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Technocrat

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Skyler Visconti

Tue Jan 30 06:16:15 -0800 2007

(in reply to solar activity )

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You've obviously missed what Josh was saying. His discussion on man killing the large beasts has very little to do with our debate. Or am I to understand you believe that early man made such an impact on the environment that combined with his hunting ability he killed the prehistoric mammoths? Since our debate is one on the environment am I so assume then, that you think early man's environmental impacts were the cause of mammoths becoming extinct more so than his hunting ability?

Again, I must say your argument over the sun's irradiance levels is laughable. Not that the sun' brightness has anything to do with this argument, but rather that you brought it up. The sun doesn't just emit light alone. With or without man (or any other animal for that matter), the planet makes it's own climatic changes. My argument is over whether or not man is solely responsible for the current condition of rising global climate. It appears that your argument is that man is the larger of the contributing factors in global climate change.

Now, considering the topic this post originally brought up, I believe that man does take a large part in the large beasts becoming extinct, I disagree with the comment that it has anything to do with early man's affect on the environment. The large animals didn't die off because early man starting polluting. They died off because the environment changed (naturally), and because of hunting. I fail to see how early man's environmental contributions changed anything drastically enough that it caused global warming. Sure, early man did hunt with fire, but even burning all of New Zealand wouldn't affect the global climate so much that it would cause the global temperature to raise even one degree fahrenheit. I would argue the smoke would actually block the light and lower the temperature in small areas. Sure New Zealand would be hot from the flames, but Australia would be cooler.

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Matt Fulkerson

Tue Jan 30 08:56:01 -0800 2007
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99% + of energy of the radiation produced by the sun is in the form photons. The solar wind carries a small fraction of that energy. Look up how solar sails work, and you'll see that they are accelerated by mostly by photons, not the charged particles in the solar wind. There are other forms of radiation like neutrinos, but those are extremely hard to detect and basically pass straight through everything.

You have repeatedly posted that there is no way that man can effect climate as much as natural causes. That is an irrational belief. I have never stated that natural causes do not or cannot have a large effect. My point is that you have no basis whatsoever for dismissing the effect CO2 in the atmosphere. I suppose if it was all belched from volcanic erruptions, you might feel otherwise.

I would completely agree about hunting probaby being the only way that early man could cause mass extinction. You are trying to read into a couple of my posts that have nothing to do with that topic. I should not have posted off topic on your rantings in the first place. But I felt compelled to respond to your opinions that have no basis in fact whatsoever, such as that photons to not carry the majority of the energy from the sun and some irrelevant nonsense about the superposition of states causing radiation not to travel at the speed of light in vacuum.

Please reread the second paragraph of Josh's post. If he is not referring to you, then I am.

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Skyler Visconti

Tue Jan 30 13:32:09 -0800 2007
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Yes I know how solar sails work. It's not a difficult principle that is lost on very many people.

Again you're still focused on the sun as the only natural force that was previously mentioned. You have yet to analyze the earth's reduction of magnetic field strength (yes the sun does play a part in that case). But you have also left out the other contributing factors. You're hell bent on blaming humanity solely for the environmental problems we face with out considering any other factors playing a major role. If my "irrational belief" that natural causes have caused more problems in the past than humans have ever caused leaves you shocked, you have the IQ of a grape fruit. Before humans, this planet has went through MANY climactic changes far more devastating than we humans have ever seen or caused.

Actually if the CO2 was "belched" from a volcano, I would be happy. Smoke covering the earth and lowering the temperature would be a good thing, because I like cold weather and want to see these global warming nuts go into a tizzy about going into an ice age without having humans to blame.

Photons do carry the most amount of energy, but you discredit the other forms of energy that don't bounce off our oceans. Again with the E=MC2? THIS PLANET IS NOT A VACUUM!!! PHOTONS DON"T TRAVEL AT THE SAME SPEED ON EARTH AS THE DO IN SPACE! OUR GRAVITY (although miniscule compared to other planetary bodies) DOES BEND LIGHT!!! Study more on special relativity!!!

As for Josh's comments he's speaking about the extinction theory where most scientist deny man had much to do with mammoths. One of the most controversial topics in anthropolgy is about the mammoths. He thinks man played a bigger part than most scientists are willing to consider. I tend to agree with him on that issue. The "other" scientists think it was that early man didn't hunt mammoths, or that when they did it was rare. Josh admits that it was probably other factors that killed the mammoths and not humans. You're sadly mistaken if you think he's disputing my claims in his second paragraph. His comment was a reply to Charles Hill, not me. Maybe if you understood the tree structure of the comments area....

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Matt Fulkerson

Tue Jan 30 18:24:15 -0800 2007
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It's not at all clear to me what effect if any a 6% reduction in the earth's magnetic field would have on climate. There are too many factors for a non-expert to take into account. That's why I only looked at the black body model to get a feeling for how much the Earth's temperature might be expected to change due to a slight increase in average solar output. From http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/earthmag.html:

3 Characteristics of the Earth's magnetic field

3.1 Reversals

When a rock is formed it usually acquires a magnetisation parallel to the ambient magnetic field, i.e. the core-generated field. From careful analyses of directions and intensities of rock magnetisation from many sites around the world it has been established that the polarity of the axial dipole has changed many times in the past, with each polarity interval lasting several thousand years. These reversals occur slowly and irregularly, and for a period of about 30 million years around about 100 million years before present, there were no reversals at all. In addition to full reversals there have been many aborted reversals when the magnetic poles are observed to move equatorwards for a while but then move back and align closely with the Earth's spin axis. The solid inner metal core is thought to play an important role in inhibiting reversals. At the present time we are seeing a 6% decline in the dipole moment per century. Whether this is a sign of an imminent reversal is difficult to say.

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Matt Fulkerson

Tue Jan 30 18:42:49 -0800 2007
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Special relativity has to do with the consequences of the speed of light being independent of the motion of an observer relative to a light source. General relativity is Einstein's theory of gravity. There is a nice thought experiment where you imagine being in an accelerating elevator. A light ray passing by appears to curve due to the acceleration of the observer in the elevator. But the observer cannot tell the difference between being in an accelerating elevator and at rest in a gravitational field. Therefore, a light ray will also bend in a gravitational field. Of course, this is all completely irrelevant to climate.

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Matt Fulkerson

Tue Jan 30 18:52:55 -0800 2007
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Josh's comments, second paragraph... "Despite my skepticism about current anthropological statements on climate change, I pay a duty to my colleagues and support the consensus."

Sounds like he's talking about climate change here, not extinction theory.

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Skyler Visconti

Wed Jan 31 00:00:52 -0800 2007
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YES, HE"S TALKING ABOUT HIS COLLEAGUES IN ANTHROPOLOGY, WHO SUGGEST CLIMATE CHANGE WAS THE REASON FOR THE MASS EXTINCTION OF MAMMOTHS! THE CONSENSUS HE SPEAKS OF IS THAT CLIMATE CHANGE KILLED MAMMOTHS, NOT THAT TODAY'S CLIMATE CHANGE IS ATTRIBUTABLE TO MANKIND. DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND THE CONTEXT OF HIS TEXT?!?! What he is talking about has nothing to do with our discussion.

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Skyler Visconti

Wed Jan 31 09:06:03 -0800 2007
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Josh clarified his statement for you if you're interested.

Summing Up

Matt Fulkerson

Tue Jan 30 20:05:55 -0800 2007
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I'd love to stick around and hear how many insults you can hurl at me (toilet paper equations, grapefruit IQ, etc), but I'm tiring of this conversation, if you can call it that.

That last thing I'll say to you on this topic is that you seem to be very keen to believe that humans are not responsible for the current global warming trend. Your logic seems to be that over the Earth's 4 billion history, there have been large shifts in climate. No doubt. However, the fundamental objection I have is that you so easily dismiss the effect of a 50% increase in CO2 concentrations. I have never stated in these posts that CO2 is the only possible cause of global warming. I have only questioned your statements that solar flares, coupled with a decrease in the earth's magnetic field, are more likely to be the cause. I have argued that the energy involved in solar flares is negligible compared to the total solar output over any extended period of time. But maybe global warming is caused by cosmic rays (or lack thereof). Maybe...

Summing Up

Skyler Visconti

Tue Jan 30 23:53:20 -0800 2007
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CO2 has historically been at < 1% of our atmosphere, raising it 50% isn't a crisis of biblical proportions. Sorry, you're wrong for blaming humanity. CO2 levels have been MUCH higher, if we consider what past super volcanoes have done.

I didn't just limit the cause to the sun's weather. Have you not been listening? I have listed numerous other possible explanations. The solar rays are just one factor you've attached yourself to. El Nino was another example. Do we need to discuss the ocean temperatures too? Shifts in the jet stream, or the effects of the shifting poles? Shall we discuss movement in earth's inner core and it's affects on ocean temperatures? Yes, I am open to the idea of global warming being caused partially by CO2, but suggesting it as a main cause or even 50% of the reason earth is warming up is ridiculous. Could it happen? Sure, but with levels of CO@ being less than 2% of our atmosphere... no.