The Religion of Global Warming
What do you mean global warming is a religion? There are evangelist, sin and absolution, ritual, faith, tithing, guilt, sacrifice, prophesy… sounds like a religion to me. The only question now is, are you a believer or denier?
If you think about it, being a faithful worshiper to the god of global warming requires little effort and perfect for those who just want something to believe in. If you ever have to defend your belief any questions can be referenced to the man behind the curtain… the all-knowing scientist. Someone questions your programming you instantly leap into ridicule mode. The topic of pollution is your safety value, because who can argue for polluted water or dirty air? Just keep buying the religion approved green light bulbs and you’re in like Flynn.
Now we come to the global warming religious fanatic. Yes, I’m afraid all religions have them so why should this be any different. To this group, man is always the problem. You may notice that it’s always other people and never convert, but people just the same. They will commit a multitude of crimes for the green cause and many are much more destructive than what they are protesting. Bullying and guilt is the chosen method of evangelism and they rarely tolerate disagreement. This group is relatively small, but it would be in your best interest to avoid them at all cost.
Let us now examine the Grand Pu-bah of the global warming movement. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Al Gore. Your first impression may be to recognize his gift for grabbing an audience. If you don’t listen too closely, it’s even possible to get caught up in the moment. However, if you do take the time to examine his facts and way of life you will see that he displays all the characteristics of the classic religious hypocrite.
The Gore family lifestyle in no way mirrors what he is preaching. His carbon footprint is easily 20 times that of mortal man. In order to receive absolution he confesses his sins by buying carbon credits… from himself. He deflects criticism by comparing his effort to combat global warming with those in the past that fought the evils of slavery. A bit like comparing apples and oranges, but what does it matter? It sounds good. To give us a good idea about Mr. Gore we can repeat his own words to live by, “Whatever works.” This bit of Algorian philosophy always incites applause and laughter.
If the religion of global warming is your thing, then go for it. But in the process please stop demanding everyone else pay your ridiculous dues. It’s your religion and your responsibility, so you pay for it and please leave the rest of us alone. We have our own religions to finance.
Lord Crimson 
“We have our own religions to finance.”
Now that’s funny and true. 😀
monolith
February 28, 2008 at 5:17 pm
i have never considered global warming a religion before. your little tongue in cheek method of explanation makes it so easy to see. thanks. i’ve never trusted al gore now i have less of a reason.
kansasgirl
February 28, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Hi monolith
Words to live by. 🙂
Hi kansasgirl
Thanks. You show good judgment and instincts by not trusting Al Gore.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
February 29, 2008 at 1:09 pm
You have to wonder if global warming is the danger people say it is. The lead cheerleader is getting richer and winning awards but not important enough to live as he preaches. That alone makes you wonder if he knows it’s a hoax and is just cashing in.
waterdog
March 2, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Hi waterdog
I’d say that your suspicions are well founded. Any reasonable person must wonder why Algore fails to live in a fashion that he demands from others. If he believed the so-called dangers of man-made global warming, wouldn’t he lead my example?
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 2, 2008 at 2:23 pm
I’d like to respond to your challenging post by challenging you to take the thesis still more seriously. Use the basic tools of the field of Sociology of Religion. Post a copy of the classic Lessa & Vogt model of religion and invite readers to plug in the various components (rituals, myths, practices, etc.), to see whether the new Environ-mental-ism is indeed a religion, with Anthropogenic Global Warming as its credal statement or essential belief.
If you want to get fancy you can Google Robert Bellah, et al, on what social scientists call “civil [secular] religion”. (Hint: German National Socialism was one.)
In the name of Gaia the Mother and her High Priest the Giver of Weather, I bid you go now, and grow~
Hugo
hughvic
March 2, 2008 at 11:27 pm
Hi hughvic
That is a challenge indeed and I have no problem with you taking this as deep as you like. All I can say is start the ball rolling and we’ll see if anyone catches it.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 2, 2008 at 11:59 pm
By attacking the figureheads of a movement for their hypocrisy, you are only justifying your own inaction. It saddens me when we hear of people like Al Gore just talking the talk and not walking the walk, but that is absolutely not an acceptable reason to ignore that we human beings do horrible things to our planet and should be ashamed, and should try to do better. Maybe my bar for “when I should start to care” is just set way lower than yours, but it shouldn’t take global warming or any serious threat to our survival to make people think about our impact on the world. It should be a matter of common human decency to conserve and protect our environment–our home. To fail to do this is to fail to be a compassionate, aware human being.
egrdog
March 3, 2008 at 12:48 am
you know, i have to say, this disgusts me. i don’t think i’ve ever read anything like it. egrdog is completely right. just because someone doesn’t do everything they can doesn’t mean that shouldn’t try to change things for the better. second, as a “global warming religious fanatic”, i would like to point out that while the government could do more, it’s rarely the focus of my (and my friends’) work. we prefer to work in our own area making changes in our lives.
In addition, ridiculing people who’ve spent their whole lives studying exactly the problems and issues is extremely offensive, not to mention pointless.
In your last paragraph, you say, “stop demanding everyone else pay your ridiculous dues”. i’d like to object to that in particular. these “ridiculous dues” are in fact, not only reasonable, can often save people money. buying higher efficiency appliances saves money and water. buying fluorescent lights saves energy, thereby saving money. buying hybrid vehicles dramatically reduces gasoline use, and now that there are hybrid SUVs space is no excuse. investing energy in renewable energy allows us (even if you ignore the possibility of global warming) to use significant energy after fossil fuels expire.
and finally, lets say the odds are exactly 1% that global warming will cause problems. the costs of assuming that it will happen are fairly low, especially if it does end up happening. however, assuming it won’t happen has its own costs even if it doesn’t. and if it does, and we don’t assume that it will, then we could all easily be wiped off the earth. when you weigh all the benefits, almost all of people i’ve talked to (a small number relative to the population of the earth, admittedly) deem it worth it. ESPECIALLY since reducing our own energy use and developing new sources have more benefits than costs.
I don’t think i’ve read anything this poorly argued in a while. thanks for the experience.
paulcd2000
March 3, 2008 at 2:23 am
Goodness, my Liege. One would think that you are Shah Pahlavi and have insulted the Prophet, blessed be he, with your Western dress.
If I may presume to entertain milord with a brief story. Twenty years ago, in the world’s most selective private university, a doctoral student proposed to the Chair of his Department of Religious Studies a dissertation topic: Contemporary Environmentalism As Secularized Neo-Paganism.
The Chair’s response: “Too obvious.”
And that, two full decades before the Governor of Missouri, delivering her national party’s official televised response to the President’s State of the Union, urged the Chief Executive and the People to support the Democratic leadership in Congress, promising that were the Democrats to remain in control of Congress they would, in the next four years, “reduce Global Warming.” The Governor did not mention why the Democrats have not yet turned down the world’s thermostat.
There’s no shortage of magical thinking by the Green Cult, your Crimsonness. It’s the ritual, the liturgy, that concerns me. They will not stop until they have controlled every hitherto un-colon-ized aspect of our daily lives.
I trust that you used no more than one square of toilet paper today, Sir. We may not all be His Holiness the Dalai Nobelist, but each of us can do his part. And you, of course, are called to lead.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 2:53 am
By your standards just about anything could be considered a religion. The Boy Scouts, magazine subscriptions, most jobs, playing online games, private schools, and God knows what else, would all fit the criteria you mention. And even if it was a religion, you haven’t disproven it, just labeled it. Which isn’t necessarily too helpful to your agenda.
Not to mention that many of your criteria for something to be a “religion” were custom cherry-picked to fit Global Warming from the get-go. Guilt is not a core aspect of religion, not all religions contain prophesy, let alone be based around it, not all religions require tithing, not all religions are based on moral philosophies, not all religions encourage evangelism, etc.
All those things things can be construed to fit environmentalists, sure, but so many religions violate these so-called criteria that it’s absurd to imply that they define religion, which means that your accusation is completely without merit.
abyssalleviathin
March 3, 2008 at 2:57 am
I beg your pardon, my Lord. The Governor rebutting was Hon. Kathleen Sibelius of Kansas (my erstwhile home!), who assured Americans that “the majority in Congress is ready to tackle the challenge of reducing global warming”, offering the timeframe of “357 days”, not four years.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 3:04 am
wow, nice. congrats, you know how to sound like someone’s acting pretentious. if you’d payed attention, you would know that i don’t participate in that, nor did i advocate it. i just said that assuming there’s a problem can be beneficial. and also, doesn’t everything new eventually invade most of our lives, with or without us knowing it?
paulcd2000
March 3, 2008 at 3:55 am
Not everything. Many cults; few religions. And many things, e.g. democracy, climatology, numismatics, that are neither. To find religions, look for a set of cosmological beliefs based on veiled metaphysical speculation and sustained by myth; next, look for ritual practices that sustain the mythic picture, the speculative belief. Are the beliefs perceived as “truths” that brook no challenge? Are the rituals—liturgies, catechisms, incantations, rites, raiment—performed, in toto, exclusively by those holding the beliefs?
Those tell.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 4:02 am
paulcd2000, if you’re referring to me, I was addressing Lord Crimson, with the titles and honorifics, to point out that some of the reactions he got were as though he’d insulted someone’s mother or, well, religion. I was just having fun with milord.
As for your point about new things invading our lives, I think I’m referring to something far more insidious. Tell me that human beings can alter the weather and I’ll say that your thinking is magical, since we can’t even predict next week’s weather with any respectable degree of certainty. Tell me that human beings are destroying “nature” and I’ll tell you that the concept of “nature” is itself a human construct, and that nothing at all is more natural than humans and their works, destructive and otherwise. Tell me about the body you have, and I’ll tell you about the body you are.
The drift I’m hoping you’ll get from this riff is that our worldviews, and even our cosmologies, are manipulated beyond the realm of manifest reality. We think in terms dictated to us. So it is with much of the “Environmental movement”. What in hell is a “movement”, anyway? And how is any of this Greenism in the U.S.A. a “movement”? Does that just sound better than “trend”? Does “the new consciousness” simply sound better than “the new fashion”?
What is “invading” every department of our lives is not an “it”, but a “them”. The enviro elites are political animals who, like all political animals. are consumed with power lust. In their case, the power mania drives them to dictate to us how and where and what and when and wheter to buy; what to wear; how to have sex, and with whom, and with what result; how to bathe and how to eliminate waste; what to teach our children; how to travel; whom to vote for, etc., etc. You’re not calling these shots, and I’m not and Lord Crimson isn’t. But somebody is. How is that, exactly? (And I mean EXACTLY.)
It’s a full-blown festival of power mania. And the question that Lord Crimson and I have is the same old one that independent persons always ask when the power deal goes down: Who/Whom? Who gets to do what to whom?
Ask that question in some countries and you’ll get jailed or worse. Ask that question of enviro’s on the Web, and you’re apt to get responses from Greenies who behave exactly as though they were anointed Defenders of the Faith! By all means, try it. Try something like what Lord Crimson did. And then be prepared to watch other people’s rationality go out the window.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 6:06 am
funny. global warming religion still makes more sense then Christianity.
madmonq
March 3, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Hi egrdog
The figurehead always bears the burden; it’s the price of being a leader. Just because someone questions a leaders failures doesn’t mean that they care any more or less than you.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 3, 2008 at 1:51 pm
Hi paulcd2000
As you admit to being a “global warming religious fanatic” may I say congratulations on living up to the stereotype. Disgusted are we? Heaven forbid someone question the validity of those that presume the power and free reign to pick our pocket via taxes or what products we must buy.
If people want to buy energy efficient products then more power to them. It’s not for you or me to tell them that it is a requirement. The religion of global warming or by extension environmentalism is not a license to become a dictator.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 3, 2008 at 2:21 pm
madmong,
I’d call it a dead heat.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 2:24 pm
Hi abyssalleviathin
You are right, there are many religions with just as many variances.
Environmentalism is one of those religions that corrupt the relationship with God. It is a thought process, which involves worshiping the creation instead of the Creator.
Whether a conscious act or not, the result is that the followers view themselves as god-like, claiming their actions will have the power to control the earth. That is one reason why we see those related to environmentalism demand we buy green products.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 3, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Hi Hughvic
Nice argument. I would be hard pressed to improve on it so I won’t try. 🙂
We do however part on the statement by madmonq that the, “global warming religion still makes more sense then Christianity.” Although we disagree, it’s nice to have the freedom to choose. This is the beauty of freewill.
I was watching the news this morning where it was reported that an environmentalist group in Washington State is engaged in a bit of eco-terrorism in the form of arson.
As the homes burn, perhaps it will provide others with the opportunity to consider the real goals of the environmentalist religion.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 3, 2008 at 3:59 pm
But Lord Crimson:
A Fideist myself, I’m rather fond of the way in which our Word makes fools of the cleverest skeptics, and I’ve even developed an affection for the way in which the World makes me a fool for The Word. It’s a baffling spiritual economy, but nonetheless marvelous in my eyes.
Your point about the Enviro-Templars of Washington State is certainly well taken; the eco-jihadists are true believers indeed. They’ve proved that much.
Even when it does not summon its martial forces, Environmentalism torches homes. The recent catastrophic fires in the California counties of San Diego and San Bernardino, for example, were made possible by years of tree-hugging that defied even the clearing of millions of acres of fire fuels created by years of drought and resultant beetle infestation left unchecked for fear of pesticides.
To recite a favorite incantation of the spiritual forebears of the eco-terrorists: “Burn, baby, burn!”
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Boy, did you ever piss in someones cornflakes.
Couple of things you should add, like there are already factions and “sects” arrising and obviously there is little to no humor when it comes to blasphemy (or blasphemers such as yourself).
Now I count myself among the believers in global warming. It is an inevitable fact that there is, has been, and always will be global warming… except, obviously, for those times when the Earth is cooling, which is the ultimate continuation to any cycle of green house warming effect.
Indeed I believe that man contributes to global warming as any dominant species would, I speculate, do.
Yes, I even agree with the efforts of sustainability. If for no other reason, regardless of whether or not one belives in GW or not, than for the fact we, as a species, are quickly overrunning our little burg of a planet and need to survive long enough till we get smart enough to get the hell out while the getting is good.
ozymandiaz
March 3, 2008 at 8:43 pm
ozymandiaz (a very cool name BTW), I for one dig what you’re saying on the environment, and I’m a pretty disciplined conservationist myself. What you say about sectarian division is very interesting.
My sense though is that AGW, or man-made global warming, is the debate to watch. (Assuming that the Most Holy Archdeacon Gore of Oslo hasn’t succeeded in closing that debate by decree.) Maybe we’re contributing to it, I dunno.
But should the climatological research at some point exonerate us (not to say that the Chinese and we are not gross poluters, and the Brazilians defilers of their rain forests, &tc.)—should we be exonerated, a sure sign of the religiosity our Lord Crimson perceives will be the hue and cry of the True Green loyalists, because instead of rejoicing upon the news of our innocence, they will rebel vociferously against the threat of their sudden loss of enormous power to exert social control. Long after the Wizard will have been exposed, they will maintain the pretense even more magically than before, and the social controls thereby will become greater than ever, and concretized.
The quite strong evidence warranting this hypothesis is the already unscientific, emotive and even irrational reaction of AGW exponents to any scientific doubter. The folks who seem to have a personal need for Global Warming to be universally accepted as anthropogenic, suddenly lose any pretense of scientific discipline when a credible scientist, or body of scientists, comes along to defy their dogma. Consider Gore’s allies declaring the “debate closed”. That’s a fiat foreign to professional scientists, for whom no theory is ever “closed”, but only awaiting disproof. But don’t say this to Gore’s people, or you’re apt to be compared, as others have been, to Holocaust deniers. Tres charmant, non?
Here’s a fun one. The sale of indulgences. You know, Luther’s theses and all that. Well, the Archdeacon is becoming wealthy off the sale of carbon indulgences. Your corporation has sinned against our Mother Earth? No problem: make a contrite confession to the Archdeacon and purchase the number of indulgences prescribed in proportion to the gravity of your sins.
See? Secularized grace! For sale.
hughvic
March 3, 2008 at 9:46 pm
I agree with you. There is something intensely finatical about people who want to save the planet from Global Warning. See my blog entry today about the ELF group that blew up houses in Seattle to further their dimented cause.
www. jonesview.wordpress.com
jonesview
March 3, 2008 at 11:09 pm
It is a shadow of a line that we try to draw between the conscientious objector who enriches and contributes and the apathetic, who has insight, but no balls. I don’t expect anyone to respond to that, in that it would only confirm your lack of courage to stand in the solution of your beliefs.
What of the energy contributed to the anti-green movement; positive or negative? Is there an inadvertent fueling of that with which you disagree? A fueling of the synthetic, collective green-consciousness – and what of the man who lives in the hills?
Perhaps the question is, what are we plugged in to?
There is a trend to spend time on the net, surfing and creating identities, saying things you wouldn’t otherwise say and perhaps, allowing for some of the pressure to be released. I’d venture to say, that for millions, the internet has become a realm more real than the hair growing on their arms. And I can see why there is so much confusion.
I must admit, I find a reflection of the primordial within natural phenomena that I can’t seem to locate in anything constructed by human hands. All around me, I watch as houses are built on the mountain lion’s property, riparian lands are eviscerated by bulldozers – I’d bet that he didn’t sign over the title – and wasn’t he there first? I guess its no different than any trespassing we have done in the past – ie. the European settlement of America.
As human beings, we can be incredibly selfish and end up causing the suffering of the natural world around us, and often the people within it. We are striking a blow that resurges back upon ourselves – for we are the natural world.
Interestingly, I watched ‘an inconvenient truth’ last night and wondered at Al Gore’s hypocrisy and privilege. And see that he’s probably making money from his findings. I believe in protecting the environment from our carelessness and greed – I’d rather stand behind that movement than behind the multi billion dollar war effort – think of all the positive improvements we could enact with all that money and energy?
poudreflyfish
March 4, 2008 at 4:07 am
The greenies are more dogmatic than any organized religion,preaching there will be hell on earth if we dont change our ways.
Scavenger
March 4, 2008 at 6:53 am
Yeah. Christians never do that. (WTF!)
madmonq
March 4, 2008 at 1:14 pm
I find the argument that environmentalists wield incredible power to be laughable. Power is located in the military-industrial-banking complex not any environmentalist cult.
The original blog seemed to say that environmentalism is a religion in order to remove its authority over the individual non-believer. I accept that viewing things like environmentalism (and even science itself) as a religion can provide insight into society. However, if science is our modern religion (practiced in secret by a select few who then shout down their discoveries from the mountain to the masses) we should ask ourselves what kind of believers we are. Do we believe the Church of Science when it gives us cars, food, and flight and then turn away from it when it tells us there is a reckoning?
Yes, environmentalism is a belief system, but so is the concept of individual freedom. Society is a blending together of many belief systems into complex whole. We need individual freedom and we also need the regulation on human destruction that environmentalism proscribes. It can be called religion, but then again so can every other social structure we have so the point is moot.
Cytochrome C
March 4, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Well played, Scavenger. And madmong, note Scavenger’s “on earth”.
Poudreflyfish, in my opinion your piece is brilliant, in spite of which, however, I’m sure that it more than meets the requirements for entry into this chattering agora you disdain. As for balls, well:
“In the Garden of Eden sat Adam,
Complacently stroking his madam,
And great was his mirth,
For he knew that on Earth
There were only two balls, and he had ’em.”
To the Greentologists, there was the Garden, and then human beings came along and screwed it up. Much like your paragraphs 6-7. Yet in Genesis the Earth and all in it are in the Creator’s gift to mankind, with the charge of stewardship. (In e.g. the Chinese worldview, this is impossible, as humans are inseparable from the rest of creation and therefore cannot be in charge of it.) It’s one thing to say that we are poor stewards, and another to say that we are unnatural or even antithetical to “Nature”.
Ah, from C.O.’s to CO2. I appreciate your remarks about COs, not least because I knew a few of the intellectual leaders of the WWII CO “movement” (Geiger, Kepler, Sandperl), and personally locate them among the stand-outs of that “Greatest Generation”. My eldest brother was a ‘Nam-era C.O. who took his licks rather than dodge or expatriate or flex his cowardice in oversexed anti-war activities that would end not when the war did (4/30/75), but when the draft did (1/1/73).
I myself say this sort of thing for a living, as I’m an historical anthropologist. Though I worked among come of the very creators of the Internet, I hadn’t “blogged” until six months ago. A neophyte then, I did so under my given name, and promptly found my privacy invaded, my family threatened and my software infected. So now I blog under a contraction of the name of one of my heroes, Hugh of St. Victor. But I don’t say as Hugo anything I wouldn’t say as yerztrooly, nor for that matter anything that Hugo wouldn’t say, were he not eight centuries in the grave.
Still, I grant you that the Internet, like television before it, is a specific technology of deception; to which a radical such as Luther might reply, “Why should the devil have all the tricks?” Just as the COs could take a war, gut it of its terrible import, and refill it with new and better meaning, so might we be able to do with this multimedium.
The war cry of Luther’s reformers, even as some of them were burned alive, was “Sola Fide!” [by Faith Alone]. Keeping this metaphor, and Lord Crimson’s placement of Environtology in the taxonomy of religions, I’d like to assure you that many of us who decry that rapidly institutionalizing religion nevertheless keep the faith.
hughvic
March 4, 2008 at 2:10 pm
The comparison of global warming to religion is neither new nor inventive. It is a scapegoat tactic that is used in any number of debates in an attempt to divert attention away from the actual underlying subject matter. Taken in any serious discussion, it fails miserably, as it does here.
Specific to global warming, it is a weak diversion utilized by those incapable of discussing the actual science with any degree of legitimacy.
Michael Searcy
March 4, 2008 at 2:32 pm
And nor is your reaction new, Michael Searcy. But then there is science, and there is social science. In the latter category, Environmentalism wedded to the AGW thesis—or, excuse me, “fact”—is a religion. It is precisely what scholars of the scientific study of religion, e.g. those with Ph.D’s in Religious Studies or Comparative Religion, are trained to identify. What we didn’t train for was “diversion”.
That you would consider a study discredited because it is neither “new” nor “inventive” betrays an over-concern for newness and inventiveness. Are you by chance an engineer? I ask, because privileging “newness” is habitual for working scientists beholden to the rules of “priority”, while the emphasis “inventiveness” evokes an applied scientist such as an engineer. Alternatively, a valorization of the “not new” could bespeak a fascination with the origin of things—or even with the very concept of “the originary”. And that, for more than a century, has been a hallmark of neo-Pagans.
Let me illustrate how “not new” this concept is. Twenty years ago in the most selective private university in the U.S., a doctoral candidate approached the Chair of his Department of Religious Studies to propose a new dissertation topic: “Modern Environmentalism As Secularized Neo-Paganism”. The Chair dismissed the idea, saying simply, “Too obvious.”
As to this topic being less than inventive, the inventiveness—and the grim fun of it all—comes from the daily pronunciamenti from Cloud Cuckooland. Why just today, the founder of The Weather Channel publicly accused Al Gore of fraudulent business dealings for making millions off the sale of carbon emission credits when Gore knows very well that CO2 cannot, and therefore does not, contribute to global warming. Now the fun starts, you see: take a front-row seat and watch the “inventiveness” with which the honor of His Holiness is defended!
hughvic
March 4, 2008 at 3:18 pm
“But then there is science, and there is social science.”
And therein lies the problem. Too often, and as is the case here, those in opposition to the theory of anthropogenic global warming have to direct the discussion to the latter category, because they can’t maintain a defensible position in the former.
As an historical anthropologist, your desire to delve into recent reincarnations of the proposed equivalence between religious fervor and environmentalist whackjobs is not only understandable, it’s justifiable. However, that is a stance for which you are fairly uniquely qualified. To extend such courtesy to all individuals skeptical of mankind’s influence on global climate is being exceedingly and ridiculously generous.
The masses simply use such an argument as a means of belittling those with whom they cannot sustain on common ground. By the majority, it’s a tactic of the ignorant, utilized by those who cannot be bothered to read any matter on the subject beyond commentaries and press releases. They simply cannot be bothered and are all too willing to acquiesce and believe what they are told to believe in such media dispersions. This is not to say there aren’t an equal number on the opposing side who obtain their perception of knowledge through similar outlets, that’s just not the blog we’re responding to at this time.
Michael Searcy
March 4, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Well that’s damn well thought out, and I respect and appreciate it. Thing is, the debate on AGW is indeed a debate, and it does remain unsettled. While I hope for its swift conclusion, in the meantime I’m very skeptical of any claims of certitude from anyone. Again, nobody in her right mind is debating the weather; the question is the human role. So I hope it seems logical rather than narcissistic of me to agree with you that the Human Sciences do impinge here. I doubt that anyone in science ever has seen a scientific hypothesis become dogma so quickly; dogma, as in: question it, and kiss your career goodbye, and your credibility and reputation along with it. As long as the scientists continue to tear each other apart like hardball politicians, I choose to remain prepared for the possibility that that day may come when we look back on this whole dust-up as the first Cold Fusion fiasco of the new century. And that’s when I and my colleagues will be called in, in earnest, to explain how in hell all this could have happened. Lord Crimson may—just may—already have the answer.
hughvic
March 5, 2008 at 2:12 am
[…] The Religion of Global Warming – Wisdom From The Realm (February, 2008) […]
The Religion of Global Warming « The Jones View
March 9, 2008 at 5:03 pm
The Catholic Church is moving to make environmental irresponsibility a sin. Religion, in its proper sphere, making proper suggestions for behavior, if you ask me.
Climate is not a god. Studying climate is not a religion. Frustrating such study is a sin, for those who are religious.
God’s right with the world, again, for a while at least.
Ed Darrell
March 11, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Well, good. Once again Rome is but a few millennia behind Judaism, then.
Ed, whassup wichoo, mon? Nobody is placing them thangs into them religious categories. I might as well scold biologists by pointing out to them that a coke bottle is not an organism, and that studying Sociology of Religion is not doing Bioinformatics. You’re constructing a straw man with non sequiturs. It works as neither disputation nor satire.
Evidence. Data, please. What has been said in these quarters that invites censure from Science or the Holy Office?
hughvic
March 11, 2008 at 6:28 pm
Hi Ed,
Studying climate is a fine thing. The IPCC and Al Gore, however, have gone beyond study and are lobbying for political action on the basis of incomplete information and some rather shoddy “science,” and many over blown claims of doom and disaster. Even James Hansen, the chief architect of the Global Warming Scam, has admitted to exaggerating the worst case effects of possible temperature increases to encourage Government to pay attention to his suggestions.
As to the religious comparison, if that’s not the effect the Alarmists are aiming for, then they should get Al Gore to cease impersonating a Southern Baptist Preacher at his lectures.
the Grit
the Grit
March 13, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Thank you, the Grit. Your grit is Fine. And I admire your sand.
If the Al and the Micronesians want to mistake a thirsty B-29 for an egg-laying god, I’m not going to quarrel with the aeronautics. But somebody ought to let the natives in on the joke.
Just today I got a really weepy dunning letter from Leo DiCaprio, of all people, promising to save the Polar Bear cubs if I kick in to his favorite K Street Soros front. I shredded it before any of the impressionable wee ones could see it.
You’re right, if Al wants to be a Baptist Preacher, he ought to come to seminary at the Carter Center and bring his claw hammer and pay his dues. Or at least do some Huckabee discipleship. It would be good for his waistline. Mostly, I think the man ought to go out to someplace very like Micronesia and take his lovely wife and have himself a rest. He can weave wicker airplanes if he wants. Just rest.
hughvic
March 13, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Hi hughvic,
I’m not so sure about Al Gore taking a rest. Last time he did that there was the beard thing, he put on a lot of weight, and came up with the Global Warming Scam. Goodness knows what would happen if he lazed about again! Piercings, tattoos, and the end of the world? Maybe we can send him to NOLA to help clean up the mold?
the Grit
the Grit
March 14, 2008 at 3:08 pm
Clean air isn’t a new idea. We knew that air pollution was damaging at least as early as the 19th century, when it was discovered that soot caused scrotum cancers in chimney sweeps in London. I don’t know about you, but I think scrotum cancer is probably harmful, and something to be avoided.
Gore and IPCC are lobbying to continue the fight for clean air. We once had a good consensus that clean air was a good idea; we cleaned up particulates, we cleaned up NOx, we cleaned up SO2, we cleaned up unburned hydrocarbons from cars, we cleaned up fluoride emissions and lead. As a result, millions of Americans got longer lives. From the lead cleanup, we got a measurable, significant increase in intelligence, though voting in the two most recent presidential elections may make one wonder whether it was worth it.
As added incentive, scientists around the world note that the massive progress we made in clean air avoided the toughest, least visible stuff, the greenhouse gases and especially CO2 emissions. Suddenly, when the climate change effects become real, a bunch of pre-unleaded air people start yelling that the science can’t be right, and that we don’t need to do anything at all?
What is your case for dirty air? Please make it, if you can.
In the interim, we note that CO2 is a deadly poison if in too great a concentration, and that we should do what we can to keep it locked up in living matter for the sake of ecological balance, which tends to have significant effects on our food supplies and disease epidemics.
Now, if you can really make a case that starvation in the Sahel is a good idea — and let’s just note that this is one more case of where conservatives step over millions of dying babies just for political points — or that the entire world can live well on less food, or that we really don’t have to fear dengue fever, malaria, or yellow fever any more, make the case.
But in the meantime, don’t tell us that we should wait until we’re close to death to start doing something about the things that kill us.
This isn’t about hugging trees so much as it is about hugging humans and hugging life. Yeah, life is nasty, brutish and short. If you really think it’s a good idea that it should be nastier, more brutish and shorter, go ahead.
But I don’t think you can.
Is it any wonder that the use of anti-depressants rises whenever conservative “know-it-alls” are in political power?
Ed Darrell
March 14, 2008 at 5:30 pm
So Ed, now you’re a social psychologist with a causal link between conservatives in high office and the public’s consumption of anti-depressants?
And do you have any more straw man weaving to do? I mean, are you finished yet constructing your notional ideal target?
No matter how many times or how clearly someone tells you he’s NOT saying something, still you claim that that is precisely what the person is saying, and is saying in the most ludicrous, crazed and most of all assailable fashion possible.
We’re not debating what you call the “weather”. But you say we are. We’re not debating climate change. But you say we are. Nobody said a thing about being cavalier with the degradation and destruction of the natural environment, and you have us being cavalier, and doing so in the name of your chosen bogey, “conservatism” (as in conservationism). We say we’re not debating the metaphorical “aeronautics”, but rather wish to draw attention to the attempted manipulation of the “natives” (lay persons), some of whom react superstitiously, and we say, truthfully, that we find that FACT variously regrettable and damned interesting.
Meanwhile you have us pegged as Luddites and conservatives who will “step over millions of dying babies just for political points”. You’re shadow boxing, Ed. How come?
hughvic
March 15, 2008 at 2:32 am
You wish it were shadow boxing, I suspect.
You’re not talking about the weather? You’re not advocating a continuation of pollution, while denigrating all those who point to the problems? You’re not disagreeing with the facts of the climate, while calling those who note them a part of a climate “religion?”
Okay, I’m just a poor country lawyer. I don’t know all them high-falutin’ words and references. What the hell is the point of the original post? Does it say we need to act to counteract the effects of warming or not?
Ed Darrell
March 15, 2008 at 3:49 am
Hi Ed
Since this is my original post I’ll jump in here and answer your question about the point of the content.
Environmentalism is a vast subject containing many shades of gray. This particular post seeks to examine just “one” aspect which is the religion of global warming. Hopefully by concentrating on a smaller chunk it will help us understand the bigger picture.
Religions in general encourage followers to assume the role of telling others how they should live their lives. We see this trait in the followers of environmentalism. If environmentalist want to worship at the alter of nature then so be it, but they must understand that many others already have a religion or relationship with God and don’t wish to kneel to their god.
To break it down into a concise thought we are left with the message – you worship your god and I’ll worship mine. By extension it’s not your responsibility to finance my beliefs nor is it my responsibility to finance yours.
This is not to say we all can’t do our part in maintaining a clean place to live, in fact it’s encouraged. It’s just that many environmentalist have some way-out ideas about what is necessary for good planet maintenance and usually go after the wrong people in their zeal to please their god.
Lord Crimson
Lord Crimson
March 15, 2008 at 11:45 am
Hi Ed,
Well, if you’re really worried about all the starving people around the world, you should be waging war on the Global Warming Alarmists, not the conservatives. On one hand, if global warming is real, that’s great for agriculture. Plants, you might recall, take in the CO2 we mammals exhale and use it in their biological processes in much the same way we breath in the oxygen that is their waste gas. So, just like you would breath easier in an atmosphere with more oxygen, plants do better when CO2 levels go up. Most plants also like a warmer temperature and the longer growing season that brings. Therefor, when plants grow better, crop yields increase, providing more food and reducing starvation.
On the other hand, the measures the Alarmists want to impose on civilization would drastically decrease the rate of industrialization in all those countries that can’t seem to feed their own populations. This, by the way, includes the industrialization of agriculture, which in many of these places is still in the stone age. You can see the difference that technology and modern farm practices can make by looking at US agriculture, where one farmer feeds something like 250 people, as compared to the effectiveness of agriculture in some of the African countries where one farmer can’t always feed one person. Once again, a reasonable person can only come to the conclusion that wasting time and effort to stop the release of a natural component of our atmosphere will kill far more people than even the most dramatic estimates of damage from Global Warming will ever do.
On the gripping hand, you should also note that our current conservative President and the programs he pushed through Congress have done more to help the poverty stricken in Africa than decades of liberal feel-good policies. For that matter, much the same can be said for Bush having worked near miracles to reduce poverty and improve public education in the US. I do, however, understand that actually making progress by helping people be responsible for their own welfare isn’t as glamorous or satisfying as simply throwing coins to the crowd, so I can see how emotionally based people might prefer having a large and perpetual under-class available as targets for doling out other peoples’ money and getting that endorphin rush for doing a good dead without actually putting out any effort.
the Grit
the Grit
March 15, 2008 at 5:04 pm
Ed, are you all right? Are you listening? Because you say that you have been addressing the “point” of the original post, about which you ask: “Does it say we need to act to counteract the effects of warming or not?” And the answer, Ed, is “not”. It’s not there, man. It’s a shadow. You’re boxing with your own shadow. Again, why?
hughvic
March 15, 2008 at 6:50 pm
That’d be fine if the people in the Sahel could move to Canada. Alas, since they can’t, they starve.
Global warming may be a net boon for humans, but it will be generations before things are sorted out. Right now it’s causing war in Darfur, starvation across much of the rest of Africa, and disasters across Asia and South America. Australia is afire, quite literally. If you regard those as good, or as offset by other good things, you’re not paying attention. So far there are tens of thousands more dead than fed from climate change.
Ed Darrell
March 17, 2008 at 3:40 am
And science is used to saying, ‘Here is the evidence; let’s use the best we know in devising policy.’
It’s not climate change activists like Al Gore who are playing this like religion. Gore doesn’t say “do this because God says.” Gore doesn’t say, “do this without asking why.” Gore STARTS by saying, “Here is the evidence I have seen, here is what the best experts say about it, I’m asking you to join me in acting to save the planet for these reasons.”
Opponents say, “We don’t believe that’s right.” So far, there isn’t much evidence to support the counter-action argument. There are nits about how much warming there is, nits about how much of the warming is caused by human activities, and a general, faith-based refusal to do anything about it.
You’re right, there is religious thinking and acting in the climate debate that is dangerous. But it’s not the climate change advocates who show that tendency in any way.
Ed Darrell
March 17, 2008 at 3:45 am
Hugo, here in Texas we’re paying 20% higher home insurance prices than we did a few years ago, because the economists with the insurance companies have determined that global warming will cause more damaging freezes, a lot more tornadoes, and a lot more damaging hail. It’s nearly impossible to insure a home on the coast.
The real, economic effects, are already here. If it’s a ghost, it’s a ghost with a hell of a wallop, and I pay every month for it.
I’m reluctant to say the markets are not acting on good information. This trend in the markets is a decade old, now, and so far there is not a single piece of evidence to support any claim that nothing is happening in climate, and a lot less to support a claim that we don’t need to do anything. Have you checked with the governments of the Netherlands, Bengla Desh, or China, lately? They think you’re all wet.
Ed Darrell
March 17, 2008 at 3:48 am
Hi Ed. That wasn’t the ghost to which I referred. The ghost was your seeing in the original post either a call to action on climate change or a call to inaction. The original post was about the weird spectacle of fellow Americans mistaking, as it were, aluminum-clad B-29’s for shining gods that lay 55-gallon eggs. In a sense all we’ve been discussing is what a botch job this selling of ANTHROPOGENIC climate change, and its implications for public policy, has been. Elsewhere I’ve said that were only Science, or even Climatology, as monolithic as a corporation, we’d simply say that the time obviously has come for the corporation to hire a new Communications firm and launch a new campaign.
I mean, you know me: I’m just fascinated by any confusion whatever between secular and religious categories. (So of course I’m in a candy shop with this presidential race!) And of course I realize that you guys don’t want that confusion to occur, but can I help it if I’m paparazzi? A person’s gotta eat.
You—and also my best friend, a religious philosopher—have brought it home to me that it can’t be repeated often enough that some End Draws Nigh climatological prophets, and some outlandishly opportunistic politicians (not to mention any names, but Governor Kathleen Sibelius), and some half-sprouted neo-Pagans and Pontifical homeroom idiots SHOULD NEVER STAY OUR EFFORTS TO IMPROVE OUR ENVIRONMENTAL CONDUCT AND STEWARDSHIP. I’ve always assumed that that sort of went without saying, ever since “Ecology” was an instant bipartisan hit in the 1968 presidential campaign. But I was mistaken. It does need constant reinforcement, and our efforts should if anything be speeded whilst the Climatologists and their extradisciplinary colleagues continue to try to locate the nexus, if any, between human action and Global Warming.
“Debate closed”, saith Albert Gore, Jr.
hughvic
March 17, 2008 at 4:25 am
Hi Ed,
The problem with your theory is that Africa isn’t, according to NASA GISS data, warming. Most all the supposed temperature increases are around the poles. Reference: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/maps/
the Grit
the Grit
March 17, 2008 at 4:01 pm
Uh-ummm. I’m TELLING! Mister Gore said the debate is O-VER, and you are DE-BATE-ING!! You are going to be in SO MUCH trouble. You just wait!
hughvic
March 17, 2008 at 7:29 pm
Wait? Reminds me of the cartoon of the two buzzards. Wait, hell! I’m going to go melt something!
Africa isn’t warming: The glaciers on Kilimanjaro are melting out of fear? The temperature around Nairobi, and the subsequent migration of mosquitoes that are malaria vectors, was done in error?
Ooh. God is gonna be so embarrassed when He finds out.
Ed Darrell
March 18, 2008 at 12:10 am
You hear that, Hominy? Now he’s calling us sonsabuzzards! The man will stop at nothing.
Before this battle resumes at daybreak, might we agree on the rule that efforts to improve environmental awareness and protection shall proceed apace, and that we are faced with the repercussions of macroclimatic change, wherever it has occurred and whatever its human cause may or may not be? Because, if we can agree on that, then perhaps we could all do the scientifically and morally responsible thing, and await preponderant scientific evidence that would compel us to the conclusion that we are wholly or partly causing the climatological dangers and can pinpoint and alter the mechanisms of that causation.
If not, then have at it. From the usual twenty paces.
Me, I like to watch.
hughvic
March 18, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Hi Ed,
The Kilimanjaro glacier is melting due to deforestation in the area that has changed the local weather patterns. While I don’t recall any mention of Nairobi in the literature, you should note that it was the coldest year on record in the Middle East with snow in many places that haven’t seen such in recorded history. You have to keep in mind that when the Alarmists speak of “global warming” they mean on average. Most of the serious temperature change is near the poles, as you can see from any of the maps in the IPCC reports. Thus, some parts of the Arctic and Antarctic and Siberia have gone from -20F to -16F (or something like that), much of the world is about the same as always, and some of it, including southern Africa and the upper parts of North America, has cooled down a bit. This is one way you can tell that it’s a scam, that being the careful selection of terminology to scare people who aren’t affected by the supposed warming out of their money.
Hi h,
I’m not sure I can hit someone with a CD full of temperature data at 20 paces, but I’ll give it a try.
the Grit
the Grit
March 18, 2008 at 5:53 pm
Sure. You should note that record colds are a predicted effect of global warming (which is why “climate change” may be a better description than “warming”). What the greenhouse effect does is trap energy in the atmosphere. More energy has to be discharged somewhere, somehow. If there is more energy, then there will be wider swings — higher highs, lower lows, wetter wets, and drier drys.
I have noted that parts of the planet were the coldest on record.
You should note that is a clear indication of global warming.
Ed Darrell
March 18, 2008 at 10:02 pm
May it please the court, I’m very interested in Ed’s description of climatic volatility being a function of energy, and if I don’t get at least a little handle on how that works, then I’ll now have to be one of those who fills in the gaps with magical saltations, like, Zeus does it with mirrors. Do you mean that the trapped greenhouse gases load atmospheric pressures that increase the incidence and severity of meterological disruptions? (Or something like that?) That CO2 stirs the pot in the sky? If so, how does that work, please?
A layman in these matters, I’m simply unaccustomed to thinking of climate in terms of energy-in/energy-out. It’s fascinating, though, to this Fisher-Price mind.
hughvic
March 19, 2008 at 3:50 pm
Hi Ed and h,
Yes, some of the Alarmists are covering their butts by predicting cooling effects from Global Warming, but these are based only on the possible interruption of the North Atlantic Current, which is still flowing nicely and has almost nothing to do with weather, or climate, in the Middle East.
On the subject of how the greenhouse effect works, the assumption made by “climate scientists” is that those gases are well mixed in the atmosphere, so the resulting minor warming should be fairly uniform around the planet. However, they also assume that this minor warming will, in places, activate other weather mechanisms, such as local increases in atmospheric water vapor levels or changes in surface reflectivity due to loss of snow and ice cover, and they call these “forcings.” While there is no proof, or anything close to proof, of “forcings,” they use them to explain the uneven distribution of observed temperature change. Since their predictions so often fail, they also go to great lengths to blame this on as yet poorly understood climate factors like El Ninio (sp?) which should make one ask why, if there is so much poorly understood on the subject, we should take their word on Global Warming?
As to energy distribution affecting weather, hughvic, all weather is generally the result of uneven energy distribution, mostly in the form of heat. That’s what makes the wind blow, and the ocean currents flow, and the mechanism that drives this is the change in density in a substance as its temperature changes. Warm air rises and cold air sinks, which is why hot air balloons can fly. Much the same is true for water, with the exception that, when it freezes it expands, and becomes less dense than it is in the liquid state, and that’s why ice cubes float. Of course, if ice gets cold enough, it eventually increases in density and sinks, but if it gets that cold on Earth, this interesting physical property of water will be the least of our worries.
On the other hand, it’s also possible that the gods are fooling us by making their whims as to how the universe works consistent, for the moment. The point of this, of course, would be to, once we get good and settled in trusting the consistency of an ordered world, they’d change things and get a really good laugh as our planes fell from the sky, integrated circuits became segregated, and nuclear reactors started producing ice cream instead of electricity. It’s interesting to note, on this subject, that some of Stephen Halking’s work suggests that it is possible to have a black hole with on sheltering event horizon, leaving a naked singularity. Since the physics around such an object are undefined making anything possible, it may be that the Old Gods do dance atop Mount Olympus, leaving us as the butt of a most complex cosmic joke.
the Grit
the Grit
March 19, 2008 at 6:39 pm
Haha, a lot of truth in there. Don’t pay attention to all of the brain washed fanatics that you upset in the process of posting your thoughts on a topic with a lot of “followers”. The more offended people get at the idea of you questioning their beliefs just proves you are dead on. Anyone with a regular religion that actually believes in it of their own free will (not brainwashed by their parents, friends, or the media) is typically open to discussion without getting instantaneously offended. Unfortunately Global warming (or climate change) is acting much like the Catholic church of old, demanding you pay your dues or labeling you a heretic and having you tarred and feathered
Now I believe we shouldn’t be cruel to the environment, that’s why I have a recycling bin (lol), but stop shoving it down people’s throats.
Shane McP
June 6, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Ahoy, the Grit! I’m thinking that maybe we should tell Shane and others here that this string is an ultra-multidisciplinary cable, but that—to paraphrase the late Molly Ivins—you just might need a scientist for this science thing. So that Ed is doing us that service.
Hugo
June 7, 2008 at 7:04 pm
ppl cool it i mean if u cn spend all dat time typing n arguin put it 2 better use n do sumthin to prevent it!!!!!
praxi
June 14, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Well plural-praxis, maybe you’d consider spending a little more time breathing some sociability into those consonants of yours, and consider working in common, cooperatively, with some of we who might feel the way you do.
Jst tnk @ t, iz all I’m syn, smartass.
Hugo
June 18, 2008 at 12:55 am