SH3RL0CK

How about old movies? I remember a Star Trek (original air date circa 1968) episode giving the formula for gunpower.

Everyone, including myself (in case I did not make myself clear) seems to be in agreement that clean energy is a good thing regardless of GW concerns. And I agree we should immediately implement them. As one example, I think we could have and should have had hybrid electric cars (and the corresponding 50+ mpg) 30 or 40 years ago which is just that much more pollution and wasted gasoline. I think the technology to do so existed then. Had we taken this one step during the oil crisis of the 1970's who knows how much more efficient these cars would be today after an additional 30 years of development?

I think we are pretty much in agreeement here. I've never been against responsible use of our resources which would include the immediate use of renewable energy (such as wind power). CaptainPanic makes a real good point too regarding the economics. Edit to include/clarify: I do have serious questions regarding the effectiveness of carbon trading (it sounds expensive and ineffective to me). And then there are some of the crazy ideas that are out there such as artificially introducing sulfur dioxide in the upper atmosphere to introduce an artificial cooling. Or pulling CO2 out of the air to pump underground (just where will the energy for this come from? Its better to stop CO2 emissions at the source, energy production).

jryan, I too am skeptical (which I will discuss in more detail below) about the global warming theory. But it is undeniable that today's climate is warmer than it was in the past. To argue otherwise is being ignorant. And no, that is NOT intended as an insult to you, unless you want to deny this point. Either stop denying the climate has changed relative to 10, 50, 100 years ago; or provide actual evidence it hasn't changed. My skepticism is in regards to some (not all) of the claims by those insisting and demanding on huge, expensive, complex changes immediately. There needs to be more debate and research on what to do in response to this climate change. Sure, there is a problem but how big of a problem is it? How can we fix (or mitigate) it? Lets count the cost and benefits for proposed actions and determine what actions are sensible (and before we can really do this, we need to understand our climate better than we currently do). It is ignorant, IMO, of people to presuppose massive changes to our economy are absolutely necessary without having even a shred of research regarding if this will even result in anything positive let alone pass a cost/benefit analysis. Panic does not solve problems.

The surface area of roofs and streets is, IMO, going to be a negligible for an albedo change. However, by making the roofs white, less heating occurs within the house and therefore there will be less use of the airconditioner. This will result in less electricity, and therefore less CO2. So white roofs, by reducing the greenhouse gases, indirectly help solve this problem. I assume a similar argument can be made regarding roads in that cars burn more gas when the airconditioner is running. As far as green roofs, its basically the same thing. By shading the building, there is less heat inside and therefore less use of the airconditioner. I think the cheapest materials for roofing (and roads) are dark, it costs more to make them light color. And therein lies the biggest potential problem, the cost. If the price was the same, builders would be fine to install white roofs. The building owner would prefer this as it would save on the electricity bill. But you're not going to get many people to do this if the cost is too high, unless it is mandated in the building codes. And even then, if the cost is too high, there will be less new construction resulting in more environmental damage as old, inefficient buildings are kept longer.

Dude, I agree with you that we need to know a lot more about our climate than we presently do. However, you are blowing smoke here. Take the brown graph; years 2000- present. Other than 1998; all previous peaks (going back to 1980) are smaller than these maximum. The minimums in 2000 to present are all higher than the minimums previous. Clearly 2001 to Present is warmer than 1980 to 1997, with some room for arguement 1998 to 2000. Granted these are "anomalies" and not actual temperatures which might tend to exagerate the extent of the problem...but still the overall trend is clear. By selective sampling are you saying the data is wrong? If so, you need to present either alternate data indicating otherwise; or show why this data is wrong. Or are you saying 2007 to 2009 is the start of a new downward trend? Since this is only two years, please provide an explaination of what changed in our climate to start this downward trend now.

CaptainPanic, I tend to respectfully disagree. Consensus among the politicians IS important because they set policy. Unfortunately, they are often clueless...but I also do recognize the difficulties in setting a course given how little we know regarding the economics associated with any possible action. How much can/should be spent on this issue? And for how much (if any) improvement in CO2 emissions?

The article, to me, seemed to report more on how politicians and the public percieves global warming...or climate change...due to CO2 emissions than on the scientific merit of the theory. Its less of a debate on the existance of global warming than on what should be done about it. It seems natural to me that politicians are much less likely to spend big money in an attempt to limit CO2 emissions in a harsh recession than they would be if the economic times were good. Why the criticism of the report? My view is that we need a much, much better understanding of this issue than we have at the moment. I do support reduction in CO2 emissions, but my support is qualified in that I want actual progress and I do not want to do anything that would be self-defeating. Exactly what are the consequences if we do nothing? What happens given a certain % reduction in CO2 emissions? How can we realistically do this? What happens to our economy and the world economy should we attain this % reduction? Would the proposed actions takens simply move the production of CO2 from the EU and USA to China and India therefore resulting in no improvement? Or worse emissions due to inefficient factories? Would the proposed actions not reduce CO2 emissions, but simply line the pockets of certain individuals? What if the CO2 emissions are only very slightly reduced, but at great cost; is it worth it then? These questions, and many others, have not been answered to my satisfaction. The fact is, while nearly everyone agrees CO2 emissions aren't a good thing, no one really knows how bad it really is or what should be done about it.

Strange. Very strange. He seems to have spent more time demanding to be spoon-fed the answer than it would have taken to simply figure out the solution for himself. And for all that work, he now has the answer (which I doubt he really understands) to one problem, rather than the ability to solve many problems.

Sorry, I did not catch the joking; maybe I need more sleep. I do see and respect your viewpoint on this issue. Its certainly not an unreasonable view to take.

JohnB provided this in post # 43. There were many times (albeit millions of years ago) when the ppm of CO2 were in the several thousands. On the same graph is the global temperature, which never exceeds about 23C as JohnB also pointed out.

A lot of what is being said, isn't actually true in my experience. Not true. what is to prevent some angry, crazy guy from rushing in, guns blazing? or swinging a club for that matter? ?? Of course it is a deterent. Imagine the crime that would happen if there were no police at all. I've actually never seen an armed guard at any of my banks; just a few tellers and managers - all unarmed. And usually they simply give the robber the money since he will go away after he gets it. He can be caught later. It isn't worth the risk of confronting him, unless someone is at immediate risk, at which point perhaps then he should be confronted. crime statistics suck, as bascule previously pointed out. lets keep religion out of this shall we? My original comment was meant to avoid the complexities of the causation of crime. But to put blame for crime on religion doesn't belong in this thread on gun control A few anecdotal youtube vidoes and examples does not make good science or good policy. That said, to reply to John Cuthber Again, I never said he had to have a gun to be a serious problem for the police... Lets put ourselves in the position of a police officer. Lets let this irate man have a running chainsaw and be threating people he has cornered; perhaps in an enclosed alleyway. Lets say he has already slashed some of the people. Sure, you (and the other police officers with you) are physically capable of beating him easily in a fair fight, but again he has hostages and a chainsaw. What should you do? You can try to tackle him or otherwise physically subdue him (I hope you and/or the other people still have all fingers/arms/ heads properly attached). Or you could outright shoot him. Or you could tazer him. Or you could try to talk him into surrendering (while he is slashing the citizens?). None of these seem great to me. Any other ideas? Life isn't always as clearcut as we would like. Simplistic answers generally are not feasible in our complex world.

The moon is about 1/81 the mass of the earth, or 1.23%. ( See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_moon ) As such how much would this tiny bit more mass change things? My guess is that it wouldn't change much at all.

That response really does not address the question that JohnB brought up, which is: Why, in the past when CO2 levels greatly exceeded todays levels, the earth did not get correspondingly hotter; and also seemed to quickly cool down. As such, are there cooling forcing functions which we simply don't know about yet? Also, is it really supposed to be cooling now? Or maybe not for another 3,000 years? The milankovitch cycles operate on geologic timescales...I don't think it is warranted to invoke these should the climate actually be cooling (or not warming as quickly as it should be). Just like I don't think it is warranted to assume (yet) global warming isn't happening because the warmest year (1998) is now over a decade ago. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles I think a big part of the answer to his question was presented in post # 46 by swansont: To play the devils advocate a bit, I'll ask: Would this imply there is a maximum temperature (22C) that the earth can realistically reach? Would this imply that there is no concern at all regarding global warming? My short answers are 1) Yes there is obviously some maximum, and 2) No, there is certainly cause for concern (but not cause for panic). But I'm more interested in what others think about his question.

Do we know that they were not decieved by the governor? If he told them he was hiking the Appalachian trail, why would they assume he was in Argentina instead? If asked, why wouldn't they say he was hiking if that was what they were told?

If you did warp space-time this intensely, wouldn't there be some rather nasty side effects?

I see. Think of it this way: You are trying to measure an electron's position and momentum. Let's define momentum as the direction and speed the electron is travelling. These are obviously related to each other; the position of the electron changes in response to its direction and speed. As your instruments get better and better at determining the exact position of the electron, you lose ability to measure its momentum. Once you know exactly where it is, you know longer know where it is going at all. This is because the process of determining its position has changed where how fast and in what direction it is going. From Wiki: This explaination is however, incomplete without going further into the math; as is described in the wiki article. As a starting point, does this incomplete explaination make sense to you?

Well, it is a difficult thing to explain. It took me about 5 seconds to locate a decent explaination here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncertainty_principle You could have done the same through Wiki, or Google, or etc. It does get frustrating when people expect someone else to look up the answers they want, rather than trying to do so themselves. Is this a homework assignment? If so, please do not copy from Wiki as I am sure the instructor will figure this out.

Thanks for making your beliefs clear, allow me to re-word it to be sure I understand (and please feel free to correct me if it isn't correct). Before a person kills anyone, they are not a murderer. So how do you propose to forbid them having a gun before commiting the crime? You can't other than forbidding guns to all citizens. I obviously disagree that an elimination of the right of the law-abiding citizen to possess guns is warranted by the current US crime and murder rates (as the crime rates do not correlate well to gun ownership and taking into consideration that guns have positive effects on these statistics as well as negative ones) and I'll leave my statement at that.

We have not yet met...would love to do so someday.

Well, yes, of course. But the original poster states I cannot tell the if temperature of an object is -40C or +60C by looking at it with my eyes. But I'd sure be able to tell if I touched it. More to the point, I could connect a thermocouple or scan it with a thermographic camera and be able to determine the exact temperature, not just "it is hot". The point is human sensory capacity isn't nearly as good as our instruments have become.

You cannot tell whether something is hot or cold by looking at it. But you can by touching it.

John, Convicted felons are not really permitted to own firearms. Your statement that is false. http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1032128620083 This article was regarding a lawsuit to the US Supreme court by a felon requesting permission to own a gun. He lost... 9-0. So now its been nearly 20 years since a felon could legally own a gun. and http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2008/06/will-some-felon.html That said, I think there is some merit to the idea that guns increase the lethality of criminal encounters (just as there is merit that guns reduce the amount of crime). Is that a fair trade for a fewer number of such encounters? Depends who you ask as this is purely a matter of opinion... Regarding the police stopping a 60 year old, I never stated he had a gun. My point is that what is a force that will stop a very healthy individual can be fatal to someone less healthy. And should said 60 year old die, it is a good bet the lawsuits for excessive police force will be filed. But if you think someone high as a kite, older, and out of shape isn't a lethal threat, then lets give this guy a chainsaw and I'll let you be the first to try to physically subdue him with your bare hands (just to be sure he doesn't die from the taser ...

No question the bullet-proof glass protects against a "sniper" type of attack, which I am sure we are all agreed is a good idea. However, you are overlooking that it also protects the public against the police being required to respond with deadly force. This gives them the option of sitting tight and finding solutions other than a deadly response. I don't know, maybe it is because people are inherently evil? If this were easily fixable by technology, why wouldn't the taser manufacturers have already built the "new and improved" tasers? Perhaps they have not done so because for some reason this isn't easily fixable. Immobilizing, but not seriously injuring someone is a very difficult thing to do across the entire spectrum of people. What will immobilize an angry 20 year old athlete high on drugs could kill an angry 60 year old non-athlete high on drugs.

I've avoided responding to these posts until now because they are off topic. However, I can't help but point out that the problem with drug addiction isn't the legality or the cost of the drugs. Some of the worst drug users are simply huffing perfectly legal (and cheap) products. Its the fact that an addict's behavior is very often self-destructive. Who knowingly hires drug users (most places test for drugs as a condition of employment these days)? When drug abuse affects their work performance (and this is almost a certainty for addicts) they lose their jobs. Then the state removes their children, if they have any, (for the protection of said children). Their spouse/girlfriend/boyfriend leaves them. They lose their normal friends. and so on as their lives spiral downward to destruction. It doesn't happen with all drug users. But it certainly happens with many drug users. But I digress...mods, perhaps this should be in a separate thread?