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Political YouTube Clips Thread

Discussion in 'Alley of Lingering Sighs' started by The Great Snook, Mar 28, 2009.

  1. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    They aren't covering it up, it's there for you to find. Most climate scientists as I've mentioned don't agree that these things are getting worse. That's what's so crazy about all of this. The ONLY THING that exists currently that is alarming is the predictions from the climate models (which have done poorly) and a ton of "could"s and "maybe"s in the media.

    That's the funny thing too that is peddled about by especially Mann: All skepticism and disagreements with the cause (Mann's words) are well-funded big oil etc. and it's simply not true. Seriously, the funding that's being poured into this issue is going to the alarmist side, not the skeptical side.

    Again, not true. Those that have done economic studies argue it is more cost effective to mitigate any problems that arise rather than try to reduce emissions to something that would make a difference.
     
  2. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    As the guy said in the video I posted. People are in love with the theory of man made global climate change. That is because it fits in to their agenda.
     
  3. joacqin

    joacqin Confused Jerk Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    What agenda? I just love this discussion. Tal don't you know that there is a MASSIVE global conspiracy of a large majority of climate experts, politicians, media to trick the world into believing man made global warning with the sole objective of stopping the development of the world and make sure everyone will get a worse life.

    The only people who have their eyes open and can see through this immense scam are American right wingers. The further to the right you are the more you see of spectacular illusion the rest of the world has created.
     
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    I won't even try to hazard a guess as to their agenda. However, there must be one to keep clinging to a theory that hasn't had a true prediction yet and when the theory is applied backwards, they also can't find an instance where it works historically???
     
  5. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    joacqin - Seriously, I encourage you to look at some of the facts readily available.

    I'm sure you (just as Tal) have heard and believe that hurricane frequency and intensity will increase in a warming world. I'm sure you've also heard and believe that the last decade is the warmest on record.

    So what would you expect given those two statements?

    Now look at Dr. Ryan Maue's 2011 paper in Geophysical Research Letters (it's not long 6 pages). Here is the second and third sentence from that paper:

    ACE is Accumulated Cyclone Energy - a measure of the overall energy expended by the cyclones (i.e. a measure of intensity).

    Is that what you were expecting?
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2012
  6. joacqin

    joacqin Confused Jerk Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    BTA I am no climate scientist, I do not believe in anything. I can't interpret the numbers and I am sure there are statistics that can show anything anyone want, especially if a lay person like myself are going to interpret them. It is possible that there is a giant conspiracy, you may be right but. I just find it far fetched.

    I am not qualified to look at the science but I can look at the people and there is a disturbing trend and homogeneity among the climate sceptics that tends to make me believe that they are as unqualified to talk about the science as me and oppose it all on political and ideological grounds.
     
  7. The Great Snook Gems: 31/31
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    I find it interesting that you don't look at it from the other side also and find it disturbing that Al Gore, liberals, and environmentalists do everything they can do to try to stifle debate about the issue by claiming "everything is settled".
     
  8. Taluntain

    Taluntain Resident Alpha and Omega Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) BoM XenForo Migration Contributor [2015] (for helping support the migration to new forum software!)

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    Well, pretty much everywhere except in the US it is. What does that tell you? To me, there's an obvious parallel here with Intelligent Design (a similar US exclusive) and evolution. Personally, I consider debating AGW with deniers having about as much merit as debating evolution with a Creationist. And the numbers on both sides are probably pretty similar as well.

    I find it really incomprehensible that otherwise completely rational people who would dismiss any other conspiracy theory as bunk have no problems whatsoever in believing in a world-wide conspiracy of climatologists without even being able to speculate what their sinister agenda is except that there must be one. Here I just have to agree with joacqin - I find it way too far fetched. If there really are any global conspiracies (which would be a first), I'm pretty sure they'd have much more sinister goals than reducing CO2 output.
     
  9. joacqin

    joacqin Confused Jerk Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    If they are stifling debate it is because they are convinced that the time for debate is long past and it is the time for action. But do not worry Snook, your side seems to have "won". Very little is done about this issue, largely thanks to people who want to debate and study more. Now we just have to hope you are correct and it was all panic-mongering baloney because if it isn't we are in for a world of hurt and I do not think the satisfaction I will get from saying "I told you so" will balance that.
     
  10. Defreni1 Gems: 1/31
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    One of the reasons people are insisting that the science is settled is not so much to stifle debate, as it is, not to make the same mistakes regarding climate change as was done regarding tobacco.
    http://www.amazon.co.uk/Merchants-D...4663/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335793882&sr=8-1
    This book is rather scaring as it shows how the same people who fought the science on tobacco is also fighting against climate change.

    There is also an explanation as to why they do it. Money. It is much cheaper to do nothing than to do something. Rather funny that deniers have a very substantive reason to deny, while proponents make a conspiracy for the heck of it.

    Regards
    Defreni
     
  11. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    I don't think it's that hard to imagine motives, and they don't have to be sinister.

    For some it's the usual: a job, money, power, fame.

    For others - the most activist among them - it's battling for a cause: Saving the world from the evil fossil fuel industry. For these, if AGW doesn't pan out they'll just pursue other avenues.
     
  12. Gaear

    Gaear ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful

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    So it's a conspiracy on the other side? ;)

    Conspiracies are generally a misconception, IMO, primarily because it's virtually impossible to conspire on anything on a large scale. You can conspire with your buddy to rob a store or something, but as soon as you start talking about tens, hundreds, thousands, or millions of people, it just becomes logistically improbable - if not impossible. (Try to arrange some kind of secret operation with even a dozen people sometime and see how much success you have.)

    So IMO it's equally unlikely that anyone's actively and knowingly conspiring to either promote or deny global warming. What does exist are trends, much as people often observe that the media tends to show a liberal bias. What that means is not that there is a liberal media conspiracy where they all gather in smoke-filled rooms late at night (and presumably have large-scale conference calls and compose secret memos for distribution ;)), but simply that a majority of the media are liberal leaning. Now likewise with those who see a conservative media conspiracy spearheaded by Fox News, humorously enough.

    Those are my :2c:. Please carry on with the fighting. :p
     
    Last edited: Apr 30, 2012
  13. Aldeth the Foppish Idiot

    Aldeth the Foppish Idiot Armed with My Mallet O' Thinking Veteran

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    That's what's so lovely about this entire discussion. That fact alone is enough to keep both sides going. First, so long as nothing earth-changing happens, those that don't believe the predictions will continue to say they are right. However, the argument on the other side is that while the earth is capable of cleaning itself up, it takes tens of thousands, if not millions of years. So the people who are asking for action to be taken now are doing so because once we start to see earth-changing events taking place, the time for action that would have prevented that from happening will have passed.

    And so it goes. Supporters will keep saying "do something while we still can", while deniers will keep saying "nothing earth-altering has happened so far, why should we believe it will in the future?"
     
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  14. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    The problem I'm having with the supporters is that they've made predictions that have not panned out. That is the essence of science: Make predictions based on your hypothesis and change or scrap the hypothesis if your predictions are wrong. But I hope I didn't really have to say that... it should have been clear from my other posts :)
     
  15. LKD Gems: 31/31
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    When it comes to climate change and unequatable(sic) distribution of world resources, I don't claim to be a scientific expert. I do claim to be a person who is just trying to live his life.

    I think that there's a group of activists out there whose main goal in life is to make people like me feel guilty for even being alive. And to them I say, "Go <blank> yourselves. Sideways."

    Every time I have a meal, or take a shower, or watch a movie, or boot up my computer to chat with you folks, there's someone trying to convince me that my everyday actions are directly causing the deaths of thousands of children in the Third World! Change EVERYTHING YOU DO! Well, as I have said before, even if I died and stopped using ALL electricity and eating ANY food, it wouldn't make one EFFING bit of difference to a single person in the Third World.

    I give to charities. I support reasonable immigration from war torn and drought stricken nations. I advocate the death penalty for a-holes like Charles Taylor and Joseph Kony. I am not uncaring about the misfortunes of others. But I am not convinced that by drastically inconveniencing myself and making all of these disruptive changes in my life will do any good whatsoever.

    So the global warming folks can pitch all the conniptions they want. Humanity will survive. We will do what we can in wealthier nations to help, but speaking purely for myself, I'm not about to move into a log cabin and not burn wood even in the winter when its -30 Celsius just because the smoke generated might kill someone in Guyana. Screw that.
     
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  16. Defreni1 Gems: 1/31
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    No my point was precisely not a conspiracy. Rather the fact that a collusion of interest exist which are far stronger on the denyers side than on the proponents.
    Im sorry if that didnt come out clearly.
    A conspiracy is by its nature a secret. There is no secret here. Actually you can find the strategy of a lot of right wing think thanks and their strategy for denials and cries for more research out in the open.
    Scaring enough is the fact that one leg of their strategy is to denounce proponents as only doing it to get tenure or other financial interest. If people where only interested in the financial part you can earn alot more by joining a think tank than toiling away at a university.

    Regards
    Defreni
     
  17. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    That depends on if you're a nobody or not. Mike Mann gets tons of money via grants. James Hanson gets tons of money as well outside of his job at GISS because of his high-profile activism.
     
  18. damedog Gems: 15/31
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    On the subject of interests, the oil industry which is kinda-sorta a big industry and has been known to influence government once in a blue moon has a big incentive to keep things the way they are. Any way you cut it big buisness would rather take a skeptical stance than have to do things that won't help their bottom line, and I think billion dollar industries are more powerful interests than a few environmental activists. If we're going to talk ulterior motives we have to admit the skeptic crowd has the more likely scenario of having them.
     
  19. Blackthorne TA

    Blackthorne TA Master in his Own Mind Staff Member ★ SPS Account Holder Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Is that so?

    First, you need to stop thinking of the oil or fossil fuel industry as something independent. The big corporations are energy companies, and energy companies care less about where the energy comes from and more that they are the ones supplying it; and they want to get in on all the money government is handing out to combat this "problem".

    Second, Government also has been known to regulate industry based on the public perception. I find it hard to believe that you have not noticed the change when global warming alarm became mainstream. Energy companies are now falling all over themselves to show how green and responsible they are these days.

    Now let's look at some numbers.

    Money spent by the US government on climate change in 2010: $8.8 billion; between 1989 and 2009: $79 billion.

    Money spent on the "climate denial machine" by Koch Industries: $48.5 million between 1997 and 2010; by Exxon Mobil between 2005 and 2008: $8.9 million. Comparative drops in the bucket so to speak.
     
  20. damedog Gems: 15/31
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    Since when does the fossil fuel industry not care whether they would have to restructure their entire buisness model to accommodate alternative energy sources in the face of climate change? They have every reason to oppose it, and companies like BP who actually sell the gasoline have every reason in the world to do so as well since widespread use of electric cars could put them out of buisness or at least take a massive portion of their profits away. The government certainly does not have a pro-climate change agenda, that's entirely dependent on who is in office. I posted a link somewhere on this thread or the other climate change one where the Bush administration was pressuring scientists to not use the word "global warming", so i'm not seeing how that can be used as evidence for ulterior motives on the climate change side. Also there are a bunch of senators who signed this document essentially stating that global warming doesn't exist so again i'm not seeing their spending as proof of any ulterior motive, just either appeasing the public or out of genuine concern, but certainly not for any special interest of theirs.
     
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