Personally, I don't think that there is enough evidence, but hey, we can at least turn off our computers for a bit to save deminishing resources, and if global warming is true, weve kill to birds with one stone, the power problem and the GW problem.

What's not to understand? I'll do it in baby steps for you.

We clear trees, we pollute, we overpopulate. All this is chocking our atmosphere. It's causeing the world to warm a bit which equels climate changes. This means the weather's going crazy.

I live in Australia right under the hole in the ozone layer. It's there, we can see it with technology. We've done studies and have PROVEN that there is more carbon dioxide in the air. It's not that hard to understand.

Well, I believe in global warming. But we're fucked anyway, because we are currently living with the effects of the pollution that happened generations ago. And with Bush and the Evangelicals' belief in the Rapture (which means the sooner the world end the sooner they get to heaven) and the growth of pollution-heavy China and India...oh shit.

PurpleRain:
What's not to understand? I'll do it in baby steps for you.

We clear trees, we pollute, we overpopulate. All this is chocking our atmosphere. It's causeing the world to warm a bit which equels climate changes. This means the weather's going crazy.

I live in Australia right under the hole in the ozone layer. It's there, we can see it with technology. We've done studies and have PROVEN that there is more carbon dioxide in the air. It's not that hard to understand.

Not much more I can add to that... I mean, why not just go along with it? If it turns out global warming is false, then you still save on your power bills, so no loss there.

How can people say that there isn't enough facts? Have they bothered looking for them. I had to do an article on Global Warming (I chose overpopulation) and the statistics are frightening. I could believe someone haveing an argument about the afterlife, because such things will never be explained, but to do it with such overwhelming evidence is ignorent.

I believe in the fact that I haven't seen real snow for the last five years. I also believe that industry has pumped a lot of shit into the sky for centuries. Why shouldn't the two be linked?

Purpy, I think he meant that there's not enough evidence that we're the cause of global warming. You can't really dispute the fact that the weather's gone to hell, but a lot of people think it's mostly due to the nature of the planet.

As for the "China" argument. You may as well say that "my crappy lifestyle is going to give me a heart attack and kill me in my fourties, so it doesn't matter if I smoke". Fatalist assholes.

Break:
I believe in the fact that I haven't seen real snow for the last five years. I also believe that industry has pumped a lot of shit into the sky for centuries. Why shouldn't the two be linked?

Purpy, I think he meant that there's not enough evidence that we're the cause of global warming. You can't really dispute the fact that the weather's gone to hell, but a lot of people think it's mostly due to the nature of the planet.

As for the "China" argument. You may as well say that "my crappy lifestyle is going to give me a heart attack and kill me in my fourties, so it doesn't matter if I smoke". Fatalist assholes.

"We're all doomed Captain Manwaring! Doomed I tell ye"

Climate change isn't something you can really believe or disbelieve, its been happening for millions of years already and will continue happening regardless of what mankind does or doesn't do in the future.

I've always thought that the real issue is about how much, if any, impact mankind has on this and its an issue which is far from settled. I've been a sceptic of the idea that mankind is having a 'devastating' impact on the climate for a long time becuase from all the evidence that I've ever seen it just doesn't add up properly to the disasterous picture the media paints for us. Gonna outline a few things here so bear with me and if anyone knows of any evidence to the contrary I'd love to know about it. Sorry in advance for a lack of links but most of what I know on this is from journals and books and I can't remember the titles.

The biggest issue I have is the co2 argument, mainly because co2 makes up so little of our atmosphere (its about 0.06% overall) and how small a proportion of that is from human industry (can't remember the figures exactly but I think it was about 6 gigatons a year and comparatively animals breathing is about 150 gigatons a year). Then there is the fact that as greenhouse gasses go climatolegists claim it is one of the lesser ones, water vapour is the strongest (6 times more so than co2) and makes up over 90% of all the greenhouse gasses.

Then there's where the warming is actually happening, if the earth was getting warmer due to greenhouse gasses the most warming should be happening in the troposphere, but the troposphere is warming much slower than the surface and in places is getting cooler, which contradicts the theory.

The ice core records, which Al Gore used in his video An Inconvenient Truth, also contradict the theory. They show that co2 levels and temperateure were rising and falling largely at the same time, but Gore got the connection the wrong way around, looking closely it shows that the changes in co2 levels were lagging behind temperature change by 6 or 7 centuries, which would indicate that temperateure drives co2 levels, not the other way around.

Then there's just the historical records of temperature. The current warming spell started about 150 years ago, when human industry was in its infancy, and kept rising all the way to about 1940. After the second world war, when global industry took off and human production of co2 went much higher the global temperatures started to fall, and eventually set off fears of an oncoming ice age, about the mid 70's temperatures started rising again, until last year when the average temperature plumeted back to 1930's levls (and woo-hoo, I actually have a link of this http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/02/19/january-2008-4-sources-say-globally-cooler-in-the-past-12-months/ this isn't the only place for this, just Google the topic if you want others).

There is also the consideration that this main temperature rise was us coming out of a period that is reffered to as the 'little ice age' where temperatures were much lower than they had been and this lasted a few centuries. Before that there was a warm period where temperatures were higher than they are now, this also lasted a few centuries, and the penguins and polar bears survived it just fine.

What really annoys me is like when the National Geographics claimed that 6 degrees celcius of warming over the next century would be catostrophic for earths climate, and it would, but there's only been 0.5 degrees celcius of warming over the last 100 years, which is quite normal historically speaking, so where do they get 6 from? There's so little reliable information being put out to people and so much scaremongering to try and sell papers and magazines and too many people are being suckered along with it. We do need to look after the world better than we have, we need renewable energy sources and to move away from our dependance on burning fossil fuels but I honestly don't think that its for the reasons that the goverments, media and eco-mentalists would have us believe.

Yeah Global Warming exists but woopdy fucking do. The truth is that if we did stop the emition of Carbon Dioxide completely then the world will be a much worse place. I do agree pollution sucks arse but does living in a world similar to the Mad Max universe sound any better?

The truth is that people can't live with out electricity, cars and their plastic crap. While I hate pollution I also hate it when people say they hate pollution over the internet as it is hypocritical.

I'm all for finding new sources of "green" electricity though.

This sums up how I feel about people who want to "save the planet" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw

PurpleRain:
How can people say that there isn't enough facts? Have they bothered looking for them. I had to do an article on Global Warming (I chose overpopulation) and the statistics are frightening. I could believe someone haveing an argument about the afterlife, because such things will never be explained, but to do it with such overwhelming evidence is ignorent.

Indeed. Given every good study has shown that Global Warming or at least "Climate change" is happening. And even with the political pressure on that UN committee, they said it was roughly 90+% probable that we were causing it.

Treating the sky like a big sewer and dumping all our waste carbon dioxide, methane, and other 'green house gases' into the atmosphere it the main environmental problem we face today.

In Holland, they have noticed water levels rising (And trust me, they pay attention to it as most of their country is below sea level). In the north and south poles, huge chunks of the ice have been breaking away and melting as they flow towards the equator. Glacers have been melting and disappearing at an alarming rate. To say its not happening is like when these guys go 'Oh, I don't believe in evolution' when they can see it happen in viruses, bacteria, and even flys and other insects.

Doug:
And even with the political pressure on that UN committee, they said it was roughly 90+% probable that we were causing it.

Is this the same committee that has a track record of lying and altering statistics?

I do believe in global warming because it is happening and that's undeniable, however I do not believe that we are causing it or that it will do serious damage to the planet.
That said I am all for using renewable energy sources because of other reasons.

I think that this puts it best...
http://xkcd.com/164/

I Think that their might be something to Global warming, But I think that we need to worry about the environment for other reasons. Like for example, the sky rocketing numbers of people with birth defects, people with cancer, people with lung conditions. It's irrational to say that at the same time as the US repeals 200 or so EPA laws, and slashes the EPAs funding by 30 percent, that theirs no connection with the millions of people suddenly getting cancer and heart disease.

Also, with regard to global warming, I think I'd believe the scientists more if they didn't ask me for money for "Studies" at the same time they warn me about global warming. Plus, Sorry I don't trust Figures from 1925. that was the same time we thought is was a good idea to eat tapeworms to loose weight.

Lastly, If we didn't tear down every Tree and Feild to build 22 bedroom houses on top of, maybe we'd have enough trees to handle the CO2. Plant Trees dumb*****.

i think global warming does exist, but the media are doing their best to blow it straight out of proportion, basically its a climate of fear which is changing (pun woot) and it's just getting continually worse as the natural disasters continue

i mean, cyclones and hurricanes did happen before we all got scared of global warming

and i've also heard theories that the world temperature hasn't risen in 10 years

I don't think the question should be do you believe in global warming, but rather, do you really care about it?

Mathew952:

Lastly, If we didn't tear down every Tree and Feild to build 22 bedroom houses on top of, maybe we'd have enough trees to handle the CO2. Plant Trees dumb*****.

Most large trees create almost the same amount of CO2 as the absorb.

About the turning the lights off to save power, how can the people in the power plant tell if your using power. I 'm pretty sure they just burn a certain amount of coal per hour so if we don't use the power we are just wasting it.

I also think its funny when they have the "OH NO Global Warming stories" on the news and they show footage of steam coming out of the big cooling towers in power stations. The smoke comes out the thin tall stacks at the back and you can barely see it.

I'm inclined to take Break and Darkong's views here, this planet was already trying to kill us thousands of years before the industrial revolution.

Global Warming is real. There is lots of evidence that it exists but people still don't want to believe.

Due to our limited knowledge of weather conditions on our planet I feel it is wrong to be completely single minded on the subject. All we can really do is just see what happens; our species is too selfish to change it's ways.

I've never really understood why Carbon Dioxide is an 'insulator' considering its 66% oxygen, anyone shed some light on that?

I just feel sorry for the Polar Bears, sucks to be them.

Global warming will probably reach a point in the new hundreds of years and go bonkerz on mankind killing most of us. But it will never be the end of us, endurance ftw.

I personally believe in it quite strongly.
However even if you dont. Even if you can somehow think that all the chemicals we use and all the pollution and deforestation and wiping animals out does indeed have no effect.
Do you really want to run the risk and keep going on until its too late to do anything about it ?

The Wizard:

I've never really understood why Carbon Dioxide is an 'insulator' considering its 66% oxygen, anyone shed some light on that?

I don't see in what respect having oxygen in something would make something non-insulating? Water vapour is actually worse in terms of being a 'greenhouse gas' (i.e. in keeping the heat in), it's just it's position in the atmosphere that means that it is having less of an effect than carbon dioxide.

The legend that is David Attenborough believes in it. I ain't gonna argue with the soft-voiced, blue-shirted one.

Of corse it's real. It's the fact that no one cares that creates the problem.

Meh, I fail to see what all the fuss is about. During previous eras, the earth had FAR more CO2 in the atmoshpere than it does now -mainly due to vulcanism going haywire. The result? Bigger plants (for those of you who dropped bio,, CO2 is plant's source of glucose.) AND a warmer earth. So yes- CO2 and methane causes temperature increases. How great will the effect be? I'm not so sure. Hell, I'm no meterologist, but when half of them claim everything will be fine and the other half describe a situation remarkably similar to the 'nuclear winter' scenarios of past generations, I'm inclined to shrug and get on with my life.

I'm all for using alternate energy because petrol prices are killing the economy.

Incidentally, pollution has never been linked to heart disease. Cancer, yes, but there is no epidemological link between heart disease and pollution.

Interstingly, methane is the worst greenhouse gas. Its main sources?

-Rice Paddies (stupid chinese)
-Cattle (stupid farmers).

That being said, I really don't care. From somewhere in 1000 AD till 1600 AD the baltic sea was pure ice. Than it melted. The result? A distinct improvement in european trade. Whooooo. Ahem.

I think its a never-ending cycle.....just like the 1st and 2nd ice age...... It happened before and it will happen again.....the question is....when?

Im sure if it does happen.....We; as humans will find a way to survive and persevere and get our asses back online to play XBOX Live and WoW

Fondant, you put it perfectly. Everyone here is so worried that we are emitting CO2 when there are so many other gases that are warming the earth. And believe it or not, water vapor is the worst green house gas, not methane. Once people caught onto this whole "live green" fad, right after that horrendous piece of drivel "an inconvenient truth", people stopped asking questions about what exactly is happening to the earth at the moment. The truth is, the earth goes through cycles, meaning that it gets cold (ice ages) then it gets hot (now). The earth has continually warmed to this point from the last ice age which was caused by the release of cold water into the jet stream in the atlantic ocean, causing it to stop, leaving no warm air to circulate throughout the world. All we are seeing is the same trend that has been happening for 4.6 billion years since the world was created that we are currently in a state of temperature increase and there is nothing that any human can do, seeing as this is not our fault.

Now, considering that people are being more or less friendly to our planet, I could care less for the reasons. Because this means that less deforestation is happening, less PCB's into the air from gas guzzling cars, most industrial practices are watched very closely to ensure no raping of our natural wildlife and their habitats. So, if you think global warming is happening, try to actually read about it from an unbiased view, look back 10 million years or so, and see the trends the world goes through. Once you realize that global warming is a frace, u can start to worry about the water shortage, and care about that next.

Global Warming is just a way Pseudo-Ecologists and Al Gore earn money.They trick people into believing this bullshit.Let me show you an example.I'm sure that some of you have already heard this story but oh well.This is how it goes.

In 1997, Nathan Zohner, a 14-year-old student, gathered petitions to ban "Dihydrogen Monoxide" as the basis of his science project, titled "How Gullible Are We?".He urged people to sign a petition demanding strict control or total elimination of this chemical.And for plenty of good reasons since:
DHMO;
* is called "hydroxyl acid", the substance is the major component of acid rain.
* contributes to the "greenhouse effect".
* may cause severe burns.
* contributes to the erosion of our natural landscape.
* accelerates corrosion and rusting of many metals.
* may cause electrical failures and decreased effectiveness of automobile brakes.
* has been found in excised tumors of terminal cancer patients.

Despite the danger, dihydrogen monoxide is often used:
* as an industrial solvent and coolant.
* in nuclear power plants.
* in the production of styrofoam.
* as a fire retardant.
* in many forms of cruel animal research.
* in the distribution of pesticides. Even after washing, produce remains contaminated by this chemical.
* as an additive in certain "junk-foods" and other food products.

He asked 100 people if they supported the petition.

86 people said yes.
12 people were undecided.
Only two(2) people knew that the chemical was water.

Conclusion is obvious.

Global warming is a natural process. As a race were speeding it up.

No. People are quick to hubris.

well, the question isn't wether the climate is changing, it is what causes it to change. The amount of CO2 has correlation to the global temperature, but what causes which? I think temperature has more effect on CO2 than vice versa, because if you heat a bottle of coke or something fizzy; the coke is less fizzy than a cold drink, this suggests that CO2 rises when temperature goes up and not the other way round.
However, if CO2 DOES cause the global temperature to rise, then there is nothing we can do about it, volcanoes spit more CO2 than we could ever do.
Global warming seems unusually convienient to companies I think; you see, they will get more money from advertising if they claim they are "green".
If you asked me if I believed in global warming, I would say that I believe in climate change, but I am not entierly convinced the current theory is correct, and that if we are wrong, it may be the "four humours theory" all over again.
but in my opinion, lack of pirates causes global warming :P

Why isn't this a poll?

Anyways, the medival times were MUCH warmer then right now, they used to have wineries in northern England IIRC. And yes. The polar bears survived. :)

I believe in global warming and do the most I can to help the environment. I work at a Recycling Center for Pete's sake! My fat carbon footprint is due to my parents driving that huge car.

Yes there is global warming and I also believe that it is a natural occurrence however, the damage we have caused to our planet has sped the process up. Hopefully, we as a species will wipe ourselves out or, will be wiped out by some sort of plague before we completely kill the planet so that life can thrive again without our interference.

I believe in global warming - I've seen firsthand evidence. Last year, a couple days before Christmas, it was like spring, and almost all the snow melted. And most of the rest of the winter there was very heavy snowfall, which I attribute to some sort of equilibrium effect taking place. I'm a dumbass when it comes to science, but I can see that it's true.