If there’s one single thing we as humans absolutely know about the weather, it is that we don’t know the weather. I keep hearing this trendy-phrase: “the new normal,” which I find both annoying and silly because can anyone actually say what normal is on a grand scale regarding the weather? The word normal is so ambiguous as to render it meaningless in this context.
It is with a sense of gladness that more people are increasingly not buying into the theory of global warming and Climate Change. I have always been someone to question things – to question what I am told. It is encouraging that more people are questioning and doubting the notion of Climate Change/global warming for the dubious and flawed theory that it is.
Human beings tend to think they know it all. We like to feel that we have reached conclusions and have the answers. This presumptuousness is entrenched in our nature and it makes us feel better to think we know it all. However, true wisdom is to admit that we actually don’t always know or that we aren’t there yet.
I am thoroughly unconvinced regarding Climate Change and view it as a likely sham for a number of reasons. There are far too many reasons to elaborate upon here. I could talk about the fact that global warming alarmists seem to alter the Climate Change theory to comport with whatever weather pattern is happening in the world at the moment. For example, if there’s cooling in some places, they will then start exclaiming: “Well, some places may even cool.” If there are large snowfalls, they will then say: “Well, with Climate Change extreme winter weather will happen too.” In other words, global warming alarmists seem to morph their argument to fit with whatever is happening in the world which discredits the theory.
I could talk about how, as a lifetime resident of Vermont, in my observation, if anything, it has become COLDER. Living in Wilmington I would regularly see snowfall in October, and saw snow on Mother’s day. Last year it snowed on Memorial Day Weekend. The Vermont snowfall record was set in 2010. Island Pond just set a record cold temperature several weeks ago of -32 degrees before the wind chill. People tend to ignore all the evidence that Climate Change is not occurring because it isn’t sensational and stimulating. Read David Ludlum’s The Vermont Weather Book, which is possibly the most comprehensive book ever written on Vermont’s historical weather data, and you’ll see that the erratic and wild weather we have nowadays is the same we’ve had since the inception of the State over 200 years ago.
Bad news sells. “The weather ebbs and flows like it has for hundreds of years” is not a story that is going to sell or intrigue people. Doom, gloom, alarmism and fear will. But I am not going to be corralled into fear, particularly regarding something highly dubious and unproven like the notion of Climate Change and global warming. I have always questioned the Government and big media. I am not going to stop here. There was an article printed several weeks ago which actually stated: “Vermont’s climate presently is the same as that of Virginia in the 1960’s.” That statement is so ridiculous, so nonsensical; I cannot even dignify it with a response. I see newspapers and major media outlets making spurious statements about Climate Change, the lengths of which these media vampires will go to scare us into readership is insulting to human intellect. It’s the age-old trick: if we repeat a lie enough, eventually people will start to believe it. Fear, manipulation and control.
I could talk about how the science is far from settled. MIT professor/atmospheric physicist Richard Lindzen, and Patrick Moore, a founder of Greenpeace, are some excellent examples.
Additionally, some of the same scientists who are now so certain that they know the weather, were ones who just 35 years ago were saying we may be headed towards another ice-age and it may already be too late to prevent the coming ice age.
I support scientific endeavors and put stock in the virtues of scientific intellectualism. However, science should be questioned and given critical thought just like everything else. These computer programs as long term prophecies of weather are preposterous. Are you really trying to tell me that you can reliably enter variables including, but not limited to: solar activity (sunspots, solar flares, solar cycle), the role of oceanic water vapor, El Nino, the number of volcanic eruptions in a given year, solar, lunar, and Earth magnetic flux effects, temperature data, and about 100 more widely erratic variables into a computer and determine an accurate prediction of the weather into the distant future? Give me a break. Human beings haven’t even learned to fully take care of each other. We still adorn the vestiges of a Cro-Magnon past by repeatedly going to war, yet now audaciously think we are so advanced that we have somehow solved the endless complexities and random ambiguities of our Earth’s weather?? Ridiculous.
I could talk about how if you want to get funding for your area of scientific research, if you include “studying the effects of global warming” in your grant application, you are often more likely to obtain funding for your project. Therefore people try to link whatever remote field they are studying to the idea of global warming because it will help them garner funding for the research they want. The entire process is skewed and fraught with shortcomings.
Now, should we continue to support big oil and outmoded technology? Absolutely not! I do not have an agenda to support big oil companies. I would like to see us get off dependency on Exxon Mobil and move from our antiquated energy system into something commensurate with our technological abilities. I fully agree we need to seek alternative, renewable sources of energy at a much faster pace. Driving gasoline powered cars these days is the technological equivalent of listening to a wooden radio instead of an I-pod.
However, I think we should seek alternative energy not because of some boogeyman propaganda like Climate Change, but simply because it’s the right thing to do. Why do we as humans have to wait to be told there’s an imminent crisis until we do the right thing? Why do we need some likely-bogus theory such as global warming in order to motivate us to care about the Earth and environment?
I don’t need Valentine’s Day to be able to love others, and I don’t need Climate Change to care about the Earth. I care about the Earth and its environment simply because it’s the right thing to do. Thus, why can’t humans care about Earth simply because it’s the right thing to do?
Until science can advance enough to develop a nasal decongestant that will truly cure my sniffles during these incredibly cold winter months, I continue to doubt and disagree with the notion of Climate Change. Why can’t we just admit we don’t know? Global warming is dubious, and comes across as another sensationalized ludicrous tale engineered to sell and control through fear. I am going to care about the Earth anyways and advocate for alternative energy, but I don’t need some fear-inducing sketchy theory like Climate Change to do it.
Spencer Crispe
Putney, Vermont.
But, of course, southern Vermont is warming
The temperature is going up here, regardless of your personal impressions from your personal vantage point in time and space.
But, let’s say you are right. Then why care about the environment? Why use alternative energy? You say it is the right thing to do. Isn’t that a decision based on fear of something else? Fear of not having trees? Fear of losing rhinos?
I wouldn’t worry, though. No one is doing anything about climate change except react to it.
Jesus Weeps
This exegesis might have some traction if history had not entered an industrial age. Now in the post-industrial, we are certainly “pushing the envelope”.
Q: Are fossil fuels flammable? If so, might igniting multi-mega tons of carbon all-day every-day everywhere have an effect?
“oh what fun it is to ride… in a one-horse open sleigh”
Ebbs & Flows
The weather ebbs and flows, but the climate doesn’t. (Animals and plants know this)
Our climate is changing, both naturally and due to human exploitation. There is already undeniable evidence that animals, birds and plants are being affected in both their distribution and behavior. Unless greenhouse gas emissions are severely reduced, climate change could cause a quarter of land animals, birdlife and plants to become extinct. (http://www.climateandweather.net/global_warming/effects_on_animals.htm)
Climate variability and change affects birdlife and animals in a number of ways; birds lay eggs earlier in the year than usual, plants bloom earlier and mammals are come out of hibernation sooner. Distribution of animals is also affected; with many species moving closer to the poles as a response to the rise in global temperatures. Birds are migrating and arriving at their nesting grounds earlier, and the nesting grounds that they are moving to are not as far away as they used to be and in some countries the birds don’t even leave anymore, as the climate is suitable all year round.
Cottontail rabbits used to be rare in Vermont. Turkey vultures never spent the winter here. Wintertime geese were unusual. The Maple industry is concerned as our forests metamorphose. The signs are there for those who have eyes to see.
Let us wish our problems away.
Spencer, no offense, but who cares what you think about this topic? It’s just depressing to hear yet another person who thinks that their personal beliefs about what is happening in the world are facts. They aren’t facts. You can’t wish problems away. Either global warming is happening, or it is not. It doesn’t matter what you think about it: what matters is whether it is happening. If it is, we should probably do something about it. If it is not, as you say, we can just relax.
In fact we know a great deal about the weather. Weather predictions nowadays are uncannily accurate, or at least they were before the government shutdown created a month-long gap in our observational data. We have the ignoramuses in Washington who think science and opinion are the same thing to thank for that. Please don’t jump on their bandwagon.
Science has advanced to the point where a few years ago surgeons stopped my father’s heart, put him on a bypass machine, cut his heart out of his body, fixed it, put it back in, started it up again, and he’s alive and healthy because of this. Science has brought us a world where when we get a compound fracture, we don’t have to have that limb amputated to avoid gangrene. Where when I broke both bones in my forearm a couple of years ago, I had surgery to correct the injury and was not maimed for life. Where it is safer to cross the country in an airplane than a car.
We forget just how fortunate we are to live in these modern times, because they are far from perfect. But they are also far from how things were when our grandparents were kids.
So when you question the scientific consensus on things like global warming, please remember that you would probably already be dead if it weren’t for science. You don’t argue with an engineer when they tell you that a bridge is unsafe: you take a different route, and hope they’ll fix the bridge before someone gets hurt. The situation is the same with global warming.
Seriously?
“Until science can advance enough to develop a nasal decongestant that will truly cure my sniffles during these incredibly cold winter months, I continue to doubt and disagree with the notion of Climate Change”
Is your nasal decongestant litmus test something you only apply to climate science or do it misapply in other ways?
I doubt and disagree with the notion that you have a competent grasp of the scientific method.
“The good thing about science is that it’s true whether or not you believe in it.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson
I believe it
I have no doubt that we are experiencing global warming – but I honestly don’t believe we can inject any meaningful natural balance (which is really the crux of the matter; humans are producing a very small amount of harm compared to the natural process of nature). We are too many people with too many demands; there’s only a minimal amount of turning back that can be done; a plink in one gigantic bucket.. it’s great that we have a few people here and there living off the grid, and factories reducing, reusing and recycling.. but, they change nothing in the grand scheme of things and to think that the entire world, or even half of it, is going to make any drastic change in time to “save” the planet is just plain crazy thinking. Get real.
I do however, want to note an absence of these two words for the past couple of years – “January thaw”. I’ve read the weather reports, listened to them as well, and never once over two years did I hear the mild days of January called the January thaw. I heard “unusually warm”, “above what we might expect” – but it is something to expect and completely natural weather pattern.
Also absent has been the term “Indian summer” – you know, those hot as hell days that arrive long after summer has ended? Those are now called the dreaded signs of global warming.
It all plays into the hype – and I would agree there IS a lot of hype and more hype than fact on both sides of the argument.
The world is doomed and has been since the time of the big bang.. it’s merely a question of when. Even under the very best of circumstances, I don’t think mankind will be on this earth to witness the end when it comes, however it comes. We’ve so far been barely a blip on the screen of all living things on earth.. and compared to the universe in total, one would need a microscope to see the mark on the charts that show how long we’ve been around.
If the facts are really there, then I would expect that science can tell us, within a few hundred years, of the end of life on earth, caused by global warming. It can’t be done! That doesn’t mean it’s not real, but I would stop arguing about it and spend as many days living in contentment and happiness with a gratefulness for being alive, and accepting the fact that at best, we can try to reverse or slow a process and make believe we are changing an outcome that is inevitable.
What If?
Spencer, what if you and all the climate deniers are wrong?
And What If It's Catastrophic?
Spencer, what’s the worse case scenario you’ve heard for Global Warming? Hotter summers, less snowy/less cold winters – in short, mild inconvenience?
Have you read or heard that sea level rise driven by Global Warming will redraw the world’s coastlines in the coming decade(s)? That crop land will become desert and food supplies will dwindle?
The worst case forecasts go well beyond a little ebb and flow in weather patterns.
A Nice Little Video
I just erased a whole long thing I wrote to you, Spencer.
I realized I’d written it all before and you didn’t buy it then, & you clearly haven’t had a change of heart.
I really am out of factual things to say to you. Therefore, I should shut up.
The problem with shutting up is that your decision to follow your heart rather than your head dooms all of us, not just you. The only way we get out of this is through the type of unified action we showed in WW II – everybody sacrificing for a common goal.
I believe that our leaders will ignore the oil money and attempt to do the right thing if the demand is loud enough.
To make that demand, we need people like you, Spencer. You really need to take another look.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUO23Y179pU
Weather ebbs and flows by magic
The “global-warming-is-a-part-of-a-natural-cycle” folks are the deniers who leave me dumbfounded. I’m sure that there’s a word for “accepting a pat answer that fits your beliefs and not coincidentally excuses your ignorance and behavior” but I can’t think of it at the moment.
Sure, there have been periods of warming and cooling in earth’s past. That much is true. But it’s not part of some kind of “tide” or “cycle.” Past climate changes have been tied to events such as cataclysmic volcanic activity, large meteor/asteroid strikes, drastic changes in solar activity, and even changes in ocean salinity. In other words, there is an identifiable cause rather than some unfathomable force exerting influence over the climate in a cyclical manner.
The science indicating that current changes in climate is related to the increase of billions of tons of atmospheric carbon is fairly simple to understand – middle school earth science class kind of simple. I suppose what’s difficult for people to understand is the scale of human impact on something that seems as large and complex as a planet. And I don’t know how anyone can explain it to the satisfaction of the kind of people who scoff at global warming because there was a snowstorm or a “polar vortex” at their location on the planet.
Tunnel vision
Among actual scientists, climate change is considered settled science. The research is overwhelming. And no, dinosaurs and humans didn’t live at the same time and the earth is way older than 6,000 years. But just keep teaching your kids the Republicant anti-science, anti-government, anti-women, anti-union, anti-education mantra and all your kids can work at Mickey D’s and practice treading water while Republicant billionaires sit back and laugh at you dupes.
Ask a Polar Bear
The glaciers have shrunk, and many mountain societies face water shortage. The polar ice cap is in similar mode. Ask a polar bear. Climate change has been a part of life on Earth, and yes, another ice age may even occur. But right now we’re adding to the process of warming, and YES the real scientists see this as already proven. The difference this time is that humans are no longer mostly hunter/gatherers. We’ve overpopulated and settled into specific locations. We can’t just move entire societies. We’ll still have ebb and flow, but the overall trend is temperatures rising.
Choices?
Let’s just suppose you’re right, and Global Climate Change is an illusion.
If we shift from fossil fuels to renewables, what do we lose?
———-We (humankind) lose absolutely nothing.
———-They (Fossil fuel corporations) lose some profit.
If we put it off and not really do much, what do we lose?
———-If you’re right, we lose nothing.
———-If you’re wrong, we lose the Earth, as we know it.
Can we afford to take the chance?
And by the way, renewables such as solar and wind have reached cost-parity with fossil fuels and appear likely to continue dropping while coal and “Nukular” costs continue to rise.
Not quite
Solar (PV or thermal) is not close to cost parity with fossil or nuclear.
Onshore wind in good locations (not NE for the most part) can compete although much of its advantage comes from things like the production tax credit.
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/aeo/electricity_generation.cfm
http://en.openei.org/apps/TCDB/
FYI, nuclear power is comparable to solar, wind, etc. when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions.
Accurate Accounting
I would imagine if you account for the military and environmental costs of fossil fuel, alternative energy is a far better deal.
Fossil fuels get tax subsidies and sweetheart deals from the government as well.
That's the problem here, all people want to do is imagine...
I’m a fan of renewables but they have very real limitations that most supporters fail to address and one doesn’t need to distort the facts to be a supporter. I am also in favor of some form of carbon tax to better account for externalities of power production.
If you are actually interested in a treatment of dollars spent per KW/hr produced, the information is already out there and once again nuclear compares quite favorably.
I don’t remember us going to war for cheap coal, maybe I was sleeping during that part of history class.
Incomplete Accounting
Once again your accounting is not accurate.
To correctly count the cost of nuclear energy you have to consider the lack of a long term storage solution for the waste. There’s is also the fact that no private insurer will touch the liability on a nuclear energy plant. How many millions and millions is Price-Anderson worth to the industry?
With Fukushima in mind, there’s no way that the industry would exist if they had to come up with non-governmental plans for liability insurance and waste disposal/storage.
Imagine if Tepco had to bear the cost Fukushima?
With renewables the costs are very tangible and upfront and the benefits are long term and lasting.
They also produce 3 to 5 jobs for every job provided by the nuclear industry. The facilities (wind and solar) aren’t going to be mothballed in 40 years, though they may be updated.
Military expenditures protect the petroleum portion of the fossil fuel industry. They protect our “friends”, the Sauds and keep the oceans safe for oil tankers.
Cheap coal merely depends on failing to account for the loss of a mountain. What is the worth of a mountain anyway? Maybe better not to ask such open ended questions
Original post
I was responding to an assertion that wind and solar had reached parity with fossil fuels. Since wind and solar have not reached parity with each other, it’s clear that the original assertion was incorrect. It’s still incorrect and you continue to muddy waters why? All forms of energy production get subsidies but people usually only disagree with the ones they don’t like.
There are answers to your questions but perhaps you were just being rhetorical or you don’t know how to find them. Let me know before I waste my time.
Talk about making no difference.
So would you rather have your kids killed by the ebb or the flow? This seems to be the important question asked by climate deniers. I don’t care, nor does any rational person whether the problem is cow farts or undersea melting. The fact is that the temperature of the earth is increasing and people way beyond your intellectual grade predict massive unpleasant results. You might think that is part of your right to screw up the rather nice earth presented to us by our parents but responsible adults disagree.
Paul Krugman observes
…that Republicans are being driven to identify in all ways with their tribe – and their tribal belief system is dominated by anti-science fundamentalists. For some time now it has been impossible to be a good Republican while believing in the reality of climate change; now it’s impossible to be a good Republican while believing in evolution.
And yet another viewpoint:
“There’s no question that if we get substantial changes in atmospheric temperatures, as all the evidence suggests, that it’s going to contribute to sea-level rise … There will be agriculture and economic effects — it’s inescapable … I’d be shocked if people supported anything other than a carbon tax — that’s how economists think about it.” Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the head of the American Action Forum, a conservative think tank, and an economic adviser to the 2008 presidential campaign of Senator John McCain, the Arizona Republican.
40 F in Anchorage Alaska Today
Just so you know, somebody is benefiting. Sarah Palin didn’t have to plug in her GMC Yukon (or Lincoln Navigator) last night.
So we may be in the deep freeze down here in the lower fortyeight, but in the far north they’re enjoying the benefits of Global Warming.
Polar Vortex?
While Americans deal with a wintery January and try to understand what a polar vortex is, one thing is clear: 2013 was one of the ten hottest years since records began in 1880. For the 37th consecutive year, global temperatures were higher than average.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported Tuesday that 2013 was tied with 2003 as the fourth-warmest year since records began in 1880 — annual land and ocean surface temperatures were 0.62°C (1.12°F) higher than average. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) reported that along with 2009 and 2006, 2013 was tied for the seventh-warmest year on record, “continuing a long-term trend of rising global temperatures.” NASA used essentially the same data — it just processes it slightly differently than NOAA does. Indeed, the difference between 4th place and 7th place is just two-hundredths of a degree. NASA had the “temperature anomaly” — how much the global temperature deviated from the average — pegged at 0.60°C and NOAA had 0.58°C.
Source: http://cleantechnica.com/2014/01/24/4th-hottest-year-record-2014/
or-
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/01/21/3187581/noaa-nasa-2013-temperature/
corporations do not think it is a hoax
Ironically, on the same day that Spencer’s piece appeared in the Brattleboro Reformer the New York Times had an article about the large number of big corporations making changes in response to climate change and global warming.
These people are concerned with the bottom line and they ain’t no saints. However, these companies see interruption of supply chains due to drought, rising pricing because production of key items will become more expensive to grow, and on and on. These corporations do not think climate change is a hoax. They think it is something to prepare for. They are not saying it’s just the usual ‘ebb and flow’ of weather.
Check it out:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/24/science/earth/threat-to-bottom-line-spurs-action-on-climate.html?_r=0
Bottom Line Lives in the Real World
I saw that.
Interesting that the corporate world supports the fantasists at Fox News with one hand and on the other deal with reality. Talk about compartmentalizing.
A final word:
“Clive Hamilton in his “Requiem for a Species: Why We Resist the Truth About Climate Change” describes a dark relief that comes from accepting that “catastrophic climate change is virtually certain.” This obliteration of “false hopes,” he says, requires an intellectual knowledge and an emotional knowledge. The first is attainable. The second, because it means that those we love, including our children, are almost certainly doomed to insecurity, misery and suffering within a few decades, if not a few years, is much harder to acquire. To emotionally accept impending disaster, to attain the gut-level understanding that the power elite will not respond rationally to the devastation of the ecosystem, is as difficult to accept as our own mortality. The most daunting existential struggle of our time is to ingest this awful truth—intellectually and emotionally—and rise up to resist the forces that are destroying us.”
Source:
The Myth of Human Progress and the Collapse of Complex Societies Monday, 27 January 2014 13:01 By Chris Hedges
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/21477-the-myth-of-human-progress-and-the-collapse-of-complex-societies
Forget the blame game political hysterics
Worry about the Earth’s MAGNETOSPHERE
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2545465/Forget-global-warming-worry-MAGNETOSPHERE-Earths-magnetic-field-collapsing-affect-climate-wipe-power-grids.html