Effects of burning fossil fuels:

[GoFaster]

Is it reasonable to state that credible evidence exists which casts some doubt on the theory of Global Warming?

Perhaps there is, but the overwhelming consensus (Note: "Consensus" DOES NOT mean that everyone is in agreement) is that the increase in atmospheric CO2 caused by mankind is causing an upward influence on global temperature.

Do you believe the occasional dissenter, or do you believe the overwhelming majority of credible scientists?

 

[TornadoRed]

Do you believe the occasional dissenter, or do you believe the overwhelming majority of credible scientists?

I use my own judgement.

Majority opinions are often wrong -- if they were not then public policy decisions could be made by polling to find out what is popular.

 

[GoFaster]

The "opinion" of multiple educated scientists working within their field of expertise carries a LOT more weight than the uninformed opinion of the "man on the street".

The "man on the street" denial of global warning is not based on scientific measurement nor prediction ... and it's biased by the realization that if something needs to be done about global warming then it is going to have an effect on the day-to-day choices that they make.

 

[Meanstreak]

double B.S. on your "global warming" caused by man farce. all the planets in the solar system are heating up.the ice caps on mars are melting(frozen carbon dioxide).the sun is in an extended solar cycle. the sun has 2 recorded cycles an 11 year and a 500 year when those come together you get more solar activity-mce [mass coronal ejections]and x-flares.it wasn't but a couple months ago a planet killer missed hitting the earth-solar flare

 

[LongWayHome]

I use my own judgement.

Majority opinions are often wrong -- if they were not then public policy decisions could be made by polling to find out what is popular.

You're more than welcome to use your own judgement. Given the choice between yours and that of a majority of the scientific community, I'll side with the scientists.

 

[TornadoRed]

The "opinion" of multiple educated scientists working within their field of expertise carries a LOT more weight than the uninformed opinion of the "man on the street".

William F Buckley once said something to the effect that he would rather be governed by 100 men and women chosen at random from the New York City phonebook, than by 100 members of the faculty of Harvard University.

You may choose to discount the opinions of the uninformed "man on the street". But you want to make decisions that will signficantly affect their lives. Educating them, so they can make informed decisions, involves more than mass-media fear-mongering. It involves presenting all sides of the issue, not just today's "consensus". This includes presenting the costs and benefits of the various options that might be adopted now, as well as the costs and benefits if we do nothing. (The most sensible course of action might well be no action at all.)

 

[LongWayHome]

(The most sensible course of action might well be no action at all.)

We could endlessly debate what is "sensible", but there is little doubt that "no action at all" is the easiest course of action. That might explain why it has so many fervent supporters.

 

[fixer]

You're more than welcome to use your own judgement. Given the choice between yours and that of a majority of the scientific community, I'll side with the scientists.

And that gets you what exactly? What are you willing to give up to reduce global warming?

 

[AutoDiesel]

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2002/2002GL015191.shtml

GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 29, NO. 19, 1918, doi:10.1029/2002GL015191, 2002
Tropical Pacific decadal variability and global warming
Amy J. Bratcher
Department of Oceanography, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, USA
Benjamin S. Giese
Department of Oceanography, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, USA

Abstract

An analysis of ocean surface temperature records show that low frequency changes of tropical Pacific temperature lead global surface air temperature changes by about 4 years. Anomalies of tropical Pacific surface temperature are in turn preceded by subsurface temperature anomalies in the southern tropical Pacific by approximately 7 years. The results suggest that much of the decade to decade variations in global air temperature may be attributed to tropical Pacific decadal variability. The results also suggest that subsurface temperature anomalies in the southern tropical Pacific can be used as a predictor for decadal variations of global surface air temperature. Since the southern tropical Pacific temperature shows a distinct cooling over the last 8 years, the possibility exists that the warming trend in global surface air temperature observed since the late 1970's may soon weaken.
Published 8 October 2002.

and the seal pups concur.......

http://eteam.ncpa.org/commentaries/california-seal-pups-predict-pacific-ocean-cooling
California Seal Pups Predict Pacific Ocean Cooling

A new study of California elephant seal pups and their weaning weights predicts that a 25-year Pacific Ocean warming has ended, and the second half of a 50-year cycle has begun to cool the northern Pacific. Historical fish catch data indicate the ocean cooling trend is likely to last until about 2025.
Burney Le Boeuf and David Crocker from the University of California/Santa Cruz monitored central California seal pups’ weaning weights for 29 years, from 1975 to 2004. The ocean’s temperatures generally increased, and the pups’ weaning weights declined 21 percent over the 24 years from the study’s beginning until 2000.
The seal pups’ weight decline coincided with an increase in their mothers’ foraging time of about 36 percent. A decline in the mothers’ own weights confirmed that fish were relatively scarce. After 1999, however, the ocean temperatures began to decline, fish became more abundant, and the pups’ weaning weights abruptly began to rise. By 2004, the pups’ weaning weights had recovered to 90 percent of their 1975 weaning size.
The seal pup weight trends confirm a cycle that is also found in northern Pacific salmon catches. The Columbia River salmon numbers declined sharply after 1977. Columbia River salmon catch data, which date back to 1900, clearly reveal 50-year cycles, with 25 years of salmon abundance interspersed with 25-year periods of salmon scarcity. The Gulf of Alaska salmon catch data show a similar but opposite cycle in salmon numbers. When the Columbia salmon fishery is down, the Alaskan salmon numbers are up.
Dr. Francisco Chavez of the Monterey Bay Aquarium led a 2003 study that found shifts in sardine and anchovy populations across the Pacific followed the same 50-year cycle, and did so in such widely-separate places as California, Peru, and Japan, with sharply different fishing pressures. Chavez’s data show the most recent shift, toward cooler temperatures that favored anchovies over sardines, occurred in the late 1990s. The previous shift toward warmer temperature, which disadvantaged the California seal pups and anchovies, occurred in the mid-70’s.
Researchers have begun to call the 50-year ocean cycle the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Temperatures rise and fall, fish species wax and wane, the fish are caught in different places, but total ocean productivity remains relatively stable.
Do the seals, salmon, and sardines have something to tell us about man-made global warming? The Earth’s temperatures have definitely increased since 1850—the end of the widely noted Little Ice Age—by about 0.8 degrees Celsius. However, 0.6 degrees C of the warming occurred before 1940, and thus before much human-emitted CO2.
After 1940, the Earth’s temperature declined moderately until the late 1970s, despite huge increases in human CO2 emissions, and in defiance of the Greenhouse Theory. Is it just coincidence that during this period the PDO was cooling the Pacific?
The current surge of public concern about human-caused global warming occurred after the Earth’s average temperatures began to rise again in the late 1970s—which coincided with the PDO’s shift back to its ocean warming phase.
Does the recent shift in the PDO mean that the Earth’s average temperatures will start to cool again? Was the “warmest decade” of the 1990s an artifact of expanding urban heat islands and a 25-year Pacific Ocean warming phase?
We might want the global climate modelers and UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to specifically address the Pacific Decadal Oscillation before we agree to give up 85 percent of society’s energy supply on behalf of man-made global warming.
Ice cores and seabed sediments have already told us that the Earth has a long, moderate natural 1500-year cycle that raises temperatures in New York about 2 degrees C during its warming phase, and drops them about 2 degrees C during its “little ice ages.” The Little Ice Age, from 1300 to 1850 AD, was the most recent of these cooling phases.
Now, seal pups and sardines are instructing us that even temperature trends as long as 25 years can mislead us about cause and effect in the Earth’s climate—which has been cycling constantly for at least the last million years.

Sure is something that the critters know more than the so-called
scientists at the IPCC!

P.S. The increase of .8C is nothing more than a recovery from the last
"little ice age" less than 200 years ago.

 

[LongWayHome]

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2002/2002GL015191.shtml



and the seal pups concur.......

http://eteam.ncpa.org/commentaries/california-seal-pups-predict-pacific-ocean-cooling
California Seal Pups Predict Pacific Ocean Cooling



Sure is something that the critters know more than the so-called
scientists at the IPCC!

P.S. The increase of .8C is nothing more than a recovery from the last
"little ice age" less than 200 years ago.

Interesting abstract, and article. In the interest of disclosure, the study that the abstract is quoted from was published by the American Geophysical Union, a nonprofit organization of geophysicists. Here is their position statement on climate change:

Human activities are increasingly altering the Earth's climate. These effects add to natural influences that have been present over Earth's history. Scientific evidence strongly indicates that natural influences cannot explain the rapid increase in global near-surface temperatures observed during the second half of the 20th century. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Geophysical_Union

In additon, the National Center for Policy Analysis (source of the second article) has received $390,900 from ExxonMobil since 1998.
source: http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=55

Also in the interest of disclosure, the AGU position statement was drafted in part by John Christy, an IPCC scientist.

I hope that these pieces weren't meant to be irrefutable proof that global warming isn't happening, because they clearly aren't. By the same token, the information I listed isn't meant to suggest that the abstract and article are completely without merit.

 

[TornadoRed]

Cosmic rays blamed for global warming

By Richard Gray, Science Correspondent, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 1:08am GMT 11/02/2007
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/11/warm11.xml

Man-made climate change may be happening at a far slower rate than has been claimed, according to controversial new research.

Scientists say that cosmic rays from outer space play a far greater role in changing the Earth's climate than global warming experts previously thought.

In a book, to be published this week, they claim that fluctuations in the number of cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere directly alter the amount of cloud covering the planet.

High levels of cloud cover blankets the Earth and reflects radiated heat from the Sun back out into space, causing the planet to cool.

Henrik Svensmark, a weather scientist at the Danish National Space Centre who led the team behind the research, believes that the planet is experiencing a natural period of low cloud cover due to fewer cosmic rays entering the atmosphere.

This, he says, is responsible for much of the global warming we are experiencing.

He claims carbon dioxide emissions due to human activity are having a smaller impact on climate change than scientists think. If he is correct, it could mean that mankind has more time to reduce our effect on the climate.

The controversial theory comes one week after 2,500 scientists who make up the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change published their fourth report stating that human carbon dioxide emissions would cause temperature rises of up to 4.5 C by the end of the century.

Mr Svensmark claims that the calculations used to make this prediction largely overlooked the effect of cosmic rays on cloud cover and the temperature rise due to human activity may be much smaller.

He said: "It was long thought that clouds were caused by climate change, but now we see that climate change is driven by clouds.

"This has not been taken into account in the models used to work out the effect carbon dioxide has had.

"We may see CO2 is responsible for much less warming than we thought and if this is the case the predictions of warming due to human activity will need to be adjusted."

Mr Svensmark last week published the first experimental evidence from five years' research on the influence that cosmic rays have on cloud production in the Proceedings of the Royal Society Journal A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences. This week he will also publish a fuller account of his work in a book entitled The Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change.

A team of more than 60 scientists from around the world are preparing to conduct a large-scale experiment using a particle accelerator in Geneva, Switzerland, to replicate the effect of cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere.

They hope this will prove whether this deep space radiation is responsible for changing cloud cover. If so, it could force climate scientists to re-evaluate their ideas about how global warming occurs.

Mr Svensmark's results show that the rays produce electrically charged particles when they hit the atmosphere. He said: "These particles attract water molecules from the air and cause them to clump together until they condense into clouds."

Mr Svensmark claims that the number of cosmic rays hitting the Earth changes with the magnetic activity around the Sun. During high periods of activity, fewer cosmic rays hit the Earth and so there are less clouds formed, resulting in warming.

Low activity causes more clouds and cools the Earth.

He said: "Evidence from ice cores show this happening long into the past. We have the highest solar activity we have had in at least 1,000 years.

"Humans are having an effect on climate change, but by not including the cosmic ray effect in models it means the results are inaccurate.The size of man's impact may be much smaller and so the man-made change is happening slower than predicted."

 

[TornadoRed]

An experiment that hints we are wrong on climate change
Nigel Calder, former editor of New Scientist, says the orthodoxy must be challenged
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1363818.ece

Twenty years ago, climate research became politicised in favour of one particular hypothesis, which redefined the subject as the study of the effect of greenhouse gases. As a result, the rebellious spirits essential for innovative and trustworthy science are greeted with impediments to their research careers. And while the media usually find mavericks at least entertaining, in this case they often imagine that anyone who doubts the hypothesis of man-made global warming must be in the pay of the oil companies. As a result, some key discoveries in climate research go almost unreported.

Enthusiasm for the global-warming scare also ensures that heatwaves make headlines, while contrary symptoms, such as this winter’s billion-dollar loss of Californian crops to unusual frost, are relegated to the business pages. The early arrival of migrant birds in spring provides colourful evidence for a recent warming of the northern lands. But did anyone tell you that in east Antarctica the Adélie penguins and Cape petrels are turning up at their spring nesting sites around nine days later than they did 50 years ago? While sea-ice has diminished in the Arctic since 1978, it has grown by 8% in the Southern Ocean.

So one awkward question you can ask, when you’re forking out those extra taxes for climate change, is “Why is east Antarctica getting colder?” It makes no sense at all if carbon dioxide is driving global warming. While you’re at it, you might inquire whether Gordon Brown will give you a refund if it’s confirmed that global warming has stopped. The best measurements of global air temperatures come from American weather satellites, and they show wobbles but no overall change since 1999.

That levelling off is just what is expected by the chief rival hypothesis, which says that the sun drives climate changes more emphatically than greenhouse gases do. After becoming much more active during the 20th century, the sun now stands at a high but roughly level state of activity. Solar physicists warn of possible global cooling, should the sun revert to the lazier mood it was in during the Little Ice Age 300 years ago.

Climate history and related archeology give solid support to the solar hypothesis. The 20th-century episode, or Modern Warming, was just the latest in a long string of similar events produced by a hyperactive sun, of which the last was the Medieval Warming.

The Chinese population doubled then, while in Europe the Vikings and cathedral-builders prospered. Fascinating relics of earlier episodes come from the Swiss Alps, with the rediscovery in 2003 of a long-forgotten pass used intermittently whenever the world was warm.

What does the Intergovernmental Panel do with such emphatic evidence for an alternation of warm and cold periods, linked to solar activity and going on long before human industry was a possible factor? Less than nothing. The 2007 Summary for Policymakers boasts of cutting in half a very small contribution by the sun to climate change conceded in a 2001 report.

Disdain for the sun goes with a failure by the self-appointed greenhouse experts to keep up with inconvenient discoveries about how the solar variations control the climate. The sun’s brightness may change too little to account for the big swings in the climate. But more than 10 years have passed since Henrik Svensmark in Copenhagen first pointed out a much more powerful mechanism.

He saw from compilations of weather satellite data that cloudiness varies according to how many atomic particles are coming in from exploded stars. More cosmic rays, more clouds. The sun’s magnetic field bats away many of the cosmic rays, and its intensification during the 20th century meant fewer cosmic rays, fewer clouds, and a warmer world. On the other hand the Little Ice Age was chilly because the lazy sun let in more cosmic rays, leaving the world cloudier and gloomier.

The only trouble with Svensmark’s idea — apart from its being politically incorrect — was that meteorologists denied that cosmic rays could be involved in cloud formation. After long delays in scraping together the funds for an experiment, Svensmark and his small team at the Danish National Space Center hit the jackpot in the summer of 2005.

In a box of air in the basement, they were able to show that electrons set free by cosmic rays coming through the ceiling stitched together droplets of sulphuric acid and water. These are the building blocks for cloud condensation. But journal after journal declined to publish their report; the discovery finally appeared in the Proceedings of the Royal Society late last year.

 

[TornadoRed]

Debate and a climate of fear — temperature projections just don't add up
William Kininmonth
February 10, 2007
http://www.theage.com.au/news/busin...1170524297680.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

The lengthy responses from prominent CSIRO anthropogenic global warming advocates Roger Jones (Business 1/2) and Paul Fraser (Business 5/2) clearly indicate that Len Walker (Business 19/1) touched a raw nerve.

Jones accuses Walker of distorting and miscommunicating the science and playing down the long-term risks of global warming. Fraser claims the consensus of 2500 scientists involved in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) process as legitimising the anthropogenic (human-centred) global warming hypothesis and attempts to denounce Walker's numbers.

The only consensus in the climate change debate is that weather and climate extremes are dangerous. The climate system throws up heat waves (like the record daily temperatures of Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney in January 1939), tropical cyclones (Tracy — Darwin, 1974; Althea — Townsville, 1971), droughts, floods and severe local storms, including wind and hail damage.

There is no clear evidence that these extremes have become more frequent or increased in intensity. Our safety and security depend on planning, early warning, emergency response systems and financial instruments for rapid restoration of infrastructure. Reducing carbon emissions will not mitigate the impact of these hazards.

Dr Jones is at odds with the IPCC when he claims a 2-degree rise in temperature will cause "irreversible melting of the Greenland ice sheets". The IPCC Fourth Assessment, released this month, gives no credence to significantly increased melting by 2100, even for the most extreme projection of temperature. To suggest that melting of polar ice is irreversible and that the biosphere does not respond and adapt to changing conditions is to ignore a vast body of scientific evidence.

The Earth's temperature was warmer 125,000 years ago than it is today. A large part of the Greenland ice sheet had melted and sea level was several metres higher.

With the onset of the last ice age, the Greenland ice sheet not only recovered but it expanded southward as far as St Louis and New York, and covered the Great Lakes to a depth of several kilometres. Ice sheets also covered northern Europe and permanent ice formed over the high peaks of south-east Australia and Tasmania.

The water locked in the extensive land ice caused the sea level to drop about 130 metres below what it is now, thus creating land bridges from Australia to New Guinea and Tasmania. Coral reefs were left exposed as barren limestone cliffs.

Recovery from the ice age conditions began about 19,000 years ago. The ice sheets melted leaving only Greenland covered and remnant mountain glaciers. The sea level rose, coral reefs took on their pristine state, and boreal forests expanded.

The Greenland ice cores reveal that many sudden local temperature increases approaching 10 degrees have occurred over periods of several decades, with some of the warm events lasting more than 2000 years. These events are associated with changes in the ocean circulations, the circulation of the atmosphere and climate.

Fraser's reliance on peer review by the 2500 scientists involved in the IPCC consensus is demonstrably misplaced. In its summary of observed sea level rise over the decade 1993-2003, IPCC identifies four sources: thermal expansion (0.16), glaciers and ice caps (0.077), Greenland ice sheets (0.21) and Antarctic ice sheets (0.21) and sums these contributions to 0.28 (all in metres per century).
(edit: bad math)

The alarmist global warming rhetoric is based on the projections of computer models but, from considerations of basic physics, runaway global warming is an impossible proposition.

Evaporation, more than 50 per cent of the energy exchange between the earth and atmosphere, increases nearly exponentially with temperature and is a strong brake on further temperature rise. Each recovery from ice age conditions over the past million years has been halted at a temperature only a few degrees warmer than now.

Jones refers to the potential impact on the poorest in society. He neglects to mention the certain impact on the poorest as resources that could be used to improve employment, housing, education and medical services are diverted to rent seekers promoting ineffective solutions to a probably non-existent problem. He also neglects to mention the social costs as energy prices escalate due to imposed constraints, pricing jobs out of the market.

William Kininmonth is former head of the National Climate Centre and author of Climate Change: A Natural Hazard.

 

[TornadoRed]

Don't Rush To Judgment on U.N.'s IPCC Global Warming Summary
by Ben Lieberman
http://www.heritage.org/Research/EnergyandEnvironment/wm1351.cfm

Just a Summary

It should be emphasized that only a short "Summary for Policymakers" has been released, not the actual report which contains the underlying scientific assessment. The final version of the full report is scheduled to come out later this year. IPCC summaries are written at the direction of political appointees representing member nations. The limitations and potential biases of such summaries give reason to withhold judgment until the scientists actually weigh in--both the IPCC scientists and especially the independent scientists who will comment on the final report. That the summary is being so aggressively marketed ahead of the science is itself reason for caution.

The Findings

That said, the summary is the only thing most journalists and politicians read, and the finding that has received the most attention is that the IPCC is now more certain than in its 2001 report that mankind has contributed to global warming since 1750. In truth, few so-called skeptics dispute that there has been some human contribution, so the fact that the summary says the likelihood is 90 percent or more is not as newsworthy as it first appears. This upward revision in the certainty that mankind has impacted the climate should not be confused with an upward revision in the predictions of consequent harm.

The more important questions have always been the extent of warming, the seriousness of the consequences, and what responsive policies make sense.

The summary includes a wide range of assumptions and outcomes, and thus it is hard to generalize about its predictions. However, it does appear that estimates of future sea level rise--likely the greatest concern from warming--are being revised downward. Estimates range from 0.18 to 0.59 meters (about 7 to 23 inches) over the course of a century, about a third lower than in the previous report and well below popular fears of 20 feet or more.

Again it is still too early to speculate what the final scientific assessment will say (and how well it will hold up to scrutiny), but the summary does appear to have backtracked on other points as well. For example, the last IPCC report emphasized the so-called "hockey stick" notion that earth's temperature was relatively stable for a thousand years (the shaft of the hockey stick) and then shot up in an unprecedented manner in the 20th century (the blade). Thus, the previous IPCC report discounted the Medieval Warm Period and subsequent Little Ice Age, implying that current temperature increases are not due to natural variability. The hockey stick (and its conclusion that current temperatures are unprecedented throughout most of recorded history) has come under scientific attack in recent years, and based on the new summary, it appears that the IPCC has deemphasized it. How the deletion of the hockey stick from the upcoming report squares with IPCC's claims of increased certainty over mankind's impact on climate will be a significant source of contention.

On the question of whether global warming contributes to powerful hurricanes like Katrina, the summary hedges quite a bit, calling the hurricane-warming link "more likely than not" rather than "very likely" or "likely," as used elsewhere in the summary. The summary concedes in a footnote that the magnitude of mankind's contribution was not assessed and that the attribution was based "on expert judgment" and not formal studies. Again, depending on what the final report says, activists and politicians who unequivocally blamed Katrina's devastation on global warming may have to back off.

 

[LongWayHome]

Don't Rush To Judgment on U.N.'s IPCC Global Warming Summary
by Ben Lieberman
http://www.heritage.org/Research/EnergyandEnvironment/wm1351.cfm

Did I miss the memo about this discussion turning into a contest consisting of posting stories that back up one's own point of view? (extra points for not adding a bit of your own analysis, double extra points if the source has questionable credibility)

 

[TornadoRed]

Did I miss the memo about this discussion turning into a contest consisting of posting stories that back up one's own point of view? (extra points for not adding a bit of your own analysis, double extra points if the source has questionable credibility)

I just wondered if I posted four articles, each of them excellent and informative, whether or not your only remark would be that one of them had been published by the Heritage Foundation. You fell into my little trap.

And I don't think you even object to what he wrote. Mr Lieberman said the IPCC summary, in strengthing the level of confidence that humans are changing the climate, also downgraded the level of this impact. Would you care to quarrel with that? The sealevel may increase -- the IPCC is more certain of that -- but the amount of increase will be less. In fact, an increase of 7 to 23 inches per century is similar to the estimate of 6 to 12 inches of increase during the 20th century.

This reminds me of the great dihydrogen monoxide scare of the 1990s. When it was revealed that this common but deadly compound was present in many of our schools, and even in our homes, there a widespread demand for immediate action.

Can you imagine the level of panic, if the headlines reported that the seas were rising, that they have already risen 12 inches in the 20th century, and that they would probably rise another 12 inches in the 21st century? And that we much radically alter our way of life because... well, we're not sure why because we don't think anything we do can reverse this trend? (We would have to go back in time to 1990 and freeze energy consumption, despite the immense hardship this would impose on billions of people.)

I actually paid very little attention to the entire "hockey stick" controversy, but apparently Mr Lieberman noticed that it's missing from the new report. Now isn't that interesting? (Maybe you can fool most of the people most of the time, but the entire hockey-stick argument didn't fool anyone except the most ignorant of fools, like Mr Gore I imagine.)

I haven't seen Mr Gore's award-winning movie, but I imagine it also tries to blame hurricanes and tsunamis on global warming too. Interesting that the IPCC report doesn't.

 

[RedTDIVA]

I haven't read all the posts but there are a few points I want to make.

1. Science can barely predict the weather a week in advance, what makes anyone think they can predict what will happen 100 or 200 years from now?
2. If the question is asked, "Is global warming happening?" The answer is yes.
3.Are humans causing it? no
4. Are humans accelerating it? maybe
5. Can we reverse it? no
6. Global warming and cooling has been happening for millions of years.
7. Global cooling, IE - Ice age, would hundreds of times worse.
8. Do environmental groups make millions claiming we're all going to die due to global warming? yes

For me clean air to breath, clean water to drink and not have trash everywhere in more important than worrying about something we can't control.

 

[LongWayHome]

I just wondered if I posted four articles, each of them excellent and informative, whether or not your only remark would be that one of them had been published by the Heritage Foundation. You fell into my little trap.

And I don't think you even object to what he wrote. Mr Lieberman said the IPCC summary, in strengthing the level of confidence that humans are changing the climate, also downgraded the level of this impact. Would you care to quarrel with that? The sealevel may increase -- the IPCC is more certain of that -- but the amount of increase will be less. In fact, an increase of 7 to 23 inches per century is similar to the estimate of 6 to 12 inches of increase during the 20th century.

This reminds me of the great dihydrogen monoxide scare of the 1990s. When it was revealed that this common but deadly compound was present in many of our schools, and even in our homes, there a widespread demand for immediate action.

Can you imagine the level of panic, if the headlines reported that the seas were rising, that they have already risen 12 inches in the 20th century, and that they would probably rise another 12 inches in the 21st century? And that we much radically alter our way of life because... well, we're not sure why because we don't think anything we do can reverse this trend? (We would have to go back in time to 1990 and freeze energy consumption, despite the immense hardship this would impose on billions of people.)

I actually paid very little attention to the entire "hockey stick" controversy, but apparently Mr Lieberman noticed that it's missing from the new report. Now isn't that interesting? (Maybe you can fool most of the people most of the time, but the entire hockey-stick argument didn't fool anyone except the most ignorant of fools, like Mr Gore I imagine.)

I haven't seen Mr Gore's award-winning movie, but I imagine it also tries to blame hurricanes and tsunamis on global warming too. Interesting that the IPCC report doesn't.

Fair enough, at least you didn't post and run. Actually I do object to what he wrote. He ignores the IPCC's warning about the uncertainty of predicting sea level changes:

"Dynamical processes related to ice flow not included in current models but suggested by recent observations could increase the vulnerability of the ice sheets to warming, increasing future sea level rise."

The IPCC's estimate doesn't take into account potential rises in sea level due to ice sheet melt. Many critics have said the report is too optimistic in its sea level rise predictions.

At this point blaming global warming on cosmic rays is still a bit of a stretch. Here's an opinion from realclimate.org:

"Whether cosmic rays are correlated with climate or not, they have been regularly measured by the neutron monitor at Climax Station (Colorado) since 1953 and show no long term trend. No trend = no explanation for current changes."

Again, interesting, not conclusive. Was there really a great water scare? I've seen the e-mail. Trying to trap me again?

I was unaware of the hockey stick controversy myself. Maybe Mr. Lieberman should take another look at the SPM.

"Even more wrong is the claim that "the upcoming report is also missing any reference to the infamous 'hockey stick' ". Not only are the three original "hockey stick" reconstructions from the IPCC (2001) report shown in the (draft) paleoclimate chapter of the new report, but they are now joined by 9 others. Which is why the SPM comes to the even stronger conclusion that recent large-scale warmth is likely to be anomalous in the context of at least the past 1300 years, and not just the past 1000 years."

http://www.realclimate.org

I actually looked at the summary (apparently Mr. Lieberman didn't) The "hockey sticks" are indeed there.


As to hurricanes: The IPCC report doesn't "blame" hurricanes on global warming. It does suggest a relationship between storms of increased intensity and climate change, however.

"At continental, regional, and ocean basin scales, numerous long-term changes in climate have been observed. These include changes in Arctic temperatures and ice, widespread changes in precipitation
amounts, ocean salinity, wind patterns and aspects of extreme weather including droughts, heavy precipitation, heat waves and the intensity of tropical cyclones10. {3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6, 5.2}

10 Tropical cyclones include hurricanes and typhoons." (my bold)

(from pg. 5 of the IPCC 2007 spm)

"Based on a range of models, it is likely that future tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense, with larger peak wind speeds and more heavy precipitation associated with ongoing increases of tropical SSTs(sea surface temperatures). There is less confidence in projections of a global decrease in numbers of tropical
cyclones. The apparent increase in the proportion of very intense storms since 1970 in some regions is much larger than simulated by current models for that period. {9.5, 10.3, 3.8}" - (pg. 12 of the IPCC 2007 spm)


Maybe you should watch Mr. Gore's film. Find out if your insults hold any water.

 

[TornadoRed]

Here's an opinion from realclimate.org:

"Whether cosmic rays are correlated with climate or not, they have been regularly measured by the neutron monitor at Climax Station (Colorado) since 1953 and show no long term trend. No trend = no explanation for current changes."

Thank you for linking to that data set. I dumped it into Excel, charted it, added a linear regression, and found a negative slope. There is also an 11.5 year cycle. Should I post an image?

Was there really a great water scare? I've seen the e-mail. Trying to trap me again?

See here: www.dhmo.org

I was unaware of the hockey stick controversy myself. Maybe Mr. Lieberman should take another look at the SPM.

"Even more wrong is the claim that "the upcoming report is also missing any reference to the infamous 'hockey stick' ". Not only are the three original "hockey stick" reconstructions from the IPCC (2001) report shown in the (draft) paleoclimate chapter of the new report, but they are now joined by 9 others.... "

I looked at those charts (the "hockey stick reconstructions") and was wondering -- wouldn't those sharp spikes disappear if the scale was changed? For example, suppose I constructed a chart showing values all clustered around 100, then showed a spike to 102? If the scale was 0-110, that spike wouldn't look like much. But if the scale was 99-103, then the spike would look enormous.

This "Summary for Policy Makers"... do these policy makers realize how easy it is to distort (misrepresent) data by changing the scale on a chart?

We know that CO2 is higher than in the past. But the time scale goes back 10,000 years. Is CO2 higher than it was before 10,000 years before present time? Ice-core data is available from much longer than 10,000 years ago.

As to hurricanes: The IPCC report doesn't "blame" hurricanes on global warming. It does suggest a relationship between storms of increased intensity and climate change, however.

Merely opinions, unsupported by any data.

At continental, regional, and ocean basin scales, numerous long-term changes in climate have been observed. These include changes in Arctic temperatures and ice, widespread changes in precipitation
amounts, ocean salinity, wind patterns and aspects of extreme weather including droughts, heavy precipitation, heat waves and the intensity of tropical cyclones10. {3.2, 3.3, 3.4, 3.5, 3.6, 5.2}

Observed? I have observed that the ocean doesn't seem as blue as it once was. I wonder why... could it be global warming?

Seriously, we know that Arctic and Antarctic icecaps have fluctuated in the past, as well as Greenland glaciers and other continental glaciers. Receding glaciers in Switzerland have revealed a mountain pass used long ago for human migrations. So the current melting is not unprecedented. Ocean salinity also fluctuates, resulting from glacial melting or increased precipitation and other factors. Wind pattern changes often occur during El Nino/Southern Oscillation events -- which we know have been occuring since at least the time of the Spanish explorations, and probably for millenia before then. There have been droughts and floods since Biblical times, and before. And the intensity of tropical cyclones? How do they know? During the medieval warming, storms in the North Atlantic were less intense -- or else the Vikings wouldn't have ventured out into the open water. How could the North Atlantic have been calmer, if the tropics were experiencing more severe weather?

"Based on a range of models, it is likely that future tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense, with larger peak wind speeds and more heavy precipitation associated with ongoing increases of tropical SSTs(sea surface temperatures).

What about recent data showing decreases in SSTs? An anomaly?

I looked through the entire SPM, and I don't know what to think. Every conclusion is hedged by "likely" or "very likely"... they left out the "maybes". There seems to be a lot of certainty about things that are very uncertain. And a lot of conclusions that seem supported by selective data or the manipulation of chart scales.

I guess if I already believed in the whole climate change hype, I'd find a lot here to support those beliefs. But if a sceptic looks closely, there isn't all that much. That's what makes me think this is more of a political document than a scientific one. It starts with a premise, it builds a case, presents that case persuasively -- but it ignores contrary evidence.

 

[BioDiesel]

First house to be claimed by g.w.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17042910/

Battle for Venice:

"In Italy, a $5.5 billion plan to build moveable flood barriers in an effort to save Venice from higher tides has been approved by state and local officials."

 

[LongWayHome]

Thank you for linking to that data set. I dumped it into Excel, charted it, added a linear regression, and found a negative slope. There is also an 11.5 year cycle. Should I post an image?

Ok, so you added information and ended up finding exactly what you were looking for. Not surprising. Take a look at this: http://www.realclimate.org/images/cr.jpg
"Finally, to show that cosmic rays were actually responsible for some part of the recent warming you would need to show that there was actually a decreasing trend in cosmic rays over recent decades - which is tricky, because there hasn't been (see the figure)" http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/10/taking-cosmic-rays-for-a-spin/

See here: www.dhmo.org.

Funny.

I looked at those charts (the "hockey stick reconstructions") and was wondering -- wouldn't those sharp spikes disappear if the scale was changed? For example, suppose I constructed a chart showing values all clustered around 100, then showed a spike to 102? If the scale was 0-110, that spike wouldn't look like much. But if the scale was 99-103, then the spike would look enormous.

I agree. If you change the parameters for the charts, they would look different.

This "Summary for Policy Makers"... do these policy makers realize how easy it is to distort (misrepresent) data by changing the scale on a chart?

It's a summary for policy makers. Not by policy makers. If the roles were reversed I'd be worried.

We know that CO2 is higher than in the past. But the time scale goes back 10,000 years. Is CO2 higher than it was before 10,000 years before present time? Ice-core data is available from much longer than 10,000 years ago.

Yes. It is higher. The data is available at least 650,000 years back.


"The global atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide has increased from a pre-industrial value of about 280 ppm to 379 ppm

3 in 2005. The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide in 2005 exceeds by far the natural range over the last 650,000 years (180 to 300 ppm) as determined from ice cores." - pg. 2 IPCC spm 2007

Merely opinions, unsupported by any data.


Observed? I have observed that the ocean doesn't seem as blue as it once was. I wonder why... could it be global warming?

Seriously, we know that Arctic and Antarctic icecaps have fluctuated in the past, as well as Greenland glaciers and other continental glaciers. Receding glaciers in Switzerland have revealed a mountain pass used long ago for human migrations. So the current melting is not unprecedented. Ocean salinity also fluctuates, resulting from glacial melting or increased precipitation and other factors. Wind pattern changes often occur during El Nino/Southern Oscillation events -- which we know have been occuring since at least the time of the Spanish explorations, and probably for millenia before then. There have been droughts and floods since Biblical times, and before. And the intensity of tropical cyclones? How do they know? During the medieval warming, storms in the North Atlantic were less intense -- or else the Vikings wouldn't have ventured out into the open water. How could the North Atlantic have been calmer, if the tropics were experiencing more severe weather?

What about recent data showing decreases in SSTs? An anomaly?

Most likely. The overall trend is upwards. Look here: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/05/planetary-energy-imbalance/

I looked through the entire SPM, and I don't know what to think. Every conclusion is hedged by "likely" or "very likely"... they left out the "maybes". There seems to be a lot of certainty about things that are very uncertain. And a lot of conclusions that seem supported by selective data or the manipulation of chart scales.

I guess if I already believed in the whole climate change hype, I'd find a lot here to support those beliefs. But if a sceptic looks closely, there isn't all that much. That's what makes me think this is more of a political document than a scientific one. It starts with a premise, it builds a case, presents that case persuasively -- but it ignores contrary evidence.

I can't say this with any authority, because I'm obviously not a skeptic, but I think anyone looking at the spm (and some of the other sources I've listed) with an open mind would find the arguments compelling.
​

 

[BioDiesel]

G.W. author's idea's

Ross Gelbspan, author of 'Boiling Point' was on the UCONN radio yesterday.
He had a couple idea's to reduce green house gases:

1. Take the 200 billion of U.S. federal tax breaks and subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and use it to fund research into alternative energy and purchase current alt. en. systems.

2. To fund adoption of alt. en. in the third world, he proposed a $0.0025 tax on every dollar spent by banks doing speculative currency trading. Such a tax would generate 300 billion annualy.

3. In his view, the biggest impediment is a lack of a trained alt. en. workforce. Logically, the most readily available workforce would be one that was obsoleted by alt. en. He proposed re-training the 50,000 coal workers
in alt. en. technology, such as wind generators.



Climate change skeptic blacklist:
http://www.heatisonline.org/contentserver/objecthandlers/index.cfm?ID=6266&Method=Full

Includes well known g.w. miscreant Exxon-Mobil.

"Acknowledging the business risks posed by climate change is just good business, and shareholders demand it.""



and..


"On Monday, another Exxon-funded organisation based in Canada will launch a review in London which casts doubt on the IPCC report. Among its authors are Tad Murty, a former scientist who believes human activity makes no contribution to global warming. Confirmed VIPs attending include Nigel Lawson and David Bellamy, who believes there is no link between burning fossil fuels and global warming."

David Bellamy! That's our friend who typo'd "55% glaciers" into "555 glaciers" and blamed it on his computer.
Good to see he's still finding work.

 

[nicklockard]

Hacks and joke websites about dihydrogen monoxide? That's all you got? Against a mountain of qualified scientists....sorry, it would take an infinite number of Michael Chrichton's, David Bellamy's and joke websites to match one qualified scientist's credibility...actually, no, they never could.

 

[TornadoRed]

Ok, so you added information and ended up finding exactly what you were looking for. Not surprising.

I didn't add information. I just charted the data, then clicked on "Add Trendline". Voila, there was a negative trendline.

I suppose I could manipulate the scale and the trendline would look flat. But it's not.

"The global atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide has increased from a pre-industrial value of about 280 ppm to 379 ppm in 2005. The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide in 2005 exceeds by far the natural range over the last 650,000 years (180 to 300 ppm) as determined from ice cores." - pg. 2 IPCC spm 2007

"Natural range"? What is "natural"? Maybe 180-300 ppm is natural -- but if 180 ppm corresponds to intense cold, then I'd rather see 380 ppm.

Humans are very capable of adapting to a warmer earth. We are less able to cope with a colder earth, because our crops need a growing season of adequate length. The wine-producing districts in Britain disappeared during the Little Ice Age because either the vines were damaged by freezing weather or the grapes never matured. The grain that once grew on the lower mountain slopes in Scandinavia was replaced by pastureland, because the growing season turned too short for grain to ripen.

I can't say this with any authority, because I'm obviously not a skeptic, but I think anyone looking at the spm (and some of the other sources I've listed) with an open mind would find the arguments compelling.

There is no one left with an open mind. It is all political... a point that was made in an early post.

 

[TornadoRed]

Ross Gelbspan, author of 'Boiling Point' was on the UCONN radio yesterday.
He had a couple idea's to reduce green house gases:

1. Take the 200 billion of U.S. federal tax breaks and subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and use it to fund research into alternative energy and purchase current alt. en. systems.

What he means is, raise taxes on energy companies. That $200 billion would come from the pensions and retirement funds of all of us.

But, if the pension fund managers want to sell off their energy stocks, they can do that. I don't think they will.

2. To fund adoption of alt. en. in the third world, he proposed a $0.0025 tax on every dollar spent by banks doing speculative currency trading. Such a tax would generate 300 billion annualy.

I'm not going to go through this one again, but will merely say that it's a really, really bad idea.

Climate change skeptic blacklist... Includes well known g.w. miscreant Exxon-Mobil.

Enough of the Exxon bashing. If Soros and his buddies want to spend money to hype global warming, then Exxon has a perfect right to debunk the many outrageous exaggerations that have been made.

The notorious left-wing billionaire George Soros, by the way, obtained most of his wealth by currency speculation. If you want to confiscate all his money and use it to buy ice cream for children in the Third World, I'm okay with that.

 

[TornadoRed]

Hacks and joke websites about dihydrogen monoxide?

All of the warnings and alerts about dihydrogen monozide are proveably true. The same level of proof regarding anthropogenic climate change cannot be claimed.

Dihyrogen monoxide is killing people every day -- can you identify one person on the planet Earth that has been killed by global warming?

 

[LongWayHome]

I didn't add information. I just charted the data, then clicked on "Add Trendline". Voila, there was a negative trendline.

I suppose I could manipulate the scale and the trendline would look flat. But it's not.

You obviously ignored the links that I included in my post. The trendline certainly looks flat when compared with surface air temperature anomalies. No offense, but do you really want to put your excel spreadsheet up against the work of a climate scientist?

"Natural range"? What is "natural"? Maybe 180-300 ppm is natural -- but if 180 ppm corresponds to intense cold, then I'd rather see 380 ppm.

Natural range... very plain english to me. If 650,000 years of data isn't enough to constitute a natural range, I don't know what is.

Humans are very capable of adapting to a warmer earth. We are less able to cope with a colder earth, because our crops need a growing season of adequate length. The wine-producing districts in Britain disappeared during the Little Ice Age because either the vines were damaged by freezing weather or the grapes never matured. The grain that once grew on the lower mountain slopes in Scandinavia was replaced by pastureland, because the growing season turned too short for grain to ripen.

Ahh, the little ice age again. The "Global Warming is ok because global cooling would be much worse" argument is moot. The next ice age isn't due for a very long time. We're dealing with the effects of global warming now.

There is no one left with an open mind. It is all political... a point that was made in an early post.

I disagree.

 

[LongWayHome]

What he means is, raise taxes on energy companies. That $200 billion would come from the pensions and retirement funds of all of us.

Maybe.... he means exactly what he says. Taking tax breaks and subsidies away isn't the same as raising taxes. I don't think "all of us" have $ invested in EM. Speak for yourself.

Enough of the Exxon bashing. If Soros and his buddies want to spend money to hype global warming, then Exxon has a perfect right to debunk the many outrageous exaggerations that have been made.

Is it Exxon bashing if it's true? They've spent millions trying to create doubt about sound science on climate change, and millions more supporting junk science. The notion that EM dollars are going towards debunking 'outrageous exaggerations' is hilarious. Unless you actually believe it. I guess their money has been well spent.

 

[TornadoRed]

You obviously ignored the links that I included in my post. The trendline certainly looks flat when compared with surface air temperature anomalies. No offense, but do you really want to put your excel spreadsheet up against the work of a climate scientist?

Your link provided the data. Did you expect me ignore the data, if so why did you post the link?

Ahh, the little ice age again. The "Global Warming is ok because global cooling would be much worse" argument is moot. The next ice age isn't due for a very long time. We're dealing with the effects of global warming now.

Actually, in the 1970s they were looking at what appeared to a 10k-year cycle for ice ages, and the consensus then was that the earth was about 9k years into the warming phase.

If we're going to spend time worrying about the earth getting warmer, why not worry about the next ice age at the same time? Global warming won't kill us, global cooling will.

 

[TornadoRed]

Is it Exxon bashing if it's true? They've spent millions trying to create doubt about sound science on climate change, and millions more supporting junk science. The notion that EM dollars are going towards debunking 'outrageous exaggerations' is hilarious. Unless you actually believe it. I guess their money has been well spent.

Then I suppose George Soros needs to spend more money, because I think you only believe about 75% of the hype. I don't think you've been persuaded about the other 25%.