Baked Alaska 632
mithras the prophet writes "Global warming stories usually focus on the hotbutton politics, scientific debate, or latest disturbing anecdote of receding ice. A very interesting New York Times story takes a different tack, highlighting the reality of climate change for small-town Alaskans. Whatever the cause, temperatures in Alaska have risen by seven degrees in the last 30 years. This has very real consequences for ordinary citizens; the rest of us would do well to consider their stories. Lucy Eningowuk and her 600 fellow citizens of Shishmaref will vote next week whether to move their town to the mainland. Despite community efforts, thawing of permafrost and wave action from melting ice has eroded away most of the land the village is built on. Residents of Barrow (warning: MIDI-enabled page), on the North Shore, are swatting mosquitos for the first time in their lives. In an ironic twist, managers of the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline are putting in supports to keep the pipeline from breaking as permafrost thaws."
The extremes always change first (Score:1, Insightful)
Hmm I wonder if the remaining forest will move north now that it is a bit warmer?
Junk Science (Score:0, Insightful)
Velkommen to ze New Vorld Order!
Cause? (Score:4, Insightful)
What isn't uncertain is that this change is real; one look at my driveway is proof enough for me.
Re:oh no... more global warming (...not...??) (Score:5, Insightful)
Extreme left-wingers? What??
What I don't understand is why most right-wingers in the USA like to classify issues such as global warming as a left-wing political issue. Is it not possible to be right wing and concerned about the environment?
Re:Argh! (Score:4, Insightful)
Your leader. Your leader doesn't get it.
Re:Cause? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Kenai Peninsula Changes (Score:2, Insightful)
FYI: Republican, NRA member, EFF supporter, lifelong Alaskan.
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:2, Insightful)
Lets rephrase:
Is my eyesight getting worse because I masturbate? Certainly I don't masturbate that often, the amount really isn't much compared to the times I have actual sex. Honestly, I'm not sure if science really has the answer. I do think I should be really cautious about it, the effects could be pretty dire.
---
The point is, there is no evidence linking human activity and global warming. There is a weak correlation between it and human emissions, but that is as strong an argument as the masturbation/eyesight link.
Just because a lot of people say something, doesn't make it worth paying attention to. As the AC said, no one has produced any evidence at all that we are having an effect. "No evidence" is a lot different from "wanting to be 100% sure".
Re:I live in Alberta (Score:1, Insightful)
It's like saying: "Well, if someone really wants to steal my car, they'll just do it anyway, so why bother locking it?"
What would be so bad about cutting down on pollution even if it isn't the reason for global warming?
Is it really that much of a risk to take?
You know, we already produce more than enough food to feed everyone.
Oh right, we have to move those little pieces of green paper around, to make people happy.
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:4, Insightful)
While I agree that we have to be careful, but even if human influence was the only cause, and kyoto was completely ratified by all countries, it would only be a drop in the bucket. This along with the fact that the treaty is quite unfair to certain countries, namely the US, Austrailia and Canada makes me quite happy that the US is so unwilling to sign it.
Cost of failure. (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a difference between the two. The cost of the correlation between masturbation/eyesight is a pair of glasses. The cost of global warming is conceivably a lot higher, and so deserves more attention and effort.
I think a better example would be the Challenger disaster, which killed the crew, and stopped NASA in its tracks for years. All because they asked the engineers to "Put their management hats on".
At the end of the day, we have three things to decide:
Now, we can argue about what the causes of global warming are, but that shouldn't stop us from finding a solution. There are only a few variables that we can conceivably control to bring the warming back down. One of those is CO2 emissions. It doesn't matter if the warming is a result of human activity, all that does matter is that it is happening and that we need to do something about it.
Jason PollockRe:Not so fast... (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:I live in Alberta (Score:1, Insightful)
I smell a poorly researched article written by a reactionary reporter with an agenda.
Re:Cost of failure. (Score:3, Insightful)
The cost of taking measures to prevent global warming are pretty high in some cases.
I'm not against intelligent ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions when they don't cost too much, but that is the key. Creating huge economic inefficiencies for something that may or may not have an effect on something that may or may not be caused by the emissions in the first place is what is bad.
Higher cost of items in stores, possible inflation, reduced GDP, companies driven out of business... I'd say the cost is high.
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:4, Insightful)
As opposed to pro-global warming advocates, whose main reason for belief is that it agrees with their biases? Come now, if you expect that the majority of people are going to hold well-reasoned out beliefs about issues that are very complex, you should sell whatever it is that you are smoking.
There are two issues with global warming: (1) what regulations, if any, should be enacted to minimize the effect of people on our environment and (2) what is really going on?
They are two completely unrelated questions, but both important. Now, people who are against the idea of being careful of what we spew into the atmosphere are the sort who seem very short-sighted, as the belief that economic progress is more important than caution is just plain dumb. Of course, people who favor instant gratification over long-term good planning are just dumb, but there's nothing particular about global warming for these people.
The other issue, what is really going on, is a completely different matter, as you point out. The world came out of an ice age fairly quickly without the help of SUVs. The world that the dinosaurs lived in appears to be warmer than the one that we currently live in. It certainly seems plausible that no matter what we do the world is going to get warmer.
Thus it is worthwile not to paint everyone with the same brush, since some of the positions are quite reasonable ones.
Re:Cost of failure. (Score:5, Insightful)
More to the point, there isn't, and never has been, any evidence that masturbation leads to blindness (or poor vision at all).
There is a mountain of evidence, piling ever higher, that our industrial wastes are changing the albedo of the planet, that the planet is thus radiating less heat away than previously, and as a result the climate is growing warmer.
Is it absolute proof? As you point out, no, it isn't, and absolute proof wouldn't be possible even after the entire process runs its course and Earth comes to resemble Venus (assuming it were ever allowed to go so far), as one could still argue that it might have been a natural phenomenon.
It is like arguing that an oily beach is a natural phenomenon. It is possible that an oil reserve is exposed to the sea through natural causes (like an undersea earthquake opening a rift), but the hulking remains of the Exxon Valdeze would, for example, make the argument that the cause could have been natural pretty weak, even without 100% irrefutable proof.
So to with the ever warming planet. It could possibly be natural, but a mountain of strong evidence suggests it isn't, and to proceed on the very unlikely assumption that it is natural is folly to the nth degree, and an action only someone living in complete denial because they simply don't want it to be so could ever advocate.
BTW, you can't even 'prove' 2+2=4
Re:Cause? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Mediaeval Warm Period was generally hotter than today and extended for some centuries up until the 14th or 15th century. Between then and the end of the 19th century the Earth went through the Little Ice Age when temperatures were cooler. Since these were natural phenomena, it seems quite likely that we may be entering another warm period.
There is indeed evidence that human activity has affected the climate; the real question is "by how much?" and "what are the likely effects, over and above what will occur naturally anyway?" If we conclude that human factors are significant in both cases, then we should ask ourselves how best to tackle the problem, not just act on folk wisdom along the lines of "fossil fuels are bad, we must stop using fossil fuels as soon as possible."
For instance, the global cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol is staggering. The cost incurred for just one year would pay for the delivery of quality drinking water and sanitation to every human on the planet. The mind boggles to think what we could do with that money each year over the next century. The reason why Kyoto is not very convincing as a save-the-Earth policy is that it will only offset the expected climate change at the end of the century by about five years. Big deal. A far better way to use the money would be to (a) quickly advance the developing world to the point where they can use cleaner, more efficient technologies already deployed in the developed world and (b) invest in research into more efficient (renewable) resources.
Read "The Skeptical Environmentalist." It's a fantastic book.
I have searched this entire thread... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Cost of failure. (Score:3, Insightful)
The issue has to be what is the potential cost of not doing anything. It doesn't matter if you caused the problem with car exhaust, or if it's the Earth's core turning up the heat. If the sea levels go up by as little 5', most of the people on the coast will have to move. Can you imagine the $$ involved in protecting New Orleans alone?
As with anything, we shouldn't have a panic response. However, doing nothing because we believe (rightly or wrongly - who cares) that warming is natural isn't a solution.
This is why we build flood control systems. It may be a natural event, but we still act to mitigate the damage caused. We need to do the same on a global scale to handle global warming.
Sure, companies will go under, others will flourish, and new millions will be made. Is that a problem? Probably not, look what happened to the .coms. No lasting damage was done. I would say that the displacement of coastal populations is going to be worse, but that's just a guess... :)
Jason PollockRe:Days of denial are over. (Score:2, Insightful)
That was a joke, sort of...
The volcano has not deforested 50% of the original forests of the earth. Man did that. I mention this because plants turn CO2 into O2 and allow us to breathe. If we kill all the plants, who will produce oxygen for us?
Cows that produce methane gas are not a natural occurance, they are man-made. That you aruge cow CH4 emissions are a natural source of greenhouse gases is utterly ignorant.
Our planet's environment is akin to the buffered acid solutions we learned about in chemistry class. It maintains the status quo, even as it gets pushed towards one direction of the other, say by mass release of CO2 or O2 or something else. The question before us is: How far can we push the system? What are the effects of man-made gaseous emissions (CO2, CH4, etc.) and what are the effects of man-destroyed "sinks" for CO2 (rainforest, plankton, etc.) These aren't easy questions to answer.
In fact we will probably never have enough of an understanding of climatic change to "know" just how our production of CO2 and destruction of CO2 converters has affected the environment. The data is massive and the time scale could be on the order of 10,000+ years. We will never know if what we're seeing is "the beginning of the end" or just a 50-year hiccup.
My reason for wanting to reduce CO2 emissions and to preserve natural habitat is because I like nature. I don't agree that the land is not being put to "good use" by remaining wild. I think an excellent example of our lack of human progress in dealing responsibly with our world is that we still mine for gold. Except now we do it by running entire mountains through a rock crusher and washing the chunks in cyanide to leech out the gold. How this possibly adds value to the world is beyond me (and no, that's not the queue for your libertairan/economic Darwinist explanation of free markets, I've read enough of that on this thread already.)
Tell me, why can't we live somewhat more in harmony with nature than we currently do? Why are we so attached to the "man vs. nature" paradigm going back to Genesis, man having dominion over the earth. What a load of hooey; ultimately the land has dominion over us as those folks in Melting Village, Alaska have discovered. The city I live in, Seattle, is beautiful not because of the buildings but because of the snow-capped mountains and deep blue waters surrounding her, and the greenways running through. Yet I look at Mt. Rainier in the distance and there's a big nasty layer of smog there. I would like to see that go away. I know that we could do it, too. Driving more fuel efficient cars would be a start, in particular Seattle could use a working mass transit system. What's wrong with legislating these things? As I see it, we could all be riding Segway HTs to work, except that the death of Ford and GM would be Bad For The Economy, and we can't have that! Fsck auto makers, all they've done is enabled suburban sprawl while they got rich because we all need cars to get anywhere now. I say open up the roads, or just one lane, to Segways and watch Detroit become Beirut. (Or is that too Free Market for you Libertarians?)
Is the globe warming? More than likely. Are we causing it? We might be, maybe not. Are our activities pushing the balance in favor of CO2 and away from O2? Yes.
Your move.
Talking metaphores here.. (Score:3, Insightful)
A few years ago, some doctors noticed that there was a certain kind of bacteria that lived in stomach ulcers, a high correlation just like the rise in temperature and greenhouse gasses. Anyway, some people suggested that perhaps the bacteria caused the ulcers, but people were skeptical. Perhaps it was just an opportunistic infection, you know, it was easy for them to live there due to the damage cells.
So, either the bacteria caused the ulcers or the ulcers caused the bacteria. Which one was it? Medical researches didn't believe the bacteria caused the ulcers, and traditional remedies were continued (you know, lots of bland food, stress free lives, etc). I would say that there was some evidence, you would say there was none. Apparently a correlation isn't evidence in your eyes, right?
Eventually, one of the people who believed the bacteria caused the ulcer simply ate a large quantity of it, and came down with all kinds of gastro-intestinal problems. Including ulcers. Now we know that ulcers are caused by the bacteria, and that they can for the most part be cured by antibiotics.
If you had ulcers, would you have waited until the final study, the one where the scientist infected himself before trying antibiotics to cure an ulcer?
By the way, those same researchers have discovered a bacteria that is often found in people with heart disease. I don't think there are going to be many scientists willing to inject themselves with this. Should we change treatments now? Or should we go on and say it's just a bunch of BS?
to the deniers of global warming... (Score:4, Insightful)
We have excellent records of CO2 concentrations over thousands of years from inclusions of gas in ice cores, as well as other sources. CO2 concentrations have unquestionably increased significantly since the 1800's. And increased CO2 concentrations invariably will lead to higher temperatures. The only scientific debate is whether the temperature increase from our current levels of CO2 will be modest or dramatic.
But that question doesn't really get to the core of things. CO2 emissions aren't standing still, they are growing exponentially. If we don't curb CO2 emissions, atmospheric CO2 won't just double, it will double over and over again. At some point, even the most conservative climate models predict catastrophic consequences, whether that be 2x, 4x, 8x, or 16x current levels.
Sooner or later, we have to put a limit on the growth of CO2 emissions because, while we may debate how much CO2 is too much, there exists some level that is going to be too much. So, we might as well impose the limits now, since there is no economic reason to keep belching out CO2 at current rates. Besides, with a reduction in CO2 come a lot of other benefits, like reduction in particulate emissions, sulfur, and other pollutants.
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:3, Insightful)
Commonality
Does Not
Equal
Causality.
Please stop being retarded, thanks.
Re:Days of denial are over. (Score:3, Insightful)
Mostly I agree with you, but there is no good reason to believe that there is just one equilibrium point. To oversimplify, the weather/climate is basically what we observe of a heat engine that adsorbs heat at the equator and radiates it out into space at the poles. We've got a kinda-sorta handle on land and air, extremely poor handle on water and no handle on where the edges are from one equilibrium to another.
Increased CO2 would lead to increased average global temperature, other factors being equal. With a big and complicated heat engine that builds its engine walls out of air and water, I just don't believe in "other factors being equal". This thing will tend to push back harder than you push it. It's not all that farfetched for the effect of global warming to be another ice age. The key is probably what triggers the ocean currents.
Back off guys.. this is serious (Score:3, Insightful)
Back off, seriously.
You have achieved the holy grail... (Score:4, Insightful)
...of /. posting: +5 (Troll). Enjoy it while you got it.
I think it was the "card-carrying Mensa" sig, coupled with the misspelling of "tolerance." Or maybe the juxtaposition of the comment on stupidity with the parroting of the latest Rush Limbaugh lies being used to dupe the really stupid who want to believe so badly.
Since others have pointed out the obvious flaw in the "Big Business is policing itself" lie, I will concentrate on the "Kyoto is a restrictive and impractical way to cut pollution" lie. The Kyoto Treaty is nothing of the kind. It is an agreement among nations as to who has what responsibility for cleaning up how much. It says nothing about the way in which the emission of greenhouse gases might be accomplished (well, it says some things, but only to preclude bogus schemes by the unscrupulous).
Government-mandated pollution reduction is not required. Each country is left to its own devices: economic incentives, tax breaks, or legislated restrictions. The fact that this lie is being promulgated is an excellent measure of the desperation of the anti-Kyoto forces. All their other arguments are falling one by one, so they are reduced to pathetic trolling such as this:
Most Democrats, of course, believe that the "the Capitalist system works." Part of the reason it works so well in the United States is that James Madison realized the key to its success would be government regulation (particularly enforcement of contracts). Since that time, we have found a number ways in which it works better with regulation.
An excellent example of this is pollution control. Imagine, if you will, a community of manufacturers who compete with each other. Imagine further that they are moral people all of whom want to do the right thing. (This is not as surprising as Ralph Nader seems to think. Businessmen are people, too, and they don't want to poison their kids any more than they want to poison yours.)
Sooner or later, one of these companies will find itself at a competitive disadvantage. They cannot produce their product at a price which will allow them to make money selling it for what they can get. If they are paying money to reduce their pollution, they will be in a position where they can stay competitive by cutting controls or they can lose everything by going out of business. They may start polluting with full intention to clean it up later, when they get competitive again.
But they may never get the chance. Because now another business is in the least-competitive position, their existence threatened if they don't cut pollution controls. Eventually you can see an entire industry polluting at a maximum, EVEN THOUGH NONE OF THEM WANT TO. Regulations prohibiting pollution can be seen as a contract (sort of like a treaty) between them with the government as a guarantor. And it also protects them against a competitor who actually is nefarious and really doesn't care what is right.
The Kyoto Treaty can be viewed as just such a contract between nations. Any industrial nation could achieve an unfair competitive advantage over the others by ignoring global warming. If one country is losing out in the global marketplace because its business is overtaxed, the government could allow greenhouse gas emissions as a way to become competitive again without giving up its beloved taxes. (We saw this in Eastern Europe and Russia and China during the Cold War.)
Mensa-morons can whine and moan all they want, but the Kyoto Treaty will WORK. Just like the pollution and fuel-efficiency regulations they probably opposed during the '70s (and now celebrate the results of).
Correlation does not refute causation (Score:3, Insightful)
Correlation is not causation, but there's a mechanism, a prediction, a verification of the prediction, and a complete lack of any alternative plausible hypotheses at this point.
Just because we understand the physiology of hangovers, and you drank like a fish last night, and you have a terrible headache just like the last six times you overdid it doesn't mean that your headache is a hangover. After all, correlation is not causation. Still, it might be a good idea to ease up on your drinking anyway.
Anyone who claims the evidence is weak at this point is willfully ignoring the evidence, or selecting *very* carefully from it, or listening to someone else who is doing so.
Things are pretty much on track with the earliest greenhouse predictions from 15 years ago. (Biggest and earliest changes were expected at high northern latitudes. What do you know...)
And it gets dramatically worse from here on. Fossil fuels, in addition to being responsible for a lot of otherwise dangerous global entanglements, are doing damage to the world not only increasingly but acceleratingly. Nothing but ideology and special interests prevent us from escaping our headlong dive toward widespread environmental disruption combined with getting messed up in medieval throwback geopolitics. Losing fossil fuel dependency fast is a big double win, but it's a little inconvenient to some corporations. Hmm.
It's really time people with any brain cells started to look at the evidence [www.ipcc.ch].