Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

facebook.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 237 posts

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#91

Post by DougWebb »

rybosome wrote: post #65

When speaking with people who do not agree with me on the correctness or urgency of global warming, this is the argument I traditionally make: let's examine the worst-case scenarios. Regardless of whether or not you agree with the science, taking it seriously is a logical choice. The plausible worst-case scenario of charging ahead with measures to combat climate change isn't actually that bad, not to mention the anci…

I think the drawback to your argument is that you're not considering all scenarios. One "worst-case" I can think of is that we charge ahead with measures to combat climate change, harming big parts of the economy in the process, and wind up with the famine, drought, and flooding anyway because we didn't charge ahead with the right measures.

It's extremely important to determine whether the global warming is caused by us or not, and whether or not we can alter global warming whether we caused it or not. If it's mostly natural (and we know the earth has gone through much warmer periods long before we showed up) then the measures we need to take involve protecting our coastal cities and our food and energy supplies. If it's mostly caused by us, then we need to stop doing what's causing it, and probably need to protect our coastal cities and food and energy supplies anyway.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#92

Post by jpadkins »

astrodust wrote: post #82
mrfusion wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure a large majority of nutrition scientists supported a low fat diet 20 years ago. (Food for thought)

Most nutritional claims are based on pretty thin evidence and even more scant data. The climate researchers are able to dig back literal millions of years and chart their findings.

> The climate researchers are able to dig back literal millions of years and chart their findings.

sorry, this is pretty funny. Do you know what the data those charts of millions of years are based on? models based on thin evidence and scant data. We are talking like 10 ice cores and 5 trees will swing the data wildly.

I am not a denier (CO2 causes some warming!) but this comment was kinda funny.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#93

Post by DougWebb »

dTal wrote: post #73
NumberCruncher wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe he has a basic understanding of time series analysis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vostok_Petit_data.svg

Notice that the last value in that graph is around 280 ppm, and that it doesn't exceed about 300 in the entire graph (about half a million years). Current CO2 levels recently broke 400 ppm and still rising. To represent the current situation, you'd need to add a spike at the end roughly double the height of that graph.

Does the temperature trend have a similar spike?

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#94

Post by jpadkins »

rybosome wrote: post #65

When speaking with people who do not agree with me on the correctness or urgency of global warming, this is the argument I traditionally make: let's examine the worst-case scenarios. Regardless of whether or not you agree with the science, taking it seriously is a logical choice. The plausible worst-case scenario of charging ahead with measures to combat climate change isn't actually that bad, not to mention the anci…

aggressively stimulating renewables is one thing, but a lot of people are calling for a world wide flat carbon tax. That is a very regressive tax that will hit the poorest the hardest. It will barely register for the average californian, but it will cause many products and services to be priced out of reach from people in developing economies.

So the worst case scenario all depends on what is being proposed.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#95

Post by joshuaheard »

"California has some of the most revolutionary environmental laws in the United States, we get 40% of our power from renewables, and we are 40% more energy efficient than the rest of the country."

California also has the second highest energy costs in the continental United States.

https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cf...

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#96

Post by ksenzee »

lmm wrote: post #37
redblacktree wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be very interested in an all-electric minivan with enough range for my frequent 600-mile trips to my wife's home town. Sadly, this does not yet exist.

You make a 10-hour-each-way trip frequently? Man, stop throwing away your life like that. Downsize your house, take a pay cut, do whatever it is you have to to move somewhere closer. I struggle to even begin to imagine the misery of what you're doing.

What are the roads like where you live? Because in my part of the world a ten-hour drive is a pleasant way to spend a vacation day. I look forward to road trips.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#97

Post by morsch »

If it takes Arnold Schwarzenegger and a frankly preposterous "sealed room" analogy in order to convince people to slow down on emissions, and recasting the emissions issue as a pollution issue -- as if there was a difference -- in order for them to safe face, so be it.

Of course those electric cars still virtually emit CO2^Wpollution when you refuel them using coal-generated power, so I guess we can go back to going back and forth about the pros and cons of nuclear energy now.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#98

Post by lmm »

ksenzee wrote: post #96
lmm wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You make a 10-hour-each-way trip frequently? Man, stop throwing away your life like that. Downsize your house, take a pay cut, do whatever it is you have to to move somewhere closer. I struggle to even begin to imagine the misery of what you're doing.

What are the roads like where you live? Because in my part of the world a ten-hour drive is a pleasant way to spend a vacation day. I look forward to road trips.

A new road you haven't seen before, sure. But the same one frequently?

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#99

Post by nickpsecurity »

rybosome wrote: post #78
lmm wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There always will be a debate on global warming. So keeping global warming as the prime focus of fossil fuel usage kept people divided. Bullshit. Whatever the focus was, vested interests would have funded opposition and that's what kept people divided.

Hear, hear. The fossil-fuel industry fought long and hard to sow doubt that ambient lead levels in the atmosphere were increasing due to the burning of leaded gasoline. Losing on that point, they then attempted to prove that low levels of lead are not harmful to humans; this has since been shown to be wildly inaccurate. It blows my fucking mind that people accuse scientists of being untrustworthy due to having a fina…

Well-said. There's financial interests on both sides but oil industry has shown itself to go to any lengths to keep its conflict high.

Re: Schwarzenegger: I don’t give a damn if we agree about climate change

#100

Post by coldtea »

OniBait wrote: post #75
toomuchtodo wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain your lack of belief when 97% of climate scientists (there's conflicting data on this; some reports show as high as 99%) agree that human activity is causing global warming? EDIT: That's not rhetorical. I'll entertain any logical reasoning you have as to why your reasoning is superior to those educated and practicing the subject daily.

I thought the 97% of climate scientists claim (based on Cook et al) was shown to be a really flawed study. In any event, Consensus does not equal science. I think given the broad definition of "human activity is causing global warming", you'd be hard pressed to find disagreement. If you refine it to "human activity is causing a majority of global warming and that warming is bad" there is a lot less agreement.

>I thought the 97% of climate scientists claim (based on Cook et al) was shown to be a really flawed study.

Only according to really flawed and biased sources.

>In any event, Consensus does not equal science.

Actually science is very much the consensus among practicing scientists.

Short of reproducing millions of man-hours of international research to verify or refute it personally, what exactly would be the alternative?

Post reply on HN