The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #99731   Message #1997621
Posted By: Bill D
15-Mar-07 - 12:31 PM
Thread Name: BS: Global warming - the myth
Subject: RE: BS: Global warming - the myth
As sciences go, this attempting to graph, predict and explain long-term climate changes is still pretty new. We can debate the details as we get more & more data, but the fact remains that ANY attempt to reduce our impact on the complex of systems that sustain us seems to be a good idea. What we do NOT want to do is base decisions strictly on political or economic special interests.
   There is no doubt that there are cyclical natural forces that we cannot easily control, and thus we need to take special care to adjust to them...(like NOT building in flood plains or on beaches!). It IS the case, however, that special interests push pretty hard for the 'right' to build wherever they think they can sell...and to fish, cut, burn, dig, pave and breed without restraints. These people have little concept of maintaining a "margin for error" ...and in the case of Earth resources and living space, it is BEYOND foolhardy not to stay within a safety margin.

so....go on...compare graphs and nitpick over precise melting rates of various glaciers and ice sheets or influence of cosmic rays and solar radiation...but we need to OPERATE as if the most pessimistic predictions 'might' be true....then if we were too conservative, we can shrug. But if we were way too optimistic, it's gonna be awkward.