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A) no. CO2 follows, rather than causes temperature. That is the debate regarding Al Gore's famous hockey stick graph
B) it is minimal, meaning that for the purposes of GW, it is being blown out of proportion

This is from opposing scientists. If it was so crystal clear, a debate would be invited -- but is avoided by Gore. This makes me think GW is shaky science.

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Watch the videos I posted earlier in the thread. They should explain it pretty well. You are looking at the whole issue backwards.

Add a third and fourth question:
C) How much of a CO2 rise are we causing?
.......
D) Will an increase in temperature have more negative effects than the prescription of reducing the pace of industrialization?
.......

D) isn't relevant to the discussion of climate change occurring or not.

Oh yeah +1 on the financial interests coming from both sides. I think those recently leaked documents from the GW denial propaganda group make it clear why we shouldn't be so quick to accept Gore/youtube videos out there.

Add a third and fourth question:
C) How much of a CO2 rise are we causing?
.......
D) Will an increase in temperature have more negative effects than the prescription of reducing the pace of industrialization?
.......

C) All of it.
D) It is a pretty big deal because it will hurt the fresh water supply - which is already FUBAR.

D) isn't relevant to the discussion of climate change occurring or not.

I accept climate change and that humans are a factor, and the questions I asked are very closely related. Do you really think we need to start separate threads for people who accept climate change and want to ask how much is attributable to humans, and another thread for peoples opinions on the policy response to climate change?

D) It is a pretty big deal because it will hurt the fresh water supply - which is already FUBAR.

I haven't seen anything on this before, can you point me to something?

Really? The people who have the biggest financial stake in this are the ones who proposing that climate change is happening? As opposed to some of the largest companies on earth? ,,,,,,,,,,

Under Bush Sr., government money for climate science was $107million. Today, it is more than $2billion. Might be even be more today.

Solyndra is an example of a push for government invested Green Energy. $500million. Failed
Lot's of other companies/universities getting government cash.
Al Gore is up to $100million net worth.

Global Carbon Tax <-- this is probably the one thing is sets me off more than anything.....otherwise none of it would bother me in the least. Climate Taxes. Is there anything more globally encapsulating than climate. Genius scam. The air we breathe is monitored and taxed.

I haven't seen anything on this before, can you point me to something?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSxaVcJ1sDA

This is a reasonable start.

Sneakers what's your ideal current policy for this, or changes to policy? Also do you think if we keep going down this totalitarian climate change path that it will be strongly endorsed whether it's true or not, aggressively enforced in ways that benefit certain people in charge (at a cost to certain other specific groups) and it will take a very long time or never before humans know any different?

Global Carbon Tax <-- this is probably the one thing is sets me off more than anything.....otherwise none of it would bother me in the least. Climate Taxes. Is there anything more globally encapsulating than climate. Genius scam. The air we breathe is monitored and taxed.

So you prefer that people are allowed to externalize all their costs to society as a whole and have no responsibilities for their actions?

Under Bush Sr., government money for climate science was $107million. Today, it is more than $2billion. Might be even be more today.

Solyndra is an example of a push for government invested Green Energy. $500million. Failed
Lot's of other companies/universities getting government cash.
Al Gore is up to $100million net worth.

Global Carbon Tax <-- this is probably the one thing is sets me off more than anything.....otherwise none of it would bother me in the least. Climate Taxes. Is there anything more globally encapsulating than climate. Genius scam. The air we breathe is monitored and taxed.

Exxon made more than 10 billion dollars (profit - revenues were over 100B) in the first _quarter_ of 2011. Obviously both sides have a financial stake in this, but frankly you're crazy if you think oil companies and other related industries aren't the largest players.

As far as government money for research is concerned, I'm very heavily biased, but if every cent we currently spend on defense went instead towards scientific research I wouldn't bat an eyelash, so going from 100M to 2B in climate science research sounds more like a gigantic win than a negative in my view. I also don't see why you'd be upset about government sponsored companies trying to produce green energy -what exactly is the downside of renewable, safer energy? Even if you think climate change is complete bullshit, I don't know how you can argue with scientific advancement and more efficient fuel (especially if we are the tech leaders in said industry). And Al Gore is worth a lot of money because lots of people, some good, some bad, want Al to trumpet their cause to the world.

I don't know anything about how exactly the global carbon tax works, but it sounds to me like you're way more angry about a tax in general than what it stands for. Also I'm pretty sure scientists had fairly little to do with that idea, it sure sounds like an economic incentive to me.

Just based on what I've read in this thread, the most likely scenario here is something like this:

1) Climate change does in fact exist
2) It's not a 100% certainty that it's as horrible as some people claim (but still bad)
3) Lots of people in business/politics have latched onto a mostly scientific issue and tried to shove it in the public's face
4) The dissemination of information on this issue, both from scientists and politicians, has been terrible
5) Some people involved in this issue may be exaggerating data/claims to scare people into waking up (because nothing else has worked?)

That being said, when 98% of scientists agree on an issue, and most of the ones who don't are either unsure or employed by oil companies, the writing may in fact be on the wall.

eta: regarding that 100M--->2B increase in climate science funding. It's very likely that that change coincided with a decrease in research funding somewhere else. Or there was a budget increase for the NIH and they decided where it went (this is normally governed by who they are getting funding applications from, not their pet projects). It's not like Bill Clinton could have said "hey, take this 2B and go find me some data about climate change!".

Sneakers what's your ideal current policy for this, or changes to policy? Also do you think if we keep going down this totalitarian climate change path that it will be strongly endorsed whether it's true or not, aggressively enforced in ways that benefit certain people in charge (at a cost to certain other specific groups) and it will take a very long time or never before humans know any different?

Sneakers what's your ideal current policy for this, or changes to policy? Also do you think if we keep going down this totalitarian climate change path that it will be strongly endorsed whether it's true or not, aggressively enforced in ways that benefit certain people in charge (at a cost to certain other specific groups) and it will take a very long time or never before humans know any different?

I guess I do think there has been a somewhat tolitarian push to save the planet for climate change, without regard for the affects on economies around the world.

For example, the push for ethanol jacked up the price of staple foods, which seriously affected the poor in developing countries. California is yet another example of an economy that is going bankrupt because of anti-capitalist pro-environment/name-your-thing laws. California's extreme environmental laws negatively affect the transportation of goods and the startup/maintenance/fixed costs for companies (economic growth). For that reason, it is difficult for California (an example) to compete with other countries/states. Companies leave. Economy tanks.


Policies? Good question. I guess I believe more in education vs forced mandates/legislations. Education is great. I do not oppose this at all. What I am strongly against are government mandates that are destructive to economies -- without consequences for being wrong. The consequences of a company being wrong is failure or losing money. The consequences of government/politicians being wrong is simply to make another law. Short answer: education good.....fervent legislation bad.

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Note: I haven't gotten anything done all morning. Need to break away for now. I appreciate the posts that have shown a little bit of neutral thinking. Those are more convincing to a change in my opinion on this topic.

Well I think it's pretty clear that the aim of any good economic policy should have the habitability of the planet as a primary concern. If the planet becomes uninhabitable obviously that does a lot of bad things for the world economy. As basic as this might sound, it seems as though these sort of externalities are regularly neglected by many economic theorists.

Policies? Good question. I guess I believe more in education vs forced mandates/legislations. Education is great. I do not oppose this at all. What I am strongly against are government mandates that are destructive to economies -- without consequences for being wrong. The consequences of a company being wrong is failure or losing money. The consequences of government/politicians being wrong is simply to make another law. Short answer: education good.....fervent legislation bad.

But who are we educating? And what are we saying? If over half of Americans still think that evolution is a lie, how do we plan on convincing the public about climate change?

Legislation that allows power companies to impose costs on others without paying a price is basically the same as a subsidy. So what he have right now actually is "fervent legislation".