Climate Change?

[herbu]

That is like asking a doctor to show you the numbers to prove that a persons heart disease was caused by weight. This person may smoke and be a heavy drinker and even though we have placed much research effort into heart disease, we cannot assign specific numbers to specific influences. However, for a person with heart disease to decide not to lose weight (or decrease drinking/smoking for that matter) because a doctor cannot show numbers does not sound reasonable to me.

Similarly, we cannot guarantee that every extreme weather event was caused by climate change. However, it is a reasonable premise that recent increases in frequency from what happened decades before are caused my some recent change and greenhouse gasses is the only explanation that holds water.
Some have argued that the Earth has seen such extremes before, and while that is true, those changes happened gradually over hundreds of years and involved elimination of many species on earth! Fortunately those extremes have not happened since the time human beings joined the party!

But below is a recent history of costs (just for the US). If you look at recent trends and project into the future, we are talking a very expensive "do nothing" attitude. The question in my mind is when is it truly too late? I don't think it is wise to wait until we can determine when is too late before we at least start addressing the low-hanging fruit!

You agree that we should be doing what we can, but our president is doing the opposite (especially in the energy sector).

Kurt, I'm not convinced with your analogy. I think there is a lot of data showing the effect of 5lbs overweight, 10lbs, 20lbs, etc. Same for smoking 5 cigarettes a day. 10/day. 20/day. In both cases a "normal" benefit of losing X lbs or stopping smoking X cigs/day can be shown. Yet I know of no analysis that shows the climate effect of 10ppm, 50ppm or 100ppm CO2 increase or reduction. If you KNOW that doing nothing will be "very expensive", you must know that doing something will help. If you KNOW that mankind is responsible for CO2 increase, you must know what decrease we can expect with particular actions.

Once again, I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying we should know the expected effect of initiating some invasive action. Now, I'm not sure we can project the effect of ANY of the proposed actions. If banning all coal burning power plants in the US will have no practical effect on the climate, why would we implement such a hardship on ourselves?

 

[highfigh]

Don't hate them particularly nor have I forgotten how much wealth has been given to so few.

Given? By whom? It's not always inherited.

Professional athletes- many came from poor families and bad up-bringing, but have become multi-millionaires. Was that wealth given to them? What about people who had an idea, worked on it, saw it through to completion and became wealthy because people WANTED that product? Look at Zuckerberg, Bezos, Buffet and Gates? They did what they did because they wanted money and they're all in the top ten of wealth on the planet. How do they vote?

 

[GO-NAD!]

Kurt, I'm not convinced with your analogy. I think there is a lot of data showing the effect of 5lbs overweight, 10lbs, 20lbs, etc. Same for smoking 5 cigarettes a day. 10/day. 20/day. In both cases a "normal" benefit of losing X lbs or stopping smoking X cigs/day can be shown. Yet I know of no analysis that shows the climate effect of 10ppm, 50ppm or 100ppm CO2 increase or reduction. If you KNOW that doing nothing will be "very expensive", you must know that doing something will help. If you KNOW that mankind is responsible for CO2 increase, you must know what decrease we can expect with particular actions.

Once again, I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying we should know the expected effect of initiating some invasive action. Now, I'm not sure we can project the effect of ANY of the proposed actions. If banning all coal burning power plants in the US will have no practical effect on the climate, why would we implement such a hardship on ourselves?

While I agree that the analogy isn't perfect, I think we have to take action based on the fact that doing nothing is going to be progressively more expensive over the longer term. Do we treat it like national debt - leave it for the kids to deal with?

We didn't know the consequences (and cost) of the consumption of vast amounts of fossil fuels "back in the day", but that didn't stop us, did it? So, by the same token, taking action to mitigate the damage will involve expenditure with unknown outcome. I don't think nations should place themselves at an economic disadvantage though - which the Paris Agreement sort of addressed within the OECD. But, countries like China and India shouldn't be granted a mulligan. It's too late for that.

 

[KEW]

Kurt, I'm not convinced with your analogy. I think there is a lot of data showing the effect of 5lbs overweight, 10lbs, 20lbs, etc. Same for smoking 5 cigarettes a day. 10/day. 20/day. In both cases a "normal" benefit of losing X lbs or stopping smoking X cigs/day can be shown. Yet I know of no analysis that shows the climate effect of 10ppm, 50ppm or 100ppm CO2 increase or reduction. If you KNOW that doing nothing will be "very expensive", you must know that doing something will help. If you KNOW that mankind is responsible for CO2 increase, you must know what decrease we can expect with particular actions.

Once again, I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying we should know the expected effect of initiating some invasive action. Now, I'm not sure we can project the effect of ANY of the proposed actions. If banning all coal burning power plants in the US will have no practical effect on the climate, why would we implement such a hardship on ourselves?

The data showing tendencies (smoking vs life-span) is definitely out there, but those are statistics.
Here is a guy who smokes daily who just turned 114 years old at the end of May 2019!
https://www.newsweek.com/worlds-oldest-man-guinness-world-record-smoking-tobacco-fredie-blom-947687

But the reason that your requirement is unwise is because it will be a long time before we begin to have the kind of data you are looking for. There are a couple of key reasons for this!
1) The most problematic aspect is that there is only one Earth.
2) We could not begin to collect this data until people die from smoking.
3) Greenhouse Gasses are not steady, they are increasing every year, so how can we measure the effect when the cause is in constant flux?
To get the data you cited from studying smokers, researchers have involved thousands of people who smoke at various levels, and the studies tracked their outcomes. In other words, these were studies that took decades because essentially they are determining influence of smoking on death so have to wait for death (of at least a large percentage of their test subjects) before their data can be compiled into anything meaningful. We can't wait until the Earth is in dire shape before we respond (unless you know a way to reverse trends with any measure of quickness).

The information you are asking for can only be guessed at because we will not have a single verifiable data point until the Earth/Civilization reaches some milestone that we probably don't want to get to.

My grandfather died from lung cancer at 62 years old in 1965. At the time, there was no data like what you are talking about. He was a chain smoker and doctors generally believed that smoking was the cause of his cancer, but there was no hard proof and definitely no numbers as to how much smoking resulted in how much loss of life-span.
I'm not sure when we finally established hard proof, but I do pity the people who continued to believe smoking would not harm them. I think this is a fair parallel to people who don't want to react until there is proof with precise numbers! It is not parallel however, in the sense that for smoking people were making their own choice for their own life. Here everyone is subject to the results.

So, the problem is you are placing a burden of proof (and somehow see it as something that you are entitled to demand) on scientists that would make it impossible to do anything before it is "game over"!

 

[KEW]

I don't think nations should place themselves at an economic disadvantage though - which the Paris Agreement sort of addressed within the OECD. But, countries like China and India shouldn't be granted a mulligan. It's too late for that.

The problem is, by withdrawing from the Paris Agreement and embracing fossil fuels, the US/Trump has given them a "Mulligan by example"! We cleared the way for them to drop out.

 

[Swerd]

The data showing tendencies (smoking vs life-span) is definitely out there, but those are statistics.

By the late 1980s it became absolutely certain that smoking caused lung cancer. Around 20 years earlier, fewer and fewer men in the US population smoked. It was gradual and it took all those years before there were actually fewer deaths due to lung or bronchus cancer. There is similar data for women in the US, but I didn't show it. Because fewer people smoked resulting in fewer deaths by lung cancer, this became hard proof that smoking caused lung cancer. This figure comes from:

American Cancer Society. Cancer Facts & Figures 2018.​

Atlanta: American Cancer Society; 2018.​

​

By the 1960s, there was enough evidence from laboratory studies to convince any scientist or MD that smoking caused lung cancer. The Surgeon General of the US, Luther Terry, delivered his famous warning about smoking and cancer in 1964. The tobacco industry disputed that because those studies were in mice or other laboratory models, and none of them were hard proof that smoking caused cancer in people. The tobacco companies were absolutely wrong – they even knew they were wrong at the time – they were only trying to preserve their substantial financial interests.

This sounds a lot like the arguments from the coal & oil industry about global warming. Waiting for evidence that is considered 'hard proof' might be fatal for the planet.

 

[GO-NAD!]

The problem is, by withdrawing from the Paris Agreement and embracing fossil fuels, the US/Trump has given them a "Mulligan by example"! We cleared the way for them to drop out.

Absolutely. I think the only way to address that would be for countries conforming with the agreement to apply tariffs equivalent in value (to the advantage derived from not conforming with the agreement) to any exports from those offending countries.

Although Canada is a signatory to the agreement, the measures enacted so far (cap & trade, carbon taxes and some investment in clean initiatives) are insufficient to help us reach our reduction goals. We have one of the highest (if not the highest) per capita CO2 emissions rates on the planet.

There is quite a bit of cognitive dissonance surrounding the need to curb our CO2 emissions here. We know they have to be reduced, while at the same time, the oil sands in Alberta are such a huge revenue generator, it's difficult to contemplate turning off the taps.

Resource extraction forms a large proportion of our GDP - not for nothing has Canada been called a nation of "hewers of wood and drawers of water". It puts us in a difficult position.

 

[Ponzio]

By the late 1980s it became absolutely certain that smoking caused lung cancer. Around 20 years earlier, fewer and fewer men in the US population smoked. It was gradual and it took all those years before there were actually fewer deaths due to lung or bronchus cancer.

As a moron smoker, I endorse this message

Brought to you by The Committee For Common Sense & Self-Preservation 2019 - Vote!

 

[lovinthehd]

Given? By whom? It's not always inherited.

Professional athletes- many came from poor families and bad up-bringing, but have become multi-millionaires. Was that wealth given to them? What about people who had an idea, worked on it, saw it through to completion and became wealthy because people WANTED that product? Look at Zuckerberg, Bezos, Buffet and Gates? They did what they did because they wanted money and they're all in the top ten of wealth on the planet. How do they vote?

By society, you're again reading too much into a comment; inheritance is certainly an issue, tho. What about the CO2?

 

[GO-NAD!]

Given? By whom? It's not always inherited.

Professional athletes- many came from poor families and bad up-bringing, but have become multi-millionaires. Was that wealth given to them? What about people who had an idea, worked on it, saw it through to completion and became wealthy because people WANTED that product? Look at Zuckerberg, Bezos, Buffet and Gates? They did what they did because they wanted money and they're all in the top ten of wealth on the planet. How do they vote?

By society, you're again reading too much into a comment; inheritance is certainly an issue, tho. What about the CO2?

Wealthy athletes are like lottery winners. I don't mean to be flippant about people who worked extremely hard to reach their goals, but only a tiny fraction of aspiring athletes ever become millionaires.
It has been well-established that social/economic mobility is an illusion, for the most part. Even when a large inheritance isn't part of the equation, higher income families foster a leg up for the offspring, whether it's providing a quality education or granting access to the networks that lead to better opportunities, kids in the higher economic percentiles tend to stay in them. And, laws and policies that largely serve the wealthy don't hurt either. The opposite is also true - people raised in poorer demographics tend to stay there.

It's the wealthy who have the greatest impact on climate change - large/multiple vehicles, large homes, lots of air travel, etc. And, they aren't all right wing climate change deniers. We can lump a lot of champagne socialists in that group too.

 

[herbu]

The data showing tendencies (smoking vs life-span) is definitely out there, but those are statistics.
Here is a guy who smokes daily who just turned 114 years old at the end of May 2019!
https://www.newsweek.com/worlds-oldest-man-guinness-world-record-smoking-tobacco-fredie-blom-947687

But the reason that your requirement is unwise is because it will be a long time before we begin to have the kind of data you are looking for. There are a couple of key reasons for this!
1) The most problematic aspect is that there is only one Earth.
2) We could not begin to collect this data until people die from smoking.
3) Greenhouse Gasses are not steady, they are increasing every year, so how can we measure the effect when the cause is in constant flux?
To get the data you cited from studying smokers, researchers have involved thousands of people who smoke at various levels, and the studies tracked their outcomes. In other words, these were studies that took decades because essentially they are determining influence of smoking on death so have to wait for death (of at least a large percentage of their test subjects) before their data can be compiled into anything meaningful. We can't wait until the Earth is in dire shape before we respond (unless you know a way to reverse trends with any measure of quickness).

The information you are asking for can only be guessed at because we will not have a single verifiable data point until the Earth/Civilization reaches some milestone that we probably don't want to get to.

My grandfather died from lung cancer at 62 years old in 1965. At the time, there was no data like what you are talking about. He was a chain smoker and doctors generally believed that smoking was the cause of his cancer, but there was no hard proof and definitely no numbers as to how much smoking resulted in how much loss of life-span.
I'm not sure when we finally established hard proof, but I do pity the people who continued to believe smoking would not harm them. I think this is a fair parallel to people who don't want to react until there is proof with precise numbers! It is not parallel however, in the sense that for smoking people were making their own choice for their own life. Here everyone is subject to the results.

So, the problem is you are placing a burden of proof (and somehow see it as something that you are entitled to demand) on scientists that would make it impossible to do anything before it is "game over"!

Kurt, those are fair points.

 

[Irvrobinson]

It has been well-established that social/economic mobility is an illusion, for the most part. Even when a large inheritance isn't part of the equation, higher income families foster a leg up for the offspring, whether it's providing a quality education or granting access to the networks that lead to better opportunities, kids in the higher economic percentiles tend to stay in them. And, laws and policies that largely serve the wealthy don't hurt either. The opposite is also true - people raised in poorer demographics tend to stay there.

I can't agree. I've worked with thousands of people over the years in the high tech product industry, and a very significant fraction of the successful people I know came from modest working-class backgrounds. I also know many wealthy people who have offspring who are not productive at all, and might be homeless or in prison if not for the largess of their parents or siblings. The most important factor in achieving success seems to be a focus on academic success or economic achievement, mostly by parents but often just by individuals themselves. Lots of people work hard, but economic success requires preparation and development. There are obvious differences in results when "tiger parents" are engaged in their children's success and expectation setting. I will assert that the environment you are in makes more of a difference than the wealth you're born into. Sometimes wealth and family businesses are just inherited, but that doesn't mean economic mobility is an illusion.

 

[highfigh]

The data showing tendencies (smoking vs life-span) is definitely out there, but those are statistics.
Here is a guy who smokes daily who just turned 114 years old at the end of May 2019!
https://www.newsweek.com/worlds-oldest-man-guinness-world-record-smoking-tobacco-fredie-blom-947687

My grandfather died from lung cancer at 62 years old in 1965. At the time, there was no data like what you are talking about. He was a chain smoker and doctors generally believed that smoking was the cause of his cancer, but there was no hard proof and definitely no numbers as to how much smoking resulted in how much loss of life-span.

I'm not sure when we finally established hard proof, but I do pity the people who continued to believe smoking would not harm them. I think this is a fair parallel to people who don't want to react until there is proof with precise numbers! It is not parallel however, in the sense that for smoking people were making their own choice for their own life. Here everyone is subject to the results.

From the article- "I use my own tobacco because I don't smoke cigarettes." and I think that has everything to do with why he has smoked for so long and is still alive- what is in cigarettes that kills people, and why?

Sorry about your GF- my dad had Squamous cell cancer in '94 and it wasn't fatal, but yes, he had smoked for decades. However, cigarette packs started to display “Caution: Cigarette Smoking May Be Hazardous to Your Health” in 1965 and in 1967, it was changed to “Warning: Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous to Health and May Cause Death from Cancer and Other Diseases.”.

I could never tolerate a bit of cigarette smoke at home, but I was OK in bars- never understood that (unless the booze changed my tolerance) but I tried for decades to get my parents to stop and it didn't work. Ultimately, cigarettes killed both of them- mom had a brain aneurysm and dad had several strokes. They knew but people like to embrace denial, rather than change their behavior.

 

[Mikado463]

Ugh, I hope this thread doesn't become another dumpster fire, and I really ought to lock it before it turns into a bunch of dudes just trolling each other. .

Ok, then why is this sub-forum known as 'The Steam Vent' ??

 

[GO-NAD!]

I can't agree. I've worked with thousands of people over the years in the high tech product industry, and a very significant fraction of the successful people I know came from modest working-class backgrounds. I also know many wealthy people who have offspring who are not productive at all, and might be homeless or in prison if not for largess of their parents or siblings. The most important factor in achieving success seems to be a focus on academic success or economic achievement, mostly by parents but often just by individuals themselves. Lots of people work hard, but economic success requires preparation and development. There are obvious differences in results when "tiger parents" are engaged in their children's success and expectation setting. I will assert that the environment you are in makes more of a difference than the wealth you're born into. Sometimes wealth and family businesses are just inherited, but that doesn't mean economic mobility is an illusion.

The phrase "economic mobility is an illusion" may dip into hyperbole, but gist of it is true:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/03/03/the-mobility-myth

The people "thousands of people" that you have worked with make for great anecdotes and I'm glad for their success, but they likely don't reflect the statistical data.

 

[mtrycrafts]

....
1) The most problematic aspect is that there is only one Earth.
...

Well, maybe. We just haven't found no 2 yet.
But, it may be just cheaper to look for no 2 than to mitigate today.

 

[Irvrobinson]

The phrase "economic mobility is an illusion" may dip into hyperbole, but gist of it is true:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/03/03/the-mobility-myth

The people "thousands of people" that you have worked with make for great anecdotes and I'm glad for their success, but they likely don't reflect the statistical data.

The two views don't correlate because the Harvard researchers were just interpreting some measured data on a large population, and noticed that economic mobility was rare, and gave their study an attention-grabbing caption. On the other hand, I noticed that mobility often happens, but requires education, preparation, and focus that most don't or won't do. The fact that most people are ill-prepared due to a poor environment or simply don't want to do whatever is necessary is not an indicator that mobility is illusory. It is just an indicator that most people won't do what's necessary, either because it wasn't important enough to them, or they were in adverse environments (like parents who didn't give a damn about their children's education). If you're brought up to expect to have an hourly wage job and you don't aspire to anything else, you probably won't be upwardly mobile.

 

[highfigh]

The phrase "economic mobility is an illusion" may dip into hyperbole, but gist of it is true:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/03/03/the-mobility-myth

The people "thousands of people" that you have worked with make for great anecdotes and I'm glad for their success, but they likely don't reflect the statistical data.

OK, but with the huge number of people who have pulled themselves out of poverty, are you saying that it can't happen? Of course, it can. People come here from all over the planet, looking for a better life and if you think they all spoke English when they arrived, I have news for you- they often didn't speak a word of it. What do they do? They live among people who speak their language and learn as they go, getting jobs in their community and many soon own a business. Those who don't may stay in their own community, but many move into the general population and can do very well for themselves.

Anecdote, or not- many people from other countries have done far better for themselves than those who were born in the US. Why? Because they freaking showed up- they try harder. The US has slipped in educational ranking for many years and it's all because there's less teaching and more coddling.

 

[Ponzio]

Speaking for myself and our family, we arrived in 1962, without much more than our good looks

Neither one of my parents went beyond 3rd grade but thru sheer hard work and will power they joined the ranks of the middle class. We left Sicily, not out of economic necessity, but to get away from the blatant corruption that made it impossible in some instances to escape the role you were born into. A silent caste system you might say. Every time you tried to take a step up, somebody had their hand out looking for a bribe. Drove my parents nuts, so they voted with their feet.

Don't get me wrong there was plenty of corruption in this country when we arrived but the playing field was a bit more level back then or so it seemed.

 

[lovinthehd]

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/06/harvard-chemist-permafrost-n2o-levels-12-times-higher-than-expected/