There is a tendency to paint all religious people with the same broad brush. Even I have a slight tendency to overstate the correlation between religious belief and pseudoscience. It's good to be reminded occasionally that there are believers who are concerned about their world and about what science has to say about maintaining it. The Link
Can you explain the ice ages to me? How did we go into and come out of several major ice ages in geologic history? How did we go into, and emerge out of, the documented global cooling that took place during the late 13th and early 14th centuries? -- a cold spell that interrupted what is known as the Medieval Warm Period? All of this was, of course, pre-industrial, and therefore seemingly not influenced by humans. I'm willing to be convinced of this "human emergency", but first someone needs to explain to me the fluctuations that we know have happened throughout geologic and even fairly recent human history. Can you explain this to me?
Don't be so thin-skinned KGP, the wording was tongue-in-cheek. I'm happy when any group agrees with me on the need to protect our environment.
so when people ask questions we should link google results for answers? here's one for 'on the field'
GT, hopefully we ALL want to protect our environment! Anyone that doesn't is an idiot. However, I am glad to see that your religious bigotry is obvious to all and not just me.
The Earth's climate has never been constant. The Earth has gone through several natural cooling and warming phases. Glaciers once covered a good portion of North America. How do we know that if the Earth is now in a warming period that it is not part of the natural cycle? How do we know that, while all other warmnig and cooling cycles have occurred naturally, this one is not natural but is caused by human activity?
Fact: the Earth has experienced billions of years and possibly thousands upon thousands of natural warming/cooling periods. It's absolutely undeniable. Fact: C02 is a greenhouse gas. What I don't quite understand, is how humans can pump trillions of tons of a known greenhouse into the atmosphere via industry, and ordinary, educated people wonder if we are having an effect. It's absolutely mind boggling.
it's not 'weather' humans are having an effect - our mere existence should have an effect. it's to what extent. if there have been violent climactic swings in the past - to a 'degree' that the planet is covered in ice, an occurrence that had nothing to do with humankind, then why would a relatively small change in temperature (what, a couple degrees? - again relative to something on the scale of an ice age) be considered so unusual? and again, i don't think anyone would argue that we shouldn't take care of the environment. it's not a debate about that.
There is only a ~10 degree shift in temperature from the hottest periods to the coldest. A few degrees can create a lot of changes.
Anastasis, I am aware of the efforts of moderate Christians (and Jews & Muslems & Hindus, et al.). I am, after all, the one who posted the original link to the religious folk who support efforts to curb climate change. I'm also aware of efforts on the part of clergy to oppose creationism - The Link I appreciate their understanding of the relationship between religion and science. I appreciate their tolerance of differing view-points. It is, however, easy to lose track of reasonable Christians. You are quiet souls. The radicals, on the other hand bang pots (I like that phrase) and demand attention. Perhaps it would be better to ignore the MOPs of the world, but that risks leaving the impression that they have valid points. They don't. Not about evolution, not about climate change, and not about AIDS. When MOP says there's no evidence for anthropogenic climate change the community needs to be told he's full of faecal matter. I should do that without casting all of the religious in with MOP. It would help though if thoughtful Christians made it clear that the fundamentalist science-deniers didn't speak for them.
Should blacks who agree with you also make sure you know radicals don't speak for them? Is everyone who disagrees with you a science denier?
Dude is just trying to be nice, crissakes. There are certainly science deniers out there. I don't know about you, I think poorly of this behavior. Headlining this not organized group are some religious type leaders. Scorn for them can appear to scorn religous folk in general, and that's not the intent. Do you disagree with this perspective, or are you just picking on style and rhetoric?
It is possible to be insulting and come across as bigoted while trying to be "nice." Imagine the following compliments, each related after a fashion to "not all religious people are science-denying nutjobs who don't care about the environment:" Not all Jews are penny-pinching tightwads. Not all Mexicans are lazy welfare sponges. Not all Blacks are intellectually inferior. Some non-religious people are not child molesters. Some gay people are more than perverts. Some working women actually do care about their children. All of the above are objectionable and any would evidence bigotry if made seriously. As for otherwise bigoted statements made in jest, I will let each reader decide for himself how funny or appropriate they should be deemed, but I don't tell them.
But the religious are not an oppressed minority to whom we should take great care in address less we prick old greivances. The religious are "the man", and with that comes a different standard. Honky. Not all white folks can't dance. Right. I understand your point, and generally agree on the standard of insult. I
