2012 Republican Presidential Candidate Race

[Jaybar]

So I'm a little confused - is he saying that our excessive CO2 emmisions are ok because plants thrive on C02? Or does he really think CO2 is bad for plants?

[Talint]

So I'm a little confused - is he saying that our excessive CO2 emmisions are ok because plants thrive on C02? Or does he really think CO2 is bad for plants?

Excessive CO2 emissions are okay because plants.

[Apelila]

I guess I should've said when and how. We don't have anything like it in our politics, so I'm wondering how it came to be in the US.

When - always. I'd say that the US has more fanatics than other developed nations. People who will put no rational thought into their actions, as long as they believe the cause is just. I've never understood it. really just look at America's take on sexuality, evolution, atheism, or civil rights and you can find someone manipulating a large group of people who will agree with them, despite their other stances, for no reason other than they don't like the opponent.

That's the real stupid that gets glossed over. Not that people will support these idiots, but the motivations behind their support.

[Kaylia]

Excessive CO2 emissions are okay because plants.

It technically would be okay if we weren't raping our forests and oceans at the same time. You have to consider that somewhere in the equation.

[Jaybar]

Deforestation? Liberal bias.

[Niiro]

It doesn't help that plants don't require much CO2 at all to begin with and giving them more of it won't suddenly cause them to flourish.

Or that plants have virtually no significant impact on CO2 levels in the atmosphere, especially compared the sheer amount we've already added.

[Mazmaz]

It technically would be okay if we weren't raping our forests and oceans at the same time. You have to consider that somewhere in the equation.

Kaylia I'm surprised to hear you say something like this. What's your stance on Keystone XL/Northern Gateway pipelines and supertankers off BC coast?

[Kaylia]

It doesn't help that plants don't require much CO2 at all to begin with and giving them more of it won't suddenly cause them to flourish.

Or that plants have virtually no significant impact on CO2 levels in the atmosphere, especially compared the sheer amount we've already added.

Your statement is misleading, if not plain wrong.

Over the last century, CO2 increased by 25-30% (I forgot the exact figure). When you say that plants don't requires much CO2, they still managed to cover the significant portion that was produced naturally over the last 500 millions years (even during era of high concentration).
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...on_Dioxide.png

Secondly, CO2 does cause the "nature to flourish". It's not immediate, but many studies point in that direction.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0416014043.htm


Should we worry about global warming? Hell yes. While the nature was able to balance itself around a larger production/concentration of CO2 in the past, the condition are very different now. Like I said in my last post, forest are destroyed and oceans are polluted... These 2 are the only significant sources of O2, and we are fucking them up pretty badly. The earth is going to survive, but we have the potential to make ourselves very miserable if we keep going that way.

You need both side of the argument to understand global warming issue (CO2 and O2 production). It makes no sense to look at one alone.

[Kaylia]

Kaylia I'm surprised to hear you say something like this. What's your stance on Keystone XL/Northern Gateway pipelines and supertankers off BC coast?

Our consumption isn't going to drop, you might as well take the money. Someone got to pay our healthcare you know.

[Niiro]

Your statement is misleading, if not plain wrong.

Over the last century, CO2 increased by 25-30% (I forgot the exact figure). When you say that plants don't requires much CO2, they still manage to cover the significant portion that was always produced naturally (even during era of high concentration).
[img]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide.png[/img

Secondly, CO2 does cause the "nature to flourish". It's not immediate, but many studies point in that direction.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0416014043.htm

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make with that graph.

I was pointing out that for our purposes the amount is inconsequential. The biosphere "regulates" CO2 loosely (itself secondary to other conditions) and the time it would take to adjust for the amount we've added in such a small amount of time is so long as to not be measured on a human scale.

[Mazmaz]

Our consumption isn't going to drop, you might as well take the money. Someone got to pay our healthcare you know.

But you just said we shouldn't rape our forests and oceans, which is what those projects do.

[Kaylia]

But you just said we shouldn't rape our forests and oceans, which is what those projects do.

Do you realize how ironic your accusations are when I'm the one working every days on improving our "green technologies" (hydrogen production/hydrogen fuel cells/hydrogen car)? What are you doing yourself to make this world a better place? Bitching on internet forums that other aren't doing enough, when you're doing absolutely nothing?

I'm perfectly conscious that fuel production/usage need to be reduced worldwide, but I'm not idealist to the point where I believe that throwing wrenches at our local economy would improves the situation, especially when the consumption isn't going to slow down. We are still far from a real penury where our decision will matter, so we might as well take our part of the cake and remain as competitive as we can.

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make with that graph.

I was pointing out that for our purposes the amount is inconsequential. The biosphere "regulates" CO2 loosely (itself secondary to other conditions) and the time it would take to adjust for the amount we've added in such a small amount of time is so long as to not be measured on a human scale.

I replied to your post because you constantly minimize the impact of the biosphere, when it's pretty much the sole regulator we have, and a powerful one.

[Byrthnoth]

These are more relevant graphs:
http://carboncycle2.lbl.gov/resource...entration.html

See how the graphs aren't smooth? That's because deciduous plants exist. The little troughs are spring/summer when these plants put on leaves (and thus pull carbon out of the atmosphere) and grow a little bit.

There are other carbon sinks that have stopped the atmospheric CO2 from matching what it should be given our output, but they aren't all (or likely even mostly) plants. For instance, the oceans will solvate some CO2 (as carbonic acid) proportional to the amount in the atmosphere. So we're making our oceans slightly more acidic, but our atmospheric CO2 is going up slower.

[Restrat]

Many studies have found that plants that actually sequester CO2 (so trees) do grow more when CO2 increases, but only young trees for a few years. Trees don't like to grow beyond their own size, and will reduce the number of stomata they have slowly with more CO2. This decreases the amount of air they bring in and also decreases the amount of water they lose. They prioritize reducing water loss over growing faster and more.

[Niiro]

These are more relevant graphs:
http://carboncycle2.lbl.gov/resource...entration.html

The annual CO2 cycle is a bit deceptive as it is only so dramatic because the vast majority of higher latitude landmass (ie. places you'd find deciduous plant life) is in the northern hemisphere and even on that page it shows measurements of the cycle as measured from NZ (barely any fluctuation). The increase in CO2 during northern winter isn't caused by less plants taking it in, it's directly released by the plants via the decomposing plant matter, and they consume roughly the same amount of CO2 when coming back into bloom during the growing season.

If you were to hypothetically lock the northern hemisphere into perpetual Winter CO2 levels wouldn't exponentially increase because of the lack of plant uptake, they would spike and quickly plateau as the annual increase is caused by their own annual cycle.

As a counter-example, before the big chill of the last ~65m years much more of Earth's land mass was equatorial, which meant much more active plant life year-round, yet CO2 levels were higher and didn't decrease exponentially for:

Many studies have found that plants that actually sequester CO2 (so trees) do grow more when CO2 increases, but only young trees for a few years. Trees don't like to grow beyond their own size, and will reduce the number of stomata they have slowly with more CO2. This decreases the amount of air they bring in and also decreases the amount of water they lose. They prioritize reducing water loss over growing faster and more.

these reasons. Expose a human to air with higher oxygen content during their growing years and they may turn out a bit taller than they would have under normal conditions, but they won't become giants.

Given that CO2 levels plummet during the ice ages despite there being so little vegetation shows that atmospheric CO2 is much more strongly effected by temperature than available plant sinks. It's also why the greenhouse effect is a runaway effect (insofar as the human factor is concerned) because plants aren't a reliable check against such a sudden, massive increase in CO2.

[Mazmaz]

I'm perfectly conscious that fuel production/usage need to be reduced worldwide, but I'm not idealist to the point where I believe that throwing wrenches at our local economy would improves the situation, especially when the consumption isn't going to slow down. We are still far from a real penury where our decision will matter, so we might as well take our part of the cake and remain as competitive as we can.

Sorry, I didn't make it clear. I'm saying those projects LITERALLY rape our forests and ocean. The pipeline goes through a rainforest, which means they will cut it down. When the supertankers off the coast hit the reef and spill that oil it will completely devastate the ocean environment along all of west coast. I'm not saying ANYTHING about consumption.

Also, my dad worked on fuel cell stuff and that shit is a hoax. You'll never get the fuel cell small enough/cheap enough. It's just a sham that the car companies came up with so that no one will mention electric cars again.

[Demosthenes11]

why are you arguing with kaylia...

I've been sent from your future to share where this thread is going. In 5 pages, you will be talking about axioms and immersed in a full-blown semantics argument about what "plants" and "atmosphere" really mean and whether your definitions fit each others'.

[Merovingian]

So the pubes candidates are coming this week to the island but one candidate name i dont recognize is fred s karger... Whos he?

[Kaylia]

Also, my dad worked on fuel cell stuff and that shit is a hoax. You'll never get the fuel cell small enough/cheap enough. It's just a sham that the car companies came up with so that no one will mention electric cars again.

"I don't understand it so it must be impossible"

You're fucking retarded.

If you want to make claim like this, you should at least post sources. It's been done before, and while the price tag is still high, it's stupid to pretend it can't go down like it does with every technologies.

[edit]
http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_rele...057-000539.htm

I've been sent from your future to share where this thread is going. In 5 pages, you will be talking about axioms and immersed in a full-blown semantics argument about what "plants" and "atmosphere" really mean and whether your definitions fit each others'.

It's indeed a shame that most posters have no education in mathematics, but I wouldn't be too proud of it if I were you.

There are other carbon sinks that have stopped the atmospheric CO2 from matching what it should be given our output, but they aren't all (or likely even mostly) plants. For instance, the oceans will solvate some CO2 (as carbonic acid) proportional to the amount in the atmosphere. So we're making our oceans slightly more acidic, but our atmospheric CO2 is going up slower.

Why do you think phytoplanktons increase in quantity when CO2 concentration increase? What do you think happen when the atmosphere and ocean concentrations aren't in equilibrium?

I posted that graph on the last pages because it indicates that nature was always able to adjust itself around higher emision and concentration when left alone. Photosynthesis isn't the only one, but when the biomass dies and sink at the bottom of the ocean, that carbon is also out of the system.

[Mazmaz]

WAIT, YOU TOOK THE SIDE NOTE THAT I SAID TO COMMENT ON BUT NOT THE MAIN POINT?
What else is new?