I'm not sure if the prior link worked so I will try again.

If it doesn't type Great Global Warming Swindle in Google and you'll find it.......

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4520665474899458831&q=great+global+warming+swindle

Just came across this news article.
Danish scientist: Global warming is a myth
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, March 15 (UPI) -- A Danish scientist said the idea of a "global temperature" and global warming is more political than scientific.

University of Copenhagen Professor Bjarne Andresen has analyzed the topic in collaboration with Canadian Professors Christopher Essex from the University of Western Ontario and Ross McKitrick of the University of Guelph.

It is generally assumed the Earth's atmosphere and oceans have grown warmer during the recent 50 years because of an upward trend in the so-called global temperature, which is the result of complex calculations and averaging of air temperature measurements taken around the world.

"It is impossible to talk about a single temperature for something as complicated as the climate of Earth," said Andresen, an expert on thermodynamics. "A temperature can be defined only for a homogeneous system. Furthermore, the climate is not governed by a single temperature. Rather, differences of temperatures drive the processes and create the storms, sea currents, thunder, etc. which make up the climate".

He says the currently used method of determining the global temperature -- and any conclusion drawn from it -- is more political than scientific.

The argument is presented in the Journal of Non-Equilibrium Thermodynamics.

Jake; you continue to speak from the point of view of the Gore movie. Greenland was WAY warmer in the middle ages, as I said before, and the ice cap didn't all melt. It is not proven that extremely bad things will happen if the earth gets warmer, it is not proven that the earth is getting seriously warmer, and it is definitely not proven that mankind can do anything about it if it is getting warmer.

Bullswan; debate is rhetoric. I'm trying to insert some economic reality into a point of view generated by an hysterical documentary.

Jake; if it is all big oil's fault and we are their victims as you indicate, then we should all run to the "greenies" to save us and tell us how to live? You say "cars are still going to sell if they get 50 mpg." Some do now and they don't sell. Should we not let the free market work? Many don't think we should because we are not smart enough to know what is good for us. Let's let some elite group decide how we should live? That has been tried for ages and always seems to come up bad for the average citizen. Here is a quote from C.S. Lewis, one of those "reborn Christian bubbas" although as a professor of Medieval Languages at Oxford, I doubt he was very bubba-like.

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience."

Words of wisdom. Certainly you are correct that we should all try to live in a more environmentally friendly fashion; no one would seriously dispute the wisdom of that point of view. And raising everyone's conciousness regarding such a lifestyle is good. But I don't think we should all forget the cost/benefit analyses we make, both as individuals and as a society in our decisions.

David
A-Cat and big cat

Bullswan; great link for an alternate view to Gore's film; even more since it comes from the BBC.

Thanks,
David
A-Cat, big cat

Agreed, good video. And... with names of scientists that disagree, unless of course they are not who they say they are. Maybe Gore is smarter than all of them? (don't take this too seriously!)
<img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />
Clayton

bullswan,

Thanks for the link to the "documentary", it was excellent. As I get older I'm hoping the current trend (warming) continues.

Jake,

Do yourself a favor and take Bonnie to the movies again, bullswan's buying.

Now, if you can somehow cash-in and get money to advocate catamaran sailing as the only viable alternative to keep thrill seeking bubba on the water, and off of PWC's and powerboats...

Okay I will come out and say it.

That BBC documentary is just as fast and loose with science as it being said about Al Gore's documentary.

Now I'm not totally hot on Al Gore's version either, but that doesn't mean that it proposes things that can only have good outcomes. It is at least more careful to not risk too much.

I'll always amused myself about how normal folk first demand complex things to be exlained by simple means only to come later at you with the accusation that what you have given them is "fast and loose" with hardcore science. How many of you would have watched the whole Al Gore presentation if he had provided 90 minutes of hardcore science ?


Also this whole debate always reminds me of a commercial that used to be shown on Dutch Television back in the 80's, putting across the message of WWF wildlife preservation.

You see a family of neatherthaler humans sitting around a fire in a cave eating roosted meat of the bone. Then the teenager of the family rushes in and grunts (which gets translated by subtitles) :"Each day it is harder to find new Mammoths, we have to do something !". The family as a whole suddenly stops eating looks up at the teenage with a totally bewildered expression on their faces. The teenage continues :"They could become extinct and then ..." . then he gets interrupted by a thunderous laughter of the family. One family member grunts ;"Crazy Uhah never fails to amaze me ! Next time he'll say that elephant are about to go extinct" To which another family members enthousiastic replies :"And there are many many more of those around !" which caused another round of hysterical laughter. Then during the uproar grandfather mumbles :"or even us ..." Then the camera pans out as the family gets back into devouring their food with total devotion, leaving the teenager totally bewildered in turn.

Wouter

In the past the world used to be covered with forests and swamps.

During the last 1000 years the amount of forests have been decimated, but it is indeed a stretch to far claim that humans have caused this with lumbering.

Afterall who is not to say that some solar flare is the cause of this miraculously but natural decline in foolage ?

Don't be stupid. Of course does man have the power these days to influence anything that goes on on this earth. We can even totally destroy it within 24 hours if we launched all the H-boms in a wide spread pattern.

The thing at the discussion here is not so much that man with cause the climate of the earth to totally change ONLY due to man made cause but that man triggers some inbalance that could well lead to very rapid and significant changes in the climate that our modern societies can not adjust too in time.

That my friends does not seem to be a far stretched idea. At least it is considered real enough that the Dutch are planning a new series of dykes and coastal defenses to be ready if it does happen. Premature ? Maybe, but better safe then sorry right ? Why allow a New Orleans to happen when you have the means to prevent it ?


Wouter

Wouter,

if the worst comes to pass, there is plenty of room for you in the northern territories here in Norway, and we could really need you industrious people up there: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnmark

I guess even the climate would be suitable for you if the oceans rise that much.

Global warming is happening. How it was started does not matter. The fact is it is now on the way and we will not stop it.
Catastrophic weather event proof society..that is the
where we need to go. Present phone and internet etc is in trouble.

Only problem is that with global warming the gulf stream will end and this will cause new ice age for us <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

--
Valtteri

Then there is always Queen Maud land..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Maud_Land

I am glad someone found the same one dutch scientist that bush has been trotting out for the last eight years to compensate for every other scientist on the planet. There is No debate about this among the gehuinely informed people. WAKE UP! Also, fill up a glass with water all the way, now heat it up. What happens. Molecules expand when they get warmer and so in turn does the VOLUME stupid! You dont even need melting ice to raise sea levels. I cant believe this is even a discussion. what is everyone here gonna do when 2 billion refugees want to get to high ground. Good thing all the doubters have lots and lots of guns and god is on there side too.

Does that mean I will get thinner if I move to someplace cold? <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

I could be wrong here, but water molecules expand when they freeze. That's why a bottle of water (or beer, or coke) will bust if you freeze it...
Jake?

yeah, it expands when it freezes, but it also expands when it is heated (which is why you need a pressurized expansion tank on a water heater system). That said, however, I've never heard figures about the ocean rise due to expansion of the water and am skeptical that it would amount to much.

The fact about all this though, is that we can do something about the filth we put into the atmosphere. Cheap? Not necessarily but neither is trying to figure out how to live on the moon (that was sarcasm).

If fuel efficient cars aren't selling, why are the Honda and Toyota companies continuing to grow and post considerable profits? The big automakers openly admit that they missed the ball and simply don't have attractive fuel efficient cars available.

Thats what I thought... but hey, I've been wrong before. Of course, I don't know why I blasted my son for putting that soda can in the freezer, forgetting about it and it almost exploded, ends all puffed out. Maybe its the sugar! Yeah, thats right... <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Clayton

Yeah, its time to get out on the water again!

This thread has inspired me to go burn tires.

Lots of them.

Because, I can.

Just do it downwind of your house -- and hope the wind doesn't switch. <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Around my parts it'd be a community affair. I'd get the kids involved. They could bring their tricycle tires to burn. I'd sell hamburgers and hotdogs that were cooked using a charcoal grill.

The local church might work. Since we're all reborn christian bubbas, it'd be the best target-rich environment.

Maugan, burning tires might cause lower wind speeds in your area, based upon this report (however, it also makes it sound like pollution is actually cooling the earth rather than causing it to heat):

Stanford Report, Jan. 19, 2007, by Maria Jose Vinas
The winds that blow near the surface of the Earth have two beneficial effects: They provide a renewable source of clean energy and they evaporate water, helping rain clouds to build up. But aerosolized particles created from vehicle exhaust and other contaminants can accumulate in the atmosphere and reduce the speed of winds closer to the Earth's surface, which results in less wind power available for wind-turbine electricity and also in reduced precipitation, according to a study by Stanford and NASA researchers.

"These aerosol particles are having an effect worldwide on the wind speeds over land; there's a slowing down of the wind, feeding back to the rainfall too," says civil and environmental engineering Associate Professor Mark Z. Jacobson, co-author of the study with the late Yoram J. Kaufman from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, who died in May 2006. "We're finding a reduction of rain, and that can lead to droughts and reduction of water supply."

Jacobson and Kaufman's study, based on NASA satellite data of aerosol accumulation, measurements of wind speeds over the South Coast Basin in California and in China, and computer model simulations over California as a whole and the South Coast Basin, was published online Dec. 27 in Geophysical Research Letters. The researchers used both the model and data to study the effects of aerosol particles on wind speed and rainfall.

Slower winds, less rain
Aerosol particles floating in the atmosphere absorb or scatter solar radiation, and prevent it from getting to the ground. This cools the Earth's surface and reduces daytime vertical convection that mixes the slower winds found near the ground with the faster winds at higher altitudes. The overall effect is a reduction in the speed of near-surface winds, which Jacobson has calculated to be up to 8 percent slower in California.

Clean and renewable, wind power made up 1.5 percent of the Golden State's energy portfolio in 2005, according to the California Energy Commission. But slower gusts may reduce wind's economic competitiveness compared to other energy sources, such as fossil fuels.

"The more pollution, the greater the reduction of wind speed," Jacobson says. Aerosol particles may be responsible for the slowing down of winds worldwide. Wind supplies about 1 percent of global electric power, according to Jacobson. Slow winds may hinder development of wind power in China, where it's a needed alternative to dirty coal-fired plants. Aerosols' reduction of the wind also may explain the reduction in the Asian seasonal monsoon and "disappearing winds" in China, observations found in other studies. Moreover, slack air currents may hurt energy efficiency in Europe, where countries like Denmark and Germany have made major wind-power investments.

Slower winds evaporate less water from oceans, rivers and lakes. Furthermore, the cooling of the ground provoked by the aerosol particles reduces the evaporation of soil water.

What's more, the accumulation of aerosol particles in the atmosphere makes clouds last longer without releasing rain. Here's why: Atmospheric water forms deposits on naturally occurring particles, like dust, to form clouds. But if there is pollution in the atmosphere, the water has to deposit on more particles. Spread thin, the water forms smaller droplets. Smaller droplets in turn take longer to coalesce and form raindrops. In fact, rain may not ever happen, because if the clouds last longer they can end up moving to drier air zones and evaporating.