Global Warming. Fact or Fiction?

Everyone has heard about it. Global warming is a problem that affects all living things, but is it going on at the current moment? First of all, it is important to know that the definition of global warming is, "an increase in the earth's average atmospheric temperature that causes corresponding changes in climate and that may result from the greenhouse effect." Now that that's covered, let's see what some people have to say about this.

William Gray, who is the head of the Tropical Meterology Project at Colorado State University, told Discover magazine in 2005 that, "nearly all of my colleagues who have been around 40 or 50 years are skeptical as hell about this whole global-warming thing." He then went on about how the average person who is not familiarized on the topic will simply look at a graph, see that temperatures and greenhouse gases are both rising, and conclude that it is global warming simply because of the common use of the phrase; furthermore, he concluded with, "just because there are two associations, changing with the same sign, doesn't mean that one is causing the other."

On the flip side, we have former Vice President and star of the documentary An Inconvenient Truth  Al Gore. Gore states that, "in climate science, we only have two things: data (the past) and models or hypotheses (the future)." Gore was focused on the statistics of things, as he spoke about the increases of the dioxide-related greenhouse gases and also the increase in overall temperature of the earth. He then continued to give his two cents about what should be done about the problem. Gore believes that, "there is no known suite of technologies that can affect this rate significantly, so the proper policy is to invest in the future rather than to waste money today in a futile attempt to significantly reduce warming."

Both men addressed the two different sides of the argument but in different styles. In my opinion, Gray tried to appeal to those who were skeptical of global warming and encouraged them to fully believe all that they hear without doing their research. On the other hand, Gore went with a more practical way of getting his point across to the public. He laid out the numbers, and stated research done by professionals.

Looking at both arguments in the eyes of bystander, both men made valid points in an ethical manner. Despite one's belief on the  matter, each argument can be read and they can take something away from either one.

All quotes were taken from the online article Global Warming or Just Hot Air? A Dozen Different Views by Sara Goudarzi. Link can be found below.

http://www.livescience.com/4144-global-warming-hot-air-dozen-views.html 

Donald Trump, Ethical?

In a recent rally against the nuclear deal with Iran, Donald Trump took to the podium to speak about the topic, but also for his own agenda. As a large majority of us know, Donald Trump is in the running to become the President of the United States in 2016 and he is not being shy about getting his name out there.  Trump has said everything from calling Mexicans rapists and to stating that he would indeed date his own daughter.  Regardless of these facts, I am here to discuss the recent breach of ethics Mr. Trump has performed.

In front of a large crowd in Capitol Hill, Mr. Trump made it apparent to inform his followers that the people currently leading our country are, "very,very stupid people."  Below, you can see and hear what exactly Mr. Trump had to say about Mr. Obama and his colleagues.

Now, I personally think that there is nothing wrong with healthy competition amongst politicians and it is also essential for the candidates to point out flaws in order for them to explain how they will fix them.  With all of this being said, Donald Trump decided to take things to a different level that was unnecessary.  The word "stupid" is something that should be relegated to immature scuffles between friends.  If Donald Trump wishes to lead our nation, then I feel he should be using vocabulary that is age appropriate. 

Moving away from vocabulary, I still feel that Donald Trump violated ethics of persuasion because he was manipulating an emotional crowd with immature words as opposed to actually using facts to back up his claim.  I feel as though he avoided the importance of the rally in an attempt to improve his own agenda.  This is not an ethical way to persuade.