"How worried are you about climate change?" Topic

On a scale of 0 (no worry) to 10 (extreme worry).

0. Planet Earth has been heating up and cooling off long before humans existed and it will continue to do so long after we're gone.

0
At my age, climate change is the least of my worries. Plus, as a student of history, I am aware of the cycles of climate change and how it effects human civilization. Sometimes it is beneficial. Sometimes it sucks. But humans have been adapting to a changing climate since Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden.

=0

As a Gen-Xer, in addition to being told we're all gonna die in 30 minutes when the ICBMs fly, were also got bombarded as children with eco-fear and media manipulation. Who remembers the ad campaign showing the Native American (who wasn't) with a tear looking at pollution? How about Give a Hoot, Don't Pollute! Or celebrities like Orson Welles and Leonard Nemoy narrating gloom & doom documentaries about Over Population and the New Ice Age? By the end of the day you'd think by the year 2000 we'd all be reduced to cannibals stalking each other through the frozen atomic bomb-blasted ruins of our cities.

YouTube link

The list of end-of-the-world eco-fears include:

*Silent Spring
*Love Canal
*Three Mile Island
*Overpopulation
*The New Ice Age
*Killer Bees
*Acid Rain
*The Ozone Hole
*Global Warming…now called Climate Change after IPCC warming predictions failed, and now several new names are being tried out, like Climate Chaos and Climate Catastrophe…

Every one of those things SBminisguy mentioned I remember and when I have told young people about them I have been told I was lying. One of them said I should go to prison for speaking out against global warming. I showed her the Lenard Nemoy In Search Of episode called a New Ice Age and told her I learned about the coming ice age in college science classes.

Every one of these crisis had the same solution.
Western Europe and the USA needed to disarm and de-nuclearize.
Pay more taxes.
Give up your car.
Live in a small apartment.
Give up free speech and private firearms ownership.
Have no more than one child.
Stop eating meat.

There was an old saying in the 1970s.
The greens are like tomatoes, they start out green but end up red (as in communist.)

Mike Bunkermeister Creek

10.
For the sake of those to come, not for me.

martin

10.

I am glad I won't be around as it continues to get worse. Sorry kids that we screwed up the world and all. But we had a great time doing it!

0, part of earths natural cycle and folks usually forget the natural changing tilt, hence Mag to Grid!

Not forgetting that Chinas output is far greater than ours ever was, have opened more new coal fuelled power stations that we ever had, so even if we went net 0 the carbon would still rise, so a bit pointless although trees do need carbon!

Tally Ho!

As a survivor of every civilization ending ecological catastrophe that I was presumed to die in since the 70s…
Big fat 0

I'll go with 7-8, for people overall. I think our civilization will find a way through, but there will be changes. Real estate will change value. Companies with vested interest are already planning for this – insurance companies are exiting the market in at least one US state. People will change their settlement patterns as a result.

And there will be new business opportunities, as well as deferred costs coming due and flattening established businesses.

A faint risk of this becoming an angry shouting match over not-miniatures? On the basis that a survey of attitudes of members/visitors benefits from a range of views I'd say 8 or 9 for myself and 10 for those who'll come after me.

Time for my tofu and quinoa snack now I think.

A 10
Not for me myself but when I see the changes in the weather even today then I am very worried for children and grandchildren etc.

0

10+ it is already affecting the world as we see stronger storms adding to costs to rebuild, hence rising insurance costs.

Frankly things look pretty grim.

Climate change happened before humans and will continue after us. Ice caps come and go. Global warming and cooling may have a little bit of help from us. I haven't bought into the carbon footprint scam but I do believe renewables and alternatives are the way forward for energy sources.

10. I've known and worked with many scientists at universities.

0. The planet heats up and cools down. My house at one time was under a glacier; now it is not. To think humans can control climate is left wing hubris.

0 nothing to see here. Move on.

2. I am worried that the political reaction (such as mandating electric vehicles in California) may well collapse our economy or electrical grid, or both. You can't change any significant infrastructure without an economy which generates the needed excess and we're already printing money to cover our expenses. You need to get China and India on board to do anything effective and I just don't see that happening.

If politicians stopped buying beachfront property and flying around in jets their arguments would be more convincing.

0.
Climate changes. Always has, always will.
Medieval Warm Period. Little Ice Age. And that's just in recorded history.
CO2 is not a "control knob". Methane is apparently a far stronger GHG but nobody seems very bothered about reducing methane.

Interesting article here on the NASA web site
"Climate change and the rise and fall of civilizations"
link

I wasn't aware that ancient civilisations drove around in SUVs

10 – I worry for my children and grandchildren. I should be gone when the worst comes. The people in power do not seem to care enough to stop it.

2 – My geography teacher said that we've got about another 20,000 years before we get out of the last ice age so give it a few years yet.

0 It's just another grift to scare people into doing what the left wants. Mother Earth will do what she wants, when she wants to. Scientists will tell you anything you want to hear if you are funding them!

10 – because it'll be worse than we think because there are so many idiots out there who can't read data.

Nice to see gun control got a quick entry into the debate – not really one of the major contributors to climate change.

BTW: Anyone watching the documentary series "Eleven Minutes"? Wow – did they get lucky that the cops got there so quickly and drew the shooter's fire whilst the showground was still really packed. If he hadn't wasted two volleys on them then the casualties would surely have exceeded 1000, and the deaths over 100. Isn't that a bizarre thing to describe as lucky though – "just" 800 injuries and "only" 50 dead ?

But back to climate change and some incisive debate, eh?

Below zero and even somewhere in the negative numbers.

I really do not understand how money laundering will change the weather or where the money is going to. Yet for millennia, I understood that the punishment for eating the King's deer was death, now it is only being worded a bit differently.

I have survived the coming ice age of the sixties, running out of oil through the seventies, global warming of the eighties, the ozone hole of the nineties, farting cows and drowning polar bears and now these wealth redistribution schemes as fronted by poster children.

Feel free to PM me to ask how I really feel.

The only constant has been the fear mongering campaigns against the populations.

Now Bill, before someone jumps on the ban button, please don't start topics you may not like the response to. There was a reason you separated the boards back when.

Why is it people accept climate change but deny weather manipulation? Follow the money. No one rememberes the USAF creating more rain storms in SEA sixty years ago??? You've come a long way baby as the saying used to go.

No debate, just a silly poll question.
0
As per info learned from cartoons (as a child) and in college (as a slightly older child), the planet is already well past it's expiration date.

0. First law of physics: Matter can neither be created nor destroyed.

And for those saying "what?" It works like this:

As per the above law, carbon— which is matter— is essentially a static presence on the Earth. There is no greater amount of carbon on Earth than there was 4 billion years ago when the Earth was formed. Aside from minor input from asteroid strikes once every 200 million years or so, the total amount of carbon on Earth has remained the same. That carbon was initially in the Earth's atmosphere as methane— the most significant greenhouse gas in the carbon family. Yet, I note, the planet did NOT then enter a catastrophic, "runaway greenhouse" condition, even though the entire atmosphere was essentially a greenhouse gas and the young Sun was much hotter than it is now.

SO,,, it is therefore impossible for the Earth to have a "runaway greenhouse" disaster based on our current atmosphere, because that NEVER happened in the past with a much more carbon-dominated atmosphere than the one we have now.

And, of course, since that time the atmosphere was converted from methane to oxygen and nitrogen by methane-eating bacteria, which set off the entire rush of carbon and oxygen based life— to whit, the plants and animals which dominate the Earth's surface today.

Furthermore, we already know that in past eras the Earth had more CO2 in the atmosphere than it does now, resulting in flourishing plant life and animal life of enormous mass and stature across the entire landmass— the dinosaurs, of which nothing alive today comes even close in form. Therefore, the increase in CO2 is more likely than not to promote plant growth and potential increases in animal size and mass over time (including us). So, if anything, any warming which does occur will more than likely extend the growing season of plants, thus removing carbon from the atmosphere, just as has happened for millions of years.

Keep in mind that all of the carbon in fossil fuels was once in the atmosphere, all at the same time— and that includes the massive amount of fuel we have not used and cannot even get at, trapped under thousands of layers of sedimentary rock. If it was in the atmosphere then and the planet's surface did not "burn up" then the amount we have added now will NOT do the same. Period.

AND on top of all that, holy cow, look at us humans. We are the ONE species in the entire history of this planet which can actually DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. We can indeed "engineer" our atmosphere and world temperature.
Right now, SpaceX is developing a rocket that could deliver enormous amounts of mass to Mars… which means they've also developed a rocket which can reach the L1 Lagrange Point which lies directly between Earth and the Sun. This point is a stable orbit that matches the orbit of the Earth around the Sun, in a direct line between the two. Put an object in that location and it will remain in that location. And that means that, should we determine that any climate change going on is to our disliking, we could conceivably launch and build a parasol to place at that point to effectively dim the light of the Sun reaching Earth. (Even by the worst calculations of the climate change advocates, this dimming need be less than 2%) Several proposals are actually being made for this, but I advocate a fairly simple one— remember the asteroid strikes I mentioned above? Well we're overdue for one— and that strike would make "climate change" look like a case of the sniffles compared to COVID-19 Alpha.
I propose that we find the inevitable "planet killer" asteroid, and, using the "gravity tractor" concept (about as low tech as you can get), coax it into orbit at the L1 site; then we give the asteroid a significant spin. Asteroids are not actually solid rock, but an agglomeration held together by gravitational attraction (for the most part)— a sufficient spin (which needn't be much) would cause the asteroid to break apart into a cloud of debris at the L1 site— effectively acting as the parasol we'd need, just as a cloud on Earth blocks the sun's light creating a patch of shadow. And, if that is too much, we can "gravity tractor" the debris out of L1 for a plunge to the Sun. (Actually, since the L1 site is not entirely stable, the debris would eventually depart on its own, but we might want to give it a little help.) SpaceX's BFR should indeed be able to provide the rocket base to do this; the rest of the tech is pretty much straightforward, probably achievable with nothing more significant than conventional explosives.
(Imagine that, haters— Elon Musk could save the world.)

So, no. I am not concerned for one nanosecond about "Climate Change." I am concerned about gullible, fearful Luddites who will endanger our lives, freedom, and economy in their foolish rush into drastic draconian "solutions" which solve nothing and only serve to push power (and money) further into the hands of self-serving and corrupt political "leaders."

And those politicians started this nonsense that "we only have twelve years left" over thirty years ago, so I'm safe on the politics front for slamming them.

0
Nope, I'm not concerned about climate change.
Actually, I like the idea of faster climate change.
And I mean that.
Every extinction event brought an evolutionary explosion of even more complex forms a few million years afterward.
Imagine the fantastic new variants of life after the next one.
Sure, it will be a rough ride and won't be pretty and a lot of life will suffer but what doesn't kill you will make you smarter.
Or whatever it needs to survive in the future.

Scroll to the end.

Borrowed from xkcd
And just in case: xkcd explained

Methane is apparently a far stronger GHG but nobody seems very bothered about reducing methane.

That would be the "eat less red meat because cattle produce a good load of methane" argument.

Which is of course countered by the "we'll genetically engineer a cow that produces less methane."

Until we are adequately prepared to handle a major solar flare event, absolutely 0. It's time to start worrying about events that are much more probable and will impact modern civilization more dramatically and more quickly (not to mention that preparation for this real danger is far less expensive than the transformation of human society that the climate activist are demanding).

10 But what has this got to do with playing with toy soldiers
H

what has this got to do with playing with toy soldiers

Some great future war scenarios, like Russia's run to the arctic.
Okay, that's fantasy, they didn't even reach Kyiv, but they may dream about it.

Flooded and decaying cities like in that great flic Split Second with Rutger Hauer.
Or Mad Max on Jet Ski like in that not-that-bad flic Waterworld.

Biblical wargaming:
Ark attack – Noah's last stand.
Thinking about it, that would be a great con game.

I think we may be seeing the differences between conservative and liberal views of the world.

0

At worst, it's the biggest, most influential, doomsday cult in history, a deeply misanthropic religion that assumes people have no agency at all and will just quietly die in place rather than move to more favorable environments.

I'd love to say I've never seen anything like it but of course, history is replete with such faith based panics.

0.

0

Parzival,stop making sense using the laws of physics or the worry warts might come back to reality.

As for "Worry", that leads to stress and shortens ones life span. Hopefully those that said 10, will turn it up to 11 and this nonsense will fade into history. The planet will survive anything that some measly carbon life forms do (or don't do).

Kim

If you want to see some real climate change, wait until the Yellowstone Cauldron blows.

0. I've been hearing various Chicken Little doomsday narratives my entire life that amount to nothing other than lining someone's pockets with money from gullible people

Brock, there are a lot of people making a lot of coin because of this scam. Always follow the money, right Al Gore?

@ Grattan54
Actually, that's been studied. I don't remember all of it, but the difference has to do with the amount of value that's placed on tradition and loyalty. Other values like empathy, sense of fair play, etc tested roughly equal between the conservative/liberal subjects.

Bill, can I use a negative number here?

0

What a topic.

TMP has turned into such a wasteland. Why should I waste my $$$ on membership when everything here is DRIVEL like this?

Doesn't anyone remember how good TMP used to be? I miss all my old TMP friends who have passed away. :-(

0.
The earth has been doing its own thing for four-and-a-half billion years, and there is nothing humans can do about it. We are pretty arrogant to think we can damage, then heal the earth with our just over one-hundred years of industrialization. The man made climate change hoax is just that: a hoax to transfer trillions of dollars to other entities and destroy entire economies.

0. The earth heals/moderates itself over the millenia, it appears. Might mean bad stuff a coming for Humans, but they'll survive too.

10 – 51 years ago on the eve of my 15th birthday I had the great good fortune to listen to James Lovelock explain the Gaia Hypotheses (now principle) on BBC Radio 4.

He had just given his first public speech on the subject at what was the second international conference on what we now call climate change, in London July 72.

Even as a 14 year old in the early 70s it answered so many questions about the world. But, you have to have your eyes open in this world.

5

I'm pretty sure it's an issue.
I'm pretty sure I'll have taken a dirt nap before I'm politically mandated to quarter refugees from the then flooded gulf states.

I'm just hope I get to hang around long enough to see news about how Mar-a-Lago guests have to be ferried out to it on gondolas.

:》

7. Do what you can while you can to make a difference. Even if it's a small one. Species extinction Is the most freighting.