Climate Change Denier comes in from the cold: SCIENCE!!!

Wow, AGW disproved in 4 short sentences and a handful of simple numbers. All those scientists must feel like total fools!

Sadly, not necessarily."The backfire effect occurs when, in the face of contradictory evidence, established beliefs do not change but actually get stronger. The effect has been demonstrated experimentally in psychological tests, where subjects are given data that either reinforces or goes against their existing biases - and in most cases people can be shown to increase their confidence in their prior position regardless of the evidence they were faced with.In a pessimistic sense, this makes most refutations useless."Backfire effect - RationalWiki

The end of the world is nigh! Doom, doom, we're all doomed!What is it about you fundie nutters? Everything is a bloody sign and you're so damn miserable but don't do anything about it but moan.Put that bloody useless book down and get a life.

We should focus on being realistic and grounded in reality - simple-minded optimism is just as bad as doom, doom, doom. Certainly, they're obvious garbage. Lots of people are doing things, millions of people. The world is turning. It's slow in some parts and fast in others. With your turd of a president it's actually trying to go backwards in your part. Whether it's fast enough to prevent a huge amount of future damage is yet to be seen.But this is a man-made problem and it's going to be mankind that fixes it, or doesn't. The world won't care and your god isn't going to help so there's no point you wasting your time wailing and grovelling to him. Your time would be better used campaigning to change things and doing what you can yourself.All this chest beating is just an excuse for doing nothing yourself.

I've pondered this a few times looking for something sensible in it. I'm not finding it.The scientific method is the best tool we've built to sort out fact from fiction. It's built our modern world. Without it we'd still be in the dark ages.Do you have a better method of establishing whether, say, a new drug works or if it's snake oil?What have you got Mike? Are you going to just think very hard about it and declare it efficacious? Maybe look it up in your 2,000 year old book?You do understand that when a scientist does something, he not only has to say what his conclusions are he has to publish his methodology so that others can verify it? It's a methodology that catches and corrects errors.Scientists don't just accept what other scientists say, they check and test. It's believers that listen uncritically to the guy in the pulpit and obliged to believe everything the institution tells them for pain of everlasting damnation. Untested and untestable. A mere assertion.

Why only a hundred? That's just a list of random products. It would be hard to find a manufactured product that doesn't use fossil fuels in it's production. (Let's forget distribution.)If you're going to put telephones in the list you might as well include all electrical goods and all white goods. What's the difference between a fishing boot and a shoe? A sweater and a dress? Dishwasher parts and dishwashers?There are literally millions of modern products that currently use fossil fuels and trillions of them are produced every year.So the job is to find alternatives and for some it will be easy - you can make dresses and sweaters from wool and cotton - some will be harder. Some may not be worth doing at all.I think you're making some big mistakes here. The reason we use fossil fuels in almost everything is the reason we need to be finding ways to not do that and because it may be difficult to reduce them in some things is not a reason to not reduce them at all.And this

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Technology for wind and solar seems to have plateaued

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Is just out-and-out wrong.Wind power is one of the fastest-growing renewable energy technologies. Usage is on the rise worldwide, in part because costs are falling. Global installed wind-generation capacity onshore and offshore has increased by a factor of almost 75 in the past two decades, jumping from 7.5 gigawatts (GW) in 1997 to some 564 GW by 2018, according to IRENA's latest data. Production of wind electricity doubled between 2009 and 2013, and in 2016 wind energy accounted for 16% of the electricity generated by renewables. Many parts of the world have strong wind speeds, but the best locations for generating wind power are sometimes remote ones. Offshore wind power offers tremendous potential.Wind energySolar energyEdited by Tangle, : No reason given.

I said forget it because you don't need to include it to make your argument. We're utterly dependent on fossil fuels. It's not a contentious point. You may have noticed that Texas is not the world. Or even the USA. We need distribution grids and power storage (not just batteries) to deal with gaps in supply. We also need nuclear power. Now you're just being silly. Everything has problems everything wears out. We manage those 'problems' with everything else.

Congratulations. So what, it was a totally stupid position.We all know that our modern way of life is built on the use of fossil fuels but we also now know that that use is killing the world. So it has to change. Unfortunately it has too whether it's ready or not. Left to deniers like you, we would never be ready.

I suspect that's because we both think that our dependence on fossil fuels needs to change so that we are no longer dependent on fossils fuels. Whether we are able to do it without using fossil fuels in golf balls is perhaps not that important? I don't accept the premise of your question.We need to reduce the use of fossil fuels as part of a global project to reduce CO2 emissions. We will do that anywhere we can whether the products are essential to our use or otherwise. It's not whether something is essential that matters, it's whether it's CO2 footprint can be successfully reduced or not. Some things will be easier than others.

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So it can be done solely with free markets, or it can be done solely by government mandates. Or obviously a combination of the two. The U.S government already meddles a lot with its various subsidies and tax breaks to experimental attempts to reduce the use of fossil fuels. I think that's enough, or too much.
  —marc9000

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You can think whatever you like.

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So while I don't favor a 100% free markets / 0% government involvement, I'd prefer more of an 90 / 10 ratio. Government action is already about 15%. What would you say your ideal ratio would be? 0 free markets, to 100% government action? 50/50? What?

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There is no ideal. We need to do whatever is necessary.

For the record, Tangle agrees that fossil fuels are currently used to produce millions - probably trillions - of goods, many of which are essential. He also agrees fossil fuels are used to distribute and make those goods and to heat and cool our homes and work places.That seems to me to be a non-contentious and obvious point.Tangle does not agree that this situation should or needs to continue.