Just imagine there was no climate change...
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| Global Warming Map-tgk (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
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| Global Warming (Photo credit: mirjoran) |
Ken Ring writes:|
Imagine if there was no climate change and no global warming and no problem to panic over.
Imagine if the oceans were not really rising at a dangerous rate, and that when we went to the beach the tide simply came in and out as it has always done, and reached the same high water marks on a cyclic basis.
Imagine if the summers were not getting so hot that we risked burning to ashes, and that there will always be hot days and cold ones as they always have been in the past.
Imagine too, that the sky was not filling up with poisonous gas any time soon, and any wind around just blew away gases as soon as they came out of a chimney or car tailpipe.
What kind of a weird world would that be? How would regional councils pass the time without the need to endlessly debate the extent of imposing eco-regulations that may eventually govern every facet of our daily lives?
Could we live in a world where no one was really certain whether or not oil was running out?
Could we sleep at night, knowing that there was no Armageddon looming, or knowing that we did not have to pay a tax for the sunshine, or for the right to light a camp fire when we slept in a tent on the beach and for the right to drive out of the city?
How would we explain to our children that it was not their job to save the universe, and that they could actually enjoy their lives and go back to leaving lights on, cardigans off, and kicking aluminum cans along the footpath?
That the Earth is still beautiful, bountiful and big enough to absorb all mankind's difficulties and bungling mistakes and many more people, and carry on functioning regardless, is too impossible to imagine.
But let's pretend that one day a scientist driving home in the rain was struck by the thought that weather and what caused it was explainable as a natural process.
What howls of scorn, suppressed laughter and unkind guffaws would he have to endure from his peers!
What a skyward rolling of the eyes when he approached, and how his family and acquaintances would be ostracized, for here would be a traitor, in league with devil skeptics and therefore a heathen of the worst order.
To entertain a notion that man was not responsible for the climate! Whatever next!
Why, it might occur to him that earthquakes and volcanoes were also part of nature, and that glaciers and ice sheets and deserts may also be subject to forces and cycles that were well beyond human understanding and influence.
There could be no stopping, as he might reflect that our Sun can be seen from hundreds of millions of miles away but the exhaust from a car from not a quarter of a mile, and that there is weather on other planets that oddly have no air and no emission trading schemes.
He may get to wondering too, why the Arctic never keeps expanding until the whole world is covered in ice, nor does it keep reducing until there is no ice left.
Rather, it seems to come and go on some regular cyclic pattern.
Similarly he may notice that the mighty ocean has never kept warming until it boiled away, nor never kept cooling until it became a huge solid block of ice, but rather the temperature of that vast watery expanse seems perpetually and regularly over geological time to simply go up and down.
He may also realize that almost everything that we used to call ‘nature’ does likewise go up and down, and in and out, and bigger and smaller, faster and slower, and backwards and forwards, amazingly all by itself and without our meddlesome hand.
Small animals, insects and fish seem to thrive away from our kindly eyes, almost as if they had minds of their own.
We are more and more finding that in a previously free world, now some questions are not allowed to be asked. We cannot publicly question nature’s effect on climate.
We cannot ask if farming is sustainable if belches and farts are given free rein to run footloose across our fields.
How will planting thousands of trees help change weather patterns, when weather is generated 6-8 miles up where there are no trees?
We cannot enquire how factories can function without workers being allowed to drive to them each morning.
We are not allowed to ask how a huge thermal mass (oceans) could be heated by, and have its total acid balance disturbed due to, the miniscule micro-heating from above by a small thermal mass (air).
You see, the global warmers would be sprung with that simple silly question. Just a 2degC increase over 100 years, according to the IPCC, will kill all the sea life.
Try putting an element that only warms to two degrees (a fluorescent bulb would do) above a big bowl of water and see if the water warms above room temperature.
A lot of us have aquariums with tropical fish. Presumably they can feel extra warming - so is that why they all want to get closer to the tank’s heater? What is that about?
Just imagine a world in which we could ask innocent questions like these and get honest answers, from people freed from the fear of losing their jobs.
Imagine if we lived in an environment of commonsense, where caring for truth became a national pursuit, and prestige came not from limiting freedoms of another, and greed, power and profit were not held up as best business ethics.
Just imagine no suppression, and the world could live as one. It might just save human society on planet earth. What a legacy to leave to coming generations. Imagine if above us was only sky?
Imagine if the oceans were not really rising at a dangerous rate, and that when we went to the beach the tide simply came in and out as it has always done, and reached the same high water marks on a cyclic basis.
Imagine if the summers were not getting so hot that we risked burning to ashes, and that there will always be hot days and cold ones as they always have been in the past.
Imagine too, that the sky was not filling up with poisonous gas any time soon, and any wind around just blew away gases as soon as they came out of a chimney or car tailpipe.
What kind of a weird world would that be? How would regional councils pass the time without the need to endlessly debate the extent of imposing eco-regulations that may eventually govern every facet of our daily lives?
Could we live in a world where no one was really certain whether or not oil was running out?
Could we sleep at night, knowing that there was no Armageddon looming, or knowing that we did not have to pay a tax for the sunshine, or for the right to light a camp fire when we slept in a tent on the beach and for the right to drive out of the city?
How would we explain to our children that it was not their job to save the universe, and that they could actually enjoy their lives and go back to leaving lights on, cardigans off, and kicking aluminum cans along the footpath?
That the Earth is still beautiful, bountiful and big enough to absorb all mankind's difficulties and bungling mistakes and many more people, and carry on functioning regardless, is too impossible to imagine.
But let's pretend that one day a scientist driving home in the rain was struck by the thought that weather and what caused it was explainable as a natural process.
What howls of scorn, suppressed laughter and unkind guffaws would he have to endure from his peers!
What a skyward rolling of the eyes when he approached, and how his family and acquaintances would be ostracized, for here would be a traitor, in league with devil skeptics and therefore a heathen of the worst order.
To entertain a notion that man was not responsible for the climate! Whatever next!
Why, it might occur to him that earthquakes and volcanoes were also part of nature, and that glaciers and ice sheets and deserts may also be subject to forces and cycles that were well beyond human understanding and influence.
There could be no stopping, as he might reflect that our Sun can be seen from hundreds of millions of miles away but the exhaust from a car from not a quarter of a mile, and that there is weather on other planets that oddly have no air and no emission trading schemes.
He may get to wondering too, why the Arctic never keeps expanding until the whole world is covered in ice, nor does it keep reducing until there is no ice left.
Rather, it seems to come and go on some regular cyclic pattern.
Similarly he may notice that the mighty ocean has never kept warming until it boiled away, nor never kept cooling until it became a huge solid block of ice, but rather the temperature of that vast watery expanse seems perpetually and regularly over geological time to simply go up and down.
He may also realize that almost everything that we used to call ‘nature’ does likewise go up and down, and in and out, and bigger and smaller, faster and slower, and backwards and forwards, amazingly all by itself and without our meddlesome hand.
Small animals, insects and fish seem to thrive away from our kindly eyes, almost as if they had minds of their own.
We are more and more finding that in a previously free world, now some questions are not allowed to be asked. We cannot publicly question nature’s effect on climate.
We cannot ask if farming is sustainable if belches and farts are given free rein to run footloose across our fields.
How will planting thousands of trees help change weather patterns, when weather is generated 6-8 miles up where there are no trees?
We cannot enquire how factories can function without workers being allowed to drive to them each morning.
We are not allowed to ask how a huge thermal mass (oceans) could be heated by, and have its total acid balance disturbed due to, the miniscule micro-heating from above by a small thermal mass (air).
You see, the global warmers would be sprung with that simple silly question. Just a 2degC increase over 100 years, according to the IPCC, will kill all the sea life.
Try putting an element that only warms to two degrees (a fluorescent bulb would do) above a big bowl of water and see if the water warms above room temperature.
A lot of us have aquariums with tropical fish. Presumably they can feel extra warming - so is that why they all want to get closer to the tank’s heater? What is that about?
Just imagine a world in which we could ask innocent questions like these and get honest answers, from people freed from the fear of losing their jobs.
Imagine if we lived in an environment of commonsense, where caring for truth became a national pursuit, and prestige came not from limiting freedoms of another, and greed, power and profit were not held up as best business ethics.
Just imagine no suppression, and the world could live as one. It might just save human society on planet earth. What a legacy to leave to coming generations. Imagine if above us was only sky?
http://nz.news.yahoo.com/opinion/post/-/blog/15534380/imagine-no-global-warming-its-easy-if-you-try/
posted by Unknown @ 9:43 PM
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