(05-29-2013 12:51 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 08:13 AM)EverRespect Wrote:  

(05-28-2013 08:53 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  Wikipedia is always a good place to find summaries of uncomfortable information:

Quote:In Requiem for a Species: Why We Resist the Truth about Climate Change (2010), Clive Hamilton describes a campaign to attack the science relating to climate change, originating with the astroturfing campaigns initiated by the tobacco industry in the 1990s. He documents the establishment of the Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC) as a 'fake front group' set up 'to link concerns about passive smoking with a range of other popular anxieties, including global warming'. The public relations strategy was to cast doubt on the science, characterizing it as junk science, and therefore to turn public opinion against any calls for government intervention based on the science.[18]

As one tobacco company memo noted: "Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the "body of fact" that exists in the mind of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy."[33] As the 1990s progressed ... TASSC began receiving donations from Exxon (among other oil companies) and its "junk science" website began to carry material attacking climate change science.
—Clive Hamilton, Requiem for a Species: Why We Resist the Truth about Climate Change

Sound familiar? It's always the same argument from the side of GW skeptics. This isn't the only time this strategy has been used:

Quote:After the Cold War ended, they continued through the Marshall Institute to campaign against environmental issues from acid rain, the ozone hole, second-hand smoke and the dangers of DDT on to a campaign against global warming. In each case their argument was the same: simply that the science was too uncertain to justify any government intervention in the market place. It is only recently, Oreskes said, that historians such as her have been able to 'join the dots': Individual environmental scientists, finding opposition to their warnings about ozone layer depletion or DDT residues, were at the time unaware that the same institute was using the same arguments at the same time against other scientists who were warning about the dangers of smoking, of second-hand smoke, and about climate change itself.[34][35]

The question is, do you honestly believe that the people opposing climate change research are interested in truth? You guys are right to claim that this issue is about the money. The problem is, you're pointing the finger at the wrong people: the group that stands to lose the most, regardless of what the truth is. In the end it's truly absurd. Scientists are being bribed with generous amounts of money from oil backed think tanks to publish papers critical of the IPCC, which is the exact thing you're accusing the "dirty liberals" of doing. You guys are so quick to point the finger that you don't even realize that it's the right that's engaging in the exact same BS that you accuse the left of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_cha...al#History

The climate is controlled in large part by the sun and in others by the oceans. According to Al Gore 12 years ago, our coastal cities were to already be underwater by now. I'm all for continuous improvement on the environment, but I am not for intellectual dishonesty. It is obviously warmer in center cities where more people and activity occur than in the outskirts... you just need to look at the Weather Channel to see that... so yes, I believe there is obviously some impact with respect to temperatures and emissions and asphalt, but the end of world prophecies by the AGW extremists are really insulting to most people's intelligence and frankly probably bring on the skepticism themselves.

That makes no sense. The world is blanketed with weather stations, inside and outside of cities. The global average has increased everywhere, not just in urban areas.

It makes perfect sense. As you said, it is an "average". With urban sprawl everywhere, a lot of those stations that were once in remote areas no longer are. Thus, the average goes up with the temperature of the newly urban weather stations. That was the basis of much of the scandal in England.

(05-29-2013 12:21 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  No, I don't think it's an either/or scenario, and I'd prefer that you not try to build that straw man.

What I am saying is that they're not coming up with useful alternatives. It's more like, "here is an alternative, we know its a terrible alternative, but if we can create enough hype, then we can get people to fall for it out of hysteria."

What we need is sensible, rational solutions. What we are getting is a lot of stupid ideas forced upon us because, ohmygod, we're all going to die if we don't do something, and this is something.

By the way, I have published (peer-reviewed) articles about sensible and rational solutions that would work. I know how the system works.

You sensible and rational? Dude, you really are becoming as big a fake as Torchy with his Doctorate degree.

(05-29-2013 12:51 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  That makes no sense. The world is blanketed with weather stations, inside and outside of cities. The global average has increased everywhere, not just in urban areas.

That's not necessarily true. The raw data does not indicate increasing temps, which is why the alarmists spend so much time modifying the data.

Whether those modifications are legit or not, is a huge part of the debate.

Furthermore, many of the weather stations started outside of cities, but have since been encroached upon. Those have seen larger increases in their reported temps than other stations.

(05-29-2013 12:58 PM)RobertN Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:21 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  No, I don't think it's an either/or scenario, and I'd prefer that you not try to build that straw man.

What I am saying is that they're not coming up with useful alternatives. It's more like, "here is an alternative, we know its a terrible alternative, but if we can create enough hype, then we can get people to fall for it out of hysteria."

What we need is sensible, rational solutions. What we are getting is a lot of stupid ideas forced upon us because, ohmygod, we're all going to die if we don't do something, and this is something.

By the way, I have published (peer-reviewed) articles about sensible and rational solutions that would work. I know how the system works.

You sensible and rational? Dude, you really are becoming as big a fake as Torchy with his Doctorate degree.

To be fair, getting published is really easy if you go for a low ranked journal.

(05-29-2013 01:09 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:58 PM)RobertN Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:21 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  No, I don't think it's an either/or scenario, and I'd prefer that you not try to build that straw man.

What I am saying is that they're not coming up with useful alternatives. It's more like, "here is an alternative, we know its a terrible alternative, but if we can create enough hype, then we can get people to fall for it out of hysteria."

What we need is sensible, rational solutions. What we are getting is a lot of stupid ideas forced upon us because, ohmygod, we're all going to die if we don't do something, and this is something.

By the way, I have published (peer-reviewed) articles about sensible and rational solutions that would work. I know how the system works.

You sensible and rational? Dude, you really are becoming as big a fake as Torchy with his Doctorate degree.

To be fair, getting published is really easy if you go for a low ranked journal.

I guess I was going with the sensible/rational part but had to include the published part when bolding.

(05-29-2013 01:07 PM)DrTorch Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:51 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  That makes no sense. The world is blanketed with weather stations, inside and outside of cities. The global average has increased everywhere, not just in urban areas.

That's not necessarily true. The raw data does not indicate increasing temps, which is why the alarmists spend so much time modifying the data.

Whether those modifications are legit or not, is a huge part of the debate.

Furthermore, many of the weather stations started outside of cities, but have since been encroached upon. Those have seen larger increases in their reported temps than other stations.

Proof?

(05-28-2013 08:53 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  The question is, do you honestly believe that the people opposing climate change research are interested in truth?

Some of them, yes. Often, the most reliable answer comes from those without a dog in the fight.

Quote:You guys are right to claim that this issue is about the money. The problem is, you're pointing the finger at the wrong people: the group that stands to lose the most, regardless of what the truth is. In the end it's truly absurd. Scientists are being bribed with generous amounts of money from oil backed think tanks to publish papers critical of the IPCC, which is the exact thing you're accusing the "dirty liberals" of doing. You guys are so quick to point the finger that you don't even realize that it's the right that's engaging in the exact same BS that you accuse the left of.

Wow... so oil money is bad but government money and "green" technology money (often from the same pockets) is good? If it's the same, and it's BS, then why do you buy into one side but not the other?

As far as I'm concerned, despite all sorts of money... the GW argument is terribly flawed... but the potential problem is bad enough that I will say... okay... let's assume for the sake of argument that you are correct... what do you suggest we do to stop it? The discussion usually ends right there, or goes off into some utopian view that the entire world, much of which is relatively uneducated, will buy into this story and do without food, despite their deserts turn to farm land so that we can keep from losing the polar ice caps. Sorry, but they have other priorities... and if we banned gasoline engines today, they would buy them for pennies and burn AT LEAST as much (and likely much dirtier) fossil fuel than we do, eliminating, or at least negating the trillions we would spend.

(05-28-2013 11:50 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  I don't believe there are many people, if any who oppose climate change research, so you question is misleadingly worded. To get to the question that i think would be appropriate to ask, yes I do believe that the people who are doing climate change research and coming up with different answers from your favored ones are totally interested in getting the right answer. And part of that is because of the money. There is more research funding to support research that says AGW is true than there is to say it is false. The whole thing about the oil companies is a straw man. Until somebody comes up with a suitable alternative to oil, they aren't going to make less money regardless of what the AGW research says.

This is where I question the AGW advocates. If you really, really thought this was going to happen and would be catastrophic, who you be spending your time and effort on getting more research grants to figure out if it is real or not, or on coming up with a solution. We have all this money going to grants to study how horrible it is, and nobody coming up with any solutions.

It's like we can't actually do anything to fix it until we convince everybody how terrible it is going to be if we don't fix it. That does not strike me as a rational, sensible response.

I've had time to read some of your links in your longer email. No,mat least the ones I've read ar not responsive to my questions. Again, if you really think that this is going to be so awful, why keep debating how awful it is going to be, instead of finding ways to fix it.

+1,000,000. I am neither funded by the oil companies nor oblivious to their goals. Why some think one side's money corrupts but the other side's doesn't is beyond me. I am only modestly convinced by the GW proponents... in no small part because they have been so wrong so often. First we had to clean up to stop cooling... then to stop warming... now to stop "change"... If the science were remotely solid, they would AT LEAST be able to identify the problem. I'll play along anyway because I believe in being good stewards of the earth... but nobody has a solution, other than one that pays the "believers" more money to look into it.

(05-29-2013 12:39 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:29 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  Who died and left you in charge of determining relevance?

You took the thread off topic and ignored the subject of the OP.

Interesting that DMAC considers potential solutions to the problem irrelevent to the problem... or more directly to the OP... to skepticism about the theory of the problem.

SOME people are skeptics of the problem because no rational solution exists, and little research is being done into potential solutions. All that seems to be getting done is arguing about exactly how big the problem might be. It's like postulating that an asteroid is likely (though not guaranteed) to come close enough to the earth or even hit us to push us out of our orbit and change our climate... and we're arguing about exactly whether it is going to be a 2 or 4 degree shift.

I'm not skeptical of the science... because at THIS point, it is a bit immaterial. My that I mean, if we can't really do anything about it... then there isn't much point in doing anything but adapt to it... just as the earth has done for eons... and we can adapt to it whether it happens or not. Like Owl, I'm skeptical of the "so what do you suggest we do about it".

Global temperatures rose when the Soviet Union fell and COLD weather stations went off line.

(05-29-2013 12:48 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  So this is what I got from the responses in this thread:

Instead of admitting that it's been documented that climate skepticism is in some part being intentionally manufactured, most of you just accuse 'liberals' of being the bad ones and bury your heads in the sand.

You guys should be impressed that the scientists being offered this money had the integrity to go to the media with the story rather than accept the bribe. Instead, you're still acting like getting a salary is the equivalent of being bribed.

Your own party is becoming more and more worried about climate change.

Add commandment 1.

(05-29-2013 01:21 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:48 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  So this is what I got from the responses in this thread:

Instead of admitting that it's been documented that climate skepticism is in some part being intentionally manufactured, most of you just accuse 'liberals' of being the bad ones and bury your heads in the sand.

You guys should be impressed that the scientists being offered this money had the integrity to go to the media with the story rather than accept the bribe. Instead, you're still acting like getting a salary is the equivalent of being bribed.

Your own party is becoming more and more worried about climate change.

Add commandment 1.

How so...

Quote:Instead of admitting that it's been documented that climate skepticism is in some part being intentionally manufactured, most of you just accuse 'liberals' of being the bad ones and bury your heads in the sand.

Like I said, commandment 1.

(05-29-2013 01:45 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

Quote:Instead of admitting that it's been documented that climate skepticism is in some part being intentionally manufactured, most of you just accuse 'liberals' of being the bad ones and bury your heads in the sand.

Like I said, commandment 1.

Like I said, how is that an ad hominem?

It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

(05-29-2013 02:03 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

I don't consider it a personal attack.

(05-29-2013 02:04 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:03 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

I don't consider it a personal attack.

Yeah, cause that's the standard.

I don't consider calling you a raving lunatic a personal attack. Does that mean it isn't?

And you just violated number 4 again.

(05-29-2013 02:07 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:04 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:03 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

I don't consider it a personal attack.

Yeah, cause that's the standard.

I don't consider calling you a raving lunatic a personal attack. Does that mean it isn't?

Calling me a raving lunatic is not the same thing as saying you're burying your head in the sands. I'm not calling you stupid, I'm saying that you need to open your eyes.

(05-29-2013 02:08 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:07 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:04 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:03 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

I don't consider it a personal attack.

Yeah, cause that's the standard.

I don't consider calling you a raving lunatic a personal attack. Does that mean it isn't?

Calling me a raving lunatic is not the same thing as saying you're burying your head in the sands. I'm not calling you stupid, I'm saying that you need to open your eyes.

You need to refresh yourself on what that term means. It carries with it an attack on a person's character. That they don't want to see so they refuse to see. They'd rather ignore the truth than be faced with it. It speaks to their motivation for disagreeing with you. You are saying people who disagree with you in this do so, not for sound reasons, but simply because you're right and they don't want to acknoweldge it. That's very personal.

(05-29-2013 02:13 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:08 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:07 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:04 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 02:03 PM)Ninerfan1 Wrote:  It's a personal attack. The fact you have to ask shows what I stated earlier. You can't follow the commandments if you can't even recognize when you've broken them.

I don't consider it a personal attack.

Yeah, cause that's the standard.

I don't consider calling you a raving lunatic a personal attack. Does that mean it isn't?

Calling me a raving lunatic is not the same thing as saying you're burying your head in the sands. I'm not calling you stupid, I'm saying that you need to open your eyes.

You need to refresh yourself on what that term means. It carries with it an attack on a person's character. That they don't want to see so they refuse to see. They'd rather ignore the truth than be faced with it. It speaks to their motivation for disagreeing with you. You are saying people who disagree with you in this do so, not for sound reasons, but simply because you're right and they don't want to acknoweldge it. That's very personal.

No offense, but that's kind of what's happening here. Instead of acknowledging that a misinformation campaign is actually happening and has been admitted to by people involved, most of the replies jump to addressing other concerns.

(05-29-2013 01:13 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 01:07 PM)DrTorch Wrote:  

(05-29-2013 12:51 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  That makes no sense. The world is blanketed with weather stations, inside and outside of cities. The global average has increased everywhere, not just in urban areas.

That's not necessarily true. The raw data does not indicate increasing temps, which is why the alarmists spend so much time modifying the data.

Whether those modifications are legit or not, is a huge part of the debate.

Furthermore, many of the weather stations started outside of cities, but have since been encroached upon. Those have seen larger increases in their reported temps than other stations.

Proof?

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2011IJMPC..22.1139L

As far as the legitimacy of adjustments to the raw data

http://itia.ntua.gr/en/docinfo/1212/

These are just single references that were easy to find and fairly direct to the point, there are many more on these subjects.

(05-29-2013 02:19 PM)dmacfour Wrote:  No offense, but that's kind of what's happening here. Instead of acknowledging that a misinformation campaign is actually happening and has been admitted to by people involved, most of the replies jump to addressing other concerns.

And this violates rule 2. Another straw man. Your straw man feeds your ad hominem.

And the above is exactly what you did in the consensus thread when you told us what the author "ought" to have done.