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Re: fHuman vs. natural influences on the environment
In article <4ubisq$a30_001@watstar.uwaterloo.ca>,
DGOURLEY@CHEMICAL.uwaterloo.ca (Dana Gourley) wrote:
>In article <4u665e$6r0_005@pm3-135.hal-pc.org>,
> charliew@hal-pc.org (charliew) wrote:
>>In article <IbFG+CAZYcByEw4p@wandana.demon.co.uk>,
>> Jim Barr <JimBarr@wandana.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>>In article <4u3avt$su3@condor.ic.net>, All locked up and
>>nowhere to go
(BIG CUT)
>I feel like throwing in my two cents worth:
>The responce time of the atmosphere would be very critical
to people trying to
>study it. A short responce time would speed up the results,
and there would be
>no greenhouse debate.
>
>It seems to me the critical problem with a long response
time is that it
>impares theoretical modeling of the environment. Without a
good model, we
>really are flying blind into uncharted territory. That in
my opinion is the
>strongest argument for taking action now to curb greenhouse
emisions(sp?). I
>wouldn't want to be arround if we find out 40 years from now
that the
>historical averages are only showing a locally stable
position and that we
>have provided a forcing function that drove us far enough
away from this
>equilibrium that the new local stability point is something
like Venus.
>
It seems to me that there are at least two "camps" of opinion
here. One group (myself included) sees nothing wrong with
collecting the data and assuming that we will not do lasting
harm to the environment during the time that it takes to
understand enough about the problem to properly fix it. The
other group seems to be of the opinion that zero emissions,
zero risk, zero tolerance, etc., is the goal that we should
be setting for ourselves. I take exception to this second
group's opinion. There are acceptable levels of risk,
emissions, etc., that we can and should establish in our
activities. Zero risk and zero emissions are a practical
impossibility, and will result in a lot of miserable people
demanding things that can't be delivered. It's time to look
for goals that are more achievable and practical than this.
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