Poll: Global warming: what are your views?

[Internet Kraken]

Global threat is no immediate threat to my existence, and nothing dramatic will happen in at least a hundred years

Wrong. There are plenty of environmental threats (not necessarily global warming) that could have a direct impact on your life in far less than 100 years.

There's a much bigger chance of being hit by a bus than getting killed by environmental threats but you wont see anyone stressing about it. Also i can fall off a cliff, doubt that would count as the environment killing me though. My point is unless i breathe smoke and drink sewage no environmental threats pose a threat. Unless you count in volcanos, but that's hardly brought on by polution

You're simply wrong. There are many environmental problems (like plastic pollution) that could become a major threat if they are not dealt with. Ignoring them will not make them go away. And while they may not necessarily kill you, you will certainly notice their impact when the standards of your current life begin to decline as a result. Then you will probably regret not doing more to avoid contributing to these problems, rather than simply sweeping them under the rug and denying that they exist.


We all contribute to some environmental problems. It's nearly impossible not to. But if we understand these problems then we can lessen our impact. But ignoring them will not make them go away. It will just result in these problems coming back to haunt you later in your life, as many of them have the potential to do so.

 

[Inverse Skies]

Of course, it's not like climate change deniers ever lie, manipulate, and deny science. It's not like massively wealthy Oil Companies and Motor Manufacturers have any vested financial interest in the debate, do they?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cif-green/2009/dec/07/climate-change-denial-industry

Oh, yes, it seems they do. I'm particularly amused by the anti-global warming lobby whose own employed scientists stated global warming was scientifically undeniable, so they just buried the report and ran a PR campaign against it anyway.

* * *

No-one knows for sure what happened in the mass extinction events. You also need to consider that there could be a massive, sudden climate change because something else (i.e. a huge asteroid hitting the Earth) screwed up a climate that was otherwise happily going about its business, and mankind's activity could be one of those big, nasty causes.

So you can happily write off maybe one of the five major extinctions to a sudden climate shift due to an asteroid striking the Earth? It leaves a lot of grey area for the other events though. Whilst it is true that no-one can say exactly what happened in those events, if the prediction of climate change is correct then what does that mean for us? That we're not the cause of it.

It's interesting when you put "climate change" into say Google Scholar and get maybe two results out of the first one-hundred which might suggest something against climate change. For an unproven science that is a massively huge bias. I ask you this, if you were to obtain funding from the Australian Department of Climate Change (sadly, a real and completely unnecessary cabinet of Parliament) would it be easier to obtain funding by supporting, or denying climate change? Mind you Australia has a government in power which was trying to shove an Emissions Trading Scheme down our throats hastily before Copenhagen so they could say that they had more than seeking any real value out of it.

The whole problem with climate change is that it has never been a debate, it's been a one-sided affair right from the start. The hockey stick article you provided shows exactly that. It quotes;

"these uncertainties have sometimes been ignored or glossed over by those who have presented the hockey stick as evidence for global warming."

And therein lies the problem. Scientific data, which should have been peer-reviewed and debated until a definitive answer has been gotten, has indeed been used as the basis of a scare campaign against us and presented us with a debate which has one side and whose unfounded claims are not properly assessed. We don't know that climate change is happening, we can't be sure that we're the cause of it. Yet we still stumble blindly into things, like our government preparing to tax us for the emission of CO2. Madness. This whole debate about climate change hasn't been properly aired out yet, and until it does there are going to be a lot of problems in the future.

 

[Arcticflame]

Here's a thought - If man made climate change was on such shaky grounds, it would have been quashed a long time ago.

Think about it, these are scientists, the scientist that disproved climate change would have his career set, money, cred and fame would all be his. It's not like there aren't enough interest groups wanting firm evidence proving climate change to be incorrect - at the moment they're having to make do with propaganda and bogus science.

 

[CastIronWin]

yes global warming is real and it is a bit of a problem, in some parts of the world.
here in sunny england however the gradual rise in temperature means that we can grow more grapes and thus make more wine for ourselves, whats not great about that!

also global warming is going to become more and more neccessary if the population of the earth is to carry on growing as it is. warmer average climate means land that would otherwise be frozen would become availible for agricultural purposes because lets face it, famine on a global scale is more likely then the earth being heated to unliveable levels.

one last thing, the polar ice caps melting WOULD NOT cause the sea levels to rise by 7 meters. the archemides princlpe should explain this to those foolish few who actually believed al gore... dopey bastard!

 

[Internet Kraken]

Global threat is no immediate threat to my existence, and nothing dramatic will happen in at least a hundred years

Wrong. There are plenty of environmental threats (not necessarily global warming) that could have a direct impact on your life in far less than 100 years.

There's a much bigger chance of being hit by a bus than getting killed by environmental threats but you wont see anyone stressing about it. Also i can fall off a cliff, doubt that would count as the environment killing me though. My point is unless i breathe smoke and drink sewage no environmental threats pose a threat. Unless you count in volcanos, but that's hardly brought on by polution

You're simply wrong. There are many environmental problems (like plastic pollution) that could become a major threat if they are not dealt with. Ignoring them will not make them go away. And while they may not necessarily kill you, you will certainly notice their impact when the standards of your current life begin to decline as a result. Then you will probably regret not doing more to avoid contributing to these problems, rather than simply sweeping them under the rug and denying that they exist.


We all contribute to some environmental problems. It's nearly impossible not to. But if we understand these problems then we can lessen our impact. But ignoring them will not make them go away. It will just result in these problems coming back to haunt you later in your life, as many of them have the potential to do so.

I ignore them cause i didn't cause them, and i can't do anything to solve them. It's a problem for the big companies that are polluting EVERYTHING and nothing i say or do will make them stop earning billions of money at the cost of our health. I choose to ignore the problem and not contribute to it by not polluting anything. I understand its a much bigger problem in the big cities like London, Paris, Berlin, LA, NY etc , and can't really be ignored by its people, but over here its not that big of a problem. Most of us are as healthy as possible since most of the big factories are not in the city or are in secluded enclaves. Truth is pollution can't kill anyone, at least not over here where there's much less companies and corporations. The only threat is if fire falls from the sky, since there is no sea (thus no tsunamis) near my country, no tornadoes, no earthquakes, and its really cold in the winter, but nothing will happen in the near future, so why would i care what happens to people a hundred years from now, its not me that has destroyed the planet.

You're just ignoring what I said. Plastic pollution is a problem caused by people who dispose of their plastic products in improper ways, like you, as you openly admitted to not recycling. If you did recycle then you would not be contributing nearly as much to the problem.

And get off the idea that it's the big bad corporations that are polluting the world. The average citizen is just as responsible as they are. Whether it be by improper disposal of trash or frivolous waste of resources. We are all part of the problem and we all need to work towards the solution.

And again, many environmental threats could turn into major problems in your life time.

 

[Terramax]

The way I see it, anything that's man made is unnatural, and anything unnatural will always negatively effect the world one way or another. Regardless whether you believe in global warming or not, burning fossil fuels, dumping waste in the earth or the sea, etc, is not good for either ourselves or the planet and we need to find a solution/ alternative.

here in sunny england...

Hey, wait, 'sunny'? Do you live in an alternative reality? What's it like over there?

 

[Internet Kraken]

That's where your wrong mate, its not the average person's fault if they don't recycle. Were not the ones packaging items in materials that pollute and need to be recycled. Why should we use our time and effort to clean up after the corporations. No one is making them use metal and plastic to package drinks, they do it because they spend less money that way. We have to buy stuff and it is not our fault if that stuff is packaged in some material that can pollute the environment. We all pay for the things we buy, and deserve to not go to extra lengths to cover for someone else. What im saying is if everything came in bio degradable cardboard, wood and glass people wouldn't need to recycle to counter the irresponsibility's of the producers. Why should i be in constant debth to the people i buy stuff from, whats next will we have to make our own packaging?! Also we will talk about plastic pollution when it kills someone, until then its not an immediate threat, and is i think mostly caused by actresses and models (if you know what i mean ;-)

Plastic is a wonderful product though. It's cheap to produce, is an efficient and durable packaging material, and it provides many other useful functions. It's a good thing that big corporations use plastic. It is not a good thing that careless consumers just toss it around instead of disposing of it properly. That's the thing about plastic pollution; the people contributing to the problem are mostly the consumers, rather than the producers. If more people were aware of this we could reduce the amount of plastic pollution.

And people have died of plastic pollution many times, but that's irrelevant. We are already beginning to see the consequences of plastic pollution in marine environments, as many animals in some areas now suffer from it. If it continues to increase it could pose a major threat to the fishing industry, and if it does you will definitely notice. So unless you think our food being contaminated is not a problem, then you better stop pretending that you are not contributing to this.