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A new report from the International Panel on Climate Change claims that at the current rate, we will have increased the CO2 levels in the atmosphere to the point that we will see run away climate change.
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[uproarious laughter] Not criticizing the actual content of the article. As I've said elsewhere, I personally only know barely enough to be skeptical, and not enough to have an informed dissenting opinion. It's just, we've been discussing State of Fear all over the board lately, and this article reads EXACTLY like one of the ones Michael Crichton wrote to be ridiculed
I mean, it must be fun for Crichton when his opponents' actual articles look identical to his straw men
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Personally I'm in favor of Annie's idea, general public conciesness when it comes to wasting our recources would do a world of good (literally). Unforunatly this doesn't seem to be happening (though I still support any group that tries to get this happening, eternal hope is not something to be snubbed ), reductions in allowed pollution and defforestation would be nice, especially if selling those rights wasn't allowed, instead perhaps bonuses for going under them, as in tax breaks, or if they insist on selling right, maybe the goverment could buy them? Just a thought.
As for the article, well I don't know who did the science, but either it wasn't reported well or it wasn't ... well ... I'm skeptical, let's say that. Seting a thresh-hold like 400ppm is quite frankly, a pipe-dream. We don't begin to understand the very complex balance of CO2 and the climate; also, man produces less than 1% of the CO2 pumped into the air annually. Of course this lack of knolwedge as to how the climate works and is affected should lead to caution, but reports describing such exact measurments and time scales are almost as ridiculous as saying we can do whatever we want with no impact.
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EDIT: All right, I hope I haven't accidentally pre-empted someone's response to my post. But Hobbes did a really good job of expressing my general doubts about the article, and I've taken enough crap about this already It's his turn.
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Yeah, the article's pretty weak. It's a shame there aren't more citations, or an explanation of why a temperature threshold is thought to exist in the first place. As written, it doesn't seem credible unless you understand some of the other logic behind it.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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Yeah, here's what bugs me. A lot of the info available in popular sources about this subject is apparently written for extremely credulous people. It doesn't address the questions and doubts that naturally occur to me when I hear the assertions. So I'm not sure how I'm supposed to evaluate this stuff without actually becoming an expert myself (which I can't realistically do while simultaneously trying to become an expert in my chosen field).
EDIT: And yes, that last line really means, "How can I study science when I'm so busy playing video games?"
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What is it about seeing a link to British newspaper anymore that makes me roll my eyes? The Guardian, the Independent?
Do they not hold themselves up to an editorial standard or just grab enough copy to fill space before the page girl of the week?
Posts: 472 | Registered: Aug 2004
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"Do they not hold themselves up to an editorial standard..."
In all fairness, they hold themselves up to an editorial standard at least as rigorous as the American print media. Of course, they'd consider that a deadly insult, but I think it's a pretty accurate statement.
Like all media sources, though, the quality of the reporting drops markedly when the article is being written by someone who isn't familiar with the subject. This is especially visible in science/technology reporting, for obvious reasons; reporters in these fields will generally quote press releases nearly verbatim (which, by the way, is one of Crichton's recent criticisms that I didn't consider too exaggerated, although his "reveal" was ludicrously exaggerated), perhaps going so far as to call to ask a single custom question -- or, if it's a politicized issue, to call an "opposing" view just to put a dissenting quote in. (You'll see a similar behavior among war reporters, financial reporters, and any field in which the people who really know what they're doing are out doing it, and the people who're writing about it are a good distance away, relying on other sources for their info.)
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