Climate Change, again...

[LittleFuzzy]

Of course you'd have to take a worst case scenario to its fullest extent, which is the whole point of Sky Falling. Lets say the arctic clathrates are a huge resevoir and they release all at once and warm up the world significantly in a very short time frame. And lets say that heat goes to the deep ocean faster than anyone thought possible and releases much more methane which bubbles up stripping out the ocean's oxygen and kills just about everything in the water. I'm not sure most of humanity would survive such a scenario.

But you simply can't rationally do that even in a fit of "worst-case" paranoia. You can't ignore cause and effect. What could cause such a massive release? It certainly doesn't "just happen." One good cause is another really impressive impact. In which case clathrates aren't the end of the world scenario, a 5-10km Near-Earth body is.

If you want to insist on your scenario as is, I refer you to what I told Minx. If it can happen, then it has happened before. Which means we can see the consequences in the geologic record.

[EyeKhan]

True; said climate change discussion is largely done by non-scientists, after all. The number of crack-pot hard scientists is low (but non-zero, I think one prominent Finnish chemist is often quoted disapproving of evolution, ffs), and the outside world's most effective way of introducing bias is regulating funding, not in the sense of buying desired results but rather directing the efforts of each sub-field to some extent. In Finland, a lot of astronomers spend time modelling optical properties of paper, for Cthulhu's sake, because the paper industry has money here. If you want to keep getting funding, you probably don't want to appear to be advocating things that don't please the people buttering your bread.

I disapprove of evolution too. (doesn't make it any less real, though.... )

[EyeKhan]

But you simply can't rationally do that even in a fit of "worst-case" paranoia. You can't ignore cause and effect. What could cause such a massive release? It certainly doesn't "just happen." One good cause is another really impressive impact. In which case clathrates aren't the end of the world scenario, a 5-10km Near-Earth body is.

If you want to insist on your scenario as is, I refer you to what I told Minx. If it can happen, then it has happened before. Which means we can see the consequences in the geologic record.

DAMN IT! Had a great post and hit the fucking back space button and it navigated fucking IExplorer back and BAM its all gone. WTF!!!!

Anyway, talked about pressure loss or warming as mechanisms for release, neither of which is a good candidate for some short term surprise. Also, the cambrian extinction 250 million years ago where 96% of marine species died out is suspected of being a large scale release. That's a big deal.

[Nessus]

But that's thought to have taken thousands and thousands of years, Congress doesn't sit quite that long.

[LittleFuzzy]

. Also, the cambrian extinction 250 million years ago where 96% of marine species died out is suspected of being a large scale release. That's a big deal.

It is also rampant speculation. There is absolutely no data for it *or against it* You might as well put an "invisible pink unicorn sneezing" as a Sky is Falling scenario.

[EyeKhan]

But that's thought to have taken thousands and thousands of years, Congress doesn't sit quite that long.

Right. I know. This thing isn't going to pop like a balloon. But once it gets going, even if it takes a thousand years to materialized, can it be stopped?

[EyeKhan]

It is also rampant speculation. There is absolutely no data for it *or against it* You might as well put an "invisible pink unicorn sneezing" as a Sky is Falling scenario.

No no no. Invisible pink unicorns are not even remotely plausible whereas a mass release is at least a mechanism that could achieve the observed result, regardless of evidence for or against. Ha.

[Nessus]

Right. I know. This thing isn't going to pop like a balloon. But once it gets going, even if it takes a thousand years to materialized, can it be stopped?

I'm not convinced we're at a stage of development, as a species, where we can respond to long-scale phenomena like that in any reasonable or meaningful way, beyond attempts at damage control. If the Sun decided to reduce activity by a small fraction, we'd probably hit some kind of small ice age, what would humanity do? We're already struggling with nutrition distribution, if arable land becomes even more scarce I doubt there could be any kind of global response; the free markets cannot deal with that kind of situation in a humane fashion, and we do not have a world government or anything close.

[EyeKhan]

I'm not convinced we're at a stage of development, as a species, where we can respond to long-scale phenomena like that in any reasonable or meaningful way, beyond attempts at damage control. If the Sun decided to reduce activity by a small fraction, we'd probably hit some kind of small ice age, what would humanity do? We're already struggling with nutrition distribution, if arable land becomes even more scarce I doubt there could be any kind of global response; the free markets cannot deal with that kind of situation in a humane fashion, and we do not have a world government or anything close.

Burn a lot more coal, likely. This would A. warm us up in the immediate term and B. warm the rest of the planet in the longer term. Win/Win. The only question is how long it would take glaciers to grow across the Northern Hemisphere vs. the accelerated greenhouse gas build-up. That sort of scenario's easy to respond to. Its the opposite type of thing, requiring planning, thinking, engineering, sacrifice, etc, that people are bad at.

[RandBlade]

We're already struggling with nutrition distribution

Are we? Funny, every time I walk into a supermarket there's plenty of fresh, refridgerated and frozen food there.

If what we're struggling with is distribution then please name any developed, well off, capitalist democracy where an individual with a good income will struggle to buy their nutrition.

the free markets cannot deal with that kind of situation in a humane fashion

Why not?

and we do not have a world government or anything close.

Thankfully

[Nessus]

I'm sure you're a big enough boy to tear down your own straw men, Randy.

[RandBlade]

You give it a go. You said we're struggling with distribution. That funny, because I buy my wine from Australia, it can get distributed from one side of the world to another with no problems. We've got more than capable distribution capabilities.

[Nessus]

To echo Steely from another thread, either

1) You are very stupid
2) You think I am very stupid
3) You are pursuing these red herrings in an effort to...I'm not sure what, exactly, self-validation, I suppose? None of these alternatives seem like behaviour that'd entice me to respond.

[RandBlade]

Is it that much easier to give stupid replies calling someone else stupid rather than entering a grown-up discussion with someone?

[Nessus]

Is it that much easier to give stupid replies calling someone else stupid rather than entering a grown-up discussion with someone?

Please don't feign martyrdom. The obvious assumption in the above list was that 1 and 2 were wrong; no one was calling you stupid. And it is not a grown-up discussion (urgh) when you engage in under-handed and dishonest tactics. We had several threads on this topic in Site Discussion, maybe someone mentioned it to you?

[GGT]

Nessie's right, we do have a global nutrition distribution problem. Just ask Pakistan....if we had a mini-ice age we wouldn't have the capacity to deal with it humanely.

[Aimless]

I thought Nessie was using the Global "we", was I wrong? It seemed clear she wasn't talking about getting booze to British managers but rather about getting basic sustenance to malnourished children in several regions of the world.

[Nessus]

I thought Nessie was using the Global "we", was I wrong? It seemed clear she wasn't talking about getting booze to British managers but rather about getting basic sustenance to malnourished children in several regions of the world.

Don't help him

[Aimless]

He is you Nessie, we are all one, and we are the world

But seriously RB you do realise that no-one is really worried about the plight of the Brits, right? I mean, you guys do have some serious issues but most of them can probably be solved by avoiding candy. The distribution problems may not be particularly great for those of us who live in the developed world, but they are greater elsewhere. As eg. Wiggin observed recently in a thread near you

[RandBlade]

Please don't feign martyrdom. The obvious assumption in the above list was that 1 and 2 were wrong; no one was calling you stupid. And it is not a grown-up discussion (urgh) when you engage in under-handed and dishonest tactics. We had several threads on this topic in Site Discussion, maybe someone mentioned it to you?

I'm not engaging in any under-handed or dishonest tactics.

Nessie's right, we do have a global nutrition distribution problem. Just ask Pakistan....if we had a mini-ice age we wouldn't have the capacity to deal with it humanely.

Do we? I honestly don't think we do. We have enough food to feed the world, we have enough distribution capabilities in order to do so too. The problem isn't that, the problem is that there are people in the world too poor to be able to afford it. That isn't an issue of either food production or distribution, its a problem of money.

I thought Nessie was using the Global "we", was I wrong? It seemed clear she wasn't talking about getting booze to British managers but rather about getting basic sustenance to malnourished children in several regions of the world.

Obviously. But we don't have a problem getting the capability to distribute food to the malnourished children any more than we have a problem distributing booze. That was the whole point of my post. The problem is that the poor can't afford food.

But seriously RB you do realise that no-one is really worried about the plight of the Brits, right? I mean, you guys do have some serious issues but most of them can probably be solved by avoiding candy. The distribution problems may not be particularly great for those of us who live in the developed world, but they are greater elsewhere. As eg. Wiggin observed recently in a thread near you

But that's my point precisely. The original post I replied to was saying "We're already struggling with nutrition distribution, if arable land becomes even more scarce I doubt there could be any kind of global response"

I disagree with this. The problem isn't one of food production or arable land, there is plenty of food getting produced in this world. The reason children are malnourished isn't because we can't grow wheat. Its because they can't afford it. It is a political/socio-economic problem, not a scientific one.

[Being]

I disagree with this. The problem isn't one of food production or arable land, there is plenty of food getting produced in this world. The reason children are malnourished isn't because we can't grow wheat. Its because they can't afford it. It is a political/socio-economic problem, not a scientific one.

It's more a religious problem than a sociopolitcal one; money is God and God is exclusive to those who have it.

[Nessus]

I'm not engaging in any under-handed or dishonest tactics.

Yes, now that you finally deigned to show your hand, it turned out option 1 was the correct one all along.

I disagree with this. The problem isn't one of food production or arable land, there is plenty of food getting produced in this world. The reason children are malnourished isn't because we can't grow wheat. Its because they can't afford it. It is a political/socio-economic problem, not a scientific one.[...]That isn't an issue of either food production or distribution, its a problem of money.

Money is a tool, a mean to achieve ends, not a goal in and of itself Nutrition distribution around the world is not working as well as it ought to, if the desired end result is global nutrition sufficiency, which was obviously an implicit assumption in my original post! In fact, this is a response to your second, one-word question to me, this is why the free market cannot deal with the kind of natural disaster I was discussing with Chambalaya, namely that people "couldn't afford" to re-structure global commerce without stupid amounts of hardship. If money is the end-all, be-all, then in the above scenario developed northern nations would haemorrhage machinery and materiel vital to their internal infrastructure in a bid to import grain from the diminishing arable nations. From the money hurf burf perspective I guess that's well and good, but dear Cthulhu if you can't see how that would also be a massive problem I must repeat my request that you inform me what kind of happy pills you're taking

[Loki]

Science isn't actually supposed to be established by democratic vote. Rather, empirical proof is the method of science.

Unless you happen to be dealing with ambiguous data, using non-exact tools, and relying on untestable assumptions. Climatology is no physics, that's for sure. Coincidentally, it's fun to see the pro-global warming people conflating weather with climate. This isn't to say that it's not happening, but weather does not prove or disprove the theory.

[Ziggy Stardust]

the free markets cannot deal with that kind of situation in a humane fashion

Why not?

Check New Orleans and the splendid job private contractors are doing there with regard to public housing.

The function of people venturing on the Free Market is not being humane, it's making sure their company has continuity.

Coincidentally, it's fun to see the pro-global warming people conflating weather with climate.

It's a periodic phenomena. 6 months ago the snow storm in Washington proved Global Warming was a hoax, now the heatwave in Russia proves it.

Political Science is flexible.

[EyeKhan]

He is you Nessie, we are all one, and we are the world

But seriously RB you do realise that no-one is really worried about the plight of the Brits, right?

I started worrying about the Brits about the time I started reading Rand's posts.

Unless you happen to be dealing with ambiguous data, using non-exact tools, and relying on untestable assumptions. Climatology is no physics, that's for sure. Coincidentally, it's fun to see the pro-global warming people conflating weather with climate. This isn't to say that it's not happening, but weather does not prove or disprove the theory.

Who is pro-Global Warming? Anyway, the point of looking at the ratio of Highs to Lows over a decade is to try and glimpse how weather events are affected by changes in the climate.

EDIT:

On a side note, now there's 8 million people floundering with no help in Pakistan's flood waters with more rain on the way. WTF. If anything, this is a preview of what's going to be happening the world over more and more frequently, not just because the climate's changing and becoming more extreme but also because increasing population in 'developing' countries means more and more people will be affected by these disasters.

[Loki]

It's a periodic phenomena. 6 months ago the snow storm in Washington proved Global Warming was a hoax, now the heatwave in Russia proves it.

Sure. That's why I find it ironic that the other side is doing the same now.

Political Science is flexible.

This is about as close to political science as me predicting the weather for next week is chemistry.

[Ziggy Stardust]

This is about as close to political science as me predicting the weather for next week is chemistry.

Shoot! Didn't mean it that way.

Partisan Science a better term?

[EyeKhan]

If money is the end-all, be-all, then

If this is the case, then starving people in poorer countries shouldn't register as a problem at all.

Sure. That's why I find it ironic that the other side is doing the same now.

Ratio of Extremes.

predicting the weather for next week is chemistry.

Technically weather is entirely chemistry. (Unless you ask a physicist...)

[Loki]

Shoot! Didn't mean it that way.

Partisan Science a better term?

Still makes a mockery of the term science. I prefer political punditry or just idiocy (the two are synonymous).

[Illusions]

But we don't have a problem getting the capability to distribute food to the malnourished children any more than we have a problem distributing booze. That was the whole point of my post. The problem is that the poor can't afford food.

I could easily rephrase this so that instead of placing the blame of the problem on the poor not being able to afford food, its placed on people with large amounts of disposable income not being empathetic towards their fellow starving man, and instead spending their vast wealth on multimillion dollar yachts, homes, or other extraneous or lavish items. Would this be a worthwhile argument? No, it would not be, it would just be a debate about perspective, and subjective opinions on the topic of money.

In addition you've framed a problem where logically there is no total solution possible, without doing away with capitalism, as there will always be people, globally, who are at the lower end of the income spectrum. However it is not necessary for everyone to want keep their money, and not feed starving people with it, nor is a prerequisite for capitalism to stop existing before its possible.