Gamer 2.0 looks at gaming and global warming
by Justin McElroy 
{ Aug 11th 2008 at 10:30AM }
We won't give the whole thing away here, but the general idea seems to be that video games aren't great, but not as bad as some things you could be doing. It's a great comfort, and not only because Plutobase Joystiq is only 75 percent complete. We're also hopeful it will keep horrifying Gallagher/Earth from killing us in our sleep.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Alex Sohn @ Aug 11th 2008 11:14AM
Sigh, I'm so sick and tired of all of this global warming crap, yeah polluting the enviroment isn't the smartest thing to do, but folks, over the time the earth has existed, the temperature has varied back and forth greatly over time, in the 80's, it was global cooling, this is just another "scare" tactic politicians use to take over more control and more money. Just like the "obesity" crisis, facing america, I'm sick and tired of all of these unproven factless based "war-cries" about global warming. And don't use "Inconvenient Truth" as the proof. For every person that tries to argue Global Warming, others come out and speak against it.
Phillip @ Aug 11th 2008 11:51AM
Did you really just say that obesity is not a crisis? Look around and tell me there aren't more fat kids than there should be. I work at a pool and there are quite a few more oinkers running around than there used to be. And adults, don't even get me started on them. Obesity is real. Global warming, not even in the same league.
Phil
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 11:52AM
Wait, Global Cooling... oh, you're talking about that idea from the 70's (yeah, the 70's, not the 80's, learn to read) right? The one that was never actually supported by any scientist worth listening to? If I can quote Wikipedia (this quote is cited from a legit government source on Wikipedia, so it's not BS): "This hypothesis never had significant scientific support, but gained temporary popular attention due to press reports that did not accurately reflect the scientific understandings of ice age cycles and a slight downward trend of temperatures from the 1940s to the early 1970s. Scientific consensus is that the Earth has not durably cooled, but undergone a period of global warming in the 20th century."
Know what you're talking about before you say anything. Global Cooling was a mistake made by half assed scientists looking at data from a 30 year period, whereas Global Warming is backed by temperature data from over thousands of years and is based on the yearly average temperatures increasing...
GenBanks @ Aug 11th 2008 12:30PM
Uhm... I don't think it's the politicians who say obesity is a crisis. That's just what the government health officials and lots of people from the US and international public.
In fact, the politicians are probably the opposite, seeking not to alienate the 'fat vote' as it were... Just look at Obama, McCain and the various Primaries candidates pointedly gorging himself on waffles doughnuts and hotdogs to prove he's 'one of them'.
Alex Sohn @ Aug 11th 2008 1:13PM
@ Phillip - Did you really just say that obesity is not a crisis?
Yes I did, if you can track it down I know this is going to sound funny, but seriously the magicians Pen and Teller do a show on Showtime, Called Pen and Teller's Bull$hit, and they did an episode on the supposed "obesity crisis" in America.
Question the people behind the show (Pen and Teller) but the points they raise and the facts they reference and draw upon create quite a plausible arguement that the obesity crisis is being promoted by health food and pharmacutical companies that will profit off of the "fat scare"
Now to @Ben, sorry bud, but I'm not going to allow a document that is looking back on a point in history to be used as the defacto for who did/didn't support Global Cooling. I lived the 80's and remember quite well the global cooling scares, the difference is back then scientists didn't jump on every new band wagon unlike today, where you have all these idiot scientists jumping on the Al Gore train claiming ManBearPig oopps, I mean Global Warming is happening.
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 1:34PM
@Alex Sohn
No, you totally missed my point... It wasn't that no one supported the Global Cooling idea, it's that Global Cooling never existed. It was based on incomplete data. It's like how we thought the world was flat then someone came along with more advanced technology (and mathematics/astronomical data) and said, no, it isn't. There is now proof that the world is round, just as there is now proof that global warming exists.
I don't care who's on what bandwagon, how could more scientist researching something be bad... I don't care if you think Al Gore is a crackpot, this evidence existed before his film and book...
Rinic @ Aug 11th 2008 3:02PM
The global cooling myth
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=94
John @ Aug 12th 2008 3:07AM
"whereas Global Warming is backed by temperature data from over thousands of years and is based on the yearly average temperatures increasing..."
The problem asshole, is that the "thousands of years" of temperature data is based on BS like tree rings. We only have concrete temperature data from the last 100 years or so, and many of the coldest temperature recording stations have closed.
If you continue to measure the tree ring data instead of switching to actual accurate readings, temps have stayed the same.
also if you think .6 of one degree is major, you are an idiot.
see how I call you names? that's how the scientific community treats other scientists when they disagree with the dogma.
I also like how you lump the founder of the weather channel and the former head of the hurricane institute as scientists who were laughed out of the discussion.
ShadowstormXIII @ Aug 11th 2008 10:51AM
...
...if I have nothing nice to say...
Burritoclock @ Aug 11th 2008 11:04AM
I'm with you, I'll just avoid this whole stupid post and the dumb debate it is going to create...
Now please excuse me while I take my Hummer to best buy to purchase madden 09.
Dracula Jones @ Aug 11th 2008 10:58AM
Gallaghearth vs. Galactus. Go!
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 10:59AM
I seriously can't wait until this whole "global warming" fad goes away. How long are fads supposed to last anyways? Wasn't the Wii supposed to be a fad? Cause I'll be terribly disappointed in humanity if global warming "theory" outlasts the Wii.
John @ Aug 11th 2008 11:40AM
Hey remember back in the 70's when we were going to die in the next ice age?
Wow, those were the glory days...
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 11:42AM
Yeah, I'm sick and tired of hearing of this evolution "theory", too. I totally can't wait for the fad to be over so people will finally realize how stupid they were... oh wait.
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 11:46AM
Sure Ben, come back and talk to me once it's actually proven that an increase in carbon dioxide causes problems with the atmosphere. Did you know that recent measurements on Mars show that its temperature is increasing in some areas? Must be all the cars...oh wait.
ogvor @ Aug 11th 2008 11:56AM
Whoa, whoa, whoa, you can dispute whether global warming is happening or if humans are the cause, but its really basic science that CO2 reflects certain infrared wavelengths (heat) back down to the planet. This is what keeps our planet hospitable (if their wasn't any CO2 at all our planet would be a lot colder). As for proof, a very simple method is with ice cores:
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/283/5408/1712
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-05/uoc-icr050808.php
Also, global warming is not all about carbon dioxide, its about methane and various other gases too. The earth has warmed and cooled in the past becuase of the things like volcanoes and or distance from the sun, that is natural. What scientist are observing these days is a rapid warming (historically and statistically speaking) that seems to be rising right in line with the rise in certain greenhouse gases humans are putting in the atmosphere.
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 12:02PM
Come back and talk to me when we know enough about Mars to actually compare it to Earth... First of all, we don't have temperature data from Mars for over thousands of years like we do here. A hundred years ago we couldn't measure the temperature on Mars. Temperatures on Earth fluctuate yearly too and that has nothing to do with global warming, it's a natural cycle.
Second of all, "its temperature is increasing in some areas"... seriously? Some areas? Last time I checked it was called Global Warming, not Arctic, North American, Asian and Australian Warming.
Third of all, the correlation between greenhouse gas levels and temperature change has actually been proven. Al Gore is not the only person who has presented similar data, the general consensus in the scientific community is (and has been for years) that the connection is there. Even George W. Bush has addressed Global Warming as a threat.
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 12:09PM
Ogvor,
I understand that global warming has to do with more than CO2 but most people have no idea. And temperature is only increasing in some areas, not globally. there's no such thing as a global temperature. In fact, the east Antarctic ice sheet is actually getting thicker and temperatures there are COLDER than they have been in the past. My real beef with "global warming" is that we don't have enough data to say if what we're seeing is an anomaly or not. Geological time is billions of years and you're going to tell me that we know all of the phases that the earth goes through? And this isn't a rapid change either. Unless you consider .6 degrees celsius rise in the last 150 years rapid...
GenBanks @ Aug 11th 2008 12:19PM
So many idiots informed by the internet who confidently proclaim that global warming is a fad with your cute soundbites. I feel a part of my brain die every time I read one of these faux-scientists' comments.
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 12:32PM
Dear Ben,
There is no such thing as a "global temperature". And people need to stop acting as if we know everything about our planet. We don't KNOW shit. We don't even KNOW if plate tectonics is real. It's a nice theory, and it seems to be working out okay, but we really have no sure knowledge. The problem with global warming is that most of the cooler measurements cited come from right around 1850 and show that since then the earth has gotten warmer. Well, history students aren't surprised by that since Earth was in a mini-ice age until about 1900, probably caused by the eruption of Mt. Tambora. The middle ages, 1300-ish - 1650, were a lot warmer, but nobody knows why. But don't worry, pretty soon people will be more worried about other scare tactics like Global Impact theory and global warming will fade away.
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 12:44PM
Yes, there is a "global temperature", it's what you get when you average temperatures from around the globe. I guess a better term would be "average global temperature". Saying that doesn't exist is like saying 1+1=2 and 2 doesn't exist... it's just math.
James @ Aug 11th 2008 12:46PM
@WRE - It is rapid. Like you say geological time is billions of years. Though you're also making a mistake there. We don't know all the phases and that's part of the worry. The idea that we can't change the climate is pretty strange. Life alters the climate dramatically, the atmosphere would be unbreathable and of a completely different composition without early forms of life and we have a vastly greater output then they ever did. Countless thousands of times.
Also saying we don't have enough data? When will we have enough? Since the west industrialised there's been a rapid increase in temperature change, sea level change and changes in the composition of polar ice.
Sure, we've never seen an entire world industrialise before so it could just be a coincidence or it might balance out right? So we should wait until civilisation rises and falls about 3 times so we can get a stronger correlation.
Even if we can't "prove" global warming is taking place, why take the risk?
Shagittarius @ Aug 11th 2008 12:46PM
There are plaenty of real scientists who don't believe in man's 'massive' effect on the global climate either.
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 1:12PM
James,
But don't you think that's part of the problem? Why are we so eager to fix things when we don't know how or why or even if they're broken? Don't we always screw things up even more when we jump in with incomplete data? Iraq War, anybody?
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 1:21PM
May I direct your attention to GenBank's previous statement, "I feel a part of my brain die every time I read one of these faux-scientists' comments."
That's exactly where your arguments are coming from. My aunt gives me clips from her conservative propaganda magazines/newspapers all the time about similar ideas... every time I've read one, the scientist/source is either not cited or if you take the time to look up the scientist you'd find that they were pretty much laughing stocks in the scientific community. It's not even worth an argument right now if you're going to continue to post disinformation like that. While events like the warming in the middle ages and the little ice age did occur, they're not as mysterious as you make them out to be.
Triforceowner @ Aug 12th 2008 12:56PM
WRE>Ben
WRE @ Aug 11th 2008 1:48PM
Guys like Ben and GenBanks are exactly the kind of people that don't actually know anything, yet they believe in gloobal warming SO much. Thanks for assuming my political affiliation and not refuting any of my points.
"While events like the warming in the middle ages and the little ice age did occur, they're not as mysterious as you make them out to be."
I didn't make them out to be mysterious at all. I explained current "warming theory" using those two events. You, however, reverted to name-calling. Good call. Maybe, just maybe, you should start reading something other than Newsweek. Just a suggestion.
SKI @ Aug 11th 2008 2:00PM
http://www.scienceray.com/Earth-Sciences/Physical-Geography/Global-Warming-Not-Caused-by-Man.119167
GenBanks @ Aug 12th 2008 8:15AM
How do you know I both "don't know anything" and "believe global warming SOO much"?
All I said is that I hate these presumptuous opinionated internet activists who read a bunch of websites then act like they know all the answers and go about trying to convince others. You're armed with a bunch of factoids and you set to work throwing them at people. Just bear in mind your side could be the 'fad' as well, so don't be too convinced of yourself. The "global warming is a myth" crowd is far more vocal in this thread than the other side, but if they were it would apply to them too. This is a gaming blog after all, so the fact that you use this site as your platform to say that global warming is a myth doesn't lend to your credibility.
Maverick Saturn @ Aug 11th 2008 11:07AM
Its official, gamers have the largest carbon footprint, hear that gamers? Stop your gaming or you'll destroy the world :O
Young_Nastyman @ Aug 11th 2008 12:04PM
WE DIDN'T LISTEN!!! WE DIDN'T LISTEN!!!!!!
deadjesterx @ Aug 11th 2008 11:37AM
Well I doubt anyone could argue that pollutants are good for you.
Even if you do believe in global warming/climate change, though, video games are very small potatoes compared to a lot of other things out there. Even a gaming rig PC with a 1000 watt power supply doesn't contribute as much as, say, a SUV. Not to mention that if the source of energy comes from a "cleaner" source (i.e. it appears cleaner than the current source, until someone finds out that it's fucking up the environment in a different way) the carbon footprint of video games and technology in general is further reduced.
So overall I'd be more worried by factory smoke stacks (which, global warming aside, can't be good to breath in) than running my 360 for a few hours each day.
Jakka (Not sure why he got banned?) @ Aug 11th 2008 11:52AM
"Even a gaming rig PC with a 1000 watt power supply doesn't contribute as much as, say, a SUV."
Hate to surprise you but a cow contributes just as much as an SUV - through farting.I love all the anti-SUV hippie bullshit.
You do make a good point though.
GenBanks @ Aug 11th 2008 12:21PM
That's why we slaughter cows by the thousands. Meat is just a positive side-effect.
Ben @ Aug 11th 2008 12:23PM
"Hate to surprise you but a cow contributes just as much as an SUV - through farting."
Actually, the methane from cows and sheep comes mostly from their mouths, not their rears. Cows farting isn't really the problem... it's cows burping.
And, I hate to break it to you, but you're way off.
"A gallon of gasoline turns into 20 pounds of CO2.
Average car drives 15,000 miles a year and gets 30 mpg (that's probably actually a rather high estimate of average mpg)
15,000 miles /30mpg = 500 gallons of gasoline a year * 20 pounds = 10,000 lbs of CO2 a year.
A cow produces up to 90kg of methane a year (that's at most, most cows produce less).
Methane is over 20 times more effective in trapping heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.
90 kg * 2.2 lb/kg = 200 lbs of methane * 20 = 4,000 lbs of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases.
All those estimates are best case scenarios for the car and worst for the cow (as in most cars produce more CO2 than that and most cows produce less methane than that).
Let's look at an SUV... let's say it gets 16MPG
15,000 miles /16mpg = 937.5 gallons of gasoline a year * 20 pounds = 18,750 lbs of CO2 a year.
4,000lbs a year is no where near almost 19,000.
Source http://fatknowledge.blogspot.com/2005/04/cows-vs-cars-greenhouse-gases.html
Triforceowner @ Aug 11th 2008 2:20PM
"until someone finds out that it's fucking up the environment in a different way"
Ah, what happens when you remove energy from something? Bad gasses, nuclear waste, fucked up wind, current, or ground temperature. As clean as anything is it still has its own footprint. For 100,000 years we've been using energy, and we should continue, consume, and move on. Like Agent Smith said, "Humans are the cancer of earth," or something like that. There's no other way for us to live and not be animals (i.e. fire let us cook our meat so we could eat lots and not get sick and die early and than create a culture, you know the drill).
FSK405K @ Aug 11th 2008 11:46AM
That ignorant earth doesn't even know his ozone layer is fixed.
Jakka (Not sure why he got banned?) @ Aug 11th 2008 11:49AM
Ironically Humans only make...3% of all Carbon Dioxide waste.The remaining 97% of it are in water vapour.
WE HAVE TO DRAIN THE PLANET TO SAVE IT FROM GLOBAL WARMING!!! CALL THE COMBINE!
Young_Nastyman @ Aug 11th 2008 11:57AM
thats why they tell you to drink 8 glasses of water or more per day, it prevents global warming
xx Beta Max xx @ Aug 11th 2008 12:28PM
Man Gallagher looks like hell.
Ghen @ Aug 11th 2008 2:52PM
And people wonder why kids are scared of clowns.
animeko @ Aug 11th 2008 12:48PM
I thought the term "global warming" was outdated. Isn't it "global climate change" now?
ScallionN @ Aug 11th 2008 1:20PM
I'm a little bit more concerned about what goes into making our video games and their consoles:as in the parts, the manufacturing process, and the labor used to produce them. What kind of pollutants went into making my Xbox and DS? What kind of treatment did the people who made them receive? How far did it have to travel?
As far as the whole global warming thing...
The general skepticism that surrounds any scientific discovery has been amplified by companies and their pet politicians that would be financially wounded if everyone agreed in anthropogenic global warming. Remember the whole hoopla over second hand cigarette smoke? The tobacco companies are STILL trying to say it doesn't do shit to us, and that they didn't know their products were addictive, while at the same time, trying to clean themselves up by running anti-smoking ad campaigns, to show they "care". And they still sell goddamned tobacco.
Now, can you think of other industries that've been trying to prove they "care" about the environment through advertising? The ones who hire scientists and authors to show up on Fox News to discredit the scientific consensus on climate change?
Yeah. It's sickening.
And let's deal with some hypotheicals: what would happen if we finally agreed that ACC was real, and discovered that playing videogames *did* do a number on our environment? Would any of us change our gaming habits?
Triforceowner @ Aug 11th 2008 2:11PM
Well, Scallion, I liked your post. For one, Video Games add pollutants during manufacturing, as you stated, but in your home as well. Many power plants run on burning things. This produces CO2 and other gasses. There are a couple reasons you don't really have to worry about this. One is that we will eventually run out of things to burn. At that point everything goes nuclear or hydro/wind/geothermal. But I think we'll be off the natural stuff before than. It will hurt our relations with Saudi Arabia, possibly causing a fat war in the Middle East (Saudi Arabia won't mind people attacking Israel if they aren't getting checks from us), and China needs someone to slap them, but they have one of those seats of power on the UN and well...
Anyway, the point is that all your electronics add to pollutants which may or may not affect the environment in ways people preach, but there are so many social issues on top of that already that it really comes down to switching fuel without starting wars.
ScallionN @ Aug 11th 2008 7:56PM
I wasn't really thinking about fuel, but things like labor and pollutants, but you're right: how much damned gas does it take to take my Xbox, or the pieces that make up my Xbox from point A to point B?
As far as the Middle East goes...they're in for some rough times once we either reach peak oil, or decide to stop using it. Places like Dubai are going to end up as ghost towns.
Keelsword @ Aug 11th 2008 1:48PM
The earth has warmed over the last century. That is indisputable.
But that isn't what the global warming debate is about.
The debate over global warming is over:
1) How much of the warming is due to human activity.
2) Whether any effects of global warming can be mitigated by further human activity.
3) Whether the earth warming will be a net negative effect
4) Whether or not there is an ideal global mean temperature, and if so, what is it?
5) Whether our efforts are best spent trying to stave off potential or imagined problems 100+ years from now, or used to help the millions of people suffering from a myriad of life threatening issues today.
Science has not been able to demonstrate proof in any of these areas. Only theories have been proposed, but the politicians and media have selected the theories that best suit their agendas and have run with them.
From my experience, the entire "climate change" movement (the new future-proofed term for "global warming") appears to be almost entirely political. The solutions are never about improving the lives of people, but rather about gaining political power over peoples' lives. (A great test is to ask an environmentalist whether they would support nuclear power)
Ultimately, you will find that most proponents of the climate change movement are anti-capitalist, anti-free market, and largely anti-human misanthropes that propose global population reduction and a life of stone-age misery for everyone but themselves (after all, their work is far too important to follow their own rules).
For my part, I will fully support Al Gore and the UN Council on Climate Change when they are serious enough about global warming to live as simply as I do.
Bass Masterson @ Aug 11th 2008 1:53PM
Mankind creates 3% or less of the CO2 in the atmosphere. And hippies like Al Gore can use up to 20x the energy of a normal human whining to you about it. Save the planet: kill a hippie.
Brian @ Aug 11th 2008 2:21PM
Save the world, dont have kids!
Batzarro @ Aug 11th 2008 3:13PM
Hey, I heard a scientist the other day seriously suggest that the most viable way to ease our impact on our planet was to reduce the rate of human growth, and eventually have less people than we have now. What an awesomely eugenic idea! I can already figure a public ad slogan: "Have you done genocide today?"
That kinds of thinking gets my morals on a twist. Does it mean that we have to start going "China" on newborns? Do we castrate against permission? Who makes the choice of who gets to procreate? Does this throw off the whole "help the impoverished nations" angle we all love so much? After all, the more advanced tech they get(electricity for their homes, hospitals, motor vehicles) the more damage the planet gets...
But I agree with Triforceowner, we WILL run out of things to burn. Not necessarilly in a direct"we don't have anymore!", kind a way, either. When the energy source of choice we use becomes to expensive or scarce to bother with it, we WILL have to move on. Why do you think we're talking about it so much now? Because of the planet, or Hell, maybe we'll move back to the stuff we used before Big Oil wrapped their arms around us: Steam and hydro energy. Or of course solar, nuclear, wind or a mixture of those.
ANDREW WILLIAMS @ Aug 11th 2008 2:25PM
Even if global warming is not as much a threat as the media is making out, pumping diesel and oil smoke into our cities and atmosphere cant be good. We owe it to ourselves to clean it up. Worst case scenario is that global warming is proved, and we are well on the way to sorting it out. If it doesnt actually exist, then we still get to breath clean fresh air!