#A - Considering the Republican Disconnect From Planet Earth. (Where EM's debate started.)

For a point of reference, I've decided to Repost the op/ed that started my current debate with EM over the Republican Disconnect from our Planet's Physical Reality.   EM made comments to this piece that I took prime time with two blog posts, along with an invitation which EM accepted and on January 1st I posted "#3 E.M. has his say. Debating the Republican Disconnect from Earth's realities" where he makes his arguments.  I've followed with three responses and there are more to come.

Still for argument sake I thought it would be good to slip this in here.

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The following started as a response over at Center For Inquiry forum.  But it took on a life of its own and I'd like to share it over here, the quote that got me going:

“I agree that there are lots of justifications to have a negative outlook for our future.  But I do think that although our ability to destroy ourselves is increasing all the time, we are also, on average, getting better at treating each other better.  (I wish I could say the same for how we treat our planet, but with our population and growth rate and 'improving standard of living', we have a long loooong way to go.”)  

(for the record this was written several months before the election.)

CC:  I wonder how you feel after this election "campaign" and its result?

As for our planet, we are her guests.  Earth has only so much to offer us and after a few hundred years of sucking out and consuming everything as fast as possible, all the while getting ever more contemptuous and disconnected from our Earth’s physical realities, she's running out of what we need to survive.  Our slow learning curve doesn’t mean a thing to how Earth reacts to what we have done to her.  What we don’t know is certainly going to harm us. 

Science tells us about Earth’s simple physical reality.  No matter how much bullshit Republican delusionals have hurled at this edifice of knowledge and understanding, the overwhelming observational evidence supports what the scientists are tellings us. 

Misrepresenting what scientists say likewise doesn’t change the facts.  Choosing to ignore it doesn’t mean the changes aren’t continuing underfoot.  Here I’m reminded of an excellent song worth sharing at this point.  I’ve wanted to share it since first hearing it downtown Denver during the 2008 Democratic Convention.  Their poetry does a pretty job of conveying a certain ugly reality about how things work in Washington DC and how oblivious most people are to it.

 Oakhurst - Moonshine Still

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iAjEbRZ9jA

http://oakhurstmusic.com

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Bringing it back down to Earth and appreciating her realities.

NC-20 Burton's five 'challenging' questions - a study in deception.

Looks like we've got a debate doing after all.  Dave Burton has challenged me with a series of questions.  It's in the comments section after Dave Dewitt's  "The Changing Carolina Coast: Managing The Threat Of Rising Water," at http://wunc.org/post/changing-carolina-coast-managing-threat-rising-water#stream/0

As these things go it's gotten confused and convoluted in a hurry.  That's another tactic, Gish Gallop, tons of distracting questions that offer nothing, so far a learning is concerned, more like playing catch the ball with a dog, but using a bucket full of balls.

Though I'll admit Dave was kind enough to come up with 5 "straight forward" questions.  In this retelling I've been able to add a little more information.

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Dave Burton to citizenschallengeAE • June 15, 2015

Nobody has identified any inaccuracies in what I've written, 

{“AnOilMan” certainly pointed out a bunch in his discussion with you, http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/11/23/research-confirms-exxonmobil-koch-funded-climate-denial-echo-chamber-polluted-mainstream-media#comment-2381652596 among other places in that thread.}

either here or on my web site. {Perhaps that has more to do with your lack of introspection and inability to admit being wrong and learning from said mistake.} But do feel free to try, Pete. Please be specific.  I suggest that you start with my list of five things which are surprising to many climate alarmists:

1. Do you dispute the fact that the new NC Sea Level Rise Report abandons the 2010 Report's erroneous claim that sea-level rise has accelerated due to global warming?

2. Do you doubt that the Obama Administration's Dr. Steven Koonin has acknowledged that sea-level is rising no faster now (at ~400 ppmv CO2 & 1.8 ppmv CH4) than it was 70 years ago (at ~310 ppmv CO2 & 1.1 ppmv CH4)?

3. Do you dispute the fact that incremental increases in atmospheric CO2 levels have a diminishing effect on temperatures?

4. Do you doubt that Scientific American called anthropogenic CO2 "The Precious Air Fertilizer," because it is so dramatically helpful for agriculture?

5. Do you question the fact that most of the apparent rise in sea-level at Duck, NC is because the land near the southern Chesapeake is sinking, rather than because the sea is rising?

Can you answer "yes" to any of those questions, Pete, or do you acknowledge that I am correct about all five?

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Please note, how NC-20 Dave’s response has devolved this into a lawyerly word game.  Tossing down carefully crafted misdirections cloaked in questions, and demanding only a simple Yes/No answer.  No details please.  That’s how political games work.  But, that is not how any of us learn anything, nor how science works.

These global warming dialogues, exchanges, debates (whatever you want to call them) should be about constructive learning experiences so I’ll try to make some lemonade out of the lemons NC-20 Dave dropped at my feet.