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Adept wrote:QUOTE (Adept @ Mar 19 2014, 10:23 AM) What the.... this is completely wrong. So if something doesn't completely "fix the problem" but only lessens it, it's not worth doing?

No, its not wrong adept its fact. Cutting emissions is a waste of time for 2 reasons. 1) It isnt working. (by not working i mean absolute complete failure) 2) It doesn't deal with what we have already polluted.

The emissions problem is going to work itself out anyway, over 80% of emissions are from burning non-renewables. Non-renewable, meaning we're going to run out (sooner rather than later).

The real problem is dealing with the damage we've caused (and will cause). Everything else is a side-show waste of time. That means carbon capture tech, and clean energy production to replace fossil fuels once we run out. This is not a hard connection to make buddy, i'm confident you'll get it.

Why is it wrong that we limit emissions while looking for a way to fix the problems we've already caused, so that we might limit the number of problems we have to fix?

Viscur wrote:QUOTE (Viscur @ Mar 23 2014, 11:43 AM) Why is it wrong that we limit emissions while looking for a way to fix the problems we've already caused, so that we might limit the number of problems we have to fix?

Its a waste of time. If you don't think that the world is going to burn every last drop of oil/natural gas before its forced into cleaner energy, you are nuts. The only thing that we can change is how we respond to it, because there's no stopping the non-renewable train until it runs out of gas.

Now, cutting certain types of emissions to a point where we don't have acid rain, or poison groundwater has real benefit and we've already done that here in the US. Outside of that, everything else is really just nonsense. The pollution will happen. Whether or not a car gets 30 mpg or 40mpg is entirely irrelevant from a pollution standpoint, you are still BURNING a gallon of gas.

It would be a lot easier to get momentum and money behind ACTUAL clean energy research if everyone wasn't so damned concerned about how many MPG a Hummer gets. The environmentalist movement is just an eye roll and a yawn in the US because they won't face up to facts. Noone is going to stop polluting until they have to, deal with it.

Well heres the thing. The reason why its not a waste of time is that the manufacturing processes and invention processes aren't using the same manpower, ergo, you're diminishing the impact of the R&D bottleneck by providing it more time to do its research thing.

So in essence, by not taking advantage of all the resources available to you, in this case both scientists and engineers rather just 1 or the other, your actually generating more time to find practical solutions.

germloucks wrote:QUOTE (germloucks @ Mar 23 2014, 09:25 PM) Its a waste of time. If you don't think that the world is going to burn every last drop of oil/natural gas before its forced into cleaner energy, you are nuts. The only thing that we can change is how we respond to it, because there's no stopping the non-renewable train until it runs out of gas.

Now, cutting certain types of emissions to a point where we don't have acid rain, or poison groundwater has real benefit and we've already done that here in the US. Outside of that, everything else is really just nonsense. The pollution will happen. Whether or not a car gets 30 mpg or 40mpg is entirely irrelevant from a pollution standpoint, you are still BURNING a gallon of gas.

It would be a lot easier to get momentum and money behind ACTUAL clean energy research if everyone wasn't so damned concerned about how many MPG a Hummer gets. The environmentalist movement is just an eye roll and a yawn in the US because they won't face up to facts. Noone is going to stop polluting until they have to, deal with it.

this does tend to ignore certain points:

i) we will never "burn the last drop of oil / natural gas" because there will be a point where extraction costs of what remains will make it more expensive than clean energy
ii) limiting fossil fuel emissions has actually resulted in marked and demonstrable improvements in air quality, as anyone over sixty in London will be able to tell you

tbh agri is of the opinion that the main thing that is going to boost clean energy / increased efficiency is the financial damage that most people in the West have been suffering from - sooner or later most of them are going to notice that the biggest waste of money they have is that car (or those cars) in their driveway, and that there are cheaper, quicker and healthier alternatives to using them in the way that we have been. This is especially true for anyone who lives in a city, certainly anyone who lives in a European one.

Viscur wrote:QUOTE (Viscur @ Mar 23 2014, 04:36 PM) Well heres the thing. The reason why its not a waste of time is that the manufacturing processes and invention processes aren't using the same manpower, ergo, you're diminishing the impact of the R&D bottleneck by providing it more time to do its research thing.

So in essence, by not taking advantage of all the resources available to you, in this case both scientists and engineers rather just 1 or the other, your actually generating more time to find practical solutions.

I do agree we need to take advantage of both. The original argument here, if you read back, adept said:

QUOTE It sounds like you are rather shaky on the science of the carbon cycle. It's perfectly doable to turn stop the rise of atmospheric CO2, and even reverse the progression. We need to stop pulling stuff out of the geological cycle at the pace it's done currently and let the planet's forests grow back properly. We need to expand our carbon sinks. Let the forests grow and build stuff out of wood.[/quote]

His premise is that its possible to stop the increase in CO2 by just not burning so much oil and let the forests regrow etc. It wont happen! I'm obviously not against being efficient about what we have left, but this "dont burn me bro" argument is absurd, and its become the battle hymn of the environmentalist movement. Its a waste of time, and a distraction. The enviros have made their platform into a laughingstock and its almost impossible to get public funding because "green" is now codespeak for slut shaming Hummer owners. How dare you do that to the environment, and What's your carbon footprint, and lets build treehouses to live in. Its nonsense, and the average voter understands that and doesn't buy it for a second.

To get anything done you need a coalition, and the enviro movement is nothing but an albatross around the neck of the democrats. They're poisoning the debate, and killing the boner of anyone with money who wants to really do something to help. Take the keystone pipeline for example. What a stupid stupid thing to oppose. They're putting everything they've got, calling in all the favors and money, just to stop this pipeline because somehow if we don't let them build it its going to change something. These guys are the democrat's version of the tea party, a nightmare.

They want to shackle industry with standards which A) make them less competitive, and won't do a damn thing to slow global emissions anyway. Business is right to fight stupid laws that cripple them domestically. I'm not saying let industry do whatever they want, noone wants to see a river on fire republican or democrat. We need win-win solutions, and a realistic approach without all this breathless nonsense.

The whole reason for this argument is that i'm smelling some of that on Adept.

Most of America drives the vehicles they do (and drives in general) because they have to. A very small percentage of people have enough money to afford to drive without concern of fuel costs.
The democratic vote is mostly without consequence - You vote with your wallet. Big Oil can influence politics however it so chooses, because it has the capital to do so, and it has and will continue to invest however much it has to in order to keep things going more or less the same way. and business is booming. Unemployment is incredibly high and anywhere you go you can hear people talk about going to North Dakota for work - there's oil being drilled there.
The governments get very little from income taxes - most of the revenue comes from fuel taxes, sin taxes, and traffic citations, and you better believe they're going to keep everyone getting drunk, stoned, and driving around their combustion engines.

#murica

tsubaki_sanjuro wrote:QUOTE (tsubaki_sanjuro @ Mar 23 2014, 08:17 PM) tbh agri is of the opinion that the main thing that is going to boost clean energy / increased efficiency is the financial damage that most people in the West have been suffering from - sooner or later most of them are going to notice that the biggest waste of money they have is that car (or those cars) in their driveway, and that there are cheaper, quicker and healthier alternatives to using them in the way that we have been. This is especially true for anyone who lives in a city, certainly anyone who lives in a European one.

I spend easily $1,000 a month on my car. I wish I could ditch it, but I can't. In any given month I drive about 2500 miles. I have to drive to various courts throughout the state, to three different offices to meet clients, and to many other different offices for mediations, depositions, etc. Public transport is not feasible for these things.

On the other hand, I have a friend and she lives in the city, and commutes a short distance to her office every day, and doesn't spend a dime on a car. Of course when she needs to get out of the city she has to rent or borrow one, but that seems a lot cheaper than owning one.

Sheriff Metz wrote:QUOTE (Sheriff Metz @ Mar 24 2014, 05:08 AM) The governments get very little from income taxes - most of the revenue comes from fuel taxes, sin taxes, and traffic citations, and you better believe they're going to keep everyone getting drunk, stoned, and driving around their combustion engines.

#murica

Um, you pulled this out of your ass

http://www.usgovernmentrevenue.com/year_re...1n_1040#usgs302

I should say, a small percentage of people pay income taxes, whereas nearly everyone is an alcoholic pothead and drives an automobile.