[dar-list] Some space for Frog X pleace...

[Sander Meier]

Hey Everyone,

As you fellow listers like Dar and will probably be concerned about the
environment like her, I thought to post some of my thoughts and maybe start a
discussion with this...I have mixed feelings about the current environmental
hype taking place. I'm glad that it's subject of discussion, but it does annoy
me a lot of the time.

I have some serious doubts about what the majority believes is causing global
warming. It's a hype to blame the CO2 we blow into the air, but isn't mother
earth much more complex than that? Yes, there is the greenhouse gas effect and
I tend to believe the world is getting warmer, but is CO2 causing it? Isn't
vaporized water a much bigger contributor to the greenhouse effect? If it gets
warmer more water from the oceans gets vaporized, which will also leads to
more CO2 in the air. But isn't there a reason for temperature rising? If I use
my common sense and think about the warming we need from the greenhouse effect
and look at the way we use nature's products, I always feel that the real
issue is the space we use and the frequency we use that space. More and more
space is used to grow things and more and more forests are disappearing. Also
the animals we eat need space. Unfortunately, we put them into small cages,
but they still need to eat. If they can't get it out from their small
territory, we have to bring it to them, which costs space to grow somewhere
else. With this you can also see the stupidity of us humans; if it's a little
bit cheaper we mass produce no matter what. It's what we do with food, getting
it from places where production is cheaper and costs seem to be the only thing
that guides us. How many people are interested in how it's produced and where
it comes from?Are we eating more? Well, maybe not, but the world's population
is rising, so we need more food and we do waste a lot more. Not even talking
about all the products that get produced (which includes packaging), but don't
need.

Trees take up water from the air and with less trees, less vaporized water
will get taken from the air (also CO2, so yes there's a link, but that doesn't
prove that CO2 causes global warming). This increases the greenhouse gas
effect, I believe, but doesn't it only extend warm periods? I mean, does it
make winters less hard and summers start early? With all the space we use to
grow things, the frequency we use that space and the increasing earths
population, I believe we need more warmth to grow it all, so we and animals
can eat. More and more water will be needed at land, so we need warmth to
vaporize the water. Maybe the poles need to melt some in order to keep the
balance. Is maximum reached when everything is melted? The sea level will rise
with the portions of the ice above the current sea level, which might be a
problem depending on the amount actually melted. It is a problem because we
humans keep living at places that are beyond sea level. We protect ourselves
from the sea. The richest countries will be able to keep doing that, but who
stays rich after 100 years from now? My country, the Netherlands, is beyond
sea level for a big part. You can say that almost our whole economy is beyond
it. There are expensive projects that now protect us after a disastrous
flooding in 1953, but they will cost more money in the future. Maybe it is a
natural process. Less trees, less land, because the ocean takes it back.

It annoys me that with this hype, people seem to have all the answers. I don't
have the answers and I don't know if CO2 is contributing to global warming or
not. I don't believe scientists have a total understanding of all the cycles
in nature. We do pollute our air and with that the oceans, so we should make
drastic changes. With the rising economies in huge populations as China and
India have, I don't see this so positive. I wish I could be optimistic, but
doesn't that make us wait for something never happening?

I just hope we will not stare at one thing, but try to see the bigger picture.
And if we don't understand, we shouldn't go there. I'm really not pleading for
continuing blowing more and more CO2 in the air. You do not want to think what
will happen to China and India if they keep on building coal energy plants and
fire up ovens to bake stones for their immense population that suddenly wants
to live in houses of stone. If they would use wood it's a problem too, but
saying they can't is hypocrite. We don't have more rights than the ones we
kept poor (with a western eye) all those times. I don't want to think about
the political consequences of American, and more and more European, companies
having sold themselves to investors of the rising economies, when nature is
really showing its teeth.

Oh yeah one last thing; As I believe that the use of space may cause global
warming, I totally don't believe in biofuels. To keep that up and increase the
use of it, we need more space, so that will increase the deforestation OR much
more people will starve to death for not having something to eat.

Anyone else some thoughts to share...?
Sander


"I am going to a far, far land. I know it sure as I've a past and a future.
With my maps on the table, you see, I have lost many things, so many I won't
turn back" "And I've been running uphill, panting, punching in the air,
Fighting what's been pushing me down, as if it's really there." Dar Williams
http://messenger.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200471ave/direct/01/