AmericanPapist Comments
The evidence of global warming, and humanpersonkind's responsibility for it, is overwhelming. How do we know? Because we would have it so. /s/ The Collective Left.
"Scientists...linked the cooling to reduced solar activity."
Headline: "The Earth Is Heated By The Sun!" Film at eleven.
this can be easily explained - also by human action upon the environment, "global cooling" is not a new concept and occurs because of particulate matter in the atmosphere (aerosols, and think "smog") that bounces solar radiation back into the atmosphere. I recall seeing a program on NOVA about concerns in Israel and Australia over the lack of evaporation of water levels despite the increase in temperature and after much experimentation it was found that suprise suprise part of evaporation doesn't have to do with temperature but simply exposure to the suns ultraviolet rays. Of course these folks also argued that as the world works on reducing aerosols and not greenhouse gasses that global warming would essentially overcome global cooling or prove our "models" on global warming as lacking - meaning that actual temp would increase at an exponentially higher rate.
and congratulations for using an opinion column as oposed to an actual news article which is intended to be biased. Good job on presenting sound journalistic integrity for your enviro-skepticism.
mm, considering the point of the opinion piece I cited was that "actual news articles" are themselves often opinion pieces on this topic, I think you missed my point.
Dear Mathew,
As if the other side doesn't use pseudo-science, opinion columns, and obviously biased sources in their presentation of Global Warming. Tom's point is not a reluctance to accept science, merely a desire to wait until all the data's in before making sweeping statements--which the media often does with regards to global warming. We remain small observers in the great world around us, and though modern science is loathe to admit this: we still know little about the world in which we live. I'm not attacking science--as you doubtless will misconstrue my position--I am not a scientist, and my appreciation for it is the appreciation of the lover at the sight of new wonders and beauties. I believe that science is noble, but oft misused as a tool of atheism/anti-humanism(See Richard Dawkins) neither goals it is meant to serve.
The evidence of global warming, and humanpersonkind's responsibility for it, is overwhelming. How do we know? Because we would have it so. /s/ The Collective Left.
Ahhhhhh, wingnuts. So quick to grasp at straws and cherry pick.
Peters Elder et Younger:-
This report is talking about comparing January 07 with January 08 point-to-point data. An interesting an unexpected temperature drop to be sure. However, according to NASA, the underlying global average temperature in 2007...
"...tied with 1998 for Earth's second warmest year in a century."
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/researc.../news/20080116/
You can't have it both ways. It's the average trend that counts. And it's entirely possible that within that average trend, some wild variations will crop up. In some ways, it's probably even likely.
And yes, the statement that "one winter does not a climate make" displays a moderate caution -- but then linking to the National Post is hardly a convincing demonstration of even-handedness to back that up.
P. senior: grow up, will you? "The Collective Left" - as you tediously put it and imagine it - actually in this case includes people who have dedicated their lives to understanding the world around us. They know a whole damn sight more than you do about the topic. Is there hysteria in the media? Of course there is. However, there are some very notable individuals and institutions who have weighed into this issue. Nothing either of you have ever said demonstrates that you know or acknowledge that.
Carbon Based Life Form: grow up, will you?
Announcer's voice:
"Please do not feed the trolls."
We now return you to our regularly scheduled programming.
"Please do not feed the trolls."
Oh, right.
So pointing out scientific facts and stylistic adventurism is trolling, is it?
What do you want? An echo chamber?
"Please do not feed the trolls."
Well I was going to comment, but then I remembered this: http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/duty.../
duty_calls.png
The debate over environmentalism will certainly be an ongoing one. It should be, because we will never have all the information but we must do with the best and most up-to-date information that we can possibly get.
All this is to say, that the underlying principle to this discussion is that we have a duty to treat the earth well. I think that this can be done, in a general sense, by living simply and humbly - a way that I think Catholicism and many other religions and idealogies advocate.
Carbon-based Life Form. Try switching to Silicon. :)
"All this is to say, that the underlying principle to this discussion is that we have a duty to treat the earth well."
Precisely. Whether global warming is legitimate or not, why do people think we have a right to waste our resources? The green economy could be a cash cow for the nation that attracts the best and brightest from abroad (well, to a lesser extent now that we're terrified of foreigners). Being behind the curve on protecting the environment is going to cost us in more ways than one.
I'm not aware of even the most sleezy cooporate raider who thinks there is a right to waste resources.
Carbon-based Life Form. Try switching to Silicon. :)
Besides insipid quips, do you have anything else to offer about this matter?
How do you think you'd fare up against, say, the Fellows of the Royal Society on the topic of climate change? You'd call them part of the Collective Left would you, getting it all wrong because of ideology?
Or do you think, perhaps, you'd look full of bluster and hubris?
I realise that decoding the minutiae of Canon Law automatically makes you an expert on damn near everything, but there are even limits to that spectrum.
Try using your mind, instead of allowing your emotions to do your thinking for you. You will come across as being more mature and intelligent than you have so far.
"I'm not aware of even the most sleezy cooporate raider who thinks there is a right to waste resources."
I wish GM and other American car manufacturers, not to mention so many other industries, felt the same way rather than lobby against anything that might upset the status quo.
Try using your mind, instead of allowing your emotions to do your thinking for you. You will come across as being more mature and intelligent than you have so far.
Since you're weighing, how do YOU think Ed Peters would fare up against the Fellows of the Royal Society?
He'd come out of it looking good, would he?
As for emotions and thinking, I'm not the one who wrote the juvenile claptrap about the Collective Left. Try opening your eyes.
In order to throw a wrench in, I suggest the following argument. (AmP, you've heard this one from me before, but I wonder how well this spaghetti will stick in the public forum.) My point is this: being a conservative and a conservationist are, esentially, apiece with one another. Given the linguistic common ancestry, if one is truly politically "conservative" through and through, i.e. not conservative about being a classical liberal as a libertarian would have it, then would it not be consistent to say that part of the proper benefit of the common good is the careful conservation of a healthy environment? I say this, not because I identify myself as a Dreherian "crunchy-con," though I do think he's dopily right, but that such a position seems to correctly assign environmental thinking as part of the overarching conservative default that order and justice are the ends, freedom the means, and not the other way around. That is, careful conservation identifies and protects the natural world as part of the moral order insofar as humans are naturally craftsmen, to a greater or lesser degree depending on the individual. There isn't really enough combox space to spell this out completely, but I do think it's worth making this argument in order to counter the accusation that supporting environmentalist behavior constitutes having a "Lefty" ideology. Thoughts?
Easy, CBLF. If YOU don't think when the Collective Left agrees on something, there is room for suspicion, fine, don't beleive it, but a lot of people just as smart as you DO beleive it. And they've been shown correct plenty of times.
Anyway, you show us all once again, that when someone treds on another's assertion of fact, he or she reacts calmly in combixes; but one someone treds on another's opinions, they go postal.
As if my opinion, or yours, counted for anything in this.
PS: I don't recall invoking canonical credentials for my opinion. Why do you invoke them, only to trash them in a typcicl straw-man attack?
I think Ed Peters would cool down all that hot air the Royal Fellows are wont to puff. Look, CBLF you say we are to trust scientists? Are you out of your mind? These folks tell us that abortion is good for babies and safe for their mothers, that taking a first class carcinogen like the birth control pill is good for women and the environment, that cloning and in vitro are so humanizing, that vaccines are safe and its OK to use murdured human beings to make them. Who brought us the atom bomb? No way am I going to have blind faith in these folks.
Easy, CBLF. If YOU don't think when the Collective Left agrees on something, there is room for suspicion, fine, don't beleive it
Well, what about the Collective Right? Have any bon-mots for them, or are they automatically sacrasanct? Is groupthink only apparent on one side of the aisle? I'm not necessarily claiming that you're saying that it is, but it does provoke curiosity.
Anyway, the theory of climate change IS NOT something that has come unprovoked out of a punditocracy. And this is my point. Whether correct or not - and in what degree - it derives from the field of science. Peer reviewed and methodical. That of course does not preclude it from being mistaken, but it does mean that it's much more than your juvenile reductivism allows it to be.
Anyway, you show us all once again, that when someone treds on another's assertion of fact, he or she reacts calmly in combixes; but one someone treds on another's opinions, they go postal.
I've hardly "gone postal". I've reacted to your juvenalia. With gusto, perhaps. But your blind spots deserve a bit of light.
PS: I don't recall invoking canonical credentials for my opinion. Why do you invoke them, only to trash them in a typcicl straw-man attack?
Because nothing you have written on this topic demonstrates that you have even a cursory understanding of it. Yet you seem to feel yourself fully equipped to wade in up to the neck, bouyed by the full weight of some self-bestowed authority.
Who brought us the atom bomb?
Oh, for heck's sake!
If you want to play that ridiculously silly game, you open up the field to rejoinders like "who brought us the Inquisition?".
No way am I going to have blind faith in these folks.
Absolutely no one is asking you to! If you think they are, then you have gravely misread the landscape.
But since you have such an animus towards science, I'll tell you what: next time you go to the dentist, ask for the non-scientific version.
Teep, I'm conservative and iffy on the global warming issue. I appreciated your (calmly presented) perspective. Makes sense to me.
I still think CBLF should switch to silicon. He's taking this way, way too seriously.
I still think CBLF should switch to silicon. He's taking this way, way too seriously.
Okay. So when you and your son bang on endlessly with your various leitmotifs (feminists, secularists, whateverists), that's fine and dandy. Serious, serious business, leaden with gravitas.
However, when anyone else holds a conviction, they are being overly self absorbed. Is that it?
By the way, do you have anything of substance to say about how the theory of climate change came about? Or is it easier for you to lump it into a category sui generis to the Dreaded Collective Left?
I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that his response to me is "No".
bill912. we're having too much fun here. anyway, as CBLF feels much stronger about his position than I do about mine, he must be right.
"Feels" is the word, Ed.
CBLF feels much stronger about his position than I do about mine, he must be right.
My position is this and only this: the underlying science is not merely a phantom of the Collective Left as you at least give the appearance of having it. There is an enormous amount of effort involved that isn't ideologically driven. Is that so hard for you to understand?
I am not even talking about whether or not the underlying science is correct.
As for your opinion, you shouldn't hold it strongly, because it's plainly obvious you know very little about this topic beyond what your political mindset allows.
So I'll ask another related question (and let's see if you can actually answer a question rather than sidestepping): do you think you are well enough informed to make a decision as to why there is a groundswell of consensus towards a theory of human exacerbated climate change? Is it ALL because of the Collective Left?
"I think Ed Peters would cool down all that hot air the Royal Fellows are wont to puff. Look, CBLF you say we are to trust scientists? Are you out of your mind? These folks tell us that abortion is good for babies and safe for their mothers, that taking a first class carcinogen like the birth control pill is good for women and the environment, that cloning and in vitro are so humanizing, that vaccines are safe and its OK to use murdured human beings to make them. Who brought us the atom bomb? No way am I going to have blind faith in these folks."
So, uh, what other matters of science do you reject? It seems like pasteurization, the smallpox vaccine, and nuclear energy are checked off. More often than not, scientific discoveries have further advanced the progress of humankind. Care to share some insight into what anti-life methods climatologists are using in making their measurements? To reject the work of scientists because some use abhorrent techniques is ridiculous. It's like saying the Church has no moral voice because of some pederast priests.
LOL!
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