Do you believe in man made climate change?

[drew]

Surely the argument is not that climate change was caused by man but whether our activities on the planet are exacerbating the problem and, if by curbing some of those activities, we can slow down climate change to allow communities to plan for changes.
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As for ice melting, some estimate there are 5m cubic miles of ice on the planet and it would raise sea levels by 216ft if it all melted which is about 65/70 metres. That might take a few thousand years it might take considerably less.

 

[Machiavelli]

call me cynical, but that just sounds like a new way to control people and make them pay those with power taxes (just like churches used to collect money from followers)

I wouldn't call you cynical, but I'm not convinced by this argument, as it is those with power that are at the vanguard of the tax avoidance and evasion industry. Taxes and laws are necessary to provide order and security, the foundation from which we can proceed. Taxes can also provide certain services, and can shift behaviour usefully -- and the issues of climate change and energy is an area in which taxes can be usefully deployed to shift behaviour. The anti-tax agenda you've expressed here is more appropriately characterised as a neoliberal -- rather than a cynical -- one, and it is the neoliberals that are in power currently.

 

[nicko31]

Better to be safe than sorry so I prefer we adopt a greener approach to life.

Indeed and even if the climate change does not exist the worlds resources are finite, we are consuming the planet at an unsustainable rate.

Personally I think the problem for now is beyond Western democracy. Probably only China can really take a lead on climate change, when they want to do something they just do it. You won't get nimbies in China stopping wind turbines..

 

[RyFish]

The map of what sea levels will be like if the ice caps melt is a great example - there wasn't any ice at the pole when the Vikings arrived in Britain so where was the coast line then?

I'm not sure where you got this from, but it's likely to have been 125,000 years since the arctic was last ice-free, and even then no-one can say whether it was completely ice free in summer or not.

how much of the melt water just fill the space that was there from the ice (it shouldn't increase the volume because they should occupy the same because they weigh the same and should displace the same amount of water even if the ice extends above the surface of the sea due to its crystalised structure)

Ice floating on the water, as at the arctic, will not raise sea levels when it melts, but ice on land, as at the antarctic, most certainly will.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

Ice floating on the water, as at the arctic, will not raise sea levels when it melts, but ice on land, as at the antarctic, most certainly will.

Is there physically enough ice on the land to do this? (map of the UK if sea levels rose by 83 metres.) or is it scaremongering?

 

[RyFish]

Is there physically enough ice on the land to do this? (map of the UK if sea levels rose by 83 metres.) or is it scaremongering?

If the antarctic ice melted sea levels would rise around 60-65 meters, then you've got to add the ice on Greenland/Canada etc, so yes, if it all melted. There is a staggering amount of ice in antarctica.