June 17, 2006

• You're missing the fact that the current system makes a METRIC FUCKLOAD of money for oil cartels, big business, politicians & banking. Naturally people benefitting from this largesse are not gonna want to change. In short, mendacity is the answer.
• Well, I was trying not to be cynical! ;-) Let me rephrase: "Is there a legitimate reason not motivated by greed?"
• Well, it would certainly take a lot of effort & work to change everything around. Also presumably there will be unforseeable economic effects, which may or may not be good. The big problem about Global Warming is that my house will be underwater in 20 years. I'm really not looking forward to that, although feeling a bit happier about renting. A lot of people's mortgages are gonna be fucked, know what I mean?
• I think it's a combination of three things: One, people are too attached to their current comfortable, convenient, energy-consuming lifestyles to trade down. Politicians dare not ask them to, for that is electoral suicide. Two, there's a belief that science will magically solve the problem, presumably soon after 'scientists' cure cancer or find a way to let us live to three hundred (Baal forbid). Three, there's a (reasonably accurate) belief that the kuso will not hit the senpuuki in our lifetimes. That's someone else's problem! The first reason is, I think, the strongest, and the reason for much of the opposition to the idea of global warming.
• a bit off-topic, but I had the weirdest "daydream" this morning, imaging that citizens of the "first world" (for instance, murrikans) voluntarily chose to live at a much lower standard of living. for instance, if you chose to live in a $30,000 trailer instead of a $300,000 house, a family of 4, say, could live on one income, enabling one parent to stay home and parent in a more full-time intensive way, getting involved with education/school/enrichment etc, in a way I believe would be very beneficial to the children involved (my mom was a 'housewife' until I was in my teens and it was great! what an awesome way to grow up, no latchkey, no daycare) what if people voluntarily chose to work for lower salaries, because they lived in a $30k double-wide, enabling their employers to provide really sweet, incredibly comprehensive health-care coverage for their whole family? wouldnt that be worth the "sacrifice" of not having a 2000 square foot home? anyway, I promise never to go to that crack dealer again!
• I really want to comment on this, but I know if I do I will have to pull out the damned library of paleoclimatological books I have sitting on the shelf, dust them off, and actually prove that global warming is a normal phenomenon. So I'll just sit here and lurk instead.
• Aircraft fuselages. Make your homes out of old aircraft fuselages. There are thousands of them rusting away out there in those old lots.
• "and actually prove that global warming is a normal phenomenon." Global warming is indeed a natural phenomenon, but not at the accelerated rate that we see today! Ancient climate shifts took thousands of years, not a matter of a century.
• Funky. I just got back from hearing President Clinton hammer away at this a couple of hours ago. You're missing the fact that the current system makes a METRIC FUCKLOAD of money for oil cartels, big business, politicians & banking. Naturally people benefitting from this largesse are not gonna want to change. Indeed. And until they get scared enough to really get serious about branching out into other avenues once they realize the oil's drying up and coal is at best a band-aid for the wound, they're going to do precisely dick about it, beyond the minimum needed for corporate PR. That will eventually happen, but we risk waiting too long.
• global oil consumption is driven by one simple fact: Oil releases more calories of heat, per calorie of heat required for its production, BY FAR, than any other energy source on the planet. this makes it the cheapest, and the one that everyone uses. next is coal, then nuclear. solar (with the panels) is like the most expensive (and the panels degrade and become less efficient over time). the current big fear is that we wont have the time or resources to authorize and build enough nuclear plants before we run out of oil. The main problem? the Left won't support any nuclear program and the Right won't support any 'alternative' fuel sources. so we trundle along burning coal and oil like stupid dinosaurs because it's the only thing we can agree on. the solution? Wake Up Hippies! get behind nuclear power before it's too late. concerned about the waste? consider this: Every Year, in the US alone, more radiation is released into the atmosphere by Coal Burning Power Plants, than by the entire history of nuclear accidents, including chernobyl. yes. coal is radioactive. AND i had a weird dream too, where i tore up the lawn chair, that i just bought, while sleepwalking, into big chunks that i strewed upon the lawn...then i tried to pass the blame.....shameful, really.
• but I know if I do I will have to pull out the damned library of paleoclimatological books ... and actually prove that global warming is a normal phenomenon yeah, good luck with that... is jealous of mct's diy* meets *aka home improvement, i believe
• global oil consumption is driven by one simple fact: Oil releases more calories of heat, per calorie of heat required for its production, BY FAR, no, that's extraction, not production. the production of oil is hugely more energy-expensive to the planet than its consumption. that's one reason we're running out. agree about nuclear though, at least for the next 30+ years. funny dream about people with irish pound notes (punts) who needed to pay for something. i think i was going to give them euros in place.
• I'm confused. Is a metric fuckload bigger or smaller than a fractional fuckload?
• Wake Up Hippies! get behind nuclear power before it's too late. Step in the right direction, but not good enough. Nuclear power is still very much dependent on oil and petroleum products. In fact, pretty much all "alternative" fuel sources are, at least to produce and maintain the machinery to produce the energy. We're a long, long way away from a long-term, viable solution. We needed to be getting busier on research fifty years ago.
• Global warming is indeed a natural phenomenon, but not at the accelerated rate that we see today It should not be forgotten that though global warming can be a natural phenomenon, and the current warming may well have been initiated by a natural temperature progression, human activity can only be accelerating the warming cycle. Opponents of global warming like the point to the first possibility while ignoring the second. This is much like the gas station owner exhorting you to throw gasoline on your housefire, with the excuse that he didn't start it. No reasonable person would agree that was a good idea. It is in the interest of modern civilization to minimize the effects of global warming, due to the likely catastrophic costs, no matter how much of the warming is a natural cycle. Why are people so oppsed to the idea [of global warming] I think it is a combination of personal, short-sighted corporate greed, as Chyren pointed out, combined with corporate fear encouraged by the short-sightedness of society at large. The greed is typified by the oil industry. It can certainly be argued that an industry with a diminishing resource would be wise to take every action to stretch the lifespan of that resource, while investing profits into diversifying corporate investments. In other words, Exxon would benefit long-term by encouraging conservation while investing profits into other energy sources to replace oil as a corporate base. However, by instead encouraging oil consumption while supplies shrink, Exxon records windfall short-term profits which translate directly into huge executive bonuses. The executives, of course, will be long gone before the next generation of Exxon investors wishes that the corporation had diversified earlier. Meanwhile, the car companies would love to sell you a more fuel efficient vehicle, but they're (apparently) paralyzed by fear. I've tried to look into this myself, and from what evidence I've come across it appears that car executives consider consumers to be idiots for continuing to buy giant, gas-guzzling SUVs. However, without government intervention, the car executives are too afraid of their competition to make the first move. The car industry is highly, highly competitive and many of the big companies can ill afford a single mis-step at this point. No car company CEO wants to start pushing more expensive (short-term!) fuel efficient cars, only to watch the public run to their competitors to buy cheap gas guzzlers.
• So what do we make of reports of some previously exhausted oil deposits refilling? Some people suggest that 'peak oil' is a myth, & that oil is not produced from biological material, but from processes in the earth's crust. The biological traces found in oil can be attributed to microorganisms entering the supply underground. A manufactured fear of oil running out would certainly be a good thing for the oil companies, for obvious reasons.
• So what do we make of reports of some previously exhausted oil deposits refilling? I'm not aware of them. I've heard in some places they're actually injecting sea water into the wells to flush out the stuff at the bottom, almost literally scraping the bottom of the barrel. You have a link?
• Oil Deposits Refilling == Better recovery methods combined with bias from people promoting abiogenic oil hypothesis. The worst thing that could happen? The earth was possibly headed for an ice age and the only thing stopping it might be human-caused warming. We could have the math completely wrong. I don't think that is very likely. I find it far more likely that we are in for warming the likes of which has not been seen since the Permian. Artic real estate anyone?
• We didn't listen!!! / I'm so very sorry. // But, really, we didn't...
• jccalhoun - I think you have your answer on why oil companies, car manufacturers, etc don't want to believe in global warming. But why don't "ordinary" people? Many reasons: people are generally conservative and don't like changing their ideas; reducing your lifestyle is a lot more difficult than increasing consumption; they are getting comflicting evidence (if the temp has changed before, and it has, what is different this time? Well, speed of change and amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere) and they would rather believe the "evidence" that means they don't have to so anything hard than listen to the research that tells them that they have to do difficult things. Even if the source of the evidence is from oil companies, while just about all the climate scientists say that it is a serious issue. It will be an economic hit to reduce the production of CO2 - and people would rather die tomorrow than tighten their belts today. And politicians follow what the people want - they don't want to be "negative". Jimmy Carter was negative, and everyone knows what a terrible president he was! (Well, except for the Nobel prize and the near universal international respect.)
• Just to clarify: Global warming doesn't mean cold places will just get warmer. In addition to sea levels rising, sea currents and all the weather systems they cause will change - more hurricanes, maybe even the Gulf stream stopping. The Gulf stream is the only thing that keeps most of northern Europe (including all of Britain) from being arctic and subarctic. Britain is the latitude of Edmonton.
• I'm confused. Is a metric fuckload bigger or smaller than a fractional fuckload? And how does this compare to a metric asston? Or an Imperial fuckload, for that matter.
• To answer the original question - there are people who believe that global warming may not be caused by human activities, and aren't necessarily motivated by oil profits. It's an interesting question - a collegue of mine is a global warming sceptic and she's intelligent, sceptical, and not being funded by big oil. She doesn't even drive to work most of the time. Reasons given on the above wikipedia link are: the climate has changed in the past, long before humans were around; the difference is temperature over the past century is too small to be taken as conclusive; there are other possible causes such as changes in ocean currents . As far as more selfish reasons for ignoring global warming - it's rarely in corporate interest to think about the long term, and people change deeply-ingrained habits only very slowly. It's taken humans about a century to get used to autobiles as transportation - not even firm believers in global warming can stop using their cars, for example, overnight .
• "There is no meaningful correlation between CO₂ levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO₂ levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years." The number one greenhouse gas is actually water vapor. I think I'll take my information from the sparse and qualified few who devote their lives to studying this phenomenon, thank you.
• The answer, of course, is Americans in their Hummers.
• I can see scepticism about the effects of global warming, but there are those who seem not only sceptical of global warming but strongly opposed to changing anything. I don't really see any downside to acting on the assumption that global warming is real. Even if it is totally wrong, so what? We just spent time and money to be more efficient. Oh no! Basically, I was hoping that there was some reason why this is such a political issue besides the fact that they are just puppets for oil companies.
• buttload < metric buttload < fuckload < metric fuckload < fuckton
• Don't forget to take into account that people find it much easier to sit around and talk about global warming than to get up and do something about it.
• buttload < metric buttload < fuckload < metric fuckload < fuckton Weight or volume, people?
• good question... /goes to consult the fuckipedia
• Science advocate destroys global warming/AIDS dismisser
• Halliburton Solves Global Warming Yay Halliburton!
• Ummm, that IS a joke, right homunculus? Right? The answer, of course, is Americans in their Hummers. You know, I honestly don't care if Hummer owners cause global warming or not. They should still be shot. Repeatedly. With small bullets. In the crotch.
• Global warming is a misleading term. Climate change is a better one IMHO. Climate change also covers a possible ice-age in Europe for instance, when the warm Gulf Stream that hits Western Europe ceases to exist or reroutes.
• Right, Weezel. The Yes Men strike again!
• /wipes brow, feels foolish
• Here's the thing about global warming and why most people don't get the panties completely wedgified over it (caveat: I've been on "nighborhood watch" tonight, which means [obviously] that I've had a few beers): First, most people consider "the environmentalist movment" to be a bunch of PETA and Greenpeace nutjobs busily taking off their clothes in public, telling children they're murderers for drinking milk, and getting their Zodiacs run over by Japanese whalers. End result: dismissal. Second, We're all still reeling from the food riots and worldwide starvation acccompanying the last batch of Rachel Carson/Paul Erlich henny-pennying (end result: dismissal). Lastly, it the science on global warming is being prestened in three ways: one, that global warming is negligible (end result: two guesses!), that global warming is moderate (end results: science will find a way, and in the interim w2e'll all wear hats), or that global warming is the End of the World as we Know It (end result: we're fucked anyway, so why should I drive a Prius and make my last few years on earth incomfortable?). It is the same problem that accompanies all doomsday scenarios - either it is not true (like ALL previous doomsday scenarios, of which there have been many) and it is true, in which case we're fucked and there nothing I can do about it anyway. Hence: the meh.
• It seems as though everybody involved in this debate misses one big central point. Even if man's pollutants aren't causing global warming we know that those chemicals are doing other bad things. For that reason there we should be working on polluting as little as possible.
• MonkeyFilter: consult the fuckipedia
• Even if it is totally wrong, so what? We just spent time and money to be more efficient. Oh no! Well, if global warming is total bullshit, then efficiency doesn't matter nearly as much. The rewards for (environmental) efficiency exist only insofar as inefficiency imposes costs on us. Global warming presumably counts as an important cost, if it's real. If it's not, then the rewards for efficiency aren't nearly as important. Of course, even if global warming is real, and we decide to devote a bunch of money to fix it, there's still no guarantee that all of our spending will make us more energy efficient; or, if it will, that the increased efficiency will be worth the cost. Which goes back to the original question: The only downsides I've heard are that it would cost companies a bunch of money to change things. But isn't spending money good for the economy? Depends. Spending money on stuff that people want to buy is good for the economy. Spending money on nothing? Or on useless crap for which there's no demand? Not so much. Jobs might be created, but at the expense of destroying many more old ones. So, it depends. (btw, none of this should be taken as at all indicative of my own views on this issue)
• Wait, what?
• I'm prepared to speak for the Devil on this. Tackling global warming seriously would certainly not be painless. Give up your car, forget about air travel. The costs of production and transport zoom upwards: everthing is scarcer and more expensive. Inflation takes off, employment plummets. A vicious cycle sets in as reduced production means lower incomes, means lower spending, means less production. In the past, recessions have been cured by boosting the economy, but that's not an option this time. Eventually, once the population has somehow been reduced to the appropriate levels, the Bronze Age resumes and continues indefinitely. It may be wrong, but it's not mad to think that global warming might be preferable to that (in practice, that's what we have all decided, since no-one is even proposing the kind of measures which would in principle be needed to reverse the momentum towards warming which is already established); nor to think that before deciding to head in that direction, you might need more than a current consensus among meteorologists, many of whom were part of a different consensus not so long ago, which held that the world was about to freeze.
• I can feel my globules getting warmer!
• I think I'll take my information from the sparse and qualified few who devote their lives to studying this phenomenon, thank you. posted by nunia at 03:54PM UTC on June 18, 2006 Well, the majority of the that sparse and qualified few are telling us to "be afraid, be very afraid". No, they don't know for certain. But they do know that the choice is between a) do nothing, and perhaps all die in a horrible Venus-like burn up, or b) do something, and maybe change that fate. And in the process of doing something, reduce the smog, pollution, maybe urban sprawl (if we aren't all building 4000 sqft houses 6 miles away from each other), reduce energy consumption of non-renewable resources and all sorts of other good side-effects. It's like wearing a bicycle helmet. Sure, most people are just fine wearing no helmut - but they could have an accident and become brain damaged. So I'm wearing the helmut, I like my brain.
• Plegmund - you're right about the pain people will have to go through. Of course, 50 years ago, we didn't have most of those things. Only some people had cars, few people flew often. And that's the way things still are in most places in the world. We are just plain spoiled. It's not going to be easy - I don't drive, but I love to fly. And one flight is worse than driving. But I'm willing to try to take the bus whenever possible, and to keep Atlantic flights down to a minimum, if there is even a possibility that human induced global warming/climate change is happening and I can help overt it. That said, I really have to stop spelling phonetically. HELMET. Not Helmut. I wear a HELMET. ----------------------- From the BoingBoing link - some pundit is claiming the world was cooling at the beginning of the 20th cent? That's ridiculous - we've been coming out of the Little Ice Age since about 1850 (which had lasted some 300-400 years). Millions of British children who have never seen a white Christmas -- unlike Dickens -- are well aware of this. Did you know the Thames once froze solid enough that James I held a mid-winter festival in the middle of it? It did suck for all the crop failures and starvation of the 1590s - 1620s, but it would be so cool to see that again. /facetious-filter
• Also - I'd like to point out that previous large climate changes in the past did happen, and didn't they lead to mass extinctions? So why should we be comforted again? The Sahara also used to be a land of lakes with a thriving fishing culture. I wouldn't want Ontario to turn into a desert.
• the choice is between a) do nothing, and perhaps all die in a horrible Venus-like burn up, or b) do something, and maybe change that fate You see, jb, I'm not sure they really do know that. The choice might turn out to be between doing nothing, and experiencing a bit of moderate warming - nothing we can't cope with - or starting a catastrophic collapse in the world economy which leads directly or indirectly to thousands or millions of deaths from starvation, lack of medicine, etc, and brings a permanent end to further human progress. You young people are so used to prosperity you think hamburgers and iPods are part of the natural order and they'll still keep coming even if we close the factories. Those of us who actually lived through the recessions of the 1590s and 1620s know different! *shakes stick, falls over* You're right that the climate has changed in historical times. (Though I've been told that another reason the Thames no longer freezes, as it did when they had the Frost Fairs you mention, is that it flows much faster these days, thanks to Bazalgette's embankments and the wider spans of the modern bridges.) But that's a two-edged argument. If the climate changes all the time, how do we know that recent changes have anything to do with human activity? Just being the Devil's advocate, you know.
• I wear a Helmut. It's much more enjoyable riding a bike with an ex-Chancellor of Germany draped over my shoulders. NOBODY cuts me off!
• Nein! Erhalten Sie zurück in Ihrem Weg!
• So does that mean sweaters will become extinct?
• Well, the majority of the that sparse and qualified few are telling us to "be afraid, be very afraid". Granted, even in the paleoclimatology community, there is debate. However, it is illogical and incorrect to look at global warming in the context of only a couple hundred years. Geologic time (over millions and millions of years) shows far greater extremes of weather that do not correlate to concentrations of "greenhose gasses" and such. We are seeing a phenomenon today that is occuring only within the limit of our recent experience, but in the overall climate history of the earth, this is barely a blink of an eye and completely irrelevant. The masses have become climatic hypochondriacs. The word "scientist" is not a catch-all phrase for people who know how to use a calculator, you know. Hell, even Gore wouldn't know a qualified scientist if one bit him on the ass. When I say "sparse and qualified few," I'm speaking of climatologists only, not political scientists.
• It's pretty obvious to anyone who takes even a passing interest in this issue that most - if not all - scientist agree that you people are all horrible fucking idiots. "Global warming" can be simply understood and its concomitant apocalypses easily avoided by using the simple and patented steps of my own fact-sheet on "How to Deal With Climate Change": Global Warming - Huh? By T Q Kid, Esq. The Earth used to be "cool" - you know, in the sixties, when HENDRIX and MORRISON were still alive. Now scientists have discovered that everything sucks, hence the Art-tic and Anti-Art-Tic are melting. Here's how to deal with the coming waterworld and/or prevent it in the first place: 1. Men - grow gills and live in the sea. 2. Women - wear skimpy bikinis. Hubba hubba! 3. Kill Kevin Costner NOW while he is on dry land and vulnerable. 4. Fill your fridge with food, climb in and close the door. Come back out in 2476 AD or when you run out of air. 5. Make night-time last longer by drinking a lot of coffee before you go to bed. A longer night means the Earth receives less sunshine and will cool down quicker. 6. Start World War III: the cold of nuclear winter and the hot of global warming should cancel one another out, or something. 7. Methane is a big, bad greenhouse gas: so stop farting so much.
• I want to know what Tom Cruise thinks about all this.
• You're being glib. Tom Cruise knows about global warming. Now here, hold these cans and answer a few simple questions.
• You don't know about global warming, Matt. I do.
• this is barely a blink of an eye and completely irrelevant I think the point is that global warming/climate change is relevant to the next few generations of human life, not to the vastness of geologic history. Sure, it's hardly likely to be the end of the earth, as good old Gaia has bounced back from worse. But we wouldn't want to have lived through those times.
• Bah. Who cares about humanity? We're going extinct anyway. Might as well enjoy the ride down.
• I was thinking of the little puppies. The poor little puppies with no one around to hug and feed them.
• THE PUPPIES WILL BE HUGGED BY THE SCORCHING RAYS OF THE SUN AND FED ON SOLAR RADIATION UNTIL THEY BECOME GIANT SUPERPUPPIES WITH LASER EYES AND SOFT SOFT EARS AND TUGGING ON GIANT SOCK AND FALL OVER SNEEZE AND BARK. IT IS WRITTEN.
• So let it be done.
• MonkeyFilter: We're going extinct anyway. Might as well enjoy the ride down. This place is going to the dogs.
• ... till someday like New Orleans their Storyville be written on the bayou tape history ...
• Study: Earth 'likely' hottest in 2000 years The National Academy of Sciences, reaching that conclusion in a broad review of scientific work requested by Congress, reported Thursday that the "recent warmth is unprecedented for at least the last 400 years and potentially the last several millennia."
• Please treat this report with all due gravity: the planet's gotten hotter than Hades can ever be.
• Plegmund - I'm not unaware of the economic effects. But constantly increasing consumption isn't a good way to run an economy either. Nor is it at all possible to extend first world standards to the rest of the world - there just isn't enough stuff or places to put the pollution - so it is a unreconcilable source of inequality. Sorry, it's late. I don't spell well when it's late.
• And if there's a problem, which there is, I find that not trying to address the problem is probably a bad idea. That whole if-you-find-yourself-in-a-hole, the-first-thing-to-do-is-stop-digging thing. There IS painless (relatively) stuff that can be done. More fuel efficient cars, houses, electrical goods etc etc. More efficient use of resources tends not to result in economic disaster, usually.
• My experience of late has been that the right-wing media has energized its base to react angrily to the mention of global warming, or at least to confine it to a "yeah this happens every 1000 years, we're probably going to die" sort of cynical-cool pose. Which is bad.
• cynicool
• Yeah . . whatever. *adjusts shades, lights cigarette*
• Oooh cigarettes - did you know that there is no evidence that they are addictive? And that they can't be addictive by definition since the WHO way back when defined an addictive substance to be one that induces euphoria. And there is no good scientific evidence that they cause lung cancer either, many scientists disagree about the data and it really isn't clear at all. It's epidemiological data which doesn't really prove causation only correlation and and and.... Bah. It is really striking just how closely the cigarette industry's playbook is being followed.
• Global Warming Surpassed Natural Cycles in Fueling 2005 Hurricane Season, NCAR Scientists Conclude
• One of the scientists whose writing I always enjoy for its acerbic truths is physicist Bob Park: item 3 here gives his take on this.
• Greenland's Ice Sheet Is Slip, Sliding Away: The massive glaciers are deteriorating twice as fast as they were five years ago. If the ice thaws entirely, sea level would rise 21 feet.
• Scientists OK Gore's movie for accuracy
• Amazing excerpt from above article: "The AP contacted more than 100 top climate researchers by e-mail and phone for their opinion. Among those contacted were vocal skeptics of climate change theory. Most scientists had not seen the movie, which is in limited release, or read the book."
• Huddled inside a red cook tent atop 3,900 feet of ice, Zwally shoveled snow into a pot simmering on a two-ring propane camp stove. Well, dammit, that's why we can't have nice things glaciers! Good - bye Glaciers Going, going, gone.
• the real reason
• The Threat to the Planet. "How much will sea level rise with five degrees of global warming?... The last time that the Earth was five degrees warmer was three million years ago, when sea level was about eighty feet higher. Eighty feet! In that case, the United States would lose most East Coast cities: Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, and Miami; indeed, practically the entire state of Florida would be under water. Fifty million people in the US live below that sea level. Other places would fare worse. China would have 250 million displaced persons. Bangladesh would produce 120 million refugees, practically the entire nation. India would lose the land of 150 million people."
• Yeah, but no biggie.
• My thinking these days tends at its gloomiest towards thinking the creatures tough enough to co-exist in the barren urban landscapes we create are probably going to be the only wildlife left on the plant in another 150 or 160 years. But that's OK, because by then the world will be almost completely surfaced in asphalt and/or cement. Most human beings alive now have no more idea what the 'real world' -- of trees, plants and animals -- is like than they do of Mars' surface.
• Cockroaches and Keith Richards?
• Scientists OK Gore's movie for accuracy Apparently the right-wing talking point to this is that the "scientists" who "approve" the movie can't be found. They know there are 19 of them though. Somehow. Plus the earth warms and cools naturally. Nothing to be done about it. There's no data. Liberal media. Wrong science. And so on.
• nifty related blue article
• When I was a kid, we worked out that if the ice caps melted, the water would rise so that it was ankle deep at the shops at the bottom of the hill I lived on. So we were OK. Then I moved to London, where we have big barrier to stop the water getting in. So I'm still OK.
• Now that the glaciers are melting, some land areas may be rising, freed of the massive weight of ice on their backs.
• Bees, your comment reminded me of something #2 told me the other night. There's a ring laser here in Christchurch at the base of the hills on the edge of the city. Apparently it's so senstive (or whatever a good laser is) that it can detect the change in the shape of the hills when the moon moves over them. The hills are part of a peninsula and the tidal movement pushes water against the hills, making them taller and narrower. I was surprised because it had never occurred to me that the shape of land is affected by tides as well.
• Norway has been rebounding from the loss of glacial ice for some time now. Don't worry, people. The glaciers will all come back in about 10,000 years.
• promises, promises.
• Don't make me do it. Damn. I done it.
• Ice core records from Antarctica show the current levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are higher now than at any time in the past 800,000 years and increasing at an unprecedented rate, the latest study of ice drilled out of Antarctica confirms. "There's nothing that suggests that the Earth will take care of the increase in carbon dioxide. The ice core suggests that the increase in carbon dioxide will definitely give us a climate change that will be dangerous."
• read this today. scary and depressing stuff.
• We're Number One! We're Number One! Beat THAT, cavepeople! "Ooh, lookit me, I'm contributing to CO2 levels with my little mastodon barbeque! Ooh! Lookit all that puffy smoke!" Pfft. LOOZERS.
• California's Global-Warming Solution
• If it's any consolation, during the era of the dinosaurs, the earth was a lot warmer than it is today. The ice caps didn't exist, if i remember right. So we do have a little breathing room to fix things before we go extinct
• Kyota accord: just a socialist scheme, according to Canada's Conservative leader.
• The middle ground on climate change: in the Globe and Mail today: Climate Change, a questionable truth . The title is a tad misleading....