And i could give a rat’s ass about the “debate” about the reality of man-made climate change. The fact remains that we will eat, drink and breathe everything that we put into the environment. It boils down to waste. CO2 is a waste product that doubles as the input for the photosynthetic cycle; change is bound to occur when there is more CO2 than the photosynthesizers can process. It is out of balance because we’re releasing a bunch of it that prehistoric plants had previously sequestered while going about their business.

We don’t have a carbon crises, we have a hydrogen problem. That is, we still haven’t figured out an efficient way to get hydrogen for the purposes of combustion.

And we have a garbage crises because we’re still operating under a set of initial conditions that held true at the beginning of the industrial revolution when resources were cheap and labor was dear. To which we must add a zeitgeist of disposability, but as i said above…what we dispose comes back around.

Take a long walk in the woods. You’ll note that what one thing produces as waste is used as an input for something else. That’s where we fail: our waste is just waste. (Though to be fair, Life will find a way to use it on a long enough time line, but we fancy thumbed monkeys probably won’t be around to marvel at it.)

Not at all. It’s just very suspicious what and how we are being fed about climate change and it reeks of manipulation. We know what the end game is, we have an idea who the players are (some of them), and the motive seems to be profit and power.

Who among us would embrace cap and trade without a crisis? No one, I hope.

The dancing climate data we are being offered to justify cap and trade is convincing only with proper framing and coddling. And my point is if the crisis is real, if our existence depends on reeling back CO2 levels, then let’s do it. We have the means, just not the will.

So I am left to conclude that the people that matter know that the crisis is not what it is being sold as, to think otherwise would mean that they are incompetent to the point of malice. At the moment many citizens are paying attention. If enough years go by without devastating climatic tumult, well, the argument crumbles. So they must move cap and trade NOW.

Cap and trade is the prize here, not saving the earth. The earth may well need saving, but like I say, the people who matter aren’t doing anything that will make a difference. They have to live here, too, so I don’t think they’ll throw the earth into the abyss for a few years of profit. At least I hope not.

Sadly, even its advocates admit that cap and trade will do little to fix things. At the moment the only thing that will is a lot of nuclear power and much better batteries for decentralized uses like transportation. But not a dang thing is being done toward that end. Nothing beyond lip service.

See why it’s easy to distrust all of it?

And I like people, too. Some of my best friends are people. I married a people.

And I think jellyfish are very sensitive to acidic pH — they will be among the first to go. I know that is true for fresh water jellies. Fascinating creatures, devilishly hard to breed in an aquarium, most species have never been cultured.

No, we aren’t all dead anyway. We’ll survive despite of the politicians trying to save us.
Can’t wait to see what the next crisis will be — I’m tired of this one.

So yeah, the Earth will shake us and our influence off eventually, but for the moment and immediate future, we’re living in the Anthropocene, and we need to regulate ourselves for the sake of our families and our species.

As George Carlin once said, “The planet is fine – the people are fucked.” I, for one, generally like the people.

Our current climate and especially our ecosystem is the sum of all past climate changes, from the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere to the timing of the monsoons. But that wasn’t my point — natural forces dwarf anything Man can do both in magnitude and duration. Clearly we can be a powerful influence, sadly mostly in terms of destroying habitat and depleting species. The overfishing of the North Atlantic Cod has trigged a trophic cascade so that when the fishing was finally stopped, the cod didn’t return. Other species filled their niche. There is no clear way to restore the cod at the moment. What a shame.

So you don’t like cap and trade either. Good, we can work from there. But from where I sit it’s clear that our leadership is much more concerned with implementing cap and trade than they are in really reducing carbon emissions. Look at the ethanol policy. What a travesty. And both parties are guilty.

scripto brought up an interesting point. He mentioned nuclear power, so here goes: Japan gets 90 % or so of their power from nukes. Until recently I believed the common line that they have little coal and no oil, so they use nukes to cut imports. OK, sounds fine to there.

At least part of their reasons came out in a verbal exchange with the Chinese. A Japanese official supposedly told the Chinese that Japan can have 3000 nuclear weapons whenever they want them. Building nukes isn’t hard, but it takes years to make enough fissile material. Japan is using their large number of nuclear power plants as an excuse to keep those materials at hand in quantity. And I think truth be told, France is doing the same thing. Back in the day DeGaulle had warheads aimed at the Soviet Bloc as well as the US and the UK.

Did you see that they are backing off on the influence of CFCs and upper atmosphere ozone destruction? Seems that CFC concentrations aren’t nearly as connected to ozone levels after all — has more to do with fluctuations in solar radiation. But the jury is still out, and always will be.

So my point on CO2 levels is this — if the crisis is what we are being told it is, we need to clamp CO2 output today, by force if necessary. Strictly ration gasoline, electricity, nat gas, coal. Industry globally needs to be cut back to essential services only. What carbon resources that are used need to go into food production and distribution, populations that can’t survive the winter without fossil fuels must be relocated to warmer areas. Air conditioning is a thing of the past. We can cut mankind’s CO2 emissions to what we breathe in a matter of months. If there really is a crisis.

But no — we are told the end is nigh, but we don’t have to give up anything. First we need to believe, and then just do some ceremonial things like recycle, ride the bus now and then, maybe drive a hybrid, and oh yes, implement cap and trade. All will be well if we do that, all will be well.

If there is a crisis, the people in charge don’t really believe it, because they certainly aren’t acting like they do. Once they have what they want, they will de-fund the supporting research and begin ginning up the next crisis. The academics who want to be funded and published will quickly find ways to prove the new paradigm. And after a while there will be a consensus.

Too cynical, or not cynical enough? Time will tell.

You tell’m! Brian is a victim of getting lost in a list of facts and never developing a gestalt view. Happens all too easily, and I know I’m guilty. Ironically it’s never been easier to follow a topic over
decades of publication. Very few ‘consensuses’ survive over time, and often the ones that do are often driven by cultural/political/economic agendas until they reach an inflection point. Take cranial size correlated to intelligence applied to racial groups during the 18th and 19th centuries. Carumbua.

That consensus was destructive and horribly wrong, but it held up for many, many decades.

Do a little research? Heh. Better to do a lot of research without a preset conclusion.

Thanks,

Cal

The question is not whether climate has changed in the past, Cal. The question is “why is climate changing today?” And on that question, the science is abundantly clear – the bulk of the changes are as a result of human emissions of greenhouse gases.

FWIW, I’m not thrilled with the current cap and trade system myself, as I’ve said here at S&R several times in the last month or two (do a site search on ACES or Waxman-Markey if you want to see those posts). But given the state of the science and the forecasted changes coming from scientists, we’d be foolish not to address CO2 emissions somehow.

Now, if you do what amounts to the same thing with liquefied aluminum and you’ll find nanoparticles of aluminum. The difference is that they won’t evaporate, they’ll solidify and become just one more component of dust.

Now, look at how many different minerals are found in concrete aggregates, and then look up the composition of those minerals. Notice how many of those minerals have aluminum in them. Pulverize those minerals in large quantities and you’ll find nano-scale aluminum particles.

Do another experiment, gringo – take a piece of sand or salt and smack it with a hammer. If you look closely, you’ll see that it produces dust. That dust will behave similar to the water droplets – you’ll get particles at all scales. Now what are most electronic integrated circuits packaged in? The ones that aren’t plastic are in alumina and similar aluminum-based ceramics. Resistors are largely manufactured on alumina bases. Capacitors come in three common types, two of which have a significant amount of aluminum in them – ceramic capacitors and aluminum electrolytics (which, not at all coincidentally, are usually flammable and have extremely small aluminum membranes that could easily be pulverized into nanoscale dust).

And finally, what would you call the air popping out from between your hands? I call it a shock wave, although that might not be the correct technical term. And last I checked, I still feel the pulse of energy on the opposite side of my hand too.

An interesting note – if you’ve not watched the Demolition Derby episode of Mythbusters (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSVfYwdGSsQ) where they use a rocket sled to destroy a compact car, I highly recommend it. The energy of the collision was roughly 10,000,000 J. The collapse of a single floor of the WTC, just hitting the floor below it, is roughly 10x that amount. If you notice the amount of metal that is reduced to dust in the time-lapse photography, it doesn’t take, as you said in the other post, “Star Wars weaponry” or dropping the building from space to turn plastic, metal, coatings, rock, concrete, into ultrafine dust.

Did I say Toba warmed the earth?

Major volcanic events are significant sources of CO2, but none have happened since humans have been around. Remember the statistician who drowned in the lake that was on average 2 feet deep? Yearly CO2 output from volcanoes is a misleading number without including the big events. Some argue that the sulfur emissions are more relevant to climate change, and I believe they have a point. Particulates play their role, too, especially in the decades right after an event.

I disagree — the magnitude of natural processes compared to anthropic influences is terribly relevant, and in fact is the core weakness of the cap and trade advocates position. We can argue ad infinitum, but only time will sort things out. One modest geologic event can and eventually will wipe away any positive impact of our society shutting down completely.

And natural climate change happens quickly, ice ages end in centuries, droughts can start in a single season.

But like I say, we have more than enough reasons to move away from oil
and coal without invoking climate change. And we will all be better off without
cap and trade except those who will profit from it.

Ironically, when it comes to the mean temperature of the earth and the changes we’ve seen
over time, the sun is probably the driver. The last pole to pole glaciation ended 640 million years ago with the close of the Proterozoic Eon, and there had been at least one other event before that. Some studies suggest that the sun is 6-10% warmer now than it was then, but I’ve seen different numbers. Of course this line of thought could all be wiped away with the next published study.

Way back when I was in school it was generally thought that the earth has steadily cooled from the molten state until the modern ice ages began a few million years ago. Now it seems the surface temps have been all over the place.

China produces more CO2 than we do besides releasing tons of really nasty toxics into the air, and India is close behind. What should we do with them? I’ve heard some say that if we cap and trade, we will set such a positive example that they will follow. OK. I really doubt it, but it’s a lovely thought.

talk about pot calling kettle black. brian knows as much physics as the average 10 year old, yet goes on to theorize about “shock waves” and thinks gravity can turn common office matls into nanothermite!

do at least a little research, indeed.

Toba cooled the planet for a decade, not warmed it (links: http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008JD011652.shtml, http://www.ccsm.ucar.edu/…/Ammann_CCSM_PaleoWG_Summer2006.ppt), and this is what happens during highly explosive eruptions like Toba or, more recently, Pinatubo. Volcanism in general today emits WAY less CO2 than human consumption of fossil fuels (link: http://www.scholarsandrogues.com/2007/07/23/anti-global-heating-claims-a-reasonably-thorough-debunking/#m20).

The Siberian traps erupted more or less continuously for something like a million years and are strongly suspected to have caused a mass extinction as a result (links: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/02/04/volcano-mass-extinction.html, http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/253/5016/176). Just because geologic forces emit far more CO2 than humanity ever could dream of doesn’t mean that this fact is relevant – the span of time during which that CO2 has been emitted matters here (link: http://www.scholarsandrogues.com/2007/07/23/anti-global-heating-claims-a-reasonably-thorough-debunking/#m1).

We could take all of the fossil fuel from all of the oil and coal fields and burn them today, right now — whoosh — and the CO2 output wouldn’t be a pimple on the butt of a Toba class event or even be noticed while the Siberian Traps were erupting.

The cap and traders are appealing to our inner need to feel like we are contributing members of the world, giving up for the common good so we can feel good about ourselves and each other. Waste is never good, we should constantly think about what we do and how we do it. But we are kidding ourselves if we think we are saving the world by sorting garbage or being ‘nice citizens’ by submitting to cap and trade. As long as we never look behind the curtain we can feel good about higher prices and blunted economic growth. Over the decades the cap and traders will make trillions, and we will pay trillions while we ride buses and sort garbage. Oh boy, can’t wait.

again, the vids clearly show the towers turning to dust *as they fell*. no pile driver existed. why did the 47 core columns (5″ thick steel box columns) just disappear all the way to the ground when there was no mass to even bend them? a shock wave? from what? did that same shock wave bring down wtc7 at 5:20 pm?

and the govt theory says nothing about a “shock wave”. it was a “pancake collapse”. i.e. progressive failure caused by the top floors crushing those below. and get this – their own computer simulations show the core columns still standing, as they would have if the lightweight floor systems sheared from the columns.

then look at the photos showing the columns were sheared at a nice neat 45 degree angle (typical in controlled demo to get the building ‘walking’), with molten metal dripping down the sides. clearly cut by something. shock wave, or nanothermite? which is more plausible?

as far as the cover up, i don’t know how they pulled it off either. but i have seen a LOT of damning footage of that day, eyewitness reports http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n593Hth8h9M etc. that were completely deep-sixed on 9/12. just as was wtc7. and the missing plane in shanksville. and the disappeared black boxes (all 4). and that the bushes and bin ladens are very cozy and have deep biz ties. and that bush sr. met with bin laden’s brother on 9.10.01. and that the cia created the taliban whose evil stepchild is al qaeda (aka ‘the database’, see: zbig). and that u.s. companies/govt routinely arm, fund, and train right wing terrorists and dictators in the southern hemisphere (school of the americas). and that wtc was bought from NYC port auth. for the first time in early 2001 by a very sophisticated re developer (silverstein), even though the buildings always operated in an ocean of red ink and needed billions in retro work for asbestos removal, and then he made billions on the insurance claim. and the fact that marvin bush was a principal in the company (securacom) that had the contract for wtc security until 9/10/01! seems newsworthy, no? how did they cover all that up? i don’t know, but they certainly did.

another bizarre ‘fact’: the off. story says the plane that hit the pentagon was ‘vaporized’ on impact. as was its black box (yet another first). yet they identified *all but five of the crash victims thru dna and dental records*. got that? aluminum, steel and titanium vaporized. dna survived. huh?!? there were no bodies removed from the site, so where exactly was said dna found? and where are all those tapes from the cameras that were trained on the pentagon that day. apparently vaporized as well.

this all sounds too bizarre to believe. are these all just ‘coincidences’? maybe i’m making it all up. check for yourself.

read pnac’s rebuilding america’s defenses written in 1999. the entire war on terror is outlined there, as is knocking off saddam hussein, as well as building up of the arms industry to cold war levels, as well as taking control of mideast oil, as well as ‘total spectrum dominance’, as well as a need for ‘a new pearl harbor’ to kick it all off. then check out operation northwoods that was declassified in 2002. motive, means, intent. qui bono?

many people in the cia, military, aviation, flight control, FD, and sciences agree that the OS just does not add up – at all. read their statements at the ‘patriots question’ link and see if you find any of these people credible, or any of thier questions valid.

ok, wrong forum. this space belongs to S&R (sorry guys). that’s all the arguing i’m going to do. only you can convince yourself of anything, bryan. i’m convinced that gravity cannot bring down rigid structures at the rate of 11 floors per second, and simultaneously turn them to dust. you don’t need to be a conspiracy theorist to realize that that is a physical impossibility.

Sorry, gringo. Not buying it. A conspiracy that large would have given itself away, and no-one has ever come up with a way to convince me of that.

(ScienceDaily – July 15, 2009) In a recent issue of Nature Nanotechnology Letters, N.J. Tao – a researcher at the Biodesign Institute of Arizona State University – describes the first direct measurement of a fundamental property of graphene, known as quantum capacitance, using an electrochemical gate method. A better understanding of this crucial variable should prove invaluable to other investigators participating in what amounts to a gold rush of graphene research…

Graphene is remarkable in terms of thinness and resiliency. A one-atom thick graphene sheet sufficient in size to cover a football field, would weigh less than a gram. It is also the strongest material in nature—roughly 200 times the strength of steel. Most of the excitement however, has to do with the unusual electronic properties of the material…

Graphene displays outstanding electron transport, permitting electricity to flow rapidly and more or less unimpeded through the material. In fact, electrons have been shown to behave as massless particles similar to photons, zipping across a graphene layer without scattering. This property is critical for many device applications and has prompted speculation that graphene could eventually supplant silicon as the substance of choice for computer chips, offering the prospect of ultrafast computers operating at terahertz speeds, rocketing past current gigahertz chip technology.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090709095420.htm

watch the vids. it is not collapse. there is no pile driver, just a massive cloud of dust. clearly explosions. and bldg 7 fell due to, wait for it, a completely new phenomena, thermal expansion, per nist. all at the speed of free fall. hence, zero resistance from below. curious, no?

and per the coroner and mayor, there was no plane in shanksville, just a smoking crater, as seen on pics, vids and news reports. rummy said the flt was ’shot down’ on live tape. the wreckage was found scattered around an 8 mile radius.

i could go on and on about all the falsities of the official conspiracy theory, but i realize no one wants to believe people (americans) could be so evil, hence complete cog dissonance. don’t believe me, i’m just a civil engineer, see what these people have to say: http://www.patriotsquestion911.com/