Best place to Live?

[Gatorboy]

Now that is funny -- believing in Global Warming. [img]/forums/images/icons/laugh.gif[/img]

[austi012]

It's pointless to argue. One of us is right and the other wrong.
Our great-grandchildren will know for sure. I hope for their sake I am wrong, because nobody's going to do a thing about it anyway.

[rbhollabaugh]

For those that would like to learn more about climate change and the effects humans are having on the climate:
http://www.ipcc.ch/
http://www.ipcc-nggip.iges.or.jp/
http://unfccc.int/

Listen to Michio Kaku's radio program via the net:
http://www.mkaku.org/

These are just a few areas, and is just the start. There is alot more.

This is not a topic the people in Washington want you to know about. It's a hot potato. To make the changes needed to try and stop global warming would require the immediate switch from fossil fuels to alternative non-poluting energy sources. No one will disagree that Bush and Cheney are tied to the oil industry. You can do the research on the net to make the connections. Follow the money trail.

This is about our children and grandchildren and the world they will live in. When they look back at what we(you) did to ruin the earth it will be a sad day in their lives. Do you have the courage to make the changes in your lifestyle? How do you want to be remembered after you are gone?

In the scientific community the debate on global warming is not whether it will happen but the degree to which it will happen. Even the best scenarios are devastating.

Rich

[Mosey]

"I hope for their sake I am wrong, because nobody's going to do a thing about it anyway."

Unfortunately, no one understands it well enough to know what to do, so we could actually make things worse thinking we're helping. Personally, I don't think global warming is an issue, just look at some of the temps about a century ago, record breaking highs. It all goes in cycles. It's almost Memorial Day weekend and we haven't even turned on the AC yet, which we normally have on about a month before Memorial Day.

[austi012]

The mechanism that is causing it is well understood: the intoduction of a lot of excess carbon in the atmosphere. You can test the mechanism in your own home.

Take 2 glass enclosures. In one, put ambient air in it and seal it. In the other, fill it with ambient air plus a certain higher percentage of CO2. Seal it. Place both containers in direct sunlight. Measure the temperatures in each and graph it. The container that has a higher percentage of CO2 will get warmer than the one that doesn't.

This mechanism is at work now. We are raising the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Consequently, a higher proportion of solar radiation that hits the planet is being converted to heat than before, as opposed to bouncing off.

The average temperature of the planet will rise. What isn't understood is exactly how the additional temperature that results will play out in specific locales. Some places will get a lot warmer. Others may not see much change, and others may even get colder. This is because of other local factors that may be more significant locally. For example, a location whose temperature is determined by the presence of a large lake may have its average ambient temperature fall because the lake is recieving much more glacial melt than it used to. Or the course of the jet stream could shift south (this is in fact happening), carrying cooler air from the north down to southern climes. In this scenario, the northern latitudes would feel much warmer than usual, but places south would feel cooler. There would still be a net temperature increase, when viewed globally. And again, this is being bourn out. The ice caps are melting. The permafrost in Alaska is thawing.

Global weather is the single most complex system we could try to understand. And because of its complexity, chaos theory states that certain effects cannot be modelled, or predicted.

Nevertheless, I have never seen a plausible argument against the proposition that Global mean temperatures are rising, and will continue to rise.

The solution is either to reduce the amount of CO2 being added to the atmosphere or find some mechanism for removing it from the atmosphere. Both would entail expense and inconvenience, which is why I think the human race is incapable of making a meaningful response in time.

[gauthier]

Well at least BUSH is tied to something,CLINTON was tied to what?If ole HILLERY ever does get to be president,[and with some of the people that we have in this country who vote its not impossible],I'm moving to IRAQ,it should have a great future now. RICHARD GAUTHIER

[Gatorboy]

Carbon dioxide is a minor greenhouse gas that occurs naturally in the atmosphere and helps to maintain the earth at a temperature suitable for life. Carbon dioxide is essential to the growth of all plants. Without it, plants could not grow and all animal life would consequently die.

The Earth has been warming erratically for 10,000 years (since the last ice age). That has been a good thing, because it's what made the regions far from the equator habitable. We can most likely expect this warming trend to continue -- no matter what we do about carbon dioxide.

Global Warming is just a term being used to scare people into buying into certain political agendas.

[egon]

The scientific community is well divided on the global warming issue. One side doesn't seem to get much publicity though.

Egon

[austi012]

40 tons of free carbon a second are being released into the atmosphere. Up until the very recent past, this was never the case in the history of the planet.

No independant (read, not Industry sponsored) study for the last 20 years has generated anything that contradicts the global warming prediction. Not one.

There's a political agenda at work all right. And it's being funded with petrodollars.

At this point, I have the same opinion of a scientist who claims global warming is illusory as I do of the "scientists" who claimed for years that smoking had nothing to do with cancer.

[rbhollabaugh]

Gatorboy,

I'm sure Fallston, MD is a nice place to live now but in as soon as 50 years your property may be beachfront property - No matter what the cause of global warming is. You may not be around to see this but your children will.
Please read the links I posted in a prior message. Read the Kyoto protocol which was written by the worlds top scientists. It's not written like some legal document - it's a fairly easy read and gets right to the point. If you still think it's all smoke and mirrors then perhaps I've missed something.
Even the Bush admin admits that global warming is real. They just choose to ignore it. It would cause economic problems for the industries that have bought and paid for them.
Go to the horse's mouth - http://www.nsf.gov/start.htm
Do a search on their web site for global warming.
The NSF is the group that had the task of preparing the latest reports for Bush.
Here's another link on climate change and oil: http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/

Rich