Three questions about global warming

Discussion in 'Science' started by bricklayer, Feb 17, 2017.

  1. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    1. What percentage of our atmosphere is carbon dioxide?

    2. What percentage of that is generated by the activities of living organisms?

    3. What percentage of that is generated by human activity?
     
  2. Distraff

    Distraff Well-Known Member

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    400 parts per million which is 405/1,000,000 = .0004 = .04%. A small amount doesn't mean not dangerous. 25 parts per million of carbon monoxide is considered dangerous.

    Every year CO2 gets emitted into the atmosphere and actually only 3.5% is of from humans and the rest is most from plants, the oceans, and volcanoes. But usually CO2 is soaked but by oceans and plants which is why CO2 levels don't spiral out of control. That 3.5% from humans is creating a CO2 surplus that is just building up without being soaked up. So lets look at the percent of CO2 built up in the atmosphere that is from humans.

    Before humans started producing it CO2 concentrations were 280 ppm, today it is 405 ppm which means humans increased it by 125 ppm which means 125/405 = 30% of the current amount is human made. CO2 levels have increased by 125/280 = 45% from the original because of humans.



    Don't know.
     
  3. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    To the best of my understanding: Carbon dioxide is now a little less than 4% of 1% of our atmosphere. Atmospheric carbon dioxide have been more than twice what they are now and more than half of what they are now long before human beings had achieved dominion let alone industrialization.

    Of that less then 4% of 1%, more than 90% is caused by geothermal activity. The activities of living organisms contribute the balance
    Of that less than 10% of 4% of 1% that living organisms contribute to atmospheric carbon dioxide, human activity contributes less than 10%. Human activity contributes much less than four parts in a million of atmospheric carbon dioxide.
     
  4. Distraff

    Distraff Well-Known Member

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    That is simply not correct. It is .04% of the atmosphere which is mathematically what 400 parts per million is. Do you understand how to convert parts per million to a percentage?

    Also not correct, it has been estimated to be up to 7000 ppm which is far more than twice of today's 400 ppm. Of course that was during the Cambrian while there was still simple life in the oceans. In the dinosaur era CO2 levels reached 1700-2000 PPM and temperatures were 4 degrees above modern levels. The west coast, and the Florida-Louisiana area were under water and most of North America was desert, and at times the great planes were under water.

    I think you are confusing CO2 production to CO2 levels. CO2 production is the amount of CO2 that enters the atmosphere, and CO2 level is the amount actually in the atmosphere (CO2 absorption is the amount leaving and going back into the ground or water). Usually the CO2 leaving is about the same as the production keeping CO2 levels about the same but the 3.5% that humans have added to the production is causing the CO2 levels to build up from 280 ppm to 400 ppm so we can say that 30% of CO2 or 120 ppm is from human activity.
     
  5. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Human activity contributes less than 10% of 10% of 4% of 1% of co2 to our atmosphere. That is less than four parts in a million.

    You left out the contributions of geothermal activity and you contribute a majority, if not all, of the balance to human activity.

    We are simply not all that.
    Anthropogenic-catastrophic-global climate change is an anthropocentric arrogance. It is a hoax.
     
  6. sdelsolray

    sdelsolray Well-Known Member

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    Just not in any way you can demonstrate.
     
  7. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I did not bring the charge of anthropogenic-catastrophic-global climate change; I bear no burden of proof.
    The one who brings the charge bears the burden of proof.
    Indeed, as far as I'm concerned, the charge has been soundly disproved. It's a disproved charge - a hoax.
     
  8. Robert

    Robert Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    It gets easier if one uses the amount as in dollars.

    They tell us today it is 400 ppm. Take one million dollars and count it out. Next take 400 dollars from the pile. I doubt you will notice it.

    This is a huge scare. And frankly done for pure political purposes. I am not clear if each nation has the same motive but doubt it. Kyoto was and is a major cluster duck and one reason is various nations look at it different.
    Here in the USA it became a religion when Clinton was in office. Way back then the babies were screaming bloody murder.
     
  9. sdelsolray

    sdelsolray Well-Known Member

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    OK, but you ignored the two positive claims you did make:

    "Anthropogenic-catastrophic-global climate change is an anthropocentric arrogance." and

    "It is a hoax."


    Please demonstrate these claims using evidence, not mere assertions.
     
  10. Daniel Light

    Daniel Light Well-Known Member

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    So did you stay in a Holiday Inn last night or could you present your credentials?
     
  11. lemmiwinx

    lemmiwinx Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Plants need CO2 to grow and produce oxygen for animals to breathe. It's been going on for millions of years don't let them tell you CO2 is bad.
     
  12. Daniel Light

    Daniel Light Well-Known Member

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    You can research what happens to plants when exposed to excess levels of CO2. Or not. Your choice.
     
  13. VietVet

    VietVet Well-Known Member

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    This thread embarrasses me as an American. Other educated nations such as in Western Europe listen to scientists, not faceless dweebs on the internet. The overwhelming majority of scientists acknowledge global warming - the fossil fuel companies and their misinformation campaigns seem to have impacted som posters here.

    I ask - suppose we heed the scientists and stop burning fossil fuels - what is the downside? We eliminate the power base of the MidEast, we pollute the Earth (land, water, air) less, and we can use oil for things like lubricants and plastics. HOWEVER, if we listen to the Koch Bothers, and the scientists are right, our children are pretty well toast.
     
  14. felonius

    felonius Active Member

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    the downside is the collapse of modern civilization. Wed freeze starve diseases ect.
     
  15. felonius

    felonius Active Member

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    Given that the continents were vastly different when the west coast was submerged, that is largely irrelevant. Do you know a land mass comparison between the cambrian and today? Doubt one can be accurately made
     
  16. MrTLegal

    MrTLegal Well-Known Member

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    Here's the thing. The Earth produces and sequesters roughly 300 Gigatons of CO2 every year. Humans only produce about 30 Gigatons a year. No big deal, right?

    Absolutely wrong.

    The 30 Gigatons that we produce every year is not built into the natural CO2 cycle. The Earth does not possess the natural processes necessary to sequester the extra amount of CO2 we produce every year. And that CO2 will remain the atmosphere for hundreds of years.

    And we are adding to the excess in the atmosphere every. single. year.

    Then, you add on the fact that as we warm the planet, we melt the permafrost and the arctic. Areas that contain large amounts of methane. And while methane does get out of the atmosphere much faster than CO2, it also has a much larger greenhouse affect.
     
  17. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    And as the arctic and glacial ice disappears, which are highly reflective, the dark ocean and relatively dark land mass absorbs more energy from the sun - ie. heat.
     
  18. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    Which is somewhat true, and of course is only impactful depending on the time of year and amount of direct sunlight. However, as long as the ice melts, it maintains the relative ambient temp around the melting ice, precluding additional absorption and heat generation.

    Also, we must define whether this process has real impact, or not. If permafrost is melted, does it in fact create additional feedback and have any demonstrable impact. Most folks would suggest they simply don't know. As in, it is unknowable. And more to the point, empirically, has happened naturally historically recently. We know this. So, why hyperventilate about it now?
     
  19. Bowerbird

    Bowerbird Well-Known Member

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    Irrelevant - how thick does a coating on a mirror have to be for it to work?

    Meaningless statement as it is the amount generated in excess of the bio systems ability to deal with it that is causing accumulation which in turn is causing temperature rise

    And it is known - but again it is the percentage above the ability of the system to absorb the excess that is the problem - if we were to have more vegetation absorbing the CO2 there would not be the concern but a 1/5 of global warming is from loss of forest cover
     
  20. Bowerbird

    Bowerbird Well-Known Member

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    Of course it has

    Or do you think that scientists do not know that?

    Perhaps you are one of those who believe that all scientists throughout the world are in the pay of EEEEEVIL AL GORE and it is all a scam??

    But, and here is the rub, for plants to absorb CO2 there actually has to be some. You cannot run your air conditioning day and night and expect the excess CO2 to all be absorbed by your little pot plant. 1/5 of CO2 rise is down to deforestation
     
  21. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    Pretty much. As in, it is unknowable is additional output caused by man does not cycle normally in the sequestration process, or what the lag time is as the cycle attempts to do so, and for how long it will be successful.

    The ability to say things like "absolutely wrong" is hyperbolic, and meaningless. It is unknowable, and more over, it is fraudulent to suggest that one can know this with any certainty. It's like folks suggesting there is no other planet with life, because it doesn't suggest this is the case in the bible. Or like saying with a certainty that man as a species could not have evolved from primitive primates. The level of absolutism is simply egregious and transitions into a profession of faith.
     
  22. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    It is part of the positive feedback mechanism. And we know it has an impact. Computer modeling shows this.

    Do you think people just make this stuff up? Do you think I was the first to suggest this and no one has done the research.

    Here's a great rule of thumb: You will NEVER think of anything in this context that hasn't been considered and researched extensively. I always get a charge out of people who think they can out think our best minds, with thirty seconds of thought and no education.
     
  23. MrTLegal

    MrTLegal Well-Known Member

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    Saying that something is "unknowable" is also hyperbolic and meaningless in this context. We are able to measure, both in the lab and in the real world, all of these variables. We are also able to model the impact of those variables and compare them against the real world consequences. It is also hyperbolic and meaningless to say that it is "fraudulent to suggest that one can know this with any certainty." Do you truly believe it is impossible to measure the aspects that you raised in your first sentence with ANY degree of certainty?

    Do me a favor. I want you to try something. I want you to find the most reputable source for MY position. That is, I want you to find the source that you believe is the most reputable that could, theoretically, be used to support the position that humans are contributing to carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere and that carbon dioxide contributes significantly to global warming.
     
  24. bricklayer

    bricklayer Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Altough there has been no global warming in this century,
    what percentage of the warming recorded in the last century is caused by human activity, and what percentage is natural ?
     
  25. drluggit

    drluggit Well-Known Member

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    So, the obvious response is that the positive feedback model has been shown to not be accurate at least as far as the current modeling is able to represent it. So, when you say, "computer models show this", it's doubling down on the acceptance of these demonstrably unreliable results are factual, which they are not.

    Yes. Yes, I think folks make up the hyperbolic representation that the scientific discovery and data. We also know that the data itself is demonstrably made up, as in it's "smoothed" or "modified" and then represents data that is no longer the collected empirical data.

    I agree, for someone to have spent less than 30 seconds in regards to this, I'd likely agree with your assessment. Perhaps the use of a mirror, for you, is necessary.
     

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