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Lynne Leichtfuss
Social climber
valley center, ca
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:31pm PT
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I would never do something to feel good...what's the point. I feel fine. But why gripe about a problem incessantly if you are not going to take an action to solve it.
Boston Tea Party...put up or be silent...talk is cheap etc. Just a thought. The one or two times in life our entire community got behind a public project they were being railroaded with that they totally disagreed with they (the public) won !
Just a thought. Lynne
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Jim E
climber
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:36pm PT
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Being a little overly simplistic there don't ya think?
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dirtbag
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 20, 2008 - 11:36pm PT
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And to further Jeremy's point, the same industries have for years done a great job of instilling enough false doubt into the intellectually malleable folks to convince them that the world is still flat. So, nothing gets done.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:45pm PT
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Lynne,
I'm asking that we measure the marginal costs and benefits of what we do. Would lowering fossil fuel consumption by, say 25% benefit humanity as much as taking the cost of doing that, and spending it on better housing, medical care and food distribution for third world countries? It makes no sense for all of us to commit suicide, or to start World War III to reduce the earth's human population, but it also makes no sense to me to do nothing. We simply need to justify what we propose by measuring what it would do, and what it would cost.
Jeremy wants us to believe that this questioning is all part of some plot by the fossil fuel industry. The questions follow logically from the actions of those who want to force economic decisions on people without providing economic data. To "do something" without trying to measure marginal costs and benefits is to practice flat-earth economics.
By the way, I don't mean to imply you need to measure these things precisely. I've been an economic forecaster since 1973, I always try to get clients to understand that the point forecast means less than the range of plausible outcomes. Until we start to get that data, at least in ranges of, say, 95% confidence, we have no logical basis to justify our actions.
John
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Flashlight
climber
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:46pm PT
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Lynne, because the people griping about it KNOW that there is nothing we can do to solve it. They like to gripe and complain that we are ruining the planet with nothing to back up the complaints. They then try to use the GW hyperbole to institute regulations to control how everybody lives.
JEleazarian, are you familiar with Bjorn Lomborg?
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east side underground
Trad climber
crowley ca
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:55pm PT
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flashlight, sorry had to put the kid to bed, I think (i'm not a scientist) the ice retreated due to greenhouse gases caused by volcanism, LA basin and Mexico city = lots of greenhouse gas production. Have we seen much natural greenhouse gas production, a few volcanic events but any of scale to cause the large reduction of ice at the poles?
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Jeremy Handren
climber
NV
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Oct 20, 2008 - 11:57pm PT
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As an example John...barrel of oil $100....barrel of oil + external costs $300 -$600 obviously much contested figures but you get the idea.
There are a mountain of studies out there, dating back twenty years, I'm sure they will form the basis of future carbon emission policies.
You think them soshulist euro's just pulled their cap and trade numbers out of a hat?.
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dirtbag
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 20, 2008 - 11:59pm PT
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"JEleazarian, are you familiar with Bjorn Lomborg? "
LOL, Bjorn is not a scientist.
Figures you'd cite him.
But he is gay. I'm sure he'd support your yes vote on Prop 8.
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Jeremy Handren
climber
NV
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:06am PT
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"Jeremy wants us to believe that this questioning is all part of some plot by the fossil fuel industry"
You think they spend that money for some other reason?
The fact is we have a legislative process. And that process can be influenced by money. I think you make a big mistake in consistently discounting the shear corrosiveness of this factor in the policy making process.
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Flashlight
climber
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:16am PT
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Dirtforbrains...I never said he WAS and I don't care if he is homosoexual or not. Read his material, then respond to what he presents.
That is all you liberal crybabies ever do...attack the messenger and ignore the message.
Joe the Plumber, Sarah Palin...etc.
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dirtbag
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 21, 2008 - 12:25am PT
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"That is all you liberal crybabies ever do...attack the messenger and ignore the message. "
Maybe I'm being a little silly, but unlike the flat earth/Noah's Ark crowd I actually think that when it comes to understanding scientific issues we should consult scientists.
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:27am PT
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JEleazarian:
"Can you measure how fast, and how much it costs to change the rate of sinking? Marginal cost data preferred."
Such data should be compared, not with doing nothing, but also with the costs of allowing warming to take place and adjusting for the effects (like relocating everybody in much of florida and many coastal cities.
Jody, don't forget when you stop somebody who is allegedly "speeding" the earth's surface is already spinning at about 24000 miles per hour and simultaneous rocking through space around the sun at over 100,000 kilometers per hour and that whole solar system she-bang is going dang fast too.
so what's a little 15-20 miles an hour between friends?
and it takes light billions of years to traverse the universe at 182,000 miles per second but the earth is only 7000 years old. Wonder what God was up to the past trillion trillion years? It's all about US US us!
;-)
karl
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east side underground
Trad climber
crowley ca
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:29am PT
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what percentage of the worlds climotologists agree that global warming is human caused?
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dirtbag
climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Oct 21, 2008 - 12:31am PT
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""That is all you liberal crybabies ever do"
BTW, I'm getting a big laugh out of that. "crybabies"--Yeah, you oughta know!
LOL!!!
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Flashlight
climber
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:34am PT
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I am knott crying about GW, you are.
By the way, in response to the above question, it should be worded "What percentage of scientists ASSume GW is caused by humans?"
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Mighty Hiker
Social climber
Vancouver, B.C.
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:35am PT
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Relative to the first galaxies that formed, and are just visible about 12 billion light years away (I forget how many megaparsecs), we're moving about .8C = 240,000 kps. And not stopping for red lights, either.
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Lynne Leichtfuss
Social climber
valley center, ca
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Oct 21, 2008 - 12:39am PT
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Well, one last little comment. And this is why I don't usually post on these threads cause they are speculation and talk. When you talk you vent and then feel relieved ..... then you don't DO anything.
I am not talking about remaking the economy in one move. JUST take an issue, like taxes, and make a stand. Together. What is so darn hard about that ? Really, when I make a comment people tell me why it can't work. One can make it work.
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JEleazarian
Trad climber
Fresno CA
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Oct 21, 2008 - 01:26am PT
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Karl,
Believe it or not, we say the same thing. Don't just measure the marginal cost of reducing carbon emissions, measure the marginal cost of not doing so. I called the latter quantity the marginal benefit of carbon emissions reduction in earlier posts.
Jeremy,
Your numbers for externalities on fossil fuel consumption will certainly cause controversy, but I suspect they're not that far off. Unfortunately, the only studies I've seen that purport to measure costs and benefits reflect self-interested groups. I don't find anti-oil-consumptionists inherently more or less credible than their opposites. I think there's still a very great deal of work to do to reach any sort of economic consensus here -- and I intend on doing some of it. I just don't want to reinvent the wheel.
John
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WBraun
climber
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Oct 21, 2008 - 01:39am PT
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"What percentage ASSume a George Bush is caused by humans?"
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