[non-ceph]: Global Warming Thread

[sorseress]

This one's about a week old.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Dead-Zone.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

 

[Psychopompos]

It is truly sad to hear of our planets animals suffering because of global warming. There is no doubt that global warming is real and is occurring. Some might say what is even sadder is the fact that it is a natural processes of Earth. The Earth goes through periods of temperatures increases and decreases as well as differing amounts of green house gasses. Periods known as Glacial and Interglacial, when looking at the geological time scale we find our selves leaving a Glacial period and entering an Interglacial period. A period in which green house gasses rise as well as temperatures. But this is not to transfer the blame of increasing temperatures from humans to a natural geological process. Undoubted man has played a key role in global warming. We produce tons of CO2 while destroying some of the only natural processes that remove CO2 from our air. And this is also not to take the matter totally out of our control. Although I do not know to what power we have in reversing what damage has been done or will be done. All I can hope for is that, while we may not be able to do anything, there are people out there who do appreciate these wonderful animals we have the privilege of sharing this world with. And while this might not be the only place with such creatures – this is the place where we will ever get to experience them.

Sorry if I’m repeating what has already been said, I haven’t read much of this thread. I guess I’m kind of in the wrong posting with out reading much of the others.

 

[sorseress]

Actually there are a lot of things people can do to mitigate the process. Most of them seem like not enough to make a difference, but if everybody did something it would help, and there are plenty of big things that governments and corporations could do if there was the political will.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20102028/

House OKs a mandate on clean energy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/01/AR2007080102051.html

I could post a lot more, but as you can see not everyone has an "Oh it's too bad, but there's nothing we can do about it" attitude. We can all do something. Even changing all your lightbulbs to CF is a help. Next time you buy a vehicle, don't get a big gas guzzling emissions spewing big macho truck or suv, get a hybrid car or suv, or if your life requires that you drive a truck get the most fuel efficient one you can find. Wear more sweaters in the winter and set your thermostat to 68. Don't leave lights on, turn off computers, stereos, televisions and unplug the power sources when possible. Same thing with those ubiquitous chargers. When they are plugged in they drain power. If everybody does it, it will make a difference.

 

[sorseress]

Here's a problem that had never occurred to me. Now we just have to see if the EPA will do anything.

Environmental News Network - EPA Urged To Limit CO2 Pollution From Cargo And Cruise Ships

 

[sorseress]

And a very good reason why something must be done!

Climate change disaster is upon us, warns UN

 

[sorseress]

This one is really scary.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/101007EA.shtml

 

[sorseress]

Here's another. Does anybody but me read these?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=15298749&sc=emaf

 

[monty]

I usually skim them, but I often find that this stuff is so poorly understood that I just get frustrated in the contradictory information on global climate issues in the press.

Caveat: This doesn't mean I particularly doubt antropogenic climate change or increased carbon levels, it just means I think we're not that cluefull on how it fits together, and where it's going in the future (whether we take any of many possible actions like this iron thing, or do nothing at all).

Ultimately, the argument that we don't understand it so we should postpone action is stupid: we understand that we're changing the atmosphere, and frankly, the odds that changing the atmosphere could do anything other than make the earth a worse (likely impossible) place for humans to live are a lot lower than the odds of a royal flush in 5-card draw.

As far as the actual article goes: plans like dumping iron into oceans to cause huge algae blooms always don't go as expected. It would be...unfortunate... to find out that this would, say, destroy 99.9% of the fish species in the ocean by some feedback we didn't expect. It maybe probably wouldn't go wrong about like playing Russian roulette probably won't kill you.

If we're going to do some crackpot mad science scheme to get rid of CO2, I kinda like this one, it's got flash (note that my blog post is rather, er, tongue in cheek): take the global warming fight to the terrorists, er, I mean gases

Anyway, it has the advantage that we can turn off the big laser if it seems to be causing problems. If we dump iron into the ocean, what are we going to do to fix any problems that arise? Order a giant magnet from ACME corporation? We know that never ends well...

The Daisyworld/ Gaia guy Lovelock has his own drastic measures scheme: From Gaia to Geoengineering: A Radical Cure for Global Warming

I've recently found that Lovelock is pretty smart, if a bit out there, and that he's sometimes been disgusted at the kooky places his rabid followers have taken the Gaia metaphor. But I think the concerns (like that his tubes could have the opposite of the intended effect, for example) are worthy of careful consideration.

The problem is that the concerned scientists are so used to fighting ignorant, obnoxious political opponents of the whole idea that they aren't used to admitting that some details are probably wrong. When engineers and scientists get in this mode, they often have irrational confidence in their designs and end up screwing things up and making false claims about how their systems are foolproof, as in this article I read yesterday about the failure of all 3 computers on the space station at the same time: http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/print/5598

Anyway, I think it's complicated. Freeman Dyson is another interesting guy, who (like me, so I can respect it) enjoys being perverse to point out when there is weird group psychology biasing research. I don't know that I agree with his conclusions, but I find that reading/listening to him usually makes me feel smarter. He's got some interesting youtube clips pt1 pt2
and his article on heretical science is on my must-read list for everyone, even those who disagree with all his conclusions.

Edit: oh, yeah, and I was mightily impressed by the known and hypothetical atmospheric issues discussed in Ward's Out of Thin Air book, which include some hypotheses about oxygen levels driving cephalopod evolution, so it's even on-topic!

 

[Cairnos]

Anyway, it has the advantage that we can turn off the big laser if it seems to be causing problems. If we dump iron into the ocean, what are we going to do to fix any problems that arise? Order a giant magnet from ACME corporation? We know that never ends well...

It's obvious, if you start up a for-profit company to dump iron into the ocean and you, for instance, discover that you now have an algal bloom that has totaly upset the local ecosystem and can't be controlled by the natives life forms, then you simply start up another company and offer to those near the affected region to, for a nominal sum, introduce a more aggresive foreign consumer of algae.

Of course while you're at it you may want to start research on finding out what will consume this new species as well so that when the time comes to start up your third company you'll have a jump on any competition

 

[monty]

hey, fossil mollusc shells are actually useful for the global warming debate: http://tech.caltech.edu/Tech2.0/10_15_2007/article1.html

who'd'a guessed? Also, this is the first post I've ever been unsure if it goes in conservation or fossils...

 

[sorseress]

Another chilling article.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/storie...ME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2007-11-03-03-13-55

 

[sorseress]

Now this is a twist on the usual climate change stories....Never even occurred to me.

http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id=NEWEN20070033338&ch=11/19/2007 7:43:00 PM

 

[monty]

Now this is a twist on the usual climate change stories....Never even occurred to me.

http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id=NEWEN20070033338&ch=11/19/2007 7:43:00 PM

Isn't there one of those Latin phrases about logical fallacies that covers this sort of thing?

It is true that many women are limited by their cultures, and that this disempowers them. It is also true that global warming issues often cause problems for poor people living on the edge. These things together happen to mean that women in some situations may be more impacted by global warming. However, if we managed to make enormous strides in women's rights without changing our CO2 emissions, then we can achieve a stupid form of equality where we're all equally hosed. I don't think this should be the goal, and therefore I'm inclined to see this as people jockeying for support for their causes by associating two hotbutton issues rather than anything meaningful.

Or, to put it a different way, I don't think that my Y chromosome gives me any reason to be less concerned about the impact of global warming, even assuming that I'm callous enough to not care about any of my female friends. I also don't really think it's that useful to ask whether more black people, asian people, eskimos, rednecks, computer programmers, or suicide bombers would be effected by global warming. It's a global problem, so there are many scenarios where people living on coasts, in deserts, on islands, and in tundra will be impacted. Rich people might be able to move from situations that go from good to bad, or bad to worse, and poor people might not. The socioeconomic factors that lead there to be more women in that unfortunate situation are entirely unrelated to global warming, and strike me as being needlessly divisive. I suppose if this taps into the "disgruntled feminists" enough to raise awareness of global warming issues that might be good (and I suspect that there is some correlation between people sympathetic to women and to environmental issues, so it might recruit more than it alienates) but it pushes my "bad science" buttons in a big way.

This is not to say that I'm opposed to action on global warming or women's issues. I just think it's wrong to suggest that they're intrinsically connected rather that just circumstantially so, and, in fact, there might even be situations where the causes are at odds, if nothing else in whether someone giving money chooses to donate to an environmental group or a women's advocacy group. I cynically suspect this is some sort of ploy for one of those to try to extract money on the coattails of the other, in fact, since I don't see any evidence of synergy to make more net progress on either issue by linking them... unfortunately, asking to spend more money on studying this dubious link means that less money is available to target where it would be most helpful for either issue by experts who have a big-picture idea on how to address each (real, important) problem individually.

 

[sorseress]

I didn't read it as any kind of a ploy, but certainly on general principles it would be much better if women in poverty and/or under various cultural restrictions were empowered. This, I think,is simply a statement of the reality of the circumstances of poor women in certain kinds of cultures. Their circumstances are dire with or without global warming. Poor people living on the edge in any culture will be more heavily impacted by worsening conditions caused by global climate change than wealthier people living in those same countries, and both rich and poor will be more heavily impacted in countries that are already struggling than those where the governments are willing and able to relocate, subsidize, pipe water in or dam water out or whatever it takes. In the Netherlands actions are already underway to cope with rising sea waters, and they are apparently willing to do whatever it takes to save their country and their people from that particular threat. Bangladesh, and many island nations will not be able to because they simply don't have the financial resources. People will be dislocated, and many will die because the "have" nations are not going to be willing to take in refugees from the "have not" nations. All countries will be facing shortages in resources, and considering the hostility facing immigrants in many nations when a lack of resources aren't really a problem you can imagine how much hostility will exist if people think they will be asked to share food and water with refugees. It is, and will continue to be a worldwide problem, but undeniably , those already living in horrendous conditions will suffer more, and in places where women are treated as somehow less than valuable members of society, they, and their children, will suffer the most. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that. Considering that the governments of the world have not been able to agree on any meaningful action to prevent global disaster I doubt that anybody is going to spend much time, and even less money, worrying about the poor and disempowered women living in poor and culturally repressive parts of the world.

 

[monty]

I didn't read it as any kind of a ploy, but certainly on general principles it would be much better if women in poverty and/or under various cultural restrictions were empowered. This, I think,is simply a statement of the reality of the circumstances of poor women in certain kinds of cultures. Their circumstances are dire with or without global warming. Poor people living on the edge in any culture will be more heavily impacted by worsening conditions caused by global climate change than wealthier people living in those same countries, and both rich and poor will be more heavily impacted in countries that are already struggling than those where the governments are willing and able to relocate, subsidize, pipe water in or dam water out or whatever it takes. In the Netherlands actions are already underway to cope with rising sea waters, and they are apparently willing to do whatever it takes to save their country and their people from that particular threat. Bangladesh, and many island nations will not be able to because they simply don't have the financial resources. People will be dislocated, and many will die because the "have" nations are not going to be willing to take in refugees from the "have not" nations. All countries will be facing shortages in resources, and considering the hostility facing immigrants in many nations when a lack of resources aren't really a problem you can imagine how much hostility will exist if people think they will be asked to share food and water with refugees. It is, and will continue to be a worldwide problem, but undeniably , those already living in horrendous conditions will suffer more, and in places where women are treated as somehow less than valuable members of society, they, and their children, will suffer the most. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that. Considering that the governments of the world have not been able to agree on any meaningful action to prevent global disaster I doubt that anybody is going to spend much time, and even less money, worrying about the poor and disempowered women living in poor and culturally repressive parts of the world.

It's certainly possible I need to turn down the cynicism a notch. I hate to see people living in harms way no matter what their gender, and if tying these issues together somehow improves things over addressing them equally, I'm all for it, but this seems to be adding a divisive rather than unifying aspect to both issues.

In places where women are systematically disempowered, that is clearly a human rights issue whether there is global warming going on or not. If the climate problems were miraculously solved tomorrow, I don't see any direct way that would help these women. Maybe what you/the article means is that these countries won't be able to maintain the stats quo in the face of increasing problems, and if they were made to realize that, then they could stop disempowering their women and let the resulting improvement in productivity and ingenuity work toward addressing the global warming problems. I'd be fine if that could work, but it seems like the psychology of the nations that have these issues is such that they're not likely to see that as an incentive.

If global warming is going to destroy the homes and economies of many nations, that is clearly a humanitarian disaster whether the impacted countries are progressive or repressive of women. If all the inequities which disempower women were corrected tomorrow, I don't see any way that would impact the climate change problem.

Does tying these things together somehow make it more likely that the women will be less oppressed or that the impact of global climate will be mitigated? Is the implication that the conspiracy of men refuses to take global warming seriously because they think "who cares, it's just women"? It actually somewhat seems to incorrectly pass the blame for women's increased risk away from the people responsible-- if women in country X suffer or die because there are ridiculous restrictions and burdens on them, I don't want the oppressive governments or cultures to be able to say "it's not our fault, it's because of global warming." Sending the message that the way women are treated is wrong because it leads to them being more vulnerable to one particular problem is weaker than sending the message that it's wrong for all sorts of reasons, and it weakens their country's society, culture, economy, and influence in the world, which is true in countries that are hit hard by global warming disasters and those that get off relatively easy (if there turn out to be any of those.)

And with respect to global warming, I think it's vastly more important to take corrective action as soon as possible to avert as much of the problem as we can, and reduce the humanitarian impact on everyone, male or female, proactively. I suppose if whatever impact can't be prevented is handled in the best way possible, that's fine, and can include taking into account who is impacted the most, but it seems like most of the humanitarian aid is stuff like food, water, medical supplies, boats, relocation help, radios, and so forth, which is pretty gender-neutral.

I'm pretty much in agreement with everything you said, I'm just not clear on how this report claims that linking the two problems together, either in people's minds or in how the two problems should be studied, is going to make either of the problems less bad, so I'd like to spend the resources needed to fix both problems, which probably involves having a separate pool of resources to spend on each problem. I'm not sure if these countries were told that they could have global warming relief money to teach women how to swim that they'd be willing to take it, and I suspect many of them would make claims that this was wester colonialism trying to corrupt their local culture and make a big stink about refusing to take it. We could bundle some carrot-aid or stick-sanctions and say "we'll provide economic incentives for you take these steps to correct both CO2 emissions and human rights" but that runs the risk that they'll say "buzz off, colonial interfering jerks" which will have them sacrifice their poor people to save their national pride... and frequently their governments can even use this as an example of how the west is responsible for attacking their culture and refusing to give them money, which lets them distract their people from the impact of their repressive policies toward women (or toward their non-elite citizens in general).