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Nowa posted:Are we really just going to keep going until we make Earth into some kind of Mars/Venus hybrid? By definition isn't it already one?
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Jan 17, 2012 20:19
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Does anyone ask conservatives why a shift to green energy production (which means a massive increase in *domestic* energy production) is bad? Are some folks just really that into kissing the ring of Saudi kings? FFS, even if you don't believe in climate change, why not endeavor to get the hell off foreign oil?
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Jan 17, 2012 20:21
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Pro-PRC Laowai posted:By definition isn't it already one? Alright, yeah but with more desert, more storms, and less life.
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Jan 17, 2012 20:22
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Radbot posted:Does anyone ask conservatives why a shift to green energy production (which means a massive increase in *domestic* energy production) is bad? Are some folks just really that into kissing the ring of Saudi kings? FFS, even if you don't believe in climate change, why not endeavor to get the hell off foreign oil? Most refinery's and oil companies are in the west. The Sauds only provide the raw product, the money is made after refining. Besides that, even if you are against foreign energy dependence it probably means you are pro coal, which is even worse.
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Jan 17, 2012 20:34
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Powercrazy posted:Most refinery's and oil companies are in the west. The Sauds only provide the raw product, the money is made after refining. Right, I'm asking why the rank-and-file "support are troops" conservatives don't want clean energy. I doubt they know that a lot of oil is refined domestically. Besides, it's pretty obvious that installing a new energy infrastructure will create more jobs than domestic refineries will. And you're probably right about the "clean coal" - but why wouldn't they be pro-coal, and pro-green energy, then? They'd have to admit people they hate could help a problem our nation faces? I guess it's a pointless question - you'd think conservatives would be conservative (as in not wanting to be dependent on foreign powers for energy, realizing that that energy at a good price will require massive investment in the military, etc.). Whatever happened to pragmatic, Rockefeller style conservatism? Radbot fucked around with this message at 20:44 on Jan 17, 2012 |
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Jan 17, 2012 20:42
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Radbot posted:Right, I'm asking why the rank-and-file "support are troops" conservatives don't want clean energy. I doubt they know that a lot of oil is refined domestically. Besides, it's pretty obvious that installing a new energy infrastructure will create more jobs than domestic refineries will. The climate is an ideological issue. You can track belief in anthropogenic climate change on a graph with lines for Democrats and Republicans; they stick close up to a point but then climate change becomes a political issue and the Republican line plummets. Conservatives refuse to believe that man-made climate change exists, going so far as to petulantly encourage more fossil fuel use, simply because Liberals (Lieberals) are against fossil fuels, and they'll be damned if they agree with lieberals on anything.
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Jan 17, 2012 21:52
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Chantilly Say posted:The climate is an ideological issue. You can track belief in anthropogenic climate change on a graph with lines for Democrats and Republicans; they stick close up to a point but then climate change becomes a political issue and the Republican line plummets. Conservatives refuse to believe that man-made climate change exists, going so far as to petulantly encourage more fossil fuel use, simply because Liberals (Lieberals) are against fossil fuels, and they'll be damned if they agree with lieberals on anything. I appreciate the response, but did you read what I posted? Shelving climate change entirely, why are conservatives so desperate to make our national security something largely beyond our control? I get why those in power want it (sweet sweet consulting gigs at Lockheed and BP), but the average conservative voter? I guess it just surprises me that there doesn't seem to be a contingent of people that are very conservative but have the ability to see that dependence on foreign oil makes the US very vulnerable in many ways. Hell, even if you didn't believe that we could ever be independent from foreign oil, why not at least try to get ahead of the Chinese in what is a serious growth industry? This was precisely the issue that made me start thinking politically, by the way. While I may not agree with conservatives on many issues, at least many of these viewpoints are logically consistent with their world view. The torpedoing-at-all-costs attitude towards alternative energy simply doesn't make sense to me. Radbot fucked around with this message at 22:15 on Jan 17, 2012 |
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Jan 17, 2012 22:11
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You're presuming a level of critical thinking that just does not seem to exist in American politics these days, if it ever has.
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Jan 17, 2012 22:13
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I cant help starting to despair a bit, right now. The whole things just getting harder as the problems get more savage. We wont convince people to use less energy because people are lazy cunts We cant replace fossil fues with biofuels because sticking food in cars is pretty evil to be honest when theres a billion odd people starving out there. Nuclear just got a lot harder politically post japan, and if we have one more incident like that, and at the general rate these things happen, I'd give it another ten years, then nuclear will be effectiely over. And........ we're hosed 
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Jan 17, 2012 22:26
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Radbot posted:Hell, even if you didn't believe that we could ever be independent from foreign oil, why not at least try to get ahead of the Chinese in what is a serious growth industry? I'm assuming by "try to get ahead" you mean active government support of developing green energy. Because, as far as I can tell, conservatives are not trying to actively shut down green energy, they just generally oppose government support for it. Given that, conservative voters are convinced to oppose this government support through the same argument that all government support (at least that which doesn't enrich conservative donors) is opposed: government should not be picking winners and losers and if green technology is superior/the future, then all we need to do is get out of the way (less taxes and regulation) and private enterprise will handle it. In short, elected conservatives oppose supporting green energy because it's financial support for the wrong people, and conservative voters oppose supporting green energy because they've been lied to for decades about how our political and economic systems work.
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Jan 17, 2012 22:27
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Sir Kodiak posted:I'm assuming by "try to get ahead" you mean active government support of developing green energy. Because, as far as I can tell, conservatives are not trying to actively shut down green energy, they just generally oppose government support for it. Given that, conservative voters are convinced to oppose this government support through the same argument that all government support (at least that which doesn't enrich conservative donors) is opposed: government should not be picking winners and losers and if green technology is superior/the future, then all we need to do is get out of the way (less taxes and regulation) and private enterprise will handle it. Really? Have you heard about the whole Solyndra debacle, particularly from the WSJ or Fox News? Please don't say that there isn't some serious green energy slander in there. I'd be happy to cite a few piece from there, if you'd like. And really, why bother investing in green energy when you can simply externalize the cost of oil? I mean, literally the only reason we're in the Middle East is because of the necessary geopolitical influence to maintain access to cheap oil, but none of that price is reflected at the pump. And if you think that the government shouldn't be picking winners and losers, what do you think about state-subsidized Airbus absolutely pummeling Boeing in non-defense contracts? And I would assume you're firmly against government-backed loans to small businesses and redevelopment agencies, correct? Because that would be picking winners, too. Radbot fucked around with this message at 22:44 on Jan 17, 2012 |
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Jan 17, 2012 22:37
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Nowa posted:Are we really just going to keep going until we make Earth into some kind of Mars/Venus hybrid? We'll kill ourselves off long before this happens, maybe not though
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Jan 17, 2012 22:43
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Let me be clear here - and I'm a little surprised this wasn't apparent from my post - that I'm not supporting the "winners and losers" argument that I posted above. I think it's bullshit. But it's something that other people seem to believe.Radbot posted:Really? Have you heard about the whole Solyndra debacle, particularly from the WSJ or Fox News? Please don't say that there isn't some serious green energy slander in there. I'd be happy to cite a few piece from there, if you'd like. That debacle was about a half-billion dollar loan guarantee that the feds gave Solyndra. So I don't think that this is really a counter-example for my claim that conservative voters oppose government financial support for green energy more than they really oppose green energy itself. Now, I'll admit that there is some mild anti-green sentiment among some conservatives. Solar power is associated with hippies and the culture war does continue to thrive. But it's not like conservatives are picketing wind farms the way that liberals picket oil pipelines. While many liberals are anti-fossil-fuel (for good reason) or anti-nuclear-power (for reasons I find less compelling), I don't believe that there is a significant number of conservatives who are anti-green-power beyond a mild dismissal of its prospects. Basically, I believe the problem with conservative voters on this issue is rooted in larger misunderstanding about politics and economics: the impossibility of a "free market" existing without government, the impracticality of a minimal-economic-intervention strategy in a global economy, the existing subsidization of fossil fuels, etc. Except for some mild cultural issues, I don't think there's a specific conservative voter issue with green energy the way there is with liberals and nuclear power. Elected officials, of course, are financially motivated. Radbot posted:And really, why bother investing in green energy when you can simply externalize the cost of oil? I mean, literally the only reason we're in the Middle East is because of the necessary geopolitical influence to maintain access to cheap oil, but none of that price is reflected at the pump. And if you think that the government shouldn't be picking winners and losers, what do you think about state-subsidized Airbus absolutely pummeling Boeing in non-defense contracts? I think the government should be picking winners and losers. But there are a lot of people (small-government conservatives) who don't, and who have managed to blind themselves to the impracticality of having the government actually disentangle itself from the market. Radbot posted:And I would assume you're firmly against government-backed loans to small businesses and redevelopment agencies, correct? Because that would be picking winners, too. I'm not, but there are people who are. To reiterate, I don't have a problem with the government promoting green energy in general or Solyndra in particular (barring convincing evidence coming out of a blatant quid-pro-quo of political donation for support). But I've talked to plenty of people who do have a problem with it on an ideological, small-government basis. That basis is bullshit too, but hey, welcome to America.
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Jan 17, 2012 23:33
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Radbot posted:Does anyone ask conservatives why a shift to green energy production (which means a massive increase in *domestic* energy production) is bad? "Hah, you think green energy works? Haven't you ever heard of Solyndra?"  And before I get a bunch of people telling me that this statement literally makes no loving sense: I know, but I've actually heard pretty much this exact argument trotted out for why we can't rely on solar 
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Jan 17, 2012 23:39
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Because I'm reluctant to assign bad faith to folks, I've got to ask: how the hell can Solyndra be an indictment of solar energy when the BP spill isn't an indictment of the use of fossil fuels?
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Jan 17, 2012 23:43
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Radbot posted:I appreciate the response, but did you read what I posted? Shelving climate change entirely, why are conservatives so desperate to make our national security something largely beyond our control? I get why those in power want it (sweet sweet consulting gigs at Lockheed and BP), but the average conservative voter? I guess it just surprises me that there doesn't seem to be a contingent of people that are very conservative but have the ability to see that dependence on foreign oil makes the US very vulnerable in many ways. Hell, even if you didn't believe that we could ever be independent from foreign oil, why not at least try to get ahead of the Chinese in what is a serious growth industry? I didn't claim that it makes sense. I also did misunderstand what you mean, and for that I apologize--I think there are some conservative voters who do support moving America away from dependence on foreign oil, but there simply aren't enough petroleum substitutes available to make it viable while still using fossil fuels. You can run cars on natural gas or ethanol, but you can't run a nation's worth of transportation and energy infrastructure just on North American fossil fuels. I think there are also plenty of conservative voters who are perfectly willing to ignore the inherent national security problems with running our economy on Middle Eastern oil, to be honest. For some people it is simply too big a problem for them to accept.
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Jan 17, 2012 23:49
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Radbot posted:Because I'm reluctant to assign bad faith to folks, I've got to ask: how the hell can Solyndra be an indictment of solar energy when the BP spill isn't an indictment of the use of fossil fuels? Solyndra is a financial failure while the BP spill was an environmental failure. Some people care a lot more about the former than the latter. Also, there's a fair bit of arguing in bad faith.
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Jan 17, 2012 23:54
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Sir Kodiak posted:Solyndra is a financial failure while the BP spill was an environmental failure. Some people care a lot more about the former than the latter. Also, there's a fair bit of arguing in bad faith. They're not mutually exclusive. I guarantee you that the BP spill caused a hell of a lot more economic damage than a $900 million loan default.
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Jan 18, 2012 00:43
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Radbot posted:They're not mutually exclusive. I guarantee you that the BP spill caused a hell of a lot more economic damage than a $900 million loan default. Yeah, economic damage to other people. It's not about useful economic activity, it's about Solyndra being out of business so if you backed them you're a loser. People care that BP spilled a little oil to about the same extent that they care their team's Superbowl-winning quarterback is a rapist.
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Jan 18, 2012 03:23
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Thank God http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/18/keystone-pipeline-state-department_n_1213136.html quote:The Obama administration will formally reject the permit for the Keystone XL pipeline Wednesday afternoon at a press conference, according to multiple media outlets.
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Jan 18, 2012 18:42
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Sir Kodiak posted:Yeah, economic damage to other people. It's not about useful economic activity, it's about Solyndra being out of business so if you backed them you're a loser. People care that BP spilled a little oil to about the same extent that they care their team's Superbowl-winning quarterback is a rapist. Well, people sure as hell cared that JoePa merely looked the other way regarding what happened during his tenure, so we can only hope.
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Jan 18, 2012 18:50
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theblackw0lf posted:Thank God For once I'm glad the US is making a decision for Canada.
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Jan 18, 2012 18:58
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theblackw0lf posted:Thank God Those comments, jesus christ 
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Jan 18, 2012 19:35
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Sir Kodiak posted:Yeah, economic damage to other people. It's not about useful economic activity, it's about Solyndra being out of business so if you backed them you're a loser. People care that BP spilled a little oil to about the same extent that they care their team's Superbowl-winning quarterback is a rapist. Solyndra's technology was very promising, and given enough investment could have easily come down in cost. The biggest reason they collapsed is because Chinese firms dumped lovely (as is the case with all Chinese-manufactured goods) solar panels on our market thanks to their government's heavy subsidization of their solar industry. There can be no free market when different countries subsidize their own industries, so it's best to stop deluding one's self into thinking the government "can't pick winners or losers".
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Jan 18, 2012 20:00
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Shipon posted:Solyndra's technology was very promising, and given enough investment could have easily come down in cost. The biggest reason they collapsed is because Chinese firms dumped lovely (as is the case with all Chinese-manufactured goods) solar panels on our market thanks to their government's heavy subsidization of their solar industry. There can be no free market when different countries subsidize their own industries, so it's best to stop deluding one's self into thinking the government "can't pick winners or losers". I'm pretty sure the bolded part is a big fat no. It was a tubular sock of a CIGS solar cell, which from a pure effectiveness standpoint isn't really worth that much. CIGS are relatively agnostic to orientation anyway (well, compared to indirect band gap silicon solar cells), and the tubular design was a guaranteed under utilization of the whole cell at any given time.
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Jan 18, 2012 20:58
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Claverjoe posted:I'm pretty sure the bolded part is a big fat no. It was a tubular sock of a CIGS solar cell, which from a pure effectiveness standpoint isn't really worth that much. CIGS are relatively agnostic to orientation anyway (well, compared to indirect band gap silicon solar cells), and the tubular design was a guaranteed under utilization of the whole cell at any given time.
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Jan 18, 2012 21:05
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With Keystone XL, the carbon output from the tar sands is the least of our worries. The route they had planned for the pipeline had it going over the Ogallala Aquifer. The aquifer is the source for virtually all the irrigation and drinking water in almost all of Nebraska, western Kansas, and northern Texas. If there were to be a massive spill into there, well, we're not sure what will happen. What we do know is that cleanup will be virtually impossible, and if the groundwater is contaminated, agriculture in those areas will cease entirely. 30% of US crops use water from it, so if it stops it will have a huge impact on food prices, as well as a huge flow of refugees from areas that no longer have sufficient supplies of drinking water. Of course, this is a worse case scenario, a large oil spill into groundwater has never happened, so we have no idea how severe it will be.
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Jan 19, 2012 21:22
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You know we live in a crazy world when the carbon output from the tar sands project isn't the worst case scenario. Not disagreeing with you Konstantin, the environmental impacts of the human race trying to squeeze every recoverable barrel of oil out of the planet are just sad. I'm beyond angry at this point, I just feel pity for my children and their children.
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Jan 19, 2012 23:43
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I wonder how much impact religion has on the attitude towards climate change, especially since the entire(almost) world is religious. There seems to be a detachment from the environment due to the belief that we aren't really a part of the Earth - we didn't spring from the Earth like the rest of these organisms, God made us and put us here for a while until we go home to where we REALLY live, so why should I give a gently caress about this temporary planet. So according to religion we are alien to this world. I would venture that a lot of religious people secretly hope for the apocalypse, so they can fly away in a golden chariot and wave to all the non-believers, and the last thing they see is the bumper sticker that reads: "I TOLD YOU SO!"
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Jan 20, 2012 13:14
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KinkyJohn posted:I wonder how much impact religion has on the attitude towards climate change, especially since the entire(almost) world is religious. I kind of wish it where true. I'd be looting the gently caress out of the saved dudes houses. More free poo poo for me!
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Jan 20, 2012 15:07
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One thing I don't understand about the "Drill baby drill!" crowd is that even if you take the environmental factor completely out of the equation, it still makes for good long-term national strategy to slow down domestic drilling. The oil America has in the ground is finite and nonrenewable, and it is only going to get more valuable as the price goes up in the coming decades. Why on earth are politicians in such a hurry to drill it when we could simply wait a 20 years for all the other major oil-producing nations to peak, then export the stuff at five times the price? If we were smart, we'd be importing as much foreign oil as possible, so everyone else runs out faster.
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Jan 21, 2012 01:01
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Because they willfully don't believe in peak oil, remember?
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Jan 21, 2012 03:09
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Cinnamon Bastard posted:Because they willfully don't believe in peak oil, remember? Not really true. Usually serious advocates of increased drilling admit full well that oil is finite, just that its peak, and the cost-effectiveness of alternatives, far enough off that the immediate benefits outweigh the long-term costs. In such a scenario, hoarding your oil right now means the people who are drilling get all the money, and in 50 or 100 years when oil has declined sharply in demand due to other technological advances the reserves aren't worth all that much compared to the infrastructure and economy you could have built in the time between. This does require you to believe the reserves will last a good while and to think the environmental impact light, but it's as consistent as most other beliefs given base assumptions.
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Jan 21, 2012 03:18
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Now that I think about it, the logic isn't that different from other economically-disastrous decisions, like the collapse of major fisheries that everyone saw coming a mile away. It was allowed to happen because people figured it was better to have a lot of jobs in the short term than a moderate number of jobs in the long term.
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Jan 21, 2012 04:06
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Corrupt Politician posted:Now that I think about it, the logic isn't that different from other economically-disastrous decisions, like the collapse of major fisheries that everyone saw coming a mile away. It was allowed to happen because people figured it was better to have a lot of jobs in the short term than a moderate number of jobs in the long term. You mean money, not jobs
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Jan 21, 2012 04:12
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I always saw a religious angle in digging/sucking poo poo out of the ground versus using pure sunlight and breezes to generate power. Hell if I was an artist I would have long since painted some kind of diptych portraying coal miners as in the thrall of Satan while windmills and solar panels bask in the shimmering glory of the Almighty above ground.
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Jan 21, 2012 12:26
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The Entire Universe posted:I always saw a religious angle in digging/sucking poo poo out of the ground versus using pure sunlight and breezes to generate power. This might be the book for you. http://www.amazon.com/Cyclonopedia-Complicity-Materials-Reza-Negarestani/dp/0980544009 We are powered by corpse juice: a chtonic wine squeezed from a ripe crop of bodies interred by processes natural or mechanical, a vintage gran reservoir. I'm sorry to disturb your eternal rest but we have made room for you in our gas tank.
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Jan 24, 2012 12:38
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In the thread on evolution, someone posted a link to this site that systematically lists the issues Creationists have with evolution research and debunks them. Does a similar site/list exist for climate change? I was recently pointed to this blog and while I know some of those posts are wrong there's a lot in there that I can't evaluate.
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Jan 25, 2012 02:05
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Listerine posted:In the thread on evolution, someone posted a link to this site that systematically lists the issues Creationists have with evolution research and debunks them. Does a similar site/list exist for climate change? I was recently pointed to this blog and while I know some of those posts are wrong there's a lot in there that I can't evaluate. This should do it: http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php
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Jan 25, 2012 02:31
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I recall reading a recent interview with a Nobel prize-winning scientist on why people seem psychologically incapable of coming to terms with climate change and reacting to it appropriately. I thought it was in this thread, but I can't find it now - if someone knows what I'm talking about, could you please link it? Thanks.
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Jan 25, 2012 03:42
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