Are we ready to change what kind of impact we are having on the planet? Are we ready to free ourselves from the reactive mentality that reflects our origins as animals? Are we smart enough to free ourselves from absolute grudging necessity?
Submitted by deronmoped on Fri, 02/08/2008 - 09:45
Here is a article about what is called the Maunder Minimum. Looks like we could be in for reduced insolation in the next couple of years. This could lead to radical cooling, offsetting any GW.
[...] some extremophiles the researchers found in an Alaskan tunnel actually came to life as the ice around them melted. These bacteria had endured being frozen for 32,000 years and were able to go back to "business as usual" as they thawed out.
Just listened to this podcast this morning while walking to the shuttle to ride to work. There's a link to the transcript below. The theme of the story is that the existing ecosystem, forests especially, has captured a tremendous amount of carbon and could be (or is) induced to release that carbon quickly. The quick release of carbon from e.g. forest fires c/would swamp the emissions from direct human activity. He presents evidence that while the direct source is from existing vegetation, that the indirect cause is human activity causing an increase in atmospheric carbon (and other greenhouse gasses) that's causing an increase in temperature that is creating the conditions which are expected to cause the rapid release of carbon from the existing vegetation.
He several times contrasted the coverage of the forest fires in southern California last summer with the lack of coverage of even more massive forest fires in remote areas of northern Canada and remote areas of China. It seems the only time forest fires are covered is when they are a direct threat to human well-being, and the coverage focuses more on people losing their houses than the side effect. The side effect is that when the tree burns it releases its carbon. The carbon sequestered in the growth of that tree unsequesters and becomes part of the carbon increase that's supposedly causing global warming.
He discussed how forest fires are a natural part of the life of forests, especially the pine forests of the West and of Northern Canada. Some of the trees can only sprout new seedlings when there is a fire. However the issue is a matter of balance. There is more carbon being released through forest fires than is being absorbed by growth of new forest. And overall the whole ecosystem is seeing an over-abundance of carbon a large portion of which is directly from human activity.
There are lots of details, it is an information packed hour of listening.
Who says loving the planet isn't worth it? Being environmentally minded could save you a couple hundred or a few thousand dollars at tax time.
If you've made energy-saving improvements to your life in the past year, you may get some tax credits on your federal and state income taxes. Follow the links in this article to see what you qualify for.'
Submitted by deronmoped on Mon, 01/14/2008 - 20:29
Did anyone read this essay that some 15 year old girl did on Al's movie? Seems to explain in detail what is going on. I wish I was 1/10 that smart when I was that old.
A 15 YEAR OLD, Kristen Byrnes of Portland Maine, decided to investigate climate change. During the 4 months she wrote this extra credit assignment for Honors Earth Science, at Portland High School, she maintained a grade point average of 4.0 while participating on her school’s track and field team. Her most recent progress reports average 98.4% with 100% in 4 classes. All of her classes are honors or college prep.
ArcticFox posted the following video at the trail end of a long thread and I though this was important enough for its own thread. What I found with a little looking is this guy did a long series of videos covering this from all sorts of angles, not just this one socratic style debate.
The interesting part is their rhetorical method. This is Pascal's Wager, which you can read about here: wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_Wager
This video is like a table of contents to their videos
For your navigation pleasure, the entire "Expansion Pack" of videos supporting the video "How It All Ends" have been replicated here. These videos anticipate and answer EVERY OBJECTION OR CRITICISM of the argument contained in "How It All Ends" that the author has ever heard. Unbelievable, but true. Go ahead--take 'er for a spin and see if you can find any holes!
The original video and the entire "Expansion Pack" are also available for download as MP4 files, available for editing, burning, subtitling, mashing up, ripping off, making fun of--whatever. You can download those--as well as the scripts of all the videos--at manpollo.org
http://Manpollo.org and http://wonderingmind42.com also both offer a much easier navigation experience than the links below, as well as discussion forums, and other resources. Check them out!
Deron made an interesting question in a sideways fashion ... in [node:1519] ... he admitted he does do a lot to reduce his carbon footprint while earlier he made it seem like we'd have to regress to the stone age Re: a crude awakening (the oil crisis)
Okay.. I think I've done a lot to reduce my carbon footprint.. despite traveling regularly around the world, that is. I've got EV's, walk or ride a bike whenever I can, I recycle, by used stuff when I can, give stuff to goodwill when I can, etc etc.
I heard on the BBC this morning where China has joined San Francisco and Ireland in banning plastic shopping bags. There are many things wrong with the mainland government, but I give them credit for not pussy footing around when they decided to tackle a problem. Plastic bags are not a huge part of the world's oil consumption, but they are one of the stupidest wastes of oil. In my patch of the country you can recycle them, but the places that accept plastic bags are few and far between.
