Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - "Man-made global warming is junk science"

Flames Draft Watcher · 06-06-2009, 10:49 PM

There are some who deny the holocaust happened.

There are scientists who claimed that tobacco is not harmful. I'm sure they had some pretty convincing studies to attempt to prove it too and some great soundbytes and quotes from so-called "respected" scientists.

Why aren't we believing those guys again?

There are lots of reasons why people don't want to believe in global warming. If it does exist, it may mean that we have to completely change our consumer society. That threatens the foundations of our economic welfare. Countries that choose to believe in global warming may make hard economic decisions that affect their economy and the well being of the citizens negatively in the short term. That's without even bringing non-renewable energy resources and their affect on politics and global power structures into the equation.

To me it pays to ask the question, who benefits from believing or disbelieving in global warming? Doesn't seem like scientists have much of a reason to believe in it beyond the actual proof, doesn't seem like there's much reason for the people who control most of the world's money to fund scientists to manipulate data to make a mythical global warming appear as reality.

On the other hand its not hard to see why those who stand to lose a lot if global warming is true and society is forced to change in order to stabilize climate change might want to fund scientists who think that it is a myth. It does not have to restricted to those in oil and gas either, many different industries may take significant hits if pollution is more closely monitored and companies are forced to pay for their pollution.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externalities

"For example, manufacturing that causes air pollution imposes costs on the whole society"
"In a competitive market, the existence of externalities would cause either too much or too little of the good to be produced or consumed in terms of overall costs and benefits to society. If there exist external costs such as pollution, the good will be overproduced by a competitive market, as the producer does not take into account the external costs when producing the good."

If global warming is a myth then every company that produces a sizeable amount of greenhouse gases gets let off the hook because there is no link between greenhouse gases and climate change. But if it isn't a myth then some very large industries may have to start paying for their external costs, for their pollution via greenhouse gases and that may threaten the viability of numerous industries.

I think people that try to take money out of the equation here are missing a big point. There is a lot of reasons to fund scientists that downplay or completely refute the role of greenhouse gases in climate change.

06-06-2009, 10:49 PM	#64
Flames Draft Watcher In the Sin Bin Join Date: Oct 2001 Exp:	There are some who deny the holocaust happened. There are scientists who claimed that tobacco is not harmful. I'm sure they had some pretty convincing studies to attempt to prove it too and some great soundbytes and quotes from so-called "respected" scientists. Why aren't we believing those guys again? There are lots of reasons why people don't want to believe in global warming. If it does exist, it may mean that we have to completely change our consumer society. That threatens the foundations of our economic welfare. Countries that choose to believe in global warming may make hard economic decisions that affect their economy and the well being of the citizens negatively in the short term. That's without even bringing non-renewable energy resources and their affect on politics and global power structures into the equation. To me it pays to ask the question, who benefits from believing or disbelieving in global warming? Doesn't seem like scientists have much of a reason to believe in it beyond the actual proof, doesn't seem like there's much reason for the people who control most of the world's money to fund scientists to manipulate data to make a mythical global warming appear as reality. On the other hand its not hard to see why those who stand to lose a lot if global warming is true and society is forced to change in order to stabilize climate change might want to fund scientists who think that it is a myth. It does not have to restricted to those in oil and gas either, many different industries may take significant hits if pollution is more closely monitored and companies are forced to pay for their pollution. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Externalities "For example, manufacturing that causes air pollution imposes costs on the whole society" "In a competitive market, the existence of externalities would cause either too much or too little of the good to be produced or consumed in terms of overall costs and benefits to society. If there exist external costs such as pollution, the good will be overproduced by a competitive market, as the producer does not take into account the external costs when producing the good." If global warming is a myth then every company that produces a sizeable amount of greenhouse gases gets let off the hook because there is no link between greenhouse gases and climate change. But if it isn't a myth then some very large industries may have to start paying for their external costs, for their pollution via greenhouse gases and that may threaten the viability of numerous industries. I think people that try to take money out of the equation here are missing a big point. There is a lot of reasons to fund scientists that downplay or completely refute the role of greenhouse gases in climate change.