Pope Francis has endorsed the science behind global warming and chastised the most powerful and polluting countries for not doing enough to address the problem. Reducing emissions, he wrote demands “honesty, courage and responsibility…”
The primary driver of global warming is increased carbon-based energy production as a consequence of economic development and an exponentially growing world population. Therefore I propose that the Pope displays “honesty, courage and responsibility” and reverses the 1968 encyclical by Pope Paul VI forbidding birth control and furthermore encourages Catholic couples to limit themselves to 2 children. Anything less would be hypocrisy.
On a related note, I am greatly enjoying the unease displayed by Catholic Republican politicians who are deniers of global warming.
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Even a broken clock is right, twice a day.
I have no wish to promote the pope.
But he must be doing something right if Fox News has started calling him "the most dangerous person on the planet".
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/danthropology/2015/06/fox-news-calls-pope-f...
Perhaps the talk of climate change can end up ruining business for the rich billionaires?
Edit:
And some more...
"Bush, who is Catholic, told a town hall event in New Hampshire that Pope Francis should steer clear of global affairs."
"Coal industry lobbyist says pope should promote fossil fuels to help poor"
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/17/jeb-bush-joins-republican...
Holy shit! The Pope kicks as these days.
"Pope Francis: The Encyclical" - an Epic Hollywood Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76BtP1GInlc
Jesus helps him with sparring, LoL.
Impressive when the Pope does a spiraling jump kick, á la capoeira.
I guess I forgot to post this:
"Pope Francis blames greedy profiteers for destruction of ‘our Sister, mother Earth’ in landmark encyclical"
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/pope-francis-blames-greedy-profiteers-fo...
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-fra...
Interesting how our "mother Earth" is also our "sister" in Catholicism. Well, less "interesting and more disturbing, and that is from a fucking Texan!
While we are on the subject of the Pope ( who I always have said is just a man, who has, and is capable of, comiting the same indescretions as the rest of us, and also must sit on the bowl everyday like the rest of us) During this world tour, at one of the stops, he "begged forgiveness of the Catholic church, for comiting "grave sins against the American people in the name of God." Then said that the church higher ups have acknowledged these " grave sins" over MANY CENTURIES!! I have better words for the " grave sins..." CRIMES!!! Why weren't the offending clergymen reported to the police, and THROWN IN JAIL??!! Along with the Bishops, Cardinals, and whomever else that had information, yet buried it and allowed these pedophiles ( THATS what they are!!) to continue their atrocities against other children BY PASSING THEM ON TO OTHER PARISHES!! How come the theists NEVER talk about this?? Just ignore facts and evidence...because we all know that ignoring something means it is NOT happening...typical theism!! If this was anything else but religion, and church, these individuals would have been thrown in prison, and the institutions closed down and burned. They are permitted to police themselves, which means that there IS NO POLICING!! Molesting children is the one thing that no one has any tolerance for...except when it comes to religion and clergy. These people are SICK!!! They put their trust, faith, love, children, and lets not forget the MONEY, into an institution that has repeatedly proven for CENTURIES that their main objective is protecting pedophiles, and extracting money from people at every opportunity!! Sickening!!!
Religious prejudice is the order of the day and unless secularist do something, its always going to be Sarlem
Absolutely, I agree. (I think... what the heck is "Sarlem"?)
But it's good that such an influential religious figure states this openly.
And the hilarious part is how pissed of the political religious right in the US are over this. It's exactly what they didn't want to hear from the Pope.
Would like to make one additional comment regarding"global warming." Yes, there is evidence that the earth may now be in a warming "trend." The earth is about 6 billion years old...there are going to be warming trends, and there are going to be cooling trends. There are going to be summers that are oppresively hot, and other summers that are cooler than others. There are going to be winters that are extremely cold, with more snow than usual, and others that will be milder than usual. These things go in CYCLES. It has NOTHING TO DO with what we are putting into the "atmosphere." The weather is the weatheer, it can change with the direction of the wind, you cannot predict it, or change it. No matter what goes into the air, it can NEVER affect the millions and billions of miles of atmosphere. If you think it can, well, you may as well bang your head against the wall...keep waitin, pal!! Several months ago, there was an article in the news about archeologists discovering the fossils of an animal that they dated back to about 140,000 years. The scientists are conducting a further investigation as to how these creatures survived in an earth that was WARMER THEN, THAN IT IS NOW. There were no emissions, cars, or industrial pollution 140,000 years ago. Additionally, if you've ever been on the tour, the Niagra Falls was created because of a warming trend on the earth. There were no cars, or emissions pollution back then, either. Do not believe every bit of propaganda the governments tell you. All this warming talk, and linking it to environmental causes is all "politically correct" nonsense that politicians use to get public support, and make tons of money with, along with these "environmentally correct" companies that they're in bed with. I've been checking the weather temps for years in the paper...when all is said and done, the temperatures average out to be exactly at, or within a degree or so of where they are supposed to be. If there is a storm,"oooh, you see, global warming." If it dosent rain as much,"oooh you see, global warming." If we have colder temps than usual for a while," oooh you see, global warming." If we have milder winters, and cooler, or warmer summers than expected, oooh you see, global warming." It seens as if ANY kind of weather we have is attributed to "global warming." And it is OUR FAULT for polluting the atmosphere. Sorry, but this is a bunch of hogwash in my view.
Perhaps there would be global warming without our involvement, I don't know enough about it to say either way.
But even if that is true, we have exceeded 7 billion people that are poisoning and destroying our environment, killing off species after species. When we were a couple of hundred million people, throwing garbage in the sea and cutting down forests without hesitation didn't impact as much. But that isn't the case any more and regardless of global warming or not, we need to do something about it.
Hi Pragmatic. Yes, there are 7 billion people or so on this earth. But only a FRSACTION of them live in places where they have the technology to "pollute". That was always one of my points...IF recycling, not throwing garbage, controlling emissions, and not "popisoning" our environment WAS to help ( I believe it dosen't) you would have to get EVERY PERSON IN EVERY COUNTRY IN EVERY PART OF THE WORLD for it even to make a dent!! That is not going to happen.
"Yes, there are 7 billion people or so on this earth. But only a FRSACTION of them live in places where they have the technology to "pollute". That was always one of my points...IF recycling, not throwing garbage, controlling emissions, and not "popisoning" our environment WAS to help ( I believe it doesn't)"
Sorry, but that sounds incredible naive...
Where is all the industries moving their production? To the cheap and undeveloped countries. By this time China has competition from multiple cheaper places and industries are moving to there instead. And the result in China? By this time it's so polluted that it's a gigantic waste dump. Have a look:
http://www.boredpanda.com/pollution-china/
http://www.boredpanda.com/pollution-china/?page_numb=2
I like this article "Biblical Curse or Industrial Pollution?":
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rama-hoetzlein/yangtze-river-red_b_1877483...
The chart shows how the river actually changes color as it passes different industry areas.
India has the same problem. And since they have been dumping antibiotics right in the drains, they now have an explosion of increased cases of antibiotic resistance.
I think they are starting to grasp the problem these days, but who knows how long before they can turn it around.
In 20, 30 or 40 years several other places will have become waste dumps to the same extent. After that industries will probably be moving back to their original countries, but by then they probably have much better production methods with less pollution.
"you would have to get EVERY PERSON IN EVERY COUNTRY IN EVERY PART OF THE WORLD for it even to make a dent!! That is not going to happen."
Every change for the better, every person that changes his mind, buys a little more time to find solutions and put more pressure on the corporations and governments.
Yes, there are 7 billion people or so on this earth. But only a FRSACTION of them live in places where they have the technology to "pollute".
There are 7 billion people or so on this earth, but takes a single finger of one of them to destroy the planet.(button on some nukes).
The argument of popularity or majority does now work in this particular argument.
It does not really matter how many people pollute, but how much those people pollute.
"IF recycling, not throwing garbage, controlling emissions, and not "popisoning" our environment WAS to help ( I believe it dosen't)"
It helps a lot, not only to reduce pollution but also to give the example, and help to set a standard by which everyone eventually must abide.
Example in the future , taxes/sanctions and fines could be issued on products if the environment was harmed to create them.
If you damage our home planet, you should be punished accordingly.
"EVERY PERSON IN EVERY COUNTRY IN EVERY PART OF THE WORLD for it even to make a dent!! That is not going to happen."
I wonder where you got that statistic, if everybody stops using fossil fuel , it should help a lot, not just make a dent.
Sorry, Jeff, NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN!!
Unfortunately for you the question is NOT, IF it happens but WHEN it happens.
Fossil fuel will eventually run out.
We just wish that it happens before it has done already too much damage.
Yes we should do something about it. Pat Robinson prayer moved a hurricane.. So if we all pray to Allah 5 times a day and are sincere God will answer our prayers. The world will be saved and those that believe in Jesus Christ will know heaven for eternity(which is a very long time).
I don't really think it should matter if someone believes in global warming or not. Unless someone is making the claim that pollution and emissions are perfectly fine, and that we should not make an effort to lower our impact on the environment, and then they would simply be too damn stupid to be listened to. We should be making every effort to stop damaging the environment with our waste, regardless of anyone's position, because even the dumbest creatures don't go out of their way to shit where they eat.
Well, I suppose that's one person that would rather shit where they eat...
Industry means MONEY...and THAT is the bottom line. You will NEVER stop the developed nations from churning out more production, more chemicals, more pollution... even in the worst places for smog, is anything done to stop it, or help it... does anyone worry about people getting sick...hell no!! because PRODUCTION IS MONEY... and THAT is all that counts. And THATS the way it is. And even if the developed nations did make a major effort to curtail their "pollution" do you really think that it would make THAT much of a difference...would anyone really notice a difference in anything?? I think not.
Yes, it is money that is the bottom line. That's why we need legislation to stop pollution.
There is never going to be any legislation of the kind...there are too many "higher ups" that are making money!
Of course we are.
In China they have realized that the downside of their explosive economic growth is pollution. And slowly, the giant is waking up.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-04-24/china-enacts-biggest-p...
But it will take a very very long time for them to clean that crap up.
The same goes for India, new laws and more are coming.
Just one more thing...I was a wastewater treatment engineer for 20 years. When things are dumped in the ocean, there is what is called a " dillution factor." This earth is 2/3 water...you will NEVER be able to dump enough shit into the water to EVER affect the weather. I agree that there is too much dumping going on, but on the other hand...people, and industry produce waste, something has to be done with it. If we want to build incinerators to burn it, people have a fit because they dont want those plants anywhere.. try dumping it, no one wants to do that either...landfills, people want them closed, we tried to pelletize the waste, and people went nuts when they saw the pelletization plants going under construction, so that was ditched. So, what do we do with all the waste that is produced...stop production and technology? Stop people from shitting...stop people from getting rid of their daily garbage?? Believe me, NONE of this is what is impacting the warming trend in the earth at this time. In another how ever many years, there will be another "trend" in the earths temperatures, and weather patterns, and the "politically correct" will think of something else to blame it on. It is simply the weather...NOTHING will change that !!
Again... Who gives a shit if "global warming" is a natural fluctuation or not.
We are still killing animal and plant life in an unprecedented rate, and we have to start doing something about it.
Btw , there are efficient waste disposal ways, we just need to learn how to recycle well the waste.
We still suck at that since no real money has been thrown in that particular research.
The shit, can go in the sea or in the soil, it actually helps it.
The problematic waste is the radioactive nuclear waste which usually is dumped in closed queries.
But that should also cease once we make use of free and clean energy.
We just need to work together to force those on top to shift in that direction sooner rather then later.
There is no such thing as free clean energy (or safe energy for that matter).
How do you mean? There is no free and clean energy now, or there never can be?
I can see how the energy from the sun could be considered free. But of course, there is always the economic and environmental cost of building what is needed to capturing, distributing and using it. But are you referring to some other costs in terms of money or environment?
I just assumed that he meant the alternative sources are extremely expensive and inefficient.
Well by free I meant that you can't extract an infinite amount of work from a closed system (no matter how much the fruitcakes tell you otherwise).
Okay, uhh, right. Like a perpetuum mobile? :)
My take on "free and clean" was more along the lines "economically without cost and with negligible negative environmental impact". Also quite hard to achieve...
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