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60 comments on The dangers of short-termism

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ericy on February 10, 2008 - 4:41pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

I see manipulation all over the place. There are all sorts of folks who deny that climate change is even real. Everything to them is political, and those on the far right live in an alternate reality where the world conforms to their beliefs.

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DaveMart on February 10, 2008 - 6:39pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

That's called people having different opinions, Eric.

Global warming is an hypothesis, one with quite a lot of support behind it and which I personally think is probably right, but it is not the word of God or something, and it is not remotely on the same level of implausibility to think that it may not be right as to be a creationist.

It is an attempt to describe a highly complex system with a great many variables, and in which it is hypothesised that the impact of greenhouse gasses is multiplied many times by mechanisms of which we have a poor understanding.

I happen to think that it is the best explanation we currently have, but dislike fundamentalism on either side of the argument, which seems to me simply absurd on when seeking to describe such a complicated system.

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geek7 on February 10, 2008 - 9:18pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

"...it is not the word of God or something,..."
When, how long ago, was the word of god something on which there was universal agreement? ;-)

On the present situation, I am puzzled about how one can expect smart people of good will to come to a consensus view. And suppose we do not limit the discussion to global warming as seems to have been done by Ian. Should we not also include peak oil in the statement of the problem?

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MikeMorin on February 13, 2008 - 7:12pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

If it was only people of good will that we needed to reach, the problem would be much less hopeless...

First order of business, get the peak oil issue to the forefront of public awareness and discourse.

Second order of business, start developing and IMPLEMENTING long term and shorter term demand and supply side plans

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