Climate Change - Myth or Reality?

The first website I went to was the "Friends of Science" website. Which after surfing around their site, I found it to be quite appauling that they would consider themselves "Friends of Science". There is just too much evidence out there that shows what is going on with our environment and much of it is from human impact. However, if one wishes to still be a skeptic, then one has that right. At the same time though, like as my partner just stated in his post, I did not see ANY real references to the claims they were making to dismiss the claims of global warming and human involvement. I searched and searched the FOS website, and I pretty much thought it was a joke. The page looked pretty - but the literature was garbage in my eyes.

The "How to talk to a Climate Skeptic" site was more of something that I could find credible and even interesting. There were plenty of research and data and ways to refute those who believe along the same lines as those from FOS. Even going to the homepage of grist.org, there were massive amounts of actual articles and worldwide stories that caught my attention, and had some substance to it. It's a website I would like to look further into in my free time. Comparing grist.org to friendsofscience.org was something I saw as being no contest. Hands down, grist.org is something I can back up as being legitimate and worthwhile, and we already know how I feel about FOS.

To answer the question of what is the purpose of these websites? I clearly see the purpose of websites like grist.org, which is open to so many ideas and articles and solutions as to what we need to do, and gives their readers access to plenty of substanial and real articles that actually hold relevance to what is going on in our world. What is the purpose of the FOS website? I don't know. I really don't. It looked like a lot of time and effort went into that site by it's lay out, but to have people still to this day dismissing research and, as I truly feel, cold hard facts about the state of our environment, I just don't see why people choose to waste their time trying to convince people that the environment debate is all nonsense. And actually, let's just say it even is. I've NEVER understood why someone is in favor of drilling for oil, and having cars and busses run on gasoline when we can find cleaner ways. Let's say the dirty exhaust from a city bus, that kicks up into the air everytime it moves from a stop, didn't hurt the environment at all. That smog and that dirty air is of no harm to the enviornment. Why are people still against those who are trying to push for hybrid transportation, and vehicles that don't omit that junk from a their exhaust. Just from an aesthetic point of view. The people who believe there is no real harm being done to the environment from smokestacks, vehichles, and on and on...and just for the sake of argument giving them merit in their thoughts, I just don't see why from a point of view as that it just LOOKS and feels bad, why they are so opposed to having something look nicer. Or why they are so keen on paying for outrageous gas prices, instead of saving their own hard earned money by going hybrid and going easier on their pockets. But we all know that air pollution is harmful to our health, and the enviornment, so I digress.

I think how we should make sense of this and evaluate these claims are simply by doing our own further investigation ourselves, if we are inclined to find out the truth for ourselves. Not to just read something off the internet and say..."hey, this must be true. I read it off the internet", and actually dig deeper and go to the actual sources they cited and see what research is being quoted and these articles are being based upon. Actually researching the researchers and seeing what type of places these people are affilliated with, be it the governement, universities, etc. and see how credible these "organizations" are and with their research.

I for one believe in human driven climate change, and even if it really was a huge conspiracy and big joke, I can still find ways to dispute someone and fight for a more cleaner way of life, even if just merely on the notion that it looks a whole hell of a lot better. I would much rather be sitting behind an electric/hybrid bus at a stoplight, then be stuck behind one running on diesel/gasoline. As well as I would much rather live in an area free of smog and pollution than to live alongside the LA freeways or near a factory that omits chemicals into the air, and I would ask these same questions to those who say there is no real harm and ask them where they'd prefer to live and why. I'd like to hear their responses.