How to Tell the Average Person About Global Warming

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And thousands of species, and millions of elderly people who will die of heat stroke, and all the people who will die due to increased natural disasters, and the people who will die due to increased and lengthened droughts, and the people who will starve when their crops get heat stressed, and the people who will be killed by terrorists funded by oil money, and the people who will be murdered due to increased crime, and the people who will die trying to migrate away from disaster zones.

Yes, there may be some small benefits in crop productivity in parts of the world where crops are grown below their optimum temperatures. There may also be some benefits due to increased CO2 levels (although photosynthesis is less sensitive to what are ultimately small increases in global CO2 concentration than the climate is, so these are likely to be small if they are noticeable at all). These are likely to be offset by heat stress and dehydration. However, those reductions in turn should also be offset by innovations and intensification, although the benefits of this will be uneven. It should also be noted that high-CO2 farming is associated with a reduction in nutritional quality. Again, it is unclear whether this will be significant on a global scale.

The main agricultural beneficiaries of global warming will be wheat at high latitudes and soy in the US. However, even these crops are expected to have their output negatively affected if warming reaches three degrees or more.

There is considerable uncertainty in these crop predictions, but certainly the current weight of evidence is against the large increases in output that you are predicting, particularly at higher temperatures.

Some interesting reading slash my sources: IMF, EPA, and collected projections on Wikipedia.

Then, make it easy.

I am saying this as someone, who invents useful things, and is a firm believer in Murphy's Law.

I remember that my grammar school was downtown, and used to stink of diesel exhaust. I think it actually deposited gray soot, in places which no hands could touch or make dirty. It's a legitimate quality-of-life issue.

But, as I try to experience nature, up-close and in-person, I am finding hot pools, faults, fumaroles, and can occasionally smell sulfur, depending on the humidity, direction of the wind, and so forth. Where oil wells were drilled, there was already grease in the rocks, and hyrdrocarbons belching from the crevices, feeding natural bacteria.

Besides greenhouse gases, which occur, naturally, warming is reportedly measurable, on other planets, in accordance with solar activity, not that we should be gross polluters.

Speaking of which, since when do successful people live in sprawl, use inefficient appliances and hoopties, followed by a cloud of exhaust. Are their things forever wearing out, for lack of quality. Are luxury goods typically, borderline poisonous, because of byproducts, or are they made of plastic.

One way to see humanity is as a keystone specie, whose health affects the health of others. Wildlife is attracted to beaver dams, as well as to local reservoirs.

Most of a global increase in temperature will be felt at the higher latitudes. There will be very little warming near the equator, possibly so little as to not even be measurable.

If you want to know what crops you will grow, just look to the south a few hundred miles.

In central Mexico, you can grow two crops of wheat a year. That is why the great Norman Borlaug did his research there in the 1940s. With Global Warming, it might be possible to have two growing seasons for wheat throughout much of Texas instead of just one.

The only way that even a three degree increase in temperature would cause problems for growing crops is if farmers insisted on growing the same varieties of crops that they grow now. Even then, it might be very little of a problem.

Heat stroke? Not so much. With increases in technology, air conditioning will likely become more common. More people dying from natural disasters? Increased crime? What? Don't fall for what the panic mongers are telling you.

Does it really matter whether we're causing it or not??

There's not that much difference between keeping a planet and keeping a house. Be as clean as you can without driving yourself crazy. Don't consume out of proportion to your resources or your need (something the West as a whole, and maybe the human species as a whole, has trouble with-- our household consumption is proportionate to our household resources, but even though we consume less than the average American family it is still disproportionate to our actual need by about half). Don't make things more complicated than they need to be. Don't be nasty. Take time to rest and enjoy yourself, but don't be lazy.

In other words, basically, don't piss where you drink.

And all those things?? They ARE good for you in the immediate term as well as being good for the planet. I'm happier when I'm doing them. And I will probably be driving a compact car again as soon as Kid#1 moves out of the house and I don't need to be able to seat six for us to be able to go somewhere together again. If we need more seats occasionally, we can always rent a van.

Quote tree getting too long.
No one really knows what it's going to do.None of us will be here to experience it.
Just clean the air up and see what happens.Who wants to breathe smog??Do you?Do you prefer clean water or would you like a pinch of dioxin in it?
I'm aware that some deserts are cold and dry,I'll also take a pass on those,I like to hear rain on the tin roof.
Just from what I've eseen here in my life,and what the old timers have told me,it's warmer here in the winter.The river here used to ice over and people could skate on it,not on my generation.We seem to get more ice than snow now.Snow is way better.
Maybe it's natural,we've had record heat and drought here before on the dust bowl days.Maybe it's not.
But I'd rather just clean up what we can,no sense in polluting.
If the climate is change natural,then nothing can be done and we just adapt.
When I was a kid my folks wouldn't let me toss even a gum wrapper out the car window,no littering.So in the large scale of things polluting is tossing a giant gum wrapper out the window.Its just not right.People (corporations,goverments)should clean up their messes.
eric76,aren't there new wind farms in your area? What's wrong with renewable energy and gradually phasing out coal?
Crime always increases when it's hot,at least around here.Always more violent crime in August.

We have a number of wind farms around here. Those who sell their wind rights seem to find out eventually that it wasn't anything near what was promised to induce them to sell those wind rights. They have to give up a lot of control over their own property.

Other than that, I don't mind the wind farms. Considering the carbon footprint it takes to manufacturer and transport them to where they are used, I don't think they are really that green. If it weren't for the generous tax credits, I think they would be few and far between.

Phasing out coal is not the panacea that many think it is. US power plants that use coal are under stringent requirements to use scrubbers to capture the CO2 and nitrous oxide emissions. As a result, their emissions are far cleaner than most people can imagine.

As for crime during hotter weather, keep in mind that people are more likely to be out doing things than when it is cold. Instead of sitting by the fire, they are out and about and criminals know that and are going to go where people congregate to prey on them. Also, the schools are generally closed in the summer and the kids are also out. Some become prey, some become predator. That would account for much of the increase in crime.

By the way, regarding wind farms, the wind farm people love it around here. In many places, people hate them. Here they are accepted. In many places they have to have guards every night or their equipment will be stolen or vandalized. Here, they don't need guards at all, although some do keep guards because of of their experiences elsewhere.

One engineer on a wind project a couple of years ago told a co-worker of mine that this was the only place where he has worked on a wind project that he felt comfortable having his wife and kid join him. He said that it was also the only place where he would be invited to local parties.

/\It's not just the emissions,but mountain top removal and the sludge ponds that occasionally bust open.Even if it's cleaner than before,it's still dirty and destructive.
I still think a hot,humid,ninety degree night makes people grumpier and more prone to fight.lol Makes me snippy.

you and several others here might not be, but i'm well convinced i will live to see some of the worst, whatever it is, and regardless of who causes it.

it shouldn't be a political message to say "don't piss where you drink" with regards to preserving perhaps the one thing that all humanity has in common.

i'm just fed up with the attitude i've seen, that it's acceptable to pollute as much as you want because the next generation will take care of it after you're gone.

when has leaving your problems for someone else ever worked?

i could not be bothered reading any of the posts so i may be repeating what someone else said.

anyway, i am not going to argue about the human contribution to global warming, or even if it is occurring, but i will say this.

the earth is self correcting.

higher global temperatures will result in more moisture in the air thus more clouds, and therefore more rain that reaches further inland than it previously did.

this, paired with the increase in carbon dioxide will provide more fuel for foliage to flourish, and so the global plant biomass will increase substantially.

this will trap the carbon dioxide and emit an increased amount of oxygen compared to what is realeased today.

the whiteness of the increased cloud cover of the earth will also serve to replace the ice as a reflector of light back out into space.

people may be forced to reaccomodate themselves, but whatever.

much atmospheric oxygen is provided by phytoplankton and marine plants and protists. terrestrial plants are only a part.

The Earth IS self-correcting.

If necessary, it will happily shake us off its back and get about the process of correcting itself.

Rather comforting knowledge, for all I'd rather the species not be wiped out (most days).

I know that it can all be a bit overwhelming, but these are both rigorous, scientifically based predictions.

Crime rises in the summer and particularly when it is hotter. Emergency services in America go to crisis mode when certain temperature benchmarks are hit because they know that there will be a spike in shootings (as well as heat stroke of course).

There's more uncertainty regarding natural disasters. However, we know that high temperatures are a major causal factor in tropical storms. See here for more information on the likely effects of global warming on tropical storms. Droughts and monsoons are also likely to become more commonplace and severe, and, yes, so are heatwaves; deaths are on the rise despite improvements in air conditioning, including in places like Russia and Canada where aircon is usually unnecessary.

I thought better of you than writing off people who make evidence-based claims as "panic mongers".

The Global Warming alarmists have put a lot of effort into trying to shift the blame for just about everything they can to Global Warming. Rather than being rational, they are trying to rationalize their fear. A great many of the predictions are, I think, not made by people with any climate expertise at all. Many of them are downright silly.

Here's "A complete list of things caused by global warming" from http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm. Some examples some of which are contradictory:

It's a big list.

My favorite is "women cheat on vacation".

/\That list is funny.
I know from experience that red wasps are more pugnacious when it's hot.We already have those super sized wasps,the cicada killers.Jeez those are some big ass wasps.Also the tarantula killer wasp,with supposedly the most painful sting ever.
But it will cause the expansion of fire ants.So far we don't have them,and I'm glad.I enjoy sitting in the grass and those will ruin it.
Dinner on the ground is a thing of the past for most Southern Baptists.