Seeing some of the reactions on the Greta Thunberg Gunged thread in the Messy forum made me wonder what people's general views on climate change actually are. On most social media sites we all tend to end up in some degree of echo chamber with people who think similarly to ourselves, and it's easy to end up thinking everyone else must think that way too, when in fact views tend to be far more diverse. One of the advantages of this site is that it brings toghether a vast cross-section of views from all across the spectrum, so it can be really interesting to find out how diverse people's views are.

So, what do we all think about climate change - oncoming apocalypse, complete hoax, or somewhere in between? Vote in the poll and feel free to comment as well, though a few ground rules:

1. Respect everyone else's views, even if you don't agree with them.
2. Remember MM's main rule, "respect the party."

Well, DM, none of the above.

Well, none of the above. Climate change will pose serious problems but it is hardly an apocalypse.

Some areas, such as Canada and Russia will benefit from longer growing seasons in return for more flooding and tornadoes.

Other areas will vanish under the oceans.

Climate is a major problem which has been contributed to by human actions and inactions. We should urgently try to reverse its effects.

But there's no point in panicking. And demanding that people make immediate and sharp changes to their lifestyles will result in pushback, both domestically and in the developing world (especially China).

Start with the professionals / experts who actually study this stuff for a living.

https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/

Page 59 (or 13 of 46 pages in the PDF) of
SR15_Chapter1_Low_Res.pdf

"In the absence of strong natural forcing due to changes in solar or
volcanic activity, the difference between total and human-induced
warming is small: assessing empirical studies quantifying solar and
volcanic contributions to GMST from 1890 to 2010, AR5 (Figure 10.6
of Bindoff et al., 2013) found their net impact on warming over the
full period to be less than plus or minus 0.1C. Figure 1.2 shows that
the level of human-induced warming has been indistinguishable from
total observed warming since 2000, including over the decade 2006
2015."

And the instant anyone dismisses these experts "because they get paid"
or are "part of the government",
I get to dismiss any BULLSHIT from judges and lawyers and attorneys
or the FBI about what "the law" allegedly says, like this BULLSHIT MYTH
that "you're not allowed to talk about some ongoing lawsuit or criminal case".
Sorry. That violates freedom of speech.

This might be an unpopular video from an unpopular source but it may be of interest to some:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwqIy8Ikv-c

I believe that texchnology will be our saviour but untill the technology is invented we must do our part to save the world. The world won't heal naturally on it's own. We live here, we must prevail, beacuse we can't just jump on a space ship and move to another habitable world.

Stupid fucking question. Stupid fucking poll.
There's no debate.
It's only a matter of how bad.

Nearly all actively publishing climate scientists (9798%) support the consensus on anthropogenic climate change, and the remaining 2% of contrarian studies either cannot be replicated or contain errors.

Might as well asked "Do you believe in evolution or the Big Bang"?

Especially at a wank site.

Again... the only "opinion" one should care about are the actual PROOFS from the specialists, experts in this field:

From http://bartonpaullevenson.com/ModelsReliable.html

bartonpaullevenson com ModelsReliable

Proof of the Law of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).

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Balling, R.C. et al. 1998. "Analysis of winter and summer warming rates in gridded temperature time series." Climate Research 9, 175-181.

Broecker, W.S. 1975. "Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?" Science 189, 460-463.

Callendar, G.S. 1938. "The Artificial Production of Carbon Dioxide and Its Influence on Climate." Quart. J. Roy. Meteorol. Soc. 64, 223-240.
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F. J., Ammann, C., Arblaster, J., Bettge, T., Washington, W. M., Tayler, K. E., Boyle,
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Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, R. Ruedy, A. Lacis, K. Asamoah, S. Borenstein, E. Brown, B. Cairns, G. Caliri, M. Campbell,
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Holland, M.M. and C.M. Bitz 2003. "Polar Amplification of Climate Change in Coupled Models." Climate Dynamics 21, 221-232.
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Proceedings of the National Academies of Science 105, 13252-13257.

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Quaternary Science Reviews 24, Pages 835-852.

Mears, Carl A. and Wentz, Frank J. 2005. "The Effect of Diurnal Correction on Satellite-Derived Lower Tropospheric Temperature." Science 309, 1548-1551.
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Journal of Climate 17, 12721282.

Philipona, R., B. Dr, C. Marty, A. Ohmura, and M. Wild 2004.
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Geophys. Res. Lett. 31, L03202

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The conference on the Hadley circulation: Present, Past and Future, 1215 November, 2002, Honolulu, HI.

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J. Arblaster, T. Bettge,
W.M. Washington, K.E. Taylor, J.S. Boyle, W. Brgemann and C. Doutriaux 2003.
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Science 300, 1280-1284.

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Santer, B.D., T.M.L. Wigley, C. Mears, F.J. Wentz, S.A. Klein, D.J. Seidel,
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Interesting responses, and "we must act now" is currently clearly the dominant viewpoint. But this wasn't intended as any kind of anti-climate-science thing, as it happens I'm firmly in the "it's real, we need to take urgent action, technology may help but we also need to reduce consumption" camp. But the vehemence of some of the negative reactions to the "Greta Thunberg Gunged" thread in the main Messy forum made me wonder what the actual range of views that might exist here, as opposed to the rather more "echo chamber" of my general social media accounts, where pretty much everyone is centre-left (by UK standards, so probably full-left by US ones) and believes in climate science. One of the features of single-focus sites like this one is that you do tend to get a wider range of views represented. I've had conversations with full on Conservatives here, which doesn't happen in my usual social circles, for instance.

Looking at the results so far, I'm actually susprised there isn't more support for the apocalyptic option, as that tends to be how I usually look at it. But then I read about the massive strides that are being taken in moving away from fossil fuel, and developments like technologies to extract CO2 from the air, and think that perhaps there is a future after all. Definitely interested to see the range of views. And as I said in the initial post, please don't jump on anyone's viewpoint, the idea is to gather stats, not beat people into submission by weight of links. Beating people into submission mostly belongs over on UMD Fetish.

I'll freely admit that I haven't read any of the papers in that list, so I can't comment on them. However, I'm curious - how many have you (ZET) read?

Also, if I follow that link I get a 404 error. Looking at the Wayback Machine, it was taken down sometime between 2015 and 2018; here's the most recent copy they have (which was updated in 2011):
https://web.archive.org/web/20150524095145/http://bartonpaullevenson.com/ModelsReliable.html

So, I'm guessing that you've been copy/pasting the same text for several years...

FYI, here's the live copy of that page:
https://www.bartonlevenson.com/ModelsReliable.html
(I assume that the writer lost control of his old website, so it's been taken over by spammy "product reviews".)

It's worth noting that this is part of a larger section of his website: "Why the Global Warming Deniers are WRONG"
https://www.bartonlevenson.com/Climatology.html

So, I don't think that actually supports your view! (Assuming that you agree with the IPCC as per your first comment.)

Just as a point of observation from working in plastic manufacturing:

Go to sea, drill for oil. carry oil to refinery. Separate oil into liquids and solids.
Solid products get turned into plastic pellets. Pellets sent to manufacturers. Manufacturers make food containers. Containers bought and have food packed in them. containers now move to supermarket. you buy containers, eat food (or pour it on yourself). you throw container in rubbish/ recycle or away.

Tell me, at any point in this chain, is there:
pollution or a potential for?
likelihood of environmental damage from processes involved?
a potential of human error resulting in ecological disaster?

Climate change is a real thing. Why? Because we're only a couple of disasters away from wiping out important food chains.

I'm 50/50 between 1, a natural thing which is happening and we need to adapt a little and 2, a load of made up bollocks which should be ignored. Personally I don't give a fuck about it and think;

1, Its boring, 2, there's something in it for everyone. Politicians like it as it's an excuse to impose taxes and oppressive legislation, the rent a gob must protest about something brigade like it as it's given them something to go on about now that nuclear weapons are no longer a live issue. 3, it attracts fruitcakes, weirdos, the chattering classes, professional protesters and the extremist political fringe.

Our here, in the real world of low paid jobs, where I am, we've got more to worry about like getting from one pay day to the next, let the comfortably off middle classes obsess about this shit. The climate has been changing since the earth began, 10000 years ago there was an ice age, 5000 years ago the Sahara desert was cultivated, 500 years ago the River Thames used to freeze up every winter.

Its being force fed constantly and it's like something from Nazi Germany or North Korea and I am absolutely sick to fucking death of this fucking stupid doomsday cult and these disruptive eco fascists who block people from doing their fucking jobs should be arrested and put in fucking prison camps.

I might be conservative on this, but on the economy I am strongly left wing and anti capitalist, the trouble with the political left us that it wastes energy on fringe stuff like this, and this identity politics shite, 72 genders? WTF? there's bastard two, end fucking of!!!

More fucking woke shit.

Rant over, everything is shit and I don't vote any more.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Zax9XTHUlo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRTic6mjCFk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EA4tDYwNYo

Just Have a Think
channel has some loads of excellent videos about energy, technology, debunking greenwashing scams.

My favorite is this one on Nuclear Fusion: Revolutionary new breakthrough

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlGzt9ur1bY

Credit where credit is due: no one can accuse you of not living up to your username.

Forwarded to me by a friend just today

Please re-read the original post. The objective here is NOT to try and persuade anyone in any direction, I just wanted a sample of opinion / belief. By spamming the thread with multiple arguments in one direction, and trying to bludgeon people into submission by enormous chunks of data, all you're doing is likely driving away the people who's views I actually wanted to collate.

Given the current scientific consensus you're very unlikely to change anyone's views with evangelism, most people's views, like Angry from Manchester upthread, will by now be fixed.

So please knock off the preaching. The objective here was to gather diverse data, not try and force people into consensus.

None of the Above!

What the human inhabitants of the planet have is a growing Waste Management aka Sanitation Problem Quickly becoming a Crises. This is coupled with a significant ignorance of History.

100 years Ago there were about 2 Billion People scattered all over the planet.
Cities over 100,000 people were few and not generally healthy places to live (Not including Asia). Along comes indoor plumbing and sewer systems with the very popular requirements to use them. Boom-city populations exploded. Efficient disposal of human bodily and garbage waste made cities and towns healthier places to live. At the same time, motor vehicles replaced horses with similar results. Farms and livestock were no longer kept in town.

The waste from manufacturing, transportation and energy generation were of small but ever increasing consequence throughout the 1st 60+ years. Problems like Rivers catching on fire were alarming, but really local problems. Followed by Smog and terrible air/water quality grew to affect more and more places. Air and Water polluting activity moved away from 1st world populations. to the rural and 2nd, 3rd world populations. Some mitigation was almost accidental. Oil burns cleaner than coal, natural gas is cleaner still. Europe went Nuclear which is even cleaner.
Garbage/Trash Dumps(ing) are an easier to recognize part of the waste management problem.

Lots of factors in addition brings us to 7+ billion people.Electric light also helped move Sleep from its place as the World's #1 hobby!

Science finds Waste from the factory/power generation etc in China and Bangladesh finds its way to London, Berlin and NYC.(plastic bags also somehow)
And the entire planet's atmosphere and vast oceans are starting(?) to significantly be adversely affected.
If 1 person pees in the swimming pool it is probably not going to hurt anyone.....

So the problem is Waste Management aka Sanitation NOW!

Meanwhile a significant portion of the population is over 60 (I just got there) and hold an even more significant portion of it's wealth/power.

Messaging the Problem as 20-30 years in the future is a neat trick. I care but there is low motivational benefits to solve a problem that I am unlikely to live long enough to be negatively affected.
While many of the suggested/SHOUTED mitigation measures: no more beef, plastic, cars ect are nonsense and turn off the conversations.
There is plenty more. but this already too long.

Bottom Line: All of the talk about Climate Change distracts from the more immediate problem of Waste Management.

The Popular Doomsayers of the last few 1000 years unfulfilled apocalypse predictions don't help. Remember 12/21/12, Y2K, Peak Oil, the 2nd Coming, Nuclear War........
It is not even that the planet is getting too crowded. All 7+ Billion people standing shoulder to shoulder could fit in Los Angeles. There are still parts of the planet that have never seen a human footprint.

Irony: Throughout much of History the Waste Management Business of Many Cultures has been the playground of and cover for Criminals
It is not even a great big conspiracy, just the flow of mutual interests!

But how diverse IS the data? One thing that might help would be to lengthen the time that the poll can continue for... and maybe part of the dataset might be how many responses you received, versus how many views there are of the thread? Versus how many "active" profiles there are for the website? but i agree there are great variations of opinions on topics of discussion outside the scope of WAM.

Some might recall i voiced some opinions that were contrary to "mainsteam" and it definitely did not feel good for me to have my postings/etc either deleted, or moved, or altered at the whims of TPTB. It even appeared that i could get myself "cancelled" here. It certainly seems i continue to be WATCHED. So basically i learned that i am not free to voice my true opinions. That doesn't exactly encourage dialogue, but then, this website isn't primarily focused on world events and political debate anyway.

And perhaps a question for you (or anyone else following along?) would be how much population reduction can be sustained without arriving at extinction of the species? Cataclysmic events could occur with 60% reduction in human population (suddenly the concept "build back better" enters my mind...) How might the world react if another asteroid strike occurs (similar to that which killed off the dinosaurs)

A lot of different possibilities could happen that are not being discussed... err... but then to discuss doomsday possibilities could be marked as "fear mongering" despite the scientific aspects of that discussion that might be so intellectually stimulating for scientific minds that wouldn't immediately wet the bed and curl up into the fetal position and cry for mommy???

I hover as a combo of "it's natural and we just need to adapt" and "it's a problem but technology is the solution, no need to panic."

All the climate alarmism and 'apocalypse' talk is a load of bull. The problem (and it's more half-problem, half boon) is greatly exaggerated and hyped by cultists (and that's basically what they are) which hinders a rational, sensible and peaceful discussion on how to mitigate most of the human effect on a natural phenomenon.

Nuclear power could provide all the clean, zero emissions baseload power needed for energy, industrial and economic security while efficient household solar systems could bolster the minimization of household emissions.

As it is, general crop yields have been increasing with a lot of record breaking yields which means more food to feed people.
According to a 2018 study, 90% of pacific islands and atolls are either of stable size or actually growing despite extremely slow rises in sea level.

TL;DR: For some, yes it is a problem but it's a problem easily solved by technology. Largely, it is something that there is plenty of time to solve sensibly and logically if ideologues could just put down their fearmongering and resistance to mature technologies already available to could solve the myriad sub-issues.

What an interesting post and a fascinating range of ideas.

Human progress has never been linear.
Great civilizations have collapsed before and development has regressed.

We have seen the great age of consumption. This is not a bad thing. Most of us living today have enjoyed a standard of living, quality of life, health, and education that our grandparents could never have imagined.

But it is not sustainable. Climate change and the devastation of the natural environment are leading to a crisis.

Technology will provide some solutions, but we can't go on consuming endless resources simply to have more and more "stuff." The climate crisis is a result.

Future progress will mean having some different values, perhaps around IT and communication. Perhaps valuing possessions more, recycling and repairing.

The transition through the crisis will be traumatic, and it is always the poor and vulnerable who suffer most.

The population of the world will probably decline, for several centuries to come.

Peter

These stupid eco fascists are at it again blocking roads in London. Have they any idea the disruption they are causing to people's lives and the economy?

I HATE these twats with a fucking passion and I hope someone drives a massive truck over them.

They need to be categorised with Islamic State as terrorists and dealt with in the same way

It is now a cult, like these crackpot American religions

I'm sure they do, that's the whole point. And they (and the larger XR movement) are absolutely correct that non-disruptive protest achieves precisely sod-all.

Also, unless they are actually rounding people up into concentration camps, sending out death squads, or firebombing properties of those they dislike while the state stands back and lets them, they can hardly be called any kind of fascists.


Bit of an extreme reaction? They're blocking roads not murdering people. They believe, as do many scientists, that unless radical change happens immediately then our entire species is going to wipe itself out. As ever, mainstream politicians promise to fix it while in reality doing as little as possible and nothing that will disrupt the economy. TBH I suspect this group will be fairly short lived, the government is planning to rush through legislation to target them and with an 80 seat majority they should get it through easily, once people start getting locked up in actual prison rather than just arrested and let go, rather fewer will be willing to risk it, however strong their beliefs.

I think that if nothing is done....precisely sod all will happen.

We've had it all before, a new ice age...didn't happen, oil is about to run out....didn't happen, we are about to be destroyed by nuclear weapons....didn't happen.

The panic has got to be ramped up to justify the continuing existence of this evil, mind controlling cult.

Climate change? Shlimate change. Don't confuse me with someone who gives a microscopic fuck.

One final point, I strongly agree with the government enacting legislation to ban these protests. These nice, university educated, comfortable, middle class Guardian reading types will miraculously melt away if they are faced with a few months in Wandsworth or The Scrubs unless they shut the fuck up and stop normal working people doing their jobs.

You cannot reason with, or engage with cults. The only way to stop them is to crush them out of existence with an iron fist

i like all the other comments that you made. I did a tiny amount of google research on nuclear waste processing. Would you then agree processing of nuclear waste is totally manageable even if the use of nuclear power was expanded?

All I've got to say is: If part of your argument is to just to find reasons to be dismissive, you are wrong, and you're hurting people.

Ignorance is not an argument.

MM

Why disregard someone's right to protest based on the newspaper which you think they might read? I'd rather read any serious paper, even The Guardian, over a comic. As for crushing with an iron fist, I'm glad that previous generations protested for my right to vote, and for the right of women to vote. There were those who tried to crush them too.

That was a worthwhile cause. This is just a load of wank.

Talking of which, I come on for my mid afternoon fap and that Swedish loon is on, puts me off, it's an outrage. I must write an angry letter to the Daily Mail about it

OK, but the point is that even the right to vote was not seen as a reasonable cause then. In 1910, most "reasonable" people, including "radical" politicians like David Lloyd George, thought that women lacked the intelligence to vote.

Today, as you sugest, most would instead sympathise with the protesters.

So, in a few years time, the climate protesters will be seen to have had right on their side, even if their tactics are misguided.

The right to protest is too important to crush.

Peter

I don't think they will be seen as right. If they are allowed to continue they will do huge economic danage, put millions out of work and drag us back to the middle ages.

They are dangerous cranks and this obsessive cult attracts cranks and loons like moths to a flame

If it were not for those who have shown the courage to challenge authority and protest, we would indeed still be living in the middle ages.

I'm just dreading the ice age