Americans' divide over global warming getting deeper

[Hoosier Daddy]

Source: MSNBC Website

NEW YORK — Tucked between treatises on algae and prehistoric turquoise beads, the study on page 460 of a long-ago issue of the U.S. journal Science drew little attention. "I don't think there were any newspaper articles about it or anything like that," the author recalls.

But the headline on the 1975 report was bold: "Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?" And this article that coined the term may have marked the last time a mention of "global warming" didn't set off an instant outcry of angry denial.

In the paper, Columbia University geoscientist Wally Broecker calculated how much carbon dioxide would accumulate in the atmosphere in the coming 35 years, and how temperatures consequently would rise. His numbers have proven almost dead-on correct. Meanwhile, other powerful evidence poured in over those decades, showing the "greenhouse effect" is real and is happening. And yet resistance to the idea among many in the U.S. appears to have hardened.

What's going on?

"The desire to disbelieve deepens as the scale of the threat grows," concludes economist-ethicist Clive Hamilton.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44654935/ns/us_news-environment/#.Tn6CztQxj-k

---

Or maybe there are too many religious fanatics in this country who think none of it matters cuz Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeezus is coming back any day now to make the world anew.

:freak:

[TwilightGardener]

1. People don't want to be bothered to change their habits and lifestyles.

Easier to pretend it doesn't exist, or if it DOES exist, we're not the cause and can't do anything about it.

[DissedByBush]

5. I'm still skeptical

The large globalist movement behind it doesn't help, neither do governments positioning themselves to gain more power over their people, all those looking to get rich off of it.

But I'm an eco-freak pretty much. My house was almost all CFL back when the bulbs cost an arm and a leg, so it cost hundreds to convert. I have a system for rotating my hundreds of dollars of rechargeable batteries for all the little devices. I recycle like crazy, and was annoyed moving into a city that didn't recycle (I had to drive quite a distance to recycle, I wonder how that changed the equation). I'll check on recycle programs next time I move, and factor it into city choice. I have to thank living in Germany for really getting me on the recycle bandwagon. They're dead-serious about it over there.

My cars always had small engines, IIRC 1.1 liter was my smallest, my mid 20s stupid irresponsible large engine fast car buy was a whopping 2.5 liter that got great mileage. If I were rich I'd probably have negative CO2 since I'd have solar panels all over, ultra-efficient house, be driving an electric charged off that solar, and have a huge property with a large planted orchard.

And you'd NEVER see me on a private jet.

This comes from growing up in real pollution, the stuff that makes you not see the mountains a couple miles away, the stuff that makes your eyes burn and have the school cancel PE because the air quality is too bad that day.

I lived it, and I will live my lifestyle to make sure I contribute as little as I can to that happening again, regardless of the Global Warming issue.

Yet any time I express any skepticism, YOU'RE AN EVIL REPUBLICAN WHO JUST WANTS TO DESTROY THE EARTH!

Uh, no.

[The Magistrate]

8. Here Is Why You Get That Reaction, Sir

"...neither do governments positioning themselves to gain more power over their people..."

Standard far right line, the claim 'global warming' is a scheme to limit Liberty, destroy Freedom, and institute Socialism....

[freedom fighter jh]

9. Standard far right line, yes,

but that doesn't mean it's not true.

Governments like to expand and take more power. The founders of this country saw that and tried to guard against it. We saw it with Bush and his power grabs, and now we see Obama's unwillingness to undo Bush's power grabs.

The need to do something about climate change gives governments vast opportunities to overreach.

Having followed the climate change issue for 3 decades, I am convinced that it is happening and that we have to do whatever we still can to slow it down. (Stopping it altogether is no longer an option.) But as mankind does that, I do hope some people will be watching to ensure that we don't give up any more to our government than is reasonable -- let's not let government use the climate crisis the way they did 911, as a power grab.

The sooner we act the less drastic the action will have to be. So it's in the interest of liberty to deal with the problem asap.

[caseymoz]

15. If Global Warming is happening, our country is finished.

Plain and simple. Already power in the western hemisphere is shifting to Canada and Brazil. I hate to be Jeremiah here, but the writing is on the wall. Oh, the fed may spend the next five to fifty years struggling, but a government power grab, at least in the long run, shouldn't be what we're worried about.

Moreover, as you've seen in global conferences on the subject so far, there is no way governments are going to agree on what action to take on this problem. You could see how terrifies people into just giving away power.

The myth you espouse upon, of the Great Green Lie has to be about the worst idea for a power grab I've ever heard, a plan so laughable, it can't exist. A power grab keeps things simple. You can say Saddam and al-Qaeida have WMD's and people will give away their freedom. That threat is simple, to the point: bad guys coming, big booms. Something that really grabs your midbrain.

Whereas Global Warming stays in your frontal lobes and cerebral cortex. As you've seen so far, any action taken is not going to be hasty. If there are any transfers of power over it, they are going to be long and deliberate and rational. Likely this means there will be none at all. This means that power structures are more likely to collapse due to Global Warming then to be altered because of it.

If Hitler had Global Warming as an issue, he would have ended up in art school.

Addendum: Now,I know you believe Global Warming is occurring. My referring to it as the Great Green Lie refers to the fear of its utility for gathering power or redistributing wealth, whether true or not. Fact is, Global Warming is going to shift power and redistribute wealth in ways human beings are not capable.

[freedom fighter jh]

25. Do you mean "finished" as in "go to sleep and wait for your life to end"?

It's not *that* bad yet. While climate change is the biggest challenge facing humanity, there is still time to try to find a way to minimize the human suffering.

That suffering threatens in many areas: famine (because climate disruption brings agricultural disruption), poverty, mass migrations forced by sea level rise. Somewhere on that list, not near the top but still high enough to matter, if government overreach. Yes, people are, as you say, terrified of giving away power to government. That doesn't mean they won't do it. Witness the Patriot Act.

Global warming may stay in *your* cerebral cortex, but when people living in low-lying coastal areas start getting flooded in this country like they are in Kiribati, more primitive areas of the brain will be tapped. Overreaction will be natural. Something very like The Shock Doctrine may kick in.

My tea party neighbor tells me climate change can't be real because it's just too convenient a way to expand government's power. I reply that it is very real and I suggest that he focus his argument on keeping government solutions to climate change within limits that respect rights and the Constitution.

Wasn't it Daniel that saw the handwriting on the wall?

[caseymoz]

39. Wrote a previous answer, and lost it.

I was too frustrated to re-compose this imediately.

By finished, I mean our system of government and probably our existence as one recognizable, nation state will end before we, as a species, could do anything about Global Warming. It isn't the only major problem we're facing as a nation now. It's going to destroy our agriculture, which is already under strain with scarcity of fertilizer, soil erosion, and the fact that seventy percent of our counties are going to have water shortages in the next twenty years. Add to that the fact that our agriculture is dependent energy from oil for its production and we're already importing most of our oil.

That being said, nation-states simply are not made to tackle problems like Global Warming. Moreover, human beings are not evolutionarily adapted to organize in ways that would make stopping Global Warming viable. Or to stop mass extinction, I will add. We are facing the macro-version of Peter Principle: we've risen to our evolutionary level of incompetence. That's what I think.

Now, whatever you plan to do to mitigate suffering from this, please note that you're working with broken political tools, tools that were never designed for such a problem in the first place. Please also note, it's overwhelming, and you're only going to notice things getting worse in your lifetime. If there's a solution to this, it's either going to be in 500 years and after the human population has fallen 90 percent, or alternately, we're going to invent a great AI to tell us how to get out of this. Of course, the AI will have to contend with the fact that humankind will divide into warring faction that thinks it's God and thinks it's Satan.

About jeering at my cerebal cortex analogy: people in the situation you've given might agitate for disaster relief. Wanting rescue will be in their midbrain, but overall, you watch, they still will not organize effectively to stop Global Warming. The big picture will stay abstract no matter how much trouble it causes people. That's part of what I mean by the fact that were evolutionarily adapted for this. And we won't be until natural selection goes to work, which would entail the deaths of many people and an “evolutionary bottleneck” coming up.

I already explained how the Patriot Act was fundamentally different, but you seem dead set on ignoring me.

I compared myself to Jeremiah because he saw nothing but doom and gloom for his country, and he was right.

For the writing on the wall, maybe Daniel said that but I was thinking of David. Gilmour.

[The Magistrate]

20. Actually, Sir, Standard Right-Wing Boiler-Plate Is Wrong, And Defending It is Pernicious

[freedom fighter jh]

24. This is a discussion board.

People are supposed to discuss things. Calling someone else's opinion wrong and their position pernicious with absolutely no basis is not in the spirit of discussion.

Oh, and please try not to make too many assumptions. It's m'am, not sir.

[The Magistrate]

30. Pick A Side, Ma'am....

[caseymoz]

13. Yes, I was about to say.

It's one thing to doubt it for scientific reasons, it's quite another to think it's some underhanded socialist scheme to redistribute wealth and take power indicates the science is suspect. The latter is a fallacy. It seems based on a gross misunderstanding of socio-economics, politics and science that's the hallmark of conservative thought. The reasoning seems to be that altering our lifestyle threatens a change power structure and making different people rich, therefore the science must either be a lie or unimportant by comparison.

Not that Dissedbybush conservative, per se, but if he's going to concede to its errors and propaganda, demonstrated to be corporate generated and contradictory to science, how is he not going to aid and abet?

[freedom fighter jh]

26. Self-delete

[DissedByBush]

35. Socialist?

Where is socialist in this?

It's politicians wanting power.

It's corrupt third-world countries wanting free money from the West, which will pretty much go to enrich their rulers as it always does.

It's CORPORATIONS wanting power and money. They're not the oil companies that everybody concentrates on as the evil ones. Crony capitalism, lobby for government action when you've set yourself up as the beneficiary for that action.

It means more power for the UN, you know, the one dominated by countries that don't give a damn about rights. It's hard enough fighting for our freedom against our own government, imagine fighting the UN too.

A "socialist" label is probably there to piss off the right and sucker those who are socialist into believing it.

I just don't see any socialism in this. I see good old greed and power.

[caseymoz]

38. Socialism was meant sarcastically.

Because conservatives have conflated all of that with socialism. Since you're somewhat more aware, though, you've thrown out the socialist conflation and kept the rest of the bullshit. After what you've written here, I could see why one might mistake you for a conservative. You fear thievery, that is, someone is going to get something for nothing from you, from the country, from somebody, and you fear it more than you fear Global Warming, more than you fear death itself. I'm sorry, that fear is the psychological posture of a conservative as far as I'm concerned. You're a conservative who's proud to call yourself a progressive.

The fact that you let the fear stand in the way of considering the science of Global Warming, says something.

[SpiralHawk]

23. ...and yet, as plain as day, the Republicon so-called 'conservatives' have long shown

they embrace wholeheartedly "...schemes to limit Liberty, destroy Freedom, and institute" a lowbrow, anti-reality corporate fascism....

There you have it...

[freedom fighter jh]

27. They do.

Yes, it is an anti-reality corporate fascism.

I just think there's a grain of truth in their fear of government overreach.

[DissedByBush]

31. Far right or not, it's true

How many proposals have we seen to limit freedom in order to address global warming?

Many, many, many. I lost count.

I do not trust things that are agenda driven. Even if Intelligent Design had scientific merit I couldn't trust it because of the "Teach the controversy" agenda behind it.

Strange, most liberals I meet are pretty watchful of governments eroding rights -- war on drugs, Patriot Act, etc.

We are the ones trying to protect rights. Yet the government seems to get a pass here.

Sure, their motives are pure. HAHAHAHA!!!!!

Yeah, I'm sure people thought that before they legalized the molestation of little girls at airport security checkpoints.

Anybody who still thinks that is an idiot, or a totalitarian right-winger.

[The Magistrate]

32. Always Fun To Watch A Fella Double Down, Sir

When your line is 'Global warming is a con-job to deprive you of your Liberty!' people are going to draw the reasonable conclusion, since that is the line favored by right-wing trolls.

[DissedByBush]

34. I don't care if they favor it

I could have left out that line, would still have been attacked.

It has turned into a religion.

And as in reality, I'm not a believer. I know I risk reprisal when I blaspheme, as I just did.

I'm just not the believing type.

And, yes, a lot of people and organizations are lining up to take your money and your liberty under the name of global warming.

I don't approve even when it doesn't affect me. Require CFL? I'm already using them. Still, I don't believe in the mandates, a lot of people don't like CFL because of the light spectrum.

[pasto76]

11. skeptical, but you do it anyway

your comments dont add up. If you are skeptical, why do anything? The ENTIRE global climate change denial is based on the premise that "mankind cannot alter his environment on this scale"

[caseymoz]

14. I'm sorry you suffer so.

Maybe you're not really a repub, but if you're going to give in to their propaganda about the threat of wealth redistribution or the government grabbing power through the Great Green Lie, how can you not aid and abet?

One might be skeptical of some studies on Global Warming, but if you survey the evidence, you can't deny the overall phenomenon. The science overwhelmingly points in one direction, toward heat being retained longer in the atmosphere.

I think what hangs people up is the notion that Global Warming has to overthrow some previous scientific theory that the earth's climate would stay stable. Actually, the idea that climate would stay stable was never scientifically demonstrated. Neither is the assumption that human beings cannot effect overall climate. Both were just presumed without the strength of science. This makes Global Warming the only credible scientific theory about climatic trend.

[cprise]

19. How does global warming permit more control over "the people"?

I think you mean control over "the large corporations", right?

If income tax paid by individuals were replaced by a carbon tax paid by fossil fuel and other big industries, wouldn't that tend to *increase* individual freedom? The tax would be passed on to consumers at the point of sale, and so is non-invasive allowing individuals to decide where to cut on emissions by using their wallets.

The biggest boogeyman I can reasonably think of is that an international treaty will be used to exert control over some multinational corporations. That isn't 'one world government' any more than other environmental treaties that have (successfully) addressed problems like the thinning ozone layer and acid rain.


"Real pollution", as you call it, doesn't need to hit you in the face every day in order to be either real or severe. I say stop demanding that a problem needs to be brutally obvious before it can be dealt-with. The reactionary world view does not work in the long-term: It is anti-preparedness and anti-science, and it is why people assume you are a Republican when you imply that the "skeptic" war against scientific truth may be justified.

[24601]

41. Actions speak much louder than any words. If you want to know if

the rich and/or powerful really believe it or not - check out what they DO. If they hob-nob in the luxury of a private jet, their actions betray their hidden conclusions that they do not buy it.

Let me know if/when they fly commercial, or even coach, like the rest of us.

[sam11111]

2. Fixes u may not have heard of

Kyoto too slow.
Other ideas:

3 that are very attractive for effectiveness, and fewer side effects than efforts closer to the surface.

Orbital sunshade
Orbital dust ring
Orbital mirrors

3 fixes in the stratophere:
- calcium, reflecting light
- burn sulphur IN the strato.. reflects ...would fast-cool earth to pre-Industrial Age temp. (a 2 degree lowering.. by Dr. Izrael of Russia)
Very attractive for effectiveness.

- shoot sulphur particles up into strato
-------------------------
Others:
-Plastic sheets that catch air's CO2, then drop it off as a solid compound

-Biochar fertilizer
Good, as we need more food.

-700 factories that deacidify our CO2-absorbing oceans, for a 1900 air-CO2 level.
More than 700 would cool us faster.

-Feed the ocean's plankton. (They remove CO2? Anyone able to clarify this?) Feed them phosphates IIRC.

[daleo]

3. We have heard of all of these

They are mostly technological pipe-dreams. It reminds me of smokers I knew when I was young, who assumed that there would have to a cure for cancer in the next 30 years or so. It was easier to believe that than it was to quit smoking.

Still no cure. For many, it was a fatal bet.

[caseymoz]

17. These are very effective, on paper.

Some of them sound like very expensive propositions involving putting massive amounts of materials in orbit, where I think orbiting debris might go to work on them.

I also have to point out, there are countries that will gain from Global Warming (Russia, Canada) who might object strongly to returning their climate to pre-industrial temperatures. It might be hard to imagine that they would object strongly enough to veto them, sabotage them, or shoot them down, but we can conceivably end up in a great "climate war."

[bluestateguy]

4. They'll keep denying it until it is too late

and then they'll just say "eh, whatever".

[Downwinder]

6. Denial -- A human trait.

[man4allcats]

7. I doubt many who spent this past summer in Texas are denying global warming.

As my father used to say, it was hotter than billy blue hell. I was never exactly sure just how hot that was, but I knew for certain it was pretty hot. There's a story that the divil used to own Texas (I think he sold it eventually) as well as hell, but he rented out Texas and decided to live in hell because it was cooler there. I used to think that was what Jack Nicholson might refer to as a "country witticism", but after this last summer I'm inclined to believe it.

[PaulaFarrell]

21. unfortunately not true

i have many family members doing just that

[cosmicone]

10. Global warming was originally framed as

a US sovereignty issue by the right wing when the Uruguay round was in progress.

So many still think it is an issue where other countries are "pushing us around" to reduce our power. This creates a hardline stance against any acceptance of global warming.

[adhd_what_huh]

12. It's all about FOX and Rush. Bring back fairness doctrine

[AlbertCat]

16. What's going on?

A lack of understanding that the world has not always been the way it is now and that it is not all just like your back yard. Things change, sometimes greatly, without regard to what is good for the human race.

This close mindedness must come from the growing attack on intellect that has been going on, buttressing religion's false message that everything should be just as it was and has always been, mixed with the 30 year old meme of "greed is good".

[alp227]

18. thanks a freaking lot american anti intellectual culture!

no wonder so many of us don't know a damn thing about science. we have kids who know everything about silly TV shows and sports teams but not real-world important issues. and the religious fundamentalists who peddle anti-thinking BS to their sheeple congregations. and the corporate interests like Koch, Bechtel, the Bush family evil empire, ExxonMobil, Shell, Goldman Sachs, etc. whose profits count on screwing over the people and our planet. I'll say this without apology: FUCK YOU LAZY-BRAINED AMERICANS.

[panzerfaust]

22. Even the Church which persecuted Galileo has seen the light

Last May the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences, arm of an institution that once persecuted Galileo for his scientific findings, pronounced on manmade global warming: It's happening.

Said the pope's scientific advisers, "We must protect the habitat that sustains us."

(From the OP article)

Simply basic physics it is: Easily noted when you have left your car out in the summer sun with the windows rolled up.



Time to roll our windows down - for when even the Holy See is forced to admit that the earth moves, you can be pretty sure that it does.


Christians Burning A Heretic Alive
Presumably in order to spread the Good News

[Tesha]

28. It doesn't matter what Americans believe.

Reality will happen, no matter their "beliefs".

Tesha

[Nancy Waterman]

29. The underhanded scheme to take over power and wealth

Isn't from those who say there is climate change, it is from those who deny it. The entire Republican economic plan
goes out the window if everyone accepts climate change. All of them base their plan on exploiting all of America's
natural resources, i.e. oil and gas, everywhere, with little or no regulation. It only makes sense of climate change and pollution are non-issues. And who is behind all the propaganda in that direction? The Koch brothers and the other oil and gas
conglomerates who would profit. And they play on the right wing's natural inclination for denial and avoidance of anything
that might suggest they are responsible or would have to sacrifice something for the greater good.

[Nikia]

33. Yet many of the deniers supported the war in Iraq

On the basis that there might be weapons on mass destruction. They refuse to do anything unless Human caused climate change is proved 100% even though the effects are deadly serious. I bet the same people buy insurance even though there isn't a 100% chance that they'll get more benefits than they pay in.

[fascisthunter]

37. sociopaths and psychopaths

[fascisthunter]

36. Sad any Human is Fooled by Anti-Global Warming Propaganda

this is the most significant issue mankind has faced, and yet there are politically brainwashed and or ignorant people dangerously choosing to prevent the rest of us from doing something to save us all. Just think about that.... whose side are you on?

[Blue_Tires]

40. the anti-science bunch are very effective 'useful idiots' for the RW