Convince me about this whole Global Warming thing?

Question

Ok, here's your chance to convince me about the whole global warming thing.

And here's the thing I don't get: Earth is a closed ecosystem, right? Except for the occasional meteor, everything that is here now has been here for a long time, although maybe in a different form. (Ice, water, vapor, etc.) So the theory behind fossil fuels is that it came from decomposing dinosaurs? So when we burn it, the carbon goes into the atmosphere? So, before the carbon was tied up in the oil, it was tied up in the dinosaurs. What form was it in before?

And another thing I don't get, is why we think that the way the climate is now is the perfect way for the climate to be. In other words, why is a change, either warmer or cooler, from where we are now necessarily a bad thing? How do we know that the climate isn't naturally returning to a better state than the way it is now?

And, finally, everyone talks about the poor polar bears. But, what ever happened to "survival of the fittest?"

Ok, so don't just tell me I'm stupid and uninformed and hate mother earth. Convince me, give me your best proof and evidence. Thanks!

Answer 1

You can't be comvinced if you are a rational thinker. If you recal that science gave us a flat earth and proof that man would never travel faster than the speed of sound... then you will look at the so called evidence with a suspicious eye.

Answer 2

Most of us don't have much time to study climate.  Experts like Al Gore are there to give us the answers.  For instance Al Gore owns three houses with a cumulative 16,000 square feet of living space.  He drives an SUV and flies in a private jet.  All of this activity generates a lot of CO2, which global warming advocates tell us is harmful to the earth.  Well if good old Al Gore operates as if there is no threat from all of this, that's proof enough for me.  It's a fraud.

Answer 3

Ok, so I'm not going to try to convince you that Global Warming is a fact. Instead I will ask you do you believe we are polluting and using our resources at an unsustainable rate? If so, then follow the advice of the global warming advocates, becuase the solutions are the same.

We are in a closed eco system and we are making it uninhabitable for humans and that is caused by human activity. We are stripping the world of finite resources so we can have grapes from Argentina in January. We are putting so much particulate matter into the air we need to breath that we are having a dramatic increase in asthma and other lung related illnesses. We are polluting our water ways and killing off wildlife and creating manmade drought due to shortage of clean drinking water. We are depleting aquafirs so we can grab a drink of water in a petroleum product from a refrigerator unit while we are waiting for out SUV tank to fill up.

So, I will appleal to your basic human instinct, survival of yourself and your offspring. We need to be less wastefull and reduce our pollution if we are to continue to live on this planet. Lets face it, Good Planets are hard to find.

Answer 4

First off, Global Warming is a misnomer. The entire globe is not warming, just the net temperature is increasing. There are places that are decreasing in temperature. Also, if/when the Greenland glacier falls into the sea because of "Global Warming," Western Europe and the American East Coast will cool dramatically, anywhere from 4-14 degrees Fahrenheit. The reason for this is that the currents that bring warm water from the equator to the North Atlantic will be shut down because of the massive amount of freshwater, and the English Channel will actually freeze over. A more accurate term for so-called "Global Warming" would be Climate Change.

About the dinosaurs and where the carbon came from, there was significant volcanic activity in the time of and before the dinosaurs, and maybe this is where all that carbon came from?

As for the climate not being perfect, the climate was good for homo sapiens (us) for thousands of years before the industrial revolution and the introduction of massive amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. So if the homo sapiens flourished for thousands of years, the climate can't have been against them. So changing the climate to places where we have not seen before will most likely put a dent in our survival.

Personally, I think that humans are way overpopulated, and the earth cannot take us for long, which is sad. Despite all the technological advances and our ultimate rule of the world for thousands of years, I believe that homo sapiens have ultimately failed. We have had complete rule of the world for a lot of our existance, but most of our existance is not even close to the time other species have lived, i.e., sharks have lived millions of years, Neanderthals lived in Europe for 300 thousand years, bacteria have thrived ever since life started. Homo sapiens have only existed for somewhere close to 20-25 thousand years, are we really going to live for 1 thousand years more, let alone 275 thousand years more? I highly doubt that we will live anywhere close to 275 years to match the Neanderthals.

I agree with you about not hating the earth, and I believe the only way for the an ample amount of other species to survive is to kill off homo sapiens, and the only way for humans to survive for a significant amount of time is for the majority of us to die (or maybe move to mars or another planet?). The earth will always survive, it is just a matter of whether we and other species will survive.

Answer 5

Here's what you need to "convince" you.  Go to ipcc.ch and read the information.

Man-made global warming is a proven scientific fact.  There is no "debate." The yapping of people who haven't bothered to learn the science does not constitute a debate.

No one is going to waste any time trying to "convince" wwyou--other than to do what i did--point you to the information. Learning it is your problem, not ours.

Answer 6

We actually don't fully understand Earth's climate, as strange as that sounds. As with the ocean, we know more about the surface of the moon. Earth, our own planet, still holds quite a bit of mysterious.

We actually have no way to know if we have changed to climate, because it's so complex. You ever heard anyone say that a butterfly flapping it's wings in one place, can cause a hurricane in another? Well it's true. Maybe that joint you smoked back in highschool will cause to earth to warm so much that it can no longer support life some point down the road, or maybe leaving the back door with the AC on will cause the Earth to enter another ice age 50,000 years from now. We just don't know.

Based upon what we do know, I have come to the conclusion that when you look at mother nature, our CO2 output, mother nature's, and other factors like the fact that CO2 is a relatively weak greenhouse gas were as water vapor is one of the strongest, that we have most likely had little if any influence on the Earth's climate.

But like I said, that one joint by one stoner is all it takes. We'll most likely never know for sure.

In the mean time though, make your own theory based on what we do know. Everyone else has, of course half of those people want to force their theories on everybody else though, but this isn't a political question so I'll leave it there...

Answer 7

Our present supp;y of fossil fuel came from plants not animal. The plants capture the energy from the sun and store it in their seeds ,olive oil etc.The only oil from animals is what they get from plants. The plant takes in CO2 and almost imediately give us O2,but the plant keeps the C for food for the plant.After the plant dies the oil does not deteriate but turns into oil & gas. Just like the water cycle for earth there is the recycle of CO2 into O2 and later oil & gas.  

Answer 8

Excellent question. You're not stupid at all and you brought up a valid point.

Here's some information on the carbon cycle. Yes, the first link is meant for children, but it's surprisingly informative and I promise I'm not trying to be condescending.

http://epa.gov/climatechange/kids/carbon...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycl...

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/2001Q1/2...

Climate change is not a bad thing... but only if it's caused natural forces such as Earth's Milankovitch cycles or solar irradiance. Unfortunately, the changes we see now are caused by increases in CO2 levels from burning coal, gasoline and other hydrocarbons. We are upsetting the equilibrium and reversing the cooling that should have been taking place, all at a speed much too fast for other species to adapt.

And the polar bears -- yes, species are always becoming extinct, just as others are evolving and new ones are appearing. Survival of the fittest is still a valid theory. In recent years, however, species that were perfectly suited to the world as it was have been entirely eliminated because of human-caused pollution and habitat destruction. Just as cutting down bamboo forests severely endangered pandas and the pesticide DDT threatened birds such as bald eagles, we are endangering polar bears by warming their ecosystems beyond their tolerance. Polar bears have extremely thick, oily fur as well as layers of fat which are excellent protection against cold air and water both. But they will be unable to evolve to suit warmer climates in the short time before their habitats are submerged

Short version -- it's up to Nature to decide which species are the fittest and will survive, not humans.

Answer 9

Exactly right.  The climate can never be the same every year.  There is no such thing as a static climate.

The climate is either warming or cooling.  Both are perfectly normal and happen naturally.

Man is too far insignificant to cause any impact on the climate.

Answer 10

Who is to say having two arms and two legs is right?   Maybe you would be better off with only one of each, but you are just used to having two.   Maybe a warmer climate would be good, but we have based our whole economy on things pretty much the way they are.   What if it got too warm to grow wheat or too dry to grow corn in the midwest?   Tens of millions dead from starvation might not be too bad, who's to say?

   People talk about volcanoes putting out millions of times more CO2 than people ever could.   I'd think that would be an obvious place where the CO2 is coming from if it were true.

Answer 11

wow, I think the same about global warming.

its good to see America can do their own research and not get it from the liberal media!

all carbon eventually ends up in the ground, which turns into oil.

I believe the earth is in perfect balance, and humans can't change the weather because we have so little effect.

nature is naturaly cycling carbon, we are carbon based life forms after all, it needs to be cycled or we couldn't exist.