LINK
(NewScientist)

This is amusing:
Or herds of autonomous shopping carts that, despite everyones best efforts to corral them still manage to end up rolling away, only to end up overturned on someones front lawn or drowned in a local creek.

I'll gladly take those threats with the benefits that will flow from the technologies needed to create such things.

If you can make a nuclear reactor for peaceful purposes, you can make a nuclear bomb. If you can make a knife to cut meat, you can make a blade to kill your fellow man.

You can't have things that can be used for "good" without things that can be used for "evil".

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If we don't play god, who will?-James Watson
I never think of the future, it comes soon enough.-Albert Einstein
The large print giveth and the small print taketh away.-Tom Waits

genetically modified crops and cloned foods will be the death of us all

Let's be honest about this. What's the worst, in your folks' minds, that each of these threats could do in the real world? Hollywood is one thing, but is simply isn't real, and the mass media isn't exactly doing its job. That's where rational folks like us come in.

- Maha Vailo

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When you get down to it, Science answers how. Religion answers why. - hippietrekx

It seems to me that environmentalists are simply physically incapable of being pleased. "We want more wind power usage!" They shout, and we comply "No! Wind turbines will hurt the environment!" They then shout. "We need biofuel!" They claim, and we deliver "No, biofuel is dangerous!" They then say.

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After you take away everything that is impossible, whatever is left, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. ~Sir Arthur Conan Doyle/Sherlock Holmes

How wind turbines will hurt the environments (except for birds), compared to other energy sources?

Did environmentalists say that we should cut jungles or convert the least energy-rich plants (and important sources of food) to biofuels so that the farmers can get big subsidiaries?

I didn't thought so either.

I appreciate that the environmentalists try to find out possible negative aspects of alternative energy sources. It isn't exactly wise to fix a problem with a solution that creates new problems. That doesn't excuse technophobia, of course.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

My favorite is the demand by many that cloned food be clearly labeled. What difference or danger does cloning make?

I think the reason for that is that "environmentalists" are individuals, with many different opinions, not a groupmind with one shared idea or agenda. Some environmentalists actually study the science of the ecology and biology; the vast majority do not, and act out of well-meaning ignorance or superficial "just enough to be dangerous" knowledge.

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

my favorite is how they always say how global warming is a threat every time we have heat wave in the midwest in the middle of summer- which is normal for this area- but as soon as we have a period of time where the temps are at or below normal, they say we can't rush to judgement based on such a small period of local weather..
i think it's time for me to have a tire fire that i start with 5 gallons of gasoline, and make sure i leave the lights on in the house and the doors open and furnace cranked to 90 while i'm out there doing it.

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"blacker than the blackest black... times infinity."- Nathan Explosion
The.. Best.. Thread..Ever...

Now, see, it's that kind of "they always say" that I'm talking about. There is no they. At least, not that matter any to the science of climatology or the science of ecology. There are a lot of self-appointed blabbermouths who can safely be ignored, and then there's the science. And that speaks for itself.

So before you say "they this" and "they that", consider the source, then ignore "them". Go with the evidence, not the noise of the crowd.

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"If this were play'd upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction."
Shakespeare, Twelfth Night
Illuminati's Razor-The most complicatedly evil answer is usually the most correct answer. - Fazor
"Every book is a children's book if the kid can read." - Mitch Hedberg
"Distance doesn’t matter much in space, where if you just start a thing off with the right kind of shove, sooner or later it will get where you want it to go." -Frederik Pohl, Mining the Oort

My favorite is when some people respond to environmental concerns by vowing to trash the planet even more.

Global warming tops my list of real threats, because of the, well, global nature of the problem. By threat, I mean to future generations. I'll be dead before it gets too bad.

Next would be air and water pollution, but those tend to be more regionalized problems.

At least in the US, depletion of aquifers also concerns me. Some people think of groundwater as a free, unlimited source of water.

GM crops? Nuclear power? These don't concern me very much.

Thank you Noclevername, that is one of my biggest pet peeves. And the same holds about "Environmental Groups"; as if Earth First! or Greenpeace has the same set of goals and methods of achieving those goals as The Nature Conservancy or Ducks Unlimited.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

Your list matches mine pretty well. I would probably throw in habitat and ecosystem destruction (or lack of preservation) pretty high on my list too. And I'm actually pro-nuclear; it is probably our best short term solution to global warming.

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At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

I take it that you are opposed to crossbreeding and grafting?

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Bill Slugg
Albany, GA

Uh, the term is sarcasm. I suggest you look it up.

I'm pro-nuke as well (which is convenient as I work as an engineer in the nuclear industry).

WRT habitat destruction, this week I attended a very interesting talk at the Jimmy Carter Library - here in Atlanta - given by a wildlife ecologist. Subject was bears and their particular difficulties. Most eye-opening was his discussion of the destruction of the sun bear's habitat in Borneo.

http://wildlifemedia.squarespace.com/

Since "tone of voice" does not translate to text, I suggest you look up smilies!

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Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

Here's an idea even you can understand: People are not monolithic. But when people are warning about man-made viruses and geneticlly modified crops for no other purpose than somebodies profit, you should perhaps get off your scientific
posterior and consider the fact that there really are people who value the next quarter's profit more than the continuing good health of our grandchildren.
A good future isn't something that just happens. Science and corporate greed must endure constant scrutiny. THAT IS A FACT! Otherwise, Monsanto and
Union Carbide and Archer-Daniels would not need lawyers. Get it?

Dan