On Jan 25, 11:00 am, Paul M. Eldridge
wrote:
My apologies; I managed to lose the text of my reply.
On 25 Jan 2007 06:02:54 -0800, wrote:
Or how about some of the other bandwagons that the scientific/political
community jumped on, only to be proven wrong? Remember how in the
70s they told us that because of fat, eating butter was going to kill
us? So, they recommended replacing it with margarine, made out of
transfats. Now, according to current thinking, it turns out the
margarine was far worse. So bad, in fact, that NYC just past a law
barring it from all restaurants.Let's be clear. New York City did NOT ban the use of margarine in
restaurants; the ban pertains to artificial trans fats and margarine
that does not contain artificial trans fats can still be used.
Yes, it is transfat that has been banned from NYC restaurants., which
is what I had in mind when I wrote the above. And of course margarine
that is made without transfats is still allowed. But it doens't
change the fact that 25 years ago, scientists claimed that magarine
made from transfat should be used to replace butter, which was supposed
to be bad. Margarines containing transfat were widely marketed,
complete with health benefit statements. And that proved to bad
advice, at least if they are right this time.
And the irony of what NYC is doing is that had they passed similar laws
25 years ago, they would have forced restaurants to replace butter with
transfat. That's one reason why what NYC is doing is just plain
stupid. There is plenty of information out there already about
transfat. Many commercial products have already eliminated them, as
have many fast food chains. More laws aren't needed, especially given
that the "experts" have been wrong before. Individuals can decide for
themselves what they want to eat.
If you want to learn more about the butter versus margarine debate,
see:
http://www.clevelandclinic.org/heart...evention/askdi...
And this is not something new. Nutrionists have warned for years that
diets high in saturated and tans fats can greatly increase our risk of
obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart attack, stroke and colon cancer.
Concerns over hydrogenated oils date back at least twenty-five years.
Now that I disagree with There may have been some concern raised
starting 25 years ago, but what about the late 60s, 70s when the
experts told us to eat margarine, which was full of transfat, instead
of butter? And I would say the real consensus against transfat did
not occur until the last decade or so. Sure, you can go back and say
there was some research that suggested problems, but that is 20/20
hindsight.
The thing that makes me most skeptical of global warming being caused
by man, is that whenever it's brought up and discussed, there is never
a discussion about previous warming/cooling cycles that occurred in the
absence of any possible man made effects. Exactly what caused all of
these cycles and how do we know the same effect is occuring now?You mean such as this:
http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/pastcc.html
or this?
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/edu/gwdebate/
These references just talk about general factors that they think
contributed to previous warming/cooling cycles. Which is exactly the
point. No one knows for sure. Look at the graph going back 400K
years. It shows 5 peaks in temperature and CO2. Since man can only
possibly be responsible for the current peak, what explains the other
4? Also note that while the current peak is the largest of the 4
complete cycles, 4 cycles and 400K years is a just a brief instant in
Earth's history. We don;'t know how high other cycles got.
And then there is the issue of cause and effect. Just because CO2 and
temp rise and fail together doesn't mean CO2 caused the temp rise. It
could just as well be that the rise in temp caused the CO2 increase.
Especially since other gases, like Methane also have risen and fallen
with temp. Just like a soda can releases more CO2 when it's warm, so
too the oceans are less capable of holding gasses when the temp rises.
This is especially interesting given that temp peaks and leads CO2 by
about 800 years.
Finally, we also have the issue of how reliable estimates are of
exactly what the Earth's temperature was 400K years ago. No one was
around taking measurements, so we are left relying on proxies, which
are virtually impossible to verify.
As for scientists being in consensus, here's what Richard Lindzen,
Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT had to say, about how
established, reputable scientists who disagree are being ignored or
shut out of discussion:I presume this is the same Richard Lindzen who has testified on behalf
of the Western Fuels Association, a consortium of coal miners and
coal-fired utilities and OPEC, right?
See:http://www.desmogblog.com/comment/reply/417
Cheers,
Paul
Does the fact that this MIT professor has testified on behalf of
industry make him any less credible than scientists that speak out for
whacko liberal environmental organizations that have no balance and
oppose everything?