Earth Might Become Unlivable By 2100

reply to post by beezzer


Well I was with you until the last sentence, so it does seem we're going to have to simply agree to disagree.



I do, as always, appreciate differing perspectives from various members, and thank you for the reply and seemingly balanced view.

reply to post by webedoomed


Cheers.

I hope we're all here a good long time. Maybe our grandchildren can debate the same thing in 2100.

reply to post by beezzer


The first Earth Day had to do with pollution and consumption of limited resources, not global warming. Had clean air and clean water Acts not been enacted (which was the major focus of the Earth Day events and the budding environmental movement at their inceptions), by 20 years ago the US would look like China does today. That's the course we were on, so imagine how we'd look now had that endeavor not been undertaken. You're the exact type of fool the author of the Reason.com article, the source of your cherry picked quotes at least gives a little context, relies on... you should probably read that article, though the author likes to ignore the different focus of Earth Day then and it's focus now. The author is counting on fools to give him weight on the matter, to not realize he is trying to say that activists should be ignored, are powerless, are idiotic (cuz look at those quotes! *LOL*)

Pollution was the other big issue on Earth Day 1970. Smog choked many American cities and sludge coated the banks of many rivers. People were also worried that we were poisoning the biosphere and ourselves with dangerous pesticides. DDT, which had been implicated in the decline of various bird species, including the bald eagle, the peregrine falcon, and the brown pelican, would soon be banned in the United States. Students wearing gas masks buried cars and internal combustion engines as symbols of our profligate and polluting consumer society. The Great Lakes were in bad shape and Lake Erie was officially "dead," its fish killed because oxygen supplies had been depleted by rot-ting algae blooms that had themselves been fed by organic pollutants from factories and municipal sewage. Pesticides draining from the land were projected to kill off the phytoplankton in the oceans, eventually stopping oxygen production.

In January 1970, Life reported, "Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support...the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution...by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half...." Ecologist Kenneth Watt told Time that, "At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it's only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable." Barry Commoner cited a National Research Council report that had estimated "that by 1980 the oxygen demand due to municipal wastes will equal the oxygen content of the total flow of all the U.S. river systems in the summer months." Translation: Decaying organic pollutants would use up all of the oxygen in America's rivers, causing freshwater fish to suffocate.

Of course, the irrepressible Ehrlich chimed in, predicting in his Mademoiselle interview that "air pollution...is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone." In Ramparts, Ehrlich sketched a scenario in which 200,000 Americans would die in 1973 during "smog disasters" in New York and Los Angeles.

So has air pollution gotten worse? Quite the contrary. In the most recent National Air Quality Trends report, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency--itself created three decades ago partly as a response to Earth Day celebrations--had this to say: "Since 1970, total U.S. population increased 29 percent, vehicle miles traveled increased 121 percent, and the gross domestic product (GDP) increased 104 percent. During that same period, notable reductions in air quality concentrations and emissions took place." Since 1970, ambient levels of sulfur dioxide and carbon monoxide have fallen by 75 percent, while total suspended particulates like smoke, soot, and dust have been cut by 50 percent since the 1950s.

So it all got better by magic? Air pollution got better simply because the environmentalists at the time were morons and had no clue what they were talking about and were just plain and simply wrong. That is what the author is trying to convey. He even mentions the EPA, but neglects to mention in the entire article the laws put into place to stop the pollution that the activists were making their predictions on. The author knows almost no one reading his article, or using it to soapbox from in their blogs, will apply any critical thought to anything he wrote. It will just be swallowed whole cuz "damn liberals"... again.

Unbelievably pathetic...

ETA: Source

How exactly is global warming accelerating when there hasn't been any measurable global warming for 17 years now? There've been recent news articles regarding this.

For example:

Global Warming Pause

Quote from article:
"The pause means there has been no statistically significant increase in world average surface temperatures since the beginning of 1997, despite the models’ projection of a steeply rising trend."

reply to post by Kali74


Moron?

Gee, thanks.

And thank you for saving the planet. Appreciate it.

reply to post by nextone


Due to fluctuations in earth's system dynamics, the bulk of radiative heating over that time has been absorbed by the oceans, at ever increasing depths. This will only continue on for so long, and a shift will again force the heating back to the surface.

beezzer
reply to post by Kali74

 

Moron?

Gee, thanks.

And thank you for saving the planet. Appreciate it.

Uh... try re-reading what I wrote.

I love ignorance and disinfo. Americans tend to think (most of them) that we can't destroy the world by polluting it simply because they are 2nd on the list of those that pollute the most in the WORLD. 300 million that have a footprint about 2 or 3X bigger than all Europe. I live in Portugal, we just had the coldest fall I can remember with no rain whatsoever and now it's winter time and it's raining with much hotter temperatures. We were hitting -2ºC, now we are at 7 or 8. Also, one day we may have an amplitude between -2 and 13 and the next day 5 to 17. It's strange, nature is sick. Deny ignorance, we only have 1 planet to live on and are ruining it with our stupidity.

reply to post by AlphaHawk


This is why I hate America so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF, why is Alaska's input always out of the pic? huh! are we not good enough for the lower 48 sleeze..
Or, maybe we're just smart enough to not be a part of it.

off topic, but whatever.

nextone
How exactly is global warming accelerating when there hasn't been any measurable global warming for 17 years now? There've been recent news articles regarding this.

For example:

Global Warming Pause

Quote from article:
"The pause means there has been no statistically significant increase in world average surface temperatures since the beginning of 1997, despite the models’ projection of a steeply rising trend."

The chief problem, now, in addressing the problem of Climate Change is the over emphasis on Global Warming. This is largely due to it's relative predictibility, due to it largely being caused by human activity which has significantly altered the chemistry of the atmosphere. We are perfectly capable of adapting to climate change, and to readdressing the imbalances that our activities have caused, but it requires global strategies, and considerable investment. As it will take decades, maybe more, for the effects of climate change to impact on the lives of the richest nations, it is very difficult to obtain the necessary public support for such investment, but, as less and less agricultural land is available, or able to produce food, prices will steadily rise. As long as we can afford to meet those price rises, we're okay, but obviously there are numerous peoples who already cannot afford food, and who's land is already barren, unable to support their own needs, and are subsequently dependent on international aid. However, already, farm land in the US, Australia, Asia, and other semi-arid landscapes dependent on irrigation systems are failing to produce due to exhausted acquivers and salination. This will only get worse. The main signature of the Climate Change so far, is that dry areas are getting dryer, and wet areas are getting wetter. This will render those countries affected even more dependent on imports to meet their basic needs. All of this can be reversed, and or adapted to, if we put our heads together and make the necessary investment of resources.

The whole thing with Climate Change is that while it is not avoidable, it is only 'Doom Porn' if we do nothing and just watch the catastrophe that is already happening to those less fortunate than ourselves, thinking it will get better before it gets bad enough to hurt us and our families.