Global warming is a crockFollow

What "specific political agenda"? Who has anything to gain by claiming that we need to take action to curb global warming?

Corporations don't. Governments don't. Normal people don't.

So who?

Who is resposible for this massive world-wide conspiracy that includes more or less every single respected scientific body?

Al Gore? Dat j00?

I don't know if Gbaji was planning to respond or not but I'm going to cut it short by saying that 12 days is longer than my thread attention threshold and I'm calling my part in this discussion finished.

No, no, you're missing the point entirely. We will take action - that is not in question. The question is now or later - and a little prevention now may prevent a large penalty tomorrow.

Humans are changing the climate. We know the effect is significant - it isn't, for example, 1% of the increase in temperature: it's a large (but unknown) fraction of it.

Standard legal theory is that if I'm harming you, you get to recover costs from me. Well, we are. We don't have to do anything except pay for the consquences when they occur. It just might be the most cost effective way. On the other hand, it may be more cost effective to just cut emmissions increases - and reduce future claims against us by signing onto (even a flawed) treaty now.

Step one is to actually acknowledge the science: humans are increasing the temperature, and it is not a tiny effect.

Let me make an analogy. When the federal government sets safety regulations on cars, manufactuers meet those regulations and we don't sue them - even if we get hurt in the car - so long as the car meets the regulations - even if the regulations suck.

But look, Americans are willing to re-elect idiots who are so fiscally irresponsible that they make the government borrow an extra US$1000 per person per year. American's don't vote for the long term.

On the issue of global warming, it is just a gamble that it won't be that bad.

Feel lucky?

You reckon that encouraging him to travel is fair on the rest of us?

then again, he prolly couldn' find his @rse with both hands, so we're prolly pretty safe down here in Aoteroa

Heyaaah, hello, everyone, allow me to return to your board like FK when you fall asleep. "What took me so long? -- Traffic was a *****." Where's the *new* thread on cows emitting more dangerous greenhouse gasses than humans that was released tonight {Edit: this past week}? Joph with+held. Mooo. Well, at least you know I'm still alive, in case you were worried.

'Aight n/m i just happened to have had to destroy notions of copyright, err, contract, this past weeek, if you wish to review, by all means, u know i ain't ashamed to link. N-E-way, hi, hope all is well. ----> #1

Edited, Dec 16th 2006 8:29am by MonxDoT

So, don't worry, I guess the Study totally /whooshed. It was about #1 Cows. It was about #2, cows emitting more greenhouse gasses than humanity and Sean Puffy Combs combined. Enron, or someone, totally scored, and it saddens me for y'all to have missed it.

But anyway, I l<3 utter, I mean udder, nonsense. Link me pics!

Edited, Dec 16th 2006 5:31am by MonxDoT

No. Joph posted that he was done with the thread. I've had a pretty busy work schedule recently so I didn't get a chance to respond to his last post before he made that statement. Thus, I responded to something else that was said in the thread. Not sure how that invalidates my statement one bit...


I'd also like to point out for the uneducated that "socialism" is not the same as "communism". A fact that could have saved Mssr. Red Phoenix a lot of embarassment if he'd known...

Not surprising though. He likely honestly doesn't believe that he lives in a socialist state. Despite the fact that he'll praise the state run power industry, and the state run health industry, and the state run education system, and the state run housing system, etc, etc, etc...

But that's not a socialism. Lol!

Whenever I start to think this forum is a pot-pourri of Trekky geeks and pregnant women, there comes gbaji to remind me not to forget the crazy conspiracy theorists.

It is the internet after all...



Ha.

Can we agree that "Socialism is an economic system in which the means of production are owned and controlled collectively or a political philosophy advocating such a system. This control may be either direct, exercised through popular collectives such as workers' councils or community councils, or it may be indirect, exercised on behalf of the people through the State" ?

It's a broad definition, but it's a simple one.

In every single industry sector you mentionned, there is a private alternative available. Second, most of those industry sectors are either completely privatized, part-privatized, or are in competition with private entities. It's hardly "socialism". It's hardly having the "means of production" in the hands of the state".



We once had a state-run power industry. That was 20 years ago in France, 30 in Britain. Today, all the energy providers are private companies that are listed on the stock market: Gaz de France, EDF, Poweo, British Gaz...

It's an open market, like the shoe/video games one. It's not "socialism".



In France, most of the public health sector is public, it's true. But most of the services associated with it (the cleaning of hospitals, some of the nursing staff, the hospital food, etc..) is done by private companies that bid for contracts. Then, you have private hospitals everywhere. And of course, all the pharmaceutical companies are private.



And how is that different to the US? You guys have state schools and private schools, and so do we.



Just like in the US. Most of the housing market is private, and for the people too poor to buy a house, they can get a council flat for cheaper rent, from the state.



There is no "etc...". That's my point, the economic systems in Europe are no different to the US. There are minor tweaks (our public health care is bigger and *coughbettercough*, but apart from that it's exactly the same system. We give subsidies to our farmers, but so do you. We can go to a public school and so can you.



Well if it is, then the US is socialist too.

I know you have this funny game of changing the meaning of words, but I doubt you'd consider the US "socialist". Just because our government has privatised a little less, it doesn't make it "socialist".

And even then, if we go back to the original point, your consipracy theory doesn't make any sense. Europe is not "socialist". No one wants to put the "means of production", whatever those might be today, into collective hands.

You are absolutely clueless about Europe, and it's obvious that you don't talk to many Europeans on a regular basis. So update whatever book it is you read, because this is not the 70s.

Saying global warming has such an importance today because of the socialist movment in Europe is one of the funniest, yet stupidest, theory I have heard in a long time, and if anyone should be embarrassed with regards to stupid and ignorant theories, it should be you.

Otherwise, ask Nobby if he lives in a "socialist state". Or the many Canadians on this forum. Or maybe their answer is all part of the conspiracy

Edited, Dec 19th 2006 5:33am by RedPhoenixxx

Let me reiterate something I just said, and put it in the context of the topic:

I believe that at the point that "the masses" excersise more control over industry via political process then via economic process *that* is the point at which the system can be called socialist. It's a subtle line. It does not require that the state "own" the industry. It's about control. Not ownership.

This is the key point I'm making here. In capitalism, there's a separation between the political and the economic. People "vote" politically, but they also "vote" economically. If they don't like something that a company is doing, they'll take their dollars elsewhere. In a socialism, the prime method by which to get companies to do things you want them to do is not economic, but political.

The relevant objective here is to use the political to control those industries and companies. Using issues like Global Warming is a key tool. Heck. Anything that can be shown as some sort of industry wide problem that requires government intervention advances that cause. It allows the government to step in and put another layer of control over industry. This in turn pushes the nations one step in the direction of political control over industry rather then economic control.


When France experiences nationwide rioting because the President suggests that employers should be able to fire workers who underperform, I think it's safe to say that the political has taken over the supposedly "private" industries. Global Warming is just another similar control method. Convince "the people" that global warming is a huge threat to them, just like being fired might be, and they'll march in the streets and demand that their companies make whatever changes those pulling the strings want.

And yeah. I come off a bit vehement about this because I wholeheartedly believe that once a nation gets too far down that path, it's nearly impossible to come back and the end result is ultimately going to be disaster. It's just a matter of time. The problem is that idealists love to think that "the people" having a direct voice things is great, so they support such marches and protests and ever greater changes to empower such things to make real changes. But ultimately, it's a lot easier to convince "the people" of something and getting them to take action on it, then it is to get experts to do the same. Which is a problem once this degree of political control becomes the standard methodology for getting things done. It's kinda like the one ring. You start using it to do things that are good. Civil rights. Working wages. Worker protections. Cleaner environment. But over time, it becomes about what you're against and not what you're for, and "the masses" are now primed for some charismatic leader to take them and their "voice" and use them for things even they would never have imagined possible. It's happened before. It can happen again.

Of course. That's obvious. What's not so obvious is what exactly "excess amounts" is? Or who should decide how to define it. Or what measurments to use. And what penalties to apply based on those measurements...

And more importantly for those of us in the US, how much of the "bad stuff" is our fault or requires *us* specifically to fix it?

Overall, the US generates 1/4th the pollution per unit of productivity as the rest of the world average. Shouldn't we measure our activity in relation to both how much pollution we generate *and* what we're doing in the process of generating that pollution? Clearly, if you and I are generating the same pollution, but you're doing it while accomplishing very little, and I'm doing it while feeding the worlds hungry, maybe we should take those things into account?


The US (actually the north american continent as a whole) acts as a CO2 "sink", with levels leaving the East coast lower then the levels entering the West coast (airborn levels that is). Some argue that we're simply saturating the green trees and bushes of the continent and ultimiately there's a piper to pay, but clearly if human ejected CO2 levels causing a greenhouse gas effect (which requires the CO2 levels to say in the air to work) is being blamed as a primary cause of a rise in global temperatures over the last century, and if we can assume that CO2 "saturation" builds over time and hasn't happened yet (meaning that we've been a sink instead of an increase for CO2 over the last century), then we have to conclude that the North American continent hasn't been causing the effect. Does this mean we should still take some draconian efforts to reduce CO2 emissions? Should we feel guilty about global warming and take actions? How much should we beat ourselves up over this?

Or should we look at what the rest of the world is doing and strive to do it "better" (as in less pollution)? How much should we spend doing this? How much of an effect will that have? And how much burden should the rest of the world be shouldering in this effort?


It's a complex issue. It deserves a complex answer. Or at least one that does not rely on simplifying the issue down to "pollution bad! You must reduce pollution!". And certainly we should not demonize those who think that we should quantify these things before acting.