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Why do you suspect that? I am not really even active on this website, I decided to jump in on this topic because it is a matter of what I do and study everyday.... well far sider, are you a geologist? even a naturalist? Sorta insulting that people will discredit my job because I have comments about the Earth and a mountain to post.

there is not more overall forest in the eastern united states than when the pilgrams landed, remember we had to make roads, towns, cities, farms, industrial places, etc.... those all took up forest. That's ok though, needed to happen. I mean, now we have sectioned off places that we call a "national forest".... however back then, it was nearly all forest.

angkor: thanks for the title.

Yes, that's why it is that hot on Venus.... no one here is saying that will happen on Earth. That was only an example to show the power of CO2 in holding heat in.

You know what the world temp. be if we doubled the CO2? Go read a book and find out, you won't be happy by what you find.
And also, if you like to think that just because the amount of CO2 is <1% that CO2 doesn't dominate our world? Look many plants cover the world... ya know what they take in to breathe? Doesn't take a lot of the stuff man.

Ahh nuclear energy, how incredible! I think 20 percent isn't enough, bring on the nuclear plants once again. What in the world is your big beef with nuclear power? And don't jump into waste management, we spent enough money figuring out what to do with that recently, that's covered. So besides the waste, lay it on me! :-)

Yes we are gnats, but we are almost 7 billion gnats. We ARE planet Earth. Perhaps for 10 years those econuts have laughed at what you said too. You think we haven't seriously altered the Earth already??? Most of it isn't anything bad, but really answer yourself this... fly across the US during daylight, and try to imagine what it would look like WITHOUT the human race down there. The plains would no longer have the characteristic quilt pattern, forest would cover from New York to South Carolina... and I mean COVER it. Forest forest forest forest, non stop. That's how it was when we arrived a few hundred years ago here. Drainage patterns, ecosystems, the atmosphere, etc etc, we have altered everything you can imagine and then some. Not that I am really complaining, just noting it. Read some of Carl Sagan's stuff, he was great at making those sort of illusions.

Good post, yeah there is no way tectonics will result in a 30 foot difference in so short of a timespan, tectonics happen so slowly. Perhaps a 6-8 foot increase in 30 or 40 years, but even that number is pushing it.
I should check that DVD out, would really like to see that. Have you seen the IMAX film Baraka?... it's now on DVD, some just incredible camera work in there, some Tibetan shots too.

"Humans are incapable of producing enough Carbon Dioxide to perceptibly change the composition of our atmosphere."

Get with it, by "it" I mean reality.

Well yes, I know this about the glaciers, and it sure isn't atmospheric cooling no. So yes, as I said... global warming IS happening, and the question remains "what effect have humans had on this rate?" We may not be having that much of an effect, no... but ya know the thing is, we just don't know. And we also don't accurately know the lag time it takes for the atmosphere to catch up to the additional carbon dioxide. It only took a 6 degree world drop in ave. temperature to create the last Ige Age.... if we have possibly risen the temp. 1 degree in 100+ years, that can't be a good thing.
Truth seems to be that the warming issue is just a fad. Remember the hole in the Ozone?... that was paramount in its day.... humans responded and adjusted CFC use, now the hole is shrinking and the entire interest in the issue has waned. I remember a lot of folks doing the same thing back then: "No way, what a load of crap, hole in the ozone, etc." Well it was true, and all we had to do was adjust a little and the problem was essentially solved for now. Same with global warming, we may find out that we need to get with reality and cut back on some things, and once we do this the issue will fade away as progress is made.

First, I could care less about the mountain. I do believe past measurements have been off, and now that GPS units are out (go geocache!), we can measure height to millimeters. (Some of the most precise units come from coastal research facilities and tectonic boundries monitored by the USGS where changes need to be measured in very very small amounts, cool stuff!) 21,000?... over 29,000 feet... but really the relief isn't anywhere near that much, the plateau is so darn high itself.

I am a geologist, and the answer to this issue is not tectonics. For the last 50 million years the Indian plate has been ramming below the Eurasian plate at a rate of a few centimeters a year. This continues today, and the whole Tibetan plateau is still rising, including Mt. Everest. The issue is not with the solid rock of the region, but rather with frozen water in the valleys of these mountains in glaciers. This article is hinting at the fact that the elevation that can get above the freezing point of water has risen near the mountain in the recent past. This leaves flowing water at higher points of the mountain to erode rock little by little.
No one knows for sure about global warming, I know I don't. The trend in the literature in the past few years has become overwhelmingly in favor of the warming trend. Fact: the Earth IS in a warming trend right now. The dispute is over how much humans are influencing this trend.
Science is something that needs to looked at objectively. I wish everyone can do this, but the U.S. is not an overall scientifically literate nation. That's just the way it goes, there are enough folks out there who just don't care about science, and that is quite understandable. How the arguement of global warming has taken political sides is absurd, why are the proponents of the theory considered mainly liberal? Why are those against it mainly conservative? Shouldnt be that way. Before anyone takes a stand on EITHER side, please read journal entries and any other published literature that will really give valuable insight to the processes at work in global warming. You may be wondering: 'Well, I don't even understand, how CAN the Earth be warming?' or "What happens in Earth's systems that can cause the warming?" These questions will be answered by reading valid literature on the subject. When it comes to scientific issues, only informed opinions have any validity. One cannot simply say, "Global warming is false." or "Global warming is true." There needs to be real reasons and process that you can explain to people about how you arrived at your opinion.
I have one model: Venus. With a dense atmosphere of carbon dioxide, surface temperatures reach 850F+. The carbon dioxide induces the 'greenhouse effect', which is a factual phenomenon.

Nader, although we may not vote for him, is an influential figure in today's politics, especially the youth who may may take him too literally.... but realistically, there needs to be someone who can come right out in interviews and say what they want to say, cut and dry, no BS. I can respect the fact that he voices his true opinion on Iraq, and its an opinion that really cannot be denied. Yeah, $300 billion is quite the number, it shouldn't matter which political side you may be on.... that's a lot of money, period. Over $100 million a day?... yeah, it's a lot of money. What if that kind of money would be directed towards basic medical and environmental research instead?... education maybe? Issues loom out there that are large and underfunded, put some of our money back where it belongs. Cheers.