Which is the best policy for climate change, that of deniers or believers?

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by Patricio Da Silva, Sep 13, 2020.

  1. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You are not driving the climate. Sorry. You don't even know where the door handle is to get into the car. People outside the car are screaming that it's going too fast, that it's going to slow, that it's in the wrong lane, that it's in the right lane, headed in the wrong direction, headed in the right direction, and that if we throw rocks at it maybe we can change what's wrong with it.

    Meanwhile, the car is transporting food, medicine, clean water, and technology that the same people screaming need to survive.
     
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  2. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You wanna build your own car? Awesome. Please do.

    Don't slash the tires on the one currently operating because people NEED it to operate. Even the folks trying to build a new car. All the parts for the new car have to come in the old one.
     
  3. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    No, you are fogging the issue in order that nothing will get done, allowing #2 to run its disastrous course.
     
  4. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    It's a metaphor. You're changing the metaphor amounts to fogging the point offered.

    There is no fog, either extreme climate change with extreme consequences is possible within the next 50 years, or less, or it's not.

    Which is it?
     
  5. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I like this analogy. Let's keep playing with it.

    The oil light is on.

    Alarmist: We need to completely redesign cars so that this never happens again. Neither of our existing new car prototypes will drive on existing roads, so we'll need to redesign the entire transportation grid. The road surface will need to be made of a rare expensive mineral that can only be mined from pristine rain forest. The new cars will drive half as far, cost three times as much, and last a third as long. You can only drive it at certain times under certain ideal conditions. There's a rare chance that they will burst into flames for no reason but we're working on that. Oh by the way. We're taking a percentage of your salary to put toward this plan. After all, we both know we can spend your money better than you can.
     
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  6. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Oh...so now you have a problem with imaginary analogies? Sheesh.

    You've create a false model. It's not my fault for pointing it out.
     
  7. Quantum Nerd

    Quantum Nerd Well-Known Member

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    It's called progress. Sometimes the ones who don't like it have to die first before it is possible. However, it WILL happen, whether you are on board or not. The efficiency advantages of the electric car are just too much to pass up.
     
  8. Doofenshmirtz

    Doofenshmirtz Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You are incorrect. CA is where dems enjoy a super majority and results show that the environment is not something they really care about. Its power. Even the Dem voters that claim to care are driving their single occupancy vehicles while the buses and trains remain mostly empty.

    What do you do to protect the planet? Do you eat a Vegan diet? Do you refuse to buy products from companies that pollute? Your dollar is more powerful than any politician!
     
  9. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Op Costs drop by 2/3rds ? Not sure what the cost of Power is where you are .. but a friend of mine calculated how much it would cost him in power and it was more than his gas bill - alot more - like more than double - and that power is not "carbon free" - and won't be for many decades ..and that is if we start building scad's of nuclear power plants tomorrow.
     
  10. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Problem. Use of fossil fuels adds energy to the climate.

    Solution. Completely stop adding energy to the climate (over 20 years) and become dependent on an energy system that converts energy from the climate into electricity.

    Wait what?

    The first cars were electric cars. People preferred otto cycle powered cars. Why? Because of how less efficient they are?
     
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  11. Giftedone

    Giftedone Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Did you forget your response to my post OP - Patrick. There is no doubt that climate change is going to do some damage - as we are already seeing - and we need to address this issue..

    however, there is are even greater environmental issues and or/ additional issues other than CO2/ Global warming.

    But Blue does not care about these issues - and that is why they are now the "anti Enviro" party - with a platform that is so bad - that it is worse than the Red Platform which horrible.

    Fancy that -

    It was interesting that Trump briefly mentioned the main issue the other day- when responding to a question about "The Environment" - and how it has taken a back seat.

    Blue deserves to lose this election. The anti Environment - Neocon party that is so far to the extremist left that Michael Moore is now way to the Right.

    Environment was the straw that broke this camels back... what a joke Blue is these days w/r to enviro policy.
     
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  12. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    Try to do what? Destroy the world economic order because you think it's a good idea? Why should he do that? What we should have is a president that recognizes the pejorativeness of demanding the unmodern world has to remain that way because, you know, bad energy, bad consumption, etc. You folks on the faithful tour need to get a grip on what it is that you're actually advocating for. The notion of the evil plantation master comes readily to mind here. Slaves in the unmodern world are required to live that way so that you can "afford" your carbon credits so you don't have to modify your own lifestyles or give up your private aviation, or naval fleets. And, since you brought it up, when the Paris accords were signed, who suffered from ALL of the output of those self righteous ass hats who flew there on their fleet of private jets? Do you suppose that's why CA is burning today? I do. So, none of that requires getting rid of Trump, does it. Why not just give up the entitlement that AGW snobbery exudes.
     
  13. Quantum Nerd

    Quantum Nerd Well-Known Member

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    The ICE is <30% efficient. The electric motor is >90% efficient. Do you enjoy throwing out more than half of the energy content of gasoline as wasted heat?

    In the end, it is not about what people prefer, it is about what is the most efficient. People's behavioral preferences just make them lazy.

    BTW: We are DEPENDENT on oil, a NON-RENEWABLE energy source. In today's mechanized agriculture, we basically eat oil. Like ANY dependency, it doesn't sound very smart to me.
     
    Last edited: Sep 16, 2020
  14. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    So, just asking, but the typical electric car would change the drive time from here to there from ~12 hours to several days, and requiring several stays overnight to get me to my destination. Is that your definition of efficient?
     
  15. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    The end of the planet is also "possible" at any second. What are you now doing to prevent that?
     
  16. Quantum Nerd

    Quantum Nerd Well-Known Member

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    Technology is already worked on to swap batteries along the trip. Will be faster than refueling. The naysayers will die off, just wait and see. My 15 year old son's dream car is a Tesla. He is not the only one in his age group.
     
  17. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    Umm.. didn't actually answer the question though, did you? The answer was, no... it is NOT more efficient. The future promise is always the issue isn't it. And how do you square the idea that batteries become commodities to those who have invested so much in proprietary technology that only supports their brand? Are you suggesting nationalization or regulatory interference to solve for uncompetitiveness? It seems as much.

    And since I haven't died off yet, and I am actually an owner, perhaps you can pay for my overnight hotel bills while I have to endure this experience that frankly sucks. If you think that experience must die off so that folks don't understand the suckyness of the experience, that doesn't bode well for the technology. As for your 15 yo., experience is often the reasons things change. When I was 15, I thought that a Formula 400 Firebird was the ultimate expression of cool.. And then I actually drove one, and well, experience says,.... nope. And when your 15 yo actually drives a tesla, they will understand immediately just how ill placed their dream was.
     
  18. garyd

    garyd Well-Known Member

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    If the bull frog had wings...

    By the way the biggest problem in the keys is erosion not sea level rise. It's amazing how much an island can shrink when it is constantly in the path of hurricanes.
     
  19. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    There's a reason long distance trains are electric motors with diesel generators. Electric motors are very efficient. The problem is powering them. Tesla's battery weighs 450kgs and delivers 150 Watt hours per Kg. Diesel has 13,762 Watt hours per kg. Even if the battery is operating at 100% efficiency and the ICE is at 30% efficiency that's over 26 times more usable energy in an equal mass of fuel. It's no contest. Liquid fuels are far more portable, weigh much less, and contain much more usable energy.

    If you're really concerned about efficiency, then just walk there, lazybones. Your body is far more efficient than both transportation types. Of course, that brings up the issue of time. Time plays a major role in how we calculate efficiency.

    Try and build an electric freight vehicle. You'll find rather quickly that your increased GVW due to your battery cuts into the amount of freight you can transport on a road, and your reduced range cuts into how fast you can move that freight to its destination. Just because you use less energy, that does not mean the entire system is more efficient.
     
  20. Quantum Nerd

    Quantum Nerd Well-Known Member

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    There is no question that fossil fuels have high energy density, per volume and per mass, I stated such already earlier in this thread.

    That still doesn't get around the problem that they are NON-RENEWABLE. That's why the next energy transition will be so much more difficult than previous ones. In the past, we went from energy sources of lower energy density to sources of higher energy density. This time, we'll be forced to do the opposite. Waiting until it is too late, so the "free market" can sort it out, is not an option. The "free market", i.e. evolution, also can leave behind many dead people. Since we are essentially eating oil, this is not just a matter of whether we have something convenient to drive around, it will be a matter of eating or not eating.
     
    Last edited: Sep 16, 2020
  21. Fangbeer

    Fangbeer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Oh there's energy sources with much much higher energy densities. They shall not be spoken of in the mixed company of climate alarmists.
     
  22. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    More boring right wing platitudes, generalities, weasel words, loaded phrases, strawman arguments, and drivel. you sound like the proverbial annoying right-wing spewing uncle at the proverbial thanksgiving dinner.

    Who is talking about 'extremism" of any kind. You are jumping to all kinds of conclusions not even mentioned.

    Liberal policies have done more good for America, while conservatives fought them every step of the way.

    You seem to have a problem with alarmism, and the essence of your rebuttal is what?

    Basically, it's " We'll all be communists if we vote for democrats. "

    "anti-capitalist' rhetoric? Where was that mentioned by me?

    I don't now if Joe Biden is the paragon of perfection, but because he is not Trump, who is an existential threat to the national security of the united states, I'm voting for Biden.
     
  23. Patricio Da Silva

    Patricio Da Silva Well-Known Member Donor

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    All I'm saying is AGW.ACC is real, scientists say so, and something must be done.


    I have no idea what, I'll let the experts duke it out on that one.

    As for what, what are your proposals?
     
  24. nobodyspecific

    nobodyspecific Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Ah the famous pascal wager. I remember watching a youtube video with this exact same premise. From a standpoint of logic, it is a false dichotomy.

    The problem with the wager is it supposes two equally weighted courses of action and two equally probable outcomes for each action. Life is rarely so nuanced as to offer only two courses of action, let alone two equally probable outcomes of those actions.

    On the actions to take, "try to do something" from my perspective may vary wildly from your perspective. Even if we narrow down a given thing to do such as stop using fossil fuels, this begs the question what do we replace it with, on what timeline, who replaces it (ex: developed nations vs developing), whether the new source(s) of energy will need to produce an exact equivalent as fossil fuels or if future energy usage will have to be cut back, etc.

    Even if we accept the premise of two and only two equally weighted actions to take, the idea that there are two outcomes is likewise false. Yes, I know you specify "worst case scenario", implicitly implying there are other scenarios. But by only bringing up the worst case scenario, you are applying weight only to the worst case scenario and none to any other scenario. What are the other scenarios and what is their likelihood of occurring? If the worst case scenario of inaction is extinction of the human race, and the worst case scenario of action is also extinction of the human race, how do you measure the degree to which action would decrease the probability of the worst case scenario? This is necessary information to make informed decisions - something which the Pacal's Wager is sorely lacking.

    Unfortunately I am not convinced there is any sound logical argument that can be made to climate change deniers. They simply refute science.
     
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