Earth Hour: Turn Off the Lights!

[Kreskin]

..and as said earlier, everybody is aware. I really believe this is about people doing nothing but giving themselves the feeling they are doing something. To me, at best, it's nothing more than a self-congratulatory pat on the back and at worst, it is proselytizing.

Drunk drivers were aware too. It took years of in your face campaigns before their attitudes changed.

To you it is self-congratulatory pats. For those who participate it's participation. I wouldn't change my resolve to participate just so others who don't participate don't feel bad about me.

 

[Cannuck]

Drunk drivers were aware too. It took years of in your face campaigns before their attitudes changed.

Have they? I would guess that 80-90 percent of the people in the bars last night would drive home if they knew they could get away with it. I don't think attitudes have changed as much as consequences have changed. As it relates to CO2 emissions, there were no consequences for leaving my lights on.

 

[lone wolf]

Drunk drivers were aware too. It took years of in your face campaigns before their attitudes changed.

To you it is self-congratulatory pats. For those who participate it's participation. I wouldn't change my resolve to participate just so others who don't participate don't feel bad about me.

I think a lot of the pat-on-the-back thing here is as niave as the people who are good God-fearing folk for an hour and PRs for the rest of the week or well intentioned kids who take their Ipods and MP3 players into a tent set up in a school gym for a 24 hour famine. Sure, it gets attention. What is the attention span of someone who has never really done without?

 

[Extrafire]

As long as you can pay for the extra cost of wasted lights go crazy. Can you let me know when you're going to teach the bank a lesson though? I want to be around to grab some of the cash you throw out when you show everyone that you can think about finances for your self. :lol:

Well let me think about finances a bit. I manage to burn the christmas lights for a month during the festive season without going to the bank for a loan so I could probably manage to fund one extra hour out of pocket change.

Teach the bank a lesson? You lost me, I haven't a clue what you're getting at. You seem to exhibit some confusion. I was referring to thinking for myself about scientific/political matters, such as that silly "earth hour" demonstration.

 

[Extrafire]

Incidentally, I don’t believe what Extrafire is saying about Saskatoon, it may or may t be true. He is giving his personal (and no doubt biased) opinion, he is not giving any statistics (like you did). So I will wait to see what happened in Saskatoon until I see the numbers.

Not my opinion at all. That was a paste, a quote from another source who was giving his own personal observations. If you click on the link above the picture you'll go to the source.

 

[Extrafire]

You're right that we couldn't give a damn about the amount of greenhouse gas we're producing.


Extrafire, so we are in agreement, anti-environmentalists don’t give a damn about how much greenhouse gases they produce. Where we differ is that while you attribute virtuous, noble motives to anti-environmentalists (they are producing more greenhouse gases because they want to help the environment, help the mankind?), I attribute to them simple, normal, human motives, namely, greed (big business), ignorance and laziness (ordinary, run of the mill anti-environmentalist) and religion (religious right).

No doubt it is this same attitude which killed off buffalos, grizzly bears, wolves, passenger pigeons and more in USA. This sort of mentality would do incalculable, irreversible harm to something, all the while claiming the purest, noblest of motives. Thus the motive behind killing off the wildlife in USA was to convert Natives to Christianity, to bring light and civilization to them.

I have no doubt you think you are doing mankind a big favor by switching on all the lights, in general polluting to your heart’s content.

I guess the reason you twist my words around is because you can't mount a good argument against them. I didn't attribute any virtuous, noble motives to anti-environmentalists, nor did I say they were producing more greenhouse gases because they want to help the environment, help mankind. In fact, nothing I said could be interpreted that way so I can only assume you are deliberately distorting in order to produce a strawman to argue against. And then to compare our motive to historical wrong-doings, I'm surprised you didn't call us Nazis!

Environmentalists aren't concerned about the amount of greenhouse gas they produce because it does no harm. That's it. No hidden motive, noble or nefarious. Pretty difficult to demonize that but it's just the way things are. Deal with it.

 

[Extrafire]

I am quite concerned about the environment. All my vegetable waste is put into my vegetable garden, I recycle, I don't litter and do my best not to pollute soil, water or air. I know many other deniers and they are likewise concerned about the environment.

Extrafire, this is internet, anybody can say anything. I could claim that I am really Bill Gates. There is no way to verify anything we say about ourselves here in these blogs.

But as they say, words speak louder than actions. From what you are saying about environment, you don’t come across as being friendly to the environment at all. In fact, you come across as positively hostile to environmentalism.

For instance, suppose I was opposed to earth hour, how would I put it? I would say to the supporters, look, I don’t see any point in it, I think it is nonsense. However, it won’t do any harm. At best it will save some energy, at worst it is neutral. So go ahead with your little project, good luck.

That is what an environmentalist, who is opposed to earth hour, would say. From what you are saying (that greenhouse gases are good from environment, you almost seem to imply that those of us who are trying to reduce GHGs are traitors to environment), I don’t think there any love lost between you and environment.

That sounds the language of a rabid anti-environmentalist to me. So you will pardon me if I am skeptical about all the supposedly pro environment things you claim you do. Maybe you do them and maybe you don’t, we just don’t know. After all, anybody can claim to be concerned about environment, without doing anything about it.

Once again you invent things that aren't there. I can't agree that the silly demonstration does no harm. The AGW movement itself does immense harm, and the annual "earth hour" is another tactic to pressure governments, corporation and citizens to come on board. Its real concern is economic and political, not environmental. People may participate out of concern for the environment (having been misled about GHG's) but the push behind it has nothing to do with envirnomentalism.

I don't know you, I don't know where you live or what you do, so yes on the internet one can say anything. I take your word that you are a promoter/participant because of concern for the environment, however misguided. That you won't extend the same courtesy to me speaks volumes about the insecurity of your position on this topic.

Incidently, I live in an industrial town with 3 pulp mills, a couple chemical factories and an oil refinery. We get weather inversions. Everyone in this town is concerned about the environment, especially air pollution. Real air pollution, that is, not CO2.

 

[captain morgan]

Eight trillion tons of CO2 is not significant?

In light of the fact that water- vapour, by far and away, is the single largest contributor to any warming trend (-in excess of 95% of the causation) certainly makes the figure of 8 trillion tons insignificant, doesn't it?

Further, the figure of 8 trillion also varies wildly depending on where- you decide to source that info as well.

The industrial revolution did not hit it's heights. It is still building. When we talk about global warming or climate change we are talking about a couple degrees or less. A one or two degree rise in the mean global temperature would have catastrophic consequences. Global warming is a self feeding thing. When the ice melts and exposes bare ground, that ground will absorb more heat which will lead to more melting and so on. One look at the changes that have taken place in Canada's Arctic should convince anyone. The worst thing is that we don't know if it can be stopped.

Most historians refer to the industrial revolution specifically to those times and events associated with the wide-spread use of electricity, the invention and use locomotives, coal-fired steam engines, let- alone the cultural factors. In short, no one is of the opinion that our current- society is experiencing the advances of the industrial revolution.

As far as these catastrophic events are concerned.. Says who? For every single naysayer that preaches doom-'n-gloom, there is one that states that all is well and no need to fret. Simply because you or I decide to follow one perspective doesn't automatically qualify it as right or fact.

That said, I do get a kick out of the omnipotent attitude of those that believe that mere mankind has the power and the know-how to alter terrestrial systems... Pretty arrogant, wouldn't you agree?

 

[Extrafire]

Scientific consensus? Irrelevant. Albert Einstein, when told that 200 scientists had signed a statement opposing his theory of relativity said, "Two hundred? All it takes is one with evidence." Get it? Only evidence is relevant.

That is how science works, extrafire, by consensus (consensus among scientists that is, not among general population). As to Einstein, he does not show up more than say once a century.

If you have some anti-environment Einstein, somebody whose word we are supposed to accept (that global warming is a hoax perpetrated by Al Qaeda to ruin North America’s economy), why don’t you produce him? Then we could accept his unsupported word (on your guarantee that he indeed is another Einstein, of course) and throw the established scientific wisdom away into a trash can.

Until you do that, I go with scientific consensus.

You seem to be very misinformed how science works. Science is utterly unconcerned about concensus. That's the purview of politics. Science is concerned with evidence and reproduceable results. Einstein is considered great because he broke with concensus.

Ever heard of Alfred Wegener? I didn't think so. He developed the theory of plate techtonics in 1912. He couldn't prove it because the technology wasn't available but he insisted it was correct. He was opposed by every scientist in the world. It wasn't until 1950, 20 years after his death that the theory was confirmed. There was a hugely greater concensus against plate techtonics that there is for AGW.

Evidence is all that matters in science. You should educate yourself on scientific principles.

 

[Extrafire]

Obviously, you know sweet **** all about power generation and the grid. It's fine to be opinionated, but when you're hopelessly uninformed, you just make yourself look like an idiot.

Uhmm....OK, educate me. When power consumption drops, say 10%, for just an hour do they shut off 10% of coal fired generators? How do you turn off a very large, hot coal fire? And do they turn it on again the instant consumption surges back of to previous levels? How do you do that with a coal generator?

I'm all ears.

 

[#juan]

As far as these catastrophic events are concerned.. Says who? For every single naysayer that preaches doom-'n-gloom, there is one that states that all is well and no need to fret. Simply because you or I decide to follow one perspective doesn't automatically qualify it as right or fact.

That said, I do get a kick out of the omnipotent attitude of those that believe that mere mankind has the power and the know-how to alter terrestrial systems... Pretty arrogant, wouldn't you agree?

Like I said, Look at the Canadian Arctic.

Mere mankind has the power to extinguish all life on this planet in several different ways. I get a kick out of those who think we can do anything to our planet and get away with it. Pretty stupid don't you think?

 

[Extrafire]

It is indeed surprising how quickly the movement has caught up. In 2007, it started in Sydney, Australia, where 2.2 million people switched off the lights. I assume it must have received more exposure last year, though I did not hear about it last year.

But this year the movement went worldwide. Those who thought up the idea (in Sydney) should be justly proud of it. I assume next year it will be even more successful.

Last year was a big bust in Aussie. Not too many turned off lights and it had lots of media exposure and government support so it was supposed to be a big deal but there was little or no drop in electricity consumption. However a lot of people were excited about watching the city go dark so thousands drove up to vantage points to witness the (non) event. As well there were a lots of helecopters flying around to film it. Seems they missed the whole point, don't you think?

Earth Hour crashes to Earth | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Science is utterly unconcerned about consensus. That's the purview of politics. Science is concerned with evidence and reproducible results.

That is how consensus is formed, Extrafire. Scientists perform experiments, publish their results. Other scientists examine the results critically, try to reproduce them. The results then support one theory or another and a consensus is formed.

Thus at one time there were two competing theories of Cosmology, Big Bang theory and Steady State theory. Over decades, experiments performed gave results that could be explained by one and not by the other (the red shift, background radiation etc.). So consensus formed around the Big bang theory.

Evidence and scientific consensus is usually the same thing. It is very rare indeed, that evidence points to one theory, but scientific consensus supports another theory, just doesn’t happen.

He was opposed by every scientist in the world. It wasn't until 1950, 20 years after his death that the theory was confirmed.

Sure, that is because evidence was not available. Until the evidence becomes available, consensus is not going to change. Thus at one time consensus was that earth was flat, or that sun goes around the earth.

So consensus can be sometimes wrong. However, consensus is usually based upon the best available evidence. Even if consensus is wrong, it is based upon the best possible evidence available. That is the scientific method. So I will go with consensus, even if at a later date consensus may be proved wrong.

 

[Tonington]

In light of the fact that water- vapour, by far and away, is the single largest contributor to any warming trend (-in excess of 95% of the causation) certainly makes the figure of 8 trillion tons insignificant, doesn't it?

Further, the figure of 8 trillion also varies wildly depending on where- you decide to source that info as well.

This is a ridiculous argument.

One single copy of the Ebola virus can lead to death, even though it is but a single part out of trillions in your body.

The magnitude of response in dynamic systems is not primarily dependent on the %volume it occupies, but the innate characteristics of the source of perturbation.

There are many examples in this world where small amounts lead to significant results.

 

[Cannuck]

So consensus can be sometimes wrong.

It's nice to see you are finally starting to learn.

 

[Extrafire]

Incidentally, in case anybody is wondering about anti-ecology enthusiasts like pgs or Earthfire (who celebrated earth hour by turning on every light in their house). They were following their spiritual leader, the far right US politician, Joseph Farah. He runs the far right website, worldnetdaily.

On his website, he called on his followers to celebrate earth hour by turning on every light in their house, and his followers like pgs and Earthfire promptly obliged. It is clear where the political inclinations of these people lie; they belong to the far right, even by American standards. Joseph Farah is considered way out on the lunatic right wing fringe (he is also very big in declaring Obama an illegal alien and throwing him out of the country or imprisoning him).

So anyway, I wanted people to be clear where the inclinations of people like pgs, or Earthfire lie, they are right wing extremists at heart. At least in this instance, they followed the advice of a right wing extreme nut.

So Earthfire, again, you will pardon me if I am skeptical about your claims of how ecology minded you are. If you indeed are the follower of Joseph Farah (and switched on every light in your house at his urgings), you are no friend of environment, no matter what you say. You are the worst kind of foe of environment.

Same goes for you too, pgs.

Who's Earthfire????

Or do you mean me? Check the name.

There you go again, trying to smear me.

Joseph Farah? Never heard of him. No, I came up with that idea all on my own last year. I suggested it to a couple of conservative bloggers for promotion to the masses and my suggestion was taken up. Maybe Joseph Farah got the idea from me!:lol: Or maybe the bloggers had also come up with the idea on their own, I can't prove that I was the world wide originator of it, but I'd like to take credit. This year I again started promoting it a month ago and it was a very wide spread campaign but I probably didn't have to say anything.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

What is Alert? Good lord I was under the impression you knew it all....

I really don't give a damn if people are accustomed to living as four generations in a mud hut. That's there. What concerns me is here - and in this here, disability puts me near the bottom of the food chain in the estimation of they with the wealth and power.

Again ... to spare the abrasive battle of wear-him-down semantics, you can be the winner because it's so important to your cause.

I understand you don’t give a damn as to how people in the third world live, that is your right. But then don’t challenge my contention that your house at 850 sq. ft. will be considered palatial by third world standards.

The whole argument started because you claimed that your house is not a palatial house. To which I replied that by third world standards, it is a palatial house.

That was our point of contention. Where did the point as to whether you give a damn or not come in? Give a damn or not as you will, but I stand by my contention that any house in North America will be considered palatial by third world standards (including your house).

 

[Extrafire]

To who? Private industry that controls the govt? I'm sure private industry was happy to get their mitts on an extra 3.5% to export or consume. Good time to make repairs too.

Private industry controls the government? Now that's a revelation! I know that Power Corp had a considerable influence on Cretien but I wouldn't say it controled him.

 

[SirJosephPorter]

Maybe Joseph Farah got the idea from me Or maybe the bloggers had also come up with the idea on their own,

Extrafire, sez you. Maybe he got the idea from you, I don’t know. But I do know that Farah is a leader of far right, you belong to far right. Farah told his followers to turn on all of their lights; you turned on all of your lights.

From this I draw the only reasonable conclusion, that you probably were following the dictates of Farah. I don’t know if you got the idea before he did, may be so. But it is reasonable to draw the conclusion that I did.

And if you are a follower of Farah, that really tells me all about you that I need to know. His extreme right wing policies, his claim that Obama is a Muslim terrorist, illegal alien and should be imprisoned by the Supreme Court (or at least thrown out of the country, deported) and so on. Chances are his followers agree with him on most of the policies.

 

[Extrafire]

Please do some research before you post silly statements.

Production equals demand, there is no magic place where extra electricity goes to have a nap. The generating load at power plants is adjusted to match the demand on the grid.

That's true to a point. I used to have a gasoline engine powered arc welder. When I wasn't welding it kept on generating, even though the electricity wasn't being used. Power plants adjust their generating capacity to supply the anticipated demand plus a little extra so there will always be enough without a brownout if demand increases. I could shut off my welder for an hour when it wasn't needed, or even for 5 or 10 minutes, but you don't just shut down a massive generating plant for an hours dip in consumption.