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Thread: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

  1. #51
    God/dess onlythebest's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by discretedancer
    "shouldn't the entire world help solve the problem?" Yes, and as the leading consumer (and waster) of materials and the largest economy (on which many others depend, as we on theirs) we have the ability to make it happen...but the idea of trying to do that is called environmental imperialism.

    Have cake + eat it too = overweight and illogical
    AGREED 100%!!!
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    economic competition should not be looked at in terms of one country versus another
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  3. #53
    God/dess onlythebest's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    I stated that there were pockets of capitalism. Despite what the newspapers would like you to believe, they are run as for profit businesses. If a government prohibits peoples from starting such a business, it is not a capitalist government.
    I'm sorry,but my dad goes back there every year,he would better than both of us,don't you think???This is someone that moved us to America to build us a so-called better life.The society is capitalist.
    One of woman's cardinal rule: Body parts can be fake,everything else has to be real.

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  4. #54
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by discretedancer
    "shouldn't the entire world help solve the problem?" Yes, and as the leading consumer (and waster) of materials and the largest economy (on which many others depend, as we on theirs) we have the ability to make it happen...but the idea of trying to do that is called environmental imperialism.

    Have cake + eat it too = overweight and illogical
    Okay, when India and China bring their greenhouse gas emmisions down to the level of ours, we'll evaluate and see if futher reductions are necessary. That seems like a balanced approach.

    The fact of the matter is that no one is pressuring India or China to sign on to the Kyoto Treaty. That's why to me, the whole thing sounds more like a scheme to redistribute the world's wealth, not address global warming, if in fact it exists.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

  5. #55
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by onlythebest
    I'm sorry,but my dad goes back there every year,he would better than both of us,don't you think???This is someone that moved us to America to build us a so-called better life.The society is capitalist.
    In late 1978 the Chinese leadership began moving the economy from a sluggish, inefficient, Soviet-style centrally planned economy to a more market-oriented system. Whereas the system operates within a political framework of strict Communist control, the economic influence of non-state organizations and individual citizens has been steadily increasing.

    CIA World Fact Book

    China is moving there, they are not there yet. In fact, as long as the communists remain in power, China will never become a true capitalist country. While the communists have been willing to allow some free market activity, they will never give up enough power to totally free China's economy.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

  6. #56
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Sh0t
    my demarcation line is the presence of a stock market.

    If you have private property in the means of production, I consider you more or less a capitalist country.
    I disagree, many socialists country allow private property. However, they have so many restrictions from the government, I would not call them capitalists.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

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    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    Okay, when India and China bring their greenhouse gas emmisions down to the level of ours, we'll evaluate and see if futher reductions are necessary. That seems like a balanced approach..
    SO being better than the worst is our only standard, when the worst is the way they are because of our investment?

    How about when we match the environmental and worker standards of European nations we'll revisit it?

    Or we'll leave child safety regulations alone until the rest of the world matches our standard?

    not upgrade computers until China's IT infrastructure matches ours?

    Go back to lead paint since it's legal in much of the world,

    food quality standards in Guatemala are low, let's wait till they catch up before we enforce health codes

    stop worrying about infant mortality rates until the rest of the world is equal or better (wait, much of it is)

    I could go on...

  8. #58
    God/dess onlythebest's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    In late 1978 the Chinese leadership began moving the economy from a sluggish, inefficient, Soviet-style centrally planned economy to a more market-oriented system. Whereas the system operates within a political framework of strict Communist control, the economic influence of non-state organizations and individual citizens has been steadily increasing.

    CIA World Fact Book

    China is moving there, they are not there yet. In fact, as long as the communists remain in power, China will never become a true capitalist country. While the communists have been willing to allow some free market activity, they will never give up enough power to totally free China's economy.
    Have you ever been there???How do you or anyone else that hasn't know this???Many Americans move to China every year because the Chinese yuan stretches farther than the USD.I don't know about you,but if the country was completely communist,how can anyone buy property there???
    One of woman's cardinal rule: Body parts can be fake,everything else has to be real.

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  9. #59
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by discretedancer
    SO being better than the worst is our only standard, when the worst is the way they are because of our investment?
    There's a middle age man, he's a chain smoker, two packs a day. He also occasionlly eats too much fatty foods. He doesn't get much exercise. He asks you for advice on improving his health. What would you say? Obviously you would tell hiim to throw the damn cigarettes away for good. Once he'd quit smoking, you deal with diet and exercise. You tackle the most immediate source of the problem first. Same with the environment. If the world is truly in danger, lets handle the worst offenders first.

    You want me to take the problem seriously? Put forth a solution that addresses it seriously. If global warming is such a serious problem, why are the two most populated countries in the world not part of the "solution"? A balanced approach would be to have the entire world involved in the solution.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

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    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    circular....I try to suggest a global solution and you call it imperialism. Done I am.

  11. #61
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by onlythebest
    Have you ever been there???How do you or anyone else that hasn't know this???Many Americans move to China every year because the Chinese yuan stretches farther than the USD.I don't know about you,but if the country was completely communist,how can anyone buy property there???
    So write to the CIA and tell them they are wrong.

    People buy property there at their own risk:

    Despite persistent rumors that Hu had been pressing for constitutional changes that would guarantee property rights and promote political reform, the brief constitutional amendment passed in March 2004 simply said that “private property obtained legally shall not be violated.” Many observers commented that without a functioning structure of civil law, the words “obtained legally” are defined at the pleasure of the Communist Party.

    According to the U.S. Trade Representative, “General barriers to investment include opaque and inconsistently enforced laws and regulations and a lack of a rules-based legal infrastructure.”

    2005 Index of Economic Freedom

    I'm done arguing with your daddy, try reasearching some facts.
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  12. #62
    God/dess onlythebest's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    You're getting your info from the CIA???Nuff said,I'm done.
    One of woman's cardinal rule: Body parts can be fake,everything else has to be real.

    一个女人的枢机规则:肢体可以伪造,一切必须真实.

    中国大CHINESE BIG BOOBS!!!中国大




  13. #63
    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    I notice few people said they don't support the concept of thinking about future generations...but several were unwilling to have decendants ACTUALLY AFFECT the decisions they wanted to make now. Sad.

    If you won't apply your beliefs in everyday decisions, then they mustn't really be your true beliefs.

    Basic ethical guidelines are not transient, or situational.

  14. #64
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    This whole thread took off when I stated:

    Global Warming? Our kids will laugh at us over that one.

    Al Gore signed the Kyoto Protocol for the United States. Yet, the Clinton/Gore Administration never even submitted the treaty to the Senate for ratification. A peculiar course for someone that wrote a best selling book predicting an ecological armageddon. If our descendants look back and find global warming to be a fact, they not doubt will deride the Clinton/Gore adminstration for fiddling while the earth burned.

    If on the other hand, they look back and wonder what all the hysteria was about, they no doubt will laugh at how easily we were led astray by gloom and doom "science".
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

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    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    You still haven't and can't back up that "Our kids will laugh at us over that one"


    and you admit they might find out GCC (global climate change) is TRUE and POLLUTION REALLY DOES CAUSE PROBLEMS - yet you don't want anything done about it ...domesitcally because the rest of the world "isn't carrying their fair share" (regardless of treaties and standards and processes in place) or internationally because it's "imperialistic"

    Your reason? Two dolts in office almost 10 years ago didn't do all they could have (or maybe they did and never got the support needed to put something to a vote...who knows?). Like that really matters now, in the real world, with an administration ROLLING BACK more than 30 years of advances.

    please...

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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    You still haven't and can't back up that "Our kids will laugh at us over that one"
    Actually, this latest tidbit might be indicating that our kids will be shaking their fists at us for doing such a good job of cleaning up air pollution !



    It's ironic that our kids may have India's unregulated industrial smokestacks to thank as their primary means of stopping global warming from reaching dangerous levels (tongue in cheek comment)

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    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    uuh....sure. So we should choose artificia, poisonous pollution over naturally-occuring levels of sunlight? Maybe we should choose paved properties (which increase the warming effect) and air conditioning systems (ditto) over natural water and air filtration and habitat areas too...

    First of all, the article talks about daylight levels and not about the impacts of pollution and greenhouse gases in the air...that's only part of the problem

    Second it focuses on global WARMING not CLIMATE CHANGE

    Third it requires alot of assumptions after the daylight is in the atmosphere....more assumptions than are required to indicate pollution, greenhouse gases, and smog are bad.

    Fourth, it ignres the health benefits of clean air, and the societal problems caused by it

    fifth...oops outta time

  18. #68
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by discretedancer
    You still haven't and can't back up that "Our kids will laugh at us over that one"

    and you admit they might find out GCC (global climate change) is TRUE and POLLUTION REALLY DOES CAUSE PROBLEMS - yet you don't want anything done about it ...domesitcally because the rest of the world "isn't carrying their fair share" (regardless of treaties and standards and processes in place) or internationally because it's "imperialistic"
    I notice you always say global climate change, not global warming. So, the earth is getting warmer....or colder? Either way, the solution to the problem is the same?

    Our kids will laugh at us for our superstitious believe in global warming. I stated "if global warming turns out to be true" merely for the sake of argument. Actually, I should amend my statement to say "most kids". I have no doubt that the usual crowd of chicken-little environmental extremists will be making similar gloom and doom prophecies a generation from now. They haven't let 30 years of erroneous predictions stop them, I have no reason to believe they will let facts get in the way a generation from now.

    Your reason? Two dolts in office almost 10 years ago didn't do all they could have (or maybe they did and never got the support needed to put something to a vote...who knows?). Like that really matters now, in the real world, with an administration ROLLING BACK more than 30 years of advances.

    please...

    On July 25, 1997, John Kerry and Ted Kennedy, along with 93 other senators ...adopted a resolution stating that ‘the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto.’

    The Kyoto Protocol imposes limits on the expansion of fossil fuel use and requires cutbacks. The countries most affected by the limitations or cutbacks called for by Kyoto are the developed countries, primarily the United States, which uses 25 percent of the world’s gasoline, and to a lesser degree, Japan, Russia and the European Union.

    Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia wrote Resolution S. 98 that opposed ratification of Kyoto if it did not comply with certain concerns, the primary one being the exemption of developing nations like China and India from its requirements. The resolution was passed on July 25, 1997. The text of the Kyoto Protocol was ready for signature at the United Nations headquarters on March 16, 1998. The Protocol has not yet been ratified by Russia, (since this was written, Russia has signed) whose signature is needed before it can become effective and binding on all signers.

    As recently as October 30, 2003, Senator Byrd stated, “The Kyoto Protocol, in its current form, does not comply with the requirements of Senate Resolution 98.” He continued: “S. Res. 98 directed that any such treaty must include new scheduled commitments for the developing world in addition to any such requirements for industrialized nations but requirements would be binding and mandatory and lead to real reductions in the emissions of greenhouse gases over time. This is clearly different than the minimal, vague, and voluntary commitments that we are currently pursuing.”

    I've repeatedly stated, that if the problem is so serious, why is the world not demanding all nations participate in the solution. If global warming is occuring (which I doubt) the Kyoto Protocol has serious scientific flaws. I have a lot democratic company in that postion.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

  19. #69
    Jay Zeno
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    Our kids will laugh at us for our superstitious believe in global warming. I stated "if global warming turns out to be true" merely for the sake of argument. Actually, I should amend my statement to say "most kids". I have no doubt that the usual crowd of chicken-little environmental extremists will be making similar gloom and doom prophecies a generation from now. They haven't let 30 years of erroneous predictions stop them, I have no reason to believe they will let facts get in the way a generation from now.
    Discover magazine is convinced that it's occurring. I don't necessarily agree with them - they've been wrong before. However, I think it takes it out of the realm of "superstition."

    I honestly do not know if global warming is occurring. I don't know what, if any, effect it will have. I don't know if any effect will actually be positive or negative or neutral for the world in general and humans in particular.

    I can tell you this - as I kid, I could run around all summer without a shirt and not burn, and Caucasian kids today cannot (ozone layer?). I can tell you that the average snowpack in Colorado has declined over the decades. I can tell you that people in Colorado used to not need air conditioners in the summer because of the mildness of the weather, and now we have oppressive days.

    Those are strictly anecdotal, not scientific. However, to this curious onlooker, they seem to be adding up to something that could be more than superstition.

  20. #70
    Featured Member discretedancer's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Destiny....GCC says mostly that our (human)impacts are affecting the normal global temperature cycle - and is having an adverse effect. We know this through documentaries, government studies, resolutions like SR98 which said Kyoto was not great, not that the problem didn't exist, and the work of insurance companies like Swiss Re.

    Bottom line...the risk of being wrong on this one (and ignoring GCC and its potential impacts) far outweigh the rewards of doing nothing -when simple and long- or short-term cost effective solutions exist or can be developed with effort.

    Again, we expect progress in every convenience, pleasure aspect of our lives...why not expect the same advances (which, like higher gas mileage result in personal benefits)in this area of our society?

    Our children will thank us for the effort, and won't ever know (assuming we work to BALANCE short term results with long term impact and reduce negative outcomes) if we were afraid for nothing...because the problems we're concerned with won't have occured

    Continue to ignore the POSSIBILITY we're causing our own problems and (if you're wrong) the WHOLE WORLD will notice.

    Balancing risk and reward, I say we try to work toward balance...taking responsiblity for our own actions and not waiting until developing nations do also (unless we can support their development in this understanding too).

  21. #71
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jay Zeno
    I honestly do not know if global warming is occurring. I don't know what, if any, effect it will have. I don't know if any effect will actually be positive or negative or neutral for the world in general and humans in particular.
    Actually, a number of people believe that global warming would be good for mankind. The main benefit cited was longer growing seasons in the northern hemisphere.
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

  22. #72
    Jay Zeno
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    Actually, a number of people believe that global warming would be good for mankind.
    Sure. Also speculative. Right? The world is cause/effect, action/reaction, just like everything else.

    Warmer = maybe longer growing season? but maybe turning arable lands into arid lands?

    maybe lowering the oceans four feet (increased evaporation and undersea polar ice melting)? maybe raising the oceans four feet (melting polar ice, which raises the oceans)? Either one brings its share of disasters.

    Whether we humans do well out of it or not, the earth will go on. Our humanity is a geologic blink of the eye, and far more drastic things have occurred throughout time. I'd just like to see it become a cleaner place. Places don't get cleaner by dumping as much shit as possible into them. Yes, shit has to be dumped somewhere. Let's work on ways to produce less of it to dump rather than saying, "Naw, can't be done, bad for the wallet."

  23. #73
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by discretedancer
    Destiny....GCC says mostly that our (human)impacts are affecting the normal global temperature cycle - and is having an adverse effect. We know this through documentaries, government studies, resolutions like SR98 which said Kyoto was not great, not that the problem didn't exist, and the work of insurance companies like Swiss Re.
    You always say global climate change, not global warming. Are you saying that all these studies show that the earth is both getting warmer and cooler? Which one is it? Or is it both?

    Bottom line...the risk of being wrong on this one (and ignoring GCC and its potential impacts) far outweigh the rewards of doing nothing -when simple and long- or short-term cost effective solutions exist or can be developed with effort.
    Ah yes, the standard answer for every fear-mongering environmentalist whenever their "facts" are questioned. Whenever anyone dares to question the "facts" of environmentalists, their response is that the risks of not "doing something now", demand action. Is such an approach valid? No, its not. Say I go to the doctor with a bad headhache. Maybe I need new contacts, maybe I've been staying out too late at night, maybe I have brain cancer. If my doctor were to adopt the reasoning of today's environmentalists, he'd immediately schedule me for brain surgery. If I were to question his treatment he would reply, "well Destiny, the risk of being wrong on this one far outweigh the rewards of doing nothing". I'd find a new doctor. The unpleasant consequences of a theory being true do not make the theory true, or demand blind acceptance of it.

    In the 80's it was acid rain. One writer described acid rain as an "ecological Hiroshima". "Experts" warned that forests would die off and that lakes would become giant death pools for the fish inhabiting them. It didn't happen. In fact, by 1997 the U.N. stated, "the widespread death of European forests due to air pollution which was predicted by many in the 1980's did not occur".

    In the 1990's it was ozone depletion. NASA even announced that they had discovered a huge hole in the ozone. Not suprisingly, this discovery coincided with request for more money to study the problem, a common theme in all environmental crises. Yet by the fall of 2000, NASA announced that this hole was shrinking and would be gone in a few decades. I could provide more examples of "the sky is falling" environmental hyperbole, but I think you get the drift.

    I suppose a new millenium demands a new crises to trumpet in all those fund raising letters and global warming fits the bill. I'm sorry, but the environmental lobby has a sorry record when it comes to accuracy. If people like me are skeptical, they have only themselves to blame
    Dancing is wonderful training for girls, it's the first way you learn to guess what a man is going to do before he does it. ~Christopher Morley, Kitty Foyle

  24. #74
    Featured Member Destiny's Avatar
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jay Zeno
    Sure. Also speculative. Right? The world is cause/effect, action/reaction, just like everything else.
    Yes it is speculation. I can't find the site where I was reading the positive things that might come about if global warming actually occured, but it was interesting to think about.

    Whether we humans do well out of it or not, the earth will go on. Our humanity is a geologic blink of the eye, and far more drastic things have occurred throughout time. I'd just like to see it become a cleaner place. Places don't get cleaner by dumping as much shit as possible into them. Yes, shit has to be dumped somewhere. Let's work on ways to produce less of it to dump rather than saying, "Naw, can't be done, bad for the wallet."
    "The earth will go on", my thoughts exactly. Does mankind have an effect on the earth? Of course. But is it as detrimental as some believe? No, I don't think so. It's an awfully big planet we live on. The earth is not as fragile, nor is Man as powerful as some seem to think.

    Some good news. First, we are not, "dumping as much shit as possible". Americans are becoming much better stewards of our environment. In 1985, Americans produced an average of 3 lbs. of waste daily. By 2000, it had dropped to 2.5 lbs. Secondly, many times Man provides solutions to naturally occuring problems. An example is the American Chestnut. Once stretching from Maine to Florida, the tree was almost totally wiped out by blight. Now, thanks to the work of volunteers, a new blight-resistant variety is being reintroduced.
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  25. #75
    Jay Zeno
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    Default Re: do you agree? If not, why? If so, why?

    Quote Originally Posted by Destiny
    Some good news. First, we are not, "dumping as much shit as possible".
    Enjoy that Hummer.

    Americans are becoming much better stewards of our environment.
    That's a good thing. Would that have happened if entirely dependent on the market? Unprovable, I suppose. But I highly doubt it, since the market went that way due to government encouragement/regulation.

    In 1985, Americans produced an average of 3 lbs. of waste daily. By 2000, it had dropped to 2.5 lbs.
    Without population figures, that still could mean a net increase, of course, if the population rose enough to overcome the percentage drop. But I'm just spouting, admittedly. I don't know. I agree, it's a good trend. Hope it gets better.

    Secondly, many times Man provides solutions to naturally occuring problems.
    Sure, and promptly creates a new problem. Man doesn't understand the consequences involved in a widespread, complex, but still closed ecosystem. The bacteria that cleans up oil spills may spread contamination through the food chain to the tuna that we eat. Perhaps the chestnut tree and its blight were evolutionary fodder, destined to go out, and the blight-resistant variety will cause the blight to evolve to more malignant forms that attack flora that would have otherwise gone unscathed. Who knows. That's all speculation, too, but it's a bit arrogant and historically ill-advised to presume that our "solutions" are necessarily just that.

    I'm simply advocating responsible living and, yeah, responsible legislation with a balanced approach to properly preserving the environment that we're stuck with. And I don't understand, for example, cries of "Can't work!! Isn't fair!!" when something is being tried, for the good of us all, outside of, or at least conserving, nonrenewable resources. (For that matter, nuclear energy strikes me as a good approach to pretty clean energy, assuming that waste is properly, very properly taken care of. My mind is open.) Some of those attempts will go down a blind alley. Some will be productive. That's how it goes.

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