Note that this does not mean he thinks irrevocable change isn't already happening, or that we shouldn't do anything.
SPIEGEL: What's wrong with reducing CO2 emissions?
Storch: It is in fact necessary to reduce CO2 emissions. There is no reason why we shouldn't spend our vacations on (the North Sea island of) Sylt instead of in the Seychelles, or drive more economical cars -- for the sake of preserving increasingly scarce resources if nothing else. But that won't enable us to stop climate change. As long as China, India and the United States continue the way they have been, what we Germans do is more or less irrelevant.
SPIEGEL: Is it even possible to prevent global warming at this point?
Storch: No. Because of the inherent time lag in the climate system, the greenhouse gases that have already been pumped into the atmosphere will undoubtedly lead to a certain increase in temperature in the coming decades. We can no longer completely avoid anthropogenic climate change. At best, limiting the temperature rise to two degrees is just about possible, according to optimistic estimates. That's why we should spend more time talking about adjusting to the inevitable and not about reducing CO2 emissions. We have to take away people's fear of climate change.
SPIEGEL: But many believe that the end of the world is upon us. Is the climate debate gradually becoming too hysterical?
Storch: Indeed. The fear of climatic catastrophes is an ancient one and not unlike our fear of strangers. In the past, people believed that the climate almost always changes for the worse, and only rarely for the better -- God's punishment for sinful behavior. And nowadays it's those hedonistic wastrels who pollute the air so that they can look at some pretty fish in the South Seas. It would be better if we only ever rode bikes. Oh, there's always someone wagging a finger in disapproval.
SPIEGEL: Are there only negative consequences when the temperature increases by two or three degrees on the planet?
Storch: Detailed forecasts are not possible, because we don't know how emissions will in fact develop. We climate researchers can only offer possible scenarios. In other words, things could end up being completely different. But there are undoubtedly parts of the world that will benefit on balance from climate change. Those areas tend to be in the north, where it has been cold and uncomfortable in the past. But it's considered practically heretical to even raise such issues.
...SPIEGEL: Why is it such a taboo to ask about the positive effects of climate change?
Storch: The reasons are likely rooted in religion. Playing around with God's creation is simply not allowed. Incidentally, in the past it was precisely the deeply religious people who said: Of course we're playing with God's creation, in fact we're perfecting it. This sort of thinking is frowned upon today.
SPIEGEL: Aren't climate researchers helping fuel a state of panic with their generally bleak warnings?
Storch: Unfortunately many scientists see themselves too much as priests whose job it is to preach moralistic sermons to people. This is another legacy of the 1968 generation, which I happen to belong to myself. In fact, it would be better if we just presented the facts and scenarios dispassionately -- and then society can decide for itself what it wants to do to influence climate change.
Hans von Storch, 57, is the director of the GKSS Institute for Coastal Research in Geesthacht, Germany. A mathematician and meteorologist, Storch is one of the world's leading climate experts and has been involved in evaluating computer models of global warming.
Also from the Spiegel, the bottom line, which is also what Storch is saying: the U.S. needs to get with the European program. "Trans-Atlantic Thinkers: The Decarbonization Challenge"
A serious breach between Europe and America is the deep-seated difference over facing up to global warming. But after years of dragging their feet, 2007 is likely to be seen as the year when Americans finally made up their mind that global warming required action. That is a huge opportunity for the transatlantic relationship.
Climate change is a critical issue for this partnership because action to avoid its most catastrophic consequences requires that the Western industrial pattern, now imitated or imposed in virtually every part of the globe, undergo a carefully managed transition to a low-carbon economy.
TRANSATLANTIC THINKERS
The transatlantic relationship is not over, as has sometimes been suggested in recent years -- but it has changed. There is still consensus in Europe and the US that the urgent global challenges confronting us today can only be met in a joint effort. The goal is to identify specific fields for strategic cooperation and formulate effective and coherent policy options toward them. Germany's Bertelsmann Stiftung aims to help in this process. The new series "Transatlantic Thinkers" provides a fresh perspective on these opportunities, touching upon topics such as energy security, climate change, civil liberties in an age of terror, trade and many others. The series is planned as part of the run- up to the annual "Brussels Forum" in April.
Europe has been the de facto global leader on this issue for the past decade. The European Trading System (ETS) inaugurated in 2005 has revealed some design weaknesses during its announced "learning period," but remains the world's first and only carbon trading system. Europeans now have a chance to strengthen its second phase beginning in 2008.
But removing the biggest obstacle on the road to a global system of carbon limits requires that the United States pass a national carbon cap-and-trade system, without "escape hatches" or other vitiating gimmicks. It must then join Europe's dialogue with China and the other giant economies of the South to build a bridge over which the US, China, Brazil, India and others can walk to join the young international regime of carbon limits. This new and truly global system should succeed the Kyoto Protocol in the year 2012.
We present here a list of policies that Europe should consider while it is waiting to see if the US will enact a carbon cap....
(list follows)
Meanwhile, this very weekend, environment ministers from the G8 as well as from China, India, Brazil, Mexico, and South Africa met to talk seriously about minimizing climate change and its impact (story here):
All together, some two-thirds of all carbon dioxide emissions were represented at the dinner table.
Host Sigmar Gabriel, Germany's environment minister, is hoping to use Germany's G8 presidency -- combined with the recent European Union pledge to reduce CO2 emissions by 20 percent in 13 years -- to convince many of the world's largest polluters to do likewise. It was the first time that developing countries had been invited to such a G8 meeting, and the message was clear.
"International climate negotiations badly need political momentum," Gabriel said prior to the beginning of the meeting on Thursday evening. "That's the only way we can meet this century's greatest challenge."
40 comments:
I need to buy a house here in Pittsburgh *before* it becomes beachfront property.
It would be better if we only ever rode bikes.
Some ass almost ran me over again on the way to the store today, so I'm rather liking the idea of everyone switching to bikes if they're able. Rather selfish reasoning, but hey. Think of all the hospital bills people could save! And taxi driver's would make a killing in tips, and then maybe the buses would deign to actually show up if they expected to see people... Oh, the possibilities...
I think we'd all be better off if we copped to our own selfishness, frankly. With the proviso that selfishness isn't -all- that defines us, which is why certain libertarians and others of that ilk are absolutely insufferable. honesty about venality is good, though.
on which note: i am here to tell you that that old saw about how you never forget how to ride a bike? Not. True.
on which note: i am here to tell you that that old saw about how you never forget how to ride a bike? Not. True.
Sounds like you might have a story there. Do tell.
Anyway, that's only the second time I've heard that, the first being, oh, two weeks ago, roughly, when my mother told me she tried and fell on her ass several times while trying to bike to the store with one of my siblings.
After a few months of not biking daily, my legs get wobbly when I start out on a bike, but I can't say my body's ever forgotten.
I wonder how many people forget and they're just to embarrassed to admit it.
Those areas tend to be in the north, where it has been cold and uncomfortable in the past. But it's considered practically heretical to even raise such issues.
Yes, funnny how talking about the positive side effects of something which will lead to the mass destruction of most of the human world near the equator and cause the deaths of at least millions of people in regions already torn to shreds by economic and social factors, is in some way taboo.
Turn that frown upside down third world countries who are all situated south of the equator! northern europe and canada will be peachy keen!
What an asshole.
He's also overlooking how most of europe will be flooded, but I'm sure he won't bother moving when berlin goes underwater - whiskers on kittens! Switzerland will be marginally warmer than it is! Accentuate that positive and drown, fucker.
Leave it to a guy from the country with the largest market for "Shiester" films to see the good in something God Awful...
Bikes will not catch on as a means of transportation until Hummer starts making bikes that block out the sun, take up two parking spaces, and can crush normal bikes in a collision.
Hey now, my bike of choice can crush normal bikes in a collision! It's 70 pounds, if memory serves. I'm working on getting new tires for it. So that, like, only leaves two other qualities needed..
***Seventy pounds crated. Never bothered to actually put in on a scale, be a bit awkward, Definitely heavier than fifty, though. Sorry for the doublepost.
Sorry for the doublepost.
In the colloquial, multiple commenting is known as "pulling a belledame"
Leave it to a guy from the country with the largest market for "Shiester" films to see the good in something God Awful...
Well he's hitting the usual "Scientists are indestinguishable from athiest creationists", "oh they just hate fun" AND the "oh and the science isn't clear about what'll happen" talking points, so it's probably not so much due to cultural biases, so much as it is due to him being a paid for shill of some kind.
Ahh just playin' I lived in Austria for a year.
Way off topic: See the letter in today’s NYT from Paula R. Goode, Acting Dir., State Dept’s Office to Monitor & Combat Trafficking in Persons, in which she reiterates the US government’s official practice of obscuring the distinction between consensual sex work & forced trafficking, rape, etc.
Miss Goode exemplifies the degree to which US anti-trafficking policy is in the hands of parochial religious conservatives, for whom anti-trafficking policy is indistinguishable from the forcible abolition of consensual sex work. Her bio: she’s a small-town Baptist preacher’s daughter from deep east Texas, educated at a Baptist college in Nashville TN & a Baptist seminary in Arlington VA. Before asuming her policy-making position at the US State Department, her main experience in the field was as a church administrator & missions coordinator at the 1st Baptist Church of Alexandria VA, & in unrelated Plum Book govt jobs (e.g., EPA); she continues to be active in Southern Baptist institutional life.
She succeeded John R Miller, the main architect of current policy, at State. He formerly was a rightwing Republican Congressman (from the Seattle suburbs), & also has close ties with the religious right: among other things, he’s a leader of the Discovery Institute, the propaganda mill that runs the “Intelligent Design” anti-Darwin campaign.
I’m not personally inclined to broadcast wholesale contempt for religious folk, & don’t doubt their sincerity or dismiss their work on behalf of trafficked women, but there are problems with their wider agenda & the way they conflate distinct questions. Their insistence on conflating, in various ways, sexual slavery with sex work per se doesn’t only have adverse consequences for consensual sex workers; it also divides potential allies in the struggle against forcible trafficking & sexual slavery.
Or maybe, by noting their sleight of hand, I’m merely revealing myself to be indifferent to the wellbeing of enslaved women & children.
Not that I'm denying the guy comes off like a wealthy, I-got-mine-Jack, Eurocentric asshole, but I doubt he's a shill (he IS a scientist, if you read the bio, and "one of the world's experts on climate" to boot; and the Spiegel is not exactly Fox news); he's not arguing that there's no such thing or that we shouldn't do anything, he's mostly arguing for a "don't panic" approach to PR, I take it, on account of, he doesn't think it'll help, panicking. To a certain extent I would agree with that much. He is also correct in that the U.S. needs to do its part (which we/the government emphatically haven't been, compared to Europe) or it's all relatively moot; this is of course not an argument one tends to hear from U.S. media very often.
As per religion, he actually seems to be arguing against it; i read him as saying that he thinks the "we ovverreached, we're all DOOMED" business has its roots in religious-apocalyptic thinking. Which, he probably has a point, there. It also doesn't mean we AREN'T necessarily doomed, of course...
but there, he's talking about something Stephen King used to talk about wrt the not-so-subtext of 50's sci-fi flicks (for example): you know, we tampered with God's Creation, and THAT'S why the Frankenstein's monster/giant radioactive mutant ants are coming after us. it's actually an *anti*-science, reactionary worldview, is his point; he seems to be rather more of the "no, really, progress and science can TOTALLY fix this if you just give it/us a chance! nanobots will save us all!" sort of school, just based on this at least.
thanks, kh
he seems to be rather more of the "no, really, progress and science can TOTALLY fix this if you just give it/us a chance! nanobots will save us all!" sort of school, just based on this at least.
Interesting take. I read him as more of a "science can't fix this to be like it was before and it can't help it not get worse. But by reducing emissions, it won't be as bad as it will be if we don't."
He's also overlooking how most of europe will be flooded -
I'm not so sure he's overlooking it so much as it wasn't touched on. Germany specifically was, and he mentioned that it would probably be better, in his view, if scientists in general gave the possible probabilities dispassionately so that people could make logical choices instead of running around like a chicken with our collective head cut off, which unfortunately's what happens (judging by history) when faced with 'end of the world' scenarios, wether they be true or false. But the questions that were asked of him had to do with Germany in particular. If someone else ran the interview, other questions would have been answered with his opinion.
...Although he could stand to be reminded that miniscule change will affect global change. Telling Germany that what they do doesn't matter and that their efforts are all based on religious motivation mixed with self aggrandizement Just because he's working from a broad schematic doesn't mean he gets the choice of overlooking small changes. Hell, it's the small changes that often start the tide turning. For that he needs at least a kick in the shin.
Or maybe, by noting their sleight of hand, I’m merely revealing myself to be indifferent to the wellbeing of enslaved women & children.
Let me get the Conservative Magic Eightball... give it a good shake... oh damn; "answer cloudy, why do you hate catholics?"
Interesting take. I read him as more of a "science can't fix this to be like it was before and it can't help it not get worse. But by reducing emissions, it won't be as bad as it will be if we don't."
Yeah, on the whole that was certainly much more his tone; I was exaggerating, just to say: he's scoffing at what he takes to be the anti-science subtext to the exaggerated (and, i saw him as saying, reactionary) fears of What We All Did To The Planet With Our Bad Technology.
Although he could stand to be reminded that miniscule change will affect global change. Telling Germany that what they do doesn't matter and that their efforts are all based on religious motivation mixed with self aggrandizement Just because he's working from a broad schematic doesn't mean he gets the choice of overlooking small changes. Hell, it's the small changes that often start the tide turning. For that he needs at least a kick in the shin.
There is that.
Otoh, I don't really know what's going on in Germany; as I'm understanding it, he probably feels pretty safe in saying this in that there's already a much stronger "let's take action, Germany and Germans!" movement going, or so I am picking up.
...at any rate, if you read the rest of the articles there, Merkel's leading the next G8, and Germany as well as Europe on the whole has been well ahead of the U.S. and the other main culprits on this.
he IS a scientist, if you read the bio, and "one of the world's experts on climate" to boot
one of the world's experts on climate could mean ANYTHING ffs, and scientists shill even if they're not actually from christian colleges.
he's not arguing that there's no such thing or that we shouldn't do anything, he's mostly arguing for a "don't panic" approach to PR, I take it, on account of, he doesn't think it'll help, panicking.
Actually he's arguing that there's nothing wrong with constantly heating the planet up, if his arguement could even begin to be sane, it would consist of him arguing that we need to prepare for the worst, and to do everything in our power to make sure that the worst isn't as bad as it will be if we don't do something serious now to combat climate change.
statements like this; "Detailed forecasts are not possible"
should instantly set off the shill alarm, because it's 100% true, detailed forcasts are not possible, even before we get into big name problems like chaos theory, the Full (note emphasis) effects of various greenhouse gases and geological/atmospheric/biological/ocean based contributary factors are not currently know - they're being researched still because they were only discovered a decade or two ago, and most of them amplify climate change effects to some degree, making all current government accepted forcasts deeply conservative, whihc is why PANIC is not a bad thing to do, because the anthropocene period WILL end soon if something isn't done now - and then there's the massive computational difficulties of modelling anything as big as the earth in and of itself, all of which mean that "detailed forcasts are not possible".
but vague sketchs of what will happen if you raise the planet's median temperature a few degree are available, and most of the effects are known - the main problem is figuring out what will happen to various plants and animals, because it's very hard to get that sort of data - but what will definately happen is htat the ice caps will melt, leading to a massive increase in the global sea level - flooding most of europe, that little island he mentions will probably not exist any more, neither will holland, venice or most of northern europe.
On top of that, the gulf stream will STOP, because that's driven by the polar ice, this will fuck up alot of the staple ocean based life that is already being fished to extinction, and all the scuttle fish in the region will die.
I am not one of the world's foremost experts on climatological scientology, I do how ever know enough to know that the various climate sciences are fully capable of producing accurate enough and detailed enough forcasts to prompt any sane person to run around screaming, intermittently wetting our pants and to fucking well learn to ride a bicycle and even brave public transport's laissez faire attitudes towards time tables and being funded should the need arise.
And the stuff he's shovelling about scientists being like preists or whatever it is, is way way too coded to the far right religious types (who infest and control europe as well remember), seriously, it makes no sense at all, it's just hollow nudge/wink code.
Let me get the Conservative Magic Eightball... give it a good shake... oh damn; "answer cloudy, why do you hate catholics?"
R.Mildred,
Dammit, I barely missed spitting my drink all over the keyboard n'monitor with that quip. Must learn to be prepared...
BelleDame,
Sorry, I missed the exaggerated effect. I think it'll be awhile before the Usa owns up to responsibilities it needs to take, though, s'pecially with Bush in office.
as I'm understanding it, he probably feels pretty safe in saying this in that there's already a much stronger "let's take action, Germany and Germans!" movement going, or so I am picking up.
Ack, I totally missed that he'd prolly feel safe to say that since a group consciousness thingie is already in effect 'bout it there. Makes sense though, in retrospect.
alright, look: Hans von Storch:
He's a meteorologist. He's a professor at the University of Hamburg. He wrote for a couple of of periodicals. He used this and that methodology. He doesn't seem to have a lot more information on him except that he founded a magazine defending Donald Duck against accusations of indecent behavior.
i don't think he's dogwhistling to the far right, really.
i dunno as his opinion necessarily carries a lot more weight than the alarmists either, however.
this would seem to be his chief complaint:
* "Scientific research faces a crisis because its public figures are overselling the issues to gain attention in a hotly contested market for newsworthy information." [2]
* "The alarmists think that climate change is something extremely dangerous, extremely bad and that overselling a little bit, if it serves a good purpose, is not that bad."[1]
Actually he's arguing that there's nothing wrong with constantly heating the planet up
The article said he agreed that we need to reduce Co2 emissions, to conserve natural resources if nothing else. I kinda thought he was trying to get people to think of the future in a bit of a more tangible way. People brush off global warming constantly, but by giving them something they can grasp. Like being able to use cars longer, since people use cars now.
Most people don't think they use the world now because it hasn't been taken from 'em yet in ways your Average American Citizen would notice. I think. ;/ Pretty sure
The panic I saw him associating to a strong religious belief system pertaining to 'end of the world' scenarios, which have people committing mass suicide and crap like that. In that way, I don't think it matters wether the panic is justified, the affect would be considered by most to be disasterous. By stating that emissions do need to be reduced but not to panic and comparing scientists to priests, I think he was arguing for clear thought.
He doesn't seem to have a lot more information on him except that he founded a magazine defending Donald Duck against accusations of indecent behavior.
Trying not to derail, but I think I remember reading about that. It was the lack of pants, I b'lieve.
Actually he's arguing that there's nothing wrong with constantly heating the planet up,
no, dude, he's really not. he's saying a certain amount of heating has already happened, or will inevitably happen, and that we can and should reduce carbon emissions to keep it from getting any worse, but that certain amount of heating in and of itself might not in fact be as universally catastrophic as some people are saying; and in any case there's no point in going OH SHIT WE'RE ALL FUCKED, IT'S DONE, EVEN IF WE STOP EVERYTHING RIGHT NOW WE'RE ALL FUCKED, THERE'S NOTHING WE CAN DO--oh wait, we'll just tell a handful of wealthy Europeans to vacation somewhere more eco-friendly, that'll solve everything all by itself--NO, WAIT! FUCK!! THE SKY IS FALLING!!! AAAAHHHHHH!!!
People brush off global warming constantly
And the other reason they/we do that, I mean Joe and Jane average, obviously, not the people who do it out of sheer venality, greed and evil, is arguably because it's just too overwhelming to deal with. especially when it starts getting couched in the language of SHIT! DOOM! INEVITABLE DOOOOOM, AAAHHHH!!!
I thought Gore's documentary was actually pretty good about "look, there IS something you/we can do, it's NOT too late," even if he did paint a far grimmer picture, on the whole, than this dude does here.
whihc is why PANIC is not a bad thing to do
only if panicking actually leads to shit getting done.
there is a middle ground somewhere between "eh, nothing to worry about, really" and PANIC STATIONS OH GOD OH GOD -hyperventilate-; generally speaking ime it's a better place for actually accomplishing shit than either of the others.
Actually the professor presented an interesting, really unique point of view. I enjoyed this post.
Still less emissions trumps more.
I think it's a tough call, but I'm leaning towards r.mildred a bit on this one.
On the one hand, it's true that 'panicking' can lead to chaos and inefficiency. OTOH, America (unlike Europe) is completely asleep at the wheel on this issue and is about to drive everyone over the cliff and is in desperate need of a true wake-up call. In the AMERICAN context the cited article runs the risk of acting more like a snooze alarm implying we have time we don't actually have than a genuine wake-up call.
In the colloquial, multiple commenting is known as "pulling a belledame"
BD, I did NOT snicker and chortle at this, swear to GAWD!
sure, in the American context. which, we are; but which his presumed (initial, at least) audience isn't. it's a German dude talkin' to Der Spiegel, translated for the International edition.
In the colloquial, multiple commenting is known as "pulling a belledame"
BD, I did NOT snicker and chortle at this, swear to GAWD!
thplllltt
And the other reason they/we do that, I mean Joe and Jane average, obviously, not the people who do it out of sheer venality, greed and evil, is arguably because it's just too overwhelming to deal with. especially when it starts getting couched in the language of SHIT! DOOM! INEVITABLE DOOOOOM, AAAHHHH!!!
And if that view point is the scientifically valid one? One which sane people would be foolish to ignore because accepting the true magnitude of the problem has something of a connection to creating the solution to it?
Trying not to derail, but I think I remember reading about that. It was the lack of pants, I b'lieve.
And he did put a towel around his waist after washing, despite the lack of pants the rest of the time.
Thought don't male ducks have internalised genitalia? Like cats?
the scientifically valid viewpoint, which he agrees with, is that global warming is real and needs to be taken seriously.
look, put it this way: you go to the doctor, she tells you you've got cancer. You get a second and third opinion; they confirm the first's diagnosis: yup, cancer. There's no doubt about it. There is a little fluctuation on what "stage" you're at, and there are a couple of different ways you can go for treatment.
Now. That a person ultimately might decide to go, -not- with the doctor who says, "we need to enact this extremely radical course of action (which is actually not really feasible, on account of this part of it is still in the experimental stage, hasn't actually been given the green light and you couldn't afford it anyway, and the rest of the draconian procedure has some serious risks as well), -right now-, jesus kid you don't look good, I hate to tell you this but it's probably already too late for you and even if it's not, your quality of life is going to deteriorate drastically and permanently, I'm just telling you right now--
does NOT go with that one, because leaving that doctor's office makes one simply want to put one's head in the over, but instead goes with the doctor who says, well, yes, it's advanced to a certain stage, but if we start treatment now your prognosis is pretty good; I recommend this course of treatment ; oh, someone told you to follow this diet and do acupuncture? well, no, i don't think it's gonna be enough all by itself, but sure, go ahead, it can't hurt. hang in there, kid.
--that, you know, does not actually mean, necessarily, that the person is in denial and might just as well not be doing anything at all, doesn't she realize SHE'S GOING TO DIE???? DAMMIT!!??!?!?
but rather that, y'know, sometimes, the scare tactic, it can backfire. and may not in fact be "correct" after all, because the truth is, to a certain extent, with scary progressive diseases (of self or anything else), one can diagnosis more or less, but one really just can't say for sure -what's going to happen,-
and you know, some people find the certainty of worst-case scenario strangely more comforting than the intolerability of ambiguity;
me, I'm sort of done with that mindset, because in my considerable experience with it it just. doesn't. help.
Thought don't male ducks have internalised genitalia? Like cats?
You know, I don't know but I'll go find out.
...Back. Yes, although the Argentine lake ducks have a roughly 17 inch penis, one inch longer than their ('round 16 inch) body. (Most interesting tidbit I found)
And if that view point is the scientifically valid one? One which sane people would be foolish to ignore because accepting the true magnitude of the problem has something of a connection to creating the solution to it?
I think people have trouble accepting a problem of that magnitude because it's hard to conceptualize the results of a problem this large. If they can't visualize it then they'll ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist, and when confronted with it people slink off in another direction where they won't have to see it anymore.
(and yes, I did accompany my mother through something rather similar to the above example when she was diagnosed with breast cancer, and it was all a rollicking good time, let me tell you)
Yes, although the Argentine lake ducks have a roughly 17 inch penis,
...
well. i learn something every day.
--that, you know, does not actually mean, necessarily, that the person is in denial and might just as well not be doing anything at all, doesn't she realize SHE'S GOING TO DIE???? DAMMIT!!??!?!?
Yeah but if the doctors say "look, you could do this this and this treatment, all of which would easily save your life and only inconvenience you in so far as they'd require you giving up your 20 a day asbestos filtered smoking habit" for 20 or so years, and hte patient not only continues smoking the asbestos tipped ciggies, but has actually been going around just plain shovelling asbestos straight into their lungs because they're being paid a million dollars per gram of asbestos that they're taking care of via inhalation.
And to complete the comparison, now imagine that the reason the doctors are asking this cancer sufferer to cut back on teh ciggies is because if she does that, she'll have enough time to then be able to complete her reasearch on an advanced new form of lung cancer treatment that consists of a cigarette that actually cures cancer rather causing it.
Because all this emission cutting stuff - that's a half-measure, it's to give us enough time to get our selves off oil and fossil fuels, and to convert to things like that hydrogen/renewables based economy.
And that's what the scientists have been saying SINCE. THE. FUCKING. 70's.
They did calm, they did present only their most thoroughly researched evidence in the face of that asinine solar warming thing that hasn't been developed at all and has been seriously debunked as bad science since it's conception, they said "okay, you don't want to just plain convert the economy striaght to renewables, here's some ways in which we can buy ourselves time to develop this or this thing to a stage where we'd convert to it anyway because it's more economically feasible"
that was kyoto.
Didn't work.
they've gotten shouty in recent years because that's the one thing they hadn't tried yet.
And it's actually seeming to work to some degree because strangely enough the public would like the government to do something about turning the earth into a giant flaming ball of death.
the consumer side thing is complete nonsense by anyone's standard though, and is a side effect of that inane myth of consumer side revolution that is largely PETA's fault, there isn't enough middle class people in the world to make a serious dent in climate change.
But things are looking bad enough that some scientists are advising that the bourgious cut down on their recreational climate changing stuff because any cut in stuff that adds to global warming buys some, admittedly infinitesimal, amount of time in which those really out there scientists can build and launch their giant space umbrellas.
Yes, although the Argentine lake ducks have a roughly 17 inch penis
Are they the ones with the corkscrew penis for use in the female duck's corkscrew vagina? Or is that a different breed?
Actually, how would they fit them into the female ducks, does it rotate on it's own, or do they sort of take off in flight then dive at the female after going into a spin?
Which explains why they're called ducks at least.
And how does one evolve such an arrangement, was there one poor duck's mother bemoaning the world that would give her son a corkscrew cock when all the girls are bayonet fittings...
well, you may be right. about the shouting wrt environment that is. i can't really say about the ducks. in general i understand they're...not very nice.
in general i understand they're...not very nice.
But... ducks are magical and well loved by witches.
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