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Re: [Phys-l] Poll shows fewer Americans "believe" in global warming

I heard from the author of a popular treatise, whose name I caught (phonetically)
as something like "Super Freeconomics".
He aired a suggestion which as far as I know is already discredited, for a
quick fix on Global Climate Change: Sulfur Dioxide. He asserted that this gas is much more potent than CO2 [like numerous other gases...] The argument goes like this:
" say that Global Warming is real, and we URGENTLY need to do something.
How much Sulfur Dioxide [the component of volcanoes which is known to have
caused episodic climate cooling] would it take to stop the warming trend?"
Not much. One single polar garden hose from a generator would provide sufficient flux,
he says.

If you are looking wistfully for a DeusXm., this is it! He says that if you are serious
about fixing the problem, you need to buy time, and this would buy time.
Acidification etc., an' all! Now you know why people believe in ghosts and fairies:
they WANT to!

Brian W


Jack Uretsky wrote:
Your movie can show neither more nor less than the opinions of the editors,
While the qualitative statements in your post may be correct, the important observations are quantitative: rates of change of tempeerature, concentrations of various isotopes (such as O18) in ice cores, and the like. They all lead to the conclusion that man-made global warming is hot upon us.
Regards,
Jack


On Thu, 22 Oct 2009, Anthony Lapinski wrote:

I have a video called Unstoppable Solar Cycles, free (with membership)
from www.izzit.org. From the web site:

When Erik the Red first arrived in Greenland, the fertile green land was
perfect for farming. But within a few centuries the thriving Viking
settlements had been wiped out by global cooling. The Little Ice Age is
one of many climactic eras that have been scientifically identified. Since
about 1850 the earth has been in a warming period.

What is the role of carbon dioxide in warming? The best available records
of temperature and atmospheric CO2 over the past 650,000 years indicate
that the earth?s temperature always rises first, followed by a rise in
carbon dioxide. If a warmer earth leads to increased levels of CO2?and not
the other way around?can humans? use of fossil fuels be the cause of
global warming? Shouldn?t this critical question remain open to scientific
inquiry?

This short movie shows that the Sun more than anything else has the
greatest effect on our climate and global warming. Interesting!


Forum for Physics Educators <phys-l@carnot.physics.buffalo.edu> writes:
Yes they are misinformed, but it's misinformation from both sides. The
anti-human-induced-global-warming crowd is touting the decade long
decrease in temperature we are experiencing. But no numbers are given.
The cooling of the past ten years is more than made up for by the larger
warming over the preceding 10 years. Then we have the
pro-human-induced-global-warming crowd equating a decrease in polar ice
with flooding of low lying cities - and a supposed threat to polar bears
to boot. They don't mention that the polar ice is floating ice (and that
polar bear populations are actually growing).

The non-experts (which even most scientists are) are fed scanty or
incorrect information. The best they can do is to look at the motives of
the activists on both sides. So it's really not a matter of belief - it's
a guess as to which side is scamming the public the least. The general
public is pretty good at determining that - given enough time.

Bob at PC
/snip/