Is there a correlation with one's views on AGW (Man-made Global Warming) and their politics. Let's do a poll. Remember, this thread is on if politics and AGW is linked - not the merits of AGW.
Maybe this will seem nitpicky, but I think "believe" is the wrong word. AGW isn't a faith, no matter how much its critics have tried to paint it as a religion. Maybe accept/reject would be more appropriate?
Yes - it is nitpicking. I ask myself at times why I do polls, as it easily generates more criticism than anything else I do at CleanMPG....even if I did not take time to reword the poll, the other position might grip anyway. Some of my "beliefs" on various things I consider "fact", but I digress. If there was bias in my wording, it was relatively light.
I voted libertarian/believe, but my view of libertarian isn't the social left/fiscal right most here have, but the social right/fiscal right that believes less proscriptions are better. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libertarian#Political_usage
I'm not sure what to believe about global warming. The only real proof I've seen has been those graphs of carbon in An Inconvenient Truth. Everything else I read or hear on the matter is so damn bias and slanted pro or against that I just can't figure it out. What I mean is, I'm not a scientist studying the atmosphere so I can't tell you if the worlds heating up, and then even if it was I couldn't tell you that it's caused by people. My real thoughts about it though is that something bad is definitely happening by burning all these fuels and coals and such. There is definitely a lot of stuff humans are putting into the atmosphere and it's gotta have some kind of effect. That's just seems like common sense though. Like you put one grain of salt in a glass of water and you can't taste it, but you put a big spoonful of salt in a glass of water and you can taste it big time. Same deal with our atmosphere.
It's too bad that AGW couldn't be broken into shades of gray, like the politics, without making the poll balloon into intractability. Though I selected a side, I still find considerable fault with the common media portrayal of this side.
What bomber991 said. I didn't see An Inconvenient Truth. So I'm even less informed I suppose. Regardless of the dispute over global warming, I believe we are hurting our Earth in a lot of ways and anything we can do to lessen our damaging behavior, I'm willing to listen/help. - Dale
My motive for the poll: Many in the general population won't even consider if AGW is valid because it's considered "heresy" in the GOP. I'll skirt AGW to point out some go so far as to think oil will continue to be cheap and plentiful...even with offshore drilling, etc this is just delusional and drinking partisan Kool-Aid.
I am hesitant to vote in this poll. I believe that AGW is happening, but I do not believe it is happening to the extent that we are being told. Our contribution to GW is only about .25% of the total (just my semi-informed opinion). And I am about as far right as you can get (and libertarian, so I don't want laws forcing my right-wing views on anyone else).
In a sense belief is exactly the right word. We won't know for sure for 50 years or more. Now is it plausible that the climate might warm considerably because CO2 has increased by about 35% in the last 100+ years-sure, However it is painfully obvious that long term weather prediction has absolutely no track record, because it has no track record-it is new as new can be. Can very bright folks be wrong? Are very bright scientists every wrong? Sure Einstein was dead wrong-for a long time-on Quantum Mechanics. Safe bet that there aren't any Einsteins on either side of this debate. Yes, most scientists are "pro" AGW. We'll see what happens.I'm intrigued by the possibility that we might"fall in" come out smelling like a rose, if we delay the next glacial advance. Charlie
Just a few consensus numbers: 90% of scientists, and 97% of climatologists, accept AGW. Also, since at least 1993, almost every peer-reviewed article on AGW in science journals accepts AGW, more than 99% of articles. (And those that aren't pro-AGW are seriously flawed.) But fuzzy (and others) are right that the media does a really bad job of reporting the issue--both in terms of science and of the scientific view. The media's idea of balance is that, if one person disagrees with an accepted view, that person deserves time in front of a microphone. And Taliesin, just asking, where do you get the 0.25% figure? The range of human contribution is roughly 9-30%. (Links here, here, and here; the last is a pdf.)
I'm a Libertarian that believes co2 is a greenhouse gas and man has increased co2 in the atmosphere, and I'm sure there is a consensus on that by 99% of the scientists. Beyond that there is a broad range and no consensus on what will happen in the next 50 years. We hear the worst case scenario as though it is the likely scenario, yet the low range is equally likely, meaning not likely either. Careful, that 9-30% is co2 contribution not human. Assuming pre-industrial was around 280 ppm and now 387 ppm and assume it's all human cause of increase that around 40% of 9-30%. Can we say humans therefore are responsible for 3.6-12%. Not really, the first 100 ppm cause a lot more effect than the next 100 ppm it's not linear. The effect of 280 vs. 390 is not known except within a very wide range of estimates.
My apologies for misrepresenting the number; it wasn't intentional. I'd add more, but since DF doesn't want this thread to be about the merits of AGW and I've told him I'd stay out of the fray, I'm keeping my trap shut for now.
Let's move on. The poll results so far don't seem to match the general public, where a sizable amount of the population apparently thinks: "I'm Republican, so I can't believe in AGW". I can respect one honestly being a Global Warming skeptic after some thought, but got problems with those that are blindly accepting the party line....just a like they hybrid myths (Sudbury, Spinella).
