Poll of the Week - Global Warming

I was having a conversation with my friend the other day where when I stated "Global Warming" and he promptly corrected me to be "Global Climate Change".

So I was wondering what term do people prefer. I think that Global Warming is a more than accurate term for what is going on in our climate today. I feel that in general we are responsible for increased CO2 in the atmosphere causing a warming effect on the planet raising our global temperature. Yes the overall climate is changing, but that term was more made up for the fact that people whined that it was still cold in the winter. Also, Global Warming has been around for a while. It is catchy (dare I say Buzz Word), and people understand (more or less) the general connotations of it. Whereas Global Climate Change is not as well known and it has an air of mystery about it, where the lay-person probably would not understand its meaning.

Therefore I wanted to instigate a poll of geologists to see what you prefer. Please click on the term you best feel should be used. This is the first of my "Poll of the Week" segment, and we will see how well this is taken to see if I do anymore.

Please use the comment section to discuss/debate anything your selection.

When did Politicians become Scientists?

"But while we recognize the occurrence of these natural, cyclical environmental trends, we can't say with assurance that man's activities cause weather changes."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/08/AR2009120803402.html

Sarah Palin


WTF!!!!!

Why do people who probably had one science class in high school think they are suddenly experts on a subject that I study daily and still don't know everything about? And as my office mates have stated, people need to get it through their thick heads that there is a difference between climate and weather. First off we change weather patterns all the time (smog anyone) and second we are constantly influencing climate if only from our pumping of CO2 into the atmosphere but with a whole host of other influences. I hate, hate, HATE, it when people think they know what they are talking about. It is just as bad as when celebrities talk about politics. SHUT UP, you don't know what you are talking about. Leave it to those who do.

In the News: Global Change vs. the Economy

In the News

Obama pushing stronger fuel-efficiency standard

Obama has hit the ground running. He has already managed to get praise and piss off people in one fell swoop. He recently proposed changes to the way the auto industry makes their cars to make them more environmentally friendly (AKA green). To do this the auto industry would need to make billions of dollars in changes in an already weakened, possibly dying industry.

Now here is where we have the problem. The auto industry in the first place is one of the most corrupt industries in America today. Chopping off the head may be the only way to save them. They made this blatantly clear when they all flew to DC in their private jets to asks for money from congress. The money from the flight alone could have been used to pay several employees for years, not to mention the cost of just maintaining the jets to be ready on a moments notice. I am all in favor of just letting them sort it out themselves. But the problem again is the American people. For the most part they did nothing wrong but they are the one's getting punished. Even with all the money Congress gave to the auto giants they are still laying off tons of people (I'm sure so they don't have to lose as much, better them than us). And they are still in threats of failure. What did the hard working line worker do to deserve this? It is probably all his fault to end up in a declining job market and be put on the butcher's block because some individuals desire to do whatever they please.

But if they fail, others will. We are a country and a society that is built upon itself, so much so that like Jenga, if you take out the wrong block, the whole thing could fail. I was just told that if AIG went under, then I would not have been able to come into work since they supply my company's insurance. It's insane that a company I had nothing to do with would hinder my being able to get a paycheck. The same could be said for almost all the mega-companies. Unfortunately they need to stay afloat - but at what cost to the "little man"?

To finish, I can just say that I commend Obama for enforcing greater restrictions, unfortunately it may be at an inopportune time. And I can say for certain, I will likely never buy an American car again, at least not until they clean up their act.

In The News: VP Debate and the Environment

In the News

One of my major concerns as a geologist is the environment. In regards to that, Governor Palin has come across as not only ignorant but down right backwards on her thinking. I think Biden's comment of "drill, drill, drill" hits the nail right on the head. Personally I think that instead of wasting time and money on more drilling we could spend the same time and money on renewable resources and get the return not only sooner, but then we would be sustainable.

However, the main focus of this rant is on Palin's comment about global warming at the VP debate:

IFILL: ... Let's talk about climate change. What is true and what is false about what we have heard, read, discussed, debated about the causes of climate change?

PALIN: Yes. Well, as the nation's only Arctic state and being the governor of that state, Alaska feels and sees impacts of climate change more so than any other state. And we know that it's real.

I'm not one to attribute every man -- activity of man to the changes in the climate. There is something to be said also for man's activities, but also for the cyclical temperature changes on our planet.

But there are real changes going on in our climate. And I don't want to argue about the causes. What I want to argue about is, how are we going to get there to positively affect the impacts?

We have got to clean up this planet. We have got to encourage other nations also to come along with us with the impacts of climate change, what we can do about that.

As governor, I was the first governor to form a climate change sub-cabinet to start dealing with the impacts. We've got to reduce emissions. John McCain is right there with an "all of the above" approach to deal with climate change impacts.

We've got to become energy independent for that reason. Also as we rely more and more on other countries that don't care as much about the climate as we do, we're allowing them to produce and to emit and even pollute more than America would ever stand for. So even in dealing with climate change, it's all the more reason that we have an "all of the above" approach, tapping into alternative sources of energy and conserving fuel, conserving our petroleum products and our hydrocarbons so that we can clean up this planet and deal with climate change.

How does that even make any sense? If somehow McCain wins, he better not die.

In the News: Global warming is definitely, most probably almost certainly human caused

So a new report came out today stating that global warming is likely the result of human activity. So what makes this report different from the many before it?

Nothing that I can tell.

I mean really. How many of these things need to come out before the US government will actually do anything. You know this report was primarily for the benefit of the US public since the rest of the world has grown up and accepted the earlier reports. The most profound international program, the Kyoto Protocol, has been panned by Bush, since it allowed too much leniency for developing nations even though we (the US) produces a vast majority of the CO2 entering the atmosphere.

One thing that I extremely dislike in the report is that they state the effects of global warming are not going to go away anytime soon. Eventually they state much further down the article that this does not mean we shouldn't do anything about it, and that if we do nothing the effects will get much worse. But what about the people that just read the first half of article? It's not like any of us hasn't done that before. It is my worry that this will lead people to the wrong conclusion; that to do nothing will be just as good, if not better than actually trying to stop this.

Anyway, that's my vent. Here is a link to a couple of the stories

Reuters

Associated Press

Live Science