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» Hatrack River Forum » Active Forums » Books, Films, Food and Culture » The Rabbit on Global Climate Change (warming, cooling, hockey stick, little ice age) (Page 0)

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Author Topic: The Rabbit on Global Climate Change (warming, cooling, hockey stick, little ice age)
King of Men
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Truth is truth. Either you're a scientist, or you're a political hack with an ax to grind. If the evidence favours the position of ignorant cretins, that is a problem of having cretins in the first place, not a problem of the evidence.

As for slowing the progress of science, in the scenario you outline nobody is going to die of that, or at least it will be very indirect - third-order effects at most. I must say that the case of climate science is a rather better argument for fraud, in that it has actual lives at stake as a first-order effect. But consider the following aphorism: "If you would break your word to save the world, then the moment when the world needs saving is the moment that your word becomes worthless." In particular, it is worthless for the cause of saving the world, because "he would say that, wouldn't he?" If what you publish becomes a function of what you believe rather than what you can show from evidence, then you lose the effect of being a scientist. If a scientist weighs in on a political problem, saying "Action X will cause effect Y", that should be a very strong argument for those who care about effect Y. But this is only true if the scientist can be trusted not to shade his report. I'm even willing to sacrifice some lives to maintain that reputation for absolute truth-telling. After all, who knows when the next crisis might come along, where it will be of even greater importance that the public should believe the science? Machiavelli reminds us that "the prince should not lie, unless it is very greatly to his advantage", on the grounds that a reputation for truth-telling is an extremely valuable asset. And the prince only has to care about his own lifetime. A scientist must look ahead to the next half millennium.

I realise of course that I'm holding up an inhuman standard; I would not necessarily burn anyone at the stake for breaking it. Keelhauling should be sufficient.

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King of Men
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
BTW KoM, I asked for some specific examples of dodgy science. Please provide these. It is important for me to know what you are talking about and whether you are simply repeating lies told by others or have legitimate examples of dodgy science that is being used to push policy.

I was referring to the "hide the decline" comment; pressure brought to bear on journal editors; some examples of 'correction factors' in code which look rather bad; and refusal to publish models. I should have been more specific in my wording: I do not necessarily say that any of these are dodgy science, there could be good explanations for each one (and of course they are all cherry-picked from a huge archive), but they do not give a good impression. Again, it is necessary not only to be pure, but to appear so.
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King of Men
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:
Originally posted by King of Men:
Publish and be damned. You can't help what the creationists do, you can only help what you do.

You can only help what you do, but you can't ignore the likely impact of what you do. Why do you think it you should publish data before you can adequately explain it whey you know that the most likely result will be to slow the progress of science? Why is there an ethical obligation to publish something you can't explain?
To answer this more directly, the fastest way to get something explained is to have more people look at it. If something is really puzzling, then you should get more brains working on the problem.
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scifibum
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I'd honestly prefer for scientists to publish their results without feeling they have a responsibility to act as shepherds of public response to what gets published. To do otherwise is hubris and ultimately counterproductive.

"Why is there an ethical obligation to publish something you can't explain?"

I know little of the process of deciding what is worthy of publication, but I think there are different ways you can have a result that seems difficult to explain. Some things might simply not merit publication without further study.

But suppressing a result that you'd have published if it turned out a different way, because you're afraid it'll sway public opinion the wrong way seems unethical because objectivity is tossed out the window.

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King of Men
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I'm accumulating a lot of posts in a row here, but oh well. Touching the creationism thing, how about those dinosaur bones with the soupy fluid inside? Scweitzer and Staedter must have known the creationists were going to jump all over that, but they went ahead and published anyway. Do you call them wrong for doing so? I don't. And I'm glad to have a specific example I can say I approve of, because after all words are cheap. "Pff", he said, waving his hand airily. "Publish and be damned; truth is truth". [Smile]
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fugu13
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I don't think any of the revelations that have come out of the letters have undermined anthropogenic global warming.

But things like that they can't reconstruct the process they used to go from original data sources to their database is an example of extremely bad science. Also, the letters reveal certain illegal and immoral practices, like conspiring to delete emails in response to a freedom of information request.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
I was referring to the "hide the decline" comment; pressure brought to bear on journal editors; some examples of 'correction factors' in code which look rather bad; and refusal to publish models
Like I keep saying, these snipets are not sufficient to make a judgement on what was actually done. I need more data. What exactly did they do to "hide the decline"? I can think of many ways of presenting data that are intended to emphasize a particular feature and deemphasize other features. Most of those are completely ethical. In order to judge whether or not something unethical was done I need more details. Otherwise, you are making unfair judgments based on heavily biased media reports of data released by criminals with clearly biased objectives.

For example, one of the publicized comments that has been interpreted as pressuring journal editors has been presented without any context. The specific journal in question, "Climate Research". One of the Journal editors, Chris de Freitas, has been a very outspoken sceptic of global climate change and critic of the IPCC. The journal published several articles skeptical of climate change that were proven in short order to be total garbage. The articles contained clear errors, some of them in high school level material, that should have been caught in the peer review process. Chris de Freitas was responsible for the review of all of these articles. This wasn't a case of suppression legitimate science, it was exactly the opposite. A case of an editor allow publication of critically flawed material because it support his bias. When this became widely known, there was backlash against the journal by legitimate scientists of all political stripes. Most of the journal's editorial board resigned in protest. The snipets I've read obtained by these hackers, are about this incident. Knowing the full story shed a very different light on the comments.

And btw, one of the thoroughly discredit papers in question, was co-authored by Michaels -- who is now whining about "suppression". That isn't what happened. Michaels succeeded in publishing a paper with obvious amateurish mistakes that should have led to immediate rejection in a legitimate peer review. The paper was non the less accepted for ideological reasons despite the fact that it was a piece of crap.

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Noemon
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Peter Watts has a blog post on this subject that I enjoyed reading. NSFW language, so if that bothers you, don't click.
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Hobbes
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Part of the ethical obligation is that in most cases research is funded by tax dollars paid by evolutionists and creationists. It's literally the job of the researcher to share with their sponsor (the public) what they learn.

Hobbes [Smile]

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by Hobbes:
Part of the ethical obligation is that in most cases research is funded by tax dollars paid by evolutionists and creationists. It's literally the job of the researcher to share with their sponsor (the public) what they learn.

Hobbes [Smile]

I think people are misunderstanding what I'm saying. I not trying to justify deliberate misrepresentation of results or violation of contractual obligations. But no scientist publishes every single piece of data they collect. That wouldn't be science. Every time scientists report on their findings, they go through a selection process of what data to include in the report and what to omit, they explore a range of ways to present the data to communicate the things they have found important. There are unethical ways of doing that, but doing it is not inherently unethical -- it is an important part of the scientific process.

Let me give an example, consider this famous set of data from Charles Keeling showing atmospheric CO2 levels over the past 50 years at the Mauna Loa observatory. The data shows a long term increasing trend superimposed on an annual oscillatory cycle. We have a good understand of both what causes the annual oscillation and the what is causing the long term trend. But now consider the hypothetical situation that this is your data set and you have to decide how to present it in a research paper. You might choose to present the data as an annual average, which would eliminate all the oscillation and give a smooth curve or you might choose to look at only a one decade long slice of the data which would emphasize the annual oscillation rather than the long term trend. Both of those choices might be completely ethical depending on the point you were trying to make. They might also be highly unethical depending on the point you were trying to make.

Without a broader context it really isn't possible to tell whether the authors were doing something deliberately misleading and unethical or not. Taking a snipet from an email where two authors discussed how to present data to "hide a decline" isn't enough to judge whether or not they were actually doing anything unethical. I need to know the details of the data they were presenting, the point they were trying to make, if they actual did "hide the decline" or simply discussed it and if they did, what they did to hide the decline and whether what they did was clearly identified in the report. The statement alone is certainly reason to further investigate into what actually happened but it is by no means proof or even strong evidence of scientific misconduct.

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malanthrop
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I wonder if the IPCC included this in their calculations. Ignoring this data would be like grading the thermal efficiency of your house without looking at the variances in your neighbors. It seems very odd to ignore the most powerful force of heat in the solar system as it's impacts on neighboring planets.

I don't argue that we pump green house gasses into the atmosphere but our C02 is a minor greenhouse gas. Water vapor is by far the most significant greenhouse gas and Mt St Helens is the biggest contributor to greenhouse gasses in WA st. Entire continents no longer burn due to wildfires.

My only contention is, the science is not settled no matter how loudly it is proclaimed or how much the doubters are ridiculed or how wealthy the proponents become.

I don't want to hear about sacrifice for a greater good from a man who uses more electricity to heat his pool than I do in my house. The millionaires with stock in green companies, flying around in private jets and polluting more than 100 families. A future world where you can have as big a house and consume as much as you want, provided you are wealthy enough to pay your carbon offsets. Unfortunately, the poor and middle class will just have to do with less.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
I wonder if the IPCC included this in their calculations.
Yes, the IPCC did consider the large body of scientific research that has been done on solar cycles and climate change. They do not cite Abdussamatov's work since it was not published before their most recent report but they do cite numerous other researches who have looked at the solar component of climate change. If you are sincerely interested, here is a link to the relevant chapter of their most recent report.
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Mucus
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
What I am justifying, is scientists becoming more actively involved politically and learning to play by the rules of politics rather than the rules of science. Because at some point, none of us are just scientists, we are human beings with political and social interests. Scientific ethics don't over ride all other ethical considerations ...

Indeed.
It is a good explanation of why scientists like Richard Dawkins should (and have) become more actively involved in promoting atheism rather than sticking just to science as well.

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malanthrop
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The subject definitely deserves more study, the problem is so often the proponents of man-made global warming behave like early Flat-Earth Catholics when challenged or questioned. It's too early, despite the religious fervor of the true believers, to make any drastic economic changes.

I'm sure I could go through Hatrack and find plenty of old comments about the war being for Bush's oil buddies and a giveaway to Vice president Cheney's prior employer, Halliburton. But no one even questions the worlds first green billionaire is also the number one proponent of the green agenda (I'd call it marketing). No questioning the fact that government grants pay for research to bolster global warming evidence while at the same time pushing for the biggest tax increase ever, based upon that purchased evidence. I doubt if there is real, objective science....the ones paying for and doing the research are already fervently convinced. Are we objectively testing hypothesis' or attempting to bolster a "debate is over" theory. In science, the debate should never be over - especially a debate as young and disputed as this one.

[ December 02, 2009, 12:04 PM: Message edited by: malanthrop ]

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TomDavidson
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quote:
It's too early, despite the religious fervor of the true believers, to make any drastic economic changes.
Well, here's the problem: if the "true believers" are right, it's actually too late now to make any changes.
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The Rabbit
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quote:
The subject definitely deserves more study, the problem is so often the proponents of man-made global warming behave like early Flat-Earth Catholics when challenged or questioned.
That is simply not true. If you look at this thread and all the links cited in this thread you will see that I and other "true believers" as you call us, have given detailed substantive answers over and over again. For example, just a few posts back I answered your question, directed you to source for my answer. You have ignored my response.

So let me give you a more detailed answer. First, we know very accurately from detailed satellite measurements how the solar irradiance has been changing and it hasn't been increasing. In fact, during the time period in which Abdussamatov did his study, the solar irradiance was unequivocally decreasing. Over the past 30 years, their has been no measured change in the average solar see data. There is a natural solar cycle, but no overall trend either upward or downward. Since 2001 we have been on the downward part of that natural cycle. Hence, even suggesting that the melting of the martian polar ice between 2000 and 2005 was the result of increases in solar irradiance is nonsense because we measured the solar irradiance during this time period and it decreased.

Additionally, melting of the polar ice caps is a local phenomenon not a global phenomenon. Measures of the global average temperature on mars over the same time period show a slight decrease in the global average temperature so this warming seems to be limited to the polar regions and not a global phenomenon. There have been a number of studies of the martian climate, if you are interested I can find you links although most of them will require a subscription.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
No questioning the fact that government grants pay for research to bolster global warming evidence while at the same time pushing for the biggest tax increase ever, based upon that purchased evidence.
There most certainly is a question about it. Please provide data to support the claim.
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King of Men
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Funny. You would think that, with Bush in control lo these eight years, the 'conservative' side would have been able to buy some evidence too. If scientists are so easily bought, where are yours?
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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by King of Men:
Funny. You would think that, with Bush in control lo these eight years, the 'conservative' side would have been able to buy some evidence too. If scientists are so easily bought, where are yours?

I could point to a few who are on the payroll of places like Western Fuels Association if you'd like.
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BryanP
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quote:
Originally posted by The Rabbit:
quote:
I was referring to the "hide the decline" comment; pressure brought to bear on journal editors; some examples of 'correction factors' in code which look rather bad; and refusal to publish models
Like I keep saying, these snipets are not sufficient to make a judgement on what was actually done. I need more data. What exactly did they do to "hide the decline"? I can think of many ways of presenting data that are intended to emphasize a particular feature and deemphasize other features. Most of those are completely ethical. In order to judge whether or not something unethical was done I need more details. Otherwise, you are making unfair judgments based on heavily biased media reports of data released by criminals with clearly biased objectives.
My understanding with respect to "hide the decline" is that one of the methods that has been used to determined temperatures for the last several thousand years has been to look at tree ring data. And while most tree ring data makes a nice story in conjunction with whatever other methods have been used to determine past temperatures, tree ring data from the last 30 years or more does not correspond to temperatures measured using thermometers, and in fact the decline that was hidden was that the tree data shows a cooling in recent years. If I haven't confused this in some way I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

Anyways, rather than tossing out all the tree data for their (IPCC?) graph, they merely tossed out the last 30 years or so of data and grafted on thermometer temperatures, which of course show the increase.

I have to figure out again where I read this, hopefully it's somewhat familiar to you. If they did indeed throw out a selection of tree data and graft on the thermometer data, it's pretty dubious. If recent tree ring data does not correspond to thermometer temperatures, then surely the whole of the tree ring data is suspect.

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Mucus
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On an intriguing note, the Economist finished their roughly one and a half week debate on whether China or the US are showing more leadership on climate change.

The debate is supposedly an adaptation of the Oxford debating style and has pretty good and hefty writing by both the proposer and the opposition (and many guests).

Of special interest to Americans may be the statement by Gary Locke which starts with a remarkable concession given his position (but does highlight many positive things):
quote:
If it was November 2008 instead of November 2009, it would be difficult to disagree with this motion, but no one has done more in the last year to take action on climate change than President Obama and his administration.
The end statement is here with links to all the various stages of the debate.
quote:
We've had a debate unusually rich in different ways to answer the question, or even to challenge its premises. Peggy Liu, writing for the motion, has noted the tremendous efforts China has made to green its energy and its transportation. Max Schulz, opposing the motion, has based much of his criticism of China on the statist, top-down approach that China has taken, and has said that China is only doing as it does to become rich. Ms Liu, and some of our guest experts, see no contradiction in that whatsoever; China is, in this view, doing well by doing good, and America would be wise to do the same. Better still, offer several of our participants, are efforts undertaken by America and China together; research breakthroughs, or even just the creation of bigger markets for green energy, will benefit both through technology transfer, best-practice sharing and economies of scale. In his close, Mr Schulz says that in any case, he is not fully convinced that manmade warming is certain, severe and near enough to warrant huge sums spent on mitigating it. By resisting legally binding regimes, America is doing the world the most good in this arena, he says.
...
In the end, our voters thought China was leading more, by a tally of 70% to 30%. This is striking not only on its face, but also given that The Economist, and probably this debate, has far more readers in America than in China. Whether this result speaks more positively of China's efforts (on which the debaters and most guests focused), or badly of American foot-dragging, we leave to the readers as an exercise.

And with that, both countries and others around the world go to Copenhagen. During the course of this very debate, big announcements—including numerical targets from both China and America—have made talks of the eventual result in Copenhagen a little less gloomy than they had been just a few weeks ago. Good news for everyone. A bust-up in Copenhagen would cause political damage that would take years to recover, while the world goes on emitting those greenhouse gases.

http://www.economist.com/debate/days/view/426
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aspectre
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Long-term seasonal hemispheric forcing of Titan's lakes

Saturn's year is 29.4571years long; and it's equivalent "seasons" are 7.37years long.
Using maximum solar insolation as its planetary "summer solstice" equivalent, Saturn's orbital "summer" began 9July2003 when it reached perihelion -- closest point approaching the Sun -- and ends near 1January2011.
Saturn receives 25% more sunlight at perihelion that at aphelion -- farthest point receding from the Sun -- so it is unsurprising that Titan has been warming through Saturn's "spring" and "summer" equivalents.

[ December 05, 2009, 12:11 PM: Message edited by: aspectre ]

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Clive Candy
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Haha.
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Eaquae Legit
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quote:
Originally posted by malanthrop:
The subject definitely deserves more study, the problem is so often the proponents of man-made global warming behave like early Flat-Earth Catholics when challenged or questioned.

It's a small thing, perhaps, compared to global chaos due to climate change, but can we lay the "flat earth Catholics" thing to its long overdue rest? Dang Washington Irving. P.S. He was not Catholic.
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Mucus
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China's coal country under pressure - 10 Dec 09 - AlJazeeraEnglish
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aspectre
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"When you think of Canada, which qualities come to mind? The world’s peace-keeper, the friendly nation, a liberal counterweight to the harsher pieties of its southern neighbour, decent, civilised, fair, well-governed?...
...So here I am, watching the astonishing spectacle of a beautiful, cultured nation turning itself into a corrupt petrostate...slipping down...towards dependence on...the dirtiest commodity known to man."

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DarkKnight
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Want to save the environment? Kill your dog now...
quote:
Man's best friend could be one of the environment's worst enemies, according to a new study which says the carbon pawprint of a pet dog is more than double that of a gas-guzzling sports utility vehicle.
quote:
"Owning a dog really is quite an extravagance, mainly because of the carbon footprint of meat," Barrett said.

Other animals aren't much better for the environment, the Vales say.

Cats have an eco-footprint of about 0.15 hectares, slightly less than driving a Volkswagen Golf for a year, while two hamsters equates to a plasma television and even the humble goldfish burns energy equivalent to two mobile telephones.

But Reha Huttin, president of France's 30 Million Friends animal rights foundation says the human impact of eliminating pets would be equally devastating.

"Pets are anti-depressants, they help us cope with stress, they are good for the elderly," Huttin told AFP.

"Everyone should work out their own environmental impact. I should be allowed to say that I walk instead of using my car and that I don't eat meat, so why shouldn't I be allowed to have a little cat to alleviate my loneliness?"

Sylvie Comont, proud owner of seven cats and two dogs -- the environmental equivalent of a small fleet of cars -- says defiantly, "Our animals give us so much that I don't feel like a polluter at all.

"I think the love we have for our animals and what they contribute to our lives outweighs the environmental considerations.

"I don't want a life without animals," she told AFP.


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Mucus
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The Rabbit: Or anyone with further information on this really. How valid is this reasoning?
quote:
So what's compostable plastic good for? It's made from a renewable resource, namely corn, but that doesn't necessarily make it environmentally friendly. Writing in Scientific American in 2000, Tillman Gerngross and Steven Slater pointed out that manufacturing PLA required more fossil fuels than it takes to make most plastics, canceling out the environmental benefit.

They weren't completely down on the stuff, though, and pointed out two benefits you might not suspect. First, much of the energy needed to turn corn into plastic could be obtained by burning the stalks and leaves, known as stover, which are normally discarded. Second, they argue, we don't really want PLA to biodegrade — just the opposite. The big push these days is on figuring out ways to sequester carbon so it doesn't enter the atmosphere as CO2, one of the major greenhouse gases. What better way to do that than grow corn, which sucks CO2 out of the atmosphere, then use the corn to make plastic, which can be buried underground after use?

Don't get me wrong; I'm not saying this is accepted scientific advice. But it's not out of the question that years from now the environmentally responsible thing may be to use all the plant-derived plastic packaging you can and then throw the stuff away.

http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2915/whats-up-with-compostable-plastics

So how valid is that reasoning?

We have an increasing number of stores that give out these biodegradable plastic bags and packaging, is the low-carbon ideal to go compost them or to throw them out into a landfill as a sort of distributed carbon sequestering technique?

And what about the cob that remains when I've eaten corn on the cob? Should I compost it or sequester it?

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Tstorm
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The best thing to do with regards to plastic bags from stores, is to avoid them completely. Bring your own cloth, reusable bags, whenever possible.

I actually reuse the plastic bags I receive from stores as trash sacks. Sometimes I just forget to bring my own bags to the grocery store, so having a few of these doesn't hurt me. Since I only have one small wastebasket full of trash every week (or slightly more), these work fine for trash sacks.

From what I've read, practically none of the plastics labeled as 'biodegradable' ever degrade, especially when they are buried.

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Raymond Arnold
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quote:
Originally posted by DarkKnight:
Want to save the environment? Kill your dog now...
quote:
Man's best friend could be one of the environment's worst enemies, according to a new study which says the carbon pawprint of a pet dog is more than double that of a gas-guzzling sports utility vehicle.
quote:
"Owning a dog really is quite an extravagance, mainly because of the carbon footprint of meat," Barrett said.

Other animals aren't much better for the environment, the Vales say.

Cats have an eco-footprint of about 0.15 hectares, slightly less than driving a Volkswagen Golf for a year, while two hamsters equates to a plasma television and even the humble goldfish burns energy equivalent to two mobile telephones.

But Reha Huttin, president of France's 30 Million Friends animal rights foundation says the human impact of eliminating pets would be equally devastating.

"Pets are anti-depressants, they help us cope with stress, they are good for the elderly," Huttin told AFP.

"Everyone should work out their own environmental impact. I should be allowed to say that I walk instead of using my car and that I don't eat meat, so why shouldn't I be allowed to have a little cat to alleviate my loneliness?"

Sylvie Comont, proud owner of seven cats and two dogs -- the environmental equivalent of a small fleet of cars -- says defiantly, "Our animals give us so much that I don't feel like a polluter at all.

"I think the love we have for our animals and what they contribute to our lives outweighs the environmental considerations.

"I don't want a life without animals," she told AFP.


What this has gotten me wondering is what the carbon footprint of a human is, all by themselves. I mean, I'm pretty sure I eat and poop more than my dog does, and I have to imagine that the giant infrastructure required to deal with human waste is dramatically more than the damage dogs do by doing what all the animals in the natural world are doing already.
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fugu13
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Keep in mind that not all carbon is damage (and really, the interpretation of any of it as damage is mostly because it will damage humans).
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malanthrop
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http://www.accuweather.com/news-weather-features.asp?partner=&traveler=0&date=2010-01-04_1701&month=1&year=2010
http://www.wreg.com/news/wreg-cold-deaths,0,5066667.story
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/149760
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/807821-pensioners-burn-books-for-warmth
http://www.necn.com/Boston/New-England/2010/01/03/Alltime-record-snowfall-in/1262573458.html
/nuclear.power.plant.2.1404207.html
http://cbs2chicago.com/national/midwest.cold.snow.2.1405658.html
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CNG.ddf1d3c1eb6d81b959257820155d3d51.1b1&show_article=1

....Pelosi and Obama push global warming legeslation. [Smile]

I live in Tampa and saw a snow flake....first time since 1977. Perhaps it has something to do with the sun. The caps melted on Mars and 2009 had the least solar activity on record. Maybe the 30 year cycle has come about, I remember being afraid of the impending ice age in the 1970's.

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The White Whale
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Again, you show a profound misunderstanding or a deliberate twisting of facts and theories. Probably both.
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Tstorm
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I roll back and forth between face-palming and laughter when it comes to people who provide anecdotal quips about the weather as proof that global warming is true or false.

But I'm always up for discussing the weather! We're going to see negative double digits for the first time in a while, here in northern Kansas. I can't wait. I think I'll experiment with freezing bubbles and photography...

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Glenn Arnold
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I wonder if the article about dogs takes into account that dog food is made primarily out of lungs and other animal by-products, which, since it isn't eaten by humans would otherwise go to waste.
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DarkKnight
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I think the premise in the dog article is that they are carnivores needing x amount of calories on average to survive which requires y amount of other animals to be eaten...or something like that.
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theamazeeaz
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quote:
Originally posted by Tstorm:

From what I've read, practically none of the plastics labeled as 'biodegradable' ever degrade, especially when they are buried.

My understanding is that that "buried" part prevents even decay-able things from decaying as they should in landfills.
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theamazeeaz
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quote:
Originally posted by Raymond Arnold:
quote:
Originally posted by DarkKnight:
Want to save the environment? Kill your dog now...
quote:
Man's best friend could be one of the environment's worst enemies, according to a new study which says the carbon pawprint of a pet dog is more than double that of a gas-guzzling sports utility vehicle.
quote:
"Owning a dog really is quite an extravagance, mainly because of the carbon footprint of meat," Barrett said.


Other animals aren't much better for the environment, the Vales say.

Cats have an eco-footprint of about 0.15 hectares, slightly less than driving a Volkswagen Golf for a year, while two hamsters equates to a plasma television and even the humble goldfish burns energy equivalent to two mobile telephones.

But Reha Huttin, president of France's 30 Million Friends animal rights foundation says the human impact of eliminating pets would be equally devastating.

"Pets are anti-depressants, they help us cope with stress, they are good for the elderly," Huttin told AFP.

"Everyone should work out their own environmental impact. I should be allowed to say that I walk instead of using my car and that I don't eat meat, so why shouldn't I be allowed to have a little cat to alleviate my loneliness?"

Sylvie Comont, proud owner of seven cats and two dogs -- the environmental equivalent of a small fleet of cars -- says defiantly, "Our animals give us so much that I don't feel like a polluter at all.

"I think the love we have for our animals and what they contribute to our lives outweighs the environmental considerations.

"I don't want a life without animals," she told AFP.


What this has gotten me wondering is what the carbon footprint of a human is, all by themselves. I mean, I'm pretty sure I eat and poop more than my dog does, and I have to imagine that the giant infrastructure required to deal with human waste is dramatically more than the damage dogs do by doing what all the animals in the natural world are doing already.
Maybe we should start feeding dogs horse meat again? There are some spares in Nevada...
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Tstorm
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quote:
Originally posted by theamazeeaz:
quote:
Originally posted by Tstorm:

From what I've read, practically none of the plastics labeled as 'biodegradable' ever degrade, especially when they are buried.

My understanding is that that "buried" part prevents even decay-able things from decaying as they should in landfills.
Yep.
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Mucus
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Which may be a good thing
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Tatiana
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Bill Gates in this TED talk said exactly what I think about climate change and what we need to do about it. Posting this here and in several other appropriate threads to catch all the people who might be interested. I apologize for the redundancy.
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DarkKnight
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Wind contributing to Arctic sea ice loss, study finds
quote:
Much of the record breaking loss of ice in the Arctic ocean in recent years is down to the region's swirling winds and is not a direct result of global warming, a new study reveals.

Ice blown out of the region by Arctic winds can explain around one-third of the steep downward trend in sea ice extent in the region since 1979, the scientists say.

The study does not question that global warming is also melting ice in the Arctic, but it could raise doubts about high-profile claims that the region has passed a climate "tipping point" that could see ice loss sharply accelerate in coming years.


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MattP
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quote:
Much of the record breaking loss of ice in the Arctic ocean in recent years is down to the region's swirling winds and is not a direct result of global warming, a new study reveals.
While 1/3 is of the effect is nothing to sneeze at, it still doesn't account for the majority of ice loss.

I also haven't seen any discussion of why winds were higher during this period and I'm curious about whether global warming might be a factor there was well.

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Lyrhawn
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Hey Rabbit, I was wondering if you could explain this graph to me.

Someone posted it on Facebook as proof that climate change was happening. As you well know, I'm a believer in climate change, but it seems odd to look at just a 30 year period, and at that, less than 20 years of sustained above average warming and call that proof. So can you explain it to me? Is this graph statistically significant?

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fugu13
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As far as I can tell, the graph is of difference from average temperature. That roughly half of the graph is above the average for the total time period will almost always be true, absent very dramatic changes, for any period you choose, whether that be warming, cooling, or staying about the same... That the half among the warmest is almost all in the latter time period is evidence of a remarkable upward trend.
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The Rabbit
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Lyrhawn, fugu is right. The graph shows the Temperature anomaly, which is the deviation from the mean value over some time period. In this case, the time period is 1979 - present (last 33 years). If there was no warming or cooling trend over this time period, the red (positive) values would be randomly distributed through the time period. They aren't. Nearly all the red lines have been in the last 15 years which indicates a strong warming trend.

All I can really add to what fugu said is that this data (v5.4) comes the University of Alabama Huntsville and was calculated from microwave satellite measurements which only go back to 1979. Satellites don't measure temperature directly, they measure irradiance. That has to be deconvoluted to get near surface temperatures. They also have to adjust for differences between satellites and drift in the satellites with time. v5.4 refers for one algorithm for calculating the mean temperatures in different parts of the atmosphere from the satellite data. Different algorithms that are being used currently give slightly different answers even when they use the exact same satellite measurements, but the underlying trends are the same.

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Lyrhawn
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quote:
The graph shows the Temperature anomaly, which is the deviation from the mean value over some time period. In this case, the time period is 1979 - present (last 33 years). If there was no warming or cooling trend over this time period, the red (positive) values would be randomly distributed through the time period. They aren't. Nearly all the red lines have been in the last 15 years which indicates a strong warming trend.
I guess my question is, is that historically abnormal? We might only have been keeping track of temperatures for the last century and change, but we have ice core data and other ways of testing what the temperature was like for thousands of years. Is a 15 year warming trend statistically significant?
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capaxinfiniti
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Why do the abnormal temperatures start so dramatically near the end of 1997? It looks like someone flipped a switch.
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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
Why do the abnormal temperatures start so dramatically near the end of 1997? It looks like someone flipped a switch.

There is no "normal". The zero line is the average temperature from 1979 and the present. Half the values are above the average and half are below because it's an average. The fact that temperatures after 1997 are nearly all above the average while those before 1997 are nearly all below the average shows that that temperatures have been rising for the past 30 years. There is no sudden switch, I you look at data for the past
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theamazeeaz
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quote:
Originally posted by Tstorm:
The best thing to do with regards to plastic bags from stores, is to avoid them completely. Bring your own cloth, reusable bags, whenever possible.

I actually reuse the plastic bags I receive from stores as trash sacks. Sometimes I just forget to bring my own bags to the grocery store, so having a few of these doesn't hurt me. Since I only have one small wastebasket full of trash every week (or slightly more), these work fine for trash sacks.

From what I've read, practically none of the plastics labeled as 'biodegradable' ever degrade, especially when they are buried.

I have a vermicomposter, and I threw one of those green plastic compost bags in it about six months ago. It's still around, but even the corn cobs that took forever (compared to fruits) are gone. It's probably not going to go until the time-bomb goes off and it shatters into a million pieces (great idea, but such a mess, because I hoard bags).
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