Can we sponsor some charity work as a Forum

Krisidious

since I don't believe in global warming... the whole thing irritates me somewhat... especially the guy saying don't travel to see something because it will elevate your carbon footprint... you should go and see as much as you can while you're here, life is short... if you want to help the planet... we should all go out and pick the trash up off a highway or our neighborhood... remember when someone says "man made" they're full of poo... man only reorganized things that were already here...

about a week after man kind has wiped itself from the planet... mothernature will start taking back every single spec of "man made" things... and after a time there will be no evidense we were ever even here...

I would suggest that people spend more time picking up after themselves and less time trying to pick up after mankind...

ok yeah I know I'm a wet blanket... sorry... it is a kool idea for the hippie in your heart...

John Sayers

Whilst I agree with Kris regards the global warming myth, I do accept climate change due to man skinning the earth alive by destroying the forests. The outcome is the changing weather patterns IMHO.

Where I live there was dense tropical rain forest where 70 men could hold hands around the buttress base of one cedar tree. They had to climb up the buttresses to get to the base of the truck. The seed of that tree probably germinated when Jesus was walking around.

They eventually destroyed the whole forest and turned it into dairy country. It would take centuries to replace should someone try.

Thailand, for example, used to be dense tropical forests yet it is now the world's largest rice exporter - check it out on Google, you can see where the forest used to exist.

There are now commercial carbon credit schemes where forests are planted and the credits sold to carbon emitting power companies. But the forests aren't forests - they are huge monocultures, they don't support any wildlife, are easily attacked by disease and eventually will be clear-felled for wood chips.

So I support any scheme that addresses the loss of wild forest full of wildlife.

cheers
john

Mike Lucey

I fail to understand how anyone can doubt that Global Warming is being helped along by mankind's activities. There is very strong prove that this is the situation.

By all means we should tidy up after ourselves but at the same time I think we should also think globally especially in this age of instant communication.

The older I get the more I notice that we are becoming a wasteful species. A case in point, oil is being squandered on trivial packaging more and more. This is becoming one of my pet hates. Just try and purchase some small piece of computer hardware and you will probably find that the transaction involves spending 10 minutes with a knife trying to free the device from its plastic package. The same often applies to software CDs with boxes that are capable of holding 10 CDs !

I have got into the habit lately (when purchasing from local sales outlets) of taking the item being purchased out of its overdone package and leaving it at the
counter. I often get strange looks but the message gets across. If more and more customers did this the sales outlets would put pressure on the manufactures to dispense with the wasteful excessive packaging as they more and more have to cover the extra overhead involved in recycling the packaging !

On the point of conserving the Rain Forests, I want to get involved in this as I believe there are as yet many undiscovered remedies / cures waiting for us in the canopy !

The old adage, 'Waste Not Want Not' still stands

Mike

John Sayers

@unknownuser said:

I fail to understand how anyone can doubt that Global Warming is being helped along by mankind's activities. There is very strong prove that this is the situation.

fair enough Mike - but if you look you will find there is just as much evidence to show that the warming is natural. We are coming out of a mini ice age when the Thames iced over and festivals were held on it. Dickens wrote about it. Prior to that period it was warmer than it is now and the Vikings established agriculture on Greenland and they grew grapes in London - hence all the Vine streets

Yes the glaciers are retreating in some areas, Switzerland for example, yet growing in other areas such as Sth America and New Zealand. The retreating glaciers in Switzerland are in fact revealing old silver mines which must have been created before the glacier covered them up.

BTW - since the global temperature peaked in 1998 it has remained either constant or dropped yet we haven't reduced our carbon output, in fact it's increased.

I'm not alone in my skepticism - there are many prominent scientists who are also skeptical.

Krisidious

well it's not that I doubt that we help it along, I have a body temp of 98.2 so I help it along, its whether or not mother nature is affected by it... I think not, the world has been much colder in the past, while humans lived and it has been much warmer... I think it's very egotistical to think we have that much input.... like I said years after we are gone mother nature will not even remember we were here...

if you have any clue about the rise of the industrial nation you will understand the need of countries especially poor ones to industrialize... and to start doing that they must break current convention on CFCs and the like... so why is it big corps are pushing global warming? mmmm I bet it's the same thing they are always interested in and that's the bottom dollar... no cheap labor competition... keep third world countries as third world countries... it's laughable to me that hippies think they are saving someone with global warming cries... they kill many more humans with lack of food and work that heat ever did....

anyway that's my rant for the night...

juju

The discussion has gone slightly OT, please stick to the original topic or create a new thread.

Mike Lucey

@unknownuser said:

The discussion has gone slightly OT, please stick to the original topic or create a new thread.

Yes, you are right Juju

Well back to the topic ...... any ideas out there ?

Mike Lucey

@unknownuser said:

Interesting fun idea have u heard anything back from the GreenEarth people Mike?

No word back yet James. I imagine they must have got 1000s of
emails. I think I will phone them and get a person contact as
all I have is an info@......

It looks like we could have a few willing SketchUpers to give it
a go .... maybe that should read SketchUcationer's

Gaieus

Mike, as I said, I'd participate. Global warming or not - preserving those beautiful forests is important (we are letting forests "reoccupy" their old places here in Hungary)
And Kriss - we regularly go out and collect all the litter people leave everywhere - also to highlight this issue. The township provides the bags and trucks for transporting the collected things but the community does the job.

John Sayers

@unknownuser said:

(we are letting forests "reoccupy" their old places here in Hungary)

That's interesting Gai - just the other day I was following the Danube from the sea to it's source on google earth and I was amazed at the lack of forest in not only your country but the others as well.

cheers
john

Mike Lucey

As I heard nothing back from CoolEarth I phoned the
London office this afternoon and had a chat with a
nice lady called Ann.

I explained what I had in mind and she took my phone
number and email and advised that she would get
someone to contact me.

BTW, I donated for an acre and got my Certificate
and link to Google Earth showing the actual piece
of forrest.

I'll keep you posted on progress. Oh! I'm attaching
a pic of the Cert.

Mike

Picture%2012[1].jpg

Will03

Thats really cool Mike! I'll be hopping on that bandwagon for sure!

you can expect the partridge family to be jealous of my treehouse!

dylan

Yep, this seems a great idea to me and also an interesting SU project.
I shall also be joining in with this.

Dylan

Mike Lucey

Thanks guys, I'll keep pushing the project along
and hope that something comes of it.

We would also need some very low poly trees that
would suit the project ..... maybe Tom might help
in this area !

We could be helping these little guys out

animatedfrog[1].gif

Gaieus

@john sayers said:

I was amazed at the lack of forest in not only your country but the others as well...

John, surely there was too much land agriculturally cultivated around here in the past. Even lands that are not really good for agriculture (most of Hungary's middle lands used to be wetlands unti the late 1800s but they drained the waters and built dams along the rivers).
Now these lands are "given back" to nature and even agriculture is practised in an old, traditional way (cattles, pigs, sheep etc. kept outside, forests "regaining" lands etc.). Fortunately I live near a woody area so I can regularly go hiking.

But again, clearing huge areas in the tropical regions willl not only destroy the forests themselves but also the soil and soon those land won't be used for anything - giving way to draughts (maybe at some other places).

Mike Lucey

Hi Guys,

I've just got some feedback from the CoolEarth people.
They are interested in the idea and want to hear more
details.

I will be contacting a Matthew Owen to discuss how the
idea can be developed into some sort of a promotional
gimmick for CoolEarth.

I will keep you posted on progress. So I think it might
be safe enough to start doodling a few ideas for suitable
3D trees and tree-houses in any spare time you may have

You just never know .... we could be paying a visit to
see the Rain Forrest in the not too distant future

Mike

PS: I'll try and locate some pics of tree-houses to germinate
some ideas and add them to this post

John Sayers

That's good news Gai - we too are realising the importance of wetlands and are encouraging our farmers to bring them back.

cheers
john

Mike Lucey

I've done a quick search and located some tree-house links.
My favourite is this, http://tropical-treehouse.com/pics.html
There is a great story behind the tree-house AND would you
believe there is a SketchUp connection. The tree-house, 'The
Sunset Hooch' (great name !) was designed using SU and there
is a model of the 10' x 10' version on 3D Warehouse. I show
a picture of Bamboojo's (another great name) model in my
composite. Here is the link to the model at 3D Warehouse,
http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse/details?mid=25d1efd7d0cd4c0938da1400868ffbd9

I like this design style over the 'traditional' tree-house as
we have come to thing of them. This type of design is obviously
well suited / tested for its intended environment and it appears
to have a low impact on the forrest, I hope

There is just enough room for a few people to eat, sleep and
feel secure. I know, I know we are only talking about virtual
tree-houses but I feel we should be looking at designs that
would if, ever constructed, not harm the rain forrest.

TREE-HOUSE LINKS
http://www.treehouses.org/
http://www.blueforest.com/index.php?kw=tree%20houses&fl=51616
http://www.matadorcoupe.com/seebee65/treehouse.htm
http://americasbestonline.net/treehouse/Tritree.htm

I hope this little bit of research has sparked the imagination
of you guys that are going to row in AND have some FUN with
the project

Mike

TREE-HOUSE%20IDEAS[1].jpg

The%20Sunset%20Hooch[1].skp