The One and Only Climate Change thread...

[Paul Beckwith]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

I have struggled for a while on what to call "them". I agree that "skeptic: is the wrong term; and that "deniers" is much more accurate a term. After all, language descriptions are very important, for example "climate change" is much more accurate than "global warming" in talking about the changes. I will henceforth try to remember to call them "deniers" who are intent on "obfuscating", trying to befog or becloud or muddle the issues with their fibs, falsifications, falacies, and falsehoods, and mendacities, prevarications, and taradiddles (tarradiddles), also known as pretentious nonsense.

Other ways to describe the thinking of the deniers is to describe it as applesauce, bunkum, balderdash baloney (boloney), blah-blah blarney blather, or blatherskite blither bosh and bull, claptrap and codswallop crapola and crock, drivel and drool, fiddle and fiddle-faddle fiddlesticks and flapddoodle folderol (falderal) folly and foolishnesh guff and hogwash hokeypokey hoodoo and hooey hoodoo or humbuggery malarkey piffle and poppycock tommyrot and twaddle with trumpery.

These terms are all apt descriptions of the denial movement thinking.

By the way Tom, my wife and I both bike into work each day. I converted my house from an energy audit rating of 35 up to 69 which is great for an old house, my hydro bill varies between $35-45 per month as opposed to a household average of $120 per month; I installed a superefficient (92.7%) boiler to both heat the house and domestic water (via a heat exchanger), all the toilets are dual flush (3/6 liters), the house has 0.2 air changes per hour (ACH) which is better than code of 0.3 for new houses and improvements are still ongoing (just limited by my time); solar panels and rain collection feeding directly into toilets are hopes for the near future...

I know that you also do very well yourself on these items.

[Adam Cormier]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Ed has posted numerous links to skepticalscience.com before and I checked out yours as well, it is a fantastic site. I downloaded the guide but I haven't had enough time to read it, but I'll try to soon.

Also I don't like calling them skeptics that gives them a sense of credibility(I consider myself a skeptic, and science is skeptical in it's nature), they are not skeptics they are deniers, simple as that. The evidence is there and they reject it, that is NOT skepticism, that is flat-out denial.

[Paul Beckwith]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Thanks Adam, I will have a look at it. I highly recommend the Lonnie Thompson article on the link that I posted above. Also, if you missed it from before Google skepticalscience.com (site that shows how silly the skeptics are, Vlad is so closed minded and ideological that he sees a hockey stick and has a coronary) and have a look at the report that I edited for them. Lots of good stuff in it.

[Adam Cormier]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

I don't know if anyone else here watches Big Ideas on TVO(lectures by experts on a diverse range of topics), but recently they had Dr. James Hansen give a lecture on human-made climate change. If anyone is interested here is the link,

Dr. James Hansen on Human-Made Climate Change

I enjoyed watching it last night, I think it was a very good presentation in my opinion.

[Gary Ruben]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Lonnie Thompson was awarded the National Medal of Science (highest honor the US gives to American Scientists) in 2007

Only last evening the missus and I were talking about the good old daze roller skating at The Terrace on Mutual street. Remembering the cold winter nights. To be a teenager again...

Anyhow, back to some of the more mundane things in life. Fighting off the snake oil salesmen and duct cleaners.

You can't predict the weather even at a climate change conference. This one tickles my funny bone.

Click Here...

Every so often money goes into the green program which helps company shareholders. Here's one I like because it's a company I like to play.

It has to do with the forestry industry in B.C. and helping to make it more competitive through some new technology. Turning waste sludge into biogas and fertilizer.

Click Here...

[Vlad Drkulec]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Any paper which presents the long discredited hockey stick graph as fact is based on lies and false science. I don't need to read any further.

[Vlad Drkulec]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

I opened up my newspaper today to read this paragraph on the editorial page:

"Thousands of bureaucrats and do-gooders from around the world have jetted into a Mexican beach resort. Surrounded by palm trees and bikinis, they're trying to decide how best to fleece working people to pay for imaginary climate improvements."

Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/business/...#ixzz17pQbWF1d

I reflected on how the tone of the debate has changed and it was actually possible to have a paragraph like the one above which honestly characterized the issues surrounding this whole ridiculous situation. HTH.

[Paul Beckwith]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Lonnie Thompson was awarded the National Medal of Science (highest honor the US gives to American Scientists) in 2007...

http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/cli...-is-best-1.asp

Source paper; important to read for everyone...
http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/TBA--LTonly.pdf

[Fred Harvey]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

This is pure entertainment right wingers, keep it up. Your invective just made my night...

You seem to have some trouble with politics, as well. I am not right wing by any stretch of the imagination. I suppose it was a catchy phrase however!:D:D

[Gary Ruben]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

It is generally accepted that oil subsidies from the government are huge. Without them is oil viable? The only difference is that the oil ones are hidden and status quo; do you realize how large they are?

I see you're moving from viability to discussing price. I suppose we are making progress.

Let's look at oil from Alberta. Natural gas as well. When a person or company drills a well and starts selling the oil or natural gas they pay a royalty to Alberta and to Canada. It's so lucrative Alberta built up a heritage fund from the money. I don't think they are charging any provincial sales tax there.

Alberta then increased the royalties. The gas companies fled the province to drill and produce in better environments. Alberta had to change the royalty to entice the oil companies back and it's not clear how many have returned.

So how much in royalties does a hydro producer pay to Ontario?

Newfoundland has also done quite well on petroleum as has Saskatchewan. This is a cash cow.

The governments make money on oil and gas in the way of royalties from the producers and at the gas pump in the way of taxes. Any incentives they might give to entice companies to drill in their jurisdiction is simply "chump change".

Do you think foreign national oil companies are coming to Canada and buying up assets for hugh amounts of money because the assets aren't viable? Do you think they are doing it so they can pay our governments royalties to take oil at a loss?

I'd been expecting McGuinty to step down before March of next year so the Liberals can get a new leader in place and try to lift their poll numbers.

[Tom O'Donnell]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Paul,

Even assuming you are totally right on the science of global change, you still haven't answered about the costs of following your vision, except to give pie-in-the-sky proclamations about how it will create zillions of jobs and lead to a better life for everyone. It may not have occurred to you that not everyone wants to follow the Green agenda because it would make their personal lives unpleasant short-term, and maybe long-term as well. Since actions are 1000x stronger than words, and in order to encourage others to make sacrifices you should have to make a few of your own, I have a few questions:

1) How many children do you have? If you have more than two, how can you justify having so many when population growth exacerbates many of the world's largest problems, including increasing CO2?

2) Do you own/drive a car? If so, how can you justify that when you live in a city with somewhat reliable mass transit?

3) Do you have a house with a yard? If so, do you use any of the land to grow your own food? If so, what percentage of your yard-space do you use?

4) Are you vegetarian? Meat is energy-intensive food.

5) Do you buy items produced and shipped from outside of Canada? How can you justify that when the energy costs of buying things from faraway are enormous?

The problem I have is that Greens seem to want others to change their lives in big, unpleasant ways while Greens think change means that they buy free-trade coffee (shipped in from South America), and drive smaller cars (normally ones still ultimately produced and powered with "evil" oil. Even people who are somewhat sympathetic to your arguments (as I am) are just not going to go along with this agenda until you demonstrate leadership through your actions rather than your rhetoric.

[Paul Beckwith]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

This is pure entertainment right wingers, keep it up. Your invective just made my night...

In the meantime look into subsidies for oil. You have been paying them for so long you no longer realize it...

And Vlad, if you want any shred of credibility read the document and comment on each point in it.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/

[Vlad Drkulec]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

Here is what that bastion of liberalism the Toronto Star had to say about the current situation in Ontario:

http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/...s-bigger-bills

For those of you that don't click on links:

"Premier Dalton McGuinty and Smitherman vowed at the time of the GEA's introduction that it would add no more than 1 per cent to the average homeowner's power bill.

Instead, electricity prices have soared 18 per cent this year. Sharp, who analyzed the electricity market through the lens of the GEA last summer, forecasts a 26 per cent hike in rates in 2011, which he said would translate into a price jump of 3.04 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) and add about $304 to a typical consumer's electricity bill in 2011.

By 2015 the typical Ontario household will be paying between 38 per cent and 41 per cent more for power.

Last week, Finance Minister Dwight Duncan — himself a former energy minister — corroborated Sharp's numbers. To placate an electorate increasingly irate over energy costs, he added yet another entry to the electricity industry's bewildering array of acronyms and programs.

The Liberals conceded that the 1 per cent rate increase promised a little over a year ago was wildly optimistic, and that the hike would be 7.9 per cent annually for the next five years."

[Vlad Drkulec]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

It is generally accepted that oil subsidies from the government are huge. Without them is oil viable? The only difference is that the oil ones are hidden and status quo; do you realize how large they are?

You are so out of touch it is laughable. By your own logic you have no standing to talk about power generation since you have no education nor (obviously) any understanding of the issues involved. You make the claim "lies, lies, lies" and I thought you were advertising your next post. How are oil subsidies huge when you compare them to paying 10 or 12 times the wholesale rate to "green" power projects for a guaranteed 20 years? Now that is HUGE!

Here is what that bastion of liberalism the Toronto Star had to say about the current situation in Ontario:

http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/...s-bigger-bills

The loonie left claimed that green power would only raise rates one percent a year. It has raised rates at about seven or eight times that rate. There is a reason that many long time Liberals are deciding not to run in the next Ontario election. They see the writing in the tea leaves. There is a HUGE backlash coming. With it will come the end of this type of nonsense. The pendulum is swinging back.

[Fred Harvey]

Re: The One and Only Climate Change thread...

"It is generally accepted that oil subsidies from the government are huge. Without them is oil viable? "

I can't believe you actually said this!

We can all try to use less energy. We are apparently going to phase out dirty coal....perhaps and some day. We are going to invest billions of dollars in totally uneconomic, and unaffordable, wind and solar. Meanwhile we can bleat about that nasty oil, gas and nuclear....until the damn light go out! Then the game plan changes overnight, and the silent majority stops giving all of you your day in the headlines!

See what's starting to happen at the gas pumps......