MonteZuma

Feel the love

Well....I guess you could always take his side (in a devil's advocate kinda way) and kick start things again. Surely there is something in all that verbage that I have posted that you disagree with??!!

Abortion, gay marriage and the war on terror (and the invasion of Iraq) are three (or 4) classic examples of issues where you cannot separate religion and politics. They are meshed together.

Heh. Funny. There is a fine line between islamic and christian radicalism.

Yeah. Most of the time, lameness is just strategy.

I think Dr Brain's geno sequence varies more than 1%

Its something that we can control. But, if you don't care what happens to the next generation, or late in your life, then party on. I don't think you need to be a creationist to care about what happens later.

This is the most ignorant comment I've ever heard in relation to this issue. A five degree change in one hundred years would be an environmental and humanitarian disaster of a scale never seen before.

Exactly. Random mutations occur all the time, but many highly evolved forms of life will become extinct if temperatures or sea levels rise. Polar bears are the classic example. But that is just the tip of the iceberg - so to speak. Research published in the Journal Nature paints a very gloomy picture. >clicky<

There are 5 major reservoirs of carbon on Earth. The atmosphere, vegetation, soils, oceans and fossil fuels. Carbon has never moved from one reservoir to another as fast as it is happening now. What should take millions of years is happening in tens of years. This is much faster than species and ecosystems can adapt. Not to mention the impact of rising sea levels. The global warming theory is becoming more widely accepted every day. Switch on your tv. Its all over the news atm. But the medieval warming period theory has been knocked on the head. [deleted sarcasm and clap-trap] Yes. Google up "Precautionary Principle". That is the prudent course of action when risks and uncertainties are very high. I, along with almost every scientists on Earth thinks that there will be a negative impact, but that impact is difficult to quantify. Third world countries don't have the capacity to do something about it. First world countries do. You think uranium mining and nuclear waste is environmentally neutral? They are both environmentally harmful.

I think I outdid myself with the length of that post, and the number of quotes. I'm so proud :-p On a less serious note: Top Reasons the Dinosaurs became Extinct 1.They all died. 2. They couldn't make rice. 3. They just all couldn't get along. 4. No caffeine or sugar. 5. Didn't know how to say "SEGA!" 6. Didn't have Air conditioning for those hot and humid days. 7. Couldn't find their MTV. 8. The earth said, " pull my finger." 9. Didn't have sun tan lotion. 10.They were abducted by aliens. 11. The females were cold blooded. 12. Those !@#$%^&* tar pits. 13. Decided to look for the wizard of Oz to get a bigger brain. 14. Were killed off secretly by the C.I.A. 15. Because their lack of a mutigenic gene and the change in environment . They were forced into extinction by the fact that they could not adapt to the harsh changes brought to their environment.

If you think it isn't, and you can demonstrate that it might not be, then why take it for granted? Let us also take all the laws of physics and chemistry to be true as well. Especially the ones concerning the conservation of m!@#$%^&* and atoms. Until someone comes up with something better, why not? What does a fossil fuel mean? Well, it means that over the course of a very long time, energy was transformed from prehistoric muck to oil. How did that prehistoric muck get there? Well, marshes absorbed CO2 and other "dangerous" g!@#$%^&*es from the enviorment. The gases are only dangerous if they have unwanted effects. CO2 in and of itself is not dangerous. A change in the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, due to anthropogenic factors, is dangerous. By burning fossil fuel, we cannot create more CO2 than there was absorbed in prehistoric times. This is a fact derived from the two statements above. We cannot raise the temperature above what was in prehistoric times with only fossil fuels. You don't seem to understand the carbon cycle. Those fossil fuels were taken out of the atmosphere over millions of years. They are being returned to the atmosphere thousands of times faster than they can be reabsorbed. And in any case, they can't be reabsorbed the way they were in, say the carboniferous era, because of deforestation. If I need to, I'll explain how the carbon cycle worked before we started burning fuels, and how it works now. But to put it simply, 'before' there was a balance. 'Now' there is an imbalance. In any case, it isn't temperature in and of itself that is a problem. The problem is change and in particular the speed of change. Also, how to you explain the fact that it was hotter in midevil times than it is today? And don't give me global dimming bull !@#$%^&*. The "medieval warming period" idea has been discounted. It was an idea put forward by one group of researchers that used a narrow and flawed set of data (you are doing the same). The 6 editors that approved the paper for publication resigned. You guys are all spouting about how evolution is such a good thing, so wouldn't some extra heat be a good thing? Kill off some of those weaker species? Species evolve over thousands or hundreds of thousands of years. Not decades. First off, the evidence for global warming is very distorted. It's a political issue used by anti-capitalists. Oil is the fuel of the free market, and if they can take it away, they deal capitalism a huge blow Whacky conspiracy theory. Second, there is no where near "near-unanimous agreement" on this issue. Far from it. Get out from behind your leftist wall and smell the fresh air once in a while. This is not an insult. This is a request The only significant source of disagreement comes from industrialists that make money from burning oil and polluting the environment. People with no scientific credibility. Third, the science that goes into most global warming research is questionable at best. The fact is that most scientists do not understand dynamic systems. Not that I can blame them for this, after all, if they did understand dynamic systems, they'd be making a !@#$%^&* of a lot of money in another field rather than wasting their time with something that's obviously stable. I agree. The science is questionable and the system is relatively stable. The Earth will equilibrate. But at what cost? Let us never forget that global warming is a political issue and not a scientific issue. It is both. Obviously. That extreme event, the one that killed the dinosaurs. The one that put us into an ice age that we're just coming out of. BS. The earth recovered from that event (climatically), whatever it was, tens of millions of years ago. It was aberration. The last real ice age ended 250 million years ago. Before the dinosaurs. If you are talking about glaciations, it is absolutely incorrect to state that we are just coming out of that "ice age". The last one ended 11,000 years ago. Remeber that one? You said yourself it was an extreme event. You said yourself it was not normal. We're still not out of it. You'd have the earth STOP warming? We are out of it. What I would have us do is stop changing the composition of the atmosphere. S!@#$%^&*, Kyoto is a joke. Read up on what the ramifications are. Most 3rd world countries earn money by signing it. If global warming is a problem, then Kyoto will not fix it. It will only make the underdeveloped countries rich at "the enviorment's expense" Heh. What makes you think that Kyoto could possibly be bad for the environment? Please explain. (I don't think humans can harm the enviorment, but that makes the whole treaty useless). Of course people can. Look up pollution in the dictionary.

Yeah. I think the US and Australia both make valid arguments. Third world countries are a difficult problem. But although some have the biggest forecasted increases in CO2 emissions, their per capita emmissions are generally low. Kyoto should, if it doesn't already, have some mechanism for financial !@#$%^&*istance to 3rd world countries to develop environmentally friendly industry with low greenhouse emissions.

LOL No you didn't. There are a lot of facts in what you have written, but I think some are slightly mixed up. I just waste more time investigating these things than most people. I'm sure there are quite a few holes in my arguments too. There is a lot of uncertainty about global warming and scientists get things wrong all the time (flat Earth for example). Anthropogenic global warming might never happen. But the balance of evidence and opinion at the moment says it will. And although the uncertainty is high, so are the risks, so my opinion on this is that we should be very cautious. The less we change the atmosphere, the less we are likely to change the climate. !@#$%^&* I feel bad

It isn't just 'political environmentalists' saying this. There is near-unanimous agreement amongst climatologists and other scientists that the source of ^CO2 in the atmosphere is burnt fossil fuels, and that this is causing global climate change. The main area of uncertainty is the speed, the amount, and the direction of temperature change. It isn't difficult to add up CO2 emmissions in the same way we tally up our grocery bill. It has been firmly established that we are changing our atmosphere and that this is likely to affect sea temperatures and climate. No. We are in an interglacial period. In fact we are at the end of an interglacial period, and most scientists would expect us to be in a cooling phase. Interglacials normally last for 10,000 - 15,000 years. The last glaciation ended and the interglacial period began about 11,000 ago. We are overdue for cooling. In any case, over this 30,000 year or so glacial cycle, the typical temperature difference at the extreme ends is 4 to 6 degC. We have seen a 1degC rise in about 100 years. Climate forecasters predict somewhere between a 1degC and 5degC rise in temperature in the next 100 years. This is not natural. This is scary stuff. The ice age that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs was an extreme event. It wasn't part of the regular cycle of warming and cooling that we are concerned with. Most people don't understand the distinction between a glaciation and an ice age, or they don't bother making the important distinction. There have been hundreds or thousands of glaciations since the extinction of the dinosours, and we still have cold blooded animals. No it isn't. Water is a greenhouse gas, but the amount of water in the atmosphere is regulated by precipitation. There are no adverse warming effects. Unfortunately we can take credit for the lot.

You can't be serious. These sanctions were accused of causing the hardship and death for Iraqi civilians. The Iraqi economy was crippled. Heh. What chemical weapons? There were strategic attacks, weapons inspections, no fly zones, and an unprecedented level of surveillance. Total BS. Blix had unprecedented access and found very little evidence of WMDs. Previous inspectors reported that they thought virtually all of Iraq's WMDs had beed destroyed. Nobody believed that Iraq was an imminent threat, except Bush and Blair.

The doomsday scenarios that you have put forward can't happen. North Korea or any other country can't make or change any of the rules. The protocol requires that greenhouse emmissions be reduced. It doesn't specify how this should be done. Naturally governments and industry will try to do this in the most cost-effective way. If 2 countries invented devices that reduced pollution then that would be a success! The one with the cheapest and best invention would make a lot of money and the environment would be better off Kyoto isn't perfect, but it is all there is.

That isn't true. The UN supported strict sanctions, military involvement and a thorough inspection program. These things kept the world and the Kurds safe from Saddam Hussein. The threat that he posed was contained by UN supported actions. The only thing the UN didn't support was an invasion. With good reason. I'm not justifying anything. I'm trying to understand it. Terrorists are criminals and need to be eliminated. But the US government's actions are counterproductive. In fact the US government provides terrorists with all the justification they need to maintain their rage. Why the rush? The US waited 70 years for the fall of the USSR.

OMFG. I agree! The only developed countries that haven't ratified the agreement are the US and Australia. Imo, both countries have made terrible mistakes. The US is the biggest producer of greenhouse pollution, and Australia is the biggest per capita greenhouse polluter. You never know - If the Kyoto protocol is a success, the US and/or Australia might backtrack. The main opposition party in Australia (Labor) supports Kyoto. The Australia government says it will join when the US and China join. And I think the Democrats (US) are a little more friendly to the protocol than the Republicans. It may take a while, but there might eventually be unanimous support for the plan.

If by left wing, you mean The Washington Post or NBC, I guess you are correct. Heh. Both polls were sponsored by the U.S. Coalition Provisional Authority. The first was before Abu Ghraib. The second after. Note that Iraqis disapproved of the occupation before and after the scandal. What were these Iraqi suicide bombers doing before the invasion? If some kid sees his mother shot dead by a US soldier, or killed by a US bomb, he is gonna be angry for the rest of his life. If you can't see how that kid could become angry at the US, and become a terrorist, then you are blind. That is simply wrong. They are fighting for strongly held religious values. And they are fighting out of anger and frustration. To claim that people are killing themselves in order to control and oppress people is ridiculous.

S!@#$%^&*. Refer to my previous post. I used to think this, but now I think it is ok to acknowledge that you are part of the problem. Society needs a course correction. You can't really expect an individual to drop out of society to prove a point. I think the main difference is that conventionally bred crops or animals do not have any advantage in the wild. An escaped hog will probably die. If it breeds, the animal will eventually revert back to its natural state. The same sort of thing would happen with corn. With GM, we can potentially produce crops or animals that have an advantage in the wild and will not revert back to a natural state. That is where we can really mess up ecosystems. I'd liken in to the release of exotic species. Sometimes they die out, but sometimes they cause an ecological disaster. I agree. But this is why we need to regulate - now. I think that this is too fatalistic. I think we can manage and reduce many of these potential problems.

Good points. In relation to the last question, I think the popular ethical justification for saving a species is that all species have an intrinsic value. The scientific justification is that a species might play an important and unknown role in an ecosystem. The medical justification is that they may help us find new medical treatments. And then there is the intergenerational equity argument. Why shouldn't future generations enjoy the same level of diversity that we all enjoy today. I think I could go along with all of those arguments and probably a few more. I like pandas coz they are cute and funny is probably a good enough reason too.

Yes. Islamic extremists that hate the US or the west have been around for decades. I don't think it is because of money. I think it is because of lifestyle and foreign policy. If we focus on Iraq we see that most Iraqi's don't want the US in their country. The occupation is culturing a new generation of terrorists who will fight for their freedom and their religion. The way that GWB is fighting it, the war on terror is becoming a breeding ground for terror. Enjoy the bread and circuses.

I agree with MD (wwooooot??) Let me try. I think we should focus on sustainability. We need to have a sustainable economy, sustainable environment and a sustainable society. This will require a mix of education and regulation. There should be rewards for being a good citizen or corporate citizen - and penalties for those that don't contribute. For example, there is no way in the wide world that real estate agents or stock brokers should be able to become so wealthy while a nurse wiping your great grandmothers arse in a nursing home gets paid $12 per hour.

Nature makes a lot of mistakes too. A two-headed tortoise or an albino are every day examples. But nature also makes mistakes that lead to extinction. The dodo was obviously not evolved to deal with hungry sailors. Humans can make the samekind of mistakes. I don't think humans will ever be able to simulate or improve the diversity that we have in nature. We might well make mistakes that make us more vulnerable. Natural diversity is one of the keys to success as a species. Perhaps. But the risk is that you go too far and give the species some kind of unfair advantage. To save a species, it is probably always much better to focus research and investment on protecting habitats than on manipulating genes. If everyone is born equal then there is a chance that some virus or whatever could wipe out the entire human race. Species' populations need to have a few freaks that are able to overcome stuff that normal members of the population can't. That is why universities have ethics committees. I think corporations are a bigger potential problem than universities. In the future, I suspect that the technology will advance o a stage where rogue individuals could be a problem too. I agree in principle. But in reality, isn't it the prospect of a payout the carrot that drives research in this field? The research is expensive and the risks of failure are high. The payout at the end needs to be high to warrant the risk and the cost. To have your profits stolen by someone using your technology would deter R&D investment. I don't know what should be done about that. Maybe S!@#$%^&* has some ideas? -