🚀 go-pugleaf

Ron Johnson wrote:
> On Fri, 31 Aug 2007 08:26:45 -0500, Jer <gdunn@airmail.ten> wrote:
> 
>> Ron Johnson wrote:
>>> On Thu, 30 Aug 2007 07:44:33 -0500, Jer <gdunn@airmail.ten> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Ron Johnson wrote:
>>>>> On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 23:14:40 -0500, Jer <gdunn@airmail.ten> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Read 'em and weep...
>>>>>>
>>>>>> http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/GlobalWarming/Story?id=3536910
>>>>> Although I believe in  protecting the environment, the first thing I
>>>>> noticed in that story was them miss labeling steam in the picture as
>>>>> smoke.  I darned sure want to get to the bottom of the warming trend
>>>>> and learn whether this is natural temperature cycling or not, but we
>>>>> need to make sure our sources don't have an agenda.
>>>>>
>>>>> That might as well have been Bush or Bill O'Reilly explaining the
>>>>> picture.
>>>>>
>>>>> Ron
>>>> I see your point about the image, and I also point out the image caption 
>>>> indicates this is a cement plant.  Cement plants produce smoke, not 
>>>> steam.  So, if the image is disingenuous, it's not just steam in lieu of 
>>>> smoke, it's not even a cement plant.  This is likely steam from a power 
>>>> plant, which is either nuclear or coal - the latter being a major 
>>>> contributor to CO2 production in China almost surpassing U.S. CO2 
>>>> levels.  China is #2, right behind the U.S. at #1.  China's air also 
>>>> suffers from sulphur dioxide (SO2) due to their reliance of high-sulphur 
>>>> coal, creating enough acid rain to poison three of their seven rivers 
>>>> beyond drinkable levels and preventing foliage growth enough to strip 
>>>> huge expanses of topsoil to erode into those same rivers, and turning 
>>>> hundreds of thousands of farmland acres to dusty deserts.
>>>>
>>>> About the image: This image is a "stock" product that Reuters apparently 
>>>> owns the copyright to.  Other media may also use this image for a 
>>>> variety of reasons, and they'll rent their use of the image from the 
>>>> copyright holder with a one time fee, or a perpetual fee for long term use.
>>>>
>>>> My cite is of an ABC posted article, but you'll notice the article 
>>>> carries a Reuters copyright.  I googled the caption and as typical, this 
>>>> article has been cited by other news agencies, text and image, all with 
>>>> a Reuters copyright symbol.  I don't have the software here to inspect 
>>>> the image for an embedded watermark key, but since all cites I found 
>>>> attribute to Reuters, I'll accept that.  On the planetark.com site, the 
>>>> article attributes photo and story to Stringer Shanghai.  A "stringer" 
>>>> is an independent contributor of material to news agencies (Reuters has 
>>>> been in trouble in that area before), and Shanghai is in China - hence 
>>>> the "Stringer Shanghai" attribute.
>>>>
>>>> Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the use of this image here may well be a 
>>>> poor choice, but the accompanying article isn't about steam - it's about 
>>>> China's environmental pollution and their contribution to a growing 
>>>> global problem, which even the Chinese themselves don't dismiss as a 
>>>> major issue of their own making.  I choose to focus my attention on the 
>>>> article itself, the gist of which is not in dispute.
>>> Well, I wasn't picking on ya, but that darned sure looks like steam.
>>> If it is a nuclear or coal plant, that it really IS steam.
>>>
>>> That is not to say that coal plants don't give off some bad things,
>>> sulfur, carbon dioxide, just to name a couple.
>>>
>>> Oh well, at least we are talking here again.
>>
>> I just don't want you or anyone to completely miss out on knowing 
>> something that may be important because some doofus chose a poor image 
>> to paste up next to the story - personally, I don't need a visual to 
>> know about something.  Sure, I know any one thing can be faked, but I 
>> don't think the scientific community is faking this issue.  Do they have 
>> an agenda?  You bet.  Do the politicians have an agenda?  You bet.  Does 
>> business have an agenda?  Count on it.  Everyone has an agenda, as well 
>> they should, especially on this important issue.
>>
>> Do I believe humans are contributing to climate change?  Yes, I do.  Do 
>> I believe the planet is on the cusp of natural climate change cycle? 
>> Yes, I do.  Do I believe the latter is more important than the former? 
>> No, I do not.  I know we can't do anything about natural climate change, 
>> but we can do something about our contribution to it.  Even if climate 
>> change wasn't an issue, is it smart to continue pouring toxins into the 
>> same environment that supports our lives?  our future?  Without a 
>> healthy environment, we're toast.  Nobody disputes that.  Or at least 
>> nobody that cares.
>>
>> Humans have been screwing up their environment since the day they 
>> started walking upright, including me.  But over the last two decades or 
>> so we've somehow managed to learn a lot.  The question now is, what do 
>> we do with this new knowledge?  Use it to improve our environment and 
>> ourselves, or hide it somewhere and keep doing what we've always done 
>> when we don't like it?  One's answer depends on one's agenda.
>>
>> Something's gotta change.  We've been on the road of self-denial for a 
>> while now, and we're on the road to self-destruction now.  We keep 
>> allowing ourselves to get wrapped around an axle about shit that just 
>> don't matter long term.  Yup, the U.S. is a large well-funded outfit, 
>> but they're not the only outfit that matters.  We need to stop our 
>> global thinking about someone else's destruction, and start our global 
>> planning to improve everyone's future.  Anything that interferes with 
>> that latter premise is our enemy.
> 
> Well thought out and articulated, or as the red necks would say, damn
> them was some mighty perty words.
> 
> I can agree with you put that way, that we are in a combination of
> natural and man made warming.   I must admit, I haven't spent much
> time looking at it that way.
> 
> But that makes more sense than the versions put oout by the political
> extremes.
> 
> Ron


I think we're all painfully aware of the position that, if global 
climate change is a natural inevitability, then we measly humans needn't 
concern ourselves with such issues beyond our meager understanding or 
limited control.  Of course, this position carries the burden of 
assumption that us humans have no part in how this natural inevitability 
impacts our quality of life, nor that of our progeny.  I consider this 
position untenable at it's best, and catastrophic at it's worst.  It's 
like the boat has begun to sink, we're incapable or unwilling to do 
anything about it, so we'll just sit here and wait for our inevitable 
demise.  Self-defeatism of the purest form.  We all have a dog in this 
hunt for life, yet despite our hunger, he continues napping in the shade 
of ignorance, arrogance, or both.  Each of us can only be expected to 
provide our due diligence individually, yet hopefully, by extension, to 
a point beyond our collective horizons.  If we, as a species, cannot or 
refuse to acknowledge our own contributions in this issue and develop 
alternatives to our collective abuse, then we have met the enemy and he 
is us.

-- 
jer
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