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Post by franko on Jun 6, 2007 18:27:22 GMT -5
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Post by Cranky on Jun 6, 2007 18:57:12 GMT -5
Someone once said that we all have some "special" or above average abilities. Well, mine is a a well honed bullsh*t detector. This "human cause" of global warming BS made the needle go right off the scale.
Meanwhile.....
Politicians are spending OUR MONEY like never before and companies are jumping on the bandwagon to screw us even further. And the eco-Nazis will NEVER stop because it gives them CREDIBILITY and EMPOWERMENT.
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Post by CentreHice on Jun 6, 2007 22:54:04 GMT -5
 People say air conditioners contribute to global warming. I say, "Screw the grandkids...I'm hot NOW." |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 4:05:07 GMT -5
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Post by ropoflu on Jun 21, 2007 9:53:51 GMT -5
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Post by franko on Jun 21, 2007 10:14:28 GMT -5
action even if we don't know whether global warming is real or what it will look like. People say air conditioners contribute to global warming. I say, "Screw the grandkids...I'm hot NOW." Fact is, we don't act unless it affects us now. Then, when the threat is over, we return to normal what was comfortable. Easy to say "manufacturers need to stop what they are doing; if they don't, fine them". Not so easy to hear "it is going to cost everybody $3,000 a year to impliment necessary changes though increased direct costs and taxes". All of a sudden the health care system will once again become the most important issue of the day. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 14:16:04 GMT -5
www.break.com/index/tough-to-argue.htmlThe videos argument is at best, childish. And this is from a so called "Physics teacher". Even at the very WORSE scenarios, the Laws of Physics will not disappear. The seas rise but on the other hand, the atmosphere collect trillions of tons of humidity absorbing some of the rise. Law of physics. Where is all that humidity going to go? Fall on the deserts? Turning millions of square miles into arable land? Wow, tha really hurts. Droughts? How do you get droughts if the the humidity increases by such a huge amount? Warmer air holds more moisture. Laws of physics. Even the slowest eco-nazi morons should be able to understand that. Worse scnario is that we have a hundred million people displaced from very low lying shore areas. In the big scheme of things, so what. There will be just as much land opening up in African on arable land and even more in cold regions due to rising tempertures. Greenland will become habitable. The WORSE scnario is that there is no "end of humanity" as we know it. The worse scenario is that there will be SOME displacement from low lying regions and economic reprecussions. Even if we use the videos childish logic, we should burn down our house NOW just in case there is a small chance the house gets burned down. B*llsh*t. I ask again and again.... Where is the irrefutable proof that global temperture increase is DIRECTLY linked to increased carbon levels? Ïn fact, now MORE AND MORE paleoclimitologist (yeah, scientist) are moving away from linking the two. The arguement held some value when it was looked at in terms of millenia but if one gets down to centuries, it shows that carbon increased AFTER increases in global tempereture. Without that last "carbon" argumnent, the eco-Nazis have nothing left but......self deluding hot air.
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 14:21:51 GMT -5
Fact is, we don't act unless it affects us now. Then, when the threat is over, we return to normal what was comfortable. Easy to say "manufacturers need to stop what they are doing; if they don't, fine them". Not so easy to hear "it is going to cost everybody $3,000 a year to impliment necessary changes though increased direct costs and taxes". All of a sudden the health care system will once again become the most important issue of the day. That is when reality will set in the REAL science begins. right now, every politician on the planet is riding the global warming BS because it means MORE TAX MONEY. If you don't believe that, Quebec just introduced a bill that will suck $200 million from taxpayers pockets. And wait there is FAR MORE TO COME. At some point, that sucking down of the economy is going to start hurting and THEN people will start to ask the HARD questions. So far, the fake morality play is winning.....but wait for the reprecussions. |
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Post by BadCompany on Jun 21, 2007 14:56:25 GMT -5
If you don't believe that, Quebec just introduced a bill that will suck $200 million from taxpayers pockets. What are you talking about?? It's a tax levied on the oil companies, and our Finance Minister has politely asked them "not to pass that tax onto the consumer." I'm quite sure they'll respect that request, aren't you?  |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 15:23:15 GMT -5
www.break.com/index/tough-to-argue.htmlThe videos argument is at best, childish. And this is from a so called "Physics teacher". Even at the very WORSE scenarios, the Laws of Physics will not disappear. The seas rise but on the other hand, the atmosphere collect trillions of tons of humidity absorbing some of the rise. Law of physics. Where is all that humidity going to go? Fall on the deserts? Turning millions of square miles into arable land? Wow, tha really hurts. Droughts? How do you get droughts if the the humidity increases by such a huge amount? Warmer air holds more moisture. Laws of physics. Even the slowest eco-nazi morons should be able to understand that. Worse scnario is that we have a hundred million people displaced from very low lying shore areas. In the big scheme of things, so what. There will be just as much land opening up in African on arable land and even more in cold regions due to rising tempertures. Greenland will become habitable. Nice theory.... |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 15:26:08 GMT -5
The Earth today stands in imminent peril...and nothing short of a planetary rescue will save it from the environmental cataclysm of dangerous climate change. Those are not the words of eco-warriors but the considered opinion of a group of eminent scientists writing in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Published: 19 June 2007
Six scientists from some of the leading scientific institutions in the United States have issued what amounts to an unambiguous warning to the world: civilisation itself is threatened by global warming.
They also implicitly criticise the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for underestimating the scale of sea-level rises this century as a result of melting glaciers and polar ice sheets.
Instead of sea levels rising by about 40 centimetres, as the IPCC predicts in one of its computer forecasts, the true rise might be as great as several metres by 2100. That is why, they say, planet Earth today is in "imminent peril".
In a densely referenced scientific paper published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A some of the world's leading climate researchers describe in detail why they believe that humanity can no longer afford to ignore the "gravest threat" of climate change.
"Recent greenhouse gas emissions place the Earth perilously close to dramatic climate change that could run out of control, with great dangers for humans and other creatures," the scientists say. Only intense efforts to curb man-made emissions of carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases can keep the climate within or near the range of the past one million years, they add.
The researchers were led by James Hansen, the director of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, who was the first scientist to warn the US Congress about global warming.
The other scientists were Makiko Sato, Pushker Kharecha and Gary Russell, also of the Goddard Institute, David Lea of the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Mark Siddall of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University in New York.
In their 29-page paper, "Climate Change and trace gases", the scientists frequently stray from the non-emotional language of science to emphasise the scale of the problems and dangers posed by climate change.
In an email to The Independent, Dr Hansen said: "In my opinion, among our papers this one probably does the best job of making clear that the Earth is getting perilously close to climate changes that could run out of our control."
The unnatural "forcing" of the climate as a result of man-made emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases threatens to generate a "flip" in the climate that could "spark a cataclysm" in the massive ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland, the scientists write.
Dramatic flips in the climate have occurred in the past but none has happened since the development of complex human societies and civilisation, which are unlikely to survive the same sort of environmental changes if they occurred now.
"Civilisation developed, and constructed extensive infrastructure, during a period of unusual climate stability, the Holocene, now almost 12,000 years in duration. That period is about to end," the scientists warn. Humanity cannot afford to burn the Earth's remaining underground reserves of fossil fuel. "To do so would guarantee dramatic climate change, yielding a different planet from the one on which civilisation developed and for which extensive physical infrastructure has been built," they say.
Dr Hansen said we have about 10 years to put into effect the draconian measures needed to curb CO2 emissions quickly enough to avert a dangerous rise in global temperature. Otherwise, the extra heat could trigger the rapid melting of polar ice sheets, made far worse by the "albedo flip" - when the sunlight reflected by white ice is suddenly absorbed as ice melts to become the dark surface of open water.
The glaciers and ice sheets of Greenland in the northern hemisphere, and the western Antarctic ice sheet in the south, both show signs of the rapid changes predicted with rising temperatures. "
The albedo flip property of ice/water provides a trigger mechanism. If the trigger mechanism is engaged long enough, multiple dynamical feedbacks will cause ice sheet collapse," the scientists say. "We argue that the required persistence for this trigger mechanism is at most a century, probably less."
The latest assessment of the IPCC published earlier this year predicts little or no contribution to 21st century sea level from Greenland or Antarctica, but the six scientists dispute this interpretation. "The IPCC analyses and projections do not well account for the nonlinear physics of wet ice sheet disintegration, ice streams and eroding ice shelves, nor are they consistent with the palaeoclimate evidence we have presented for the absence of discernible lag between ice sheet forcing and sea-level rise," the scientists say.
Their study looked back over more than 400,000 years of climate records from deep ice cores and found evidence to suggest that rapid climate change over a period of centuries, or even decades, have in the past occurred once the world began to heat up and ice sheets started melting. It is not possible to assess the dangerous level of man-made greenhouse gases.
"However, it is much lower than has commonly been assumed. If we have not already passed the dangerous level, the energy infrastructure in place ensures that we will pass it within several decades," the scientists say in their findings.
"We conclude that a feasible strategy for planetary rescue almost surely requires a means of extracting [greenhouse gases] from the air."
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Post by ropoflu on Jun 21, 2007 15:55:24 GMT -5
And now a message from your favorite slow-eco-nazi-moron!
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A Climate Culprit In Darfur
By Ban Ki Moon
Washington Post
Saturday, June 16, 2007; A15
Just over a week ago, leaders of the world's industrialized nations met in Heiligendamm, Germany, for their annual summit. Our modest goal: to win a breakthrough on climate change. And we got it -- an agreement to cut greenhouse gases by 50 percent before 2050. Especially gratifying for me is that the methods will be negotiated via the United Nations, better ensuring that our efforts will be mutually reinforcing.
This week, the global focus shifted. Tough but patient diplomacy produced another win, as yet modest in scope but large in humanitarian potential. Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir accepted a plan to deploy, at long last, a joint United Nations-African Union peacekeeping force in Darfur. This agreement, too, is personally gratifying. I have made Darfur a top priority and have invested considerable effort, often far from public view, toward this goal.
Clearly, uncertainties remain. This deal, like others before it, could yet come undone. It could be several months before the first new troops arrive and longer before the full 23,000-member contingent is in place. Meanwhile, the fighting will probably go on, even if less intensely and despite our many calls for a cease-fire. Still, in a conflict that has claimed more than 200,000 lives during four years of diplomatic inertia, this is significant progress, especially considering that it has come in only five months.
It would be natural to view these as distinct developments. In fact, they are linked. Almost invariably, we discuss Darfur in a convenient military and political shorthand -- an ethnic conflict pitting Arab militias against black rebels and farmers. Look to its roots, though, and you discover a more complex dynamic. Amid the diverse social and political causes, the Darfur conflict began as an ecological crisis, arising at least in part from climate change.
Two decades ago, the rains in southern Sudan began to fail. According to U.N. statistics, average precipitation has declined some 40 percent since the early 1980s. Scientists at first considered this to be an unfortunate quirk of nature. But subsequent investigation found that it coincided with a rise in temperatures of the Indian Ocean, disrupting seasonal monsoons. This suggests that the drying of sub-Saharan Africa derives, to some degree, from man-made global warming.
It is no accident that the violence in Darfur erupted during the drought. Until then, Arab nomadic herders had lived amicably with settled farmers. A recent Atlantic Monthly article by Stephan Faris describes how black farmers would welcome herders as they crisscrossed the land, grazing their camels and sharing wells. But once the rains stopped, farmers fenced their land for fear it would be ruined by the passing herds. For the first time in memory, there was no longer enough food and water for all. Fighting broke out. By 2003, it evolved into the full-fledged tragedy we witness today.
A U.N. peacekeeping force will help moderate the violence and keep humanitarian aid flowing, saving many lives. Yet that is only a first step, as I emphasized to my colleagues at the summit in Germany. Any peace in Darfur must be built on solutions that go to the root causes of the conflict. We can hope for the return of more than 2 million refugees. We can safeguard villages and help rebuild homes. But what to do about the essential dilemma -- the fact that there's no longer enough good land to go around?
A political solution is required. My special envoy for Darfur, Jan Eliasson, and his A.U. counterpart, Salim Ahmed Salim, have worked out a road map, beginning with a political dialogue between rebel leaders and the government and culminating in formal negotiations for peace. The initial steps could be taken by this summer.
Ultimately, however, any real solution to Darfur's troubles involves sustained economic development. Precisely what shape that might take is unclear. But we must begin thinking about it. New technologies can help, such as genetically modified grains that thrive in arid soils or new irrigation and water storage techniques. There must be money for new roads and communications infrastructure, not to mention health, education, sanitation and social reconstruction programs. The international community needs to help organize these efforts, teaming with the Sudanese government as well as the international aid agencies and nongovernmental organizations working so heroically on the ground.
The stakes go well beyond Darfur. Jeffrey Sachs, the Columbia University economist and one of my senior advisers, notes that the violence in Somalia grows from a similarly volatile mix of food and water insecurity. So do the troubles in Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.
There are many other parts of the world where such problems will arise, for which any solutions we find in Darfur will be relevant. We have made slow but steady progress in recent weeks. The people of Darfur have suffered too much, for too long. Now the real work begins.
The writer is secretary general of the United Nations.
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Post by Disgruntled70sHab on Jun 21, 2007 16:38:37 GMT -5
www.break.com/index/tough-to-argue.htmlThe videos argument is at best, childish. And this is from a so called "Physics teacher". Even at the very WORSE scenarios, the Laws of Physics will not disappear. The seas rise but on the other hand, the atmosphere collect trillions of tons of humidity absorbing some of the rise. Law of physics. Where is all that humidity going to go? Fall on the deserts? Turning millions of square miles into arable land? Wow, tha really hurts. Droughts? How do you get droughts if the the humidity increases by such a huge amount? Warmer air holds more moisture. Laws of physics. Even the slowest eco-nazi morons should be able to understand that. Worse scnario is that we have a hundred million people displaced from very low lying shore areas. In the big scheme of things, so what. There will be just as much land opening up in African on arable land and even more in cold regions due to rising tempertures. Greenland will become habitable. The WORSE scnario is that there is no "end of humanity" as we know it. The worse scenario is that there will be SOME displacement from low lying regions and economic reprecussions. Even if we use the videos childish logic, we should burn down our house NOW just in case there is a small chance the house gets burned down. B*llsh*t. I ask again and again.... Where is the irrefutable proof that global temperture increase is DIRECTLY linked to increased carbon levels? Ïn fact, now MORE AND MORE paleoclimitologist (yeah, scientist) are moving away from linking the two. The arguement held some value when it was looked at in terms of millenia but if one gets down to centuries, it shows that carbon increased AFTER increases in global tempereture. Without that last "carbon" argumnent, the eco-Nazis have nothing left but......self deluding hot air. Didn't know where I could jump in this thread but this is as good a place as any. I thought it was an interesting take on the subject, but it's in the extreme and meant to frighten people in an A-B-C sort of way. But, as an American friend once told me, if you don't A-B-C folks, the majority simply won't get the message. Like you, I don't think fossil fuels are the sole cause of this, but at the same time we should be exploring alternative fuel sources. BC posted something many moons back that stuck with me. It was a link to a site that promoted making fuel out of ordinary garbage and if I could find it I'd post it (Sorry BC, laziness on my part). As far as massive droughts go, well, the Israelis converted deserts into fertile farming lands. Believe it or not, it's something the previous occupants couldn't do. Nowadays, removing salt from saltwater is nothing new, so there should be plenty of water to reroute to any droughts. (according to this prof, though, there'll just be too much of it). Yet, the technology for alternate fuel sources is there. Heck in the 1920's or so, they were making light bulbs that could burn for decades, but they soon realized that there wouldn't be any more demand if everyone had them. It may not be the main source of the warming phenomenon but cutting back wouldn't be a bad idea. But, the scenario is the same with fossil fuels as it is with light bulbs, in that they need consumers. The bottom line for using oil is cash. Yet, we can do all we want about fossil fuel emissions here in North America, but when you get over to the Middle East, say Syria, there are very few people who understand the adverse effects these emissions have on their personal health let alone the environment. Worse, many would regard any symptoms as "God's will." Seriously. At least we have guys like David Suzuki who can educate us in what the short term and longterm effects will be. Some are in the extreme like the guy on your link, but it's education anyway. That's more than a lot of the rest of the world has. Cheers. |
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Post by Skilly on Jun 21, 2007 18:46:46 GMT -5
Greenland will become habitable. Greenland is habitable ..... my wife has been there. They even have a golf course. Nuuk, Greenland  |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 18:48:16 GMT -5
If you don't believe that, Quebec just introduced a bill that will suck $200 million from taxpayers pockets. What are you talking about?? It's a tax levied on the oil companies, and our Finance Minister has politely asked them "not to pass that tax onto the consumer." I'm quite sure they'll respect that request, aren't you? Of course they won't. They are in business for the pleasure of serving the community. Do you know why oil companies are the first target of what will be endless taxation? Because all of society absolutely dependant on feul in one form or another. It's use is inescapable. Oil business in one form or another is "blossoming" as a tax base with the full co-operation of the oil companies. You ever wonder how $65 a barrel, which translates to 163 liters which translates to 40 cents land up as $1.10 at the pump? Half is taxes and the rest is profit for the oil companies. Before anyone googles that it's not EXACTLY that way, for all intents and purposes, it works out that way. |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 19:32:56 GMT -5
Nowadays, removing salt from saltwater is nothing new, so there should be plenty of water to reroute to any droughts. (according to this prof, though, there'll just be too much of it). We have droughts now that don't get water rerouted to them. Just because we could do it, doesn't mean we would. Also, how much would it cost? They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. According to a poll, 13% of Americans have never heard of global warming. Wouldn't that also be true of the fundamentalist Christian Right? |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 19:34:28 GMT -5
Two decades ago, the rains in southern Sudan began to fail. According to U.N. statistics.......
BAD example....REALLY BAD example. LOL! First..... UN statistics are not worth writing on toilet paper. The UN will come up with anything that will support it's slant of the month. Do you know what what my second task for a Canadian division of a huge multinational? "Creating" statistics that justified equipment expenditures. Heck, if anyone questioned them, I could point to a Masters degree in engineering. That was no different BS shield as the "scientific consensus" that the IPCC and followers love to quote. And of course it second nature for a BS statistic sculptor to recognize other peoples BS sculptures. I started my career BS'ing statistics to prove/show whatever my bosses needed in order to put food on the table. The UN and it's specific interests is no different. No crisis, the UN becomes more irrelevant then it is and there goes the FUNDING. Second....and for the record.....Ropoflu, answer me this. A huge part of the Sahara had running water 5000 to 10000 years ago and has slowly dried up. Did humans also cause "climate change" that far back? So if humans did NOT , then you have to admit that climate change occurs naturally and has NOTHING to do with "carbon is the human cause of global warming". You can't have both. LOL! Is it Pepsi or is it Coke? |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 19:48:13 GMT -5
Wouldn't that also be true of the fundamentalist Christian Right? Not really. Some see it as their beloved Apocalypse. Like religion, global warming is taking a variety of paths according to ones beliefs/prejudices. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 21, 2007 19:59:57 GMT -5
Only intense efforts to curb man-made emissions of carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases can keep the climate within or near the range of the past one million years, they add. I almost fell off my chair whan I saw this. Carbon emssions have VARIED, repeat, VARIED between 180 to 300 parts per million over that million years YET we had an ICE AGE in between. ICE AGE. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ earth.rice.edu/MTPE/cryo/cryosphere/topics/ice_age.html~~~~~~~~~~~~ "The growth of the ice sheets began about 120,000 years ago as ice built up on the continents in the Northern Hemisphere, especially in Canada and Europe. The largest extent of these ice sheets occurred 18,000 years ago. At that time the largest ice sheets were between 3.5 and 4 km thick. In North America the largest ice sheet was the Laurentide Ice Sheet centered on Hudson Bay with other sheets centered on Greenland and in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. As these ice sheets expanded they grew together, covering Baffin Bay and eventually the Great Lakes and New England. In northwestern Europe the Fennoscandian Ice Sheet began to grow and expand south to cover what is now Norway and Sweden and north to cover the exposed continental shelf. Over time the ice sheet grew to cover Finland and the United Kingdom. This ice sheet extended east to the Ural Mountains where it met the Siberian Ice Sheet. Before the last ice age ice sheets already existed on Antarctica and on Greenland." Scientist? My ass. Does anybody even ask any hard questions from these idiots? The example above and the Sahara example is what crushes the "human cause" of global warming. Yet it's ignored. Why? |
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Post by ropoflu on Jun 21, 2007 20:10:20 GMT -5
BAD example....REALLY BAD example. LOL! I thought it was a good example.First..... UN statistics are not worth writing on toilet paper these UN stats are rain measurement, pretty hard to misinterpret, unless you invent them. The UN will come up with anything that will support it's slant of the month. Do you know what what my second task for a Canadian division of a huge multinational? "Creating" statistics that justified equipment expenditures. Heck, if anyone questioned them, I could point to a Masters degree in engineering. That was no different BS shield as the "scientific consensus" that the IPCC and followers love to quote. And of course it second nature for a BS statistic sculptor to recognize other peoples BS sculptures I've done enough statistics to distinguish bad methododogy, and slanted interpretation from honest ones. I started my career BS'ing statistics to prove/show whatever my bosses needed in order to put food on the table that's really sad. The UN and it's specific interests is no different. No crisis, the UN becomes more irrelevant then it is and there goes the FUNDING the UN first goal is to prevent crisis, namely another world war Second....and for the record.....Ropoflu, answer me this. A huge part of the Sahara had running water 5000 to 10000 years ago and has slowly key word dried up. Did humans also cause "climate change" that far back? Probably not see Franko's answer So if humans did NOT , then you have to admit that climate change occurs naturally yes it does and has NOTHING to do with "carbon is the human cause of global warming the recent scientific litterature that i came across tend to say the opposite (I doing my master degree in environmental science and Ive done Managment at McGill before thatm so I'm not your classic hippy) ". You can't have both. yes you can LOL! Is it Pepsi or is it Coke? neither, but a beer most certainly. |
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Post by franko on Jun 21, 2007 20:12:10 GMT -5
Time to wade on in with a little bit of moderation. Greenland will become habitable. Greenland is habitable And weather has fluctuated over the millennium so that it has been warmer and green and colder and white. A huge part of the Sahara had running water 5000 to 10000 years ago and has slowly dried up. Did humans also cause "climate change" that far back? Sorry, HA . . . the answer is “yes”. At one time Ethiopia and surrounding countries were lush and arable. However, the watershed was destroyed through deforestation, and the desert encroached on the land (and lands around). Yup, human greed did it. |
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Post by franko on Jun 21, 2007 20:17:46 GMT -5
[ the UN first goal is to prevent crisis, namely another world war, not to react Actually, I think the UN's goal is to continue. It is a lot of "busy-work" for a lot of people. If it were to be a credible world force despots would not be appointed to chair the human rights commission, and every vote taken regarding the middle east would not just censure the Israeli side of things (not that they are innocent, but I have a hard time with the fact that it is only the Israelis that are condemned for their actions) |
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Post by franko on Jun 21, 2007 20:32:28 GMT -5
Wouldn't that also be true of the fundamentalist Christian Right? Actually, the fundamentalist Christian right is too busy trying to create a theocracy in North America to care about "this fallen world" (and now they have to find a replacement for Jerry Fallwell). In a way HA is right about an Apocalypse -- except the apocalypse is a spiritual battle with an antichrist and . . . well, some of it is too bizarre imo to pay any attention to. So I don't. The thing is, "the Christian Right" includes so many people . . . and many of them don't want to be lumped in with others. Fundamentalist groups include snake handlers in Kentucky, Moral Majorityists in South Carolina, and Bible Thumpers in Georgia. Some see a cataclysmic end-of-the-world but most see a premillenial second coming of Christ in which they are "taken" and the world is left on its own -- a new world comes into being a thousand years following -- not our doing but God's. Pentecostals are members of the Christian right and so are Baptists, but neither group is wildly fanatical. They are probably pro-life/anti-abortion. Some may be in favour of capital (and corporal) punishment; others not. Some may be accepting of immigrants and others not. But say "Christian Right" and immediately the image of wild-eyed backwoods illiterate closeminded people come to mind. Actually, I congratulate the "open-minded tolerant" left (open-minded and tolerant of all but the Christian Right, that is) for painting the picture and having it stick, so that Christians are for the most part marginalized -- they've done what they've wanted to do. Anyway: Christians and God's will -- little to do with this temporal world; everything to do with the spiritual. |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 20:58:58 GMT -5
Wouldn't that also be true of the fundamentalist Christian Right? Actually, the fundamentalist Christian right is too busy trying to create a theocracy in North America to care about "this fallen world" (and now they have to find a replacement for Jerry Fallwell). In a way HA is right about an Apocalypse -- except the apocalypse is a spiritual battle with an antichrist and . . . well, some of it is too bizarre imo to pay any attention to. So I don't. The thing is, "the Christian Right" includes so many people . . . and many of them don't want to be lumped in with others. Fundamentalist groups include snake handlers in Kentucky, Moral Majorityists in South Carolina, and Bible Thumpers in Georgia. Some see a cataclysmic end-of-the-world but most see a premillenial second coming of Christ in which they are "taken" and the world is left on its own -- a new world comes into being a thousand years following -- not our doing but God's. Pentecostals are members of the Christian right and so are Baptists, but neither group is wildly fanatical. They are probably pro-life/anti-abortion. Some may be in favour of capital (and corporal) punishment; others not. Some may be accepting of immigrants and others not. But say "Christian Right" and immediately the image of wild-eyed backwoods illiterate closeminded people come to mind. Actually, I congratulate the "open-minded tolerant" left (open-minded and tolerant of all but the Christian Right, that is) for painting the picture and having it stick, so that Christians are for the most part marginalized -- they've done what they've wanted to do. Anyway: Christians and God's will -- little to do with this temporal world; everything to do with the spiritual. I wasn't trying to cast too wide a net, but I don't know of a better term to refer to people like Fallwell who say that AIDS, hurricanes, terrorist attacks, and the like are God's will - punishment for homosexuality or what have you. |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 21:08:23 GMT -5
Scientist? My ass. Does anybody even ask any hard questions from these idiots? Ok... Those "idiots" had their paper published in one of the oldest scientific journals in the world, but I guess science is no match for the power of Google. |
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Post by MC Habber on Jun 21, 2007 21:16:06 GMT -5
Do you know what what my second task for a Canadian division of a huge multinational? "Creating" statistics that justified equipment expenditures. Heck, if anyone questioned them, I could point to a Masters degree in engineering. Is that code for "Don't believe anything I say"? It sounds like you could work for the Bush administration. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 22, 2007 4:45:14 GMT -5
Sorry, HA . . . the answer is “yes”. At one time Ethiopia and surrounding countries were lush and arable. However, the watershed was destroyed through deforestation, and the desert encroached on the land (and lands around). Yup, human greed did it. Which has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with "carbon emissions". And THAT is my point. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 22, 2007 4:53:44 GMT -5
Do you know what what my second task for a Canadian division of a huge multinational? "Creating" statistics that justified equipment expenditures. Heck, if anyone questioned them, I could point to a Masters degree in engineering. Is that code for "Don't believe anything I say"? It sounds like you could work for the Bush administration. They don't pay enough. LOL! The point I was trying to make is that statistics more often then not are used to prove a point of view. Take something like trace carbon in ice cores. How hard is it to create a bunch of numbers (parts per million/billion) correlating to time period and then compare it to historical evidence of temperature variations. And yet, it seems that even something as simple as this has stupid amount of variations. The penguin lovers scream that it's irrefutable proof of impending penguin doom and in the other extreme, it shows that there is a LAG TIME between warming and carbon content. Why? Who is telling the truth? Who has an agenda? After all, reading the raw data is straight forward. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 22, 2007 5:06:34 GMT -5
Scientist? My ass. Does anybody even ask any hard questions from these idiots? Ok... Those "idiots" had their paper published in one of the oldest scientific journals in the world, but I guess science is no match for the power of Google. So where is the INDEPENDENT peer review? Publishing a paper does not make it fact and it certain millions of miles away from ïrrefutable conclusions". What I find interesting is that you did not address the carbon emmissions and the ice age, but instead focused on my challange to the "scientists". Why? Maybe there is a fundamental difference between how you and I read things. For me, anything I read goes through a "filter" that challenges the content and obviously, the amount of "challange" corresponds directly to my (or your) bias. Probably the same way your mind goes through a filter challenging anything you hear about the Middle East or Iran or Bush love. As for your sly remark about "googling". Your insulting my intelligence. At some point in the last 40 years, I read that Sahara desert was much greener then it is now. Since there is no way for me to remember where I read it, or even if the publication can be found, I googled SEVERAL article corresponding to my statement. Notice I said SEVERAL articles so as to make sure that I was not presenting someone's biased opinion. Multiple corresponding sources to varify and suppport a point of view. And frankly, if your responses are "smart" one liners and piling of gooogled articles then it's a waste of cyber paper. |
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Post by Cranky on Jun 22, 2007 5:10:06 GMT -5
The thing is, "the Christian Right" includes so many people . . . and many of them don't want to be lumped in with others. Fundamentalist groups include snake handlers in Kentucky, Moral Majorityists in South Carolina, and Bible Thumpers in Georgia. Some see a cataclysmic end-of-the-world but most see a premillenial second coming of Christ in which they are "taken" and the world is left on its own -- a new world comes into being a thousand years following -- not our doing but God's. That is who came to mind. |
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