Curious Snippets

Via DK I find two articles holding contradictory views on global warming. Not just any natural global warming but specifically the kind supposedly induced by us greedy, rich, selfish and materialistic bastards who don't give a flying fuck about the planet. You might be aware of this kind of global warming as it is all that is ever reported.

This decidedly scary 'take 40 lashes for your greed' article...

An already relentless melting of the Arctic greatly accelerated this summer, a warning sign that some scientists worry could mean global warming has passed an ominous tipping point. One even speculated that summer sea ice would be gone in five years.
Greenland's ice sheet melted nearly 19 billion tons more than the previous high mark, and the volume of Arctic sea ice at summer's end was half what it was just four years earlier, according to new NASA satellite data obtained by the Associated Press.

And this somewhat more balanced article... (my underlining)

The record melting of Arctic sea ice observed this summer and fall led to record-low levels of ice in both September and October, but a record-setting pace of re-freezing in November, according to the NASA Earth Observatory. Some 58,000 square miles of ice formed per day for 10 days in late October and early November, a new record.

The record melting of Arctic sea ice this summer was widely viewed as a harbinger of global warming, though unusual wind patterns played a role and many factors affecting fluctuations in Arctic ice are poorly understood by scientists. Still, so much ice melted that the fabled Northwest passage opened for the first time in history*, and the melting broke a record, set just two years ago and by a country mile, that at the time was seen as unprecedented and worrying.

*Perhaps worth pointing out that the North-west passage has been navigated over a hundred times in the last 100 years, as explained by Mark Wadsworth, and the words used in this article probably refer to 'since records began' which was 1978 (hardly a time period capable of providing meaningful data on the relevance and significance of the latest opening of the passage)

But if we suspend our rational superiority for a moment, and play the idea that global warming is man made to any significant extent that it actually having a direct effect on the climate and could be hypothetically reversed, we come to some hard questions to which the answer is either unpalatable for normal people or unpalatable for greenie sandal wearers. If MMGW disciples believe MMGW is the biggest threat to the planet and humanity then why do they not support nuclear power when 1/3rd of the UK's emissions come from electricity generation? Why do they want us to to go back to living in mud huts instead? If they wish to martyr themselves then great, but but they can stick their blind faith in MMGW if it means I am expected to knit my own clothes and live as a hermit.

The truth is harder to bare for our disciples: It is just to early to tell whether MMGW is real or whether the more likely and rational explanation is that the current warming is part of a series of natural cycles that we don't yet fully understand! So until we get some real evidence supporting MMGW should we not opt for easy changes like switching to nuclear power which has additional advantages besides carbon emissions, i.e. energy security, before taxing the blood out of us and regressing our standard of living to medieval standards?

How about that for an idea? No need for 'carbon credit cards' (fuck right off millipede!) which would give the government ultimate control over our lives. By controlling our carbon quota they would directly control what we could and could not buy. No government should have such power over it's people, and if it comes to that what is the point of attempting to perpetuate our existence when we have no liberty? The un-born can't hold grudges against us. So even if MMGW is real, we may as well enjoy the party and marvel in the destruction of the planet rather than look forward to a future in state bondage.