Crazy ideas thread

[Solaris]

Yes, but the point was that the 'what is bad for people is good for nature and vice versa' argument is fundamentally flawed. Regarding the environmental movement, it really depends on what you mean by "doomsday" prediction. Very few environmentalists are pushing runaway greenhouse effect turning Earth into Venus type scenarios. But there are all manner of scenarios less extreme than this but significant enough to warrant action. Regarding what we know and don't know, I am pretty certain very few people on SDF, or more likely probably nobody on SDF, has enough knowledge of climate change to determine whether we as humans know enough to make accurate predictions about the effects of global warming. What I do know is that the overwhelming scientific consensus is that global warming is anthropogenic (man-made).

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

These are actual climate experts, not some streetside straw poll of anyone who calls himself a "scientist".

And from:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Several studies have confirmed that “...the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes”. (Doran 2009). In other words, more than 97% of scientists working in the disciplines contributing to studies of our climate, accept that climate change is almost certainly being caused by human activities.

We should also consider official scientific bodies and what they think about climate change. There are no national or major scientific institutions anywhere in the world that dispute the theory of anthropogenic climate change. Not one.

 

[AssassinsMace]

You are trying to create some kind of dichotomy which does not exist at all in nature. "High amounts of oxygen" does not kill plants and also is not good for humans. Never heard of oxygen toxicity? And that's in HUMANS, not plants. And if humans get wiped out because of environmental degradation, that's not "mother nature" at work. That's stupid humans at work.

Don't blame me for the logic of environmentalist which I'm using. It's just like when I tackle animals rights activists who claim people who eat meat tend to be more violent and are more likely to be serial killers. I retort and say then animal rights activists are more likely to be Hitler because he had the same beliefs of animal rights activists and thought animals were better than humans. Do I believe this is true? No but that's the simplistic logic that I'm spinning right back.

BTW if humans eliminate themselves from the planet, that is "mother nature" at work. Are you saying humans are not of nature? Out in the wild let's say wolves kill too many deer that they feed on to survive. What happens to the wolves? They start to die off because they've over eaten their food supply that natural replenishment cannot keep up. Isn't that "mother nature" at work? Why are humans and what they do any different?

 

[Solaris]

Don't blame me for the logic of environmentalist which I'm using. It's just like when I tackle animals rights activists who claim people who eat meat tend to be more violent and are more likely to be serial killers. I retort and say then animal rights activists are more likely to be Hitler because he had the same beliefs of animal rights activists and thought animals were better than humans. Do I believe this is true? No but that's the simplistic logic that I'm spinning right back.

I was just pointing out that whatever logic you are using for whatever reason, it was incorrect.

BTW if humans eliminate themselves from the planet, that is "mother nature" at work. Are you saying humans are not of nature? Out in the wild let's say wolves kill too many deer that they feed on to survive. What happens to the wolves? They start to die off because they've over eaten their food supply that natural replenishment cannot keep up. Isn't that "mother nature" at work? Why are humans and what they do any different?

What humans are doing are certainly "not of nature". Nature doesn't spew CFC's into the air to cause a hole in the ozone layer. Nature doesn't spew carbon into the air in the space of a few short decades to create a CO2 level of 400 ppm.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

Let's guess what that will do to temperatures based on historical data:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

 

[AssassinsMace]

What humans are doing are certainly "not of nature". Nature doesn't spew CFC's into the air to cause a hole in the ozone layer. Nature doesn't spew carbon into the air in the space of a few short decades to create a CO2 level of 400 ppm.

Do you think wolves eating too many deer thus causing the own population demise is not of nature? Whatever you can think of to note of as a difference I can apply that to support my argument. Wolves destroying themselves from their own acts... humans destroying themselves from their own acts are the same thing. "Mother nature" doesn't see the difference.

 

[airsuperiority]

While I do appreciate Assassins for taking the time and help explain my inquiries about the volcano thing, for the other things on environmentalism and such, I have to disagree.

Last semester, I took the following courses in my university to finish my final 3 semesters for my bachelor of Psychology. I took the following: Environmental Psychology, Evolutionary Psychology, Health Psychology, and Attention. (it won't make sense why I'm telling you guys what I took, but when you finish this post you will understand why I did)

For Environmental Psyc. I was very confused on how psychology can be applied to environment, but by the end of the course I see the connections. Anyway long story short, there are actually substantial amount of scientific and psychological works done on the subject, and they do reaffirm not only climate change as real, but also many other things, and drew many connections. Amongst all of them would be specieism, which is the concept of man>nature and animals. They did do a study on meat-eaters vs vegetarians and determined their scores on animal welfare, compassion, and sympathy, and the results did indicate that vegetarians score higher while meat eaters are lower on animal welfare, compassion, sympathy. It's a shocking finding. I will try and pull up the academic journal for you guys if you like. It explains everything.

As for the mother nature argument, I have to disagree because that will be confusing the 2. first, it is only natural if there are no man-made interventions. if wolves wipe out deer and then they extinct too, then that's just basic ecology.

however teh truth is that generally it won't happen, as nature has its own way to regulate itself. All animals have their own oscillators (such as for homeostasis) to regulate their physical functions for behaviours, such as sleep, mating, eating, hunting, hormones, anything. that said, even if wolves are put into the same habitat as deer(which they did at one point to reduce the population of deer), neither wolves nor deer will go extinct because their reproduction cycles and dietary cycles will eventually return to equilibrium. the same applies for even species with smaller population:they have their reasons. their genetics, innateness all comes into play. these are the actual ways of the mother nature. it is only nature's way if it is designed by nature.

therefore, it is nature only if it is natural behaviours. nature do not dictate natural humans behaviour as having industrialization or create weapons of war that leads to atomic bombs as part of our life cycle. these things are man-made through science.

what is not mother nature, however, will be things we don't find in the nature and not designed by nature by default. man-made products, outputs, materials, such as plastic, synthetic elements or events, such as atomic bomb testing are simply run by the laws of science. because these things don't exist in nature, animals die and also cause climate changes. these man-made events take a toll on the environment and on animals, as their ecological systems have never been exposed to them, and not designed for those substances. therefore, they cannot cope with the outputs or the effects of those products or events.if animals die from man-made causes, it's not mother nature

For one thing, the amount of pollution produced by combustion is killing our ecosystem. This is a short assignment I had written for the course:

Toxins in our environment, consumer goods, and our bodies pose as major threats to our health, other species, and the environment. Some products that we consume, such as the fish that we eat, may contain various substances that have adverse effects to our health. While there are many existing governance regulating the compositions and chemicals going into consumer goods and into the environment, other substances and toxins continue to get into our environment due to pollution. When we extract from this environment for resources for our consumer goods, we inadvertently reintroduce the toxins back to ourselves. This essay will briefly illustrate the bioaccumulation system of methylmercury as its danger in our environment and re-introduction in consumer goods, but also how human behaviors play a role in constructing this toxin contamination-consumption cycle.
Mercury in the environment can be converted to methylmercury when absorbed by marine plants and micro-organisms (Mercury in the Food Chain, 2013). These life forms in turn are food for bigger species such as small fish and other small marine animals, which also absorb the methylmercury in the process. Bigger fish, birds, and other predators then accumulate even more of the toxins in their system by preying on these smaller species. This bioaccumulation of the toxins through the food chain results in huge deposits of the chemical in the organisms near the top of the food chain, where the toxins play major health damage. Methylmercury is highly toxic, and at significant doses can play major damage to the kidney and neurological system (Mercury in the Food Chain, 2013). Reproduction, “growth, neuro-development, learning ability” (Mercury in the Food Chain, 2013), and other behavioral changes can also be affected, while also leading to increases in mortality rates (Mercury in the Food Chain, 2013).
While the results of bioaccumulation of mercury in the food chain represents the natural system of toxins in our environment, human interaction and management with our environments also play very significant role. One of the leading causes of mercury distribution is from combustion such as “coal combustion, chlor-alkali production, waste incineration and metal processing” (Laws, 2012, p. 52), which contribute to relatively 65% of the mercury emissions (Laws, 2012, p. 52). The emission enters our atmosphere and circulate itself throughout the planet before returning to our environments in the form of precipitation (Laws, 2012, p. 52). As humans, we are responsible for not only the dispersal of the toxins with our waste management, but also the consumptions of such toxins through systematic fishing. Large species such as dolphins, halibut, sharks, swordfish, and Bigeye tunas are relatively near the top of the food chain, and by fishing and consuming these species, we also consume the most amount of mercury possible. For instance, salmon contains a mean level of 0.008ppm of mercury compared to the mean level of 0.689ppm for bigeye tuna. (Mercury Levels in Commercial Fish and Shellfish (1990-2010), 2013) Finally, while special interests groups, industries, environmental groups, and governments can improve the situation through regulation and new technology, the problem will persist for the ongoing future with continued industrializations until new technologies can be provided as an effective substitute for fossil fuel combustion.
References
Laws, E. A. (2012). Environmental Toxicology: Selected Entries from the Encyclopedia of Sustainability Science and Technology. Springer.
Mercury in the Food Chain. (2013, July 9). Retrieved from Environment Canada:

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

This is about environment and not about the volcano thing.

 

[solarz]

Do you think wolves eating too many deer thus causing the own population demise is not of nature? Whatever you can think of to note of as a difference I can apply that to support my argument. Wolves destroying themselves from their own acts... humans destroying themselves from their own acts are the same thing. "Mother nature" doesn't see the difference.

Environmentalism isn't about protecting "Mother Nature". Mother Nature is way too badass to need humans to protect her. A little Typhoon or Tsunami can reduce the most modern cities to rubble, and those are the equivalent of Mother Nature splashing the bathtub a couple of times.

No, environmentalism is about protecting humans from themselves. Nature doesn't give a crap about climate change, or even a new mass extinction. She will just create more critters to populate this world. On the other hand, humans *should* care about climate change, because crazy weather and rising sea levels are worse for the economy than the carbon tax.

 

[AssassinsMace]

Wolf-made... man-made.. it's the same thing. Do you think when wolves kill all the deer it doesn't affect the ecology? Other animals aren't affected? What makes that any different from what "man-made" things humans do? Show me a study that paints with a broad brush the differences in behavior between meat-eaters and vegetarians and I'll show you it’s a study conducted by a partisan with an agenda. I like the euphemism because it would be a different reaction if it was animal lovers vs. non-animal lovers which is what they’re really saying. Dogs and cats eat meat but those animal lovers still love their pets for their unconditional love as they put it to which they're saying how animals are so much better than humans. Hitler was a vegan. Hitler valued animal life above human life. Charles Mason was a vegan. Charles Mason valued animal life above human life. I bet someone can do a study to show that disparity between animal lovers and people who don’t have a stick up their butts. Anyone can play those games. The reason why people advertise about their love for animals is to say everyone else doesn’t. Why is that important? Is about the animals? No, it’s about themselves, aka narcissism. People who hide behind animals are actually hiding how much of a sociopath they are and they even know it. Hitler despised humans. Charles Mason despised humans. I can make simple observations and say animal lovers aka vegetarians and vegans don’t like babies. Every time I see someone make a “hate babies” comment… guess what? They’re animal lovers. Animal lovers also have hateful comments about society. Animal lovers always talk about compassion but it’s only about compassion for animals. So why does that make them stand out as special above everyone else? It’s just like people I come across who hate Asians (a lot of them are liberals) but are in denial that they're racist because they say they love black people. How can they be not racist because they like another race? Racism is hating someone because of their race. What they’re actually saying is they see black people ironically at the bottom. So if they can love black people, it’s impossible for them to be racist towards anyone else above. Animal lovers just took it to the next step and included animals at the bottom now. If they can love lowly animals, they cannot be hateful towards anything else.

A lot of people who take up causes are not really about the cause. It's a cover for their narcissism. You know who really believes in a cause? Someone who doesn't advertise it.

 

[Solaris]

Wolf-made... man-made.. it's the same thing. Do you think when wolves kill all the deer it doesn't affect the ecology? Other animals aren't affected? What makes that any different from what "man-made" things humans do?

When wolves kill off deer they will be less abundant and harder to find. They will start losing their pups. There will be a wolf population decline. There will be a balance achieved. When humans put CFC's into the air, there's not a damn thing 'mother nature' can do about it until we ban CFC's. Which is what we did. And now the ozone hole has been thickening again. And when it comes to climate change, we aren't talking about human extinction, but long term or even possibly permanent effects on a planetary scale, not just ecological scale. We aren't going to correct our problems by killing ourselves off just because this would help your analogy. No, our children will be living with anthropogenic climate change, and our children's children.

You know who really believes in a cause? Someone who doesn't advertise it.

What does this even mean? If I believe that female genital mutilation is wrong, I should keep that belief to myself so that I won't sound narcissistic???

 

[airsuperiority]

Wolf-made... man-made.. it's the same thing. Do you think when wolves kill all the deer it doesn't affect the ecology? Other animals aren't affected? What makes that any different from what "man-made" things humans do? Show me a study that paints with a broad brush the differences in behavior between meat-eaters and vegetarians and I'll show you it’s a study conducted by a partisan with an agenda. I like the euphemism because it would be a different reaction if it was animal lovers vs. non-animal lovers which is what they’re really saying. Dogs and cats eat meat but those animal lovers still love their pets for their unconditional love as they put it to which they're saying how animals are so much better than humans. Hitler was a vegan. Hitler valued animal life above human life. Charles Mason was a vegan. Charles Mason valued animal life above human life. I bet someone can do a study to show that disparity between animal lovers and people who don’t have a stick up their butts. Anyone can play those games. The reason why people advertise about their love for animals is to say everyone else doesn’t. Why is that important? Is about the animals? No, it’s about themselves, aka narcissism. People who hide behind animals are actually hiding how much of a sociopath they are and they even know it. Hitler despised humans. Charles Mason despised humans. I can make simple observations and say animal lovers aka vegetarians and vegans don’t like babies. Every time I see someone make a “hate babies” comment… guess what? They’re animal lovers. Animal lovers also have hateful comments about society. Animal lovers always talk about compassion but it’s only about compassion for animals. So why does that make them stand out as special above everyone else? It’s just like people I come across who hate Asians (a lot of them are liberals) but are in denial that they're racist because they say they love black people. How can they be not racist because they like another race? Racism is hating someone because of their race. What they’re actually saying is they see black people ironically at the bottom. So if they can love black people, it’s impossible for them to be racist towards anyone else above. Animal lovers just took it to the next step and included animals at the bottom now. If they can love lowly animals, they cannot be hateful towards anything else.

A lot of people who take up causes are not really about the cause. It's a cover for their narcissism. You know who really believes in a cause? Someone who doesn't advertise it.

Solaris had made his point clear on environmental impact so I won't repeat it. As for the remaining stuffs, dude you can't just generalize that everyone's like that. That's gross generalizations. Plus, there are certainly people of either sides who are still genuine concerned citizens of animal welfare. The point of the study was to study species-ism.

Finally, even if they had an agenda, their studies would need to go through ethics committee before approval and peer reviews and replications of studies before publications. Not only they can't just twist or spin the data, they can't spin the outcomes to abide by their bias. If they manipulate the experimental group and the methods for these purposes, their study will be criticized and scrutinized for bias, inaccuracy, and a bunch of administrative works to deal with. As for data, the numbers don't lie, particularly by large sample sizes. Anyways yes although there are occassional controversial studies with questionable studies, however some either demonstrates consistent results for replications, or if they don't they may get revoked.

Anyway the point is, the study is probably valid with all the checks in place to govern the quality and ethics. However, even then the study only looks into attitude and cognitive from behaviours, and certainly it's not conclusive nor does it demonstrates 100% external validity. To generalize from one study to all human is fallible, but even more inappropriate to make statements to condemn animal-lovers, vegetarians as narcissist by basing on the example of one individual. (albeit the worst example ever too, hitler).

It is strange, however, that you'd rather go deny the academic study and accuse them instantly as bias.

 

[AssassinsMace]

When wolves kill off deer they will be less abundant and harder to find. They will start losing their pups. There will be a wolf population decline. There will be a balance achieved. When humans put CFC's into the air, there's not a damn thing 'mother nature' can do about it until we ban CFC's. Which is what we did. And now the ozone hole has been thickening again. And when it comes to climate change, we aren't talking about human extinction, but long term or even possibly permanent effects on a planetary scale, not just ecological scale. We aren't going to correct our problems by killing ourselves off just because this would help your analogy. No, our children will be living with anthropogenic climate change, and our children's children.



What does this even mean? If I believe that female genital mutilation is wrong, I should keep that belief to myself so that I won't sound narcissistic???

You don't think human beings wiped out from what they do is nature balancing things out? People who make humans out to be an exception whether bad or good are operating on narcissism.

I never said causes were wrong. My point was people use them to advertise themselves. Do corporations give money to charity because they care about the cause or do they do it for their image? Look at the LA Clippers scandal right now. Don Sterling gave tens of millions to charity. And he spent money advertising it patting himself on the back. He's not unique which comes to rich people and charity. Dambisa Moyo who is an African scholar has talked about how her friend who runs a humanitarian organization in Africa received several million dollars in charity from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. She said they were lucky her friend runs an honest operation because the Gates Foundation just gave them the money and never heard from them again. There was never any follow-up from the Gates Foundation on accountability of where that money went. She was noting that's what wrong with how the West handles Africa. She's an outspoken critic of how Africa is treated like a charity and how it doesn't help the bigger picture. What she argues for is business investment not charity. That's what China does in Africa and Africa has grown because of it. Do you see China advertising what they do in Africa as charity?