Conservatives repeat inane claim that CO2 can't be a pollutant because "we breathe" it

[compJockey]

Originally Posted by momonkey

Well, ancient man certainly didn't drive an ancient car to his job at an ancient factory so I expect the source of the CO2 was non-anthropogenic in any case. The effect on the those living at the time was greater prosperity due to greater harvests and of course a better selection of wild animals to eat at a time when people didn't know what was for dinner until they bashed its skull in.

"Professor Stott said the evidence also undermined doom-laden predictions about the effect of higher temperatures.

'During the medieval warm period, the world was warmer even than today, and history shows that it was a wonderful period of plenty for everyone,' he said."

Research casts doubt on global warming theory - theage.com.au

I could see a lot of issues with providing the world's increasing population enough food and fresh water being solved by global warming that I attribute to increased solar output. Higher temperatures mean increased precipitation, and increasing levels of CO2 will boost plant growth. It's a win-win.

I was trying to determine a comparison point to today's 6 billion people, millions of cars, etc - that we're just now getting back to ancient earth levels of CO2 somehow (fewer or no people depending on what time you speak of, no cars, no factories), doesn't make a lot of sense.

[compJockey]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

The point is the title of the article is simply made to deceive people. They are comparing the radiation in fly ash to nuclear waste in a containment area designed to keep radiation inside. They don't even make that clarification until a year after it was written. That's besides the fact fly ash is used in many products most notably concrete as it makes it stronger.

Here's what the USGS has to say http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/1997/fs163-97/FS-163-97.html (http://pubs.usgs.gov/fs/1997/fs163-97/FS-163-97.html: - broken link)



The uranium is concentrated during the burning process, doesn't mean its toxic though because we're not that much higher than granite which a lot people are using for counter tops.

In the following graph radiation from burning coal falls under "other":



You're more likely to get radiation poisoning from a granite counter top or the dirt under your feet. The article is sensationalizing an issue that is really irrelevant.

So maybe the author was paid to write that by a lobbyist from the nuclear industry?

I'll just take your word for it for now (sleep calls).
However, I seriously doubt that the author was comparing to nuclear waste to something we'd use for counter tops.

I'll read your new link tomorrow if I maintain interest in this tangent (all stemming from you jumping to the defense of CO2 for being called pollution).

[thecoalman]

The articles title is "Coal ash more radioactive than nuclear waste"... how much more deceptive can it be?

The point of providing the article is to provide the best example I can of someone using words to try and manipulate people. Strictly speaking the article is correct but without context it's an attempt to needlessly put fear into into people. Why else choose a title a like that? Like I said it could just as easily say "Dirt is more radioactive than nuclear waste". Much the same as saying CO2 is pollutant, when people hear pollutant they think of taoxic barrles glowing green. CO2 is harmless unless you breathe it in very high concentrations.

[compJockey]

Originally Posted by thecoalman

The articles title is "Coal fas more radioactive than nuclear waste"... how much more deceptive can it be?

The point of the article is to provide the best example I can of someone using words to try and manipulate people. Strictly speaking the article is correct but without context it's an attempt to needlessly put fear into into people. Why else choose a title a like that? Like I said it could just as easily say "Dirt is more radioactive than nuclear waste".

Hmm.
That is the best example of twisting words you can think of?
Strictly related to science I assume.

Politicians spin/mislead to a greater magnitude than that article, and on a daily basis.

[momonkey]

Originally Posted by mossomo

You know you cannot have it both ways. If CO2 is a pollutant, countries volcanos would by definition be considered a liability/a pollutant and as defined, should be taxed as such.

Decaying bodies would also release CO2. Looks like we'll all have to buy carbon credts if we plan on dying.

[BigJon3475]

Oceans Found to Absorb Half of All Man-Made Carbon Dioxide

The problem with CO2 absorption in the ocean is it turns it more acidic. If you go to the bottom of the food chain you'll find little (very little) crustacean type animals. They are basically calcium deposits. If you go back to high school chemistry you'll know exactly what happens to calcium deposits when water on the negative side of the calcium saturation index touches it. On the food chain what happens if you kill out the very bottom? The whole house comes tumbling down...

Richard Feely, a marine chemist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, is the study's lead author.
Feely said, "Because carbon dioxide is an acid gas, the surface ocean pH is dropping" (pH is a measure of acidity in solutions).
If predictions made by Feely's team are right, the surface of oceans—where most marine life is found—could soon become more acidic than they have been in five million years.
This increase in acidity makes it difficult for shell-forming animals and some algae to amass carbonate ions from the seawater to form their calcium carbonate shells.
Corals, some types of mollusk, and tiny planktonic organisms called foraminifers and coccolithophorids could all be affected. Many of these species form key links in the marine food chain.