Global Warming - It's Our Fault

[BawanaRik]

Above and beyond the average first world human, of couse. Actually, he probably expends less when drumming because of the opportunity cost of having to not use the television or computer that he'd otherwise be sucking juice off the grid with.

And herein lies the crux of the bisquit.

 

[skychief]

... but even if we kill ourselves with the way we treat the planet to sustain our needs, we will also kill every last living things with us. It will take a lot of time and maybe this planet won't be able to sustain life again, maybe once we will have cut the last tree and kill the last cow there won't be anything left.

I disagree.

You are not considering the largest part of our planet's biomass which is all the organisms which live in the oceans. There are billions of mammals and likely trillions of non-mammal sea organisms.

Man(kind) just doesn't possess the knowledge or the resources required to eff things up bad enough to snuff out all life in the biosphere. But we could make things pretty miserable for land-based creatures (and birds). imo.

 

[Tituscrow]

As this guy (^) said in post #4

 

[BawanaRik]

I disagree.

You are not considering the largest part of our planet's biomass which is all the organisms which live in the oceans. There are billions of mammals and likely trillions of non-mammal sea organisms.

Man(kind) just doesn't possess the knowledge or the resources required to eff things up bad enough to snuff out all life in the biosphere. But we could make things pretty miserable for land-based creatures (and birds). imo.

Mostly, in my opinion, we'll make thing pretty miserable for oursleves

 

[BawanaRik]

As I said in post #4.

And what's the best way to do that?

 

[BawanaRik]

As I said in post #4.

And yet we spend tens of trillions of dollars to encourage the creation of Planet Destroying Pollution devices.

Please explain the logic to that

 

[Tituscrow]

And yet we spend tens of trillions of dollars to encourage the creation of Planet Destroying Pollution devices.

Please explain the logic to that

Huh? I was referring to the point that Munji and jmatt made about the fact that we will all be dead by the time things get seriously bad, which I'd happened to mention in post #4.

 

[Munjibunga]

Actually most scientists believe that life on earth will exist for another 1.75 billion years.

A crude link, but one found rather hastily:

Link Removed

Yeah, I saw that somewhere. Of course, that assumes that the interval is not punctuated by the sundry catastrophic event (asteroid, widespread volcanism, etc.). There have been several extinctions that wiped out 75 to 95 percent of all species on earth, but life seems to be pretty persistent. Of course, nothing will survive the slow, agonizing death of the sun. If we humans don't extinct ourselves, we should be able figure out a way to go somewhere else in the next million years or so. But first we have to stop killing each other for stupid reasons.

 

[Munjibunga]

Huh? I was referring to the point that Munji and jmatt made about the fact that we will all be dead by the time things get seriously bad, which I'd happened to mention in post #4.

That's the kind of thing the news media would pick up on a slow news day: "THE WORLD'S ENTIRE POPULATION WILL BE DEAD BY 2130!" or "SIX BILLION PEOPLE WILL DIE IN THE NEXT 100 YEARS!"

 

[BawanaRik]

Huh? I was referring to the point that Munji and jmatt made about the fact that we will all be dead by the time things get seriously bad, which I'd happened to mention in post #4.

Originally Posted by jmattbassplaya View Post
That's part of the argument as to why we should work to lower our impact on the environment. We might not be here but our children will be.

Here's the quote you were referring to.

Thanks for the chance to clear that up. If you wish any more information please just ask. No need to uh?

And before you inquire my post was an attempt to make it clear that we have a choice in the matter if we decide to act rationally.

 

[BawanaRik]

That's the kind of thing the news media would pick up on a slow news day: "THE WORLD'S ENTIRE POPULATION WILL BE DEAD BY 2130!" or "SIX BILLION PEOPLE WILL DIE IN THE NEXT 100 YEARS!"

It's front page news

 

[will33]

The earth will come out of it just fine. The only question is, "will people come out of it just fine, or at all?"

Whatever side of the global warming debate you come down on, I don't know anybody who would cut down the last tree, kill the last cow, etc. Most people realize there will be other people around here after they're dead and gone who need this stuff.

 

[96tbird]

I see this as an huge business opportunity: at last, I will be finally able to sell ice to the Inuit! (That's Eskimos to you that are not yet on the pc bandwagon).

 

[BassyBill]

Yeah, I saw that somewhere. Of course, that assumes that the interval is not punctuated by the sundry catastrophic event (asteroid, widespread volcanism, etc.). There have been several extinctions that wiped out 75 to 95 percent of all species on earth, but life seems to be pretty persistent. Of course, nothing will survive the slow, agonizing death of the sun. If we humans don't extinct ourselves, we should be able figure out a way to go somewhere else in the next million years or so. But first we have to stop killing each other for stupid reasons.

It's always interesting to speculate on the future of our species. If we could see the distant future, it's a simple and uncontroversial fact that there won't be any Homo sapiens around, that's for sure. Whether we have any descendants or not after our own species is extinct is something as yet undecided. But go a bit further forward, and the whole party's over anyway.

 

[fhm555]

And that's exactly my point. We could end up having a future society where everyday people are told what they can and what they can't do individually with regard to energy usage. Meanwhile the elites would continue to do as they please.

We are already living in such a system. It's called a free market economy. If you can afford a hummer and can afford to put gas in that hummer, you are free have a hummer. If you can't afford a hummer or afford to put gas in that hummer you can't have a hummer.

If you don't have the cash to buy and maintain a hummer, you can't have it no matter how bad you want it.

Same applies to everything else, if you can't afford ribeye, you eat SPAM no matter how bad you may want ribeye.

The only flaw in this system is the way government gets paid to favor those with more cash, or the way bad things are ignored because of the profit they generate for their owners.

Ever heard of clean coal? It didn't exist until a serious effort was made to reduce our dependency on coal fired power generation. All of sudden the owners of coal mining interests and energy generation companies mobilized into a PR campaign to sell the idea of clean coal to the general public by couching it in patriotism. After decades of trying to stay off the public radar, coal and coal fired electricity suddenly decided it was time to "educate" the public on the environmental benefits of burning coal to produce electricity when the exact opposite is a proved fact.

But I guess it would be a tough sell to mount a PR campaign to the effect of "use coal because if you don't my huge personal fortune will dwindle" with any realistic expectation of success. It's as pathetic as American auto makers believing we would continue to buy outdated technology at high prices for no other reason than it was not made in Japan or Germany.

 

[duff beer]

You're welcome. I still find it odd that all the nations that were targeted were Asian.

Would you care to clear that up?

Are you deliberately being difficult, or are you simply uneducated? Those countries were targeted because they are high polluters, not because they are Asian.

Is that clear enough for you?

 

[BawanaRik]

The earth will come out of it just fine. The only question is, "will people come out of it just fine, or at all?"

Whatever side of the global warming debate you come down on, I don't know anybody who would cut down the last tree, kill the last cow, etc. Most people realize there will be other people around here after they're dead and gone who need this stuff.

But someone did cut the last tree down on Easter Island. And someone also cut the last stand of trees down in the Fertile Cresent. The home of what is modern humanity.

Many people realize there are going to people around after we are gone. . I would wager many if not most do not care.

 

[fmoore200]

Many people realize there are going to people around after we are gone. . I would wager many if not most do not care.

Yeah, screw those suckers! First come, first serve baby!!

 

[BawanaRik]

Are you deliberately being difficult, or are you simply uneducated? Those countries were targeted because they are high polluters, not because they are Asian.

Is that clear enough for you?

Mulleyeo

Here's some other opinions.

Link Removed

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/env_co2_emi-environment-co2-emissions

 

[BawanaRik]

We are already living in such a system. It's called a free market economy. If you can afford a hummer and can afford to put gas in that hummer, you are free have a hummer. If you can't afford a hummer or afford to put gas in that hummer you can't have a hummer.

If you don't have the cash to buy and maintain a hummer, you can't have it no matter how bad you want it.

Same applies to everything else, if you can't afford ribeye, you eat SPAM no matter how bad you may want ribeye.

The only flaw in this system is the way government gets paid to favor those with more cash, or the way bad things are ignored because of the profit they generate for their owners.

Ever heard of clean coal? It didn't exist until a serious effort was made to reduce our dependency on coal fired power generation. All of sudden the owners of coal mining interests and energy generation companies mobilized into a PR campaign to sell the idea of clean coal to the general public by couching it in patriotism. After decades of trying to stay off the public radar, coal and coal fired electricity suddenly decided it was time to "educate" the public on the environmental benefits of burning coal to produce electricity when the exact opposite is a proved fact.

But I guess it would be a tough sell to mount a PR campaign to the effect of "use coal because if you don't my huge personal fortune will dwindle" with any realistic expectation of success. It's as pathetic as American auto makers believing we would continue to buy outdated technology at high prices for no other reason than it was not made in Japan or Germany.

Herein lies a wealth of knowledge.

Can't afford a Hummer so you don't get one. And that's a bad thing?

Personally I can think of nothing that reflects what is wrong with the world today, with a few exceptions that are beyond the scope of TB, than a Hummer. And here you use this as an example of what everyone deserves. I disagree. In fact if you email me I tell you waht to do with these monstrosities and their owners.

Same with "RibEye". I suggest you investigate the environmental impact of that "ribeye" you wish to offer to the masses. And really anyone is the US that can't come up with 5 or six bucks to afford this hyper lux item needs to evaluate their life. Beans are a few pounds for 5 bucks and rice is about the same.

(BTW get good rice. Go to an Asian market and watch what they buy. )

And Guilt Free! Not to plug his books again but Jared Diamond seems to think that there are 3 orders of magnitude more environmental impact with a pound of "RibEye" and a pound of beans. And it's healthier than MickeyDees!

Clean Coal? Isn't that what they burn for those Coal Fueled Cars like the Leaf?

Just the fact that anyone would consider a Hummer of the auto variety and a 'RibEye" basic life goods shows just what the issue is. And how hard it will be to educate people to engage in a sustainable future.