Denial...was CC- What do we know, when did we know it?

[Smidge204]

Those politicians and pundits who deny AGW (and while they are at it also evolution) are not idiots, they are being paid to lie.
Also, they need to reinforce a parallel view of reality (the one presented every day on faux news) which keeps the people who vote for them in a constant state of denial and paranoia.

Maybe not all of them. Some people just can't handle having their worldview challenged and will defend it to the death even if it's demonstrably wrong. See also: Religious Fundamentalism.

I grant you that a good number of them are benefiting from their denialism, but it's entirely possible they actually believe what they are selling - it is then technically not a lie, but a delusion. Hanlon's Razor cuts deep.
=Smidge=

[Yodrak]

The elephant in the room is: the biggest driver of climate change is a growing population ... . I wouldn't exactly expect to see a line of volunteers to reduce the problem in short order.

[walterbays]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html

Richard Muller, a respected physicist at the University of California, Berkeley, used to dismiss alarmist climate research as being “polluted by political and activist frenzy.” Frustrated at what he considered shoddy science, Muller launched his own comprehensive study to set the record straight. Instead, the record set him straight.

[Fabio]

Science and data converted a conservative skeptic. It's getting lonely at the other side of the GW debate.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/ ... story.html

Richard Muller, a respected physicist at the University of California, Berkeley, used to dismiss alarmist climate research as being “polluted by political and activist frenzy.” Frustrated at what he considered shoddy science, Muller launched his own comprehensive study to set the record straight. Instead, the record set him straight.

[Pipcecil]

Honestly, I can be sometimes conflicted both ways. I delve alot more into air quality than most and run the standard air quality models (Mobile & Moves). The scary part about all these models? They really are just best guesses. They base emissions factors and other base data on traffic, travel miles, etc. Thats pretty....not exact. The worst part, these models are ment for regional air quality yet many use them for micro levels (so wrong) and macro country wide, or hemispheric data (very VERY wrong). Some data for GW and GHG (Green House Gas) emissions uses these models on a hemispheric or global scale which most likely produces bad results as these models are calibrated or verified for this use. The global climate models, while a significant step better than the other 2 for hemispheric and global air quality are still using some base data how these more regional models use, thus, it starts to question how accurate these really are.

Scareier still, ask any air quality specialist how Ozone is formed, not basic but the multiple chemical reactions involved with bad air quality to make it. No one knows. Seriously. We don't. We know its a process that takes anywhere from 10-100 different chemcial reactions mixed with the heat of the sun. We know the chemcials invovled, but we have no clue how it gets to the Ozone point. We know so very little, yet we have been studying this for years! GHG emissions are new and there is a similar complex process to create the global warming, but seeing how little we know on stuff thats been problems for years, it really makes me question how much they really know on GHG emissions (btw our base calcluation for GHG emissions: vehicle miles traveled, thats it..so basic).

Now, Carbon Dioxide is the largest HUMAN source GHG emission we know of (there are other minor ones like methane, etc. but they aren't worth mentioning since they take up a small portion), BUT CO2 is NOT the largest GHG emission, not by far. Water Vapor is the largest GHG gas (by far) and is completely out of our control which is why we concentrate on CO2 (#2 behind water vapor) since we control it (something to strain your brain about: if fuel cell cars become mainstream, would the tailpipe emission of water vapor cause an increase in global warming?). So even now, we are concentrating on a gas thats not responsible for most of the regional climate changes we have recorded.

All-in-all we need better facts. Our climate and air quality models are pretty crappy since we don't really understand how it all works. BUT we do know the end results of things like ozone and what chemicals are needed to make that. We do know temperature is increasing (human source? coming ice age?), but we need more hard data (actually more prehistoric data). As a scientist I must concede that the opponents of GW have a point, we don't have enough hard factual data I would be happy betting my results on. From an ecology standpoint of view to say one model and we understand the biosphere AND we know what the problem is is complete arrogance to me. So many studies and "corrections" have been done with animal populations, ecosystems, etc. were we try and introduce or correct something and we mess it up WAY WAY more, from those examples there is absolutely no way we can safely say we understand enough of the entire ecosystem of our biosphere to get these results. There are 7 know really bad mass quanitity polutants the EPA tracks (called NAAQS). Then there are 87 MSAT pollutants that are usually in more smaller quantities but are just as bad. All of these are KNOWN to have health problems associated with them.

In the end I see no need to focus just on GHGs or climate change. Just reduce air pollution period. If we stop carbon monoxide, lead, particulate matter, benzyne, and all the other bad junk, CO2 will reduce too. Why focus on something people question when you can get the same clean-up results focusing on stuff we know is bad.

[jimcmorr]

Seems a climate change skeptic has converted himself...

http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2 ... rming-real

[Fabio]

On the argument Water Vapor vs. CO2:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/water-v ... ediate.htm

Now, Carbon Dioxide is the largest HUMAN source GHG emission we know of (there are other minor ones like methane, etc. but they aren't worth mentioning since they take up a small portion), BUT CO2 is NOT the largest GHG emission, not by far. Water Vapor is the largest GHG gas (by far) and is completely out of our control which is why we concentrate on CO2 (#2 behind water vapor) since we control it (something to strain your brain about: if fuel cell cars become mainstream, would the tailpipe emission of water vapor cause an increase in global warming?). So even now, we are concentrating on a gas thats not responsible for most of the regional climate changes we have recorded.

[smkettner]

I am still waiting to see the effect of one of the super volcano eruptions that happens every 10,000 + years and cools the earth by a full degree or more.
Otherwise the world has always fluctuated in temperature. We have adapted over the last million + years and I think we will continue to do same.
No worries.

[Yodrak]

Agreed.

I am still waiting to see the effect of one of the super volcano eruptions that happens every 10,000 + years and cools the earth by a full degree or more.
Otherwise the world has always fluctuated in temperature.

Life on earth in general has adapted, for as long as it's existed. But most individual species have not adapted and "we", the human species, which has not been around for "the last million + years", have big worries. There are now so many of us that if climate change significantly reduces the amount of inhabitable land mass we are not all going to fit comfortably. We'll adapt all right, by reducing our numbers, and the mechanisms that bring about that reduction in numbers are not likely to be pleasant. But with luck, the reduction will not be as large as it was for the dinosaurs, or the wooley mammoths, or the numerous othe species that succombed to past climate changes.

We have adapted over the last million + years and I think we will continue to do same.
No worries.

[Yodrak]

I observe that all readily available fossil fuels are essentially a mixture of just two elements, carbon and hydrogen, in various combinations ranging from 100% carbon (coal) to 1 part carbon and 4 parts hydrogen (methane, the primary constituant of natural gas). So the combustion of any fossil fuel produces only two end products, carbon dioxide and water vapor, again in varying amounts depending on the fuel. (Trace elements in the fuels and their combustion products ignored for the purposes of discussing the main actors in the drama.)

The paragraph quoted below causes me to wonder (tongue firmly in cheek) should we be burning as much coal as possible to minimize the use of oil and natural gas and so minimize the production of the largest GHG emission?

Now, Carbon Dioxide is the largest HUMAN source GHG emission we know of (there are other minor ones like methane, etc. but they aren't worth mentioning since they take up a small portion), BUT CO2 is NOT the largest GHG emission, not by far. Water Vapor is the largest GHG gas (by far) and is completely out of our control which is why we concentrate on CO2 (#2 behind water vapor) since we control it (something to strain your brain about: if fuel cell cars become mainstream, would the tailpipe emission of water vapor cause an increase in global warming?). So even now, we are concentrating on a gas thats not responsible for most of the regional climate changes we have recorded.