe in global warming because it was well documented that temperatures in certain areas were not going up. Well, researchers recently discovered that there was a mistake in the measurements, and all the temperatures including atmospheric and oceanic were going up. Did you see any news reports? Did you hear any public apologies by those who had been using the incorrect data to deny the existence of global warming? Nope. So do not ask me to get excited by the fact that trace amounts of methane come out of plants. This in no way compares to the massive changes that over 6 billion humans are making in our atmosphere.

chris wiegard

[VAlibrarian]

It is also pretty clearly understood by 99% of atmospheric scientists that global warming is driven by the burning of fossil fuels: gasoline, coal, etc.
I see no clear reason to pay much attention to the other 1%, as most of them are being paid by the Petroleum companies.

chris wiegard

[ariel]

quote:Originally posted by DoctorBeaver

Of course beavers are good for the environment.

yeah DocBeaver! look what the internet told me:
Beavers are not necessarily harmful. In fact, many land managers and ranchers are now reintroducing beavers for stream restoration work. Beaver dams slow stream erosion, raise water tables, and filter pollutants and sediments - critical during times of mud slides and ash flows.
[^]

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by VAlibrarian

"Trees and plants are not as good for the environment as we once thought"- wrong, trees and plants ARE the environment.

This is the problem with the notion of The Environment.

Environments are whatever is around at the time – and at present, this includes power stations, factories, tarmac roads, etc.; they are all part of The Environment.

quote:

Every time some researcher re-measures something and discovers a 1% error it seems to cause an enormous opinion ripple around our planet with millions of people seizing onto the information as a way to believe "things are really okay, there is no danger that natural systems will ever collapse under the pressure of human over-use".

 
What on earth do you mean by collapse?

The natural system does what natural systems do, and they may adapt, they may change over time, but they do not collapse.  Human systems may collapse, because we judge the collapse of the system by the purpose to which we design the system, but since we did not design or give purpose to natural systems, we cannot judge what might be regarded as a collapse of the system.

quote:
The problem with this is that the cumulative evidence that we are doing real damage is simply too clear at this point.

Damage is a human concept, not a natural one.

We do not talk about the death of the dinosaurs as damage.  It was a part of natural change.

quote:

I recall a few years back many people refused to believe in global warming because it was well documented that temperatures in certain areas were not going up. Well, researchers recently discovered that there was a mistake in the measurements, and all the temperatures including atmospheric and oceanic were going up. Did you see any news reports? Did you hear any public apologies by those who had been using the incorrect data to deny the existence of global warming? Nope. So do not ask me to get excited by the fact that trace amounts of methane come out of plants. This in no way compares to the massive changes that over 6 billion humans are making in our atmosphere.

The changes 6 billion humans are making to the atmosphere is still dwarfed by the effects of all the photosynthesis by plants and algae.

Even those who promote the notion of human effects on global temperature seem to accept that global warming is substantially driven by changes in solar radiation, and if humans at all have a significant effect upon this process, even those who claim so, claim its significance has only been in recent decades (i.e. the warming of global temperatures between the middle of the 17th century and the middle of the 20th century is claimed not substantially to have been of human origin).

[VAlibrarian]

Another Someone, we will just have to agree to disagree on this topic. I will grant you that we may not wish to refer to the extinction of the dinosaurs as "damage"- but I think you might agree that we would view the extinction of homo sapiens as "damage". Not that accelerated climate change would result in our extinction, it would probably just reduce our numbers a bit. But even that might be viewed by many of us as "damage", as we are not fond of dying in our anthrocentric value system.

Perhaps in a technical sense we cannot claim that human activity causes the "collapse of natural systems". But from the standpoint of the Passenger Pigeon, Great Auk, Dodo, etc., our activities could be viewed as detrimental to other species. If we were to deforest the amazon area, grass or weeds would grow in place of the trees, sure. But we might not be happy with the unforeseen results of the deforestation. What would Brazilians use to build houses thereafter, mud?

In a broad sense we inhabit a planetary biosphere that incorporates plants, animals, nonliving structures and gases, and you and me. To pretend that humans lack the power to drive the processes of this system is disingenuous. Take a look at our planet from space at night and study the lights. Take a look again in daylight and note that the green areas are much smaller than they were 200 years ago.
The reality is any natural system has population limits. Like any organism which lacks predators (other than a few microbes and other humans), humans have an upward limit to their numbers. One limit is food supply, and another is having survivable temperatures. Both those limits help explain why human-caused global climate change is not a joke. I will agree with you that the increase over the past fifty years is slight, if you will agree that trending that rise over the next 100 years would spell trouble. I will not be here to see it, but I would like my great-grandchildren to inherit a survivable planet.

chris wiegard

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by VAlibrarian

but I think you might agree that we would view the extinction of homo sapiens as "damage". Not that accelerated climate change would result in our extinction, it would probably just reduce our numbers a bit. But even that might be viewed by many of us as "damage", as we are not fond of dying in our anthrocentric value system.

The thing that has has the greatest impact upon continued human population expansion is probably education and the changing role of women in society.  Populations in the most educated portions of the world are getting to the point where they are beginning to fail to replace themselves.  Is this a good thing or a bad thing depends upon what you feel about human population levels, but it has nothing to do with greenhouse gases or deforestation (excepting that, at least in Europe, the deforestation of the continent contributed to the wealth that allowed the people of that continent to develop their education systems).

quote:

Perhaps in a technical sense we cannot claim that human activity causes the "collapse of natural systems". But from the standpoint of the Passenger Pigeon, Great Auk, Dodo, etc., our activities could be viewed as detrimental to other species.

The same same could be said from the standpoint of the smallpox virus.

quote:
 If we were to deforest the amazon area, grass or weeds would grow in place of the trees, sure. But we might not be happy with the unforeseen results of the deforestation. What would Brazilians use to build houses thereafter, mud?

The term 'weeds' has no meaning – a weed is merely an ordinary plant that is growing in an undesirable place.  A rose is a weed if you did not want roses growing, or it can be a very desirable plant, if that is what you wanted to grow.

The fact is that tomorrow is always an unknown quantity.  The idea that somehow by not chopping down the Amazon forests we would make tomorrow a known quantity seems to me to be an erroneous notion.

The point is that Europe gained its affluence by chopping down its forests.  Is it fair that we should demand that the people of South America should be denied the same opportunities?  Beyond that, as has been shown, it is not at all clear what benefit the Amazon forest does provide.  The loss of the European forests have not created an global catastrophe from the human perspective (although it did inevitably remove the habitat for much European wild life).  One thing we do know is that the forests and wetlands tend to harbour many dangers for humans, dangers that can be reduced by removing those forests and wetlands, dangers that have substantially been removed in Europe.

quote:
In a broad sense we inhabit a planetary biosphere that incorporates plants, animals, nonliving structures and gases, and you and me. To pretend that humans lack the power to drive the processes of this system is disingenuous. Take a look at our planet from space at night and study the lights. Take a look again in daylight and note that the green areas are much smaller than they were 200 years ago.

'Drive' or 'influence'?

I never said we do not influence the system – we are a part of the system, and the inevitable consequence of being a part of any system is that the parts of a system will have an influence upon the whole of the system.  All I said is that we are not alone in having an influence upon the system, and we are not even the dominant influence upon the system, although that does not mean we have an insignificant influence upon the system.

quote:
 
The reality is any natural system has population limits. Like any organism which lacks predators (other than a few microbes and other humans), humans have an upward limit to their numbers. One limit is food supply, and another is having survivable temperatures. Both those limits help explain why human-caused global climate change is not a joke. I will agree with you that the increase over the past fifty years is slight, if you will agree that trending that rise over the next 100 years would spell trouble. I will not be here to see it, but I would like my great-grandchildren to inherit a survivable planet.

Apart from the inevitable risks in arbitrarily extending trends, but I would not concur with you that, even if those trends do continue, it would create insurmountable problems for the human species.  I accept that it will create challenges, but no matter what happens, tomorrow will always be a challenge, just as it always has been, and it has been our ability to rise to those challenges that has allowed our populations to grow as far as they have.

Our ability to obtain food now far exceeds anything our ancestors had.  If we looked back at the ability of our ancestors to obtain food for themselves, and we had simply taken that as the natural limiting factor upon human population growth, we would have a worldwide population (at a guess) of probably one 1/1000th of what we have today.  From the moment humans developed farming technology, to the continued improvements in that technology, we have enabled every successive limit in population size to be exceeded.  I am not saying there are not people today who are starving, just as there always has been (although this is typically more a political problem than a technological problem in growing enough food), but nonetheless in past centuries we would have not even been able to feed the populations we do today.

Nor are we nearly as sensitive to environmental temperature changes.  It is true that the naked human being cannot survive extreme hot or cold, but humans within the context of the technologies they have developed have survived from the Arctic to the Equator.

I do not believe that any foreseeable human created change on this planet (as distinct from more natural catastrophes, such as an extraterrestrial impact, or a super-volcanic eruption) would present an insuperable challenge to human ingenuity.

The bigger human created risk to human survival seems to be our falling birth rate, and consequential skewed age distribution, in much of the developed world, which is gradually also spreading to much of the developing world.

Ofcourse, all life is dependent upon the ready availability of energy, and human success has been even more dependent upon even greater use of energy that other forms of life, and thus if we were to run out of energy, that would indeed cripple our ability to feed ourselves.  At present, although any individual energy source has a finite limit, there is no evidence that overall we are in danger of running out of energy, particularly if we are to embrace nuclear energy sources.

[VAlibrarian]

Hmm. While we agree on some points, our philosophies seem to be essentially at odds. My views proceed from an assumption that humans have a moral burden to protect the current biological system of planet Earth for our own survival as well as the survival of all other species (excluding roaches and smallpox, if you wish).
You seem to feel that there is no such moral burden, and that humans need to pursue whatever course they feel appropriate to further their own ends.
While we both see physical constraints to potential human humbers, you seem to feel that we are far from those constraints and that we will never reach them due to declining birth rates in much of the world. I note that we will tack on another 2 or 3 billion humans while we are reaching the actual point of zero population growth, and I feel that we are pretty close to fully exploiting our potential supplies of food now. You feel that our ability to generate food is only limited by our ability to generate energy. I might look with more favor on that concept if I thought it would not result in every square inch of North America being occupied by cornfields, factory farms for chickens, and houses for humans.  
I guess I will end my side of the discussion now. While I find it interesting I imagine many of the other readers do not. I really wish I had a time machine to go 100 years into the future and bring back evidence of how difficult conditions will be for our descendants. But doubtless you would wish to take the same trip in order to prove to me that we currently live in the "dark ages" in comparison to the marvels that time will hold for future human generations.

chris wiegard

[Andrew K Fletcher]

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php?t29285-100.html

Disquiet disbelief as a satellite views the fires of habitual environmental desiccation from a country Hell bent on self destruction.

All the red dots are fires and this does not relate only to Thailand, most of the countries and even continents can be seen blazing from satellites

Over 9.5 million suffer as drought spreads to 66 provinces
http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=29285

But it is not all doom and gloom!
Practical solutions are being debated on a lively discussion relating to the water shortages Thailand Now faces along with the current drought.

Invitation to anyone interested to bring in his or her thoughts and views, and see if some sense can come from this chaotic Armageddon madness.

One solution is a simple project titled “A Pocket Full of Acorns, designed to address Thailand’s declining natural forests by encouraging schools and parents to take an active roll in replanting trees in areas that are in need of some helping hands.

Another is to have a National Tree Planting Week

Native tree Seeds are given free by many forestry organisations, we just need to let people know how simple it really is to address the major environmental problems faced by Thailand today, to make sure Thailand has a tomorrow!

Andrew K Fletcher


"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."
K.I.S. "Keep it simple!"

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by VAlibrarian

My views proceed from an assumption that humans have a moral burden to protect the current biological system of planet Earth for our own survival as well as the survival of all other species (excluding roaches and smallpox, if you wish).
You seem to feel that there is no such moral burden, and that humans need to pursue whatever course they feel appropriate to further their own ends.

I have two issues on this.

Firstly, I see us as another animal, not a God, and so our responsibility is no greater nor less than that of any other animal, or any other living organism.  We are all equal.

Secondly, what do you mean by 'protect'.  If you were given care of a caterpillar, would protecting that caterpillar be regarded as keeping the caterpillar in its original juvenile state in perpetuity, or would you regard allowing a caterpillar to metamorphose into a butterfly to be consistent with protecting the caterpillar?

The point is that we have seen millions of caterpillars, and we know enough about their natural life cycle, that we may reasonably ask, and answer such a question.  We do not have an equivalent experience of other planets to be able to know what the natural life cycle of a planet in the state of age of the Earth would be.  Can we know that the changes that we are party to upon this Earth are anything other than the natural development of any planet similar to the Earth that is at this stage of its development?  Is it reasonable to presume that in trying to prevent developmental changes to the Earth that we are in fact dispensing our moral duty, or simply fighting against the natural maturation of a living organism?  Can we ever know the answer to such questions, and should we hastily jump to one conclusion or another in the absence of such knowledge?

quote:
You feel that our ability to generate food is only limited by our ability to generate energy. I might look with more favor on that concept if I thought it would not result in every square inch of North America being occupied by cornfields, factory farms for chickens, and houses for humans.

I cannot say what is true of North America, but in Europe, the present trend seems to be a reduction in the amount of land used in agriculture.  Yes, agriculture is becoming ever more factory farming, but it is learning to do so with ever less use of land.  Whether this is a good or bad thing is open to debate, but simply an acknowledgement of current trends as I perceive them.

quote:
 
While I find it interesting I imagine many of the other readers do not. I really wish I had a time machine to go 100 years into the future and bring back evidence of how difficult conditions will be for our descendants. But doubtless you would wish to take the same trip in order to prove to me that we currently live in the "dark ages" in comparison to the marvels that time will hold for future human generations.

I don't think it is an either or.

We are all creatures of our own time.  If, rather than moving forward 100 years, we were to swap places with one of our ancestors of 200 years ago (before the coming of the railway), and ask how well we could adjust to the time we had moved in to, and how well our ancestor would be able to adjust to our own time.  Each would be horrified by what they saw and what they had to endure.  Even though our ancestor might marvel at our technology, he would also be totally shocked by much of what is normal and commonplace to us, just as we would be shocked and horrified by all that was commonplace to him.

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by Andrew K Fletcher

Disquiet disbelief as a satellite views the fires of habitual environmental desiccation from a country Hell bent on self destruction.

All the red dots are fires and this does not relate only to Thailand, most of the countries and even continents can be seen blazing from satellites

Over 9.5 million suffer as drought spreads to 66 provinces
http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=29285

Fires are a natural part of the life cycle of forests.  If you want natural forests, then you will have natural forest fires.

Clearly, not all forest fires are caused by non-human sources; but if humans did not cause fires, then nonetheless sooner or later a natural fire of some sort would come along.

The question we have to ask ourselves (and I know that many people in North America are asking this question) is whether we should attempt to curtail this natural part of forest evolution, or just let it happen naturally.  The trouble is that as humans are ever more encroaching on forest land, so these fires (whether natural or man made) are ever more endangering human life.  Thus the political pressure is to try and prevent fire, even though this may actually mean undermining the natural processes of the forest.

Ofcourse, natural forest fires and fires used for land clearance are two distinct things.

quote:

Invitation to anyone interested to bring in his or her thoughts and views, and see if some sense can come from this chaotic Armageddon madness.

Your use of adjectives is interesting.

The natural world is chaotic.  A highly ordered world is either a dead world, or a highly artificial world.  There is much to be said for bringing order to the world, but the one thing that cannot be said is that such a world would be a natural world.

quote:

Native tree Seeds are given free by many forestry organisations, we just need to let people know how simple it really is to address the major environmental problems faced by Thailand today, to make sure Thailand has a tomorrow!

I would consider it highly naïve to believe that the planting of a few trees will in any way address any significant part of the environmental challenges faced by Thailand, or any other nation of the world.  Trees certainly wont prevent drought.

[Andrew K Fletcher]

First of all, the fires on the map are from people burning their rice stubble, and clearing out forested areas.
secondly, all the areas devoid of trees no longer receive the rainfall they used to.
thirdly, a handful of seeds in one persons hands will do little to address the massive environmental problems Thailand now faces. But a handful of seeds in the hands of a few thousand children can go along way to addressing it.

For example, if everyone in the U.K. planted one tree in the whole of their lives, it would give us an extra 6o million trees, these trees could then reseed themselves multiplying the initial 60 million by another 60 million trees and so on, but this requires a little more effort than most of the users of this world will donate.

Trees won't alter the climate?

artificial trees are milking the moisture from the coastlines of Mexico and many other areas, using a simple nylon net and pipework to provide running water for villages that do not get sufficient rainfall.

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."
K.I.S. "Keep it simple!"

[Andrew K Fletcher]

O and I forgot to add. The fact that the trees have been removed from the coastlines prevents moisture from crossing from the oceans on to the land and falling as rain, causing more inland forests to become tinder dry and bursting into flames.

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."
K.I.S. "Keep it simple!"

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by Andrew K Fletcher

Trees won't alter the climate?

artificial trees are milking the moisture from the coastlines of Mexico and many other areas, using a simple nylon net and pipework to provide running water for villages that do not get sufficient rainfall.

If the artificial trees are enough to precipitate water from the atmosphere, then we scarcely need real trees.  But in any case, all you are suggesting is that the artificial trees are precipitating rain, not that they can in any way create the moisture from which the rain precipitates.  If the are taking water out of the atmosphere, then they must inevitably leave less moisture in the atmosphere to fall as rain elsewhere.  Clearly, if one has a country where too much rain is falling in one place, and not enough in another, then this would be an adequate solution; but where one has too little rain over large areas, it is unlikely to make much difference.

That having been said, it is not clear that what you describe is really effecting rainfall as much as creating dew.  It is true that trees can also collect water in this way in arid environments, but this would not allow much water to be left over for human use, which is why the artificial trees would do better, since the do not actually need the water for themselves.

Looking specifically at the Thai problem, it seems that the monsoons from May to August, which Indian ocean, was if anything, slightly above normal rainfall for the time of year.  The problem seems more to do with the season from September onwards, which is normally dominated by rains coming from China.  This, I suspect, is totally outside of the influence of anything Thailand can do for itself, and probably has more to do with what is happening in China.  Whether this is just a part of the natural cycle of things, or a consequence of changing land use in China, is another question.

Given the enormous changes going on in China, both in terms of industrialisation, and in terms of damming rivers, and changing structure of farming in the country, one can imagine that it may well effect the nature of water evaporation going on in the country.

[VAlibrarian]

Another someone, as you are interested in correct definitions of terms, I have concluded that I must dispute your use of the term "challenge". You write that the Human Race always has surmounted challenges which come our way. I suppose the 20th century World Wars were challenges, and so was the Bubonic Plague.
I feel that it is inappropriate however to place global climate change into the category of "challenge". A challenge is something that looms up out of the darkness, demanding to be confronted. Global Climate change, on the other hand, strikes me as a self-inflicted cup of poison rather than a "challenge". Is it a challenge when you dig yourself a hole ten feet deep, jump in, and debate trying to crawl out?
Is it a challenge when someone warns you that your house is on fire, and you ignore them?
Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps there is actually an analogy to be drawn between the threat of global climate change and the "challenge" of Fascism in the 1930s. The United States was unwilling to confront Hitler until Japanese airplanes bombed Pearl Harbor, so why should we behave any differently now? We are quite talented at ignoring threats until an airplane drops a bomb on us, or flies into the World Trade Center. Denial is more convenient and less expensive in the short term. In the long term, however, denial fails.

I refer you to the case of Dr. James E. Hansen, an American climatologist who works for NASA and has issued many public warnings of global climate change over the past 17 years. His supervisors are now telling him to shut up, because George W. Bush does not wish to have climate change discussed in public: it annoys his friends in the Petroleum industry.


chris wiegard

[another_someone]

quote:Originally posted by Valibrarian

Is it a challenge when someone warns you that your house is on fire, and you ignore them?

I think you misunderstand my position on the matter.

I am not advocating ignoring any warnings.

I think your example above is a perfect example of my position.  If someone warns you that your house is ablaze, and all you have at your disposal is a bucket of water, you don't stand around to fight the fire, you let the fire take its natural course, and you act simply to protect yourself from its effects.

In many ways, asking whether the fire was your fault or not is an irrelevance, the only question you have to ask at that moment is whether you have the tools available to stop the fire or not.

The same issue ultimately must be the question regarding global warming, and it must be said that (even if it was a desirable outcome – since we don't know what the secondary effects of trying to stop the changes would be) I have not heard a single suggestion as to how we would stop global warming – the only scenarios I have heard have had about as much impact upon the final outcome as a bucket of water upon a house fire.

What we do know is that in part global warming is an effect that would have occurred even if humans were not on this planet, so even if we have had any effect upon the climate, it has at most only been to exaggerate something that was already a natural process.  That being the case, in order to stop global warming, simply stopping human activity would not be enough, we would have to also compensate for the natural events.  We simply don't have the capability to do this.

Thus, rather than waste resources by trying to throw a bucket of water over the fire, lets concentrate our resources on how one should build protection for ourselves against the inevitable.

I believe we do have the technical competence to protect ourselves from this fire, but I do believe it is futile to try and put the fire out, and we would be wasting valuable time and resources if they were thrown into such futility.

[sharkeyandgeorge]

im not as up on this topic as you all seem to be but would like to point out that trees act as stores of water after rain absorbing run off which would otherwise strip away topsoil and leech nutrients out of whatremains also theyre root systems bind the soil and keep it together and over time break down rocks to create more soil. as to moisture in any close forest the area between the tree canopy and the ground is very much cooler from the shade which helps retain moisture and has more moisture due to the fact that trees sweat water to keep cool adding to moisture in the air thats called transpiration and over a wide area such as a forest means a massive amount of water is put in to the air everyday.

"Defender of the Sea"

[VAlibrarian]

Okay, I will reply to your last posting in the same constructive mode that you use. How can we seek to address the threat of climate change, at the same time that we are working on understanding it more fully by means of scientific research? Answer: work at the same time to reduce the amounts of Carbon gases we release into the atmosphere yearly. Use financial incentives to encourage conservation, or use punishments to discourage waste. Truly, we can do nothing to condense the massive amounts of CO2 we pumped out over the past 50 years. But we are not yet even reducing our annual contribution of CO2. You have to start somewhere. I vote that the USA adopt a policy of reducing our use of fossil fuels, and demand that other nations including China follow our example. That would be far superior to our current polcy of refusing to sign any international agreements due to concerns that they might slow our economy, with the result that the Third World feels free to ignore the issue of climate change and tries to imitate our sad devotion to automobile culture, despite the fact that there is not enough oil left in the ground for all of them to have cars.  

I will admit that this may be inadequate as a means of avoiding climate change altogether. But isn't it better to do something to at least mitigate the process, rather than dedicating ourselves to making it worse?

chris wiegard