Specifically, those who refute the view that climate change is an anthropogenic phenomenon.
Do we have any on here?
I was listening to Al Gore on the radio this morning discussing his new film, An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power. They then interviewed Lord Lawson (giving him virtually the same air time) where he claimed that there was no concensus on anthropogenic climate change. Given that virtually the entire scientific community think otherwise, why is so much attention given to the counterclaim, I wonder?
Anyway, hereās the trailer, in all its Gory (see what I did there?) glory
I have a friend (no not Trump) who watched one tv programme and became convinced that this is a natural phenomena and there is nothing we can do to slow it down or that we are responsible for speeding it up. I have sent him an annual subscrition to the Flat Earth Society.
This year, for the first time EVER, our plants are dying. A Yucca thatās been with me 22 years - slowly departing. About 4 bush type things - dead. Orchids - half have died.
Now Iām not the gardener here Mrs D_P is, but we have never known that before.
Also, we used to ālaughā because there was an urban myth that if the temperature went over 50C weād get a day off, so again in those 20+ years it has never officially been over 49C. This year weāve had the Government officially confirming many days over 50C.
Spain has always been hot, my first trip to Poland 8 years ago was hot - 40C but here it really seems that each summer IS getting worse.
In fact for the past 3 years I have not picked up a golf club in the summer - considering this is the only time of year that it is actually affordable for us mere mortalsā¦
I heard Al Gore, but not Lawson - was that on the Today programme? If so, Iām not disappointed to have missed Lawson. Heās an egregious character even by the standards of climate deniers. He has no scientific credentials whatever, but is more than happy to spout on about the work of proper scientists being pure speculation (Iāve heard him do just this).
I remember the BBC being given a bit of a slap a couple of years back by a parliamentary committee for just the same thing that youāve described - giving equal airtime to both sides of the climate debate, regardless of the fact that 95% of the scientists who study these things agree on the basics of it.
Itās not really a dig at the BBC - I know theyāre in an invidious position.
It is more the case that Trump and his cronies buy into the whole āclimate change is a mythā thing. I find it incredible that people are so short-sighted and so wedded to their ways of doing things that they are prepared to doom their children and childrenās children to a ruined planet without feeling any culpability. In fact, they are like children, putting their fingers in their ears and effectively saying āI canāt hear youā.
Surprisngly, Al Gore was relatively upbeat about the whole thing. He pointed out that pretty much every other country had confirmed their commitment to the Paris Accords and that many cities and States in the US were also planning on meeting their commitments, in spite of Trump.
Oh I just meant in terms of needing to put across a ābalanced viewā and being criticised if they donāt - but how can you when scientists are 95% in agreement!
I find it incredible too, but like the last link I just posted, the consequences are so unimaginable, and depressing, that itās almost human nature to put head in sand or scream lalalalalalala. Luckily we have people like Al Gore and many others to persist on our behalf.
The big problem is that the deniers are stupid and/or selfish and usually greedy industrial cuntsā¦ because the great thing about doing everything to try and clean things up is that if it turns out it was not necessaryā¦ what have we lost? nothing, just gained some clearer air, cleaner oceans, and saved some resources for future generationsā¦ OK so it cost a bit of investment, and some already very rich folks migt be denied even more billions, but surely generally a good thing?
The worst of it is that I know Iām a total hypocrite. Iād have to recycle a fuck of a lot of plastic and convert a lot of my energy use to solar to offset the flight weāre going to take to California in a week
What I find strange is that most deniers have kids. They must, in their heart of hearts, recognise that climate change happening and that their actions are, in part, responsible for that yet they continue to deny it. It just seems such odd behaviour.
As am I. Although to be fair, weāre fighting a set up in the world thatās designed to push you in the direction of not being environmentally friendly. At least thatās the excuse I give myself.
Sorry for interrupting but I read the title as āclimate change the grade of females tights/ stockingsā and assumed wrongly it seams that they were getting lighter as it gets warmer.
As the boardās usual contrarian, Iād love to help you here, but after watching hours of Jeremy Kyle and standing on my head for 9 hours solid, Iām still not thick enough to doubt climate change.
I do not deny climate change is happening, I do not necessarily deny that it is anthropogenic in cause, but I am not convinced and Iām not even convinced that its a bad thing for the planet. I do think there is mass hysteria being whipped up about it by various vested interests. I do not believe that the vast majority of the scientific consensus and the public at large have the required knowledge to give a properly informed answer to the question. I.e. you are all bullshitting. My reasoning is as follows:
In my working life I am involved in the modelling of physical systems. What I see is mistakes and inaccurate assumptions everywhere. The people who design the discrete models make mistakes. The people who take those discrete models and turn them with others into a big systematic model make mistakes. The people in industry and academia who review the models make mistakes. The Input data is full of mistakes or is missing or is misinterpreted or is misunderstood. If I get a simulation result that matches the measured data it is a fucking miracle and usually if I manage to get to that point, I often find that the tiniest tweak to the simulation will often make everything go completely tits up once again.
The systems I am modelling are complex enough that I donāt think there is a person alive who appreciates more than a few small parts of the models i work with, in any real depth.
Getting good real life data is incredibly hard and even if it is obtained I often see people convincing themselves that the model predicts the behaviour of real life when nothing of the sort is really happening. I see people getting paid to solve problems for people, tricking those people that they have solved the problem using the models and clients paying for those results oblivious to the fact the modelling approach was bollocks. Unverified models in use in systems everywhere where the model gets certification at system level.
Apparently simple models can often exhibit incredibly complex behaviour. The systems I model are not simple, but they are nothing compared to the complexity of planet earths ocean, atmospheric, biological, chemical systems. I simply donāt believe we have models of the required accuracy or even if we did I donāt believe we have the measurements of the required accuracy, we donāt have a proper benchmark case to verify the results against because anthropogenic global warming has never happened before as far as we know, even if we did have those things i am certain that the people with the required understanding to verify the behaviour of the models donāt exist but if they did, they would be few and far between. They would not be some seething mass of mediocre bullshitting scientific consensus.
The fact is, there are limits to human understanding, and there is money to be made from exploiting peoples lack of understanding.
āā¦The fact is, there are limits to human understanding, and there is money to be made from exploiting peoples lack of understanding. ā¦ā
Think you hit the nail on the heat there @stickywhitedovepiss . If you look behind most scare stories and issues thereās always someone with a vested interest in keeping the money / funding going.
Not that Iām denying mankind is right royally fucking up the worldā¦in fact the opposite.
Someone posed a point the other day that global warming could be a good thing as weāre technically in an interglacial period of the latest ice age. If thatās correct then itās saving g on everyoneās heating billsā¦
Iām determined not to worry about it, I mean at least until something bad happens.
I donāt believe any of the stuff ppl want me to do, like shit in the dark, or drive electric car, or put plastic bottles in my own recycling bin rather than next doorās skip, will make much difference anyway. Way I see it, weāve got two choices: A mass cull of human life, or leave it for future science boffins to find A Clever Technological Solution.
Well, this morning, the Beeb fact checked what Lawson said yesterday. Transpires that most of it was bollocks. The only thing he said which was a little bit true is that the UK donāt subsidise fossil fuels - IF you take a very narrow view of what a subsidy is. However, they did say that, worldwide, fossil fuels are massively subsidised (I think a figure in excess of 300 billion was mentioned).
