Any one see Al Gores talk about Global Warming on Oprah ... He has a New Documentary film and I think a book with all proceeds going towards the cause of Global Warming ..You can rent the DVD on Netflix . "An Inconveinent Truth" is the name of it .. I had to sit down and watch and listen to him yesterday . I'm not down with him Politicly but as someone who's been studying Global Warming he says the last 50 years, he has some scary stuff to say . All coming alot sooner than predicted.. Lot of pics of Greenland with major Ice melting in recent years .. Says 9-11 memorial could soon be well under water .. All due to CO2 emissions world wide but led by the USA.. Can be avoided by doing small things and using certain products but must be a world effort . I'm not an expert on the subject just passing info that may be of intterest and affecting us all .. He says Large energy interest coal, oil,are already combating him ,,but he,s not alone on this by a long shot ,, Major scientific warnings ,,warmer climates,, dryer climates,, warmer oceans ,, more powerful ocean affects on storms, He said scientist tied to special intterest say there's no problem,, much like the early cigarette doctors who said there's no proof smoking is bad for you .. 100's of thousands of deaths later we know better and still learning.. Sounds like its time to get the head out of the sand ..

Any one see Al Gores talk about Global Warming on Oprah ... He has a New Documentary film and I think a book with all proceeds going towards the cause of Global Warming ..You can rent the DVD on Netflix . "An Inconveinent Truth" is the name of it .. I had to sit down and watch and listen to him yesterday . I'm not down with him Politicly but as someone who's been studying Global Warming he says the last 50 years, he has some scary stuff to say . All coming alot sooner than predicted.. Lot of pics of Greenland with major Ice melting in recent years .. Says 9-11 memorial could soon be well under water .. All due to CO2 emissions world wide but led by the USA.. Can be avoided by doing small things and using certain products but must be a world effort . I'm not an expert on the subject just passing info that may be of intterest and affecting us all .. He says Large energy interest coal, oil,are already combating him ,,but he,s not alone on this by a long shot ,, Major scientific warnings ,,warmer climates,, dryer climates,, warmer oceans ,, more powerful ocean affects on storms, He said scientist tied to special intterest say there's no problem,, much like the early cigarette doctors who said there's no proof smoking is bad for you .. 100's of thousands of deaths later we know better and still learning.. Sounds like its time to get the head out of the sand ..

just watched it last week Eddie.....food for thought.....

The real question is. Obviously something will be done, laws made etc. But will it be too late?

As slowly as the gears of Government turn? Yup! It'll be too late!

I never liked the Man, but have gained a lot of respect for him after reading his stuff. He is the real deal and what he is talking about is coming real fast.

I watched a film on Greenland and the loss of ice, It is real scary. If we are looking for access to the shoreline, we may gain a heck of a lot of it in the next century if we continue to damage our surroundings:smokin: .

Any one see Al Gores talk about Global Warming on Oprah ... He has a New Documentary film and I think a book with all proceeds going towards the cause of Global Warming ..You can rent the DVD on Netflix . "An Inconveinent Truth" is the name of it .. I had to sit down and watch and listen to him yesterday . I'm not down with him Politicly but as someone who's been studying Global Warming he says the last 50 years, he has some scary stuff to say . All coming alot sooner than predicted.. Lot of pics of Greenland with major Ice melting in recent years .. Says 9-11 memorial could soon be well under water .. All due to CO2 emissions world wide but led by the USA.. Can be avoided by doing small things and using certain products but must be a world effort . I'm not an expert on the subject just passing info that may be of intterest and affecting us all .. He says Large energy interest coal, oil,are already combating him ,,but he,s not alone on this by a long shot ,, Major scientific warnings ,,warmer climates,, dryer climates,, warmer oceans ,, more powerful ocean affects on storms, He said scientist tied to special intterest say there's no problem,, much like the early cigarette doctors who said there's no proof smoking is bad for you .. 100's of thousands of deaths later we know better and still learning.. Sounds like its time to get the head out of the sand ..


Just keep in mind that there is not a consensus that people are causing global warming. There's a fairly loud minority out there, but some, including myself when I researched it 5 years ago, feel that the "proof" is pretty thin. Also, these people tend to reference each other in their publications. I found myself going around in circles when I tried to follow their sources.

What's not up for debate is that there have been drastic climate changes before people were ever around i.e. the ice ages.

It's very easy to believe things that seem reasonable. Pollution is bad, therefore pollution can cause global warming. Just be careful. It took the FDA 15 years to re-approve silicone breast implants because of hysteria-based faulty logic. In the end, the statistics proved the truth beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Here there is no way to do that, there's no way to prove what the temperature of the earth will be in X years, so it's easy for people to create a lot of fear with little in the way of facts. Similarly, the other side can't point to indisputable facts that it's not going to happen, they can only disagree with the alleged evidence.

Just keep in mind that there is not a consensus that people are causing global warming. There's a fairly loud minority out there, but some, including myself when I researched it 5 years ago, feel that the "proof" is pretty thin. Also, these people tend to reference each other in their publications. I found myself going around in circles when I tried to follow their sources.

What's not up for debate is that there have been drastic climate changes before people were ever around i.e. the ice ages.

It's very easy to believe things that seem reasonable. Pollution is bad, therefore pollution can cause global warming. Just be careful. It took the FDA 15 years to re-approve silicone breast implants because of hysteria-based faulty logic. In the end, the statistics proved the truth beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Here there is no way to do that, there's no way to prove what the temperature of the earth will be in X years, so it's easy for people to create a lot of fear with little in the way of facts. Similarly, the other side can't point to indisputable facts that it's not going to happen, they can only disagree with the alleged evidence.

Its real, its happening, I work in a lab that studies climatology and my gf is working on her phd on it as well. its true that in the past there have been perterbations in climate, consisting of warming and cooling periods, but never on the scale and the pace that is occuring now. One of the biggest effects is that the CO2 in the atmosphere is being absorbed into the oceans forming carbonic acid which attacks calcium carbonate, which is what makes up most shells and coral reefs.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/276613_coral06.html

one thing that non-scientists often site is that the proof of global warming is only a "theory." to the general public "theory" doesn't necessarily mean fact, but from a scientific perspective a theory is about as solid as you can get. not long ago i was a skeptic myself about the effects of global warming thinking that the earth was just in a warming cycle. but through reading papers and speaking with many people MUCH smarter then me at WHOI where I work, and at other research institutions, who have been studying this for a long time, they have convinced me.
the reason the papers continually cite the same people is that these people are experts in the field and are working on these problems non-stop so they continue to produce papers.
I have not seen the Gore video, I would like to. but from what I hear it is pretty accurate. The time scale at which these things are occuring might be slightly slower then is implied but they will happen. ice is melting and sea level is rising.

Something extremely disasterous has to happen eventually just to keep the balance of things. It's not necessarily the things we're doing. Most of the worlds problems are coming from POPULATION. No matter what, eventually something drastic must happen. It's harsh but based on earth's reoccuring cycles so its true... all i know is i'll be dead before any of it happens, so as Johnny Cash would say "What do i care."

And i think it's stupid that Al Gore is trying to take credit, so he can say i told you so. His ideas are stolen (plagarized), just like most peoples opinions.

Take away 1/2 the worlds population and it will solve more problems than anything, unfortunately man can't do it, so the environment has to; because people don't have any self control. That's just the Nature of the Beast.

but that's just my opinion, but at least i came up with it and didn't have to "borrow" it.

oh and by the way, I invented the internet :hihi:


:soon: ---------------> :behead:

Who is to say that the global warming is not a natural progression of the evolution of this planet or the solar system in general? Man can't even predict this afternoons weather with any degree of accuracy let alone know how the atmospere surrounding our earth is changing due to man or on its own accord! They have been studying it for what??? Maybe 60 years and how much of that time have they really been serious about it??? Maybe half that time?? Give them another 30 years and they will have another "theory"!:doh:

Tagger... U watch Oprah? :eek:

I would say that in part it is a natural progression, but we are speeding the progression. I also believe that the earth has been through a lot more, and soon any and all human existance will be wiped free either from man made destruction or natural causes and after another 5-7 hundred million years life will reinvent itself again. its happend before in the earths cycle and it will continue to happen. i have no solution for stopping global warming, as someone said the earth is overpopulated, and thats a major issue. but i know for sure that humans are speeding the process of global warming and it could very well be the end of human civilization as we know it. maybe not in our lifetimes, but in our childrens or childrens children if we continue to destroy the atmoshpere at the rate we have been.

I more believe that the natural evolution of the planet is whats going on....if politicians or guys like Al Gore would close their "hot air holes" more maybe that would go a long way towards helping!:rotf2:

Just kidding a bit! I think it is admirable what Al Gore is doing.....my hat is off to him!:btu:

I more believe that the natural evolution of the planet is whats going on....if politicians or guys like Al Gore would close their "hot air holes" more maybe that would go a long way towards helping!:rotf2:

Just kidding a bit! I think it is admirable what Al Gore is doing.....my hat is off to him!:btu:
jacka$$:bshake: :laugha: :kewl: :buds:

Saw him on Oprah, it was compelling. Not necassarily a Gore fan, but what he has to say here is worth our attention. This is something that in the end has no party line.
The pieces of ice blocks that Antartica is loosing are larger than the Rhode Island.
I'll have to make a point to watch the video and read the book.
Nice post.

Nightprowler,
You could argue that that happens on much shorter time scales than 500-700million years. We have had 5 major extinctions in the last 440mil yr. The causes range from bollide impacts (like what killed the dinosaurs) to flood volcanism that caused rapid warming, to rapid fall and rise of sea level in response to an ice-age...
Wheresmy50
Do I believe that we as a species have an impact on the planet; yes. As a geologist do I know that the earth has been warmer in the past you betcha. Look at the Cretaceous (~65Mil years ago) sea level was MUCH higher than today, most of North America between the Appalachians and Rocky mtns were flooded with a huge sea.. Whats the point of all this rambling...
On a geologic time scale we have seen more rapid and larger changes in climate; in our recorded history we have not. So if we are having an impact you're right NP, on the geologic time scale we're a flea on a dogs back and would/could be wiped out as a species, but since we deal with shorter timescales than that when talking about human lives I do agree we have something we need to worry about, but I still think the timescale you're talking about is a bit rapid (children's children's lifetime; I think nuclear war is a threat in that time scale not global warming) Probably the biggest threat of global warming would be slow change, as climate shifts, food production would decrease and shift North (think Canada growing oranges) which would slowly suffocate the species, not cause a catastrophic wipe-out for the species.

I suppose the global warming by overpopulation could be likened to a huge cold empty function room....you walk in there its cold, and then as the room fills with people it warms to a point you can't stand it any longer! Thats not to mention the effects of all of the waste produced by so many...co2...emissions from cars etc.

A lot of smart people are wrong. When Bill cites John, and John cites Pete, and Pete cites Harry, and Harry cites Bill - somthing's up.

Look, it's great to try to predict the future, but take a look at your local 5-day forecast and tell me how accurate the 5th day turns out to be. Then tell me with a straight face that these people are predicting what the weather will be within 5 degrees (the magnitude of what we're talking about here) in 40 years. Bullchit.

You want to live longer, change the batteries in your smoke detector.

This is all politicians drumming up support by using something that's about a trillion times less likely to kill you than lack of exercise, smoking, car accidents, cancer, etc, etc, etc.

Good points Wheresmy50, all valid but I'm not talking killing people on a short time scale, I'm referring to gradual and negative shifts in our way of life as a species.. A bollide impact would cause rapid extinction, climate changes on this scale would not.
Are you familiar with and do you believe the ice-core records from Greenland that span 800K yrs of history and climate change? The present is the key to the past, and the past is the key to the future... and if you really read the literature most of the time people might cite each other but good scientists always cite and disprove the other theories, and most papers I have read do just that.

Tagger... U watch Oprah? :eek:

Hey did you forget Karl, he's gotta be hip to these Hollywood types

to get ideas for Rockin Friday Nites with Tagga. :hihi:


Problem with global warming, it's not just us but the expolding

population of the world. How are you going to get the third world

countries to stop air polution when they're trying to create an

economy to survive?

I thought global warming was responsible for last years hurricanes, and that we were supposed to see more Katrina type events? At least that is what I was led to believe by the news reports last year. They said this year was going to be bad for hurricanes. Looks like they did not predict the short term (one year) future very accurately. How can they predict the next 50 years with a better accuracy?

Thats why you cant believe the media, global warming is not directly causal to more and stronger hurricanes; it might have an impact but not on the short timescale of a few years. Same thing with sea level rise and erosion. Sea level will cause shoreline change, but the 7" of sea level rise since 1938 was a lot less erosion than the hurricane of 1938...

I thought global warming was responsible for last years hurricanes, and that we were supposed to see more Katrina type events? At least that is what I was led to believe by the news reports last year. They said this year was going to be bad for hurricanes. Looks like they did not predict the short term (one year) future very accurately. How can they predict the next 50 years with a better accuracy?


Get it right. George W. Bush was responsible for Katrina and all hurricanes under his presidency. He also blew up the levees in New Orleans, orchestrated the 9/11 attacks, knew about the tsunami and didn't warn SE Asia in time, caused the recent e-coli breakout and is currently planning a massive earthquake along until now dormant northeast fault lines.:wave:

Don't forget Mad Cow and Bird Flu too

Yeah, I left out the part about it being Bush's fault. I figured that was a given. What I want to know is how did he manage to keep the hurricanes away this year?

Yeah, I left out the part about it being Bush's fault. I figured that was a given. What I want to know is how did he manage to keep the hurricanes away this year?

Thats simple. Karl Rove purchased the Mid-Term Election Year Calm Weather Option for the Whitehouse Weather machine. Seems they were to cheap to spring for the Wildfire nulliifcation module though.

:fishslap: Too cheap? They have all that Haliburton and big oil money.

:fishslap: Too cheap? They have all that Haliburton and big oil money.

Yeah but they paid all that money to Diebold.

While I believe that we humans have a great impact on the climate, isn't the issue and the consequences to great to sit back and do nothing b/c there isn't a consensus on all of the evidence?

Tagger... U watch Oprah? :eek:

My wife does ... Came up from the cave and saw Al Gore talking and pointing to a large map . I thought it was funny Al doing the weather man bit until I listened . I don't feel educated enough on the subject to have a strong opion . I will be looking into it more and paying closer attention starting with this documentary . It spurred my interrest and just passing the info along . I do believe we are consuming all the earth resources at an alarming rate and man kind in general is similar to a cockroach overunning the planet . Just for the record ...Oprah is hot ,,,, with lots of make up that is .. without makeup ? :yak4: :yak:

Regardless of what position you take, here's my issue.

There certianly is debate as to how much influence man is having on atmospheric warming, but the energy industry and their right-wing mouthpieces are trying to kill the debate completely.

The net effect of this is that as a country or a planet we're simply not going to be prepared for very real threats to the global environement.

Additionally, there's tremendous potential for a US led Green Industry to bolster the US economy for decades, but this is being held back by those looking to bleed the Earth dry in the name of short-term profit.

Not only is this hurting economically, but it's continuing to fund the same middle eastern nations who are supporting terrorisim.

But say this to Rush Limbaugh and it's all just a liberal conspiracy :rolleyes:

-spence

First of all why is this not in Scuppers?

Second,for all that man contributes to the downfall of the environment there are two things left out of Al's "documentary".

The Earth ALWAYS warms before an ice-age and yes kiddies we are due.How do we this know this you may ask?Well besides revolving around the sun the Earth also moves in and out of the Galactic Plane(above or below the Disc we call the Milkyway).This "in and out" movement directly affects the distance of the Earth in Aphelion or Peraphelion.This phenomenon is easily read from rocks.

The second thing is that Earth is due for what is called a "flip-flop".This is the changing of the magnetic poles.This occurs at or around the same time as the onset of an Iceage.We are so close to a "flip-flop" we all may actually see it within our lifetimes.

These occurrences are facts.Al kinda forgot that.

Looks like the "inventor" of the Internet is running out of money and needs to sell himself.He's as much a joke as Bush.

Don't kid yourselves, there isn't a lot of argument in the scientific community, scientists are convinced that we are having a large impact here. Sure, natural climate change does happen, but it seems extremely likely that we're speeding the hell out of it. They know that CO2 insulates the atmosphere, keeps heat in. Think about all our cars, oil-burning homes, industries, slash-and-burn in the tropics, we're doubtlessly adding huge amounts to the atmosphere. Even if you believe there is some reason for doubt, I'd much rather err on the safe side,...and it'll do ourselves a lot of good in other ways, also. Renewable fuel sources would benefit us all tremendously, as well as help our ecosystems.
That comment about scientific theories is right on the money. Non-scientists confuse the word "theory" with the word "hypothesis". A hypothesis implies uncertainty, theory has to have a huge amount of supporting evidence. Scientists never say that anything is proven, by consensus, science leaves everything open to further testing. The opportunity for further testing is what gives science its credibility.
Adherents to the Intelligent Design hypothesis like to say that evolution is only a theory. It is fact, but called a theory because of the above reasons. That doesn't mean that there isn't a God, religion and science fit together very well if you don't develop a near-sighted case of tunnel vision.
If you don't have the training of the scientists who have the educational background and do that stuff for a living (biologists, geologists, chemists, environmental scientists, meteorologists...), then it would seem to me to be pretty naive to argue with them.
You wouldn't blindly go against the advice of your financial advisor about your retirement investments, or argue with your doctor about how to cure your possibly terminal case of cancer, would you? Leave the politics aside and use your sense of reason.

Don't kid yourselves, there isn't a lot of argument in the scientific community, scientists are convinced that we are having a large impact here. Sure, natural climate change does happen, but it seems extremely likely that we're speeding the hell out of it. They know that CO2 insulates the atmosphere, keeps heat in. Think about all our cars, oil-burning homes, industries, slash-and-burn in the tropics, we're doubtlessly adding huge amounts to the atmosphere. Even if you believe there is some reason for doubt, I'd much rather err on the safe side,...and it'll do ourselves a lot of good in other ways, also. Renewable fuel sources would benefit us all tremendously, as well as help our ecosystems.
That comment about scientific theories is right on the money. Non-scientists confuse the word "theory" with the word "hypothesis". A hypothesis implies uncertainty, theory has to have a huge amount of supporting evidence. Scientists never say that anything is proven, by consensus, science leaves everything open to further testing. The opportunity for further testing is what gives science its credibility.
Adherents to the Intelligent Design hypothesis like to say that evolution is only a theory. It is fact, but called a theory because of the above reasons. That doesn't mean that there isn't a God, religion and science fit together very well if you don't develop a near-sighted case of tunnel vision.
If you don't have the training of the scientists who have the educational background and do that stuff for a living (biologists, geologists, chemists, environmental scientists, meteorologists...), then it would seem to me to be pretty naive to argue with them.
You wouldn't blindly go against the advice of your financial advisor about your retirement investments, or argue with your doctor about how to cure your possibly terminal case of cancer, would you? Leave the politics aside and use your sense of reason.

:claps: :claps:

Basswipe...
yeah but... not really...
Baldwin is right, among most scientists there is little disagreement that there is warming occurring. They tend to bicker about rates of change, mechanisms causing it, whats forcing what to change etc.. There is little debate that things ARE changing

Magnetic reversals happen at random intervals w/in the geologic record, 4-5times/million years with times of that being much longer. These are not directly linked to ice ages.

As far as they other cycles your describing are Milankovitch cycles, which determine the precession (wobble of the North Pole) Axial tilt (tilt of planet and causes seasons) and Eccentricity which determines how oval the earths orbit is. These occur on time scales of 23K, 41K, 100K (with a second peak at 400K). You are right about the Aphelion or Peraphelion, and in ~10.5K years our winters will occur at the time when we are furthest from the sun (the opposite of now) which COULD shift us into a glacial stage.

These can and do have a profound impact on climate change, however these have been going on for Millions of years (I have seen rocks where it was believed to have an influence on their deposition 400+Million years ago) But we have not always had ice-ages. They occur at intervals throughout the geologic record; ~700Million years ago, 300Million years ago etc.. the current one is less than 3mil years old with several glacial and interglacial periods.

Yes we are probably in an inter-glacial period, however some would argue that was the Early-Holocene was the warmest period, 10000ish years ago. The last Glacial maximum was the Laurentide Icesheet, which was ~24K years ago and extended south of Block island.

Baldwin basically hit the nail on the head, go with the weight of evidence approach. If 99 Doc's tells you smoking causes lung cancer, you can choose to believe the 1 that tells you it doesn't. There will always be naysayers and disbelievers, and if they choose to use politics as their platform shame on them. What this did do was get people talking about global warming who might not have talked about it before. And hopefully it helped people realize that 'The day after tomorrow' was not going to be reality... changes wont happen that fast. I think the fastest change in the ice-cores are 4 or 5 Degrees C in a few decades.

RIRock while I essentially agree with a good portion of what you stated, but not all.

In the end Man only accelerates our inevitable return to an Iceage by a mere few hundred years,a blink of an eye in time.The time IS now.This is where Baldwin and I will disagree.Most scientists are not saying that Man is the major contributing factor to our planet getting warmer but that we are entering another massive global climatic change that heralds the next Iceage.Whether "non-scientists" know the difference between theory and hypothesis doesn't matter,the fact is time marches on and moves forward.The fact is Time says we are on the doorstep of our next Iceage and that the Earth gets very warm right before that happens.The rocks don't lie.


As far as magnetic reversal is concerned,"Flip-flops" absolutely occur around the same time as massive global climatic changes +/- a few million years and not at random but at a very regular interval almost timely according to most geologists.But when you take into consideration the age of the Earth(4 billion years) that +/- a few million ain't so big,it does coincide with massive climatic changes.
Again the rocks don't lie.

Umm..
as a geologist I am quite familiar with the fact that the rocks don't lie.

As far as the reversals; currently they happen 4-5 times every million years, yes we are due. But that doesn't mean we'll have one and it certainly does not mean it causes an ice-age! In climate change +/- a million years is everything. I could tell you that an Asteroid hit the Yucatan and +/- a few million years later the dinosaurs went extinct.

Do me a favor. quote your sources and let me get on your page and we'll talk.

Umm..
as a geologist I am quite familiar with the fact that the rocks don't lie.


as a public servant, I am quite familiar with the fact that the rocks don't speak english. :rotfl:

hehe j/k

Whether "non-scientists" know the difference between theory and hypothesis doesn't matter,the fact is time marches on and moves forward.
The problem is a lot of those "non-scientists" are really energy industry marketing firms :hee:

Like I said, I believe there's debate as to the total influence of man...but few believe that man isn't having a large influence.

Listen to Rush Limbaugh on this topic and it's no wonder people don't see the substance of the issue. The baseless claims and disinformation he spews forth is pretty amazing.

-spence