How to argue with a global warming "skeptic"

it’s funny, you don’t prove anything he’s said is wrong, nor the Nobel Laureate, just send typical stuff in the media.

Argue his speech contents, otherwise, it means you can’t.

I’m not arguing it, climate science experts, hundreds of them, are arguing it.
Their models are getting to be more and more accurate now in predicting climate change .

97.2 percent, to be precise. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

The vast majority.
Why do you think the 3% at the edge are correct ?
Odds are very poor that they are right especially as climate modelling improves and warming trends becomes more pronounced.

Throw darts at a wall covered with photos of climate experts, blindfolded, and see how many times your dart lands on someone who basically agrees with Lindzen on key issues in contention here. Then ask yourself why you are choosing his opinion as the one to bet on when he has red flags for bias all OVER his contrarian ass.

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You could have said the same about trump getting elected :wink:

You almost make it sound like he is being blasphemous. There are certainly others that have questions let’s say about some areas such as the total radiative forcing related to Co2 rise. Or for that matter the accuracy of models.

But sure, they are in the minority.

Even if we agree that the precautionary principle should dictate what we should do. That only brings us the the next question, what should we do and how much will it cost and what will the outcome of such measures be. OK.

At this point there are also a new set of questions that need to be asked.

I think it’s a great pity people can’t stop shouting ‘yes it is’ and ‘no it isn’t’ across the aisle. Poo-flinging is a fun activity for us primates, but it’s never been a good problem-solving strategy.

If people could discuss practical solutions on their own merits, we might get somewhere. I reckon what we need is a forum (a sort of Climate Change Dragon’s Den) where people could stand up and say, look guys, here’s an idea that I think will produce $X return and ABC benefits from $Y of investment, who’s interested in funding it? At the moment, funding is distributed on the basis of virtue-signalling and CO2 reduction potential, which is not sensible.

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Right, it’s also being able to see what policies have been adopted, looking at them objectively and reaching conclusions based on why there were or were not implemented.

For example, a fuel tax, how effective is this in getting people to reduce the amount of fuel they use. I would argue not really effective since people just pay the extra and go about the business as usual, which leads the skeptic to think the measure is more about raising tax than anything else.

On the other hand deforestation is reportedly responsible for up to 20% of the overall rise in Co2 levels, you would think we would be planting trees like maniacs, but the urgency there and there is some, but just doesn’t seem to be anywhere close to what it should be.

Or more obviously Governments should stress the need for smaller families, less people, less Co2 footprint, Just no urgency there and you could point to nations like India where large families are the cultural norm or Recep Erdoğan’s recent comments that Muslims should breed as much as possible to outnumber the Europeans. Where was the condemnation from the Global warming supporters?

These are facts too, Then we can ask question like how seriously or honestly are other nations behaving and you look at India for example that makes comments like they will reduce carbon emission intensity by 20% (off the top of my head) by 2030 which sounds good until you realize they are playing word games. Plus they never want to actually commit to anything just vague promises decades away.

If you really want to discuss the issue, there are even more questions that come into play such as just how far do you trust the leaders of our countries to put money that is raised to an efficient use as opposed to something that helps financial institutions and other businesses profit.

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Exactly. Those things you mention are simple, do-able options that everyone can sign up to, right down to the average penniless nobody in the backwoods of Bumfluffistan. However, what the average climate-change delegate completely overlooks, as he sips on his Starbucks and shuffles his papers in his five-star hotel room, is that Average Nobody needs to have a good reason for doing those things.

Providing motivations is what the bigwigs should be focusing on. They’re often non-obvious, but they do exist. There are powerful reasons to plant trees; the CO2-offset advantage is just an added bonus. But people living at the margins of survival often don’t understand what those reasons are, and often have a victim mentality that prevents them from taking responsibility for their own decisions (and the inevitable outcomes). Getting them to stop ripping up trees and planting new ones instead will be a struggle against deeply-ingrained pigheadedness, but I don’t think it’s impossible. Adults are probably stuck in their ways, but their kids aren’t irredeemable.

Governments - especially governments that have proven over and over again that they’re untrustworthy - shouldn’t be given money for anything. I’m convinced that there are a whole raft of practical projects that can be funded by small- and medium-sized corporations to fix this. What I see is governments that are dead-set on stopping them from doing that. Anyone who solves the problem is by definition pulling the rug on a comfortable lifestyle for the great and the good.

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Agreed I would add that another question that has yet to be brought up in this, is what is the media role?

I am not suggesting some conspiracy here, more like what you see with Trump and the media, they hate him already they don’t need a conspiracy to relentlessly report negatively, they take joy in doing that. The result is the population has some very strong feelings about him.

It seems with global warming they are doing much the same and they are scaring the hell out of the local populations. I heard a story of a guy in the UK who was so determined to leave as minimal Co2 footprint as possible he even made his tooth brush out of wood. But you try to think of this in perspective and China next door to us has 1 billion people who don’t give a shit and India has another.

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Seems to me like natural selection will take care of these types.

Just a general comment: All scientists are political and biased and prefer for their world views to mesh with their science. Let me provide a small example of this.

In the early 20th century, the steady-state theory was accepted among physicists as the best explanation for the nature of the universe and particularly its beginning. Simply put, the steady state theory asserts that the universe has no beginning and no end. In 1927, however, Lemaître, a Belgian priest and physicist, proposed his “hypothesis of the primeval atom,” which later became known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe. His theory was not well-received by the scientific community, and in fact, derision probably best characterizes the reaction to the new theory by Lemaître’s fellow physicists. For example, Einstein refused to accept the idea of an expanding universe that has a beginning, and commented to Lemaître, “Your calculations are correct, but your physics is atrocious.”

In Einstein’s case, his part in the history of the Big Bang theory is much more involved than simple mockery of a colleague. Repulsed by the notion of a beginning of the universe and all that would imply, the German-born theoretical physicist refused to get rid of his cosmological “fudge factor” in equations related to relativity until 1931. Let me explain. In 1917, Albert Einstein tried to use his new theory of general relativity to describe the evolution of the universe. As stated above, steady-state theory reigned supreme and this meant that general relativity should have explained a static and unchanging universe with no beginning. When it didn’t, a surprised Einstein added a term to his original equations which enabled his mathematical universe to appear permanent and invariable. That’s right folks, Einstein artificially introduced math into his equations because they didn’t mesh with his world view (hey biologists and chemists, does this remind you of what you did in your college labs when your experiments didn’t produced results like they should have?). Lemaître would have the last laugh, however, when Hubble’s astronomical observations caused Einstein to grudgingly accept “the necessity for a beginning.”

The cool thing about science is that bias and desired world view only go so far. The point of no return is when evidence has interfaced with other evidence so that we now have mutually corroborative evidence, and this mutually corroborative evidence has given rise to a well-founded theory, and this well-founded theory has become a well-corroborated theory, and this well-corroborated theory has become a very well-corroborated theory which is a highly probable theory, and this highly probable theory ought to be given truth value and credence.

Getting back to the Big Bang, British physicist Arthur Eddington provides the best illustration of the point I’m trying to make. Eddington stated during the initial period of debate surrounding the Big Bang theory that, “Philosophically, the notion of a beginning of the present order of Nature is repugnant to me … I should like to find a genuine loophole.” (Notice he started that by stating “philosophically”).

We’re not yet there with global warming and may never get there since weather is not an exact science. But we don’t need to ever get there, in my opinion, because of what I stated previously:

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Is Gaia, as a living organism, self-regulating and we, as humans(superior beings), think we are to blame?

That sort of thing would definitely limit your options for reproduction, I reckon.

Although apparently tooth-twigs (or whatever the correct term is) are quite effective.

image

It’s my life ambition to look like that guy when I’m 80.

I’d say he looks like he’s getting some.

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I don’t think so. Look at the right arm position.

I think he’s resting his arm on his ladyfriend’s head. :wink:

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