[Vision2020] Game Over for the Climate

Thu May 10 16:46:54 PDT 2012

First, notice this is an OP/ED article.

Second, notice that Hansen presents a lot of facts, then makes predictions
on that basis.

Hence, if you want to dispute his facts, do so.

If you want to dispute the probability of his conclusions based on the
facts presented or alternative facts, do so.

However, he has a right, and perhaps even a moral obligation given the
seriousness of his claim, to present warnings to the world.

Scientists do what Hansen is doing all the time, and have been do so for a
long time.  The most common cases are about the consequences of using
various prescription drugs, OTC drugs, and nutrients, medical devices,
fillings, medical procedures, etc.

All scientific theories are probabilistic, and therefore opinions --
opinions hopefully based on probabilities based on careful research and
reasoning.  Scientific theories predict impacts on all of us.  They ought
be put into the market place of ideas for all of us to evaluate.

"Leave the rest to politicians."  Are you fucking out of your mind?  Are
you not aware of what egregious messes contemporary politicians have gotten
us into, and how little regard they have for the truth and the overall well
being of human kind?

w.

On Thu, May 10, 2012 at 1:26 PM, Paul Rumelhart <godshatter at yahoo.com>wrote:

> I remember a day when scientists used to stick to the facts.  They would
> say things like "we can't tell you what to do, but we can tell you that our
> analyses have shown that this and this and this are likely with this level
> of uncertainty".  Nowadays, scientists are fricking political activists.
> They give their opinions in articles in Rolling Stone and charge big sums
> of money for speaking engagements at various venues, and get arrested for
> protesting oil pipelines.
>
> Can James Hansen show with scientific certainty that his plan would keep
> all the alarmist predictions of disaster at bay and then it would no longer
> be "game over"?  What is the scientific definition of "game over"?  Climate
> scientists need to, in my opinion, take back their scientific neutrality.
> Here's what we've found, here's what our degree of confidence is.  Leave
> the rest to the politicians.
>
> It's statements like "the science of the situation is clear — it’s time
> for the politics to follow" that make me immediately skeptical of
> everything he says.
>
> Paul
>
>   ------------------------------
> *From:* Art Deco <art.deco.studios at gmail.com>
> *To:* vision2020 at moscow.com
> *Sent:* Thursday, May 10, 2012 11:49 AM
> *Subject:* [Vision2020] Game Over for the Climate
>
>   [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>
>
>
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>
> ------------------------------
> May 9, 2012
> Game Over for the Climate By JAMES HANSEN
>  GLOBAL warming isn’t a prediction. It is happening. That is why I was so
> troubled to read a recent interview with President Obama<http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2012/04/i-have-the-utmost-respect-for.html>in Rolling Stone in which he said that
> Canada<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/canada/index.html?inline=nyt-geo>would exploit the
> oil<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/energy-environment/oil-petroleum-and-gasoline/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>in its vast tar sands reserves “regardless of what we do.”
>  If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the
> climate.
>  Canada’s tar sands, deposits of sand saturated with bitumen, contain
> twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by global oil use in our entire
> history. If we were to fully exploit this new oil source, and continue to
> burn our conventional oil, gas and coal<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/coal/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>supplies, concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere eventually
> would reach levels higher than in the Pliocene era, more than 2.5 million
> years ago, when sea level was at least 50 feet higher than it is now. That
> level of heat-trapping gases would assure that the disintegration of the
> ice sheets would accelerate out of control. Sea levels would rise and
> destroy coastal cities. Global temperatures would become intolerable.
> Twenty to 50 percent of the planet’s species would be driven to extinction.
> Civilization would be at risk.
>  That is the long-term outlook. But near-term, things will be bad enough.
> Over the next several decades, the Western United States and the semi-arid
> region from North Dakota to Texas will develop semi-permanent drought, with
> rain, when it does come, occurring in extreme events with heavy flooding.
> Economic losses would be incalculable. More and more of the Midwest would
> be a dust bowl. California’s Central Valley could no longer be irrigated. Food
> prices<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/f/food_prices/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>would rise to unprecedented levels.
>  If this sounds apocalyptic, it is. This is why we need to reduce
> emissions dramatically. President Obama has the power not only to deny tar
> sands oil additional access to Gulf Coast refining, which Canada desires in
> part for export markets, but also to encourage economic incentives to leave
> tar sands and other dirty fuels in the ground.
>  The global warming<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/science/topics/globalwarming/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>signal is now louder than the noise of random weather, as I predicted would
> happen by now in the journal Science in 1981. Extremely hot summers have
> increased noticeably. We can say with high confidence that the recent heat
> waves in Texas and Russia, and the one in Europe in 2003, which killed tens
> of thousands, were not natural events — they were caused by human-induced
> climate change.
>  We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the
> atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But
> add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise
> too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The
> earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where
> temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s
> because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.
>  The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280
> parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands
> contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close
> cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an
> additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels,
> instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there
> is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that
> would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that
> is out of their control.
>  We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to
> increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected
> from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections
> to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would
> not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation,
> jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick
> winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would
> get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the
> reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six
> times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada,
> rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by
> a slowly rising carbon price.
>  But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil
> fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s
> governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds
> of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to
> extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining,
> hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean
> and Arctic drilling.
>  President Obama speaks of a “planet in peril,” but he does not provide
> the leadership needed to change the world’s course. Our leaders must speak
> candidly to the public — which yearns for open, honest discussion —
> explaining that our continued technological leadership and economic
> well-being demand a reasoned change of our energy course. History has shown
> that the American public can rise to the challenge, but leadership is
> essential.
>  The science of the situation is clear — it’s time for the politics to
> follow. This is a plan that can unify conservatives and liberals,
> environmentalists and business. Every major national science academy in the
> world has reported that global warming is real, caused mostly by humans,
> and requires urgent action. The cost of acting goes far higher the longer
> we wait — we can’t wait any longer to avoid the worst and be judged immoral
> by coming generations.
>  James Hansen <http://www.giss.nasa.gov/staff/jhansen.html> directs the
> NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and is the author of “Storms of My
> Grandchildren.”
>
> Room for Debate: Should Churches Get Tax Breaks?<http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/05/09/should-churches-get-tax-breaks?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp>
> --
> Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
> art.deco.studios at gmail.com
>
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-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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