–By Daily Tech
A new threat to all life on the planet? And yes, it’s YOUR fault! Coming soon on your local news! (You’ll see…just wait!)
Atmospheric oxygen levels are declining! The sky is falling! Accompanied by scary graphs and even more frightening scenarios, the new environmental disaster of oxygen depletion seems poised to overtake the crumbling CO2 fright as the next great challenge to mankind’s survival. Someone call Al Gore! He needs to jump on the next big cash cow! Maybe he can create another “consensus” of celebrity psuedo-scientists to support him and get the mega corporations to milk it for all it’s worth! Soon our school systems will be educating the “facts” to our naive innocent children, thus inspiring even more unfounded fear and anxiety in their lives! Oh yeah, and maybe he’ll make another one of his Hollywood science fiction movies too! -JC
The story is already making converts in the media, which includes Peter Tatchell of the U.K. Guardian, who recently ran a breathless story on possible consequences, including “genetic mutations, hormonal changes…cancer, degenerative diseases” and even death.
Tatchell says the rate of decline has dramatically increased in the past 30 years. He calls for immediate “scientific research” to examine the problem, blissfully unaware that several dozen researchers have been doing just that for decades.
The decline is predictably pinned on “deforestation” and mankind’s “burning of fossil fuels”. Once again, man is trashing the planet. Sorry if I just rolled my eyes again…lol.
The only problem? It’s pure bunkum. Unlike the trace gas CO2, oxygen comprises over 20% of the atmosphere. Oxygen is the most abundant element in the earth’s crust; it accounts for nearly 90% of the mass of the ocean. While we can’t breathe water, atmospheric oxygen levels have been measured since the 1890s and haven’t varied to within three significant digits (a tenth of a percentage point). Also, forests and greenery around the world have been growing at a fast rate and have increased approximately 40% during the last 50 years, and it’s all thanks to that wonderful CO2, which is, in fact, a very beneficial gas which encourages plant growth! Back when the dinosaurs ruled, much of Earth was a lush green paradise, largely due to the fact that CO2 levels were MUCH higher than they are today.
The fearsome decline seen in the graph is the result of misinterpretation, designed to impress. The values given are relative, not absolute, and correspond to changes of a few parts per million. With O2 levels currently at 210,000 ppm, the changes we measure won’t be significant for tens of thousands of years, if then.
I’m sure Mr Gore would love to take a graph like this and project it on a four-story screen, much like his flawed “hockey stick” graph which has now been completely debunked throughout the scientific world. It’s no wonder An Inconvenient Truth has been banned from many public school systems, finally. (Even the high court of England has cited 35 major scientific errors in the film and has labeled it as “political propaganda” not suitable for the education system. Good for them!)
Dr. Andrew Manning of the Scripps Atmospheric Oxygen Research Group tells Daily Tech the miniscule rate of O2 decline is of “no concern whatsoever to human health or any ecosystem”. According to Manning, while fossil fuels do consume oxygen, an ever-increasing amount of plant life in the biosphere offsets the loss. (Thanks, CO2!)
So what is the source of this crackpot idea? Nope, not Gore this time. It stems from the writings of interdisciplinary ex-professor Ervin Lazlo. Lazlo calls himself “the recognized founder of systems philosophy”, a New Age holistic pseudo-science that has unfortunately accomplished nothing useful since he created it 35 years ago. Lazlo is the founder of the Club of Budapest, an environmental group which specializes in “planetary consciousness”. The group shares members and ideas with the Club of Rome best known for the “Limits to Growth” scare of the early 1970s. That led to a book of the same name, which became the best-selling environmental title of all time. The book was roundly called tripe by dozens of esteemed economists, and even later admitted to be nothing more than a caper to gain media attention — none of which seemed to hurt sales. Even today one can still find environmentalists still quoting the book’s conclusions as fact. The environmental movement has a long history of promoting scare stories without a shred of scientific backing. From “Silent Spring” which predicted the global death of all bird life, to forest-demolishing acid rain, to more modern scares such as Alar and GM foods, the climate change hoax, etc, the poor track record of success seems to only stimulate a never-ending stream of new drivel.
At least this time around, you’ve been forewarned.
I've often wondered why more concern is not expressed about the depletion of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. Back in the Jurassic era, CO2 levels were as much as twenty times higher than they are now. Oxygen levels only became high enough to support aerobic life some 600 million years ago. Three and half billion years of photosynthesis had by then converted most of the CO2 on the planet to free oxygen molecules and carbon compounds (e.g. sugar, coal, diamonds).
If this trend had continued unabated, eventually all of the CO2 would have been gone. As you mentioned, it is already a trace gas. Without carbon dioxide, all plant life would perish, followed in short order by all animal life.
Fortunately, this is not what's happening. CO2 levels are finally going up again. That so many humans are hitting the panic button in response to this natural wave (What goes down, must come up.) would be funny were it not so scary.
From Otto – You may find this video interesting, please watch it for a bit, thanks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nt72W08uv0Q
Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one, and they all stink… so here's mine…
Freedom of speech is a double edged sword. It's easy to hide behind when you have your own group of "scientists" to back you up.
When you alone believe something solely based on faith, you are insane. When millions of people believe the same thing for the same reason, you are religious.
Global warming is a religion for atheists. It's comforting to think you are making the world better. It doesn't need to be true, you just have to believe it. Faith again.
It has become a popular device to assert anyone speaking against global warming is either paid off by big oil or they just have their heads buried in the sand. That is the power of religion (in any form), the power to judge others as insufficient or immoral without evidence.
Literally or figuratively, people who don't believe in their particular magic man on a cloud become heretics and should be burned alive. Is that the next step, to actually eliminate all opposition to global warming (in environmentally friendly, high efficiency ovens perhaps)? Maybe create heretic laws banning the questioning of this new religion. After all, there is a consensus of all important scientists! Dissension is now "crazy".
What if the neo-environmentalists are wrong? What if the ultimate goal is not to "save the earth" but to "save the earth (for the powerful wealthy minority)"?
In my humble opinion, if a politician backs something, it means he/she is making money off of it somehow, directly or indirectly. These released emails are direct evidence of some type of loose conspiracy, by definition, to manipulate the facts to fit a desired outcome.
Is it not illegal to take money for something which you know is not true, or intentionally misleading? Isn't there a conspiracy to commit fraud here? Each and every scientist who has taken money for global warming research that has propagated this stupidity is guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud.
AND they will get away with it too. Mainstream Media will not discuss this because while personally it is impossible to ignore, it is also just too radioactive to touch professionally. Ignore it and this too will fall into the memory hole to be forgotten by the next news cycle.
This "global warming” is a sham from beginning to end, envisioned by the elites after the "cold war" ended with the USSR imploding. New enemies were needed, and when none were found and we were on the doorstep of peace for the first time in many lifetimes, some other evil was invented to scare us into submission. To scare us into further taxation, control and subservience. They are good at what they do! They have already won.
I don't condone violence, nor would I participate in it. However, I would imagine that the only way to defeat these elites is a resort to bitter violence. Only with the support of the lower ranks in the military can any revolution succeed. Without that, it will be violently quelled, as has been done in the past (again, down the memory hole so it never happened).
As an American citizen, is it not your duty to uphold the constitution, including outright revolt should the government no longer represent the people? Wasn't that what the whole point was of separating from England? Now you are in a similar situation, except you have supra-national corporations as your master, instead of supra-national imperialist governments. Do you see the difference? I don't.
Antithetical
please do not claim there is no reality to the dangers posed by GM foods. realize that the same groups which support fearmongering in regard to climate are those pushing GM foods on thirdworld nations to control local food production. if you realize the lies inherent in climate change propaganda.. you should not be buying the hype that GM is safe for local economies. research your claims.
Hey GM Food is bad 4 U