Global Warming

[Cress]

Has anyone here seen An Inconvenient Truth? I saw it and it scared me beyond measure, not the least becuase this threat is HERE. So much of the time people tell us that eventually the world will end at some point and we have proof, but it will be hundreds, thousands of years before it happens. Global warming is so iminent. In 50 years or less the oceans could rise 20 ft. How scary is that?
Just wondering about other reactions etc.

[bookworm6]

I wanted to see it. My social studies teacher even told my class to go see it for bonus marks. We talked about global warming in science class, and the picture of the hole in the ozone layer over Antartica freaked us all out.

[the_peridexis]

cress, you know what's scary? in 50 years or so,if global warming doesn't slow down, my homeland will no longer exist, because water will completely cover it. bangladesh, a tiny country not just about fifty years old. and that scares me. it's such a young place, i wouldn't want it to die right after being born. so i understand your horror...but the only way anything is going to slow down global warming is if the whole world pitches in. and is that even possible? i can only hope.

-peri

[fred22]

you know what makes me mad, is that most people just keep on wasting everything, and leading to our demise. I think my dad is right when he said that we will see the end of orca in our time. The only way this is going to change, is if, for example, the major world groups, like china and US were to pass a law that made people somehow use less energy and pollute less. We need to use taxes to build less useless roads, and put it into anti- global warming research. I dont know, I think it will ever happen. We either will die by this, or a nuclear war. Hmmmm, I know US has at least 12000 nukes... lets see, 4 nukes to destroy the world, and we have 12000...lets do the math... we can destroy the earth 3000 times... And Nukes take 50,000 years for the radiation to die... we are so... yea

[Cress]

I agree completely. The thing that drives me crazy is that so many people don't believe global warming exists! There is no debate within the scientific community about it. They all believe it. They've all got the proof. So can we stop wasting our time on that issue and get onto the important things. Because we have the tools to stop it, we just need to get to the point of USING them. What do people not understand about dead? Do they not understand that it won't matter if abortions are legal or not, cause we'll all be dead and no one will need to have abortions? The homosexuals? Dead too, so no need for the marriage ban. It blows my mind where people's priorities are.

[Cyber Mirage]

I'm no expert, but my guess as to people screwy opinions is that they don't see it everywhere and it seemingly doesn't affect them.

Abortion and Homosexuality? You see all this negative publicity and crap about it.\

Global warming? It's not esactly "in your face" or anything.. It's just there like the air you breathe

[Cress]

That's my point. Ok, I'm going to get a bit political here and these are generalizations I know, so don't kill me. The Republican party is too busy being power hungry and dragging issues like homosexuality and abortion into politics when they SHOULD be worried about global warming. Again, i say what do you not understand about dead? You dead. Soon. Do they think the water will say "oh, you're the president of the US, so I'll just stop rising now and let you live in your nice little home and I'll go kill all the poor people who aren't Republicans"?
My entire point is that global warming SHOULD be the issue that is "in your face", not moral issues. First we should make sure we have a place to live before we decide how to live.

[Mel]

Now, please don't kill me for my own opinion.

My opinion is this.

Global warming certainly isn't helping us. It's a big problem, but it all isn't global warming. Ozone holes, yes, are big and scary. But another big thing here is the changing climate of the earth.

This is something that has occured in history a lot. What is the ice age? A change in climate. Why did it melt? A change in climate. The vikings came to North America, now Labrador, and it was hotter. Not by too much, but still plenty enough. Was there really enough pollution back then to cause global warming? No. I admit, there is too much pollution going on: Water pollution, air pollution, light pollution, sound pollution. But, while that is affecting us some, I still believe that we are going through a climate change and will be for a long time. Pollution must definately decrease, it's making things bad, making things disappear faster than they should. But it's only a rather large piece of an even bigger puzzle.

Also, I think that morals are important. Always important. You should always fight for morals, no matter whatever happens. It's just dignified.

Now please don't slaughter me!

[Cress]

Ok, I respect your opinion Mel, but I'd like to point something out. All the climate changes in the past were natural. They were happening at a natural rate. There was a rise and fall to the temperatures of the planet, but that was natural and happened pretty much the same in a steady cycle. However, global warming now is happening in SUCH dissproportionate figures that we are worried. The temperatures are SO much higher than they should be, especially if you look at them in comparison with the other times the climate has spiked.
What worries me is the fact that the oceans will rise TWENTY FEET if we don't do something...oh wait. That's twenty feet for Greenland and then twenty feet for each of the polar ice caps. Pretty much say good bye to any coastland.
Ok, I didn't mean to jump all over you, it just scares me a LOT. I don't claim to be the expert on this, but I'd really like to know more. For some good info go see the movie.

[Space Cadet]

Here are some interesting articles:

If you read only one article, read this one: Rewriting the Science. What do people think about this issue?

Here is an announcement from March: Rapidly rising sea levels.

A much newer and more scary article: A Global Warning.

Here is an article that at first looks as if it is going against the Global Warming theory, but if you get to the end of it you will see that it also supports the case: Greenland's glaciers.

I found all of these articles on the first page of a Google search using these keywords: global warming, news, 2006.

[Cress]

My computer wouldn't show either the first or third, but I had heard about the second one, except I've heard from some studies that they were wrong about how fast water levels would rise and it's far faster than they thought it would, meaning up to 20 ft in the next 50 years.

[Space Cadet]

The first and the third are the most interesting too . . .

They are both CBS news articles. That's a non-subscription site isn't it? I at least don't have a subscription and can view them.

[Cress]

I dunno...my computer would show the CNN website, but the actual articles wouldn't show up. It's highly annoying. I'll try again.

[Space Cadet]

Sorry to post this on the public forum but,

Cress, I sent you a PM. It looks as if you haven't found it yet.

< /spam >

Anyway, I have been doing a little more reading on global warming. What I am most worried about now is whether the permafrost peat bogs of siberia are going to melt or not. There is a lot of carbon stored there.

[alla]

Ah, global warming... that wonderful scare tactic . Don't get me wrong, I don't deny that the world is warming up - I realise that it is to a certain extent, but there are some things that the media never let on when they talk about these things, as it takes more of the 'scaryness' out of them.

We are in an interglacial period - this means a period inbetween two ice ages, a period where the temperatures are likely to warm up and produce 'global warming'. Its happened before and it will probably happen again. It was not too long ago (geologically speaking) that Antarctica was covered in forests - thats right _trees_! There are fossils of them that have been brought back - the first ones were brough back by Scott and his team when they trekked for the pole. Those fossils were one of the few things that Scott decided to not throw away because of their scientific importance! The rocks were found on his and his team members bodies (They died on the way back from the pole).

Another thing that the media likes to use is the amount of greenhouse gasses that fossil fuels put into the atmosphere per year, but what they forget, is that one - just one semi-major volcanic eruption can put many times that amount of gases and aerosols into the atmosphere (and _higher_ into the atmosphere) than we could probably ever hope to achieve.

Some scientists belive that global warming will swamp the planet in the next few years. Personally I don't. One of the things that you (eventually) begin to understand when you are studying geology, is the time scale of the planet that we live on. Our planet is around 4.6 billion (one thousand million) years old. The last ice age ended _ten thousand_ years ago. These numbers are generally incomprehensible to most people.

Our planet _is_ warming up. There is no denying that. What is up for debate is whether it is because of us, or a natural effect. Personally, I believe the latter.

Ok: Update. I've just gone and had a look at a couple of clips from it courtesy of Youtube, and I must say, tis a very well done scare tactic. Very well done. Now just a few points from what I've heard so far:

1. "Its like the difference between one icecube in a glass of water melting, which doesn't raise the level of water, compared to several..." Well, one ice cube _will_ raise the water level. I've nearly overflowed my cup from putting one in it and forgetting about it. Just putting others in it makes it more pronounced.
2. The levels are at levels that we have never seen before - _that we have observed_.
3. The temperature and CO2 diagram that"only a select group of scientists have seen". Well, I must have been one of this select group for the past seven years, because the first time that I saw that diagram was in grade eight! Oh, and another point on the diagram - after every ice age there is a swift increase in temperature over a - geologically speaking - short amount of time.

I do respect others opinions, of course. This is just the way that I look at it.


Alla