The American Spectator

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(Page 7 of 17)

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Since "carbon credits" are invisible, what is there to keep the same "credits" from being sold over and over? Talk about snake oil salesmen, this is a winner. This has got to be one of the dumbest things going.

p>Today I am not using A/C so I can sell what I am not using to someone that wants to keep their A/C on and it just comes out as a wash. How is this going to help anything? Not that I think anything needs to be done in the first place. Just remember it was not very many years ago that we were going into an ice age, at least if you listened to the wackos. br> -- Elaine Kyle /p>

I found Peter Hannaford's article very interesting, especially the part where he repeats Mr. (Dr.?) Gray's observation that the Earth may cool down in 5-10 years.

I've often wondered how close our observations "track" to what is actually occurring; are the supposed "effects" we see today caused by today's activities or "yesterday's" activities. In other words, is there some delay in what we observe and what caused it? Even better, are there "things" happening today (or even yesterday) that are already mitigating the problem, only we haven't yet seen their effect on the system?

This is a process called hysteresis: the delay between impetus and observation. The phenomenon can be observed in many scientific areas such as magnetics and the elastic behavior of plastics. I struggled with the principle while in Engineering school, as did many others. It's difficult thinking in terms of responses in days or even years, much less decades, especially to the "I want it now" generation. It could very well explain the disparities between temperatures and CO2 observations. Then again, as Gray points out, it could be that CO2 isn't even a player. But there's probably still some hysteresis occurring. After all, the Earth represents a DAMN BIG SYSTEM.

The other process, the one favored by the TOOTSIF, is called hysteria. That probably doesn't need much explanation, but I'll attempt one: it's the measure of the response by the ill-informed to any phenomenon that they've accepted as "bad." It's a differential equation defined as H=dR/dT where dR is the change in response and dT is how fast it comes. Hysteria is maximized when dT approaches zero.

There are a LOT of zeros in TOOTSIF.

p>Prior to anyone flaming me for this, please be sure to purchase some carbon offsets and offer up a virgin sacrifice to Gaia. I'm just watching out for you. No charge this time... br> -- Karl F. Auerbach br> Eden, Utah

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