Climate change and COWS!!

Yeah animal products are pretty bad for the planet. There's no real reason for the vast majority of people to eat them either, vegetarian alternatives are so advanced now that you don't even miss it. It's also much cheaper and better for you.

Yeah animal products are pretty bad for the planet. There's no real reason for the vast majority of people to eat them either, vegetarian alternatives are so advanced now that you don't even miss it. It's also much cheaper and better for you.

Yeah because my pack of sausages is soooo much worse for the world than some ******s 6L 4x4.

Equally there is absolutely no reliable evidence saying that living off of carrots is better than a diet with meat in it - especially given that humans arent herbivores.

There is evidence . It's based on medical conditions and scientific analysis. People who suffer from diverticulitis is one such condition where the eating of red meat is detrimental to ones health . It also prevents a lot less farting as food passes through the colon more peacefully and quickly ......

I always find this idea that meat free diets are better to be quite strange. The overwhelming majority professional athletes eat meat, these are people with access to the best nutritionists and who are deeply concerned with what they eat.

As for the OP, do you have a source to support your claim that more than half of congress doesn’t believe in climate change? That seems very unlikely

I'd agree that it is at least questionable that a completely meat-free diet is more healthy for individuals. But it's not really the point - meat consumption in wealthier countries and classes is way beyond the level needed for optimum health, and farming for meat consumes far more resources (including land) than is good for the planet's health (and consequently for all of us).

Tragically, it's entirely plausible that the majority of the US Congress are climate change deniers. This survey in 2017 defined "climate deniers" as those who deny the existence of anthropogenic climate change and concluded that 53/100 Senators are deniers and 232/435 in Congress are deniers. It lists the individuals by state and gives illustrative quotes to substantiate the classification, so it's not bad evidence.

Yeah animal products are pretty bad for the planet. There's no real reason for the vast majority of people to eat them either, vegetarian alternatives are so advanced now that you don't even miss it. It's also much cheaper and better for you.

Having looked through the list I’m not sure I agree that some of the quotes constitute denying climate change, below are a few examples:

"In our fervor to protect the environment, we lose sight of economic and scientific reality”

"I am sure human activity plays some role, but I don't think the science is clear on how much is man-made and how much is natural. What I do know is that the United States should not follow the path of the global warming alarmists like the Obama administration who wants us to unilaterally handicap...industry with over-burdensome EPA regulations." - saying we can’t quantify how much of climate change is caused by humans isn’t denying its existence, he explicitly said that humans have contributed.

"Climate was changing before we had carbon emissions… I need to be convinced how much of that is man and how much of it is just the global climate conditions." - as above

"A lot of these predictions haven't been proven to be true."

These are all just from Florida, I don’t think any of them would constitute denying humans are in some part the cause of climate change.

Re those quoted from politicos, I'd first point out that the claim is not that that they deny that "humans are in some part the cause of climate change". It is rather that to deny that climate change is happening AND that human activity is the main driver of this change. This, after all, is the scientific consensus, and it is denying this latter emphasis that gives these politicians their justifications for doing nothing about it. This seems to be a fair representation of the politcos you highlight when I looked at the sources for the quotes:

As reported in the Panama City News Herald:

"Matt Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach, said there is no denying the planet is warming, but more needs to be done to determine whether it’s a natural cycle of warming and cooling or if humans are irreversibly harming the planet....“In our fervor to protect the environment, we lose sight of economic and scientific reality,”....any future legislation [on climate change] should not be enacted if it harms jobs." In his first remark, he clearly indicates skepticism and in the last, a commitment to do nothing about it anyway.

"Neal Dunn, a Republican congressional candidate for District 2, said the climate has been changing since long before man was on Earth. “I am sure human activity plays some role...[etc]...handicap industry with over-burdensome EPA regulations. That will only further empower China..." Again, I think it is clear how he will be voting on climate change legislation.

There was nothing further at E&E News on John Rutherford, the man who said "Climate was changing before we had carbon emissions… I need to be convinced how much of that is man and how much of it is just the global climate conditions." But his quote is clearly indicates that he refuses to accept the scientific consensus.

The last quote is from Ron Desantis, in a YouTube clip, who went on to say, "A lot of these predictions haven't been proven to be true....what are you telling us to do?....my view is, from a policy perspective, those are not policies that I am going to embrace.."[instead, he advocates increased fracking]

From that little bit of digging, I feel it's fair to call each of these politicians "deniers", if only provisionally. Even if they don't come out and say as much, they give every indication that they will act in their legislative role as if they were out-and-out deniers.

In respect of the quote from Matt Gaetz I would say it's the closest of the bunch to denying climate change however I always become suspicous when I see quotes seperate by an ellipsis. As for the latter they all seem to be either asking the question of how much is caused by humans and saying they aren't in favour of current or proposed legislation. In regard to the first question, can you quanitfy how much of climate change is attributable to people and how much is caused by other factors? As for the second part, disagreeing with the proposed solution to a problem does not mean you are denying the problem exists. While some or even all of those politicians may be climate change deniers the evidence presented in the form of those quotes is not compelling enough to assert that. I also find it quite worrying to suggest that politicans shouldn't be free to challenge or disagree with sceintific consensus; there have been lots of things in the past that I'm sure would have been classfieid as consensus that have turned out to be wrong.

If you are suspicious of the ellipses, all you have to do is look up the sources of the quotes - which are provided in the link I posted - and draw your own conclusions.

With regards to your question about the degree to which human activity has caused climate change, these lists are of those scientific agencies which have concluded that human activity is the primary driver of climate warming. As you can see, it is no longer possible to claim that this is a matter of "debate", it is an overwhelming consensus. https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/ and here http://www.opr.ca.gov/facts/list-of-scientific-organizations.html

The 5th assessment report of the IPCC concluded that the contribution of human activity to climate warming since 1950 is close to 100%. If you'd like to see their workings, here is the technical analysis (no ellipses!) http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/report/WG1AR5_TS_FINAL.pdf

EDIT: this article explains the calculation reasonably simply https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-why-scientists-think-100-of-global-warming-is-due-to-humans

I agree that politicians should be free to challenge scientists to demonstrate that what they say is true. But of course, to anyone who really wants to examine the evidence, there is no longer any doubt. The reality is that these politicians have other agendas, concerned with how best to represent the interests of their power base. No petrochemical giant is going to bankroll a politician who says, "We have to stop burning fossil fuels right away". No MP with shares in a new fracking venture in the UK is going to say, "Ban fracking". Their "doubt" has nothing to do with scientific enquiry and everything to do with protecting vested interests.

Either that or they acknowledge the reality of the situation; if we suddenly banned the use of all fossil fuels the world would grind to a halt. And of course, politicians have donors with interests but most companies tend to diversify when they see the future is different to the past hence why alcohol manufacturers are investing huge amounts into marijuana and large car manufacturers are making hybrid cars. Oil companies are now spending huge amounts to develop renewable energy

Either that or they acknowledge the reality of the situation; if we suddenly banned the use of all fossil fuels the world would grind to a halt. And of course, politicians have donors with interests but most companies tend to diversify when they see the future is different to the past hence why alcohol manufacturers are investing huge amounts into marijuana and large car manufacturers are making hybrid cars. Oil companies are now spending huge amounts to develop renewable energy

We could stop ridiculously reproducing (Africa and Asia)

Population 1800 was 1 billion
1928 2 billion
1974 4 billion
1983 5 billion
2018 7.5 billion.....

The population of Africa is set to go from just over a billion today to 4 billion by the end of the century.

You can try and protect all the animal and plant species you want, you can try and stop using plastics and decarbonise but we keep taking that population up stupidly and it will still end up in the same place.

We could stop ridiculously reproducing (Africa and Asia)

Population 1800 was 1 billion
1928 2 billion
1974 4 billion
1983 5 billion
2018 7.5 billion.....

The population of Africa is set to go from just over a billion today to 4 billion by the end of the century.

You can try and protect all the animal and plant species you want, you can try and stop using plastics and decarbonise but we keep taking that population up stupidly and it will still end up in the same place.

The whole point of our exchange was to demonstrate that most senior politicians in the US are denying the reality of the situation by pretending that there is real uncertainty over how far human activity is the driving force behind climate change. As I have shown, anyone who has bothered to look at the science can see there is no uncertainty about this. They are acting in bad faith and deliberately spreading misinformation.

The question of whether they are proposing viable solutions is a different issue.