Please give me your answer to the real choices about global warming.?

Question

There are only two choices about what to do about glabal warming.

1) Do nothing / If we do nothing an there is no global warming, well I would have to say thats a nice roll of the dice. If we do nothing and things continue on the track we are on, well we, and our kids are in deep, deep doo doo.

2) Do something/ If we do something and global warming is a hoaq, well we waste allot of money but potentialy have better air quality. If we do something and coditions continue on their current path, we can possibly head off catastrofic desasters in the future.

Which would you choose?

Do you have car Insurance? Home insurance?, term Life insurance?

Answer 1

I have insurance, and I would definitely choose #2.  You always need to be prepared for the worst case scenario, especially when the experts are telling you that's the correct scenario.

Answer 2

Both of your options assume that we CAN do something.

What if it is not human caused; what do we do? That is quite different that what we would do if we could stop it.

Do something means nothing..What is "something"?

Is is offensive or defensive?

Answer 3

This is really oversimplifying the issue.  This is very similar to saying you should believe in god just to avoid h**l.  That is something I can't do.

J S- "Possible extinction of the human species"?  Really? And people wonder why I think global warming supporters may be exagerating the risks.

Answer 4

Interesting question, although it bears an uncanny resemblance to Pascal’s wager rephrased to suit AGW beliefs. But I digress.

Although this is postured as a valid question it is really the logical fallacy of false dilemma because it assumes only two possible answers. But I’ll let you off the hook and for the sake of argument assume that your second solution means at least do *something*, perhaps even all that can be done. A noble enough idea, albeit tragically flawed.

Here is, as they say, the rub: AGW believers seem to think that CO2 is the only factor that affects global temperature, when the fact is that water vapor provides about 95% of the greenhouse warming effect. CO2 is a around a 3% percent contributor, and the human contribution to that is about 5%, for a net human contribution to the greenhouse effect of less than 0.3%. Unfortunately, even if we were able to completely eliminate anthropogenic CO2, we could only control this 0.3% of the greenhouse warming effect. If we could instead control water vapor we could possibly meaningfully affect global temperatures and your “do something” idea would be great.

Thank you for your concern as to whether or not I am insured - or are you trying to sell me insurance? ;-)

But as far as the insurance part of this goes, it’s a clever tactic, albeit a loaded question. It assumes that if someone would buy fire insurance even though they may never have a fire, how could they logically defend not doing something about global warming, even though it may never materialize as a great global catastrophe. I think you can readily see the problem with this thinking though, for the reason given above – controlling a miniscule portion of a problem is akin to no solution at all.

Let me illustrate: If a bomber drops 1,000 bombs on your house, but you can stop 3 of them (0.3%) before they hit, are you not still going to be blown up? And so it is with AGW – the human contribution to global warming is extremely exaggerated and in reality is of virtually no effect compared to nature. In other words, if nature is warming the globe, there is precious little we can do about it.

Your assumption is that if there is anything meaningful that can be done, it is reasonable to do it. But curbing CO2 emissions is not going to provide any meaningful change.  

BTW, this little "detail" about the water vapor is conveniently left out of most global warming discussions, and is also why (IMHO) the whole carbon trading industry is a farce and a non-solution to global warming.

Answer 5

2 because it would help the world say cooler. It's ok to waste money to live longer.

Answer 6

Not only are world governments taking important first steps with the IPCC and the Kyoto Protocol (and its follow-on agreement under development), but the Bush Administration is actively working on identification and mitigation of our carbon contributions to global warming right now, despite the phony skepticism they pretend to have in public to please their corporate puppetmasters:

http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sa...

http://co2conference.org/agenda.asp

The choice is being made for us.  Skeptics are irrelevant.  They can't lead (provide credible science), so they'll follow or get out of the way.  The main question is whether we'll do it sooner (in time, minimizing damage) or later (possible extinction of the human species).

Answer 7

There is no "choice"--because global warming is a proven fact--so #2

Except you've fallen prey to the special interest probaganda about "how much it will cost" to fight global warming.  That is simply not the case.

Forget what you've been told to believe--and look at the facts. Here's a few jsut to get you started--and to help you question the assumptinon that fixing the environment is a "cost"--because it isn't:

>Compact flourescent light bulbs--will eliminate the need for 50-75 coal plants.  The cost--they pay for the added up front cost in longer lifetimes--and save consumers money.  NOTE: that money thengets sspent on other goods and services--helping the economy.  To the tune of about $10 Billion a year in savings to consumers.  Not much of a "cost," is it?

>Basically the same arguement for high-efficiency car engines.  Those won't hurt the auto companies (because their competitors have to meet the same requirements--it's a level playing field. Nor need the average cost of a car rise (in fact, it might actually decrease).  A savings-collectively--on the order of $100 billion dollars a year to consumers.

>Converting homes to solar energy ADDS t a homes value--its an investment for those who can afford it--and the price is falling as the technology improves (and will eventually pay for itself already).  That's not a "cost"--its an investment thatpays off.  The same goes for home remodeling to cut energy use. And all those things also create new jobs.

what I jsut listed--alone--is enough to reduce our per-capita use of fossil fuels by about 30%--and our imports of foreign oil by about half.  Where is the "cost?"

Here's the facts: we have a variety of modern technologies that are more cost effective, as well as environmentally friendly, available to us.  We can continue to WASTE money on obsolete fossil fuel technology and inefficient products--or we can INVEST in better systems tha twill save consumers money, create jobs,and spur economic growth.

Answer 8

We could pick #2 and NOT waste a lot of money.

Nuclear power is clean, carbon emission free, proven, available off the shelf today at competitive energy prices, and with Yucca Mountain going online the waste problem is solved.

Even people that think anthropogenic global warming complete nonsense, would accept this solution.

And people that believe in anthropogenic global warming should embrace this solution as well.  Otherwise they might be viewed as less than gung ho for saving the world from climate disaster.