Trans-Arctic Internet Cable Project Made Possible by Climate Change

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CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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There’s always a silver lining to every dark cloud and the melting of the polar ice may be bad news for the environment, but it has opened a pathway for the Trans-Artic Internet cable.

Undersea surveying will begin in the next few months, using side-scan sonar, digital cameras, electromagnetic probes, and core samples to plot a route across the sea floor. In the past, such a surveying trip wouldn't have been feasible due to year-round ice.
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MajorDomo said:
There’s always a silver lining to every dark cloud and the melting of the polar ice may be bad news for the environment, but it has opened a pathway for the Trans-Artic Internet cable.
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Hope the also plan out the eventuality when everything refreezes in winter. Otherwise, this could be really cool. :D (Pun sort of intended.)
 
Runaway global warming and feedback loops as a positive thing... Guy McPherson mentioned that Big Oil is happy about the ice melt, since it gives them access to all that yummy Arctic oil.
 
Am I the only one who believes that weather is cyclic? Climate Change? DUH. It's been changing forever....it cools down, it warms up, etc. So does the Sun.

The cable is a good idea. Let's get it done before the planet cools down again and it freezes over.
 
Scythe said:
Am I the only one who believes that weather is cyclic? Climate Change? DUH. It's been changing forever....it cools down, it warms up, etc. So does the Sun.

The cable is a good idea. Let's get it done before the planet cools down again and it freezes over.
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Yes climate change is cyclical, that has been proven, however, it's happening too fast. What I don't understand is how folks can argue that the wholesale release of carbon into the atmosphere isn't exacerbating the effect. Humans have essentially been a natural disaster, much in the same way violent volcanic eruptions were in the past. The release of carbons speeding up the process in turn melts permafrost quicker which in turn is releasing methane from old vegetation. Climate change is more than just the natural cause at this point. Humans are seriously helping it along.
 
Scythe said:
Am I the only one who believes that weather is cyclic? Climate Change? DUH. It's been changing forever....it cools down, it warms up, etc. So does the Sun.
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No you unfortunately are not the only person who thinks it. And along with those same groups you also don't understand the difference between weather and climate ;)
 
You know its almost like we should run a live test for these people that think we can have no effect on the environment. Lets just have every country start pumping oil into the oceans and watch everything be ok because humans can never have a real effect right?
 
Climate change deniers are a good thing to point to when you're trying to explain confirmation bias to a five year old
 
Let's not forget that the term "climate change" Frank Luntz, a Republican political strategist and global warming skeptic, who used focus group results to determine that the term 'climate change' is less frightening to the general public than 'global warming'. Read/see Luntz explaining how and why he did it: Interview with Frank Luntz @ Frontline

It is global warming, even if Luntz taught Republicans in Congress and mass media to propagate the term climate change.

This is actually also a great example of how one man can make a huge difference.
 
It's always funny reading "politically sensitive" threads. Especially around the whole global warming debate. It's either black or white. If you're not screaming "SAVE THE PLANETS!!" you're some big oil, kill the planet enthusiast. :rolleyes:

No rational thought allowed.
 
maverikv said:
Climate change deniers are a good thing to point to when you're trying to explain confirmation bias to a five year old
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"Climate Change" is a good lesson about importance of marketing by how Luddites were able to rebrand themselves as seeming to be something new.
 
I personally enjoying hearing from "The polar ice caps are larger than they've ever been since we started using satellite technology to measure them, so they've actually been growing over the past few years instead of shrinking" deniers (It's against their religion to believe the ice caps are *growing,* don't ya' know...;)). That's always fun...;) People have a difficult time learning new things, sometimes--they prefer what they were told first instead of what they're told later, when the actual facts emerge.

It reminds me of saccharin...it was originally taken off the market because "saccharin causes cancer"...except that it turned out the original "science" done with saccharin was done all wrong in the beginning...and that in doses even hundreds of times larger than what a human might be able to ingest in a day, no tumors result from saccharin intake. You have to do the "science" the wrong way as it was done initially and give your test subjects thousands of times the dose a human might ingest in a day, to get the tumors to grow. It was also discovered around the same time that you get the same results with virtually any "harmless" chemical a human might ingest daily in doses thousands of times higher than normal: tumors grow. When the final, indisputable facts emerged, it was a big surprise to a lot of people at the time. Some people still can't get over what they heard the first time about saccharin...;)

I think it's the same with global warming, aka climate change--in a few years when everyone is completely satisfied that the initial science was done really poorly and the "sky is falling" results were entirely bogus, we'll all be able to laugh about it--it'll be a quaint joke, as in "Remember when Al Gore said we'd all be dead in ten years if we didn't give government loans to the "green" companies he was representing (and the big commissions he would earn for doing it)?" First, the scare was Global Warming--then when *all* of the computer models began to fail and the climate began to unexpectedly *cool* they did a switcheroo to "Climate Change" which they still used to spread FUD so that they could get politicians to keep on throwing out those juicy government-backed loans to their buddies and cronies--hundreds of millions of dollars to those companies that as quickly as possible ran down the BK highway where the money disappeared down the rabbit hole. Calling it "green technology" has got to be an inside joke--I mean, after all, green is the color of money, is it not?

The arguments will rage idiotically for a few more years until even the diehard Priests in the CC Temples can no longer deny that the weather just isn't cooperating with the FUD. As long as there is illicit money to be made from the spread of FUD, however, there will always be the Priests proselytizing true believers. It's all fairly amusing, and at the same time a sadly poignant comment on humanity.
 
climate%20change%20we%20can%20believe%20in.png
 
ravx25 said:
Yes climate change is cyclical, that has been proven, however, it's happening too fast. What I don't understand is how folks can argue that the wholesale release of carbon into the atmosphere isn't exacerbating the effect. Humans have essentially been a natural disaster, much in the same way violent volcanic eruptions were in the past. The release of carbons speeding up the process in turn melts permafrost quicker which in turn is releasing methane from old vegetation. Climate change is more than just the natural cause at this point. Humans are seriously helping it along.
Click to expand...

And what was the CO2 levels 500 years ago, 2,000 years ago, 50,000 years ago?

Using Ice cores they can estimate the CO2 level going back 10 of thousands of years.
If you go back far enough the CO2 levels where even higher than they are today.
Guess it was due to all the SUV's the cavemen where driving around....
 
ravx25 said:
Yes climate change is cyclical, that has been proven, however, it's happening too fast. What I don't understand is how folks can argue that the wholesale release of carbon into the atmosphere isn't exacerbating the effect. Humans have essentially been a natural disaster, much in the same way violent volcanic eruptions were in the past. The release of carbons speeding up the process in turn melts permafrost quicker which in turn is releasing methane from old vegetation. Climate change is more than just the natural cause at this point. Humans are seriously helping it along.
Click to expand...

And the truly scary part is we are just beginning to realize how much more of an effect we have then we even previously realized...

Climate change models are incredibly complex, and every new little thing we learn about is increasing the predictions for "worse case scenarios" by leaps and bounds.

Case in point: The polar ice is melting and we can currently somewhat predict the melt rate based on current and past trends... problem is, with the ice melting and new shipping lanes opening up, the remaining ice is quickly becoming covered with soot from ships engines, and this darkening of the ice is *dramatically* accelerating the melt levels based on the increased heat absorption from the sun.

Climate change deniers can stick their heads in the sand all they like, but emerging models are all but certain that before the end of the century much of the current low lying coastal regions (especially on the east coast) are in for major disaster.

Not only are many climate scientist relocating away from certain regions, but there are a few major companies who are quietly planning to as well based on plans both the government and defense department are coming up with to relocate certain infrastructure...

But yeah, it's all a hoax
 
WaltC said:
The arguments will rage idiotically for a few more years until even the diehard Priests in the CC Temples can no longer deny that the weather just isn't cooperating with the FUD. As long as there is illicit money to be made from the spread of FUD, however, there will always be the Priests proselytizing true believers. It's all fairly amusing, and at the same time a sadly poignant comment on humanity.
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Doubt it will be over in a few more years. There's still to much money to be made pushing climate change.
If the ice age returned, and half the country was covered in glaciers, they would still be blaming the CO2 levels.
 
Wow. Believe whatever you want.

There are too many data errors and political agendas woven into this pseudo-science of 'climate change'. In some cases....people just made shit up. That's not science folks.
 
It's really sad watching deniers flail around trying to justify being wrong
 
maverikv said:
It's really sad watching deniers flail around trying to justify being wrong
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Its sadder to realize that the alarmist luddites have even less reason to believe they are right and the only real difference their side has it that it also serves political ends so there's plenty of budget to repeat the same weak presumptions trying to make people believe its fact.
 
WaltC said:
I personally enjoying hearing from "The polar ice caps are larger than they've ever been since we started using satellite technology to measure them, so they've actually been growing over the past few years instead of shrinking" deniers (It's against their religion to believe the ice caps are *growing,* don't ya' know...;)). That's always fun...;) People have a difficult time learning new things, sometimes--they prefer what they were told first instead of what they're told later, when the actual facts emerge.
Click to expand...

Luckily satellite imagery is publicly available and you don't have to believe those who say that the ice caps are growing, look for yourself and you'll see that at least for the Arctic that is not true.

The Arctic ice cap is shrinking as measured by the extend of its summer size. The reason this is important is that once the Arctic is ice-free in the summer the the Northwest Passage will be open for business year-round and most, if not all, shipping from Asia to Europe will take the shorter route through the Arctic leaving the Panama Canal as a relic of times past.

So yeah, you go on believing that the ice cap is growing while the multi-billion dollar shipping industry is gearing up for shipping through the Arctic by constructing a new fuel terminal in western Alaska.
 
What I find amusing is, for sake of argument, say global warming deniers are right and it's not happening. What would be the disastrous side effects of preparing for this "hoax"? We would have less reliance on fossil fuels, which are a finite resource anyway, and have less involvement in the Middle East? OH NO ANYTHING BUT THAT
 
Thuleman said:
The reason this is important is that once the Arctic is ice-free in the summer the the Northwest Passage will be open for business year-round and most, if not all, shipping from Asia to Europe will take the shorter route through the Arctic leaving the Panama Canal as a relic of times past.
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The biggest advantage would be ship size. Many ships, including US warships, are limited in size based on their ability to just barely squeeze through the canal. Without that limitation, you can have truly massive ships that bring greater economy of scale.
 
jpm100 said:
Its sadder to realize that the alarmist luddites have even less reason to believe they are right and the only real difference their side has it that it also serves political ends so there's plenty of budget to repeat the same weak presumptions trying to make people believe its fact.
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Cuz not burning dead dinosaurs to run our society somehow makes us Luddites, m I rite? :rolleyes:
 
ViperGrendal said:
It's always funny reading "politically sensitive" threads. Especially around the whole global warming debate. It's either black or white. If you're not screaming "SAVE THE PLANETS!!" you're some big oil, kill the planet enthusiast. :rolleyes:

No rational thought allowed.
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It is interesting though, how some subjects are taboo for any sort of debate beyond the screaming "YOU WRONG I RIGHT!!!".

Always made me wonder if Al Gore never made a movie about the subject would there still be this much of a partisanship over it. Regardless of your mindset, politicians are crafty individuals and get people so damn polarized over anything that might affect their voting base.

If anything it's a sad state of affairs that something which should be scientific has become so political.
 
Here's the thing i find funny about either situation. Lets say for argument we do everything we need to do to fix the situation with climate change within 5 years. The result would be millions/billions of people dying. How do you say that would happen? Currently there's not even enough food to feed our current population globally. One small change to slow/stop climate change would result in less food from needing to change farming methods. Are you going to be the first one to line up to starve to death? Of course not but that's some of the extreme changes required to fix this complex problem.

The only thing we can reasonably do is to slowly make changes over the course of time to help mitigate the issue. Anything else would result in something like above. If you wish to help make an impact just buying a prius and complaining about deniers isn't going to help. People deciding to not have 7 kids and being educated probably does more to help then anything else.
 
There are still people who deny advanced climate change?
/snicker
 
nutzo said:
And what was the CO2 levels 500 years ago, 2,000 years ago, 50,000 years ago?

Using Ice cores they can estimate the CO2 level going back 10 of thousands of years.
If you go back far enough the CO2 levels where even higher than they are today.
Guess it was due to all the SUV's the cavemen where driving around....
Click to expand...
We've had all kinds of swings. Initially very high CO2 levels until plantlife took hold on dry land. Then C02 levels plummeted as the overgrowth of plantlife on land wasn't immediately met by enough animals evolved to exist on land to eat it, and the ultra-high oxygen levels lead to the largest insect life the world has ever seen (dragon flies the size of hawks). Then C02 levels gradually declined but still much higher than today, which is what we believe supercharged the growth rate of plants, and this high growth rate provided ample nutrition for gigantism in fauna to take hold (hence why dinosaurs were so damn huge compared to modern day animals).

That said, we are adaptable as a species for various climates, and live everywhere from Arizona deserts to Alaska. The problem though is that the rest of the planet's fauna and flora don't handle rapid changes very well. That's why we've had so many mass extinctions from catastrophic celestial events. So its not so much a question of whether or not there is global warming, we know there is. The question is how much man is contributing to this, and if the change is too rapid and if it can be slowed. Not only plantlife is affected, but shorelines around the world where cities exist would be disrupted. Change is ok, rapid change is bad.

That said, it may all be for not if we suddenly find that the sun has entered a "cool" period of slightly reduced output, at which point we'd want to raise CO2 levels if we wanted to maintain current temperatures, heh!

So best thing to do is worry more about pollution in general, and not about C02 in particular. Reducing other forms of pollution that we know are bad to breath, create smog, pollute the waters, and cause acid rain and the like will likely result in some C02 reduction as a side effect.
 
Raudulfr said:
There are still people who lack the brainpower to comprehend the difference between doubt/scepticism and denial?
/snicker
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I must have hit pretty close to the mark to get you so riled up ... lol.
Just continue to ignore the smoke.
 
Ducman69 said:
We've had all kinds of swings. Initially very high CO2 levels until plantlife took hold on dry land. Then C02 levels plummeted as the overgrowth of plantlife on land wasn't immediately met by enough animals evolved to exist on land to eat it, and the ultra-high oxygen levels lead to the largest insect life the world has ever seen (dragon flies the size of hawks). Then C02 levels gradually declined but still much higher than today, which is what we believe supercharged the growth rate of plants, and this high growth rate provided ample nutrition for gigantism in fauna to take hold (hence why dinosaurs were so damn huge compared to modern day animals).

That said, we are adaptable as a species for various climates, and live everywhere from Arizona deserts to Alaska. The problem though is that the rest of the planet's fauna and flora don't handle rapid changes very well. That's why we've had so many mass extinctions from catastrophic celestial events. So its not so much a question of whether or not there is global warming, we know there is. The question is how much man is contributing to this, and if the change is too rapid and if it can be slowed. Not only plantlife is affected, but shorelines around the world where cities exist would be disrupted. Change is ok, rapid change is bad.

That said, it may all be for not if we suddenly find that the sun has entered a "cool" period of slightly reduced output, at which point we'd want to raise CO2 levels if we wanted to maintain current temperatures, heh!

So best thing to do is worry more about pollution in general, and not about C02 in particular. Reducing other forms of pollution that we know are bad to breath, create smog, pollute the waters, and cause acid rain and the like will likely result in some C02 reduction as a side effect.
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We don't really want to increase CO2 levels either. Greenhouse gas effects in the atmosphere aren't the only thing we may worry about. CO2 is always seeking equilibrium between the atmosphere and the ocean. What does that do? It acidifies the ocean by increasing carbonic acid content. Yes, our oceans have been more acidic throughout time, however it hasn't changed this quickly unless there was a massive volcanic or other massive natural acidifier that have been associated with mass extinctions on the geologic timescale. Our ocean PH levels are changing faster than the ecosystem can adapt. What does this do? For one, it's already having a negative effect on how shellfish form their shells. If the shellfish go, you can go ahead and dial up a massive oceanic ecosystem collapse since that's a pretty critical link in the food chain. It's a bigger near term risk than global warming could ever be.
 
HoosegowFlask said:
Until our scientists can make accurate week-over-week weather predictions, how people be expected to believe mathematical projections? Climate changers are no different than Birthers and what makes it even more laughable is that skeptics are the majority.
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shade91 said:
Until our scientists can make accurate week-over-week weather predictions, how people be expected to believe mathematical projections? Climate changers are no different than Birthers and what makes it even more laughable is that skeptics are the majority.
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oh look another person who doesn't know the difference between climate and weather

images


images
 
maverikv said:
Cuz not burning dead dinosaurs to run our society somehow makes us Luddites, m I rite? :rolleyes:
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End result of what you push for is the same. You miguidedly want to shut down the machines and stop progress (19th century use of the word), meaning you want to kill the factories and machines (like cars) that improved the quality of life for the masses.

A case in point
Nuclear is not allowed.
Suddenly Fracking is going to cause earthquakes.
Your fear mongering is going to lead to the shutdown of coal power plants which have no viable replacements. The cost of energy is going to go up. Things become more expensive to make, own and operate which means people must make do without.

Your end result is the same as the Luddites.

Feel free to bring up the unicorns of real energy production, solar and wind.
 
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