How many sources do you need?

[spooker]

My four-year-old will typically trust something I say as "truth" because she still believes I am smarter ...

But I really wonder about this guy:
http://www.castanet.net/news/BC/179996/ ... hange-real

And just today another study was published that brought the math down to a simpler level for us mortals:
https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/201 ... a-ice.html

Is he just being that obtuse so that he can show that he is a good responsible CEO for his shareholders?

[shaking my head]

[rustled]

Oh, I don't know. Like many of us, he's probably wondering if anyone can actually quantify anything in a way that can be measured, so we can gauge which of our policy efforts, if any, are paying off.

The IPCC is hardly a neutral filter through which to assess what hundreds of scientists are saying. So far, they have been unable to quantify anything about our activities versus natural phenomena in any meaningful way.

As to the second link, scientists generally expect a premise like that to be met with skepticism, because correlation is not cause. Which is why in the story, she says it might just be rather simple.

If it turns out the premise holds water, and this is accurate:

An individual’s share of a round-trip economy class fare between Edmonton and Toronto is almost exactly one tonne of CO2.

then we're left wondering how many tonnes are generated by an individual's round-trip economy fare to, say, Paris, and whether or not it's important enough that we ought to be asking people to quit going to places like Paris to discuss saving the sea ice when it would be better for the sea ice if they don't go to places like Paris.

It goes without saying that we should take practical measures to reduce our negative impacts on the environment. But I wouldn't expect that only from Anderson. I'd expect those who are absolutely certain an unnecessary flight impacts climate change, and that therefore the policies they impose on us are effective, to lead by example. And yet, they choose not to. He's not talking the talk, but they are not walking the walk.

[hobbyguy]

Climate change is another of those areas where what we know is dwarfed by what we don't know. That is largely because the system is so complex and filled with feedback loops.

To me, the K-M CEO is just plain allowing himself to be in denial because he could not stomach doing his job if he wasn't.

It is fundamentally a numbers game that can be reduced to the analogy of a forest: if one person cuts one tree down in the forest every month for firewood, there is little impact. If a thousand people cut down one tree every month, the forest suffers. If a million people cut down one tree every month, the forest is gone, and everybody freezes.

So the K-M guy is just totally out to lunch on purpose because the necessary changes don''t suit his personal interests. Which of course, in his mind, is likely to be followed up with the circular arguments revolving around "if I don't do it, someone else will".

[rustled]

I wonder if you're presuming to know what he thinks and why he thinks it? Here's what he's quoted as saying:

Anderson says he does know the broad public view is that over time, humans should reduce their reliance on fossil fuels and he accepts that.

Slamming Anderson for not leaping on the bandwagon may bring some folk satisfaction, but to me it's just deflection from the inconvenient truth. As you say, what we know is dwarfed by what we don't know.

As complex as forest ecosystems are, your forest analogy is overly simplistic for the complexity of this problem. You can count and quantify trees, measure their health and maturity, and you can quantify the direct effects of human activity related to cutting them down. You quantify and count how many trees humans have replanted. Although you cannot quantify how many acres of forest we've saved by fighting forest fires, and you cannot predict what an invasive insect will do to undo your efforts, you can still quantify how fires and insects have impacted the forest after the fact.

However, I've yet to see anyone accurately quantify how human activity affects climate change with enough precision to be certain any of the steps we're taking, whether small and cumulative or drastic and widescale, are having any positive effect.

It's also conceivable some of what we're doing could have negative consequences for the planet (just as preventing the forests from regenerating naturally through fire, and replanting clear cuts with monoculture have had non-positive effects on forest ecosystems.) But these sorts of oops effects on climate change would probably be probably minor. I suspect they'd pale in comparison to what we can clearly see and quantify: the harm done when we install wind farms and solar farms, when we cut down healthy forests to pellet and ship overseas, when we decommission nuclear and then have to go back to relying on coal for industry. We're told we must do these things to save the planet, and it doesn't add up.

So I'm not thinking Anderson's the one that's in denial and out to lunch. Seems to me the people who talk the talk but won't walk the walk are the ones we should be holding to account.

[Glacier]

[GordonH]

^^^ yep, as many areas of this planet continues clear cut forests. Forests consume large amounts of co2 then produce oxygen. Its our filtration sysyem, by removing vast amount of that natural filter. Yes, co2 level will rise with both natural sources & human made co2.
Sooner or later something will happen, putting worldwide stoppage on clear cutting and go back to select logging.
Increasing the amount of mature trees to filter the planets co2 levels would be good start. Removing coal burning power plants along with any other coal burning sources.
Knowing how many travel/cargo/oil tanker ship are on worlds oceans at any one time is huge. Maybe developing a non weaponizalbe nuclear power and replace all diesel electric engines on those ships.

Solutions take research, engineers & money.

Added: one of the largest single natural sourses of co2, which we have absolutely no control over is volcanic eruptions.

[hobbyguy]

Yah right, the pine beetle explosion was a minor effect...

Anyway, the analogy is only intended to show two things: scale and the limitations of the systems to accommodate human inputs.

From a pollution type effect standard, you could use a stream as an example too. If one person piddles in the stream, meh! If 100,000 people piddle in the stream - it becomes a sewer.

From the perspective of the planetary systems and the effects of a dominant species, we do have a historical example of what happens when a dominant species changes the atmosphere. Cyanobacteria dominated the earth until they had changed the atmosphere dramatically by raising the oxygen content. Stromatolite forming cyanobacteria are now very rare.

Humans dumping CO2 into the atmosphere probably did not matter much in 1800 when there were 1 billion humans, and each with a much smaller "carbon footprint". However today we are approaching 8 billion people. Making that even more significant is that each person's "carbon footprint" is roughly 20 times higher.

Given those things, it is hubris to imagine that humans are not having serious effects.

[Glacier]

Given those things, it is hubris to imagine that humans are not having serious effects.

The science has not given a verdict on that yet. Yes, we are having an effect, but there's not one shred of evidence that the results will be catastrophic. If anything the evidence points to a net benefit with warming.

As for the pine beetle problem, it was human caused, not climate caused. There was disaster to speak of. Beetles spread rapidly because trucks traveling across the Chilcotin and Nechako plateaus filled with beetle infested logs rapidly spread the beetles (thank you BC government for encouraging centralization of mills in Williams Lake, Quesnel, and Prince George instead of milling closer to the timber source).

The 2nd cause was drought. A major drought hit in the 2000s in the central interior not seen since the 1930s. This weakened the tree's ability to defend against the bugs. As soon as the rains came back in 2012, the beetle infestation ended. There is no longer a problem; the trees are not getting wiped out in large numbers. My mom's house is on 6 acres of land. Every single tree over 10 feet tall was killed except for the one aspen tree. She has 10 years worth of fire wood, and best of all, the trees are now 3 feet apart instead of crowded together. Since the beetles moved through, those small trees have grown another 5 to 10 feet, and within another five years her place will be full of mature trees again.

The 3rd cause was fire suppression. naturally lodgepole pine only lives 20 or so years before getting wiped out by fire. No fire meant large stands of mature trees ripe for infestation.

The only reason there was devastation is because it stopped loggers from raping the land of trees. The dead trees are rotting, giving nutrients to the soil. Animals love it. Plants love it.

[rustled]

Yah right, the pine beetle explosion was a minor effect...

And no one said it was.

Anyway, the analogy is only intended to show two things: scale and the limitations of the systems to accommodate human inputs.

From a pollution type effect standard, you could use a stream as an example too. If one person piddles in the stream, meh! If 100,000 people piddle in the stream - it becomes a sewer.

Which is, again, why some of us feel we should focus on cleaning up what's quantifiable, measurable fixable, and instead of being distracted by theoritics. Lord knows there's a big enough practical mess to deal with, without fixating on theory.

Humans dumping CO2 into the atmosphere probably did not matter much in 1800 when there were 1 billion humans, and each with a much smaller "carbon footprint". However today we are approaching 8 billion people. Making that even more significant is that each person's "carbon footprint" is roughly 20 times higher.

Given those things, it is hubris to imagine that humans are not having serious effects.

The 1800s were disgusting for quantifiable pollution. We've come a long way from burning wood and coal to heat our cities, and dumping our sewage and other waste "wherever".

It's hubris to presume the climate is entirely within our control.

Back on topic, is it sensible to bash Anderson for saying he doesn't know? Why is he expected to pretend to know? Just to be fashionable with the catastrophe crowd, when the catastrophe crowd does not even bother to lead by example?