Even if Climate Change was not real...

[NuclearEnergy]

What is so wrong with trying to maintain a clean, healthy environment? Oh wait, I forgot! Republicans are in bed with oil. Or I guess caring about the environment isn't manly I guess.

[Crunchy]

What is so wrong with trying to maintain a clean, healthy environment? Oh wait, I forgot! Republicans are in bed with oil. Or I guess caring about the environment isn't manly I guess.

One of my favorite conservative stupidities involves the straw man that environmentalists are crazy prophets of doom and want us all to go back to the horse and buggy.
They then argue that if anything at all is done to deal with global warming it will lead to... THE COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF THE ENTIRE GLOBAL ECONOMY!! OOOOOHHHH

[Sal]

What is so wrong with trying to maintain a clean, healthy environment? Oh wait, I forgot! Republicans are in bed with oil. Or I guess caring about the environment isn't manly I guess.

One of my favorite conservative stupidities involves the straw man that environmentalists are crazy prophets of doom and want us all to go back to the horse and buggy.
They then argue that if anything at all is done to deal with global warming it will lead to... THE COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF THE ENTIRE GLOBAL ECONOMY!! OOOOOHHHH

I'm pretty sure the reality is the other way around, though. That the global economy will collapse if the environment goes haywire. Particularly stuff that's dependent on it like agriculture, fishing, livestock, whatever biosphere-dependent economy there exists also. Probably others, maybe tourism too.

[Jackalope]

One of my favorite conservative stupidities involves the straw man that environmentalists are crazy prophets of doom and want us all to go back to the horse and buggy.
They then argue that if anything at all is done to deal with global warming it will lead to... THE COMPLETE DESTRUCTION OF THE ENTIRE GLOBAL ECONOMY!! OOOOOHHHH

I'm pretty sure the reality is the other way around, though. That the global economy will collapse if the environment goes haywire. Particularly stuff that's dependent on it like agriculture, fishing, livestock, whatever biosphere-dependent economy there exists also. Probably others, maybe tourism too.

There you go, taking the long view. You've got the think like an MBA - only next quarter's results matter, of course.

[DarkerEnergy]

The science of climate change has been established beyond a reasonable doubt.

The troposphere has warmed at a significant rate, while we observe the stratosphere is experiencing a cooling at the same time. Both are at the rate that are indicative of a greenhouse effect. If climate change was due to something other than greenhouse gases - say something along the lines of a solar cycle or cosmic rays - then we would see a warming trend through the Earths atmosphere, and that's just not what we see. Instead we see warming trends and a clear established link between greenhouse gases and temperature in the Earths history in paeloclimate data.


http://www.climatecentral.org/news/new-e...ming-15316

https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Featur.../page4.php

A snippet from a NASA article concerning this issue entitle "Is Current Warming Natural?" that is very helpful.

Although volcanoes are active around the world, and continue to emit carbon dioxide as they did in the past, the amount of carbon dioxide they release is extremely small compared to human emissions. On average, volcanoes emit between 130 and 230 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year. By burning fossil fuels, people release in excess of 100 times more, about 26 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere every year (as of 2005). As a result, human activity overshadows any contribution volcanoes may have made to recent global warming.

Changes in the brightness of the Sun can influence the climate from decade to decade, but an increase in solar output falls short as an explanation for recent warming. NASA satellites have been measuring the Sun’s output since 1978. The total energy the Sun radiates varies over an 11-year cycle. During solar maxima, solar energy is approximately 0.1 percent higher on average than it is during solar minima.

Each cycle exhibits subtle differences in intensity and duration. As of early 2010, the solar brightness since 2005 has been slightly lower, not higher, than it was during the previous 11-year minimum in solar activity, which occurred in the late 1990s. This implies that the Sun’s impact between 2005 and 2010 might have been to slightly decrease the warming that greenhouse emissions alone would have caused.

Scientists theorize that there may be a multi-decadal trend in solar output, though if one exists, it has not been observed as yet. Even if the Sun were getting brighter, however, the pattern of warming observed on Earth since 1950 does not match the type of warming the Sun alone would cause. When the Sun’s energy is at its peak (solar maxima), temperatures in both the lower atmosphere (troposphere) and the upper atmosphere (stratosphere) become warmer. Instead, observations show the pattern expected from greenhouse gas effects: Earth’s surface and troposphere have warmed, but the stratosphere has cooled.

Sorry people, we burned the gases, we put in them in the atmosphere, and it's our mess to clean-up. While climate scientists might disagree on certain prediction of climate change, they do not disagree that it IS happening, that we did it, and that there will be negative consequences.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

[Brian37]

What is so wrong with trying to maintain a clean, healthy environment? Oh wait, I forgot! Republicans are in bed with oil. Or I guess caring about the environment isn't manly I guess.

These corporate assholes don't understand that short term profit will cost our species more long term. They don't want to see that they could make just as much money by doing the right thing, just like car companies once railed against seat belts only to create MORE factories to make those seat belts and ended up making money by selling them as a safety feature. Just like we no longer make rotary phones. 

The science is in, and even back in the 1890s you had scientists sounding the alarm about too much CO2. Neil's COSMOS series points that out in one of the episodes. But even since then, our computer tracking of past 100 years of millions of points of worldwide data and weather tracking worldwide is saying WE are making the atmosphere hyper active and that will cause more frequent storms of all kinds, more extreme swings between hot and cold, more ice cap melting less freezing.

These asshole oil companies CEOs really think they own the planet, but if we don't stop our trend eventually we will end up in a nuclear war because of weather destroying lives causing more political unrest. If we end up having a nuclear war all that oil wont mean shit, even the rich will end up fighting over resources like cave men.

I love my species ability to problem solve, but far too many greedy people worldwide don't understand that the planet is not a pet you tame, but a house you live in.