There have been some interesting suggestions to solving the methane hydrate issue, but the none are very realistic. The closest thing to a possible plan would be that we introduce particulate, natural or man made, into the atmosphere to partially block the solar heating cycle. That would seal the methane back into the permafrost and give us time to try to reverse the effects of climate change or find another method of neutralizing it.

That is the main issue. We don't have a way to remove the methane safely. Basically the situation is primed, we have a methane bubble that is going to happen at some point, there is no stopping that without removing the methane deposits in a safe fashion.

I think I see part of the problem. The other option you wondered at is you are comparing(literally) apples to grains.

If your lucky enough to live in a climate that can support orchards and vegetables that's an entirely different story. Grain farming is a different beast and you can't farm canola and wheat the same way you'd farm apples or tomatoes.

As for out here on the prairies, the average family owned and operated farm is on the 1k acre mark. Of the 20k farms in my province, more then 90% of them will be under 2k acres and virtually none of them hire more than 2 people outside their immediate sons and daughters to work there.

As for over production, the grain vs vegetables thing still hits. Crop rotation matters with grains, over production simply doesn't. Most of the land here has been passed down from parent to child for 100 years and they've always been quick to pick up on the latest innovations from new equipment to man-made fertilizers to round-up ready crops. The only consistent theme has been greater(and more consistent) yields per acre each year and correspondingly better profits for the farmer. Your gloom and doom scenario just isn't the reality for current grain farming techniques.

In first world countries....yes, or close to that much. Agreed. Not world wide.

Mechanized harvest is accepted in "natural" old school farming. Agreed, it would fall under the "industrial farming" methods, but is one of the least damaging.
>1000 acre farms do not count as "family farms" in my eyes, even if they are owned by a single family. So is Walmart, but it's not a mom and pop or family store.

Again, mechanization is not the same as industrialization, but does still do damage by over plowing, etc. I'm talking about monoculture crops, over application of man made fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides. Grain was farmed "by hand" since farming existed with few problems, but more work involved. The work it takes to rehab a river system because industrial farming runoff contaminated and killed it is FAR more work than the extra work involved in farming using old school methods (which does not mean everything is done with hands, tools and machines have been in use for eons).

Roundup doesn't "break down" completely, and doesn't break down at all if it's washed into river systems and out of the UV light.

Once again, machines aren't all of "industrial farming", they are one of the least damaging facets, and they are not unknown in old school, smaller farming techniques. BUT....overuse of heavy equipment either over packs the soil, making it produce far less, or over plows the soil, making it run off and blow away (see the dust bowl). If it was ONLY about machinery, and ONLY industrial farming used machines, you would have a point, but neither is true.

No, actually overproducing on a piece of land like that makes it unusable quickly and new farm land is needed to replace it while it recuperates (if it ever can). Chemical fertilizers add salts that kill beneficial bacteria, "killing" the soil, sometimes permanently. producing double or triple the amount of food on the same land is beneficial in the extreme short term, and disastrous in the barely long term. (See 'dust bowl')

Man power is far less damaging to the environment than fossil fuels for the same amount of energy. Also, the people would use no more resources because they're in the field than they would anywhere else, so there's NO net gain to the energy used or demand on the environment if they farm instead of sit at a desk, but machines don't use energy when idle, so there is a net loss to the energy required if you replace them with pre-existing people.

Yes, you quoted it directly, buy your characterization of what that meant was insane. You claim they said Monsanto worked on the project (and other things) because they're evil and want to do evil and harm. The video actually said they do these things without much care for the negative consequences to others, and that makes them evil. I hope you can comprehend the distinct difference in those statements, and that your portrayal of what they said is not honest.

I don't think intellect or "brightness" has anything to do with it. It's desire/zealotry that is the key to staunch belief in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary (or complete lack of supporting evidence) paired with ignorance, sometimes deliberate, sometimes incidental. It's a faith thing, which makes it akin to religion.

eg. the discussion we are having re: solar PV, I mentioned James Hanson who was really the first modern scientist to codify man made global climate change. Climate deniers ridicule him for his stance on global warming, and many environmentalists hate him for his staunch pro nuclear stance.

The inference being that I have a choice..? =) We don't in Aus.

But you're missing the point, X >= 1 feed in tariffs are being subsidised by other users on the grid. You upload your power regardless of demand peaks (so you could be sending power when it really isn't required). Electricity companies are not going to massively drop production of regular power as it takes a considerable amount of time to spool up/down baseload production, and they are still going to switch on high cost gas turbines during peak load just in case a big old cloud blocks out the sun for an hour or so and solar production falls in a heap...

And peak usage times are usually ~8-9am (schools and business start up, switch computers and air con on etc) before solar production really kicks in, and later in the afternoon when it get's hotter, people are getting ready for dinner. If you have significant daylight savings time shifts, then you can certainly get better production when peak demand in the early evening is occurring. If the panels are facing west rather than east or north (because that's where you maximise production and make the most money... =)

As for "the idea that it might take more energy to produce a panel than it will produce itself is ridiculous", I didn't say that it did, just that it's return on that energy invested is comparatively poor. You coal analogy is patently wrong though. Depending on which source you go to, coal is anywhere from 30:1 to 50:1 for EROEI (energy returned on energy invested). It's cheap to obtain, burn and dispose of the waste, despite being toxic/radioactive.

eg. http://bravenewclimate.com/2014/08/22/catch-22-of-energy-storage/

When you talk about solar PV and the energy required to make it, you're not just talking about the production line, you're talking mining the silicon, purifying, the wasted wafers which aren't up to snuff, the cost of the workers and the power that goes in to building, transporting etc, lifetime maintenance, loss of production over time and disposal. The above link puts PV at the low 1.5-3:1 which is well beneath the roughly 7:1 required to sustain our modern society (and does not cover the massive increases in energy demand and consumption from developing countries). And as the author of the article notes, these are unbuffered values. If you add buffering to load shift, the sums get even worse.

"Put simply, if solar PV is such a bad deal, how are they saving me so much money even without any rebates?"

I didn't say solar was a bad deal, I said it's a poor way to reduce carbon pollution. If the electricity company you are connected to is willing to pay high feed in tariffs to you and you save cash, that's great, but that doesn't automagically (intentional typo mean that solar PV is making any sort of serious inroads in to reducing carbon pollution.

If we're going to fix man made climate change, we need to be prepared to pay a far higher cost and worry less about our hip pockets. Nuke might not be economically viable without causing jumps in bills, but in terms of the energy output it provides over it's life time, it is one of the highest returns in energy for the energy invested in building it, paired with very low carbon emissions.

Obviously, the figures on EROEI depend on which article you read, as it's a very complex number to work out (and will always be an approximation), but it's fairly commonly acknowledged by people who do not have a vested interest in solar PV (vs low carbon power sources in general) that PV is a feel good technology that doesn't actually do a hell of a lot in terms of carbon reduction.

Interestingly with my global journal access through academia, not anywhere is the article I linked shown as peer reviewed media accessible through the common university publications...must just be a nature journal thing to want to rort people for money no matter what their affiliation.

At first glance, I read this article to mean that the area is a sink in so far as it contains a large quantity of methane, and its 'consumption' or 'uptake' rates are shown in negative values...indicating a release of the gas.

In checking peer reviewed articles through my academic channels, I come across many that are saying pretty much the same deal, heres a tl;dr from just one of them;

"Permafrost covers 20% of the earth's land surface.
One third to one half of permafrost, a rich source of methane, is now within 1.0° C to 1.5° C of thawing.
At predicted rates of thaw, by 2100 permafrost will boost methane released into the atmosphere 20% to 40% beyond what would be produced by all other natural and man-made sources.
Methane in the atmosphere has 25 times the heating power of carbon dioxide.
As a result, the earth's mean annual temperature could rise by an additional 0.32° C, further upsetting weather patterns and sea level."

Source: Methane: A MENACE SURFACES. By: Anthony, Katey Walter, Scientific American, 00368733, Dec2009, Vol. 301, Issue 6

A "climate denier" is shorthand for "morons who refuse to acknowledge the scientific reality of man-made climate change either through blind ideological stupidity or because they are sucking oil company cock".

But I'll grant you that it really should have been "climate change denier". I'm sure at this point you will now decide that my one typo invalidates literally millions of man-hours of climate research.

You're right about one thing, we are getting desperate. Everyone should be, because we are fucking ourselves over.

Unfortunately, I see this as a ploy to get people to buy their drugs. I see no way they could possibly get approval for the type of experiments they would have to do to prove their theory, that it could somehow at least slow the effects of oxygen deprivation to the brain.
Any study on near death medicine is going to be difficult and dangerous in the extreme. It takes a long hard fight to get the FDA to allow even limited trials on humans, even humans that agree to it, even humans that are almost dead and will certainly die without it. Even animal studies on something like this will be hard to get approved and will have PETA up his ass with a flamethrower. This is the kind of science that won't get done, unfortunately, because those willing to do it don't have the means, and those with the means won't touch it with a 10 foot pole.
Don't get me wrong, though, I do think it's a good idea to examine this, and other substances, both natural and man made, for unknown properties/effects they may have, I just don't believe for a moment that this guy, or his small crowdfunded group can get the kinds of legal approvals needed just to START such a study, much less the millions of dollars they cost to actually run, which means they will only be using the money to buy their drug of choice.
Contribute if you like, but I strongly suggest researching this guy and his team first, and investigating exactly what they intend to do with your money beyond what they said, which is just buying some high grade DMT, unless you don't mind just buying him a few hits for personal use. ;-)

What a load of horseshit.

I have no intention of arguing that Mohammed was anything other than a terrible human being.

But to say that all Muslims are guilty of mass rape or genocide is so patently absurd it's barely worth rebutting.

Are they guilty of cognitive dissonance? Hell yeah.

I've argued in the past that almost all members of religions are hypocrites; either you believe your religion is divine and therefore, infallible, or you're just making up your own morality and therefore tacitly acknowledging your religion is a flawed man-made thing.

But since the alternative is insane fanatical fundamentalism, I can forgive a little hypocrisy.

The moral gap between hypocrisy and mass rape or genocide is pretty fucking substantial. If you can't or won't understand that, then you're looking at the world in terms of absolutes and little better than a fanatic yourself.

Oh, and ordinarily, I would take this as given, but just in case you really are that simple, I think mass rape and genocide are Bad Things.

Do not rape people. Do not murder people. Especially do not do this to lots of people.

Clear?

Ah, got it. I couldn't find my own photos, but google came to the rescue - here is Lake Colac in its "Colac mudflat" phase a few years ago - http://otway.biz/images/lakecolacdry.jpg

And here's a more normal view after a bit of rain - https://fredodonnellphotography.wordpress.com/2012/10/30/jetties-lake-colac/

The lake's only shallow, so it's prone to drying out completely if there's a drought. It's only happened once in my lifetime that I know of though, although the level does go up and down.

There's a man made lake called Lake Wendouree a few hours north in Ballarat, and around the time that a few years before lake Colac dried up they had to mow it... and started a fire in the dry grass! It was still mud underneath, so it was a bit hard to put the fire out too, they couldn't get the fire trucks onto it

On the Lake Wendouree fire - http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2008/12/31/2457263.htm

Quoting from an obviously man made book, even though it is 2000 years old, proves nothing, except you cannot think for yourself. If you have to quote this book, how about quoting the many evil things it says regarding slavery, woman, homosexuality, murder, rape, children, torture, etc,etc. The bible, as with other "holy" books, is vile and sickening; we are better off rid of it, and its twisted fanatics, before they drag us back to the dark ages.

This sounds like another great reason to grow your own produce. Then, with the exception of airborne chemicals you can't avoid, you can know what's gone into your own food, and decide for your self which chemicals are acceptable and which aren't. Strawberries are fairly easy to grow. I have 4 large beds of them, all started from one $3 6pack 5 years ago and grown on cheap, plentiful poo, not man made chemicals. Egg shells and horticulture oil work as good as most pesticides, and do no harm. I still lose 20% to pests, but I just grow 300% more than we can eat, so no problem.
I get not everyone can subsistence farm at home, but almost everyone has a window they can put a potted strawberry in....or a pineberry (a new variety, pineapple flavored strawberries).

They ignored the fact that other crops are grown next to the berries that may absorb the toxic chemicals, and that other chemicals are put on those other crops that also drift to the berries, contaminating them with other poisons. I'm glad they did at least mention direct neighborhood contamination.

@Taint, The skeptics don't "deny" that the climate changes. They are skeptical of the reasons why it changes, the claims of consistent warming, and the claims about the catastrophic effect of whatever is caused by human activity. Also, I don't think I need to go into the debunking of that 97% claim (science is not a function of votes or consensus, but of evidence). In any event, most of the "debate" about this topic is a waste of time considering the "believers" are mostly not climate scientists and that no one is actually doing very much about it in their own lives.

So, straw man opinions about so-called "deniers" is a pathetic attempt to substitute character "analysis" for actual scientific evidence of man-made global warming of catastrophic proportions. Evidence of which has yet to be provided.

So the real reason many people don't "believe" has to do with not being presented with actual evidence and instead being given false claims (97%) about "consensus" (which is irrelevant to science), and claims of "settled" science (also meaningless in real science), postulated mostly by writers, politicians, and activists with no scientific credentials.

No one really argues with the idea that the climate changes. But, rather, what caused the change, to what degree, and what the effects will be... Well, let's just say for now that all (not a few but all) climate models have been proven wrong.
So no, there are no climate change "deniers," but plenty of people, and many scientists, who don't believe certain claims about specific aspects, even when believers keep repeating the "consensus" canard.

I honestly don't think believers actually believe their own claims of impending greenhouse gas climate catastrophe. If they did, they would all drive hybrids and go vegetarian. Also, most "green" tech companies wouldn't fail (like most of them do). Why do the climate change believers drive their SUVs and fly to their holiday vacation without regard to the impending climate doom? They are polluting the air, are they not? By their own theories, they also warm up the climate.

Contrary to consensus claims, nearly every aspect of climate change is being debated by the scientific community. Can you name a specific aspect of it that is not under debate (without going into some general "climate change" "consensus" canard)? Such claims are too broad to mean anything of any relevance. What specific aspect? What about it?