Hot Topic (11/30): Do you believe global warming is occurring?

[Cafe GroupAdmin]

From ABCNews: 

The number of Americans who believe global warming is occurring has declined to its lowest since 1997, though at 72 percent, it's still a broad majority. The drop has steepened in the last year-and-a-half – almost exclusively among conservatives and Republicans.

Climate scientist Gerald Meehl explains how the latest findings affect you.This ABC News/Washington Post poll also finds that support for government action to address the issue, while still a majority, likewise is down from its levels in summer 2008.

Belief that Earth is warming peaked at 85 percent in 2006, then flattened before turning back. Even with the decline, Americans who think global warming probably is occurring outnumber those who think not by nearly 3-1, 72 percent to 26 percent.

Levels of concern are undiminished among those who think it is happening, and intensity of sentiment has risen: Eighty-two percent call it a serious problem right now (it was a similar 84 percent last year); 44 percent call it "very serious," up 6 points.

On policy, 76 percent now favor unspecified government action on global warming, down from 86 percent in summer 2008. This now includes 55 percent who favor the United States taking steps even if countries such as China and India do less; that's down from 68 percent.

(Read complete story here.) 

* * *

Do you believe that humans are causing global warming?

Do you want the government to take action to combat global warming?

What is your opinion?  Do you consider this a pressing issue?

[resamerie]

 

Do you believe that humans are causing global warming? No. Global warming has occured every so often during centuries. It is the Earth's way of renewing itself.

Do you want the government to take action to combat global warming? No again. They can no more stop Global warming than they can stop a hurricane.

What is your opinion?  Do you consider this a pressing issue? I don't think it is a pressing issue. I do believe that the likes of Al Gore & Co. would have you believe so. Even though he is not in government anymore, the man never gives up. Him and the people with the pics of the polar bears and the penguins...follow the money trail. The animals are fine and Gore picked a stupid platform to call his legacy, if you want to call it that. There were no SUV's in the ice age. The Earth is a revolving, everchanging thing. In 2005 we had so many hurricanes that we had to start over the alphabet. This year, none of any destruction hit our country.

Mother Nature will do what she wants and it doesn't matter what you're driving.

[JaiDawn81]

I don't see how global warming could not be happening.  I live in Oklahoma.  It is the the end November, less than four weeks till Christmas, and it is still almost 80 degrees outside some days.

[Mergath]

Yes, I do agree with the existence of anthrpogenic climate change.  I've read reports and data, I've seen the pictures, and I do believe the current change is man-made.  And really, it doesn't matter to me either way.  Pollution is bad for more reasons than global warming.  Oil is bad more more reasons than global warming.  Even if this climate change wasn't occurring, we still need to find renewable sources of energy.

I'd also like to add that, while I know climate change and its effects are very complex, I live in Minnesota, and tomorrow it's supposed to be in the forties, which is not normal.  It's been like this all through November.  

[resamerie]

 IDK how other states decide climate change.I can tell you from where I live right outside New Orleans. Things change constantly. I had only seen snow once when I was a child. My DD has seen it 2x now and she is only 7.

All I'm saying is that they are making a whole too-do about nothing when it comes to global warming. In the 70's aerosol cans were to blame, they were making a hole in the ozone layer, etc. I never heard of dinasaurs using hairspray but we had a melt down anyway.  Ever notice that whomever brings up all this stands to make a ton of money off of whatever books they write? BTW, out of curiosity, anybody have any stats on how much money frome Gore and other's book sales are going to active groups promoting climate change?

[babie113]

yes but i think its a natural process and that it will happen no matter what we do ....my dh thinks we are still coming out of the ice age .i agree with him but i do think that we are speeding the process up

[diospira]

• I think that for those of us who are committed to a conscious lifestyle, care deeply for our Earth, and are concerned about the effects man's activities have on it, the global warming or climate change question often gets a free pass. It may seem so intuitive that we have damaged the Earth and we perceive changes as the result of our actions.(After all, we have been told they are.) While according to the OP, Republicans and Conservatives are apt to be more skeptical of this theory, those of other political persuasions may have embraced the idea without the critical examination it deserves.

  What I think is important here is that although something makes sense, that does not make it true. In this case, we have had the cause and the effect, the "problem" and the "solution", all provided to us by those who stand to gain big. Indeed, its main salesman and his business buddies have already made millions, and stand to make much more.

   I noticed the OP article made no mention of the leaked emails that show manipulation of scientific fact to match the global warming  agenda. The authenticity of the hacked emails has been admitted. I think that we need to take a hard look at what we are being sold here and see who benefits. We also need to ask ourselves why the scientists were fudging and concealing and dodging FOIA requests. What do they have to hide?  Why are the facts being manipulated here?

  Some may think of those who deny global warming as unenlightened or callous and believe we are supporting our Earth in this way. But the facts show  climate change is a constant; our Earth has in fact warmed before, even before industrialization.

  This issue is complex and we need to apply our critical thinking here and not let our good intentions lead us to support this theory without scrutiny. I know I have reexamined my position on this.

  To me it was eye-opening that even the picture of the stranded polar bears that so tugged at our hearts was not what it was made out to be and was used for mass manipulation.I wonder what others think of the proven deceptive use of this photo. To me it is a red flag.

  We all want to do our best for the Earth. We need to be sure our good intentions are not hijacked for another's gain and not allow ourselves to be  thrown into crisis mode without stopping to think twice.

  
  

Australian TV Exposes 'Stranded Polar Bear' Global Warming Hoax

Remember that wonderful picture of stranded polar bears on an ice floe that were used by folks like soon-to-be-Dr. Al Gore to demonstrate how dire the man-made global warming issue is?

Well, ABC television in Australia, on a show called “Media Watch,” recently debunked the entire issue (video available here, h/t NB member dscott).

It turns out -- as NewBuster Jake Gontesky reported on March 20 -- the picture was taken in August, “when every year the fringes of the Arctic ice cap melt regardless of the wider effects of global warming.”

The photographer, Australian marine biology student Amanda Byrd, didn’t think the bears were in any jeopardy:

They did not appear to be in danger…I did not see the bears get on the ice, and I did not see them get off. I cannot say either way if they were stranded or not.

Denis Simard of Environment Canada agreed:

You have to keep in mind that the bears are not in danger at all. This is a perfect picture for climate change…you have the impression they are in the middle of the ocean and they are going to die...But they were not that far from the coast, and it was possible for them to swim...They are still alive and having fun.

How delicious. Think this kind of broadcast would ever happen in America?

What follows is a full transcript of this segment. Furthermore, here are the e-mail questions answered by the photographer who took the picture. And, here is the full transcript of the interview “Media Watch” did with The Sunday Telegraph’s Neil Breen regarding this matter.

Those stranded polar bears on the shrinking Arctic ice - victims of global warming - certainly tugged at the heart-strings.

That photo was published not only in the Sunday Telegraph.

It made it onto the front page of the New York Times.

And the International Herald Tribune.

It also ran in London's Daily Mail, The Times of London and Canada's Ottawa Citizen - and that's just to name a few.

All used it as evidence of global warming and the imminent demise of the polar bear.

But the photo wasn't current. It was two and a half years old.

And it wasn't snapped by Canadian environmentalists.

It was taken by an Australian marine biology student on a field trip.

And in what month did she take it?

“The time of year was August, summer.”

— Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

Summer, when every year the fringes of the Arctic ice cap melt regardless of the wider effects of global warming.

So were the polar bears stranded?

“They did not appear to be in danger…I did not see the bears get on the ice, and I did not see them get off. I cannot say either way if they were stranded or not.”

— Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

And they didn't appear stranded to Denis Simard of Environment Canada.

He told Canada's National Post.

You have to keep in mind that the bears are not in danger at all. This is a perfect picture for climate change…you have the impression they are in the middle of the ocean and they are going to die...But they were not that far from the coast, and it was possible for them to swim...They are still alive and having fun.

— The National Post (Canada), Gore pays for photo after Canada didn't, 23rd March, 2007

Polar bears are good swimmers. So how did all this come about?

Photographer Amanda Byrd gave her photo to fellow cruiser, Dan Crosbie - to have a look.

“Dan Crosbie gave the image to the Canadian Ice Service, who gave the image to Environment Canada, who distributed the image to 7 media agencies including AP.”

— Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

Associated Press released the photo two and a half years after it was taken, on the day the United Nations released its major global warming report.

That's where Sydney's Sunday Telegraph got the photo, running it with a story taken from the Daily Mail as Neil Breen explains.

…the photograph represents polar bears standing on ice that’s melting. Now obviously there’s a disputed account of when that was taken now, and maybe it was taken in the Alaskan Summer when you would naturally expect ice to melt but at the time it was sent to us, Associated Press in their caption to us told us that the picture was taken of melting ice caps and to do with global warming and that it was sent to them by a Canadian ice authority and we had no reason to question it.

— Statement from Neil Breen (Editor of the Sunday Telegraph) to Media Watch

But Amanda Byrd didn't think her photo necessarily described whether global warming is occurring.

I take neither stand, I simply took the photos...If I released the image myself, it would have been as a striking image. Nothing more.

— Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

That's not how Al Gore saw it.

He used it in a presentation on man made global warming.

"Their habitat is melting... beautiful animals, literally being forced off the planet," Mr. Gore said, with the photo on the screen behind him. "They're in trouble, got nowhere else to go." 
Audience members let out gasps of sympathy…

— The National Post (Canada), Gore pays for photo after Canada didn't, 23rd March, 2007

Well that's because they're bears… and at a distance, they're rather cute.+++++

NY Times leaked emails
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/21/science/earth/21climate.html?_r=1

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25348657-401,00.html
Polar Ice caps are growing. 

http://newsbusters.org/node/12694
Polar bear populations growing

http://www.iceagenow.com/List_of_Expanding_Glaciers.htm

[Trexof4]

I do, just by looking at the satellite pictures and seeing how the ice caps have gotten smaller and other images..

[Nummymommy]

 

Quoting diospira:

 

• I think that for those of us who are committed to a conscious lifestyle, care deeply for our Earth, and are concerned about the effects man's activities have on it, the global warming or climate change question often gets a free pass. It may seem so intuitive that we have damaged the Earth and we perceive changes as the result of our actions.(After all, we have been told they are.) While according to the OP, Republicans and Conservatives are apt to be more skeptical of this theory, those of other political persuasions may have embraced the idea without the critical examination it deserves.

  What I think is important here is that although something makes sense, that does not make it true. In this case, we have had the cause and the effect, the "problem" and the "solution", all provided to us by those who stand to gain big. Indeed, its main salesman and his business buddies have already made millions, and stand to make much more.

   I noticed the OP article made no mention of the leaked emails that show manipulation of scientific fact to match the global warming  agenda. The authenticity of the hacked emails has been admitted. I think that we need to take a hard look at what we are being sold here and see who benefits. We also need to ask ourselves why the scientists were fudging and concealing and dodging FOIA requests. What do they have to hide?  Why are the facts being manipulated here?

  Some may think of those who deny global warming as unenlightened or callous and believe we are supporting our Earth in this way. But the facts show  climate change is a constant; our Earth has in fact warmed before, even before industrialization.

  This issue is complex and we need to apply our critical thinking here and not let our good intentions lead us to support this theory without scrutiny. I know I have reexamined my position on this.

  To me it was eye-opening that even the picture of the stranded polar bears that so tugged at our hearts was not what it was made out to be and was used for mass manipulation.I wonder what others think of the proven deceptive use of this photo. To me it is a red flag.

  We all want to do our best for the Earth. We need to be sure our good intentions are not hijacked for another's gain and not allow ourselves to be  thrown into crisis mode without stopping to think twice.

Australian TV Exposes 'Stranded Polar Bear' Global Warming Hoax

Remember that wonderful picture of stranded polar bears on an ice floe that were used by folks like soon-to-be-Dr. Al Gore to demonstrate how dire the man-made global warming issue is?

Well, ABC television in Australia, on a show called "Media Watch," recently debunked the entire issue (video available here, h/t NB member dscott).

It turns out -- as NewBuster Jake Gontesky reported on March 20 -- the picture was taken in August, "when every year the fringes of the Arctic ice cap melt regardless of the wider effects of global warming."

The photographer, Australian marine biology student Amanda Byrd, didn't think the bears were in any jeopardy:

They did not appear to be in danger...I did not see the bears get on the ice, and I did not see them get off. I cannot say either way if they were stranded or not.

 

Denis Simard of Environment Canada agreed:

You have to keep in mind that the bears are not in danger at all. This is a perfect picture for climate change...you have the impression they are in the middle of the ocean and they are going to die...But they were not that far from the coast, and it was possible for them to swim...They are still alive and having fun.

 

How delicious. Think this kind of broadcast would ever happen in America?

What follows is a full transcript of this segment. Furthermore, here are the e-mail questions answered by the photographer who took the picture. And, here is the full transcript of the interview "Media Watch" did with The Sunday Telegraph's Neil Breen regarding this matter.

Those stranded polar bears on the shrinking Arctic ice - victims of global warming - certainly tugged at the heart-strings.

That photo was published not only in the Sunday Telegraph.

It made it onto the front page of the New York Times.

And the International Herald Tribune.

It also ran in London's Daily Mail, The Times of London and Canada's Ottawa Citizen - and that's just to name a few.

All used it as evidence of global warming and the imminent demise of the polar bear.

But the photo wasn't current. It was two and a half years old.

And it wasn't snapped by Canadian environmentalists.

It was taken by an Australian marine biology student on a field trip.

And in what month did she take it?

"The time of year was August, summer."

- Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

 

Summer, when every year the fringes of the Arctic ice cap melt regardless of the wider effects of global warming.

So were the polar bears stranded?

"They did not appear to be in danger...I did not see the bears get on the ice, and I did not see them get off. I cannot say either way if they were stranded or not."

- Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

 

And they didn't appear stranded to Denis Simard of Environment Canada.

He told Canada's National Post.

You have to keep in mind that the bears are not in danger at all. This is a perfect picture for climate change...you have the impression they are in the middle of the ocean and they are going to die...But they were not that far from the coast, and it was possible for them to swim...They are still alive and having fun.

- The National Post (Canada), Gore pays for photo after Canada didn't, 23rd March, 2007

 

Polar bears are good swimmers. So how did all this come about?

Photographer Amanda Byrd gave her photo to fellow cruiser, Dan Crosbie - to have a look.

"Dan Crosbie gave the image to the Canadian Ice Service, who gave the image to Environment Canada, who distributed the image to 7 media agencies including AP."

- Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

 

Associated Press released the photo two and a half years after it was taken, on the day the United Nations released its major global warming report.

That's where Sydney's Sunday Telegraph got the photo, running it with a story taken from the Daily Mail as Neil Breen explains.

...the photograph represents polar bears standing on ice that's melting. Now obviously there's a disputed account of when that was taken now, and maybe it was taken in the Alaskan Summer when you would naturally expect ice to melt but at the time it was sent to us, Associated Press in their caption to us told us that the picture was taken of melting ice caps and to do with global warming and that it was sent to them by a Canadian ice authority and we had no reason to question it.

- Statement from Neil Breen (Editor of the Sunday Telegraph) to Media Watch

 

But Amanda Byrd didn't think her photo necessarily described whether global warming is occurring.

I take neither stand, I simply took the photos...If I released the image myself, it would have been as a striking image. Nothing more.

- Email from Amanda Byrd to Media Watch

 

That's not how Al Gore saw it.

He used it in a presentation on man made global warming.

"Their habitat is melting... beautiful animals, literally being forced off the planet," Mr. Gore said, with the photo on the screen behind him. "They're in trouble, got nowhere else to go." 
Audience members let out gasps of sympathy...

- The National Post (Canada), Gore pays for photo after Canada didn't, 23rd March, 2007

 

Well that's because they're bears... and at a distance, they're rather cute.+++++

 

 

 

NY Times leaked emails
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/21/science/earth/21climate.html?_r=1

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25348657-401,00.html
Polar Ice caps are growing. 

http://newsbusters.org/node/12694
Polar bear populations growing

http://www.iceagenow.com/List_of_Expanding_Glaciers.htm

 

 

 

 

How can you ignore this:

Antarctica's ice loss helps offset global warming: study

(AFP) - Nov 10, 2009

PARIS - Global warming has been blamed for the alarming loss of ice shelves in Antarctica, but a new study says newly-exposed areas of sea are now soaking up some of the carbon gas that causes the problem.

Scientists led by Lloyd Peck of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) said that atmospheric and ocean carbon is being gobbled up by microscopic marine plants called phytoplankton, which float near the surface.

After absorbing the carbon through the natural process of photosynthesis, the phytoplankton are eaten, or otherwise die and sink to the ocean floor.

The phenomenon, known as a carbon sink, has been spotted in areas of open water exposed by the recent, rapid melting of several ice shelves -- vast floating plaques of ice attached to the shore of the Antarctic peninsula.

Over the last 50 years, around 24,000 square kilometres (9,200 square miles) of new open water have been created this way, and swathes of it are now colonised by phytoplankton, Peck's team reports in a specialist journal, Global Change Biology.

Their estimate, based on images of green algal blooms, is that the phytoplankton absorbs 3.5 million tonnes of carbon, equivalent to 12.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2), the principal greenhouse gas.

To put it in perspective, this is equivalent to the CO2-storing capacity of between 6,000 and 17,000 hectares (15,000 and 42,500 acres) of tropical rainforest, according to the paper.

The tally is minute compared to the quantities of greenhouse gases from fossil fuels and deforestation, which amounted to 8.7 billion tonnes of carbon in 2007.

But, said Peck, "it is nevertheless an important discovery. It shows nature's ability to thrive in the face of adversity.

"We need to factor this natural carbon absorption into our calculations and models to predict future climate change," he said in a BAS press release.

"So far, we don't know if we will see more events like this around the rest of Antarctica's coast, but it's something we'll be keeping an eye on."

The Antarctic peninsula -- the tongue of land that juts up towards South America -- has been hit by greater warming than almost any other region on Earth.

In the past 50 years, temperatures there have risen by 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 degrees Fahrenheit), around six times the global average.

Ice shelves are ledges of thick ice that float on the sea and are attached to the land. They are formed when ice is exuded from glaciers on the land.

In the past 20 years, Antarctica has lost seven ice shelves.

The process is marked by shrinkage and the breakaway of increasingly bigger chunks before the remainder of the shelf snaps away from the coast.

It then disintegrates into debris or into icebergs that eventually melt as they drift northwards.

The Antarctic ice shelves do not add to sea levels when they melt. Like the Arctic ice cap, they float on the sea and thus displace their own volume.

Ice that runs from land into the sea does add, though, to the ocean's volume, which is why some scientists are concerned for the future of the massive icesheets covering Antarctica and Greenland.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ioKN-6tqKqccbLbVgmtkNuDRgo7w

[Clairwil]

Do you believe that humans are causing global warming?

I believe that human activities have been and continue to be a major contributing factor to the current extreme pace of global climate change.

Do you want the government to take action to combat global warming?

The government, organisations and individuals all need to play their parts: to reduce their own impact, to facilitate others to reduce their impact, to ameliorate the effects of the change and pace of change, and to research ways to do the above more efficiently and cheaply.

Do you consider this a pressing issue?

To some more than others.  Some poor countries whose agriculture has already been affected by a recent change of climate are already in dire straights.  Countries with a significant area of land currently at or below sea level are going to need to implement massive infrastructure projects similar to the system of dykes and pumps in The Netherlands.  Rich countries not overly dependent on agriculture will just be hit by more erratic and extreme weather, which is annoying but not crucial to them. However ultimately we are all on this Earth together, and nobody benefits from having other countries destabilise and get taken over by extremist religious or nationalist governments.  Either way, it is definitely an urgent issue because if we go 10 years without agreeing a global deal, billions of Chinese and Indians will have risen above the wealth tipping point where car ownership makes sense and, once that happens, they aren't going to want to give them up.

What is your opinion? 

I am repeatedly amazed how Americans are so willing to let people with money manipulate their opinions.  It is a matter of public record how much money various oil companies have funded any think tank or organisation willing to speak against anthropogenic climate change, muddy the waters or heckle the scientists.  Like Young Earth Creationism and moon landing denial, it flies in the face of science, and yet a significant proportion of the American public are so arrogant, stupid or gulled that they give greater weight to the talking heads in the media than to the immense body of evidence facing them.  "Teach the controversy" indeed.

For the record, scientific issues are NOT always easy to grasp.  It shows immense ignorance of the process and arrogance to think that you can decide the validity of this by looking at temperatures in just one place, or any argument that can be stated in under an hour.

[home-sweet-home]

this

Quoting resamerie:

 

Do you believe that humans are causing global warming? No. Global warming has occured every so often during centuries. It is the Earth's way of renewing itself.

Do you want the government to take action to combat global warming? No again. They can no more stop Global warming than they can stop a hurricane.

What is your opinion?  Do you consider this a pressing issue? I don't think it is a pressing issue. I do believe that the likes of Al Gore & Co. would have you believe so. Even though he is not in government anymore, the man never gives up. Him and the people with the pics of the polar bears and the penguins...follow the money trail. The animals are fine and Gore picked a stupid platform to call his legacy, if you want to call it that. There were no SUV's in the ice age. The Earth is a revolving, everchanging thing. In 2005 we had so many hurricanes that we had to start over the alphabet. This year, none of any destruction hit our country.

Mother Nature will do what she wants and it doesn't matter what you're driving.