PDA

View Full Version : How does this spiel sound?


gigantes1966
07-30-2008, 08:52 AM
this is something i whipped up last night for people with relatively short attention spans. it could probably be even briefer, but where to chop?

anything needs fixing or adding?

NOTE: this is not meant as a "how it all ends" segue or companion-piece. i have many GCC links, but i included greg's because it seems to be the most logical one to add at that point. the audience is people on forums whose attentions wander but who respond well to some confrontation.

...
global warming facts

we taste and feel and see the truth. we do not reason ourselves into it.
-w.b. yeats

if you want to make enemies, try to change something.
-woodrow wilson

FACT: science has recognised the greenhouse effect for a long time. it is not considered controversial by any rational standard that i'm aware of. CO2 is a gas that, due to current concentrations, is the second greatest player in the earth's greenhouse effect. in the 1850's, john tyndall first discovered CO2's role as a greenhouse gas. in the 1930's, svante arrhenius and e.o. hulburt established that adding CO2 to the atmosphere causes a corresponding rise in average global temperature.

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761578504/Greenhouse_Effect.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Tyndall#Scientific_influence
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius#Greenhouse_effect_as_cause_for_ic e_ages
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22E.O.+hulburt%22+%22carbon+dioxide%22&btnG=Search

*FACT: although water vapor is responsible for most of the greenhouse effect, it has little role in global climate change. this is because it is a feedback agent, not a forcing agent, therefore it is not responsible for the recent rise in average global temperature. by example, water vapor added to the atmosphere takes no more than a week or two to return to the surface. CO2, by contrast, currently requires up to hundreds of years to be absorbed into the earth's surface once added to the atmosphere. this is because the current amount of CO2 in the atmosphere greatly outweighs the earth's ability to sequester it onto land and sea areas.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_vapor#Water_vapor_in_Earth.27s_atmosphere
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/figspm-3.htm
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=142

FACT: by the burning of fossil fuels (coal and oil) during the industrial age, humans have intensively increased atmospheric CO2 during the last 200 years or so. the increase is by far due to ourselves- the oceans and terrestial plants remove more CO2 than they emit, and volcanoes emit only a fraction of our CO2 output.

{link to NASA data here}

FACT: methods such as satellites, weather balloons, mountain sampling stations and ground-based recordings are in agreement that global temperature is indeed rising and has been rising quickly in the last 100 years or so.

FACT: the rate of temperature change going on now during our industrial revolution rarely or never can be equaled in our 650,000-year world temperature record.

FACT: there is a scientific consensus at all levels across the world that global warming is due to man's added CO2. that consensus includes every major science org in the world, including the most prestigious, such as the national academies of the major nations, the royal society and the AAAS.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686
http://www.logicalscience.com/consensus/consensusD1.htm
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=joint+academies+climate+change&btnG=Google+Search

FACT: there are, as expected, detractors and petitions against the theory of man-made global warming. skeptical viewpoints have been studied and found wanting, however, suggesting that the consensus view is in fact correct.

FACT: science and history say that even small changes in temperature can lead to dramatic consequences. for example, the global temperature during the last ice age was only about five degrees lower than right now. meanwhile the so-called "modest" gain we currently have is already causing serious effects on the world and already less profitibility due to crop losses alone.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/03/070316072609.htm

FACT: the IPCC, the global scientific body appointed twenty years ago by the UN to study this matter, says in their last report that the problem is still going on and the consequences will be more serious than previously estimated... again.

http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/assessments-reports.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ipcc#IPCC_Fourth_Assessment_Report:_Climate_Change _2007

FACT: it is not hard for science to give a likely picture of what will happen if the warming trend continues. examples are droughts, increased and more intense storm systems, collapse of the world's bread-basket regions (including such in the US), mass starvation, loss of imported goods and supplies, increased disease due to better breeding temperatures for parasites, collapse of the world market, inability for national govt to handle all this resulting in regional wars over dwindling resources. none of these things are outrageous or scientifically difficult to predict. for example, australia's national academy of science just warned that severe drought due to climate change might start there as early as 2010.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=pentagon+climate+change&btnG=Google+Search
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080706/sc_afp/australiaclimatedrought;_ylt=AjJwa8U9wEC_HXNQQ9ERM ccszJV4

FACT: the US has 5% of the world's population but produces 25% of it's world's greenhouse gas emissions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas_emissions_by_the_United_States

FACT: the world's energy industry is the only proven group to be running a propaganda campaign to manipulate the public's opinions on global warming. most published detractors of global warming, including online article-writers, many of them not even scientists, can be linked to funding from the energy industry. the documents are even on public record.

http://www.exxonsecrets.org/maps.php
http://oilmoney.priceofoil.org/federalRaceGraph.php
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/19/ethicalliving.g2




any questions?


or for a different kind of reason to take action, watch this: (also suggests a simple way you can help out)
http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=wonderingmind42

FINAL THOUGHT: if science is right about man-made global warming then you have a chance right now to alter what happens to you, your family, and to mankind in general. even if you need some cooperation to cause the changes.


NOTE ON THE LINKS: most links route through wikipedia, not because wikipedia itself should be taken as the final authority on anything, but because the sublinks presented there represent some of the most universally-recognised and scientifically peer-reviewed information on the subject at hand.

Tempest Stormwind
07-30-2008, 11:17 AM
FACT: science has recognised the greenhouse effect for a long time. it is not considered controversial. as for CO2, science first discovered it's role in the greenhouse effect in the 1800's. in the 1930's it was established that adding CO2 to the atmosphere causes a corresponding rise in global temperature.

If it's a possessive, it's just ITS, but if it's supposed to be a contraction then it's IT'S. And its important to note global *average* temperature -- weather noise makes individual areas impossible to forecast.


FACT: by the burning of fossil fuels (coal and oil) that we use to create electricity, run engines and machinery, provide heat, literally to power commerce and make our modern life possible, humans have added more (by many multiples) CO2 to the atmosphere than any other source for the last 200 years or so. animals, plants, land, the ocean and volcanoes do not even come close.

In terms of permanent additions, yes. In terms of emissions, no. It's important to phrase this properly: We haven't added more CO2, we have increased the level of CO2. Oceans and the biosphere adds more CO2 than we do -- it just removes more than that as well.

FACT: methods such as satellites, weather balloons, mountain sampling stations and ground-based recordings are in agreement that global temperature is indeed rising and has been rising quickly in the last 100 years or so.

Good.

FACT: the rate of temperature change going on now during our industrial revolution rarely or never can be equaled in our 650,000-year world temperature record.

To be fair, it's hard to single out specific years. I haven't read the 650,000 year data in some time, though.

FACT: there is a scientific consensus at all levels across the world that global warming is due to man's added CO2. that consensus includes every major science org in the world, including the most prestigious, that being the national academies of the major nations and the NAS and the AAAS.

The NAS is one of the national academies. I'd replace it with the Royal Society, which is a science organization older than the United States.

FACT: there are, as expected, detractors and petitioners to man-made global warming. but so far the scientific body has upheld it's view after considering the counter-arguments. if anything, the body of science has only been getting more unanimous and more emphatic about the dangers of global warming.

Poor choice of phrasing, as it suggests hunkering down. Better to suggest that skeptical viewpoints have been studied and found wanting, suggesting that the consensus view is in fact correct.

FACT: science and history say that even small changes in temperature can lead to dramatic consequences. for example, the global temperature during the last ice age was only about five degrees lower than right now. meanwhile the so-called "modest" gain we currently have is already causing serious effects on the world and already less profitibility due to crop losses alone.

Correct.

FACT: the IPCC, the global scientific body appointed twenty years ago by the UN to study this matter, says in their last report that the problem is still going on and the consequences will be more serious than previously estimated... again.

No issues.

FACT: it is not hard for science to give a likely picture of what will happen if the warming trend continues. examples are droughts, increased and more intense storm systems, collapse of the world's bread-basket regions (including such in the US), mass starvation, loss of imported goods and supplies, increased disease due to better breeding temperatures for parasites, collapse of the world market, inability for national govt to handle all this resulting in regional wars over dwindling resources. none of these things are outrageous or scientifically difficult to predict. for example, australia's national academy of science just warned that severe drought due to climate change might start there as early as 2010.

I'd have to reread the WG2 report to comment on this.

FACT: the US has 5% of the world's population but produces 25% of it's world's greenhouse gas emissions.

Right order of magnitude, but you'd do well to link your source here to prove it. Another one that works is the *cumulative* emissions since the Industrial Revolution, which showcases why the US has more to answer for than China.

FACT: the world's energy industry is the only proven group to be running a propaganda campaign to manipulate the public's opinions on global warming. most published detractors of global warming, including online article-writers, many of them not even scientists, can be linked to funding from the energy industry. the documents are even on public record.

Draw the link to tobacco, which often used the same experts. Youtube "The American Denial of Global Warming" for some examples.

Cliff_Sedge
03-20-2009, 02:21 AM
If it's a possessive, it's just ITS, but if it's supposed to be a contraction then it's IT'S. And its important to note ...

Irony is awesome!

:-p

I think that's a nice little fact sheet. The thing I worry about is it is only useful to someone with very little knowledge of the subject, no personal conclusion, and an intellectually honest mind to consider scientific findings.

It feels a little cold and abrasive as if it's meant as a counter to skeptics' arguments it's going to be like throwing dirt at a wall - very little will stick and none will get through.

The greatest opposition we have - the small, but vocal minority of "skeptics" and denialists - already have their minds made up; like arguing Evolution vs. Intelligent Design with the religiously devout, the scientific facts do not matter.

I think Mr. Craven made this point in one of the How It Ends videos: Debating directly with the "skeptics" does nothing to convert the skeptic, so while doing so, remember your actual audience - the fence-sitters and spectators. You have to speak to them indirectly while they observe how you debate the hard-set opposition.

Keep that in mind when creating informative pieces. Communication has much more to do with transmission than with information.

gigantes1966
03-21-2009, 06:13 PM
thank you, cliff.
thank you, tempest. (very late)

my original factsheet is admittedly very adversarial.
i will try to improve the message so that more humans can take it in.

my immediate project is to translate some of these questions to funtrivia.com, the internet's top trivivia site, which only has 1-2 GW quizzes, sadly.

sinimod
03-22-2009, 04:39 PM
Svante Arrhenius died in 1927. He was the first scientist to calculate CO2 climate sensitivity.

gigantes1966
03-23-2009, 12:17 PM
Svante Arrhenius died in 1927. He was the first scientist to calculate CO2 climate sensitivity.
thank you. i see the error and will correct that.

the arrhenius and hulbert loose dates i got from... naomi... er... oreskes (sp?), i think.
i will go over that again.