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Human Activity to Blame For 2003 Heatwave
Dirak writes "The temperatures of the summer of 2003 were almost undoubtedly the highest in Europe for over 500 years. New research shows how human influence, mainly fossil fuel burning, can be blamed for increasing the risk of such a heatwave and by the middle of this century every other summer could be even hotter than 2003."
What a great boon for real estate in Norway! Time to buy up those cottage properties.
No way. We humans caused it through what is known as the "environmental slashdot effect."
It involves burning servers heating the atmosphere and such...
Human Activity including exhaling has become a huge problem in europe. I propose we have some regulations on the number of exhales per day per human. When everyone exercises and everyone's breathing hard, the ENVIRONMENT is taking one for the team.
What difference does a report like this really make? The people who don't believe in global warming as it is will only repeat their same excuses, and the people who do believe in global warming will offer a smug told you so. I personally believe something has to be done to curtail our fossil fuel usage (although I'm sure running out of it will certainly help in the future), but really, who will this report convince?
They must have had some terrible green-house gas emissions 500 years ago!
Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird -- Proverbs 1:17
by the middle of this century every other summer could be even hotter than 2003.
Excellent, it sure sucked where I live.
This seems to be the norm rather than the exception, unfortunately.
I guess it's very hard to get continued funding for a study that says "Everything's fine, situation normal" That must be why, no matter what the scientific endeavor, there's always some cataclysmic disaster looming on the horizon.
So -- using that old razor of Occam's -- either the entire world and every observable natural system is on the brink of an unheard-of disaster, or there is a noticable (and understandable) trend in scientific research to a) follow the herd, and b) doomsay.
Just my opinion. I get paid for these. $.25 will get you another one.
That's what I keep telling the kids, shut the window your letting the heat out.
... though personally I doubt it.
In the Kyoto Protocol, signed 1996, the many countries agreed to reduce their Co2 output below 95% of the output in the year 1990.
However, the biggest Co2 producer was among the countries that decided not to ratify the Protocol - the USA - while resposible for 25% of the Co2 produced worldwide, they decided that protecting the environment of the entire world was not an important issue.
Brief update: a few weeks ago Russia ratified the Protocol - way to go USA, even Russia has a higher priority on clima protection than you.
+++ MELON MELON MELON +++ Out of Cheese Error +++ redo from start +++
You mean that some Joe Random Commentator on Slashdot (who can't spell flawed) has spotted some "serious" flaws in a research paper that the peer reviewers of Nature, one of the most reputable scientific journals in the world, have failed to spot.
Well, spank me on the arse and call me shorty!
I'll look forward to reading your comments in the next issue of Nature.
No but, yeah but, no but...
This research has some serious flaws..... I think it was written to grab headlines.
I agree. Fuming liberals were responsible for the heatwave.
They are cooling off now though.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
"Human activity to blame" != "Human activity can be blamed". The study does not prove human activity was the culprit (in fact they say it is possible it was not), but merely offers an explanation in which human activity was the cause.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
Didn't I hear a news report about Mt. Saint Helens just the other day... something about it putting out more C02 than all human civilization? Surely that has no influence on the atmosphere...
If you did it was inaccurate. I don't have the figures any more, but I did work them out for a previous reply on this subject where I had believed the same thing you have been told. It turns out that vulcanism only accounts for about 50% of CO2 emissions in total at the moment. No single source dwarfs human production, as is routinely reported in some sources.
Or the chemists saying that bucky-balls are a major cause of global arthritis?
Or the recent flood of biologists publishing data suggesting that trees are plotting behind are backs.
These results are based on model runs. You can believe them or not (although its unlikely you're qualified to make a informed assessment), but I've heard of no climate modelers deliberately putting falsifying data or results in order to keep funding.
Do you have any references to such activity, or are you just spreading malice?
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
So -- using that old razor of Occam's -- either the entire world and every observable natural system is on the brink of an unheard-of disaster, or there is a noticable (and understandable) trend in scientific research to a) follow the herd, and b) doomsay.
True enough, Up here in the arctic the change in temprature is really noticable. Over the last few years all sorts of plants and animals that would hardly ever bee seen in here just 10-15 years ago have become common place. They do concede in this article that the climate is still colder than it was during the middle ages when people were able to grow wheat in quantity as far north as sub arctic Norway, Sweden and in Iceland: "...the temperatures of summer 2003 were almost undoubtedly the highest in Europe for over 500 years." So I'm still not convinced that this isn't just a natural fluctuation in the climate, althought is is probably not completely unaffected by human activity.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
By drilling in the Antarctic ice they DO have thousands of years of data.
Name an actual climatologist who seriously believes Kyoto will actually stop global warming.
Name an actual climatologist who seriously believes doing nothing at all is better than Kyoto.
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
It is quite striking that wherever there's a predominently american crowd, the gut reaction to anything global warming related is denial - even with a comparably smart crowd like this one.
I sincerely hope we're not at the brink of self inflicted global destruction. But are you guys so addicted to your gas guzzlers and inefficient houses that you refuse to even discuss your behaviour's more or less possible/probable consequences?
You're sounding very emotional. Maybe a couple of deep breaths might help.
As an architect who has written both simulation engines and created complex models of various systems, I can tell you that the implicit assumptions going into a simulation are the ones that cause poor predictive ability. These are almost never discovered until later when better models are created.
Nobody is accusing the world of science of foul-play. I'm simply pointing out that scientists are people too. And as a system of people, they also have observable behaviour. It might be a better use of one's time to look at the pattern of scientific herd-mentality FIRST, and then take into account individual studies second.
I'm certain that all involved were top-drawer and well-meaning people.
Human Activity to Blame...
Too much "human activity" in Europe?! *nudge* *nudge*
You're saying that scientists are either falsifying or wilfully misinterpreting their results (stressing that "there's always some cataclysmic disaster looming on the horizon" which you imply is fictional). And you suggest, they do this for personal, professional or financial gain.
You have absolutely no evidence for either implication, both of which are absolutely disgraceful.
And yes, I'm emotional, you've just accused me of being a dishonest charlatan. I'm allowed to be emotional.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
I am however, very familiar with how large corporations do PR campaigns. It always strikes me as spooky how a large corporations sees a profit problem, hires a PR agency giving it millions of dollars, whereas the PR agency does things such as write bogus reports from "independent" institutes saying whatever the company wanted (Linux was not written by Linus Torvalds, smoking tobacco is not bad for you, whatever...), as well as a media campaign which includes commercials, the "independent" institute people going on Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and if they're lucky, the major corporate news stations as well.
For example, I've been tracking Wal-Mart and the Walton family's giving in this regard. Two of the things they try to do is privatize education and create what we call "right-to-work-for-less" laws. I care more about the latter than the former, but I've been researching the former more lately. The Walton family is obsessed with privatizing education, giving massive amounts of money to efforts to do so, including giving $10,492,047.38, just in 2003, to the Children's Educational Opportunity Foundation America. They've also given millions in the last year alone to a variety of such education privatziation organizations, as have the foundations of other billionaires and millionaires such as the Olins, Scaifes and so forth. One of their jobs is to "astroturf", e.g. make fake it appear that a fake grassroots campaign exists to privatize education. Many of the privatize education groups have black and Hispanic faces at the top of the organization to talk to the press. These foundations also create scholarship foundations (for private schools only) to put a humanitarian face on the effort, and the scholarship front of this massive effort draws in people like Charles Rangel, Will Smith and people like that. These people are very clever and you wouldn't believe how tens of millions of dollars from the Wal-Mart billionaires alone can change the public discourse. And of course, the Olins, Scaifes and so forth are involved with this, even Bill Gates is peripherally involved.
My point is to stress how big money can generate all this talk you hear about privatization of education, charter schools, how our schools are failing and the need for tests and so forth. I am not deeply concerned with this relative to other issues, I'm just using it as an example, and I have been following it lately. I've been more concerned with Wal-Mart and the Walton Family and other businesses very successful campaign to do away with labor laws, or create bad labor laws around the country. They passed a right-to-work-for-less law in Oklahoma a few years ago, mostly by focusing on the massive evangelical churches in Oklahoma and preying on job and unemployment fears, the law passes something like 50.1% to 49.9% on a referendum. They're pushing these laws all over the country - they're even trying in Pennsylvania which is scary, because one thinks of Pennyslvania as a union state. Anyhow big money combined with a public which is more apt to be accepting Jesus as their personal savior in evangelical churches then seeking rank-and-file run militant labor unions can lead to all sorts of wacky laws passing.
Which is why the attitude on Slashdot about global warming scares me. Admittedly I am not an expert on chemical reactions with fossil fuels. I only have seen this show before: some group with no axe to grind and is objective as one can be says there is a problem (tobacco causes cancer, whatever...). Big corporations hire lawyers, PR firms, their own "experts" blah blah blah attacking this effort. Soon they're putting commercials on TV, catch phrases and so forth. Soon I hear the same thing coming out of people's mouths at lunchtime, they're complaining about trial lawyers or so
no matter what the scientific endeavor, there's always some cataclysmic disaster looming on the horizon
It's funny that when scientists warn of impending disasters, they get ridiculed and their motives questioned. But when politicians cook up another external threat as an excuse to spend trillions and send young men to die in a faraway country, the people eat it up.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Here is the Petagon Climate Report) which was leaked through The Observer.
An interview whith one of its athors (Doug Randall) is here.
The BBC has some reactions from scientists on it.
-- Qu'est-ce que la propriété intellectuelle? It is thought control.
The big concern, Kyoto-wise, is China. A nation long famous for its citizens using bicycles, China's economic growth is expected to bring with it a rise in fossil-fuel-burning industrial factories... and automobile usage.
It's just kind of odd that a nation with a billion-plus population poised to become an industrial juggernaut gets a free pass on Kyoto.
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
"For example, if it is GLOBAL warming, why only study Europe?"
Because there are lots of records in europe. Perhaps you'd care to ask the Apache or Sioux for their weather records for 1504? And I doubt you'd get much better data from africa, australia, or asia (except maybe china & japan).
way to go USA, even Russia has a higher priority on clima protection than you.
For those of you that found the parent to be insightful, please go read a newspaper, and get an education. Russias ratification of Kyoto had nothing to do with them trying to be good shepherds of the environment, and everything to do with money, and their admittance to the WTO.
Just another day in Paradise
You further rub salt in the wounds by claiming that that scientists are doing this because they can't get funding for "everything's fine, situation normal" reports. Of course, this is balderdash anyway: the oil industry does fund such reports, and presumably the Bush administration would also rather see such things.
To me, accusing the scientists working in this area of being greed-driven liars most certainly is accusing them of "foul play".
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
i) The models are right.
ii) The models are wrong, but scientists don't know it. They predict global warming, but due to omissions in the theory, this won't actually occur. The scientist believe the results, because they're the best we've got.
iii) The models are wrong, the scientists do know it, but they're not telling anyone because they'd all have to get proper jobs.
I put it to you that either (i) or (ii) happen to be the case, but that only (iii) is consistent with the assertion
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
This was published in Nature, which is one of the two most prestigious science journals (the other one is Science). It is based on climate models that predict that the probability of heat waves like that of 2003 has doubled due to greenhouse gas emissions. (According to the same models, by 2050 about 50% of European summers are going to be like the 2003 or worse.)
If we suppose the probabilities from the models are correct, the attribution of part of blame to greenhouse gases is correct, just like one can claim some lung cancers are caused by tobacco.
I have already seen speculation about the possible use of the results in courts against the polluters.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Many environmental scientists have suggested that global warming will actually make Norway colder. This is because Norway is relatively warm considering its latitude due to the Gulf Stream. If the world warms up, the gulf stream disappears (or shifts), and Norway gets colder.
Thats the theory anyway...
Also, Norwegain cottages are at a premium due to hytte culture- so dont expect any bargains there!!
...astroturfers are hired to log onto Slashdot to change our opinion.
Some people get paid to post here? I gotta get me some of that!
Have you read the article?
Probably not, because you need a (rather expensive) subscription to Nature to read the full article. I am able to read the article from here, so I can comment on your "analysis".
The findings are basically a statistical analysis of the probability of a summer like the one in 2003 to occur in different scenario's. It was concluded that there is a >90% confidence level that human influence has at least doubled the risk of a heatwave of this magnitude. Chances of rising global temperatures in the future were also investigated, as is mentioned in the abstract. Simulations and measurements were utilized that run from 1900 to 2100.I get sick and tired of people that tell me to draw my own conclusions, pointing from one media-hyped article to the next. If you want to draw your own conclusions, do your own research. I can give you this prediction, though: that your model will also give human-induced global warming as a fact, because they virtually all do
Furthermore, if you're talking about mediahypes, please don't pay attention to isolated scientists that storm in and bring atmosphere-devastating vulcanoes to the stage, or give very pretty graphs of relations of solar flares to rising temperatures. I could probably find a correlation with shoe sales in India as well! It doesn't mean there is a causal connection. Most of these people really have nothing to lose, and love the attention!
Not that I think this will convince anyone. It's much more fun if everybody just sticks to his own viewpoints and then we can have a nice discussion/flamewar about it. It's a lot easier that actually doing something about it.
I read about a psychology experiment at a university. The subjects were asked to wait in a small anteroom outside the room where the experiment proper was taking place. The anteroom was equipped with a few ordinary-looking chairs, lights and pictures on the walls. Unbeknown to the subjects, the anteroom was also equipped with video cameras -- and the experimenter had a console which allowed pictures to be knocked down, chairs to collapse and light bulbs to blow at the flick of a switch. {Also plenty of spares so the anteroom didn't look too much like a war zone!} The experiment consisted of observing the subject in the anteroom, operating a self-destruct button at an appropriate time {e.g. bringing down a picture when the subject approached it} -- and then calling the subject into the room for debriefing. Most of the subjects ended up blaming themselves for the damage.
There is also the case of a DJ on a radio station in the Midlands who was playing a rather old, worn record one day, and the needle skipped. Several listeners rang in to apologise for jostling their sets and causing the record to skip!
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Also note that the year 2003 had one of the highest amounts of sun spot activity in recent history. High sun spot activity has significant effects on the global climate. As the end of this article says, "There's more to global climate change than just carbon dioxide."
Love sees no species.
What's even more staggering are some of the Slashdot users who obviously have little-to-no clue but pretend to know everything. These people give off knee-jerk reactions without even reading the article once. No evidence or even logic is needed, scientific reports must be wrong here.
One of the funniest replies I've read in this thread claimed that researchers cannot get funding unless they shout "Doomsday is coming". Not even the most imaginary hypothetical example is cited - the report is simply made up by some liberal asshole. And that's even modded insightful. And then for each and every such knee-jerk reactions you get another opposite knee-jerk that Bush and co. are to blame for global warming.
Reading Slashdot on such topics makes you think the world is really only divided into two kinds of persons - the coporate man/politicians and the crazy gaians. Every scientist has a conspiracy in mind, every environmental research is biased and meaningless. If someone is thinking about starting a business I'd suggest selling tinfoil hats here, the Slashdot crowd simply cannot resist it.
You obviously have much greater insight and wisdom than these scientists. Never mind that you don't even seem to know the difference between weather and climate. You'll go on with your head firmly planted in the sand so you can rest easy in your comfortable ideology bubble.
"The sky isnt falling people.Move along,nothing to see here.More of the same crap that goes on year after year,nothing new here.Feel free to continue life as it was and bring back regular gasoline."
Self delusion can be comforting. It's much easier to deny hard realities than to face them and work toward resolving them. Yes, it's very hard. You may continue sleeping if you wish. Those mean old tree-hugging hippies only lurk in your dreams and fantasies, though. The rest of us are responsible citizens who want a stable world for our children and grandchildren to inhabit.
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
It's an important and clever study. One big question on the observational side of climate change studies is how much the direct observation of warming is due to local rather than global heating. Thermometers tend to be clustered near where people are, and there are local heating effects around cities that, while pretty trivial on a global scale, might be showing up.
The cited paper addresses this question and shows that this bias in the estimate is small. It does this by showing very similar trends in nighttime temperature on windy days as on calm days, though (for compelling and obvious reasons) the local heating effect is (and can be shown to be) much larger on calm days.
The strident denial camp, (many of them paid in the style of 'tobacco scientists') of course, loves the "urban heat island" hypothesis and often parades it around so as to deny one part of the science.
This paper goes a long way toward demolishing that argument. That's one reason why it's very important. The linked breathless journalism article is pretty unclear about that, unfortunately.
This work is also interesting as a lovely demonstration of how science works. I'd teach this one in high school science if I were teaching high school science.
mt