[DBursey]

Spliffdaddy has an ulterior operandi at work here. Whilst all you alarmist hippy leftist commie-loving pinko tree-hugging elitist socialist liberal nutjobs go helter skelter in a summer swelter, that bird'll be off to his own ozarkian shelter c/w his collection of refurb'ed circa 1980 a/c units stuffed into every possible domicular orifice blasting ozone-smashing comfort, all in eager anticipation of his newly ocean-fronted property in southern GA.

Here's an interesting click:

Fingerprints of Global Warming

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Y3a

I meant it as ANYONE who is absolutly taking sides. But Global warming over 300-700 years 'might' happen, but far MORE DAMAGE can occur from a fair sized asteriod hitting earth. A direct hit would do lots of damage withing a few months, and the life on earth might survive. A glancing blow which changes our rotation/inclination would mean certian death for everything. We need to first spend the bucks to find and eliminate that threat, so we can do something long term about global warming if we can - and IF it's not from other unknown thing like the suns changes, or our solar system traveling thru a very clear part of space, without debris.

Again, I agree with your assessment, but I feel it's misplaced.

Not only are the chances of an asteroid large enough to case major damage hitting the earth quite remote, but it's a scenario that's impossible to predict. Furthermore, the kind of money that would be spent developing such a system would be almost mind-boggling – I don't know if we currently even have the technology possible for such a venture.

Finally, your prediction of 300-700 years just doesn't fit in accordance with the facts as we currently understand them. Almost all theories on future global warming predict a "ceiling" of at least close to a 5 degree Celsius rise by 2100, ie. in 5 years. (Remember, that at the height of the last Ice Age average earth temperatures were only about 5-7 degrees cooler than they are now.) I will freely admit that those are just guesses, but some hard data has even been indicating a faster rise than that at the poles.

The irony of us being left with a massive asteroid-destroying space station and an environmental disaster down below would probably make baby Jebus giggle.

greg

[DBursey]

but it's a scenario that's impossible to predict

Most humbly begging to differ. Lots of scientific and technical effort is going towards tracking and cataloging the many near-Earth objects that have heretofore gone swinging by all but unnoticed.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...dd_000112.html

from the above:

Until recently most scientists thought there were about 2,000 of these Near Earth Objects (NEOs). Now the astronomers who operate the Near Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) project have come up with a lower estimate: 700.

If accurate, the new number would reduce the odds of a civilization-destroying impact in any one year from about one in 100,000 to about one in 300,000, something still more likely than being dealt a royal flush in five-card poker.

[tie]

Good news for the anti-gay Republicans! Here's a map showing how ocean level rises predicted to occur by 2100 by a recent study would affect San Francisco. Hop in your Hummers, folks!



Global warming isn't just famines across Africa, ocean acidification and warming wiping out coral reefs, hurricanes in New Orleans. Every coin has two sides.

[FeLiZeCaT]

Originally Posted by tie

Good news for the anti-gay Republicans! Here's a map showing how ocean level rises predicted to occur by 2100 by a recent study would affect San Francisco. Hop in your Hummers, folks!



Global warming isn't just famines across Africa, ocean acidification and warming wiping out coral reefs, hurricanes in New Orleans. Every coin has two sides.

Thank Goodness, the beach gets closer to home every year!

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by DBursey

Most humbly begging to differ. Lots of scientific and technical effort is going towards tracking and cataloging the many near-Earth objects that have heretofore gone swinging by all but unnoticed.

Mmmm, yes, sorry, I didn't put that in the proper context. I didn't mean that we wouldn't be able to track in advance whether an asteroid would hit the earth. What I meant was that it's impossible to predict whether this event will ever happen or not. As you indicated, the odds are somewhere between 1 in 100,000 to 300,000 years. We could build a big-assed space station and have a giant asteroid slam into the earth 3 weeks before it's completed...in which case, I'd much rather have spent my last few hundred billion dollars making our entire humanity a little more comfortable. Or, we could build it and not have one hit for the next few hundred thousand years, by which time it's been used to destroy the moon because the tides just really pissed us off one day. Or, who knows, maybe we build it and save the world.

My point was, expensive planning for the remote possibility of certain destruction seems silly when you ignore less-expensive yet more certain problems that in themselves could lead to the same conclusion.

I just re-read that. I don't even understand what I was saying. Guess it's been yet another successful post, then.


greg

[Y3a]

How much will it cost world-wide to stop global warming? How much will it cost the average guy in salary, inflation etc for the changes to be made to our industries??

[FeLiZeCaT]

Originally Posted by Y3a

How much will it cost world-wide to stop global warming? How much will it cost the average guy in salary, inflation etc for the changes to be made to our industries??

Think of it as an investment in the future.

There is lotsa money to be made in this venture.

[itistoday]

Originally Posted by Y3a

How much will it cost world-wide to stop global warming? How much will it cost the average guy in salary, inflation etc for the changes to be made to our industries??

What a selfish statement. Utterly ridiculous and vomit-worthy. Here's at clue: it doesn't matter how much it costs. Do you know what a rare thing this Earth of ours is? It's one in a billion. No, one in a trillion. Perhaps more. And you don't care about preserving it?

[ShortcutToMoncton]

It's a matter of ongoing debate, of course.

I believe one problem is that current economics do not take environmental concerns into proper consideration. What, for example, will it cost world-wide if our climate change becomes severe enough that we have disasters like New Orleans every year around the world, or we have to plan dikes or removal of coastal cities because of rising ocean levels?

Of course, at the moment GDP is almost looked at as some sort of best indicator of a country's progress, even though it does not take "negative" transactions into consideration. You get in a car accident, break all your limbs? GDP goes up. New Orleans floods and hundreds are killed? GDP goes up. Exxon Valdez spills millions of litres of oil along miles of Alaskan coastline? GDP goes up. You get cancer? You get the idea.

I've only done basic-level economics, so perhaps someone else can better elaborate on this if they feel it'll add to the discussion. However, my point is that all of our current knowledge indicates that it is more cost-effective to prevent environmental disasters than it is to fix them (ie. clean them up). Why this shouldn't apply to air pollution as well, I have no idea.

The Kyoto Protocol itself includes some interesting economic aspects, such as the credit system you might've heard about. I haven't studied it thoroughly, but it seems like it could become a bit of a market within itself.

greg

[Spliffdaddy]

We could argue about global warming for the next fifty years and we still won't know whether it's real or not.

I say we give the global warming reversal contract to Halliburton.

[hyteckit]

And yet Pres. Bush wants to spend billions on the Star Wars program when most leading scientist say it's impratical and a waste of money.

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_...nitiative.html

[Y3a]

Originally Posted by itistoday

What a selfish statement. Utterly ridiculous and vomit-worthy. Here's at clue: it doesn't matter how much it costs. Do you know what a rare thing this Earth of ours is? It's one in a billion. No, one in a trillion. Perhaps more. And you don't care about preserving it?

OR...

It could be something else causing the problems. IT DOES matter how much it 'costs' being sold a bill of goods that may not matter. Go ahead, ruin the western economy for what may turn out to be far more international politics than science. Then, a rougue asteroid hits earth, and we had the technology to deflect it, but had to spend the money elsewhere, so we would have more trees and it would be colder in the winter.

[FeLiZeCaT]

Originally Posted by Y3a

OR...

It could be something else causing the problems. IT DOES matter how much it 'costs' being sold a bill of goods that may not matter. Go ahead, ruin the western economy for what may turn out to be far more international politics than science. Then, a rougue asteroid hits earth, and we had the technology to deflect it, but had to spend the money elsewhere, so we would have more trees and it would be colder in the winter.

I think you are exagerating. Not that your reasoning is wrong though.

The odds for a asteroid of the "doomsday" type could fall on us may be less than that of global warming.

I do agree however that this issue over weather is quite difficult to determine. But there are changes under way. Understanding it is difficult to determine with certainty how dramatic they are, and how long those will last is another thing.

In the end, we coul take a chance and see what happens. But what would be the good choice?


Let's say we do as you suggest. WEe don't bother much about environment and we use all our technology to better predict or deflect incoming doomsday asteroids. What would be the minimal mass to correspond to a doomsday type?

Then, let's reflect on what would be required to deflect such an object with technology available in 100 years. Now we won't be able to change the laws of physics, right? We will understand better, but necessarily do better. For instance, it is doubtful we'll find some anti-gravity trick anytime soon, since it does not exist naturally. So we will have to use technologies similar to what we have now.

Deflecting an asteroid with solar sail would require a lot of area. Chemical rockets, keeping in mind that we improve them by 100%, I doubt we could make the asteroid move much, unless it is detected a long time nefore impact.

How about blowing it to "smithereens"? I suppose we could do that. However, the yield of such weapons would have to be much more efficient, much more important than anything we have now. We could suppose the use of anti-matter, but to contain that stuff would require energies
several times more important than required to carry it to the threat.

And actually, maybe even more than actual efforts to save us from a potential climatic catastrophe.

This is all speculation, of course, and I doubt we'll have any solutions anytime soon, from either perspective.

[tie]

Originally Posted by Y3a

OR...

It could be something else causing the problems. IT DOES matter how much it 'costs' being sold a bill of goods that may not matter. Go ahead, ruin the western economy for what may turn out to be far more international politics than science. Then, a rougue asteroid hits earth, and we had the technology to deflect it, but had to spend the money elsewhere, so we would have more trees and it would be colder in the winter.

Of course it matters how much it costs. But as far as I can tell it doesn't cost very much. Say we add hybrid technology to every car sold. What is the cost, maybe $2-3000? I think this works out to be less than the cost of the Iraq war (projected now to be $1 trillion), which we entered into with zero thought and which has zero benefit for the US. Besides benefitting us with regards to global warming, this kind of step would help the Middle East far more than the war -- by removing the crutch of oil revenues for dictatorial, repressive, terrorist-supporting states (e.g., Saudi Arabia), it would force reform and democratization.

I'm always happy to see serious discussion and more facts. Will adding hybrid technology to cars suffice to slow global warming? I don't know, but I do hope so.

[Nicko]

Originally Posted by Y3a

OR...

It could be something else causing the problems. IT DOES matter how much it 'costs' being sold a bill of goods that may not matter. Go ahead, ruin the western economy for what may turn out to be far more international politics than science. Then, a rougue asteroid hits earth, and we had the technology to deflect it, but had to spend the money elsewhere, so we would have more trees and it would be colder in the winter.

I have a difficult time believing that someone of moderate intelligence could take a position such as yours. The facts are, CO2 levels are rising and that temperatures around the world are rising as a result, its a fact.

You speak of ruining the western ecomony. How exactly would it be ruined by adoping higher environmentally friendly standards? Once the rainforests of the world are gone, thats it, no more rainforest! Its not like you can regrow them in a 100 years, they take 1000s of years to form. Its the same with the ocean, once you pollute it enough or overfish it, it will be ruined forever (in human terms).

Americans have it very easy. They can eat fast food, drive their suvs, buy ikea furniture cheaply, without ever having to consider where any of these products come from nor the environmental cost. They can die obese and happy and never know the damage they caused the earth --- or the damage they caused in other countries by buying their products.

You are just being selfish. Not that it is your fault entirly, you have billion dollor corporations conditioning you to think that way.
I could almost pity you.

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by Nicko

I have a difficult time believing that someone of moderate intelligence could take a position such as yours. The facts are, CO2 levels are rising and that temperatures around the world are rising as a result, its a fact.

A cow, simply by breathing, puts out more CO2 than a Range Rover.

Originally Posted by Nicko

You speak of ruining the western ecomony. How exactly would it be ruined by adoping higher environmentally friendly standards? Once the rainforests of the world are gone, thats it, no more rainforest!

And what is causing the cutting down of the rainforest? Meat production and export.

So, every environmentalist had better be veggie if they want to be taken seriously. Otherwise it's just hysterical anti-right propaganda.

[Monique]

This last Sunday I was reading about Chernobyl and I was wondering if the man-made pollution has nothing to do with global warming as the anti-environment groups are saying; why worry about nuclear accident because obviously radition is non existant and has nothing to do with the health problems the people around Chernobyl experienced years after. And to help the environment there should be more nuclear accidents, more pollution, more contamination of our water source by companies like PG & E and the children from the anti-environmental group should drink the radioactive water, the polluted water, bath in it then we will discuss again in a few years why we should take care of our environment for future generations. And if you do not want your children to consume that water, maybe you should not be using your very polluting SUV to get your paper at the corner store or your boose when you can walk there, maybe you should start recycling your containers.

[Stradlater]

Monique: are you kidding? Quit it with the fallacious arguments, there are others better suited to argue your cause than yourself.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by Monique

why worry about nuclear accident because obviously radition is non existant and has nothing to do with the health problems the people around Chernobyl experienced years after.

The area around Chernobyl itself is a ghost town. There are no people "around" there. Look up pictures on the internet if you want. It's freakin' creepy, like a movie. Empty ships sitting there, high-rise apartment buildings falling apart, everything pretty much deserted and growing over.

greg

[Monique]

There are a lot of people that went back especially older people, you should buy the last National Geographic it is facinating.

But, the anti environment groups are saying that man made pollution have not effect on people's health, so maybe they should move close to places like Chernobyl and let their children drink contaminated water since these accidents and polution have no effect on the health of human beings.

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Y3a

Go ahead, ruin the western economy for what may turn out to be far more international politics than science.

We don't need Global Warming for that, we have George Bush.

Whoa. GW and GW.

[tie]

Originally Posted by Doofy

And what is causing the cutting down of the rainforest? Meat production and export.

So, every environmentalist had better be veggie if they want to be taken seriously. Otherwise it's just hysterical anti-right propaganda.

Um, can you be any more illogical? One doesn't follow from the other.

I get the feeling from this thread that everybody on the right either gets their science from the Bible or from novelists. (Bush should have a chat with Dan Brown; I'd love to see more of our tax dollars spent on researching antimatter weapons or rotating-cleartext cryptography.)

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by tie

Um, can you be any more illogical? One doesn't follow from the other.

Do I need to spell it out?

Cows produce CO2. Lots of it.
Cows require grazing land. Lots of it.
Grazing land is made by chopping down CO2-absorbing rainforest. Lots of it.

You're doing more damage to the environment by eating meat than I could ever do in my SUV. But it's easy for environmentalists to point the finger at the "other guy", no? So easy to get the "other guy" to change first instead of looking at and changing one's own contribution.

[tie]

I understand your point, of course. But you wrote, "Otherwise it's just hysterical anti-right propaganda." The science of global warming, and of our contribution to global warming, has nothing to do with whether environmentalists eat meat or not. Sorry if my smiley wasn't clear.

I don't think pointing fingers contributes much, but that's a good point. The US has been arguing for a while that we shouldn't do anything until China and India cut back their emissions. So easy to get the 'other guy' to change first instead of looking at and changing one's own contribution.

If you are looking to point fingers at environmentalists, though, I think another issue might be air travel. I don't personally eat beef, but I do fly a lot for my work, and I don't think this is good at all in terms of carbon emissions. (Googling for statistics, though, it seems to use only 25 gallons of fuel to fly across country in a full plane, which is less than I had thought.)

[Monique]

I don't about the cows thing; I leave close to a parking lot and some idiots sometime let their cars run for 15 to 20 minutes and I can smell the carbon dioxide but, I also live in the country and cows do not pollute the air as much as a car emissions.

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by Monique

I leave close to a parking lot and some idiots sometime let their cars run for 15 to 20 minutes and I can smell the carbon dioxide

I wasn't aware that one could smell CO2?

Originally Posted by Monique

cows do not pollute the air as much as a car emissions.

Yes, they do - as far as global warming pollution goes. You simply can't see it because it's their breathing and farting which does it.

[NYCFarmboy]

Originally Posted by Doofy

I wasn't aware that one could smell CO2?



Yes, they do - as far as global warming pollution goes. You simply can't see it because it's their breathing and farting which does it.

[FeLiZeCaT]

Originally Posted by Doofy

I wasn't aware that one could smell CO2?

You know very well she talks about the gases of combustion and she assimilates those to CO2.

No need to be condescendant to make your point.

Yes, they do - as far as global warming pollution goes. You simply can't see it because it's their breathing and farting which does it.

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by FeLiZeCaT

No need to be condescendant to make your point.

Wasn't trying to be.

[Spliffdaddy]

Excerpt from a column by George Will in the Washington Post...

While worrying about Montana's receding glaciers, Schweitzer, who is now 50, should also worry about the fact that when he was 20 he was told to be worried, very worried, about global cooling. Science magazine (Dec 10, 1976) warned of "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation." Science Digest (Feb 1973) reported that "the world's climatologists are agreed" that we must "prepare for the next ice age". The Christian Science Monitor ("Warning: Earth's Climate is Changing Faster than Even Experts Expect" Aug 27, 1974) reported that "glaciers have begun to advance," growing seasons in England and Scandinavia are getting shorter" and "the North Atlantic is cooling down about as fast as an ocean can cool." Newsweek agreed ("The Cooling World" April 28, 1975) that meteorologists "are almost unanimous" that catastrophic famines might result result from the global cooling that the New York Times (Sept 14, 1975) said "may mark the return to another ice age." The newspaper (May 21, 1975) also said "a major cooling of the climate is widely considered inevitable" now that it is "well established" that the Northern Hemisphere's climate "has been getting cooler since about 1950."



So when I say I don't believe the "global warming" hype - it's because I'm old enough to remember the "global cooling" hype.

These are the very same journals and magazines and newspapers and SCIENTISTS OF THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY that you point to today and call me an idiot.

I will not be a sucker again.

For most of you, this is your first time being a sucker. I will forgive you for it.

[Chuckit]

Can you find anything that's not a tiny snippet from the exact same point in time?

[Spliffdaddy]

Sure. Plenty of "scientific journals" exposed the global cooling myth for YEARS before the news media started hyping it.

We even learned about global cooling in public schools.

It was just as real then as global warming is today.

Don't buy into the hype. Any hype. If any generation should be aware of that fact it's THIS generation. They grew up on media and advertising and non-stop efforts to get them to buy stuff.

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by Spliffdaddy

Excerpt from a column by George Will in the Washington Post...

While worrying about Montana's receding glaciers, Schweitzer, who is now 50, should also worry about the fact that when he was 20 he was told to be worried, very worried, about global cooling. Science magazine (Dec 10, 1976) warned of "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation." Science Digest (Feb 1973) reported that "the world's climatologists are agreed" that we must "prepare for the next ice age". The Christian Science Monitor ("Warning: Earth's Climate is Changing Faster than Even Experts Expect" Aug 27, 1974) reported that "glaciers have begun to advance," growing seasons in England and Scandinavia are getting shorter" and "the North Atlantic is cooling down about as fast as an ocean can cool." Newsweek agreed ("The Cooling World" April 28, 1975) that meteorologists "are almost unanimous" that catastrophic famines might result result from the global cooling that the New York Times (Sept 14, 1975) said "may mark the return to another ice age." The newspaper (May 21, 1975) also said "a major cooling of the climate is widely considered inevitable" now that it is "well established" that the Northern Hemisphere's climate "has been getting cooler since about 1950."



So when I say I don't believe the "global warming" hype - it's because I'm old enough to remember the "global cooling" hype.

These are the very same journals and magazines and newspapers and SCIENTISTS OF THE GLOBAL COMMUNITY that you point to today and call me an idiot.

I will not be a sucker again.

For most of you, this is your first time being a sucker. I will forgive you for it.

it would be interesting to share these articles here if they were available. i did the last one, so this one's on you... but george will? last time i heard of him he was spewing some stuff about ANWR. anyway...

a interesting tidbit i discovered the other day is that the reason for the cooling from the '40's - '70's was due to the large amount of pollution generated in the boom of the american post-WWII economy, an effect very similiar to the cooling after a major volcanic eruption.

when efforts were made to clean up the pollution (and i believe that that wasn't a bad thing) is when the atmospheric levels become unbalanced - cooling vs. warming gases in the atmosphere - which accounts for the increase in temperature post '70's.

bbt

[Spliffdaddy]

I'd like to read the original articles, as well.

With any luck, they've been reprinted somewhere in cyberspace.

After Wife Swap is over I'll see if I can find some of them.

[black bear theory]

okay, so i think you guys are a bunch of slackers so i started looking up the references...

Originally Posted by George Will

While worrying about Montana's receding glaciers, Schweitzer, who is now 50, should also worry about the fact that when he was 20 he was told to be worried, very worried, about global cooling. Science magazine (Dec 10, 1976) warned of "extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation." ...

so the actual quote from the first reference, Science (Dec 10, 1976), was...

“…the results indicate that the long-term trend over the next 20,000 years is toward extensive Northern Hemisphere glaciation and a cooler climate.”

imminent? (about as imminent as saddam's nuclear program) if you think it's impossible for humans to alter the very thin biosphere at the surface of the earth, how do expect humans to change our entire orbit?

looks like another biased, selective quoting from george will.

[Chuckit]

I think his point is that people are now saying the opposite.

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

I think his point is that people are now saying the opposite.

you mean ... according to some out-of-context quotes?

[NYCFarmboy]

interesting reading on the "global warming nutjobs...er I mean scientists (rolls eyes) " and their "logical conclusions"


>>>>>>>

The Seguin Gazette

http://story.seguingazette.com

UT professor says death is imminent

By Jamie Mobley
The Gazette-Enterprise

Published April 2, 2006

AUSTIN - A University of Texas professor says the Earth would be better off with 90 percent of the human population dead.

"Every one of you who gets to survive has to bury nine," Eric Pianka cautioned students and guests at St. Edward's University on Friday. Pianka's words are part of what he calls his "doomsday talk" - a 45-minute presentation outlining humanity's ecological misdeeds and Pianka's predictions about how nature, or perhaps humans themselves, will exterminate all but a fraction of civilization.

Though his statements are admittedly bold, he's not without abundant advocates. But what may set this revered biologist apart from other doomsday soothsayers is this: Humanity's collapse is a notion he embraces.

Indeed, his words deal, very literally, on a life-and-death scale, yet he smiles and jokes candidly throughout the lecture. Disseminating a message many would call morbid, Pianka's warnings are centered upon awareness rather than fear.

"This is really an exciting time," he said Friday amid warnings of apocalypse, destruction and disease. Only minutes earlier he declared, "Death. This is what awaits us all. Death." Reflecting on the so-called Ancient Chinese Curse, "May you live in interesting times," he wore, surprisingly, a smile.

So what's at the heart of Pianka's claim?

6.5 billion humans is too many.

In his estimation, "We've grown fat, apathetic and miserable," all the while leaving the planet parched.

The solution?

A 90 percent reduction.

That's 5.8 billion lives - lives he says are turning the planet into "fat, human biomass." He points to an 85 percent swell in the population during the last 25 years and insists civilization is on the brink of its downfall - likely at the hand of widespread disease.

"[Disease] will control the scourge of humanity," Pianka said. "We're looking forward to a huge collapse."

But don't tell local "citizen scientist" Forrest Mims to quietly swallow Pianka's call to awareness. Mims says it's an "abhorrent death wish" and contends he has "no choice but to take a stand."

Mims attended the educator's doomsday presentation at the Texas Academy of Science's annual meeting March 2-4. There, the organization honored Pianka as its 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist - another issue Mims vocally opposes.

"This guy is a loose cannon to believe that worldwide genocide is the only answer," said Mims, who filed two formal petitions with the academy following the meeting.

Joining the crusade, James Pitts, who recieved a Ph.D. in physics from UT-Austin, became the second to publicly chastise Pianka when he filed a complaint Saturday with the UT board of regents. He insists a state university is no place to disseminate such views.

He writes:

"Pianka's message does not fall within the realm of his professional competence as a biologist, because it is a normative claim, not a descriptive one. Pianka is encouraged to use his ecological expertise to predict the likely consequences of certain technological and reproductive strategies, but to evaluate some as good, bad, or worthy of prevention by genocide is the realm of philosophy or political science, not science. His message falls no more within his professional competence than it would for a physicist to teach religion in class or a musician to encourage racism."

But Pianka, a 38-year UT educator, maintains he's not campaigning for genocide. He likens mankind's story to an unbridled party on a luxury cruise liner. The fun's going strong on the upper deck, he says. But as crowds blindly absorb the festivities, many fail to notice the ship is sinking.

"The biggest enemy we face is anthropocentrism," he said, describing the belief system in which humans are the central element of the universe. "This is that common attitude that everything on this Earth was put here for [human] use."

To Pianka, a human life is no more valuable than any other - a lizard, a bison, a rhino. And as humans reproduce, the demand for resources like food, water and energy becomes more than the Earth can sustain, he says.

Ken Wilkins, a Baylor University biology professor and associate dean, agrees the inevitability of a crashing point is unarguable.

"The human population is growing," he said. "We will see a point when we reach the carrying capacity - there aren't enough resources."

But resources aren't the only threat, Pianka says. It's the Ebola virus he deems most capable of wide scale decimation.

"Humans are so dense (in population) that they constitute a perfect substrate for an epidemic," he says.

He contends Ebola is merely an evolutionary step away from escaping the confines of Africa. And should an outbreak occur, Pianka assuredly says humanity will quickly come to a "grinding halt."

The professor's not the only one who can articulate this concept. Because Pianka includes his doomsday material in his coursework, Ebola and its potential play a notable role in some students' studies. A syllabus for one course reads:

"Although [Ebola Zaire] Kills 9 out of 10 people, outbreaks have so far been unable to become epidemics because they are currently spread only by direct physical contact with infected blood. However, a closely-related virus that kills monkeys, Ebola Reston, is airborne, and it is only a matter of time until Ebola Zaire evolves the capacity to be airborne."

It is here that some say Pianka ventures from provocative food for thought to, as Wilkins said, "very extreme material" that violate many people's views - including his own - about the treatment of human life. While many praise Pianka's boldness and scientific know-how, others say he crosses an ethical line in his treatment of Ebola's viability as a killer.

In an evaluation of Pianka's course - performed anonymously in keeping with university policy - one student offered:

"Though I agree that conservation biology is of utmost importance to the world, I do not think that preaching that 90 percent of the human population should die of Ebola is the most effective means of encouraging conservation awareness."

Mims says he's seen countless doomsday predictions come and go. But Pianka's is different, Mims said. Pianka, he insists, exhibits genuine cause for alarm.

Mims worries fertile young minds with a thirst for knowledge may develop into enthusiastic supporters of a deadly disease, advocating the fall of humanity.

"He recommended airborne Ebola as an ideal killing virus," Mims said. "He showed slides of the Four Horsemen of the apocalypse and human skulls. He joked about requiring universal sterilization. It reminded me of a futuristic science fiction movie with a crazed scientist planning the death of humanity."

But as confident as Mims is in his assessment, he faces one unarguable fact: Most of Pianka's former students are bursting with praise. Their in-class evaluations celebrate his ideas with words like "the most incredible class I ever had" and "Pianka is a GOD!"

Mims counters their ovation with the story of a Texas Lutheran University student who attended the Academy of Science lecture. Brenna McConnell, a biology senior, said she and others in the audience "had not thought seriously about overpopulation issues and a feasible solution prior to the meeting." But though McConnell arrived at the event with little to say on the issue, she returned to Seguin with a whole new outlook.

An entry to her online blog captures her initial response to what's become a new conviction:

"[Pianka is] a radical thinker, that one!" she wrote. "I mean, he's basically advocating for the death for all but 10 percent of the current population. And at the risk of sounding just as radical, I think he's right."

Today, she maintains the Earth is in dire straits. And though she's decided Ebola isn't the answer, she's still considering other deadly viruses that might take its place in the equation.

"Maybe I just see the virus as inevitable because it's the easiest answer to this problem of overpopulation," she said.

Though listeners like McConnell may walk away with a deadly message, Pianka maintains this is inconsistent with his lecture. One UT official said Pianka is likely well within his rights as a tenured educator.

The 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure - a set of guidelines recognized nationwide - guarantees college professors vast classroom liberties. But Neal Armstrong, vice provost for faculty affairs at UT, said even this freedom is not without limits.

"Faculty members have the right of free speech like anyone else," he said. "In the classroom, they're free to express their views. There is the expectation, though, that in public - especially when speaking on controversial topics - they must make every effort to be clear that they are not speaking on behalf of the university."

Students should be able to discern on their own the validity of views like Pianka's, Armstrong said. But if allegations of Pianka actively advocating human death were to be confirmed, he said "there might be some discussion about the appropriateness of that subject."

"I would hope that's not what's intended," he said. "I don't think that's appropriate for the classroom, but that's my personal statement."

Robert K. Jansen, chair of the section of integrated biology under which Pianka is classified, said his understanding of the doomsday material left no cause for concern.

"It's important for students to get all opinions, and they have to do that on a daily basis," he said. To hold a classroom's attention, Jansen says educators must often "speak their mind" in a fashion bold enough to garner a bit of shock.

The Texas Academy of Science uses a similar approach in defending its decision to honor Pianka with the Distinguished Scientist award. Though TAS offered no direct comment to the Gazette-Enterprise, an email sent from TAS President David Marsh to Mims in response to Mims first letter of protest reads:

"We select the DTS speaker based on his/her academic credentials and contributions to science. We do not mandate the subject he/she decides to address, nor will we ever. I would suggest that one of the purposes of any such presentation is to stimulate discussion - which indeed it did."

In his petitions, Mims inquires about the group's stance on Pianka's talk, asking if the recent honor should be interpreted as an endorsement by TAS. Marsh responded firmly, saying the award does not represent any formal backing of Pianka's ideas.

But despite the academy's flat denial of any wrongdoing, Mims maintains his stance. He said thus far, he's seen no response to the second petition.

"I completely agree with one assertion made several times by Dr. Pianka: ‘The public is not ready to hear that he hopes 90 percent of them will be exterminated by disease,'" Mims said.

McConnell said the TAS audience, unlike Mims, was in awe of Pianka's words. They offered a standing ovation, and enthusiastically applauded Pianka's position, Mims said.

"There was a good deal of shock and just plain astonishment at what he had to say," the student said. "Not many folk come out and talk about the end of the human population in as candid of a manner as he did. Dr. Pianka received a standing ovation at the end of his talk, if that says anything. What he had to say was radical, no question about it, but that is not to say that at least some of what he had to say is not true."

Though Pianka turned down requests for a sit-down interview, he maintains he is not advocating human death.

Does he believe nature will bring about this promised devastation? Or is humanity's own dissemination of a deadly virus the only answer? And more importantly, is this the motive behind his talks?

Responding to these very questions, Pianka said, "Good terrorists would be taking [Ebola Roaston and Ebola Zaire] so that they had microbes they could let loose on the Earth that would kill 90 percent of people."

As of press time, Pitts - who sent his appeal via email Saturday - had received no response from the university, but he says, "It's too early for any responses to have been made." Meanwhile, Pianka urges humanity to heed his call to be prepared, saying "we're going to be hunters and gatherers again real soon."

"This is gonna happen in your lifetime," he told his St. Edward's audience. "Do you wanna go there? We've already gone there. We waited too long."

Read more about Pianka by visiting his lab page at: uts.cc.utexas.edu/~varanus/

Read more about Forrest Mims at:

www.forrestmims.org or visit the Citizen Scientist at http://www.sas.org/tcs/index.html

Editor's note: A correction was made to this story to reflect that while Pitts got his Ph.D. from the university, he is not a professor there.

[tie]

Originally Posted by NYCFarmboy

interesting reading on the "global warming nutjobs...er I mean scientists (rolls eyes) " and their "logical conclusions"

See page 1. Pianka's not on the list.

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by NYCFarmboy

interesting reading on the "global warming nutjobs...er I mean scientists (rolls eyes) " and their "logical conclusions"

he offers nothing more than the classic "carrying capacity" of the earth + adding into the mix the thought of a pandemic disease breaking out, an idea not unheard of in gov't planning offices.

do you think our way of life is sustainable? and a follow-up question. does sustainability (or lack therof) have anything to do with quality of life of human kind?

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by tie

See page 1. Pianka's not on the list.

seriously. not once is either "global" - OR - "warming" mentioned in the article.

[Spliffdaddy]

OK, I've found published articles from April 1970 that theorize the cause of global cooling could be man-made. The global cooling theory continues until about 1978 - when it is abandoned...but not disproven. Right around the same time period (77-78) the "global scientific community" chose a new plaything - Acid Rain.

Acid rain was popular from 1977-78 up until 1987, when "global warming" started to gain a following.

Also, 1977 yielded the birth of the "Ozone Depletion" theory. I wonder what happened to that one? I think it died on the vine.
EDITED: Oh yeah, it died as soon as DuPont's R12 patent expired. What luck! Just as DuPont was about to lose their patent protection, it was deemed that chlorofluorocarbons were hazardous to the ozone layer - and R12 was the worst of the worst! All hail the saviour - R134a !! Whew! Just in time to save the ozone! A fresh start for DuPont's all-encompassing patent on another refrigerant!
woohoo! Wow, it's as if the global scientific community ALL owned DuPont stock.

From my research, it would appear that we're due for a new "world-ending" theory from the "global scientific community" - just any day now.

Being old like me has its advantages. They are few, however. The older you get, the more skeptical you become. And, generally, you stay skeptical because you discover that while being skeptical - you're right more often than not.

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by Spliffdaddy

OK, I've found published articles from April 1970 that theorize ...

share?

[edit to add: i was interested in the articles but i've already pointed out that the cooling might well be man-made. no doubt about that. also i don't think acid rain has gone away. it still exists, just like pollutants in the atmosphere have not gone away, though they may be unbalanced with the contrary CO2 levels recently]

[Spliffdaddy]

See. There you go. Not only are you *not* being skeptical - you're buying into ALL the fad theories and morphing them together into one big sack of suckerbait.

"It's all true!"

Because you can't discount ONE of them without discounting ALL of them.

Let me make this as simple as possible for you to understand...because you haven't quite figured it out.

The "global scientific community" is comprised of nothing but journalists and news media. They pick and choose which scientific data they need in order to produce a product that sells. Guess what? bad news sells. I think that's fairly evident to anybody that watches the news on television or reads a newspaper - or listens to the doomsday scenarios portrayed by the "global scientific community" (aka, the news media).

Tell me this. What was the last good news you heard from the "global scientific community"?

Cat got your tongue?

Heh. Good news doesn't sell.


Now, skeedaddle, young 'uns. Run along. Maybe tomorrow grandpa Spliff will tell you more about life. and living it.

[Spliffdaddy]

*sMAcKdoWn*

I'm so damn good at this I could do it in my sleep.

Who da man?

SPLIFFDADDEEE!

show me some luv.

southside representin.

peace out, yo

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by Spliffdaddy

*sMAcKdoWn*

I'm so damn good at this I could do it in my sleep.

Who da man?

SPLIFFDADDEEE!

show me some luv.

southside representin.

peace out, yo

okay, you've convinced me g-dog...

so, we have the benefit of hind-sight. the "scare" in the 70's about global cooling had nothing to do with a natural cycle or ironically, as it wasn't their thesis at the time - a man-made one. now, we know much better now (you may remember a time when something called "plate tectonics" was simply a theory, too) and you won't find much dispute that the cooling then was man-made then.

once the source of that cooling was stopped (mainly particulates/pollutants), the cooling trend stops and correlates very nicely with decreased SO2 emissions and increased CO2. and the warming that follows.

true, we know more now than we did then, and we'll know more in 30 years than we do now, but as have been pointed out, many times before, earth/enviro-science was a nascent field.

i'm not taking this stuff on blind faith, and neither should you. i've asked time and time again (most recently that article you uncovered - though i'm beginning to doubt the usefuleness of such historical documents - newspapers even) don't believe everything you read in the news. it's much more complex than is portrayed. you should know that... this is not my point.

but what has been lacking in this discussion from one side of the debate is proof that this is not happening. natural cycles? shot down. volcanoes? shot down. scary newspaper stories? shot down. lack of scientific consensus? shot down. lack of proof for GW? shot down. what have you left to fall back on? name-calling.

ok, fine, go ahead. pat yourself on the back. good job.

[Spliffdaddy]

don't be a hater

[black bear theory]

Originally Posted by Spliffdaddy

don't be a hater

i don't hate. *hugs*

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by black bear theory

also i don't think acid rain has gone away. it still exists, just like pollutants in the atmosphere have not gone away

Acid rain is now just as big of a problem as it ever was, I imagine. Get a biologist to tell you about the imbalances its creating in natural systems sometime; it's pretty wild.

You're yapping about this same old topic of global cooling, Spliffdaddy? Get over it, man; you're lucky I'm too busy writing about Gassendi and Descartes to bother with your nonsense.

Silly, ignorant people.



greg