The hypocrisy of climate change

[Frank Manning]

All new houses should come with compulsory solar panels, and there should be a tide turbine between Hurst Point and Colwell Bay for starters.

I get a sense of Deja Vu, because when I worked for a large combustion company, many years ago we drove back to Poole from a project on Tees, and I argued all the way back that we could not keep pumping CO2 into the atmosphere indefinitely with out upsetting the equilibrium of nature. I was rubbished by our Chief Development Engineer.

However I am slightly petrol (diesel actually) headed, and would hate to lose my car.

[Manoverboard]

If ALL new houses DID come with compulsory solar panels we would only buy old ones ... unless and until they are less hideous than is presently the case.

[Quizzical Bob]

If windmills are the answer to saving the polar bears it's a shame that of the hundred or so I saw this morning (windmills, not polar bears) only three were actually going round. We're paying more in subsidy for them not to work than we are for the paltry amount of electricity they generate.

Just saying.

There's a wind generator on the M25 near Watford that is floodlit at nighttime! Please explain that one to me.

[Quizzical Bob]

All new houses should come with compulsory solar panels, and there should be a tide turbine between Hurst Point and Colwell Bay for starters.

I get a sense of Deja Vu, because when I worked for a large combustion company, many years ago we drove back to Poole from a project on Tees, and I argued all the way back that we could not keep pumping CO2 into the atmosphere indefinitely with out upsetting the equilibrium of nature. I was rubbished by our Chief Development Engineer.

However I am slightly petrol (diesel actually) headed, and would hate to lose my car.

I think you need to look into the lifetime energy savings for these panels and see how long it is before they generate more energy than has been used in their manufacture.

[Silver_Shiney]

I think you need to look into the lifetime energy savings for these panels and see how long it is before they generate more energy than has been used in their manufacture.

A very good point!

[Not so ancient mariner]

Silver Shiney wrote:

" Again, with a sample from India, using the lead-lead method, a whole-rock sample gave an age of 508 million years. With the potassium-argon method, samples of mica gave an age of 450 million years. Zircons using the uranium-lead method gave an age of 572 million years".

So these 3 tests gave a mean age of approximately 510 million years (with a range of plus or minus around 12%) While clearly not 'pin-point' accuracy, these results are certainly in the same 'ball park' and a factor of 85,000 times that of the 6000 years maximum quoted by some (in my opinion, misguided) persons.

[Silver_Shiney]

Silver Shiney wrote:

" Again, with a sample from India, using the lead-lead method, a whole-rock sample gave an age of 508 million years. With the potassium-argon method, samples of mica gave an age of 450 million years. Zircons using the uranium-lead method gave an age of 572 million years".

So these 3 tests gave a mean age of approximately 510 million years (with a range of plus or minus around 12%) While clearly not 'pin-point' accuracy, these results are certainly in the same 'ball park' and a factor of 85,000 times that of the 6000 years maximum quoted by some (in my opinion, misguided) persons.

What you overlook is that, given the widely differing ages, none of those methods can be trusted to be accurate.

Whether one believes in the Bible or not, it must surely be agreed that Paul's advice in his letter to the Thessalonians to "test all things, keep what is good" is valid. Just because the majority teach a point and the vast majority accept it, it doesn't make the point correct. Surely an honest scientist will think, "hey, I've always thought x, but he's now saying y, let;'s do some further research". Instead, dissenting voices are shouted down and ridiculed. It's even being made illegal to talk about alternative views on origins in schools! So much for honest debate.

Polystrate fossils are one evidence for a young earth. Derek Ager, Emeritus Professor of Geology, University College of Swansea, and mocker of creation said ‘If one estimates the total thickness of the British Coal Measures as about 1000 m, laid down in about 10 million years, then, assuming a constant rate of sedimentation, it would have taken 100 000 years to bury a tree 10 m high, which is ridiculous. Alternatively, if a 10 m tree were buried in 10 years, that would mean 1000 km in a million years or 10 000 km in 10 million years (i.e. the duration of the coal measures). This is equally ridiculous and we cannot escape the conclusion that sedimentation was at times very rapid indeed and at other times there were long breaks in sedimentation, though it looks both uniform and continuous’.

Ager could see, in spite of his training, that the geological evidence pointed to rapid sedimentation and burial. Further, although sedimentation looked ‘uniform and continuous’, he assumed that there had to be ‘long breaks in sedimentation’. Why? To preserve the idea that the earth is millions of years old—in spite of the evidence.

Since it can be worked out how much salt there is in the sea, as well as the rates that salts go into and out of the sea, it should be possible to calculate a maximum age for the sea.

This was proposed by Sir Edmond Halley (the comet man) and, more recently, by geologist, physicist, and pioneer of radiation therapy, John Joly, who calculated that the oceans are, at most, 90 million years old (‘An estimate of the geological age of the earth’, Scientific Transactions of the Royal Dublin Society, New Series, 7(3), 1899; reprinted in Annual Report of the Smithsonian Institution, June 30, 1899, pp. 247–288). Geologist Dr Steve Austin and physicist Dr Russell Humphreys analyzed figures for the quantity of sodium ion (Na+) in the ocean, and its input and output rates. The slower the input and faster the output, the older the ocean could be. Allowing for the most generous assumptions in favour of popular secular teachings, they found that the maximum possible age for the oceans is less than 62 million years. Yet it is taught as hard fact (even though there are no eyewitness accounts to the event) that life evolved in the oceans and walked out onto dry land billions of years ago.

Which is correct? Here we have just two (out of many) totally different aspects of research, both of which disagree sharply with the worldview of long-age formation but would fit more comfortably with short-age creation.

[Quizzical Bob]

Nice try SS, but there's no way that rocks can be formed in a few thousand years (excluding the metamorphic, of course)

[Stephen]

If ALL new houses DID come with compulsory solar panels we would only buy old ones ... unless and until they are less hideous than is presently the case.

I agree Moby..to a point. Yes, when they first came out they were and still are these silver framed panels which I agree stand out like a baboons ar*e. But our neighbour had some fitted last year out front and they have dark brown frames and even the panels themselves look dark and they blend in well with the rest of the house. And to be honest I never notice them.

It like anything different, you notice it for a while, get use to it and then forget it. Unless you want a permanent crick in you neck you don't continuously walk around looking at roof tops.

[Dark Knight]

on the wind turbine comment
the reason they are shut down in very windy conditions is that in such heavy wind they are unsafe and the blades can break
talk about efficient design

[Silver_Shiney]

Nice try SS, but there's no way that rocks can be formed in a few thousand years (excluding the metamorphic, of course)

Sorry, matey, but rocks form very quickly. For example, a few years ago, a set of car keys were found embedded inside a piece of sandstone. It does not take millions of years to form rock, just the right conditions, as recently proved by Australian scientists (Kucharski, E., Price, G., Li, H. and Joer, H.A., Laboratory evaluation of CIPS cemented calcareous and silica sands, Proceedings of the 7th Australia New Zealand Conference on Geomechanics, South Australia, pp. 102–107, 1996. and Engineering properties of sands cemented using the calcite in situ precipitation system (CIPS), Exploration and Mining Research News 7:12–14, January 1997). They developed, using natural, not synthetic processes, a chemical process that transforms loose sediment into rock within days.

If rock layers do, indeed, take millions (or longer) of years to form, then the trees being slowly buried would have been rotted away before they became completely buried. Common sense alone tells you that.

[Silver_Shiney]

on the wind turbine comment
the reason they are shut down in very windy conditions is that in such heavy wind they are unsafe and the blades can break
talk about efficient design

Old windmills harvested enough wind power in their small sails to turn heavy grindstones through a series of thick wooden shafts. Imagine the amount of friction that this had to overcome. Surely, with today's technology of low-friction bearings, the same sail size could be used to generate electricity?

As DK rightly says, it's a matter of efficient design.

[Quizzical Bob]

If rock layers do, indeed, take millions (or longer) of years to form, then the trees being slowly buried would have been rotted away before they became completely buried. Common sense alone tells you that.

Not at all. Once the oxygen is cut off the rotting stops.

[Silver_Shiney]

If rock layers do, indeed, take millions (or longer) of years to form, then the trees being slowly buried would have been rotted away before they became completely buried. Common sense alone tells you that.

Not at all. Once the oxygen is cut off the rotting stops.

And the oxygen would be cut off by....?

[Quizzical Bob]

If rock layers do, indeed, take millions (or longer) of years to form, then the trees being slowly buried would have been rotted away before they became completely buried. Common sense alone tells you that.

Not at all. Once the oxygen is cut off the rotting stops.

And the oxygen would be cut off by....?

All the sand, silt and water on top of it.

e.g. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... pines.html

[Silver_Shiney]

All the sand, silt and water on top of it.

e.g. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... pines.html

Exactly - which in many cases forms rock, and as has been observed, this does not necessarily take millions of years.

[Dark Knight]

not to dispute QBob , who no doubt has a degree in geology, physics, seismology and many other sciences, to back up his claims, heaven forbid he just quotes the Daily Wail as his font of knowledge

but you can create a rock in a matter of minutes given the right temperature and pressure and chemisty

now how you ask ,does the Dark one know this? , because my company do it every single day

oops sorry QBob

[Mervyn and Trish]

And there's me thinking you only sold Tupperware. Now it's rock as well. Do you do peppermint with 'Ull written all through it?

[Dark Knight]

yes Merv...quite so

[Quizzical Bob]

not to dispute QBob , who no doubt has a degree in geology, physics, seismology and many other sciences, to back up his claims, heaven forbid he just quotes the Daily Wail as his font of knowledge

but you can create a rock in a matter of minutes given the right temperature and pressure and chemisty

now how you ask ,does the Dark one know this? , because my company do it every single day

oops sorry QBob

I have a couple of degrees, as it happens. I'm fairly confident that any rock you might create is easily distinguishable from the real thing.

[Dark Knight]

obviously not the right degrees for this argument
what we make is exactly the same as the naturally occurring rock, chemically and physically

you argument seems to have a deep flaw in it, best not put too much stock in the Daily Wail in future eh

[Quizzical Bob]

obviously not the right degrees for this argument
what we make is exactly the same as the naturally occurring rock, chemically and physically

you argument seems to have a deep flaw in it, best not put too much stock in the Daily Wail in future eh

I'm puzzled where does the newspaper come into this?

I know for a fact (and so do you) that with the right equipment your 'rock' is distincguishable from old 'rock'.

[Dark Knight]

your link to the daily mail, in you reply to SS
I suggest you do your homework on how a rock is formed first, it is simple chemistry and physics and can be manufactured in hours not the billions of years you may think
and as to your point of testing for age etc SS has already covered that in great detail

[Quizzical Bob]

your link to the daily mail, in you reply to SS
I suggest you do your homework on how a rock is formed first, it is simple chemistry and physics and can be manufactured in hours not the billions of years you may think
and as to your point of testing for age etc SS has already covered that in great detail

Ah, that link. Are you disputing that these trees were discovered?

I know all about rocks and their creation. I also know how their age is measured, and so do you.

[Dark Knight]

Radiocarbon dating is generally limited to dating samples no more than 50,000 years old, as samples older than that have insufficient 14
C to be measurable. Older dates have been obtained by using special sample preparation techniques, large samples, and very long measurement times. These techniques can allow dates up to 60,000 and in some cases up to 75,000 years before the present to be measured.[44]

thanks Wiki

not quite the billions of years some people would have us believe.....odd that