Sub's Alternative Energy Thread

[jdshock]

This is a neat comic that puts into perspective global temperatures throughout history: https://xkcd.com/1732/

[jdshock]

What if global warming is real, is partially man-made, we know ways to spend money and resources to slow it, and the end result of all our calcs is that the cost of fighting global warming is larger than the cost of living with it?

My instinct is that the "cost of living with it" will likely be much higher for many other countries. US cities are much smaller and less densely packed than many other countries' cities. China and Japan have a lot more people living in coastal cities than the United States does. And that's just the mortality calculation. The US is a lot less agrarian than many other countries. Imagine a country that only exports crops. If that country suddenly becomes less conducive to growing food, what is the country supposed to do?

Global warming is one of the best examples of an externality, right? A single company doesn't recognize the full costs of global warming in its production. But your costs question is a strange side discussion of international externalities. Should the United States take into consideration the costs of global warming at an international scale or just at a local scale?

[SB Shock]

This is a neat comic that puts into perspective global temperatures throughout history: https://xkcd.com/1732/

The "hockeystick" trend has been shown wrong.

[Jamar Howard 4 President]

@jdshock:, I don't mean to imply that calculating the costs of global warming is easy. I'm merely saying that it is very possible, in simplistic terms, that fighting to stop/slow it becomes a "spend $10 to do $1 worth of good" type of endeavor. It might be more effective to just give $5 to the poorest, most hard hit countries and keep the other $5 in our pockets.

Of course, the complicated nature of the issue will always allow both sides to make wildly extreme claims. Many liberals will continue to claim that their global warming regulations help everyone and harm no one. Many conservatives will continue to claim that global warming is nothing but myth and will hurt no one. More nuanced opinions will often be lost amidst the shouting from the fringes.

[SB Shock]

The "hockeystick" trend has been shown wrong.

Here is story how behind where the error came from that created the "hockey stick" and show the revised graph after the errors are corrected.

http://a-sceptical-mind.com/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-hockey-stick

[jdshock]

The "hockeystick" trend has been shown wrong.

No source? The silly comic I posted at least cited several academic papers.

Edit: you posted again, so I'll respond with another source: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/05/the-hockey-stick-the-most-controversial-chart-in-science-explained/275753/


The vast majority of scientists agree with this theory. It doesn't matter. Look at the data in the comic that isn't predictive. The stuff that has existed in the past. We're already on a trend that we haven't seen before.

[Jamar Howard 4 President]

It doesn't matter. Look at the data in the comic that isn't predictive. The stuff that has existed in the past. We're already on a trend that we haven't seen before.

I'm honestly not confident I can trust worldwide temperature data from 1900 AD.
I really, really, really question the accuracy of data points from 1900 BC.

[wufan]

No source? The silly comic I posted at least cited several academic papers.

Edit: you posted again, so I'll respond with another source: http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/05/the-hockey-stick-the-most-controversial-chart-in-science-explained/275753/


The vast majority of scientists agree with this theory. It doesn't matter. Look at the data in the comic that isn't predictive. The stuff that has existed in the past. We're already on a trend that we haven't seen before.

There's actually several source papers linked within the article. It does a pretty good job of explaining the issues linked to the politicization of climate change. It's not too difficult to see how the data was manipulated with improper justification to demonstrate a predetermined conclusion.

[jdshock]

There's actually several source papers linked within the article. It does a pretty good job of explaining the issues linked to the politicization of climate change. It's not too difficult to see how the data was manipulated with improper justification to demonstrate a predetermined conclusion.

You must have missed the edit. The initial response had no source. I hadn't seen the second post, which is why I edited my comment.

That said, the articles that are cited are all wildly out of date. The newest studies all support the hockey stick. There was one pair in the early 2000s that argued the original model had a problem. The vast majority of scientists discussing this matter have sided with the hockey stick finding: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hock...ck_controversy

[Aargh]

Here is story how behind where the error came from that created the "hockey stick" and show the revised graph after the errors are corrected.

http://a-sceptical-mind.com/the-rise...e-hockey-stick

That is one tough read. My eyes were glazed over before the author got around to anything backing up his claim.

Eventually it came down to knowing global temperatures to within a couple of degrees Celsius hundreds of years ago. That's pretty simple. Just construct the data model to fit the temperature needed for a specific position. Then claim your data model is the right one. I doubt a data model can be established that could be verified as accurate to within +/- 4 degrees Celsius. That would seem to be within about any margin of error.

One way the hockey stick model definitely does not work is that we will not have a runaway greenhouse effect and end up like Venus. If that could happen, it would have happened before there was life on Earth and all the CO2 being released today was already in the atmosphere. We run out of fossil fuels before we create runaway greenhouse effects.

[SB Shock]

You must have missed the edit. The initial response had no source. I hadn't seen the second post, which is why I edited my comment.

That said, the articles that are cited are all wildly out of date. The newest studies all support the hockey stick. There was one pair in the early 2000s that argued the original model had a problem. The vast majority of scientists discussing this matter have sided with the hockey stick finding: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hock...ck_controversy

You must have missed climategate and climategate 2. Which discredited Mann and has shown that climatology has moved from science to politics. Climategate exposed that:

1. Scientist on global warming debate are trying to conceal their underlying data and stifle discussion. Any scientist who dare try to say anything negative about global warming are ostracized, shouted down and called name and are being threatened with jail

U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday that not only has she discussed internally the possibility of pursuing civil actions against so-called “climate change deniers,” but she has “referred it to the FBI to consider whether or not it meets the criteria for which we could take action.”

This is a type of move of totalitarian regime, not a democracy that embraces free speech.

2. They view this global warming as a political cause instead of actual science where you gather data, develop models and test your hypothesis and it gets peer reviewed.

3. After exposure of their email we found there are scientist who are manipulating the data and were into fear mongering. We have went past the "point of return" several time according to their predictions. So "what difference does it make now" -- or where they wrong?

Personally I think wushox1 post several reply ago was very balanced and well thought out opinion on climate change and summed up the challenges. I don't deny the climate is changing (It is always changing) or that we are not warming (we are coming out of ice age - so it has to be warming). And we should be good stewards of environment. But before you start throwing trillions of dollars at something - you better know what your doing or you going to make things much worse.

Joseph L Bast of the Heartland Institute said: “The global warming scare has enabled environmental advocacy groups to raise billions of dollars in contributions and government grants. It has given politicians (from Al Gore down) opportunities to pose as prophets of doom and slayers of evil corporations. And it has given bureaucrats at all levels of government, from the United Nations to city councils, powers that threaten our jobs and individual liberty.

But hey, there is a lot of money and profiteering out there for somebody - so let not really search for the truth. Follow the money and you will find your answer.

[jdshock]

But hey, there is a lot of money and profiteering out there for somebody - so let not really search for the truth. Follow the money and you will find your answer.

I haven't missed "climategate," I just feel as if every single one of the dozens of sources that discredited "climategate" has significantly more credibility than those folks. There are many, many more scientists that agree with the hockey stick theory than those that refute it. Just because one pair of scientists deny climate change it doesn't mean that the hockey stick theory has been disproven.

I do agree with you on this, though. Follow the money. There's a lot of money in denying climate change. Multi-billion dollar companies have absolutely everything to gain from denying climate change.

[wufan]

I do agree with you on this, though. Follow the money. There's a lot of money in denying climate change. Multi-billion dollar companies have absolutely everything to gain from denying climate change.

Why is it okay for your side to profit from the policies, but it's not okay for those whom might lose profits to be skeptical?

[jdshock]

Why is it okay for your side to profit from the policies, but it's not okay for those whom might lose profits to be skeptical?

He recommended that money be the way we determine who is lying. I just pointed out that more money stands to be made by the companies currently in place. Please pose your question to the OP, not me.

Saying the scientific consensus is created because of money is just silly. It's like if the scientific consensus is that cigarettes are bad, and one industry scientist says they aren't bad for you. There's obviously more money to be made on the denial side.

[wufan]

We are in agreement that money is not a good indicator of the correctness of science.