Sorry, Poirot, sometimes it's impossible to tell the difference between a nitwit and a blowfly.

Now perhaps we could get back to the issues, and what we can do about them. And I don't mean world dictatorship, a strong Leader who can guide us out of our dire man-made troubles, someone we can surrender our civil rights to, for the greater good, because that sometimes seems to be the sub-text guiding the alarmists.

But no, I'm not holding my breath on that either :)

Cheers,

Joe

Loud mouth,

"...sometimes it's impossible to tell the difference between a nitwit and a blowfly."

(How true)

But let's examine this line from the man who likes to present himself as "Mr No ad hominems, please". Here's a guy who revels in casting aspersions while simultaneously and snidely exhorting his opponents to resist doing the same.

"Now perhaps we can get back to the issue...."

Pray tell? You mean the issue on which I posted two topical links to Hansen's 2012 paper...or do you mean your diversion to discussing life expectancy?

My advice is - if you are going to set yourself up as the arbiter of fair debate on a thread, then you should at least abide by your own dictates.

Here's another link on the waning debate in the media affecting public perceptions regarding climate change:

http://www.thenation.com/article/164497/capitalism-vs-climate

Apologies for the delay, cohenite. I'm pressed for time but don't want you to think you've had the best of it.
I'd love to comment at length in response to you and loudmouth on your nitwit triumphalism, but I'll have to confine myself to your last to me.

On your first point; humanity has dogged itself with one tyranny or another since societies formed. Whatever the merits of the current system in such a comparison, there's still surely much to be desired, no?

Poirot's "polluting its nest" comment is perfectly correct, however I already made your point that AGW shouldn't be the focus.

Your other comments are really unworthy of you: semantics about "pollution", as if any but a tiny minority is taking such an extreme view about "pristine nature", or any serious voice sees nature as benevolent. The real danger is that us post-Hobbesians forget we're part of nature. It's one thing to not be romantic about nature, but quite another to think we can be aloof from it, or despise it.
Nature is of course indifferent to us, but we can't be indifferent to it. Even supposing we could, we have an ethical and aesthetic duty not to wantonly destroy it.
In short I pre-empted you above when I condemned such "lying, duplicitous sophistries" as you've indulged in since.

I do condemn the democratic capitalist form, but not for ideological reasons. I see through the ideology that "you" are so enamoured of: that capitalism in any form is destructive and dehumanising, and that "democracy" entailed upon it is nothing of the kind.
Like I also said above, "callous little conservatives, wretchedly devoted to a slavish mentality".
Apparently you're not even a progressive.
You might impress some with your "emotive and ideological terms", but I see through them.

Re Poirot’s link to the Naomi Klein article in The Nation

The best thing about Poirot’s link to Naomi Klein’s little rant is this admission:

<< The deniers did not decide that climate change is a left-wing conspiracy by uncovering some covert socialist plot. They arrived at this analysis by taking a hard look at what it would take to lower global emissions as drastically and as rapidly as climate science [read AGW activists] demand[s]…Here’s my inconvenient truth: they aren’t wrong>>.

[remember that is Naomi Klein speaking –not Andrew Bolt]

The second best thing about that link is the incongruity (and high comedy) of a movement who according to Poirot has taken a stand against <<greed and rapaciousness>> running banner ads for wrinkle creams , IKEA ,the latest Mitsubishi Pajero and designer T Shirts.

ROFLAO

Well, Poirot, as Paul Keating said, the dogs keep barking but the caravan moves on.

The issues: world temperature (0.7 degree in 100 years), sea-level rise (2-6 inches in 100 years), rapidly-growing pollution of air, waterways, soil, deforestation, etc., depletion of world fisheries - is that enough to go on ?

But why on earth consider that a world dictatorship to 'fix' these problems would be socialist ? Surely, it would be as fascist as they come ? Mind you, in practice, there hasn't been all that much difference, and I write as a life-long socialist, from birth.

But the last sixty or seventy years of experience has surely forced any decent socialists to re-think ? That there must be something better than BOTH democracy chained to capitalism, AND socialism as it's been practiced up until now ? A socialism built on the best principles of democracy, for a start.

So, yes, there are issues to discuss, besides our petty sensitivities, Poirot.

But keep barking if it makes you feel better :)

Cheers,

Joe

Squeers says:

"as if any but a tiny minority is taking such an extreme view about "pristine nature", or any serious voice sees nature as benevolent."

Google gaia Squeers and list the notables who think gaia is not just a symbol of the Earth but the Earth and that humans are the beneficiaries of 'mother' gaia.

Squeers, your view is similar to the Greens:

http://greens.org.au/policies/environment/environmental-principles

Let me ask you, who determines what is a sustainable lifestyle and what measures do you endorse to enforce your notion of a sustainable lifestyle. As a corrollary do you agree with what Jorgen Randers says about sustainability:

http://www.smh.com.au/national/this-is-as-good-as-it-gets-says-visionary-20121105-28u4m.html

Randers supports:

''eco-dictatorship'' in the form of a global executive body with the authority to tell nations how much greenhouse gas they are permitted to emit."

In his book, Limits to Growth 11 Randers says:

"A WORLD with "enough" would) aim for an average industrial output per capita of $350 per person per year - about the equivalent of that in South Korea, or twice the level of Brazil in 1990 ... If this hypothetical society could also reduce military expenditures and corruption, a stabilised economy with an industrial output per capita of $350 would be equivalent in material comforts to the average level in Europe in 1990."

William Nordhaus said this about Randers:

"THIS astonishing passage (on a world with "enough") is one of the few recommendations in Limits II that can be held up to the light of statistical analysis ... the factual predicates of the recommendation are so faulty that one wonders whether Limits II is referring to another planet ... The Limits II proposals would limit our material aspirations to attaining the living standards of Somalia or Chad. At these income levels, to purchase Limits II would take a month's wages. ... The LTG prescription would save the planet at the expense of its inhabitants."