Slashdot Mirror
More on Global Dimming
dtolman writes "According to the New York Times (registration required) if the world seemed brighter to our grandparents 50 years ago, they were right. While the sun's output hasn't dropped, the amount of sunshine reaching the Earth's surface has dropped an average of 10% since the 1950's. In Hong Kong, the sunlight reaching the surface has decreased even more - 37%! Scientists are theorizing that this is mainly due to air pollution - so this trend might reverse if air pollution clears up." We had a another story on global dimming last year.
For a second there, I was under the impression that this was a study on the intelligence of humans.
*whew*
Here is a copy of the exact same news story that does not require a registration link.
Stories like this are typically SYNDICATED, which means that you can find the exact same thing in 50 or so other newspapers, right?
Why, oh why, do people choose to link to a page that requires registration when it's totally unnecessary?
Finally, does this remind anyone else of the Animatrix, on how the skies were darkened to stop the machines?
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In the area i live alone, my father has remarked several times in the last five years how either his eyes have gotten used to the sun after almost sixty years, or that things are a lot dimmer -- he used to wear Blueblockers religiously but now doesn't even keep a pair around.
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Before anybody asks the question we know you want to ask:
There's heat, and then there's visible light. They ain't the same thing.
Just because it's "dimmer" doesn't mean it isn't getting warmer.
There, I feel better.
Every few years this gets brought up. There was an article in the June 94 sci american about it. The topic is a bit of a yawner anyway.
Future not so bright, shades no longer required.
Ok ... so less light is reaching the surface than did 50 years ago though the energy output has remained relatively the same. Is it safe to assume that the energy is being absorted by pollution and thus heating the planet?
Quick! Invest in lightbulb manufacturers!
An unrelated, but similar phonomenon is that of the effect of jet contrails on temperature. You can read about it here. The study used the period after 9/11 when all flights in North America were grounded for a few days. An interesting read.
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to make sure that solar energy will never be cost-effective. Clever, but diabolical.
So, after the ice age coming back, global warming destroying us, acid rain eating us and the oil supply being exhausted by 2010 I take science headlines with a grain of salt. The fact that this is from the NY Times just furthers my suspicion. That paper has destroyed its reputation over the years.
One thing that folks have to realize is that scientists are people. They get happy and sad, they are humble and proud, and they lie, steal, cheat and grab for headlines as reagularly as any normal person would.
This is not to discredit the publishers of this work, but to remind us all that headlines like this pop up often amount to a new natural trend or in the very rare case, us acctually damaging the environment in a way that it isn't designed to cope with.
I mention this because our geek culture has a way of worshiping the words of scientists and as a result some amusing lies have drifted in and out of school text books and around our little digital communities. Trust no one. The truth is out there. Now will I get sued by Fox or the aliens over Mexico??? Hmmm...
Sam
Wrong. (Not just because you're too lazy to provide any links. You know, like this or maybe this.)
No, you're actually wrong because you fail the reading (and understanding) the articles test - it didn't warm the earth up. It increased the temperature range for each day - that is, both the high and the low temperature - just like a clear day versus an overcast one.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
This from Environmental History Timeline:
1661 -- John Evelyn writes "Fumifugium, or the Inconvenience of the Aer and Smoake of London Dissipated" to propose remedies for London's air pollution problem. These include large public parks and lots of flowers. http://users.synflux.com.au/~ant/Evelyn/fumifug.h
"The immoderate use of, and indulgence to, sea-coale in the city of London exposes it to one of the fowlest inconveniences and reproaches that can possibly befall so noble and otherwise incomparable City... Whilst they are belching it forth their sooty jaws, the City of London resembles the face rather of Mount Aetna, the Court of Vulcan... or the suburbs of Hell [rather] than an assembly of rational creatures..."
In his diary, Evelyn writes in 1684 that smoke was so severe "hardly could one see across the street, and this filling the lungs with its gross particles exceedingly obstructed the breast, so as one would scarce breathe."
And this from Air Pollution:
In the Middle Ages London air was so polluted by smoke from coal fires that in 1273 Edward I passed a law banning coal burning in an attempt to curb smoke emissions. In 1306 a Londoner was tried and executed for breaking this law. Despite this, pollution was not checked, and on one occasion in 1578 Elizabeth I refused to enter London because there was so much smoke in the air. Smoke killed vegetation and ruined clothes, and the acid in it corroded buildings.
I always wondered if this early pollution may have contributed to Europe's mini-ice age
That previous story on Slashdot included Dimming's relation to Warming - in particular, scientists suspect Mars lost its water in a disastrous event called a "Hot Spot," where one point in the ocean reaches so high a temperature that it begins evaporating so fast it actually magnifies the sun's heating effect at that surface point - causing nearly all the ocean to leave the planet through that spot.
Dimming was suggested as the reason this has not occurred - that although heat is up, average sun exposure to the surface is down, and so, evaporation is down too. The net effect is a constant level of evaporation despite rising temps.
So - is Dimming the buffer that keeps the Earth alive during times of Global Warming? Or is it possible to lose Dimming and keep Warming, rendering us as waterless as Mars? Or, is the Hot Spot theory just hot air in the first place?
This single utopic sentence should have told you it's only unrealistic babble.
The folks in Pittsburgh during industrialization are familiar with the loss of sunlight. So were those in London and Manchester in England during industrialization there. The "English Disease", or rickets, resulted from low levels of vitamin D production due to a lack of sunlight attributable in part to (1) long working hours out of the sun and (2) particulate pollution from burning coal.
An interesting book that deals, in part, with that is Coal: A Human History. Also available here or from your local library.
GF.
Lots of petrified grits