Al Gore for President: The Inconvenient Truth

[Copernicus]

"Please point to a natural mechanism that can explain most of the warming."

What is so important about the mechanism? There is a clear history of warming and cooling, long before man could have made any significant contribution. There is clear evidence of warming and cooling on other, uninhabited planets. you dont need to know the mechanism to know that warming and cooling happens in the absence of people.

[JussiUt]

Are people really so stupid that the fact that the climate has always varied somehow disproves CO2 emissions as a major reason for today's extremely fast warming of the climate? Where's the logic in that? No intelligent person has ever claimed that only humans are responsible for climate changes. That doesn't the change the fact that the warming we're experiencing now is according to overwhelming evidence caused my human actions.

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
"Please point to a natural mechanism that can explain most of the warming."

What is so important about the mechanism? There is a clear history of warming and cooling, long before man could have made any significant contribution. There is clear evidence of warming and cooling on other, uninhabited planets. you dont need to know the mechanism to know that warming and cooling happens in the absence of people.

[/ QUOTE ]

The mechanisms that changed climate over the last million years are understood. The shifts in temps can be explained via albedo, orbital wobbles, and greenhouse gases. I see no reason to give the present a free pass.

Also, can back up everything I say with evidence, links, etc. I said there was no evidence in existance that could point to a natural cycle for most of the warming. He contradicted my statement by calling it "clearly false". He should be able to back up his statement. He has not yet done so.

[Mr. Now]

It is now June 2 2007.

Since my OP, Al has a new book out, and he has appeared on the cover of TIME magazine in a Presidential profile article.

Al Gore is Presidential and is, right now, running for President.

He makes the other candidates look lower than his stature. They all seem petty as they run, don't they? Al Gore is 'not running'.

With his Oscar, his books, and his intellect, he is playing the press like a fiddle. He is also intentionally sidestepping all the limits imposed if he were to formally announce his intent.

Al Gore is behaving like a shrewd cardplayer, with a healthy stack, in the late-middle stage of a tournament.

He is waiting for the bubble events in the natural progression of this election cycle.

Al Gore has the best of both worlds. On the one hand he can make offhand jokes about being the 'former next President of the United States', on the other hand (at every turn) he puts himself in position to capitalize on every mistake made by other candidates. From both parties.

He stays out of the fray, above it all. Yet he is always on TV. He maintains an image of a statesman and intellectual, with the high ground with respect to moral authority (Iraq, global climate change). He gets tons of absolutely free TV PR. Al Gore is a genius.

This is not a post on any polarizing policy that Al Gore may implement. That is a different discussion.

It is about strategy, about how he is playing. In this election, he plays brilliantly. He is using the full powers of his position in the popular consciousness, his intellect and his experience. The fact his book is recently published at this point in the 2008 election cycle is no accident. The play is standard if you are running. ANOTHER book, Al? Why? Why now?

Right now, Al Gore is running for President. How it plays out is event-driven. And he is playing it that way. I believe that one way or the other he is a large factor in the election. He is running now.

[NewTeaBag]

[ QUOTE ]
There is zero evidence that it's part of a cycle and an insane quantity of evidence that man is causing most of the recent warming.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is the original statement with I took exception.

I submit it is still hyperbole. You said "zero evidence that it's part of the cycle." It is not being semantic to see that that statement is clearly different from your then followup statements.

[ QUOTE ]
Did I say that man was the only factor? No. My question still stands. Please point to a natural mechanism that can explain most of the warming.

[/ QUOTE ]

Um, yes! Actually you did say it was the ONLY factor when you said zero evidence natural cyclical change has anything to do with global warming and that is what I take issue with.


[ QUOTE ]
Corn ethanol is controversial and many claim it has a negative energy return on investment. Sugar cane ethanol has a 4 fold return on energy investment. Sugar cane is +EV. There are problems with scalability of course. All of this was explained in the link which you apparently did not read carefully. Again, not a good start on your behalf.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ethanol having a negative energy return is not a claim, tis as close as you can get as hard fact amongst these issues. Sugar cane as you allude to has it's own problems.

Now is probaly a good time to let you know I am/was a certified nuclear energy with significant experience in both nuclear and conventional powerplant technology. I am familiar with most of the proposed technologies in your link from both technical and political perspectives. A few of them are interesting, (most notably hot fusion), a few of them are implementable today but have the same minimal impact as the "unplug your phone charger" type ideas, and a few of them are doomed to near permanent economic infeasability (barring some radical engineering or science breakthrough WRT power XFER mechanisms). The key to most of these ideas is scale and cost.

Lets face it, wind farms just aint going to do it for a growing world industrial base. The costs per location and MWH are just ridiculous for the output.

We've already discussed the ethanol and sugarcane crop ideas. Similar problems apply to soybean and other such crop based solutions.

I resubmit, within the next 50 years, the only viable large scale, clean (certainly as relates to global climate change), power source is nuclear fission.
What is your opinion on this proven technology? Why is the idiot, GWB, the only public leader actually talking about it as one of the major players in solutions land?

[ QUOTE ]
um......... how is developing clean technology depriving people of energy? You are projecting arguments onto me that I have never and will never make. Not a good start.

[/ QUOTE ]

Two simple answers: COST and SCALE.

Think about the repurcussins of trying to shove an enhanced/new Kyoto protocol down China's and India's throats. The majority of the power plants fueling their growth, which is lifting signifcant chunks of their populace from abject poverty, are either COAL or OIL fired. Yep. Nasty, polluting coal and oil. Why? Because it's cheap and can be produce a lot of MWHs to feed the demand. Examine the cost/MWH of any of your proposed power generation projects (not just the linked list but all of them). Do any of us really expect China or India to accept that because they are late to the game wrt Industrializing they should pay 10X or even 100X the cost/MWH than the west did whilst creating/exacerbating the global warming problem? If I was Chinese or Indian, I'd say "piss off!" Especially since the crippling costs and scalability problems associated with cleaner production methods would either slow or stop their growth which has the direct follow on of maintaining the world's 1st and 2nd largest populations in a state of abject poverty compared to the western world.

I'm not saying give the developing world a free pass when it comes to pushing more filth into the atmosphere, but I am saying it is an important, sticky, issue that cannot be ignored.


<u>Summary</u>
Amusingly you are trying to argue with someone who agrees in large part with you.
What I disagree with are politicizations/distortions of important global issues (not accusing you of this but definitely on topic WRT Gore) and the hyperbole (already covered) used to shove these down the world's throat.

As I've already said, I have an open mind WRT being convinced as do many in the world. But, I'm sure you will agree most people find it distasteful to have distorted/politicized science shoved down their throats by overanxious zealots (once again, not specifically you, but many in the "the world is on fire" brigade), who often fail to take into consideration other signifcant issues (I.E. Growing economies, improving standards of living in developing countries, the effects upon both individual and the global 1st world economies of any major initiatives).

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Did I say that man was the only factor? No. My question still stands. Please point to a natural mechanism that can explain most of the warming.

[/ QUOTE ]

Um, yes! Actually you did say it was the ONLY factor when you said zero evidence natural cyclical change has anything to do with global warming and that is what I take issue with.

[/ QUOTE ]

Positive feedbacks are not man. They are a factor.
Natural cycles *could* be a factor but nobody has pointed to a mechanism that could explain *most* of the warming. A naive reading of the ice cores would say we should be cooling right now. The current warming is occurring 10x faster than anything that happened in the last million years. There is no trend among cosmic rays, the sun, or orbital forcing. I hope this can squash the word games and some real discussion can occur.

I'm still waiting for some evidence from you. How many times do I have to ask? You claim you want to discuss science but you have yet to provide a single piece of supporting empirical evidence.

[ QUOTE ]
There is zero evidence that it's part of a cycle
This is the original statement with I took exception.

I submit it is still hyperbole.

[/ QUOTE ]

Again, until you provide evidence saying otherwise my statement is correct and you are just typing empty words. Also I find it curious as to why you bolded "crap".

[ QUOTE ]
Ethanol having a negative energy return is not a claim, tis as close as you can get as hard fact amongst these issues.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well if the distillery is close to the farms and you include feed credits then corn ethanol is +EV calorie wise. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] Sorry, just throwing some of your crap back at you. Glad we generally agree.

[ QUOTE ]
Now is probaly a good time to let you know I am/was a certified nuclear energy with significant experience in both nuclear and conventional powerplant technology.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good, so then you should be able to provide me with the hard data I've been asking for again... and again... and again.. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img] In all honesty I don't respect calls to authority. There are a couple of Ph.D's in this forum that screwup concepts taught in freshman courses within their own field. Fredrick Seitz has the best credentials you could get and he's completely loony tunes. Again, I will ask you to supply some hard data.

[ QUOTE ]
Lets face it, wind farms just aint going to do it for a growing world industrial base. The costs per location and MWH are just ridiculous for the output.

[/ QUOTE ]

The finance of wind power is not something I'm either an expert in or I'm terribly interested in. But I know some credible people in both private industry and academia that I do trust and disagree with you. (to varying degree) This is especially true when external costs and subsidies are accounted for. Here is an interesting story on grist:
http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2007/3/12/63111/0928

I haven't fact checked it or anything. I'm really not interested in debating finance of windpower. That is a long detailed topic that could take up an entire thread. We are getting sidetracked. I'm more interested in seeing your supporting global warming evidence. So again, I will ask you, where is your 'CO2-isn't-it' evidence?

[ QUOTE ]
What is your opinion on this proven technology?

[/ QUOTE ]

Other than nuclear proliferation problems with some versions of fission tech I don't have a problem. Again we are getting sidetracked.

[ QUOTE ]
But, I'm sure you will agree most people find it distasteful to have distorted/politicized science shoved down their throats by overanxious zealots (once again, not specifically you, but many in the "the world is on fire" brigade),

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, I'm glad you are being civil. But quite frankly if Nate Lewis is right about CO2 projections and the damn near supernaturally prophetic James Hansen* is accurate with his latest study, then the world is going to be "on fire" as you say and we have only 10 years before mitigation becomes impractical.


*not a hyperbole if you've studied him. James has made numerous predictions w/ regard to temps, ice cores, etc that are truly amazing.

[Copernicus]

[ QUOTE ]
Are people really so stupid that the fact that the climate has always varied somehow disproves CO2 emissions as a major reason for today's extremely fast warming of the climate? Where's the logic in that? No intelligent person has ever claimed that only humans are responsible for climate changes. That doesn't the change the fact that the warming we're experiencing now is according to overwhelming evidence caused my human actions.

[/ QUOTE ]

I was responding to wacki's statement that implied that here hasnt always been temperature fluctuations.And no, there is no "overwhelming" evidence that human actions are a major contributor.

[NewTeaBag]

To start with, as much as I hate to use the silly deabating terminology, you are using a strawman with me. I have repeatedly aquiesed to the fact that man is a significant factor in climate change. I am not trying nor have I tried to argue that all the earth's current changes are part of the natural cycle.


Now from a DA's point of view.

The earth's climate has been changing, of it's OWN accord for millions of years. You have already agreed to this (I think??). So this is the basic information from which any scientific discussion must originate.

With this as the established basis, the burden of proving that current climactic change is now almost completely attributable to man's intervention surely lies with those who claim it, not with those who subject it to scrutiny.

Surely, you can see the illogic of repeatedly telling me to disprove your theory when 1) I've already agreed to it, in essence, several times 2) your theory is the shift from the accepted norm not vice versa. IOW the burden of proof lies with your side of the argument NOT the side you assign me.

WRT specific energy provision ideas, start a new thread "New Power Producing technologies/ideas to save the planet" or some such stuff and I'll gladly contribute to the discussion.

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
Surely, you can see the illogic of repeatedly telling me to disprove your theory when 1) I've already agreed to it, in essence, several times

[/ QUOTE ]

Um....... ok. If you say so. [img]/images/graemlins/shocked.gif[/img] [img]/images/graemlins/confused.gif[/img] Then why did you take offense to my comment of Zero evidence?



[ QUOTE ]
2) your theory is the shift from the accepted norm not vice versa. IOW the burden of proof lies with your side of the argument NOT the side you assign me.

[/ QUOTE ]

um........ now I'm confused. Do you agree with it or disagree with it? Well since I can't prove something doesn't exist I guess I will have to resort to quotes.

"Global warming is almost a no-brainer at this point," said Mahlman, who lives now on a mountain in Colorado. "You really can't find intelligent, quantitative arguments to make it go away."-Jerry Mahlman, NOAA

quote #2:
Recent research strongly reinforces our previous conclusions. It is unequivocal that the climate is changing, and it is very likely that this is predominantly caused by the increasing human interference with the atmosphere.

Signed by the National Academies of 13 countries.
http://www.nationalacademies.org/inc...rgy_07_May.pdf

Now, the scientific method works by empirical falsifiability. I have given a hypothesis and supported it with evidence in multiple posts. Now it is your job to prove me wrong via empirical falsifiability or what is commonly known as the scientific method.

Please contribute something meaningful to this thread.

[bills217]

[ QUOTE ]
Since my OP

[/ QUOTE ]

Mr. Now,

bills217 misses the days when Mr. Now always referred to Mr. Now in the third person.

-bills217