Only .5% of world energy comes from wind, tide, wave, solar and geothermal put together!

Speaking of 'logic'... you do realize that what you are saying is based one of the most classic fallacious arguments right?

Argumentum ad Populum, also known as the "Bandwagon Fallacy".

Exposition: The Bandwagon Fallacy is committed whenever one argues for an idea based upon an irrelevant appeal to its popularity.

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/bandwagn.html

Think about this some more and try again.

There is no logical merit whatsoever to the idea that because a thing is done more frequently, then that thing is clearly superior in nature.

The fact is that China is already far ahead of us in the "green technology" department because they do not have the oil industry fighting them every step of the way like we do here. Our growth is stunted by the very market forces you cheer. And our country will pay a dear price for this lack of foresight.

What is your point?

The most central point in the small amount of text in your article is:

Only .5% of world energy comes from wind, tide, wave, solar and geothermal put together!

This is meaningless. That's my point.

The bandwagon here is everybody jumping on the "green wagon" because liberals and environmentalists say it will work and it is cool.....with no logic, science or reasonable plan to pull it off!

So... you suggested a new bandwagon to jump on that isn't widely supported by a group of people you don't like?

Look, what you did was throw out a bandwagon appeal and followed it up by a string of other logically fallacious appeals.

You didn't show a single fact or rational argument here at all. Not once.

The single thing you said here was even close to being a statement of fact is, "Nuclear is the most promising energy and we are using it the least" which isn't even a statement of fact, it's a statement of opinion with no supporting evidence included in your article.

Then, you followed that up with THIS strawman attack:

It is similar to someone saying there is a water shortage, so tomorrow let's stop using water and find a replacement!

"In the straw man fallacy, an arguer oversimplifies, or purposely distorts an opponent's argument (sets up the straw man), in order that he may attack it more easily (knock it down), and then claims that the opponent's position has been refuted. "

http://editthis.info/logic/Informal_Fallacies

I find it the height of irony that you could bring yourself to write the following sentence, without once using logic, facts or un-muddled reasoning.

We need to rely on reason and fact to solve the energy problem

There, try using logic, tryusinglogic.

Here's a good primer for you:

http://editthis.info/logic/Informal_Fallacies

Read that, then apply it to the things you say and to the things people say to you. Then, you'll be using logic.

If you'd like, I can also point out where you resorted to the "poisoning the well" strategy and numerous ad hominem fallacious logical appeals.

You're about ZERO for 11 here.

Yeah.

I'm not convinced you know the difference between a fact and an opinion yet.

If this article is your opinion of what "logic" is, then I'd say your capacity to determine which is which is open to conjecture.

Care to try again?

Why is it that on Newsvine the people who use their brains the least, pick nicknames that attempt to suggest that they use them the most?

New energy sources will be found by free markets and capitalism

This might be true if energy sectors in the market weren't so completely controlled by oligopolies who see no use or profit in:

• finding more resources (despite the rhetoric, the oil companies are not drilling the lands that they already have access to; they just want more land access)
• make better profits by creating shortages rather than encountering shortages
• exhibit price leadership instead of competition (competition is almost dead in corporate America).
• only look out for their own interests and nobody else's interests.

I am a huge fan of capitalism; if we ever get back to being a capitalistic society, I will be the first one to cheer. However, we are light years away from that now; largely, by rhetoric such as this.

The fact is that China is already far ahead of us in the "green technology" department because they do not have the oil industry fighting them every step of the way like we do here. Our growth is stunted by the very market forces you cheer. And our country will pay a dear price for this lack of foresight.

Uh, no. China is building far more coal fired plants and nuclear plants than any country in the world because they understand that it takes terawatts of power to run a modern civilization.

Today, the so called green energy that you love (an which I sell and support), has a massive subsidy from oil, coal, and nuclear power because it takes a LOT of energy to make a solar panel and a wind turbine.

If we had to make solar panels and wind turbines using only solar and wind power, the cost would be prohibitive.

I read all of these posts in this thread and not an engineer in the bunch. I design and build these systems and while in niche applications it is a wonderful technology, you are not going to run a planetary civilization of 9 billion people with wind and solar or hydrothermal and hydroelectricity. It simply is not going to happen, the numbers do not support it.

the world is getting 99.5% of its energy from coal, gas, nuclear and oil

Actually, coal and gas and oil are in a way, "bio-fuels." They are derived from living matter that has been grown using solar and geothermal energy, with help from the sea currents and the wind currents. Almost all the energy that we have ever used was the result of solar and geothermal energy.

We have had to use the "inefficient" means (ie, coal, gas, oil) of capturing this energy because we didn't have the knowledge and technology to use the energy directly. We need to make big investments in "green" energy, just like we did with nuclear power.

Countries and Mega-Corporations who try to hold onto the old ways are going to be left in the dust by the groups who invest in the new technologies. Imagine if we had refused to start using that radical new energy source, crude oil, and had insisted on sticking with Whale Oil--we would still be using horses and steam for transportation.

The one argument that the free-marketeers always make is that capitalism leads to development, but it seems that it has been the "capitalists" who have been holding us back the last 50 years.

A good argument for putting the other 99.5% of natural energy too work!!!!! Compared to fossil fuels natures energy is infinite. Too bad our human minds are not being used to comprehend our own sheer ignorance of science and the truth about ourselves.

The well of knowledge has been capped by those with the power and money. Knowledge is power and money is a ponzi scheme.

Chris-735, me thinks you posted a whole bunch of “nothings” in your attempt to criticize what tryusinglogic posted.

(#1.10) Countries and Mega-Corporations who try to hold onto the old ways are going to be left in the dust by the groups who invest in the new technologies. Imagine if we had refused to start using that radical new energy source, crude oil, and had insisted on sticking with Whale Oil--we would still be using horses and steam for transportation.

eapeau, imagine what will happen iffen everyone “jumps on board” those blue sky dreams of the “greenies” and tries to ride them into the next century.

HA, you will be praying for a team of horses to pull you through the dust of a collapsed economy.

Do the math, eapeau, you don’t have enough real estate to produce sufficient “green energy” to supply the demands of the current population. And those demands are going to increase at least 40% over the next 50 years.

And eapeau, your “green energy” is incapable of producing two (2) extremely important products that the population and the economy can’t survive without, …… aluminum and steel.

Mimicry is not a substitute for abstract thinking.

And mimicking piffle about "using logics" is not proof that one is capable of making logical choices or decisions. Memory recall of critical elements and associated data/info is a prerequesite for making logical choices or decisions.

As conservatives like Koch, SamC & spaceguy love to point out, greatly increasing fossil fuel production/use isn't a problem.

We have an estimated ten thousand years worth of coal still in the ground waiting to be exploited. The problem however is with the already well-documented gathering droughts, floods and accelerating ice sheet melt now occurring after just 2 centuries of intense fossil fuel combustion, our ten thousand year supply is also sufficient to destroy our civilization fifty times.

http://www.scienceprogress.org/2010/11/a-stunning-year-in-climate-science-reveals-that-human-civilization-is-on-the-precipice/

Spaceguy and SamC, I handpicked the following link just for you both, as the excerpt makes obvious. And seeing that you love highlights Sam, I highlighted it for you:

"Over the past two or three years, the science of climate change has become a more widely contested issue in the public and political spheres. Climate science is now being debated outside of the normal discussion and debate that occurs within the peer-reviewed scientific literature in the normal course of research. It is being attacked in the media by many with no credentials in the field. The questioning of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the “climategate” incident based on hacked emails in the UK, and attempts to intimidate climate scientists have added to the confusion in the public about the veracity of climate science."

We at Skeptical Science have documented many such attacks on climate science by individuals with no climate credentials, who misrepresent scientific research, and attempt to sow doubt in the minds of the general public through non-scientific issues like Climategate.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/the-critical-decade-part-1-the-science.html

Chris-735, me thinks you posted a whole bunch of “nothings” in your attempt to criticize what tryusinglogic posted.

He didn't make a coherent argument in his article. If pointing out the the basis of what he said was rationally unfounded and filled with appeals to contempt for the opposing side.

You may find pointing out where another person is making a fallacious argument contemptuous but I'm still correct. He never actually wrote anything substantive and was attempting to put forward an argument in entirely the wrong way if one is to be taken seriously.

Insults, group think and appeals to the majority or popularity are NOT worthy of rebuttle except to point out where they are lacking in logical or reasonable foundations.

If that's "nothing" to you, then I suggest you write your own article and make claims that cannot be countered without ever actually having to produce real data.

If the seeder had put forward a well written piece and approached the discussion of the matter in a rational matter, then I wouldn't have to point out where his arguments are founded in irrational and otherwise toxic logic.

I think that if a person is going to make a claim, especially a controversial claim about science, that claim should be reviewed in an academic manner.

Let me ask you a question. I assume you went to college. If you were to submit a paper or article written with that kind of language and those kinds of fallacious logical appeals, what kind of grade do you think it would get? Unless it was purely a grammar class where content of what was written didn't matter, it wouldn't get a very good grade at all.

It's divorced from science, it's illogical and it's filled with attempts to denegrate the opposition with both ad hominem attacks, bad rhetoric and sophistry without actually ever introducing an argument that is based on science. It's just a statistic without any supporting details and a faulty inference about what that statistic actually indicates.

He has a conclusion without any supporting details. That is NOT science. How is that nothing?

Efficiency could cut world energy use over 70 per cent

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20037-efficiency-could-cut-world-energy-use-over-70-per-cent.html

Our per capita carbon footprint is significantly greater than that of other wealthy industrialized nations.

Thanks to the GOP and oil lobbyists, energy conservation are dirty words in America. We need to significantly slow our carbon pollution of the environment so we can solve our energy problems before we destroy ourselves. For example, its estimated that if all states implemented California's energy conservation standards, overnight we would reduce our national energy usage & bill by at least 20%.

This thread has nothing to do with climate change Roxanne, it has to do with the inanity that you can run a planetary civilization of 9 billion people with solar panels and wind turbines.

Your new scientist article is rubbish.

Changes to homes and buildings included triple-glazing windows and installing 300-millimetre-thick cavity wall insulation, using saucepan lids when cooking on the stove top, eliminating hot-water tanks and reducing the set temperature of washing machines and dishwashers. In transportation, the weight of cars was limited to 300 kilograms.

When are you going to sell that BMW Roxanne?

Space guy

The new scientist article is relevant. If energy demand is cut by 73 percent, it would take less green energy to power the planet. No one said we would power the planet with only solar panels and wind turbines, there is many more possibilities that need explored.

New energy sources will be found by free markets and capitalism......not Big Government demands!

Well they're not doing it.

And now, a leaked report by the International Energy Agency shows a record increase in CO2 emissions last year, and a clear indication that we are not going to be able to contain deadly levels of global warming without major governmental intervention:

Greenhouse gas emissions increased by a record amount last year, to the highest carbon output in history, putting hopes of holding global warming to safe levels all but out of reach, according to unpublished estimates from the International Energy Agency.

The shock rise means the goal of preventing a temperature rise of more than 2 degrees Celsius – which scientists say is the threshold for potentially "dangerous climate change" – is likely to be just "a nice Utopia", according to Fatih Birol, chief economist of the IEA. It also shows the most serious global recession for 80 years has had only a minimal effect on emissions, contrary to some predictions.

Last year, a record 30.6 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere, mainly from burning fossil fuel – a rise of 1.6Gt on 2009, according to estimates from the IEA regarded as the gold standard for emissions data.

"I am very worried. This is the worst news on emissions," Birol told the Guardian. "It is becoming extremely challenging to remain below 2 degrees. The prospect is getting bleaker. That is what the numbers say."

The IEA has calculated that if the world is to escape the most damaging effects of global warming, annual energy-related emissions should be no more than 32Gt by 2020. If this year's emissions rise by as much as they did in 2010, that limit will be exceeded nine years ahead of schedule, making it all but impossible to hold warming to a manageable degree.

..."Such warming would disrupt the lives and livelihoods of hundreds of millions of people across the planet, leading to widespread mass migration and conflict. That is a risk any sane person would seek to drastically reduce."

Free markets don't care about this - they care about profits. Using a 'free market' approach to solve climate change is like applying a train's brakes when you see a car on the tracks ahead - it's far too late to fix the problem when climate change finally begins to really impact markets.

As Roxanne's seeded article above states, it's difficult to believe that a technologically-advanced civilization would choose it's own extinction - but that's exactly what we are doing.

Freedom and capitalism will find the new energy sources for the world and it is delusional not to see that!

The 'delusion' lies in believing that capitalism will solve this problem.

We already know that climate change is real, and that humans are the major factor causing it. What has Capitalism's response been? To buy politicians who deny basic science, and continue on a (very profitable) 'business as usual' model.

You have too much faith in capitalism. Even Adam Smith recognized it's limits:

As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestick industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestiek to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

So do you have faith in Government organized control and socialism to solve our problems?

Like most Americans, I support the ideals of Social Democracy.

A popular talking point on the Right insists that all government is always bad. But the vast majority of Americans simply don't agree. Ask anyone about Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, SCHIP, the VA, or a wealth of other successful government programs. People like them, and they work.

Government has it's place, and history proves me correct - as Paul Ryan and the Republican/Tea Party are now learning.

Government is necessary and should be responsible

Finally, something we agree on.

So when the U.S. Department of Defense calls climate change a grave threat to our security and a 'threat multiplier', what is the proper role of government?

“We will pay for this one way or another... We will pay to reduce greenhouse gas emissions today, and we’ll have to take an economic hit of some kind.

Or we will pay the price later in military terms. And that will involve human lives.”

Gen. Anthony C. Zinni

Roxanne, now why did you make 2 posts right after I dun got thru tellin you that …. “Mimicry is not a substitute for abstract thinking.”

(#1.16 - Chris-735) He didn't make a coherent argument in his article.

He never actually wrote anything substantive

Chris-735, me thinks you should educate yourself on a subject before you claim the commentary is incoherent and/or without substance.

I had no problem understanding what tryusinglogic posted.

(#1.16) You may find pointing out where another person is making a fallacious argument contemptuous He never actually wrote anything substantive and was attempting to put forward an argument in entirely the wrong way if one is to be taken seriously. Insults, group think and appeals to the majority or popularity are NOT worthy of rebuttle except to point out where they are lacking in logical or reasonable foundations. If that's "nothing" to you, then I suggest you write your own article and make claims that cannot be countered without ever actually having to produce real data. If the seeder had put forward a well written piece and approached the discussion of the matter in a rational matter, then I wouldn't have to point out where his arguments are founded in irrational and otherwise toxic logic. I think that if a person is going to make a claim, especially a controversial claim about science, that claim should be reviewed in an academic manner.

YADA, …. YADA, ….. YADA, ……. Chris-735, that piffle reads like you were practicing for your Child Psychiatry 101 Exam. Mimicking all that crapolla and blowing it out as a “smokescreen” doesn’t impress me in the least. HA, I smoke bout 2 packs of cigs every day and don’t have a problem “seeing thru” that kinda smoke.

(#1.16) Let me ask you a question. I assume you went to college. If you were to submit a paper or article written with that kind of language and those kinds of fallacious logical appeals, what kind of grade do you think it would get? Unless it was purely a grammar class where content of what was written didn't matter, it wouldn't get a very good grade at all.

“Yes”, I graduated from college ……. with an AB in Physical and Biological Science.

And Chris-735, iffen I re-enrolled in either High School or College today, and submitted a paper on “The False Claims and Beliefs Concerning CO2 Caused Anthropogenic Global Warming” that was expertly written and included all the actual, factual Scientific data, evidence and proofs, …. including all necessary mathematical calculations and all logical, reasonable, associateable commentary, references, citations, etc. …. to prove and justify my claims of falsity, …….. you, Chris-735, could pretty much bet your arse that it would receive a Grade of “F” or ZERO …… because those lefty liberal “greenthinking” Teachers and Professors don’t like for anyone to be badmouthing “CO2 Caused AGW”.

(#1.16) It's divorced from science, it's illogical and it's filled with attempts to denegrate the opposition with both ad hominem attacks, bad rhetoric and sophistry without actually ever introducing an argument that is based on science. It's just a statistic without any supporting details and a faulty inference about what that statistic actually indicates.

He has a conclusion without any supporting details. That is NOT science. How is that nothing?

YADA, …. YADA, ….. YADA, …….again. Save that “smoke” for someone you can impress.

Chris-735, iffen you were learned in Science and/or familiar with all the facts, figures, criteria, etc. being discussed relative to AGW then you would know about those “supporting details”.

And Christ, one can not write and post a complete manuscript for the “clueless” to be reading ….. every time one make a post to NewsVine.

(#1.20) The new scientist article is relevant. If energy demand is cut by 73 percent, it would take less green energy to power the planet. No one said we would power the planet with only solar panels and wind turbines, there is many more possibilities that need explored.

“YES”, …. leeman1525, …. and iffen a hoppity toad sprouted wings then it wouldn’t be bumping its arse on the ground every time it hopped.

Killing off 73 percent of the population is a possibility that would probably work.

========================

(#1.21 - Physicist-retired) And now, a leaked report by the International Energy Agency shows a record increase in CO2 emissions last year, and a clear indication that we are not going to be able to contain deadly levels of global warming without major governmental intervention:

(quoted article) Greenhouse gas emissions increased by a record amount last year, to the highest carbon output in history, putting hopes of holding global warming to safe levels all but out of reach, according to unpublished estimates from the International Energy Agency.

Last year, a record 30.6 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere, mainly from burning fossil fuel – a rise of 1.6Gt on 2009, according to estimates from the IEA regarded as the gold standard for emissions data.

OH GOOD GRIEF, …… the 2010 Mona Loa atmospheric CO2 data … DISPROVES that silly arsed claim of a record 30.6 gigatonnes of CO2.

Atmospheric CO2 has been increasing at the same steady and consistant rate of ..... "1 to 2 ppm/year" .... for the past 54 years.

Hey, Sam

Happy Memorial Day.

The new scientist article is relevant. If energy demand is cut by 73 percent, it would take less green energy to power the planet. No one said we would power the planet with only solar panels and wind turbines, there is many more possibilities that need explored.

Not going to happen. The cuts that they claim are necessary are simply not required. We want a prosperous planetary civilization, not a weak and pathetic, energy poor one.

Space guy

We would will have a "prosperous planetary civilization". The savings would NOT have negative effect the quality life, it would improve it. With cleaner air from reduced smog forming emissions.

SamC

Killing 73 percent of the worlds population is not the answer. Reducing energy consumption, without negatively affecting quality of life is. Look what happened in California, it was able to cut energy at data-centers with no negative affects.

http://tinyurl.com/3jx66jp

Spaceguy,

Unlike the GOP and TP, I'm all for ever-increasing vehicle mileage standards on all the cars my parents can go out and buy and which I subsequently borrow, hydrogen-powered autos R&D, hybrids & all-electrics like the Chevy Volt, urban and cross country high speed rail, cycle paths within cities, a carbon tax, etc.

We need to neuter KochPAC and the GOTP so that I can happily have all of the above choices.

And as for this seed "not being about climate change", give me a break. This seed is championing "drill baby, drill" and a mass extinction event of human civilization & living species.

Every science organization on the face of the planet agree with with my analysis, and not with you and Sam.

So if you want to prove us wrong then cough up the Paper you promised years ago that in your words "will debunk AGW science."

Your debunking science Paper, just like the attacks on the Hockey Stick, will forever remain a fable exactly similar to the Birthers' nonsense.

Oh? So NASA, NOAA, every leading university science department around the world, coupled with every science organization that exists, are all "utopian dreamers"?

I'm simply repeating what 97% of climate scientists = the only qualified scientists on climate, are saying as regards excessive greenhouse gas pollution. Ghg pollution that to this day the Free Market has not rescued us from.

Pollution is pollution, whether it be chlorofluorocarbons destroying the ozone layer, DDT destroying birds' eggs, asbestos, 2nd hand tobacco smoke, and lead in gasolene stunting our kids' growth; or over 30 gigatonnes each year of CO2 pollution melting all our ice sheets and destroying world agriculture with extreme weather.

In every single example of past & deadly pollution that I just listed, it wasn't the Free Market that saved our behinds.

It was government coming to our rescue by regulating the pollution before it killed us and our environment. Except for our current flirtation with pollution-triggered global warming that is; the jury is still out on whether the GOP will finally do their job and rescue America.

roxanne2sweet - back when I was younger many years ago, we called it clean air and clean water. That's because having clean air and clean water was something we all want and need - and it's good public policy.

The business right got handed a gold mine when they got the "global warming" issue because they can scam it as a hoax and throw out the need to have clean air and water along with it. I would contend even if it is a hoax which of course it's not, we still want clean air and clean water. If we focus on that, we can't go wrong we'll get that and get global warming more under control.

Pollution is pollution - yes thank God a bit of common sense prevails here in 2011.

Thanks Mark. And I completely agree.

This little sub-thread wasn't that much about alternative energies it was about clean air and clean water. We have a lot we can do along that line with existing technologies - scrubbers for coal fired plants and such things.

One thing I agree with you though is when the more traditional energy companies "reach out" to environmentalists they get their ass chewed out. Too many ex-hippies I'm guessing.

(#1.36) I'm simply repeating what 97% of climate scientists = the only qualified scientists on climate, are saying as regards excessive greenhouse gas pollution.

Then Roxanne, you are simply repeating a blatantly false statement ……. because those 97% of climate scientists are repeating the blatantly false statement made by the International Energy Agency when they made the claim that:

“Last year, a record 30.6 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere, mainly from burning fossil fuel”.

And Roxanne, you know what one is commonly called when they knowingly repeat a blatantly false statement, don’tja?

So now that you know that statement is blatantly false then best you think about the consequences before you repeat it.