VincentRJ

I don't think it's true to claim the technology has been ignored. The major problems with hydrogen as a fuel, are safety issues, plus the additional expense of producing hydrogen from renewable energy. From the following site: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0016236122001867 "80% of the whole hydrogen produced is by 'steam methane reforming' (SMR) at an energy efficiency of 74–85%. However, steam methane reforming and other fossil fuel based technologies are neither green nor sustainable. Hydrogen, could only be counted as a renewable and clean fuel if the required power to produce hydrogen comes from a renewable source such as wind or solar power." This issue of the 'additional expense' applies to most, if not all renewable forms of energy. Can you give any example of a 'renewable energy' device which is not dependent on fossil fuels for its construction? If one always recharges one's BEV from electricity produced by solar panels or windmills, one might feel virtuous because of the delusion that one one is not using fossil fuels. However, all these devices, such as BEVs, windmills and solar farms, require massive amounts of fossil fuels for their initial production. The reason why a BEV is so much more expensive than an equivalent ICE vehicle, is because the BEV requires much more energy for its production, and most of that energy is from fossil fuels used to mine, transport and manufacture the materials used to build the car and its batteries. As a rough estimate, I would suggest that before the buyer of a BEV has even begun to drive the car, he has already used, in terms of the purchase price, the amount of fossil fuel that an equivalent ICE vehicle would use after having been driven more than 100,000 km, including the fossil fuel used during the construction of the ICE vehicle. This is the major problem that technological development has to overcome, in order to reduce dependence on fossil fuels. In other words, it all boils down to 'efficiency'. The more efficiently we use our fossil fuels reserves, the longer they will last.

As I've mentioned, Placeholder, I don't want to get into endless discussions about the claimed harmful and beneficial effects of CO2. Too much of anything can be bad. People have died from drinking too much water, but water is essential for life. Likewise, people can die when CO2 levels are extremely high, but CO2 is essential for life. The real problem is excessive consumption as countries develop economically. About 2/3rds of the population of many developed countries are overweight or obese, due to too much consumption of food, which is just one example. As people become wealthier, they spend more and more on unnecessary items, such as expensive cars to boost their ego, luxury clothes which eventually end up on the scrap heap, unnecessary large and expensive houses, and many other expensive but unnecessary items which all require the use of energy in their production. The drive towards renewables will curtail that over-consumption, as energy prices rise. It will be interesting to see if the majority of the populations in developed countries accept their static or falling living standards in order to fund the change to renewable energy. In Australia, I've never seen petrol prices as high as they currently are. I recently did a comparison between the current cost of my KIA Cerrato ICE vehicle and the equivalent KIA Battery Electric Vehicle. I calculated the initial extra cost of the KIA BEV would never be recouped even if I could recharge the battery with free elecricity from my solar panels. It will probably take a few decades before BEVs become an affordable option for most people. However, I think it makes perfect sense to attempt to develop alternatives to the gasoline car. I'm all in favour of scientific and technological progress. Potentially, a BEV with an affordable, lightweight, safe and durable battery which doesn't rely upon scarce materials, would be a great achievement. It might never happen, but at least we should try.

Wow! I've just discovered this long thread about climate change. It reminds me of an even longer thread about the existence of 'God'. I don't have time to read all the comments, so I hope I'm not repeating issues that have already been addressed. Whilst I'm skeptical about the claimed significance and contribution of human CO2 emissions to the current warming period, I think human activity in general must have some effect on climate. However, quantifying that effect in any precise manner is impossible because of the complexity and chaotic nature of climate. There cannot be any certainty, only degrees of probability based upon computer models which are fed incomplete data. However, there are environmental issues about which we can be fairly certain. We know that CO2 is the 'Gas of Life'. Without it, nothing lives. We know, from satellite images, that the planet, as a whole, has significantly greened during the past 30 years or more, due to the increased levels of CO2. We can measure the significant effects of increased levels of CO2 on plant growth in 'real' greenhouses. Whilst I don't believe that the current emissions of CO2 are a problem for the environment, I do believe that the increase in the use of fossil fuels could present a future problem which could be disastrous for the world economy. Our prosperity and well-being is fundamentally dependent on the regular supply of affordable energy. Fossil fuels are a limited resource. At the current rate of usage, we probably have hundreds of years of reserves, much of which has yet to be discovered, so no need to worry about that. However, why would anyone presume that the current rate of usage would remain constant, as undeveloped countries become more developed, and developed countries raise their 'working class' to the 'middles class', and everyone becomes wealthier, consuming more energy. I did an internet search on the current world consumption of energy, and found the following site. https://ourworldindata.org/energy-mix The attached image of a graph shows that fossil fuel use has continued to rise significantly since the alarm about CO2 emissions began. As of 2022, the percentage of energy from nuclear, wind, hydro, solar, biofuels, and othe renewables, is less than 20%, but the rise in the use of fossil fuels, since the alarm about CO2 emissions began in the 1980's, has risen far greater than 20%, more like 60%. Since 1950, the graph shows that fossil fuel use has increased by around 600%. Imagine what would happem if there were no scare about the devastating effect of fossil fuel use on the environment. Imagine a future scenario, say in a hundred years time when fossil fuel consumption was 1,000% greater than the current usage, and the Arctic and Antarctic were close to depletion of their oil reserves, and energy prices began rocketing. Wouldn't it be too late to begin research on renewables? The economy would collapse disastrously, far worse than any previous economic collapse. The purpose of the scare about CO2 emissions is to motivate the development of alternative and additional sources of energy, which are hopefully cleaner than fossil fuels. Nuclear power is an obvious contender, but has the problem of toxic waste and potentially dangerous accidents. Fossil fuels are not only needed for the energy to drive our economy, but also for many essential products that we use every day. Here's a list of 6,000 products from a barrel of oil. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/partial-list-over-6000-products-made-from-one-barrel-oil-steve-pryor If we develop alternative, effecient, and renewable sources of energy, then we will never run out of fossil fuels, which can be used for essential products that can't be produced from renewables. Makes sense?

From my quote from the article, the resolution is up to 50cm, which means any object smaller than 50cm will not be recognised.

Read the full story. "Operated by GISTDA, THEOS-2, will be capable of capturing detailed colour images of Earth with a resolution of up to 50cm. The satellite will transmit data to a ground station, covering about 74,000 square kilometres per day, providing current, but not real time, accurate information for various sectors in Thailand. The data will have significant applications in emergency response, agriculture, water management, disaster management, urban planning and natural resource management."

From the full story: "The house in question actually belongs to a transport tycoon in Udon Thani, but is leased to Surachate for his subordinates."

Why are the comments so negative? At least planting more trees will improve the scenery and the air quality. "The project plans to cultivate more trees on road islands and pavements across 14 districts, covering 34 kilometres."

The full story implies that the Move Foreward Party was responsible for the 'lack of quorum' because they didn't press the button. Here's the quote from the full story. "A check by pressing a button to certify presence at the meeting showed less than half of the 498 performing MPs were present, leading to House Speaker Wan Muhamad Noor Matha to adjourning it until next Thursday." "While 150 Move Forward MPs were present, they did not press the button to certify their presence."

The abbot is also significantly overweight, which indicates he eats too much, which is against Buddhist principles. ????

If you check the actual data, instead of news stories written to create alarm, you'll find that the number of deaths, world-wide, from floods, droughts, storms, and temperature extremes, have dropped significantly since the 1920s, and those figures in the attached graph do not take into account the dramatic population increase since the 1920s. "This decline is even more impressive when we consider the rate of population growth over this period. When we correct for population – showing this data in terms of death rates (measured per 100,000 people) – we see an even greater decline over the past century." https://ourworldindata.org/natural-disasters#natural-disasters-kill-tens-of-thousands-each-year There are two major issues to consider here. (1) The reporting of an increase in extreme weather events in recent decades is related to an increase in the improvement of recording such events, due to modern technology, when anyone with a cellphone can immediately share news of a storm or flood from halfway around the world. Therefore, an increase in registered disasters does not necessarilly equate to more disasters in reality. (2) The same improvement in technology also reduces the number of deaths from extreme weather events, because of better reporting and predictions of extreme weather events, allowing people to get out of the way before the storm or flood arrives.

If this is true, then man-made global warming must be beneficial. Do you know that, globally, far more people die from cold weather than hot weather? "Cold weather kills 20 times as many people as hot weather, according to an international study analyzing over 74 million deaths in 384 locations across 13 countries." https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150520193831.htm

The above statement is also a product of the human imagination. All opinions and perceptions, including scientific theories, are products of the human imagination. We tend to use phrases like 'the Laws of Physics', as though these are facts of reality that can never be broken, yet the history of science is rife with laws that have been broken and replaced with new laws that will no doubt be broken, or at least modified, at some point in the future. The issue to contemplate and address is 'what laws, opinions, views, and interpretations actually work, and/or are beneficial to our survival and well-being'? When individuals and/or communities suffer, starve, get killed, and so on, it's usually because of wrong views. Exceptions would be certain natural disasters which are beyond anyone's capability to accurately predict.

In other words, God is a creation of the human imagination. ????

Thailand is a Buddhist country. Buddhist principles are opposed to the consumption of alcohol, which is why there are restrictions on advertising alcoholic beverages. However, these restrictions are a compromise, for the sake of the economy. It's too difficult for most people to conform to many of the Buddhist precepts. "The Buddhist layman is expected to conform as closely as possible to certain moral injunctions known as the Five Precepts. These list five immoral actions which a lay-Buddhist should train himself or herself to avoid, namely: destroying life; taking what is not given; wrong-doing in sexual desires; false speech (including lies, harsh words, tale-bearing and idle gossip); and consumption of distilled and fermented intoxicants causing carelessness. "

I asked ChatGPT that question. Here's the answer. "Thai monks are exempt from military conscription in Thailand. The Thai Constitution states that monks, novices, and persons undergoing religious education are exempt from military service."

You seem to have missed the point I've been making. When talking about predatory animals we tend to think only of carnivores such as Lions, Tigers, Snakes, and so on. These are animals that are far more developed than insects, ants, microbes and bacteria, and are far more visible to us humans, so we tend to ignore the incessant predation that occurs amongst the tiny and microscopic creatures whose existence is essential for our survival. All favourable conditions are favourable because the good guys eat the bad guys. Any animal or human can only be in good health as a result of the good bacteria in the biome killing and/or eating the bad bacteria, and the immune system killing, and/or eating harmful germs and viruses. The following article describes the situation. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/10/061002214703.htm#:~:text=CD8%2B T-cells are specialized,as viruses in the body "CD8+ T-cells are specialized white blood cells that serve an important role in the body's immune system. The cells attack and destroy disease "invaders" such as viruses in the body." "If you use a fluorescent dye to stain infected cells, you can literally watch T-cells consume membranes and outer surfaces of diseased cells." "While we don't fully understand why this happens, one possibility is that the T-cell consumes virus-infected cells to fuel itself in the continued fight against an ongoing infection." "Further investigation revealed that the CD8+ T-cells, often referred to as "killer" T-cells, were literally ingesting parts of the virus-infected cells that they were attacking."

And my point was that no life-form can exist in a non-predatory environment, as far as I understand. Every life-form is either directly predatory, or indirectly predatory in the sense they rely upon others (whether microbes, insects, animals, or humans) to do the killing on their behalf.

That's an interesting concept. If one uses the broad definition of 'predatory', which includes "seeking to exploit others', then it would be difficult, and perhaps impossible, to discover any form of life which is not predatory. For example, vegetarians might feel good because they don't rely upon the killing of other animals for their survival. However, they do rely upon the killing of plants, and the plants rely upon trillions of predatory microbes, ants, worms, fungi, and so on, in the soil, which provide the necessary nutrients in the soil, for the plants to grow. Some plants are directly predatory. Consider the following link: https://www.bbcearth.com/news/10-of-the-planets-most-predatory-plants Also, many species of fungi, are predaceous. Fungi perform important functions within the soil in relation to nutrient cycling, disease suppression and water dynamics, all of which help plants become healthier and more vigorous. Along with bacteria, fungi are important decomposers of hard to digest organic matter. From the following wiki link: "Carnivorous fungi or predaceous fungi are fungi that derive some or most of their nutrients from trapping and eating microscopic or other minute animals. More than 200 species have been described, belonging to the phyla Ascomycota, Mucoromycotina, and Basidiomycota. They usually live in soil and many species trap or stun nematodes, while others attack amoebae or collembola." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnivorous_fungus In summary, most people who eat fish and meat, do not kill the animals themselves, but rely upon others to do the killing. Likewise, whilst most plants are not directly predatory, they all rely upon massive numbers of predatory 'soil animals' to provide the essential nutrient for them to survive and flourish.

Good quote, which highlights the problem. "It's an established fact...'', in other words 'the science is settled'. Many people believe that. It's the new religion. The continued existence of the IPCC organization is based upon an assumption that human-induced greenhouse gas emissions are bad for the climate, so claiming it is an established fact is understandable, and is required for continued funding, or increased funding. However, you should also pay attention the the following part of the quote; '..have led to an increased frequency and/or intensity of some weather and climate extremes'. I checked the details in the AR6 report which you linked, to find what those 'some weather and climate extremes' are. Here are a few quotes from the report. Temperatures Extremes "The additional observational records, along with a stronger warming signal, show very clearly that changes observed at the time of AR5 (IPCC, 2014) continued, providing strengthened evidence of an increase in the intensity and frequency of hot extremes and decrease in the intensity and frequency of cold extremes." Now that does seem very worrying. Since the previous report (AR5), the evidence that shows an increase in hot extremes, has strengthened. My Gosh! That is alarming. But wait! The strengthened evidence also shows that there has been a decrease in the intensity and frequency of cold extremes. There is so much evidence available on the internet which shows that a far greater number of people die from extreme cold than from extreme heat, globally. If this is true, then an increase in heat waves, linked to a decrease in cold waves, should be beneficial. Wouldn't you agree? "Floods There is low confidence about peak flow trends over past decades on the global scale , but there are regions experiencing increases, including parts of Asia, Southern South America, north-east USA, north-western Europe, and the Amazon, and regions experiencing decreases, including parts of the Mediterranean, Australia, Africa, and south-western USA." Droughts "Some AR6 regions show a decrease in meteorological drought, including Northern Australia, Central Australia, Northern Europe and Central North America (Section 11.9). Other regions either do not show substantial trends in long-term meteorological drought, or they display mixed signals depending on the considered time frame and sub-regions, such as in Southern Australia (Gallant et al., 2013; Delworth and Zeng, 2014; Alexander and Arblaster, 2017; Spinoni et al., 2019; Dunn et al., 2020;" If you read the details in the linked AR6 report, you should see that there are a lot of uncertainties regarding the trends and the degree of changes in extreme weather events, globally, so I would suggest that this uncertainty contradicts the beginning of the quote, 'It is an established fact..." This will be my last post in this thread because it feels like I'm trying to convince a person who believes in a Creator God, that there is no sound scientific evidence for the existence of a Creator God. Such discussions can be endless, so what's the point?

Nothing. I wasn't addressing temperature predictions. I was addressing the claimed consequences of a gradual warming trend which is causing great alarm, especially amongst children and the scientifically illiterate. Scientists who are political activists are promoting an existential threat, and the media latches on to that, claiming that every extreme weather event is caused by anthropogenic climate change. The IPCC, for example, have stated in their previous reports, that climate is a complex, chaotic and non-linear system and that predictions are very 'challenging'. They now use the term 'projection' instead of 'prediction', as a consequence. They've also stated in previous reports, in their scientific summaries, not their political summaries, that there is low confidence that extreme weather events such as floods, droughts and hurricanes, are increasing on a global scale. "And your link looks like just another attempt at cherry-picking. Or is all of Australia contained in the Brisbane-Ipswich areas What about, say, Western Australia?" I've just checked the history of floods in WA, and the first government site that came up, begins with the following statement: "Since the mid-1960s Western Australia has been experiencing below average annual rainfall and has had relatively little major flooding especially in the more populated areas of the south-west." https://www.water.wa.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0012/5313/11445.pdf However, this report is dated July 2000, so it doesn't include the most recent flood that has occurred during this triple La Nina event. This latest flood is claimed by the media to be a 'one in a hundred year flood'. If this is true, then the logical conclusion is that one hundred years ago, when CO2 levels were much lower, there was an equally bad, or worse flood, which means that the flood is not necessarilly a consequence of anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Got it?

What predictions and by whom? Can you answer that? Here's one example, that I've personally experienced. During the Millennium Drought in Queensland, Australia, from 1997 to 2009, there were a number of proposed projects to build more dams to prepare for the future flooding, because Australia has a well-known history of droughts and floods. However, during this drought, a major advisor to the Australian government, who was a so-called climate expert, named Tim Flannery, advised that such droughts would become more prominent and extended due to Climate Change, and that there would be little purpose in building new dams because they would never fill. As a result of this advice, desalination plants were built instead. Then in 2010-11, massive flooding events occurred, causing billions of dollars of damage, and the desalination plants were placed in hibernation. If the proposed dams had been built, there would have been much less damage to homes and properties, and perhaps none at all. The flood, of course, was described by the media as unprecedented, and the worst on record. Curious, as I usually am, I checked the BOM records, and was amazed to discover that the flood was not the worst on record, but the 7th worst. In other words, there were 6 previous, worse, floods going back to the worst flood that occurred in 1841. Of course, the degree of flooding was not the same throughout the state of Queensland. In some areas the flooding was only the 5th worst. Here's a detailed record of the history of flooding in the Brisbane and Ipswich areas, if you're interested. http://www.bom.gov.au/qld/flood/fld_history/brisbane_history.shtml

My belief is in the effectiveness of the scientific method which must include experimentation which has to be replicable if the theory is correct, and falsifiable if the theory is wrong, so of course any interpretation of data which contradicts my belief (in the methodology of science) causes me to be skeptical. The evidence that the Earth, overall, has been in a slight warming trend during the past 100-150 years is probably correct and I don't dispute that, although I am aware of the enormous difficulty of getting a continuous and accurate, average, temperature of the entire planet, including land, sea and atmosphere, over that 150 year period. Since I'm relatively unbiased, unlike alarmists, I consider both the positive and negative aspects of the current warming trend. I haven't yet seen any reliable evidence that shows the claimed 1.1 C rise in average global temperature during a 150 year period is anything to worry about. If the temperature in my house were to rise by only 1.1 degrees C during the course of just one day, I wouldn't even notice it.

What's also significant is that elevated CO2 levels allow plants to grow much better in drier areas. That's because increases in CO2 levels reduce the size of the leaf spores which allow evaporation. With smaller spores (or stomata) the plants lose less water from evaporation and therefore need less water to grow. Whilst a doubling of atmospheric CO2, from say 300 to 600 ppm, or 600 ppm to 1200 ppm, causes approximately a 35% increase in plant growth under normal water conditions, the increase in plant growth under water-stressed conditions results in a 65% increase in plant growth. This is no doubt at least part of the reason why the southern part of the Sahara Desert, known as the Sahel, has been greening in recent decades. Here's an article that provides details. https://www.thegwpf.org/images/stories/gwpf-reports/mueller-sahel.pdf "In spite of the gloomy predictions of even more frequent and severe droughts and famines caused by global warming, vegetation in the Sahel has significantly increased in the last three decades." "Climate scientists do not agree how the future climate of the Sahara and the Sahel will look like. Some climate models simulate a decrease in rainfall; others – for example Haarsma et al mentioned above – predict an increase in rainfall. According to Professor Claussen, North Africa is the area of greatest disagreement among climate scientists. Claussen explains that forecasting how global warming will affect the Sahel is complicated by the region’s vast size and the unpredictable influence of high-altitude winds that disperse monsoon rains. Claussen has considered the likelihood of a greening of the Sahara due to global warming and concluded that an expansion of vegetation into today’s Sahara is possible as a consequence of CO2 emissions."

Don't be silly! If you chop down forests to mine Lithium for car batteries, or for timber to burn because you are lacking coal resources, or to get access to the forest to build windmills, or build solar farms on rich grasslands, or build new roads and housing estates, then obviously those areas are becoming less green. The satellite imagery show that the total amount of greening of the land has increased by an area equivalent to the USA, despite the numerous areas where greening has been reduced due to human activity. Crikey! Got it?

Of course I understand the concepts of trends. Climate always changes over any given period of time. It changes locally and globally. However,the change is never 100% coherent, globally. There will always be certain areas which are cooling, whilst other areas are warming, and there will always be some areas that are becoming drier whilst other areas are becoming wetter. What you don't seem to understand is the complexity of the situation and that the role played in the current warming, by increases in minuscule amounts of a trace gas, such as CO2, cannot be accurately quantified, and that future predictions of changes in climate are unlikely to be accurate, and that many past predictions from the Alarmists have already been proved wrong. However, what can be accurately quantified are the benefits of increased CO2 levels for plant growth and crop production. We can apply the true scientific method by experimenting with crop growth in true greenhouses. No computer models are required. Satellite imagery has also shown that during the past 30 years, the additional greening of the planet due to the increase in atmospheric CO2, is equivalent to an area the size of the USA. CO2 is one of the essential molecules for the existence of all life. For God's sake, get real!!