Between the two sides on the AGW/GCC question which is the optimist and which the pessimist position?

Question

Please state not how the sides describe themselves but how you view them from what they say about the issues.

My personal view is that because the skeptics and deniers have as actual programs and plans for solving the problems stated by the others they are the optimistic side of the debate.

Because all I ever hear from those who promote and argue in favor of the issue is doom and gloom predictions about what is going to happen if their recommendations are not met by the rest of society I have to view them as defeatist pessimists.

So state what your view is and what makes you feel that way for real not propaganda talking points or links to incomprehensible video speeches.

Answer 1

It is almost too easy to answer.  Of course the gloom and doomers are the gloom and doomers.  The optimists are those skeptics that don't fall for every dooms day scenario that comes around.  I am curious to see if any gloom and doomers dare to pretend to be optimists.  They see humanity destroying the planet.  There is very little wiggle room for optimism when that is your world view.  

Answer 2

Something to grin about: http://www.twainquotes.com/Discovery.htm...

Answer 3

That's an interesting question.  In general, I think of optimists as people who believe that things can change for the better and problems can be overcome; pessimists might be described as tending to believe that it doesn't matter what we do-we cannot influence the outcome of events.

From that broad perspective, one might then reach the conclusion that AGW proponents are optimists since by and large, they believe that human beings are responsible for or may influence the natural climate changes that are occurring, and that by changing our behavior we can moderate or overcome the worst effects of global warming.

Skeptics, on the other hand, often believe that it doesn't matter what we do, we cannot influence a process that they perceive as natural; therefore one might conclude that skeptics are the pessimists.

Conversely, it might be argued that AGW proponents are predicting disaster if we don't act while skeptics are predicting that everything will turn out just fine and we can go on as we have been.  That argument would classify AGW proponents as the pessimists and the skeptics as the optimists.

As far as your personal views go, I would like to get a little more detail on the programs and plans the skeptics have for solving the problems stated by others, and it does seem contradictory then to go on and say that the pessimists-in your view-predict doom and gloom if their recommendations are not met.  If they have recommendations, it would seem to follow that there is a plan on that side of the debate too.

My own point of view is that more progressive people tend to be more optimistic and people who are unwilling to change and adapt are more pessimistic.  I mean, we talk about youthful idealism and 'saving the world' in rather sarcastic tones, but I would say people believing that the world can be saved regardless of whether they have a foolproof plan to do so are clearly optimistic.  Practicality is not a requirement of optimism.  Overall, I'd have to give the optimist club plaque to the AGW proponents.

EDIT: You said: "The programs recommended by the proponents are basically stop using oil or coal for everything now and when something is found that we are happy with you will be told how much it is going to cost you. In the mean time stop using any electricity that does not come from wind or solar. "

I understand that you are paraphrasing but this doesn't sound like an accurate interpretation of anyone's recommendations.  I've never heard anyone with any kind of credibility  propose that we simply immediately stop using oil or coal for anything.  Please do go on and let us know exactly who is proposing such things.

Answer 4

Al Gore has Brainwashed the doom and gloom-er to believe there is a doom and gloom

Answer 5

I'm an optimistic proponent.

There are serious plans to address the problem, worked out by international teams of scientists.  Mostly they involve nuclear, wind, and solar power, and vehicles that run on hydrogen and electricity made by those power plants.  And energy conservation.

As a bonus we'll move our energy/transportation technologies into the 21st century, and greatly reduce dependence on expensive and unstable imports of foreign oil.  Current policies are making countries that don't like us VERY rich.

Truly a win-win.  I find the view that we can't do anything about this to be the pessimistic one.

EDIT - "when anybody brings up nuclear power and the recycling of nuclear fuel you sound off like it would end the world"

WHAT KIND OF UTTER NONSENSE IS THIS?   I've supported nuclear power the entire time I've been posting here.  I've repeatedly answered nuclear power skeptics that we can fairly easily solve the problems of safety and waste disposal.

From A YEAR AGO:

"The risks of global warming are clearly greater, and it's hard to see a short term solution for global warming without building a lot of nuclear power.

We can build plants that are safe and safe from terrorists. We're very good at that kind of engineering. We know how to bury the waste safely, it's just a political problem to pick a site."

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?...

Typical denier, just make things up.  I never get angry here, but you've accomplished the feat.  Congratulations.

EDIT 2 - I see you've answered me by totally ignoring your gross misrepresentation of my position.  When I've been wrong here, I've admitted it.

EDIT 3 - Maybe?????????  Be a man, and admit you messed up.

Answer 6

Proponent optimists think that humanity knows everything now, that even though the LIA came out of no where and pushed civilization to the brink, and there is no real understanding of why it happened that's not going happen again, we can predict what the climate will do 100 years into the future, and we have a plan to stop it, or something like that.

Proponent pessimist think that if we do not start riding bicycles to work right now, there is an imaginary tipping point, "in which 500 million years of climate history indicates there can't be one", somehow we are going to breach it in 10 years and we will go extinct.

Skeptic Optimist think that climate will do what it has always done, and that is change. Humanity will do what it has always done, and that is adapt.

Skeptic pessimist think that there is evidence to suggest that global warming is a cycle and it is over, and the world has already started a cooling phase that has been predicted by a minority of the scientists of the world. It will more than likely place severe hardships on the third world population. Ice coated windmills and other futile carbon mitigation steps will come crashing to the ground, but there is enough coal in America to survive the harsh winters that this century will see.

Answer 7

There are optimists and pessimists on both sides.  Neither side has a monopoly on either position.

Proponent optimists: Believe we can avoid catastrophic climate change by switching to alternative energies and fuels, becoming more efficient, etc.

Proponent pessimists: Believe either it's too late to avoid catastrophic climate change or that we don't have the will necessary to avoid it.

Skeptic optimists: Believe there's nothing to worry about, unicorn farts are causing global warming but now that unicorns are extinct, the warming will stop.  Or something like that.

Skeptic pessimists: Believe the global climate is out of our control and the planet will either continue to warm or we're headed for a nasty ice age or something like that.

As for nuclear power, most AGW proponents support it to at least some degree.  However, when you take all costs into account, nuclear is often more expensive than many renewable options like wind and solar thermal power.  Nuclear needs to be a component of our power grid, but it's not the silver bullet that many make it out to be.

As for space based solar, I'd really like to see an analysis of the costs associated with it.  Somehow I doubt it can compete with land based renewables.

Answer 8

i say gw is false hard core. one of my opions is one how does co2 get in the air if it is heavier? and if more co2 is in the air then trees would grow then not as many trees would die. then we could have more tree wood. then if it burns the co2 goes in the air and trees will grow better. you following me on this?

Answer 9

"Skeptic optimists: Believe there's nothing to worry about, unicorn farts are causing global warming but now that unicorns are extinct, the warming will stop. Or something like that."

Let me fix that for you dana:

Skeptic optimist: Believe that the effects of CO2 may be overstated (or possibly understated), but CO2 and other human produced GHGs are still significant, and require largescale mitigation efforts and more sustainable living practices in general. Unicorn farts are only minor in comparison.

Answer 10

Why pigeon-hole people into two "sides", let alone ascribe one of these two imaginary "sides" with a negative label stereotype "pessimist"?

If global warming continues, no matter who's "right" or who's "negative", we're in for some very bad times... species extinctions, food price escalation, lowering of quality of life, wars over resources, etc.  Who's going to say, "Yay, we were right!" or "Hooray, we were positive!"?

Scientists are optimistic that we can curb global warming if they can communicate their pessimistic scenario they've discovered and documented.  Since there are virtually no peer-reviewed journal articles with contrary conclusions (a couple of skeptical articles with well-documented flaws have been published since Oreskes' 2004 count of 928 to 0), how can we accept the vague, unsupported, illusory claim of "two sides"?

Answer 11

It is not a question of whether you believe in man made global warming or not it is a question of how much energy we have to meet our needs in the future.

In a perfect world we would have a portable source of energy that does not pollute, cause excess heat, give off radiation or create chemical reactions that can effect the environment or cause health problems.  Where are the alchemists when you need them?

Being that the magic power source has not been found we need to use a mix of power sources that will generate the amount of power we need and at the same time reduce the amount of energy needed to power our country.

Nuclear power is a major substitute for coal burning power plants.  Little or no CO2 and if used correctly is safe.

See:  http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/BOO...

Petroleum is on the way out because we have gotten the easy supplies and we don’t want to waste our supply to burn as fuel when we will need it for feed stocks for plastics.

See:  http://www.hubbertpeak.com/hubbert/1956/...   an old paper but right on the money.

Save the coal and oil shell for a rainy day.

And the orbital solar collector is a great idea, especially when some country moves it off its orbit a little and it dumps it microwave beam on the capital of some other country but that would never happen.

Answer 12

The "believers" are definitely doom and gloom, but socialists are always that way because it promotes their agenda.

Marx would be proud of the liberals today with the chaos they create that is central to getting people to fall in line with what the "state" wants them to do.

I saw a question on this forum that asked if people should be forced to recycle.  You wouldn't believe how many said it should be enforced.  The Marxist doctrine believed that you had to get the people - especially young people - to want to be controlled and want the government to tell them what to do.

It's kind of sad that so many no longer want to control their lives themselves.

Answer 13

What makes you think there are only two sides?

I do find it ironic that the denialists tend to have better ideas for solving global warming than a lot of the people who accept that global warming is happening (and suspect that it is partly the bad 'solutions' if you can call them that proposed by some that causes a lot of people to deny global warming).

Of course optimism and pessimism don't really matter all that much, what really matters is who is true and who is false about both global warming and how to solve the problem (eventually this will all come out, hopefully without too many cities ending up underwater).

Although arguments that we humans are too puny to affect the climate of the planet do seem pessimistic to me (although I have a view of the future where we're building Dyson spheres and directly mining stars which might not be everyones' idea of what we should be doing).