Environmentalism, right or wrong? Options

[Kontroll]

Now, when I say environmentalism, I'm dealing with the rainforest and what not. How do you guys feel about it? What's your stance on this topic?

If there has already been a thread about this, then whatever.

[sadolakced acid]

mayhaps you should do the same.

CO2 is not a blanket. it's not insulated the heat from escaping. it's allowing the earth to absorb more thermal radiation from the sun than without it.

or, how about this, you explain global warming and the greenhouse effect to me.

[think!IMAGINARIL...]

and i ask:

how do you know that reducing CO2 emmissions will help the environment?
how do you know that reducing CO2 emmissions won't hurt the environment?

Were these questions answered yet? I have my own opinions to add to it.

Reducing it greatly will harm the environment, but the CO2 levels right now are dangerous. Reducing CO2 levels by a lot will make the global temperature drop steeply.
Reducing it slowly will probably help the record-breaking temperatures to cool down a bit.

CO2 production from increased industrial activity (fossil fuel burning) and other human activities such as cement production and tropical deforestation has increased the CO2concentrations in the atmosphere. Measurements of carbon dioxide amounts from Mauna Loa observatory show that CO2 has increased from about 313 ppm (parts per million) in 1960 to about 375 ppm in 2005. The current observed amount of CO2 exceeds the geological record of CO2 maxima (~300 ppm) from ice core data (Hansen, J., Climatic Change, 68, 269, 2005 ISSN 0165-0009).

Because it is a greenhouse gas, elevated CO2 levels will increase global mean temperature. There has been an observed global average temperature increase of about 0.5oC since 1960 (Science 308, 1431, 2005), . Quantitative understanding of climate sensitivity to CO2 concentration remains elusive due to uncertainties in a variety of feedbacks, especially those related to clouds, but there is little doubt that a substantial portion of the warming in the last half century was caused by the incresase in CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere.

This probably answers the second one.
Directly from Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect

And I suggest you go watch An Inconvenient Truth (or read it). I thought it was a great documentary.