Gore's Message to Climate Change deniers

Originally posted by tarichar
Climate Change denial is a line that the neo-cons ...

oy ... Didn't read the thread, did ya'? It has already been stated that the climate IS changing.

The problem lies with those who point at humans and say 'it's your fault'. This has not been established. The problem also lies with those pushing the 'humans are the problem for climate change' - those same humans are making oooooodles of money off of their products blaming humans and off of 'carbon credits', etc etc

Your attempt to muddy the waters by throwing in the buzz word 'neo-cons' fails. Many people from the left and the right and the moderate middle all agree that 'global warming' being a human fault has not been proven. Many people from the left, the right, and the moderate middle are deeply troubled at the money making scheme that is going on with those, like Al Gore, who trumpet 'global warming is the fault of humans'.

So you can save your neo-cons buzz word .. and you can save the 'denial of climate change' phrase. Neither is accurate.





[edit on 3/29/2008 by FlyersFan]

Originally posted by Nookster
Global warming has both natural and man-made components but the natural components are of such magnitude that I don't think there is anything man can do to stop it. It's also not a constant warming but a series of overlapping cycles, some of which are short term and some of which are long term along with a degree of chaotic behavior.

We really desperately need better energy sources than fossil fuels, not because discontinuing the use of fossil fuels will prevent global warming, it might slow it somewhat but it won't prevent it, but because fossil fuels can not provide us the magnitude of energy we will need to adapt to a changing climate, or to eliminate poverty, or to reach our human potential.

Kudos, sir, and a star for you, for saying it so succinctly. The changes in climate we are seeing are indeed cyclical. I think most people are confusing weather with climate and therefore are making assumptions based on local phenomenon. The bigger picture tells a much more serious tale.

And you are right that we need to stop using fossil fuels, but I just don't see that happening. There is too much money involved for the big money people to give it up. I suspect, however, that they will have an alternative, just as soon as we use the last drop, and will make it available at huge profits. If it's not too late....

reply to post by FlyersFan


Neo-con is not a buzz word, neo-conservatives are self proclaimed and can easily be labelled as those who subscribed to the ideas of the PNAC. This is not a media created label.

Originally posted by traderonwallst

Not only isn't global warming is man's fault. I have yet to see any concrete evidence that global warming EVEN EXISTS!!! Its nothing more than NORMAL heating and cooling cycles the Earth has gone through since its was formed.

sorry hold on .... 900 peer-reviewed scientific studies confirming the IPCC statement that carbon emissions caused by the actions of human beings are having a significant impact on climate change is not evidence?

[edit on 29-3-2008 by tarichar]

comeon guys hes super cereal!

The group assembled here seems to be quite 'on the ball' so I am asking for a favor from anyone inclined to oblige. I am trying to define a problem I have with the the debate on this thread and I want to keep one eye on the thread topic - If you are patient enough I would like to find the 'flaw' in my reasoning regarding the topic:

#1 - It's clear that Mr. Gore (if correctly quoted) equates doubt that global warming is caused by man - with being ignorant (again assuming his allegory -moon landing never happened, earth is flat- is a reference to a disconnection with reality and foolishly archaic beliefs flying in the face of science.)

Unless I have this premise correctly distilled the remainder of the points to follow are mute - So if you disagree at this point, I'm already talking apples to your oranges.

If you accept #1

#2 - I would like to consider the reference to Dick Cheney an artifact, (while I would never be caught defending the man) If the 'target' of the comment was Cheney and not participants in the argument regarding climate shift, then the allegory may be a cleverly obfuscated insult directed at the VP and we're merely dancing in the shadows - It doesn't lessen the validity of the argument - but it ceases to be the point of the comment. It may have been an editorialization inserted by the author of the article - but there is no data to be clear on that so I want it rendered null for the purpose of the remaining points

If you accept #2

#3 The declaration that 'Global warming is caused by man' cannot be recast. Therefore - man's activity = global warming; there are no other variables.

HOWEVER - I am willing to accept that the intent to simplify the equation to that degree may not mean 'malfeasance' on the part of the author (the Gore core). It is unlikely that anyone is pursuing a line of reasoning that mankind is solely' responsible for ecological changes that effect the dynamics of climate.

I contend that to stubbornly use this phrase to characterize the climate shift event as it unfolds is a primary weakness toward the debate because no branch of science and no organized group of scientific research has denied that climate shift HAS happened in the past - particularly before mankind existed as we do since as far back as historical memory.

If you accept #3

#4 To foray exclusively into the alternate causes of Climate Shift and historical details thereof will neither support nor debunk the theory as such. So all the 'evidence' and 'scientific facts' that get thrown about here is getting us nowhere.

This reasoning leads my objection to take a different form from climate change isn't happening; namely

Recognizing and drawing attention to the fact that climate shift is happening does not equate to knowing what can and or should be done about it. The importance of the proper response is orders of magnitude greater than crying wolf, and it needs to be explored and considered accordingly.

When questioned regarding how paying tax will stop 'global warming' I get the feeling that the Gore consensus' answer is very disingenuous; often peeling off into statistical applications of axiomatic data, which is apparently seized upon as the holy grail of 'proof'. To question this approach is to have your opinion 'shifted' (bad pun, sorry) into a Climate Change Denier.

From there on out it's a down hill slide, I will take the bait almost every time - only because I have some trash to throw out there as well, I won't get into those observations showing how skepticism is a safe road to take here, but then, that's not the point of the OP's post is it? Is it?

[edit on 29-3-2008 by Maxmars]

[edit on 29-3-2008 by Maxmars]

[edit on 29-3-2008 by Maxmars]

[edit on 29-3-2008 by Maxmars]

reply to post by Maxmars


I am not qualified to answer you, but I will point this out - I think the OP should answer you, as original intent lies with him. This is a hot button issue with many people (myself included) and it appears that most times these discussions degenerate into a slugfest quite rapidly. I admire you for the attempt to steer the debate to a more civil tone, but I suspect the OP wanted the slugfest. Good post, sir!

Pro or Con, Global Warming or not, Manmade or not, we do have to admit that not once in the manknown written history the nature is so affected by a particular species of the planet Earth. This species has completed the globalization for centuries and for the past decades build so many unnatural structures and machines which were never intended by nature to be built at all. Mineral resources are drawn from the planet and forests are replaced by metropoles. Carbon dioxide is harmful or not, the Earth is warming or not, reality is that homo sapiens has totally destroyed the natural eco-system of Earth, no matter where on this planet. We are like a virus to planet Earth. So at least start by yourself to think about the environment.

Originally posted by IchiNiSan
Pro or Con, Global Warming or not, Manmade or not, we do have to admit that not once in the manknown written history the nature is so affected by a particular species of the planet Earth. This species has completed the globalization for centuries and for the past decades build so many unnatural structures and machines which were never intended by nature to be built at all. Mineral resources are drawn from the planet and forests are replaced by metropoles. Carbon dioxide is harmful or not, the Earth is warming or not, reality is that homo sapiens has totally destroyed the natural eco-system of Earth, no matter where on this planet. We are like a virus to planet Earth. So at least start by yourself to think about the environment.

And that, my friend, is what the issue boils down to. I like to use plain English so my point is clear, rather than twisting a sentence around it sounds more technical than it should be.

People will find holes in your argument, no matter how thorough the research, or how compelling your argument. They'll find a hole for the sole purpose of stifling your intend toward awareness, and stall anyone who may be in a position to act upon your message.

"Global Warming" isn't good enough for these people. "Climate Change" gets them to rebut with conjectures that this is a natural cycle and it's been happening since prehistoric times, stating that's what killed off the dinosaurs. Those generalized terms aren't gonna do the trick, maybe use "Ecological Deterioration", "Cyclical Cleansing Upheaval", "Malignant Temporal Climatic Anomalies". Even coin phrases like those will most likely offer themselves to scrutiny.

We can all see the problem. Some people would rather we ignore it, and by ignoring it they're ignorant of the fact that oil companies and refineries, steel mills, and the industry at large will pollute the skies and the water unhindered.

Why the hell are we making this same damned argument over and over? Why is this message getting stonewalled by a few stubborn bastards in power who insist on feeding their machine?

Indict Dick Cheney, and the CEOs of his affiliated oil and chemical companies! Force the responsibility on the industry to down-phase their production RIGHT NOW, IMMEDIATELY! In the next few years when their # rains down on us all, nobody on earth will be happy that the industry will be forced to shut down! By then, there will be so much regret, everyone will hate everybody for every reason why they haven't done something sooner!

Trust the people on this board to have the highest concentration of climate change opposition I've seen in months. =_=

You people do realise this started off as a conspiracy theory too? It crept up as a niche subject, until (pushed by many conspiracy theorists AND scientists) it finally reached the mainstream position it is in today.

Now suddenly it's where we want it, where people can see it and be 'awakened' (as everyone likes to say here), we're all angsty about it and don't like it anymore? Pfft! Is this a joke?

Talk about "Tall Poppy Syndrome". This is the epitome of it. We build the theory up, we knock it down, we start building another all the time ranting about how people won't accept the 'truth'. Yet we can't even stay loyal to a truth we previously pushed hard.

Great work everyone, great work.

reply to post by Duality


Let me guess, you aren't buying into all this stuff about pollution, and melting icebergs? You were born into a time when you can sit back comfortably and debunk another conspiracy? What do you know that I don't?

I have a unique resource available to me: The US National Weather Records Center is located in Asheville, NC, where I live. I have made the acquaintance of several of the people who work there. Among them are a meteorologist who studies satellite data and a climatologist. Privately, they have told me something they will not tell you: While there is evidence for local warming in cities, due to the growth of buildings and paved surfaces, there is no evidence for global warming. In fact, the satellite data shows a slight global cooling. You will never hear this from them, they love their jobs and the information is not politically correct.

Originally posted by knives4less
I have a unique resource available to me: The US National Weather Records Center is located in Asheville, NC, where I live. I have made the acquaintance of several of the people who work there. Among them are a meteorologist who studies satellite data and a climatologist. Privately, they have told me something they will not tell you: While there is evidence for local warming in cities, due to the growth of buildings and paved surfaces, there is no evidence for global warming. In fact, the satellite data shows a slight global cooling. You will never hear this from them, they love their jobs and the information is not politically correct.

I'll accept that. Every five or seven years could signify the some of the peeks and valleys attributed to solar cycles. There's no denying the evidence to support the melting of ice that's been frozen for several hundreds of years. How about the level of contaminents in the water and air?

Should be breath a sigh of relief because of how sharp the temperature is falling recently? How about in a few years when the temperature reaches another peek? Are we going to just live in the moment and argue ourselves stupid about the overall impact these drastic shifts in temperature contributes to the overall effect?

Originally posted by tarichar

Originally posted by Kinesis
Take the attitudes of people in these forums as a microcosm of society in general. Is it really no wonder that nothing ever gets done? We need solidarity on this issue, "but it don't look like it gonna happen."

and this is where your bang on the money. The bush administration has always insisted that it doesnt want to make a decision until all the facts are in. As long as there is a question mark looming over the idea of climate change in the minds of the nation there will be no solidarity. Create confusion and uncertainty and people will be very unwilling to commit to something that may have economic repercussions.
Its nice to know its easier to go to war than save the world.

This is an ironic arguement given the perilous economic situation we are in today. A similarly vigorous examination of the reasons for opening a war on Iraq could have placed us in a much stronger position today.

I can see how what Gore said would be offensive to those who have doubts about human affected GW/CC. I guess being an independent liberal leaning libertarian I have built up callouses from very frequent slurs and mischaracterisations hurled at "my side" from the likes of Cheney, Lott, Tedd Stevens... the list goes on and on.

Therefore I understand the "outrage". Gore should apologize and try to be perfect like the rest of us polite people.

First of all I would like to point out that the scientific research that is done is not 100% correct. I would also like to point out that scientists can't deny global warming because they will get fired. That is how global warming is taking over, the scientists fear losing their jobs for denying it.

Cliff Mass a professor of atmospheric science in the University of Washington wrote:

"Anytime politics intrudes on science, science is degraded and society as a whole is the loser," said Sterling Burnett, senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis. "That is why the whole global warming issue is a mess right now. Scientists have not reached a scientific conclusion yet, but the politicians want to jump the gun and be seen as saviors on the issue. This is a recipe for disaster."

Burnett continued, "The reputation of science as an independent and nonpartisan source of knowledge is put at risk whenever scientists are censored for sharing scientific knowledge. Scientists should never be pressured to come up with predetermined conclusions or punished for challenging the status quo.
Source

This should be an outrage to the science community. Politicians jumping to conclusions yet scientists have not even reached a conclusion.
I am not saying that global warming is not reality, I am saying that no conclusions have been made by scientists so therefore it would be hypocritical for politicians to start pushing their agenda's.

There is a climate shift happening, it happened before and we can't stop it from happening again. Looking at the past is a great way to predict the future.

The study, led by Mark Pagani, associate professor of geology and geophysics at Yale, looked at an episode of rapid climate change that occurred some 55 million years ago. Known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), the period was marked by a rapid rise in greenhouse gases that heated Earth by roughly 9° F (5° C), in less than 10,000 years. The climate warming caused widespread changes including mass extinction in the world's oceans due to acidification and shifts of plant communities due to changes in rainfall. The era helped set the stage for the "Age of Mammals," which included the first appearance of modern primates.
Source

The climate changes from time to time. Yes we are speeding the process but I still don't get why people are profiting from "saving" the planet. You can't do anything about it, and Al Gore....yes what a big savior of the world! He wastes more energy in one month then my family does in one year.

The former vice president's mansion in the posh Belle Meade area of Nashville consumes more electricity every month than the average American household uses in an entire year, says the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, citing data from the Nashville Electric Service.
Source

For all those on this forum whom have called Global Warming a farce I put this experiment to you. Go into your garage and close the door. Get into your car and start it. Now stand there and tell me that you are going to fine. As simple as that is, expand that microcosm to that of our planet and maybe you will then get it.

Too many people have the attitude that the pollution on this planet is magically "out of sight, out of mind" and there is no advanced thinking. You people are the same ones whom toss your coffee cup out the window and think that it is OK. Al Gore is backed by scientific proof, not to mention scientific communities, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out. I think many on this forum spouting trash about how global warming is not man-made are either in an industry supporting it and earning a living by it, or had their heads so far up the a$$ that they don't have a clue.

We are well passed the point of no return because of idiots like yourselves whom think that there is not a problem. For the planet to be saved we would have had to have made serious changes already. There is no way that you could take the average American and ask them to do right by this planet because they are too busy stuffing cheap fast food down their throats to care. If it meant losing the convenience of Swiffer floor sweepers as opposed to saving a farmers field from becoming a landfill... well Johnsons and Johnsons are making a killing so let that tell you where the psyche is for saving this planet.

We are all screwed!

reply to post by blackpanther1967


In response to all posts and not any one in particular I feel the urge to throw my thoughts into the ring. The certainly is a hot topic. It seems obvious to me that there is much more to this issue than most of us know. I am no scientists and yet I have known scientists to be wrong, even the majority of them. We tend to think we know something and down the road we find out we were wrong. However, this heated issue will hopefully make us all aware that what we do to our Earth we do to ourselves. Certainly we have abused her in many ways. Generally there are many things that contribute any state or condition. Clouds, sun spots, radiation, fossil fuels, super novas, cows farting, and perhaps cycles of nature may all contribute in some way to the heating or warming of a planet. I believe that all of life is connected with any one aspect affecting all others in some way. Some believe in individual consciousness which contributes to a global consciousness. Perhaps how we think affects others as well as our planet. Earth is a living thing or system with a consciousness too. When Earth has had enough of the negative consciousness of Earthlings, she will revolt. Just some ideas I render for your thinking. Atleast we are concerned and seeking truth. Working together seems to be a much larger problem than global warming or climate change.

Heck yeah The first class ignorant idiot Al Gore wants to promote so called global warming, that's his bread and butter! Take away the lies about global warming and put down some true scientific evidence. That jerk is costing this country millions of dollars. If the scientists and meteorologists could speak the truth without the fear of ramifications then maybe that would send GORE back to the hills where he belongs. I think everyone should file a lawsuit against him.

Those who agree with the theories relating to mans global effect on earth’s climate are those who think quite highly of themselves and are in for an even greater surprise than the rest of us. This year you will all get to see first hand the power of nature and the insignificance of man in her wake. It will be a thousand times worse than Katrina and Rita. It will be hail storms wiping out the crops of the earth and it will begin when the harvest begins and end when the harvest season is over. Only one third of the crops of the earth will survive and Wal-Mart won't get any of it. I hope you all have prepared for this. Your families are counting on you.

If such a hail storm did happen as you say, Al Gore will say "I told you so" just like Hillary took credit for the success of the surge.

Grrenland is Called STILL Greenland because 700 hundred years ago it had a lot of less ice than it has today, then a cold wave happened and it had to be abandoned due to long winters and such....

Too bad Al gore was not there to shout that the world was going to end...

BTW the ammount of biomass now is a lot less than lets say 200 years ago due to extinctions and a smaller presence of big animals, so all that CO2 is not being produced right now.... tell that to big Al $$$$.

I have camped in yosemite for almost 15 straight years (well I skipped 1997 because of the flood) but this winter has been in my recollection the one with more snowfall in a very long time, in fact a woman in Oakhurst California (elavation=3100f) had snow falling and she told me it was the 2 time she saw snow falling there in 40 years

pic