If you think climate change isn't happening...

[MAA89]

if we all invest in being "green", his pockets mysteriously get a whole lot greener.

 

ROFL :tup:

[metsfan]

I'm sorry, but i am still stunned that people refuse to see the immense changes going on around us, and dismiss any ideas that defy the "nothing's wrong, keep walking" mindset as "just a theory".

 

When i see trees blossoming in february outside of my house, strong winds that until the last 10 years really were not a common thing in this area, migratory animals staying put that were rarely spotted when my mom was my age aside from migration times (spring/fall), and a snow-less, forever, rain 45 degree "winter", lightning storms that stopped traffic along highways when they were just regular average storms just a few years ago points to something very wrong with the climate. Weather is not isolated, it's the cause of an imbalance trying to balance itself out. Our atmosphere isn't divided by lines on a map.

 

Maybe living in a city with no wildlife and minimal natural habitat doesn't allow people to really see what's going on, or maybe people simply can't accept reality because the reality is disconcerting enough and the outcome of these events disturbing to our way of life enough that saying nothing will happen is the only real response some people can think of.

 

Whatever the case may be, i live in a wooded area with nature all around me, creeks, streams, fields with natural native grasses etc, everything is out of whack, and it only seems to be the case the farther i go.

 

I personally am trying all i can to hopefully stop extreme irreversible climate change with my day to day activities, which include not owning a car, and taking trains and mass transportation wherever i go when practical.

 

I can only hope that people wake up, snap out of it, and do all they can to prevent catastrophe.

 

- A

[KTrainExp]

Climate change exists, but there's really nothing we can do about it at this point.

 

The damage has been done and it's going to take a whole lot of time before the thing heals itself. By then, we'll probably have adapted to it physically or mentally in ways which we probably don't want to know now.

[MAA89]

I'm sorry, but i am still stunned that people refuse to see the immense changes going on around us, and dismiss any ideas that defy the "nothing's wrong, keep walking" mindset as "just a theory".

 

When i see trees blossoming in february outside of my house, strong winds that until the last 10 years really were not a common thing in this area, migratory animals staying put that were rarely spotted when my mom was my age aside from migration times (spring/fall), and a snow-less, forever, rain 45 degree "winter", lightning storms that stopped traffic along highways when they were just regular average storms just a few years ago points to something very wrong with the climate. Weather is not isolated, it's the cause of an imbalance trying to balance itself out. Our atmosphere isn't divided by lines on a map.

 

Maybe living in a city with no wildlife and minimal natural habitat doesn't allow people to really see what's going on, or maybe people simply can't accept reality because the reality is disconcerting enough and the outcome of these events disturbing to our way of life enough that saying nothing will happen is the only real response some people can think of.

 

Whatever the case may be, i live in a wooded area with nature all around me, creeks, streams, fields with natural native grasses etc, everything is out of whack, and it only seems to be the case the farther i go.

 

I personally am trying all i can to hopefully stop extreme irreversible climate change with my day to day activities, which include not owning a car, and taking trains and mass transportation wherever i go when practical.

 

I can only hope that people wake up, snap out of it, and do all they can to prevent catastrophe.

 

- A

 

Either one of two things will happen:

 

We will finally run out of space to grow enough food for the entire human population (a fate predicted many times in the future but always averted to human ingenuity), or, we'll just let our coastal cities go under and move inland and still find enough space to live AND grow food.

 

I like the idea of urban farming (growing food on the rooftops and ledges of buildings). While some claim that a large skyscraper could grow enough food per year to feed 50,000 people for a year (probably an exaggeration), it is an intuitive move to produce food where people need it and avoid wastage and pollution created by large-scale long-distance transport of food. Even if enough can be grown on one building to, say, meet 5,000 people's need for vegetables in a year, 1600 Manhattan skyscrapers would suffice for the entire NYC population. Grain and livestock is much trickier, but could possibly be moved to areas just outside the city where housing density is lower. The fallout from this would be the loss of agricultural jobs outside the cities, and more migration into the cities will certainly test the community's infrastructure (roads, housing, social services, health etc).

 

My family visited NYC once when I was very young (I grew up outside the US); I remember the conversations long after we returned home about the subway and mass transit and ease of travel without a personal automobile in NYC. I grew up to assume that all major cities had a rapid transit system, only to discover that, unlike European or South-east Asian cities, most US cities didn't. Just thinking how one subway train, in one run over its entire route, will move more than 2000 people, taking almost 1500 cars off the road, makes me wonder why most of the US chose to prefer getting stuck in rush hour traffic jams for 250 days a year. It's no wonder, then, that the US produces 25% of the world's CO2 output with only 4% of the population. Unfortunately, when I was living with my aunt in Maryland and a walk to the nearest Sears shopping mall took 45 minutes, I realized how badly sprawled and dispersed the majority of US communities are. I am not sure how public transit would overcome the issues of suburban sprawl and low ridership (due to low population density), even though I always root for their success.

 

I am all for biking: I have many friends who are bike enthusiasts, and I might consider buying and using a bike for short distance travel, or even combining biking and taking the subway for longer rides.

 

At home, we barely ever turn on the AC; we prefer to open the windows and let in a breeze during the summer and wear warm clothing in winter to avoid having to always have the heater on. When I see PSA's saying people should turn their heating/cooling off when they are not at home, I find it astonishing that people would want to heat/cool their homes when they are not even there.

 

Simple measures such as turning off appliances instead of keeping them on standby, washing dishes by hand (it takes only 2 minutes to wash a plate and a bowl) instead of in a dishwasher, keeping unwashed clothes aside until you get a big pile and then washing them all in a large washing machine at the neighborhood coin laundry, not using a hairdryer or electric toothbrush, turning off lights and televisions in rooms that are not being used etc etc would all lower energy consumption and lower one's bills, but the average American seems to think that such common sense measures amount to too much penny-pinching and that such behavior is better suited to poor folks.

 

Back in my old country, the government banned polythene bags due to environmental reasons and concerns over the health of workers who produced and recycled them. People are happily using and re-using canvas, jute or cotton bags, this after a massive initial outcry about the "right to choose" and the cost of buying reusable bags. I always refuse a bag when buying snacks, stationery etc, preferring to put them away in my backpack instead.

 

I have always tried to make sure my old clothes (and I mean really old, the average T-shirt in my wardrobe is 4 years old and some are as old as 7) that I have grown out of are redistributed to someone who needs them, old gadgets like cell phones are recycled (recently sent a cell phone and a camera to http://www.recyclingforcharities.com/index.php) and stuff I don't need (like old textbooks) I either sell or give away.

 

I almost never print an email, lecture notes, Hopstop or Google directions (at least for the subway and bus, I can always remember the routes and transfers) or anything else on my computer. I never even come close to using up my college's 500 pages per semester printing limit.

 

I use a single portable lamp (40 W) to illuminate my entire room; this compared to upwards of 6 100W lamps and massive chandeliers that many people like to have in each room.

 

I have stopped receiving paper copies (switched to online billing) of statements for all my bank accounts, student loan servicers, credit cards, health insurance company, college newspaper etc and am in the process of converting to digital delivery for all my magazine subscriptions. I have long ago stopped picking up paper versions of documents I know I can find on the web.

 

I once used a MetroCard from the date I bought it to the date of expiry almost a year later (until August 31) and am currently doing the same with a new card. I have never littered a subway station mezzanine/platform floor with disused MetroCards.

 

When I am living alone, I plan to buy a small wind turbine and maybe a solar panel (in spite of my distrust of alternative energy companies, or maybe because I do not believe in getting power from large solar arrays or wind farms) to produce all or part of my electricity needs, unless my neighbors or the city council complains about noise/visual distractions. I also plan to live in as small a house as possible so as to minimize heating, cooling and lighting needs.

 

I prefer to shower as opposed to filling up the bathtub as that saves a lot of water, and I try to save water every other way I can. I drink tap water exclusively.

 

I never buy food that has excessive packaging, unless the packaging material is recyclable. I don't buy anything that I cannot finish by its expiry date to avoid having to throw it away into a landfill. (Between plowing, sowing, fertilizing, watering, spraying of pesticides (often by aircraft), harvesting, processing, transport, more processing, packaging, storaging, advertising, transporting to market, buying, cooking, reheating and consuming, twenty-five or more calories of energy is used to assimilate one calorie of energy into your body. The best we can do is not waste some of that food that has already cost so much).

 

I hardly ever fly or go for pointless long drives simply because it's "summer driving season".

 

You don't have to believe in climate change or live in the countryside in order to make such changes to your lifestyle; saving your money and just plain common sense should be enough. Yet, most Americans need to be scared into giving up the "right to waste" which is so pointless and hard to understand from an outsider's point-of-view. While I am very much a skeptic of the global warming bandwagon, I firmly believe my "carbon footprint" is way smaller than even the so-called environmentalists.

 

The damage has been done and it's going to take a whole lot of time before the thing heals itself. By then, we'll probably have adapted to it physically or mentally in ways which we probably don't want to know now.

 

Humans will have to adapt to growing populations anyway. See my first and second paragraph above.

[Messino]

The earth is actually heading towards a cooling period not warming. Its all a scam to issue CO2 carbon taxes.

[PopsicleXGirl]

ok... so since weather is supposed to be predictable, and climate change isn't supposed to happen, does that mean we must have caused the ice age too?

 

it will take a lot more than a dust storm this year, a snow less winter that year, a windy day today, and lightning appearing in the sky during a rainstorm yesterday to convince me of all these IMMENSE climate changes leading to a catastrophe.

 

i mean, we had a warm winter and a cool summer in NYC this year. so what is it? "global" warming (while the earth is cooling) during the winter or "global" cooling (while the earth is warming) during the summer?

 

like i said, SCAM. or shall i say... $CAM.

 

doesn't mean i do not take precautions against polluting the environment though. i was a vegetarian for 6 years for a reason. too bad chicken is my weakness.

[metsfan]

These werent today or yesterday or just once. Things have been getting more and more into uncharted territory.

 

If you think saving the future of our species is a scam, well more power to ya, i just want my kids to thank me, not curse me.

 

Also, scientists have been concerned about this since the 50's, but only till measured rises in the GAT (global average temperature) over several decades did alarm bells start going off in the early 90's. Then the odd weather started and things have been flying off the handle pretty much since then.

 

 

1993:

 

2005:

 

 

2008:

 

2009: (biggest wildfire in history)

 

- A

[EE Broadway Local]

I never said anything about the video not working, it is a corrupt website that starts opening connections from your computer to other shady hosts with DNS that resolves to names that are porn sites and other shady stuff. This laptop has never been to any porn sites and is password protected, I also have software that monitors all of the inbound and outbound TCP/IP UDP connections and when I clicked on that link all of these shayd connections started opening up. Before that my computer was clean and not opening up connections to sites like that.

I applaud you for keeping your laptop on safe search, Messino. You sound like a good person.

[metsfan]

Corrupt website? No issues here!

 

- A

[PopsicleXGirl]

actually the worst wildfire was in 1893 - almost 4 million acres in wisconsin. hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, heat waves, mass floods, *insert any other erratic weather phenomenon here*, existed before we have. do some research on the top 10 disasters of any of the above and i assure you your time line is incorrect.

[MAA89]

By the way, what does earthquakes and tsunamis ever have to do with climate change. Tectonic activity is certainly not affected by greenhouse gases. Yet many people, in their frenzy, will blame them on GHG emissions too.

[metsfan]

actually the worst wildfire was in 1893 - almost 4 million acres in wisconsin. hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, heat waves, mass floods, *insert any other erratic weather phenomenon here*, existed before we have. do some research on the top 10 disasters of any of the above and i assure you your time line is incorrect.

 

Weather is not unconnected, random, or erratic. It has a pattern, and it is globally connected with small local variations here and there which can be mistaken for random stuff. Try looking at a global satellite animation of water vapor or temperature.....

 

By the way, what does earthquakes and tsunamis ever have to do with climate change. Tectonic activity is certainly not affected by greenhouse gases. Yet many people, in their frenzy, will blame them on GHG emissions too.

 

There is strong evidence to suggest that sedimentary buildup along subduction zone sea floor can affect tectonic action, as well as the types of eruptions that result from the mechanism of tectonic subduction. Sedimentary buildup is directly linked to the carbon and nitrogen cycles.

 

- A