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Here’s a recent classic frustrated, cranky and rather silly denier post deep down a thread on Quora where the search engines don’t go …
“Alarmists make the mistake of believing their own rhetoric, their own fiddled stats, and the constant repetition of falsehoods.
By the way, I have 4 “O” levels in English, speak 5 languages and have an “O” level in Latin AND Latin verse. Do you?
I am a “word sculptor”. You can write virtually what you want for “literary emphasis” Thus starting with AND if you want. I also speak/understand Swahili, though I cannot write or read it very well.
You make a point of avoiding your weak areas. Is dishonest.
Lets cut to the chase – name ONE BAD thing PRESENTLY from GW. You cannot.
Address the insulation versus windmills.
Address the record food production, a lot of it due to (1) more CO2 (2) to warmer weather (3) longer growing seasons (3) use of LESS water because the stomata not so open. (4) address the the fact that HALF of Britain would have to be covered in windmills to replace fossil fuels (5) address the alarmists denial of energy in Africa for their religious beliefs – if you exclude S.Africa and Egypt, the WHOLE of the rest of Africa uses less power than ONE medium American city
……I can hear you now, “Who cares? Let them suffer. GW, GW, GW,” on and on and on.
You will address these issues or the debate is over and I do not want to hear from you again. Have a nice day.”
Our ‘discussion’ had already gone back and forth a number of times as I tried to explain some science to this guy. And he kept telling me how smart he is. Here’s my response to the above …
“Deniers soon run out of scientific argument (or should I say pseudoscience and misinformation) and resort to rhetoric. And personal achievements have nothing to do with climate science either. I don’t mention my university prizes, for example, or that I’m an editor. Also, I have already addressed all of the issues you raise, often many times. I know how frustrating it must be for deniers these days but you need to read my posts. Then you won’t get “constant repetition”.
Fiddled stats. No stats have been fiddled. Weather bureaus around the world and large scientific organisations such as NASA and NOAA adjust raw temperature data for things like urban heat islands, weather stations moving (typically from warm spots in the centre of cities and towns to cooler spots in outer areas at airports) and changes in temperature measuring instruments and methods. But the difference between raw and adjusted series in recent decades isn’t great with both series showing a rapid increase in temperatures. See graph below. Note that the 1930s US heatwave wasn’t global. Adjustments are made to raw temperature data to make it more accurate than simply running with what the thermometer said in different places at different times.
Falsehoods. No, it’s called science. That we have anthropogenic climate change is abundantly obvious. This is due to our CO2 emissions. The natural environment adds and takes out CO2 from the system in roughly equal amounts; we only add it. This is why CO2 levels are increasing 100 times faster than coming out of the last glacial period and temperatures 40 times faster. Virtually all climate scientists agree with ACC. No scientific organisation takes a contrary view, nor do hardly any governments. They are not going to side with the pseudoscience and misinformation of a right wing political movement that was started by the fossil fuel industry in the 1980s when it realised that any move to reduce fuel consumption or move to cleaner energy sources would hurt it. So it shifted from a position where it agreed with the science to one of sitting on the fence to one of denial. But it’s gone the full circle. The likes of Exxon now once again agree with ACC. But there are still quite a few ACC deniers with their pseudoscience and misinformation floating around.
One bad thing presently from global warming. Try extinction rates hundreds of times higher than preindustrial. Also, the number of extreme weather events is 3–4 times more than 1980. The effects of extended drought, more flooding and other extreme weather is already having an adverse effect in some parts of the world. Desert areas are larger, e.g. the Sahara is 10% larger. Antarctic ice melt volume was six times greater in the 2010s than the 1980s. The ocean is 30% more acidic. Crops have lower nutrient levels. Weeds, insects and other pests tend to be a greater problem with warmer temperatures. Low lying farm land is more prone to saltwater intrusion with sea level rise. And there is a greater area burned from wildfires due to heat and drought.
The last time CO2 levels were as high as now was 3 million years ago, temperatures were a couple of degrees warmer than now (expected by 2100), and sea levels were at least 30 feet higher. This could happen again in centuries to come, flooding coastal cities (home to billions) and vast areas of low lying farmland. Collapse of the environment, the economy and society is quite possible if we don’t get rid of fossil fuels. Besides, renewables are cheaper and cleaner so why take the risk with fossil fuels which will run out anyway.
Insulation vs. windmills. I’m still not sure what you’re trying to show or prove with this. It’s hardly a tradeoff. If you relied on roof insulation in the UK and nothing else, you’d be cold nine months of the year. You’d need heating, lighting, etc. as well, and renewables are cheaper than fossil fuels. This includes construction, operation, storage, decommissioning and waste, and taking out subsidies.
Record food production. This is because there are more people to feed. Food production overall has risen, not due to extra CO2, but due to opening up more farmland, technology, science, and government and international organisation programs. Grain production, for example, has increased more than fourfold since 1950 while CO2 levels have risen about a third.
What happens with more CO2 is that the Earth is greening and plants are bigger, therefore they will need more water not less. But the main concern here is that we are releasing so much CO2 that the natural environment is only absorbing about half of it, thus the rapid build up of CO2 in the atmosphere, thus the rapid increase in temperatures.
Windmills covering half of Britain. The UK and most other places are transitioning away from fossil fuels. Coal has fallen sharply and is now less than 10% of UK energy, having been 70–80% several decades ago. Wind has increased rapidly and is up to 25%. The UK has about 11,000 wind turbines. So it’d need about 44,000 of them to go 100% wind. UK area is 240,000 sq km. They need to be about 100 metres apart. So you’d fit 100 of them into a square km. This means 44,000 of them would need 440 square km. Thus 440/240,000 = less than 0.2% or 1/500th of land area rather than half. Where do you get half from? I was in England for three weeks in 2019. I saw a lot of windmills in the countryside on sheep farms etc. The sheep don’t mind and the farmers are happy as they get paid. Other windmills are at wind farms. This is infinitely better than coal mines (which are atrocious for the environment), coal fired power stations (which are dirty and emit huge amounts of CO2) and trains pulling dirty wagons full of dirty coal all over the country.
Denial of energy in Africa for their religious beliefs. What’s all this about? Yes, Africa uses a lot less energy than advanced economies. What’s the hidden message for “alarmists” though? Left and centre left governments are more likely to give more aid to Africa than right and centre right governments.”
He didn’t get back. But he raised most of his issues again elsewhere on Quora and I pointed him to my posts here and elsewhere and could he actually read them rather than keep coming back with the same or similar nonsense. I’m cutting back on my efforts at Quora for obvious reasons.