Global Warming Past The Point of No Return

mad_goldfish writes "The UK's Independent is running a front page story today on a scientific report claiming that global warming is now unstoppable, after measuring changes in the level of ice in the arctic." From the article: "The greatest fear is that the Arctic has reached a 'tipping point' beyond which nothing can reverse the continual loss of sea ice and with it the massive land glaciers of Greenland, which will raise sea levels dramatically. Satellites monitoring the Arctic have found that the extent of the sea ice this August has reached its lowest monthly point on record, dipping an unprecedented 18.2 per cent below the long-term average." Either way, someone wins a bet.

Comments

Doom and Gloom

[AKAImBatman]

[drab]Oh. no. The. world. is. going. to. end. (Waves little white flag in an uninspired fashion.) Everything. is. going. to. die. God. save. us. all.[/drab]

Seriously, we've had the technology to detect global climate changes for what, a hundred years at most? Of that, we've had useful tools (such as satellites) for less than 50 years. I hate to say it, but the earth has gone through a variety of climate changes in its history, and it will continue to go through plenty of climate changes regardless of whether we eject terawatts of thermal energy into the atmosphere or not. (Putting aside the fact that a forest fire or volcano is a hell of a lot more energy than humans normally put out.) The fact of the matter is that we've been living cushy with our modern technology in our idea of what the climate should be like. We haven't considered that major climate shifts could be possible, and thus have done nothing to adapt our technology to the variety of conditions that may be faced in the centuries ahead.

But that's okay. On the grand scale of things, we're pretty new to this whole technology thing. Not even the Romans managed power production, even though they invented the tech early on. (See: Aeolipile) The climate will change, and we'll adapt. No "fall of civilization" as Hollywood predicts every other day, or massive Slipstreams that make airplanes the only viable tech. Life will continue on, and we'll adapt. Okay? :-)

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Gulthek]

You know about ice core sampling? Hundreds of thousands of years of accurate temperatures. Neat huh?

But we are actually still coming out of the last ice age, so we may just be egotistical to think that we have an effect on the planet's climate.

Did you know that it's an oddity in the Earth's history that we have ice at *both* poles?

Of course up until recently the Earth's climate was wildly variable, pretty damn close to chaotic. We have no idea what could have been changing Earth's temperature as rapidly as the ice samples indicate.

So we may, as a species, be in for a bumpy ride in the next few thousand years or so.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Red Flayer]

"Seriously, we've had the technology to detect global climate changes for what, a hundred years at most?"

[snide]Yes, but we have discovered amazing technology that allows us to see into the past![/snide]. We have examined records of climate change that span hundreds of thousands, even millions, of years.

"Life will continue on, and we'll adapt. Okay? :-) "

Sure, we'll adapt, since we don't require genetic change to make different climates livable. What about all the species that do? What about our food supply? How much suffering will be endured by less rich nations while we race to adapt our agritech?

Maybe we differ in points of view, but as I see it, it's not just about us. Don't we have the responsibility to minimize our impact on other people and other species?

Re:Doom and Gloom

[srock2588]

Erik the Red started a colony in Greenland back in the AD 900's. http://www.greenland-guide.gl/leif2000/history.htm According to archealogical records, at time the colony was warm enough to grow crops and support a decent little town. Now, all ice. The region went through an extremely warm spell for a hundred years or so then froze up again. I wonder what the glacier levels where then? I guess we will never know.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Alex P Keaton in da]

As much as $3 a gallon gas has changed my habits, I guess it is good because it makes other, more environmentally friendly alternatives, an alternative price wise.
Here is my opinion on the global warming thing. I think it is Hubris for humans to think that we can destroy the Earth. We certainly can make it uninhabitable for certain flora and fauna, including Humans, but we can't destroy it. Humans weren't the first species, and we likely won't be here when the Sun finally goes out. If we screw the Earth up bad enough, she will just spin us off, and other species will take over.
Maybe we will be able to keep ourselves going until we can develop ways to populate other planets- but it will require a concerted effort.
Like anything however, we (humans) usually need something really big to get our asses in gear. We are reactive, not proactive. So unless there is some giant event like the atmosphere suddenly disappearing, things aren't likely to change. Although I am holding out some glimmer of hope that we (humans) will decide to be better stewards of our land.
If you are a hard core scientist, then on an intellectual level you must want to help our Earth.
Whether you belive in creationism or God- you would think that serving God requires us to take care of what God blessed us with.
Whether Humans cause Global Climate Change or not, we need to take better care of our Earth. There is an old saying- you don't shit where you sleep....

Re:Doom and Gloom

[mikkom]

So we may, as a species, be in for a bumpy ride in the next few thousand years or so.

From the article:

Current computer models suggest that the Arctic will be entirely ice-free during summer by the year 2070 but some scientists now believe that even this dire prediction may be over-optimistic, said Professor Peter Wadhams, an Arctic ice specialist at Cambridge University.

Yes indeed.. This is not something I'm looking forward to.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[harlows_monkeys]

I hate to say it, but the earth has gone through a variety of climate changes in its history, and it will continue to go through plenty of climate changes regardless of whether we eject terawatts of thermal energy into the atmosphere or not

The same argument could be made about the economy and interest rates. By your reasoning, a 0.5% rise in interest rates should have no serious effect on the economy, because that is smaller than the normal range of interest rate variation.

Similarly, by your reasoning, a small permanent rise in the birth rate would not have much effect on population, if the birth rate has a normal variation higher than the small permanent rise.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Saint Aardvark]

I'm not so sure. First off: yes, Earth will continue. We're not essential to the planet at all.

There may be debate over the source of this warming (and from what I've read, I'm bending over backwards to be fair), but the evidence seems pretty clear that it is happening. What worries me is how fragile our current societies will prove to be in the face of big, (relatively) sudden changes like the ones described here. You hit the nail on the head:

The fact of the matter is that we've been living cushy with our modern technology in our idea of what the climate should be like. We haven't considered that major climate shifts could be possible, and thus have done nothing to adapt our technology to the variety of conditions that may be faced in the centuries ahead.

In the long run Earth will be fine; in the long run, Homo Sapiens may be fine too. But in the short run, I think there are going to be some mighty big jolts and pains as we adapt to a warming planet. You'll only be able to summarize it as "the climate changed, and we adapted" many, many centuries after the fact, when it's easy to be blase because it all happened so long ago.

Right now we're far too used to easy, cheap, polluting fossil fuel energy sources to just switch on a dime. You simply can't make 6 - 10 billion people (allowing for pop. growth) turn around and start using solar cells or hydrogen or whatever. That goes double for people like us (yes, I'm in there as well) who've gotten damned used to cheap energy, and triple for those in the developing world who are looking enviously at us and wondering why the hell they shouldn't get a piece of the pie as well.

If it's this bad now, it's going to get a lot worse. By the looks of things, it's going to get a lot worse pretty damned soon. And I do not believe that our societies are resilient enough to just absorb this w/o problems. We'll adapt, but it'll take a few hundred years, and it is not going to be fun in the meantime.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[tpgp]

regardless of whether we eject terawatts of thermal energy into the atmosphere or not.

Our thermal energy output is not the problem (for now). It is our output of C02 and other gases. These change earth's atmosphere, adding to earth's overall thermal energy retention.

But of course, I could just ignore global scientific consensus and listen to some random slashdotter who obviously has no clue about what the problem actually is instead.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Guysmiley777]

Sweet! If we're past the point of no return, there is no sense worrying about it now!

Repeal the Kyoto Treaty and fire up the coal power plants. If we're all going to die, it mine as well be full speed ahead!

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Etcetera]

You're thinking of the Orontius Finaeus Map of Antarctica from the 1500's.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Bastian]

Quite honestly, it's the fact that we aren't quite sure that scares me the most.

Maybe everything will be hunky-dory in 100 years and there was no need to worry. But the cost of making that assumption and being wrong is so ridiculously high compsared to the cost of assuming the worst and taking massive preventative steps, that as far as I can tell, the only sane reaction to this issue is to err on the side of extreme caution.

The whole @$#@%^ planet is something we should not be playign cavalier with.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[AKAImBatman]

[snide]Yes, but we have discovered amazing technology that allows us to see into the past![/snide]. We have examined records of climate change that span hundreds of thousands, even millions, of years.

No need to be snide. That was something of my point. We've had the technology to track global climate with precision for about 50-100 years. We've then based our ideas of what the climate should be, based on that. However, the imprecise records we have of historical global climate shifts have showed that the Earth has historically experienced WILD fluctuations in climate. The only hubris is that we think our 100 years of precise weather experience will somehow prevent the climate from wildly shifting again. :-)

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Rei]

Yes, the Earth *has* gone through dramatic climate changes in its history:

Vostok data and others. We also have more recent data from ice, sediment cores which all give the same sort of data: the earth's climate changes wildly naturally, but over many thousands of years.

Two things seriously stand out in all of the data:

1) The earth's temperature *has varied* widely - but over tens of thousands of years. The most pronounced spike was when temperature went from 8 degrees below present 140,000 years ago to 2 degrees above present 125,000 years ago; that's 10 degrees in 15,000 years. We're currently experiencing a change of 0.2 degrees every decade, I.e., thirty times as fast. While there have been shorter spikes that have been steeper, nothing in history even approaches what we're experiencing right now.

2) There is an extreme correlation between CO2 and temperature. There is no doubt about the severity of our CO2 spike, nor its cause. We're injecting at a rapid rate earth's sequestered carbon into the atmosphere, and have 2.5xed atmospheric carbon since the early 1800s. We output about 7.1 billion (of which 3B enters the atmosphere) additional tonnes of carbon per year. The atmosphere currently holds about 750B tonnes (which, as stated previously, is a 2.5x over the early 1800s). While there is hope that marine biota will increase carbon consumption, history has shown that such changes take thousands of years when left unassisted.

regardless of whether we eject terawatts of thermal energy

What on earth does this have to do with global climate change?

A forest fire or volcano is a hell of a lot more energy than humans normally put out

If you want to get back to climate change, their CO2 and methane emissions aren't comparable, except for historic supervolcanoes. At the same time, volcanoes produce overall global cooling because of the aerosols and sulfuric acid particulate (which increases cloud formation).

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Snocone]

There may be debate over the source of this warming (and from what I've read, I'm bending over backwards to be fair), but the evidence seems pretty clear that it is happening. What worries me is how fragile our current societies will prove to be in the face of big, (relatively) sudden changes like the ones described here.

Our society isn't as fragile as during the Medieval Warm Period when the Vikings settled Greenland and birch and willow trees grew there natively and treeline was several hundred feet higher in Iceland than it is now. So current temperatures are not even close to matching those already experienced in historic times, and we did just fine then. (Well, depending on your definition of "we". Some cultures were completely wiped out, some did great, in roughly inverse correspondence to how well they did in the Little Ice Age that followed it and we're still recovering from.)

In any case, give it ten years and this whole global warming debate is going to seem as ludicrously wrongheaded as debates over Lamarckian evolution do today, that's my call. See, I come down pretty solidly on the side of the solar-variability theorists and think the anthropogenic theorists have next to nothing in the way of evidence ... and the solar people predict that we're already on the downward swing to a new minimum which we'll reach around 2032, and it could very well be a *real* deepfreeze which makes the Maunder Minimum look like Maui in a heatwave.

I'd actually prefer the standard media runaway warming view, to be honest, because that I could address nicely for my expected lifespan by just moving to my new Ellesmere Island beachfront property and investing in the new Nunavut wheat fields. If the solar people are actually right like I figure they probably are, though, in a decade it's going to be pretty darn undeniable that the world is indeed getting sharply colder, and the four-five decades after that are going to REALLY. SUCK.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[protolith]

The post was refering to wild climate fluctuations in ice core samples that date to >10,000 years ago, precivilization.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[sockit2me9000]

What ever happened to pragmaticsm? Seriously? Wouldn't you rather be wrong about the fact there is global warming than be wrong about there not being global warming? That's what I don't understand. Look at it from a free-market perspective for christsakes. Markets are all about hedging bets and spotting potential trouble on the horizon and then taking steps to reduce the potential issues. It's called due diligence. We live in a country that has the most incredible technology, ever. We act like we are an enlightened society. And yet we don't do anything except react. True moral leadership comes from seeing problems before they are problems and then fixing them. When a society fails, it comes from the inability to see where policies will lead. If you look at great empires that have crumbled, they fail from the inside out. Easter Island? It failed because no one was smart enough to say "Gee, maybe we should stop cutting trees." Rome? "Gee, maybe we shouldn't over-extend ourselves." Followed by, "Nobody could have expected the Huns to invade." And this keeps going on and on through history. Empires fail due to a confluence of events and policies. And we, as a country, as an idea, continually ignore any sort of cautionary tale. I don't want to sound flip or ironic... I just want people to start realizing that the stuff that is happening right now matters. It matters who we put into office. It matters what kind of car we drive. It matters that we aren't asking the really tough questions. Because the ugly stuff, the talk of what is looming as a very real threat to our entire way of life, is absolutely important.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Kymermosst]

Err, I don't know...maybe the missing ozone layer has something to do with it?

No. Completely wrong. The missing ozone allows UV radiation through, not more heat. Ozone itself is a greenhouse gas and a pollutant.

Note that while ozone is considered a greenhouse gas only in the troposphere, the primary source of tropospheric ozone is stratospheric ozone... which is what the hole is in.

Bottom line is that stratospheric ozone relies on continual production to sustain itself. Certain chemicals (CFCs, for instance) both interfere with production and destroy some existing ozone in the stratosphere. This creates the hole.

Eventually, (surviving) ozone in the stratosphere sinks down into the troposphere, where it becomes a greenhouse gas, and contributes to globabl warming. This process is the biggest contributor to tropospheric ozone.

So, in reality, the ozone destruction is limiting global warming to an extent, though since some CFCs themselves are powerful greenhouse gases, it is not a net reduction.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Obfuscant]

Yes, but we have discovered amazing technology that allows us to see into the past![/snide]. We have examined records of climate change that span hundreds of thousands, even millions, of years.

Sadly, no we haven't, simply because records of climate change do not exist for millions, even thousands of years, into the past.

What we HAVE examined are indirect indicators of climate, such as tree rings and ice core CO2 levels. These are not records of climate change, but only of tree growth and perhaps CO2 levels.

What people forget, because scientists don't bother telling them, is that using such indirect measurements involve a lot of assumptions about conditions at the time and since. For example, one must assume that the CO2 in a core hasn't either accumulated or dispersed due to some unknown process to accept the 'measured CO2' from a current core being the actual value from the time the core was created.

Even the current "direct" measurements from satellites involve assumptions. Fortunately, the validity of these assumptions is testable (we have both the satellite measurements and ground truth data), whereas the validity of an assumption about conditions ten thousands years ago isn't (no ground truth).

So, the summary of the entire article is that many people have already been saying there is "nothing we can do" to stop what is a naturally occuring process that has happened before without us and will happen again after we are gone.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[lgw]

The Vostock ice cores have given us good temperature and CO2 records for the last 400,000 years, and we see an obvious 100,000 year cycle of glaciation punctuated by brief warm spells, like the one we're in now. We're currently in an ice age that started 50,000,000 years ago. So that's two cycles we know about: the 100 ky glaciation cycle, and the ~300 My ice age cycle. Presumably there are temperature cycles in between those times as well.

The biggest driver for the ice age cycle is geological. Rocks erode, removing CO2 from the atmosphere as part of the chemical reaction involved in weathering, and eventually depositing it on the ocean floors. The ocean floors are subducted, and the CO2 eventually spit out by volcanoes again. Nothing humanity can possibly do regarding CO2 levels will even be noticed by this vast slow cycle. The cycle is self-governing, as glaciation reduces the amount of exposed rock, increasing atmospheric CO2 levels and therefore temperature. This correction would presumably take millions of years, however, no so helpful to humanity.

The cycle that's interesting on our time scale is the 100,000 year cycle. Every 100,000 years or so temperatures spike (usually to higher than they are now, by a bit) and CO2 levels spike, then within 1,000 years or so something forces temperatures and CO2 levels back down. We don't know what that mechanism is, but it must be quite powerful. For some reason when temperatures peaked 10,000 years ago, they stayed warm (it's a little too early in mankind's history to give us the credit for that, but the unnatural warm spell almost certainly allowed us to develop civilization outside of the tropics).

What mechanism usually cranks CO2 levels and temperatures down when they spike every 100,000 years? Why didn't it happen 10,000 years ago? When will it eventually kick in? Without knowing the answers to these questions, it's just absurd to announce that global warming is "unstoppable". We have only the most shallow hypotheses about how the cycle works in the first place.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Moofie]

Best to go ahead and kill yourself now. That way, nothing scary and complicated will happen to you.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[TheViffer]

Tell ya what, I miss the days of Global cooling.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Ucklak]

I saw a special on sugar on the History Channel (I think).
Brazil runs 40% of their cars manufactured by Chevrolet and other US manufacturers, 100% off Ethanol from cane sugar.
They pay 2.5 a gallon for gas vs 1.1 a gallon for Ethanol

Ethanol from cane is a waste neutral energy source. Basically the exhaust from your car is the same as the gasses a decomposing sugar cane plant gives off
The only caveat is that 100% Ethanol requires a hotter engine to combust so they have a 1 gallon gasoline tank to start the car for the winter months. They call it Flex Fuel.

Why the hell don't we have this here?

Re:Doom and Gloom

[stlhawkeye]

If the temperature rises by 6 degrees by 2050, as is expected under the Kyoto Treaty,

That is not what is expected. The temperature is expected to increase by 1.4 to 5.8 degrees by 2100, not 2050. I note that you round up the top end of the range and then reduce the timeline by 50 years. Further, the Kyoto protocol is expected to REDUCE this increase by 0.02C to 0.28C by 2050. Not reduce _TO_, but reduce _BY_. So we're going to shave a quarter of a degree off, and at what expense? That's assuming that our theories on what is causing global warming pan out in the first place.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[dpilot]

You may well be correct to say it's absurd to call it "unstoppable." But lacking evidence or better models, any statements are absurd. Perhaps/probably all of our activities are a pimple on the 300My cycle, I won't deny that. I'd be more curious to know how our activities are compared to the 100ky cycle which, as you say, we don't understand.

But the phrase comes to mind, "Unusually sensitive to initial conditions." Assuming, and this may be a big assumption, that there are chaotic elements at work here, our activities may be sufficient to drive climate cycles in a slightly different direction. For better or worse, or are we insignificant, who knows?

Would this really be ANY sort of issue at all if it weren't so darned profitable for some people that we emit a bunch of greenhouse gases?

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Rei]

100,000 year cycle of glaciation

Apparently I missed 10,000 years between the start of the industrial revolution and now, when we've experienced the degree of CO2 increase and temperature rise. ;)

Are you trying to claim that the rates are comparable? If not, then what kind of argument are you trying to make? "The earth has changed before, so 30x-ing the rate won't make a difference"? :)

within a thousand years

I think you need to look at those graphs again. Historically, temperature changes relatively little over a thousand years, except in modern times.

eventually spit out by volcanoes again

Human CO2 emissions far outpace volcanic emissions. We mine Earth's carbon resevoirs at a tremendous rate - burning about 6 gigatonnes (6e12 kg) (plus an additional GT from displaced carbon sinks) annually. To put that number in perspective, if the carbon sources that we burn annually averaged the density of water, they would fill a cube 1.8 kilometers on each side.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[AKAImBatman]

Well, if there was no need to be snide, then there there was no need in the OP to be drab.

Gosh, nobody can ever be funny around here. Do Slashdotters ever get out of their houses and lighted up? (Never mind. Forget I asked that.)

Our actions do have an impact, which I believe should be minimized.

Are we absolutely certain that we want to minimize our changes on the environment? I certainly agree that we want to make the environment as suitable for life as possible, but I'm not so keen on the idea of letting nature take its course. Nature is a rather violent thing that tends to destroy and remake on a regular basis. Even without our interference, nature is guaranteed to revolve through extinction and speciation cycles.

The difference between man and nature is that man attempts to control these cycles for his own benefit, and hopefully to the benefit of other life as well. Sure, we got a bit carried away with our technological prowess toward the turn of the 20th century, but by the end of the century we were more sensitive to the life around us. I believe that's a good thing.

But the solution to the Earth's violent and chaotic changes is not to stop meddling and hope it all corrects itself (because it won't, history can prove that), the solution is to change the world around us for the purpose of securing life for ourselves, and plants and animals around us.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[ScentCone]

Would this really be ANY sort of issue at all if it weren't so darned profitable for some people that we emit a bunch of greenhouse gases?

When you say "some people," you mean, of course "pretty much everyone that's currently alive." Right?

Because everything from refrigeration of antibiotics to high-yield/acre farming and the treatment of potable water involves energy consumption. More nukes, etc., would certainly be a good (and less hazy) thing, so I'm all for that and whatever other little nudges we can make here and there with solar, etc. But to suggest that the only beneficiaries (thus, those that profit) of our energy use are the people that extract/sell it... well, that's completely ignorning the benefits/profits of every family, farmer, business, etc. that uses energy as part of their daily lives.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[orzetto]

The name "Greenland" was pretty much an early form of advertising by Eirik Raude, to attract settlers. During the summer, you can still find green spots here and there on the West coast.

Mind you, the place Eirik was coming from was called Iceland, and it lies in the middle of the Gulf stream.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Wyatt Earp]

"There is an extreme correlation between CO2 and temperature. There is no doubt about the severity of our CO2 spike, nor its cause."

CO2 is going up at the same time the Climate changes. That DOES NOT mean that CO2 is causing the Climate change.

In 998 when the Vikings go a Vik'ing over to Greenland, the planet is warmer by many accounts...

"In the 960s Erik the Red, a fiery Norwegian, was exiled from his home in Norway. He went to Iceland, where he married Thjodhildur. He was later banished from there for three years. Erik headed west and discovered a land with an inviting fjord landscape and fertile, green valleys. He was greatly impressed by the land's resources, and he returned to Iceland and spoke about this land, which he called "the green land"'.

Greenland is an ag region in some parts. Now, we have an extreme correlation between Vikings and tempertature. All the models of the time take this into account, so that when the Vikings decline in the 1200s and the global temprature goes back down and Greenland ices over and Iceland gets more icy, the extreme correlation between Vikings and Global Climate is proven.

So today, since CO2 is entering the atmo and the temp is going up a bit, all our models focus on that. It's bad science pure and simple. It's worse science because anyone who looks at other data, like the increased output of the Sun, they are pointed at and called Heretic!

For a "science" the study of Global Climate change is far, far too editorialized in scientific journals, look at how Lomborg was treated in regards to the Skeptical Environmentalist

Re:Doom and Gloom

[AKAImBatman]

BZZT! Wrong Answer!

The correct answer is, "Ethanol has traditionally been more expensive than crude oil. However, with gas pricing rising, Ethanol blends have helped keep prices of gasoline down. Now the only issue remaining is to find a good method for phasing out gasoline rather than a direct cut over to Ethanol.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[clem9796]

Sources, monetary and otherwise for conflicting studies...

Greenpeace: Global warming is in effect
OPEC: Global warming doesn't exist
PETA: Global warming is in effect
George Bush: Global warming doesn't exist
Kyoto Accord: Global warming is in effect...

There are many sources of studies and they definitively create two sides of the fence. I grew up in Estevan, SK and there are two coal fired plants within a ten minute drive of one another. Estevan has increased levels of skin cancer, and lung problems, lots of external issues like eyes and asthma and a perma haze over a town of 11,000 people. Not ot mention if you look out to the east of the city (Hwy 39) on google maps you'll see the wonderful spill piles from years of careless strip mining. While the results are in fact cloudy, you can't change the fact that what we're doing to the environment is having an effect in some way.

Mother nature is way more powerful than a lot of people realize (see: trying to control a hurricane). I agree that Earth will continue on it's merry way wether we manage to kill ourselves or not in the process of stripping it bare and filling the sky with garbage.

It'll all work out in the end, we only notice and care because we're the only ones aware enough to see the problems we're creating.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Catbeller]

In other words, when you find yourself trapped in a burning building, it's not wise pump a barrel of gasoline into the flames.

We may be in a warmer cycle, but it is a firm fact that we've pumped up the methane, CO2 and CO in the atmosphere. We are pumping a tanker of gasoline onto a raging inferno.

No matter the overall climatic changes, OUR activites have made it much worse and much faster. Ice is melting everywhere. Glaciers are going, Siberia is melting, releasing methane in a vicious cycle, villages in Alaska are disappearing in the meltoff of the land, we're getting four times the normal number of hurricanes in a year -- and they are stronger, for the waters are warmer than they have been in centuries. The Northwest Passage over the arctic ocean is opening up as the ice floes melt.

It's real. The only choice we have, in the short run, is whether we wish to mitigate the changes by cutting down greenhouse gases -- immediately. We wait, there'll be new oceanfront property really soon.

Of course, the same industrial and financial firms who wished to maintain their status quo by resisting change and financing PR fake science will shift gears in the new warm world and find massive profit in the meltdown. It's all the same to them.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[bombadillo]

I always heard the same thing about the name being a marketing ploy. Looks like you are spot on about the west coast. Wikipedia of Greenland

Re:Doom and Gloom

[WindBourne]

Actually, scientists routinely tell exactly what is assumed and what is not. What happens is that others will read more into what is being said and distort it. For a good example, one of my past students told me that he did not believe in carbon dating. When I asked him why, he told me about a radio show that featured Focus on the Family. The gist of it was that they tested a pocket knife blade and found that the age indicated it was only 200 year old metal. Of course, it is well known that carbon dating can only involve once-living material. So these ppl will go to great lengths to lie about nothing.

What does this mean about your statement? All the scientists will tell you that base assumptions are made. Few are questioned, because they appear to be reasonable. More importantly, there is a very strong correlation between all the various approaches such as ice core and tree rings. If assumptions were incorrect, or the approach was wrong, we should expect to see major differences, but there is not (some minor, but that is expected due to local variability).

Re:Doom and Gloom

[ecki]

I think it is Hubris for humans to think that we can destroy the Earth

Indeed

Re:Doom and Gloom

[jadavis]

I think this goes back to that "bad science reporting" article a little while ago.

Computer models need assumptions. What assumptions are used to model the loss of artic ice by 2070? A computer isn't magically smarter than people, it just calculates using the numbers a human gives it.

I'll give an example: Let's say it's 60 degrees F when you wake up, and 75 degrees F by 2pm. A computer model might say that we're all going to be cooked in a week.

A computer is not a scientific source to be cited in a news article. The alternative, however, is a little bit less exciting to print. What they really mean to say is that "If assumptions X, Y, and Z remain true, then [horrible thing] will happen by [really soon].".

Not only that, but "some scientists now believe"?! Of course "some scientists" will believe almost anything. You can find scientists that think the Earth is 5000 years old. What matters is a consensus among reputable, peer-reviewed scientists.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[lgw]

Here's one chart of the Vostock data, here's another in a weird movie format that you have to scroll around in, but has some additional data. The commentary on the first page may be BS for all I know, but the charts are good. You've probably seen all this, but many slashotters haven't.

You can see the 100,000 year cycles clearly. Temperatures spike from -8 or -9 degrees (C) below present to 2 or 3 degrees above present in about 5000 years, then almost immediately reverse, dropping about 5 degrees over the next 10,000 years, then cool off slowly over the remainder of the 100,000 year (give or take) cycle.

About 15,000 years ago temps spiked as normal, reaching today's temps about 10,000 years ago but *didn't* dive as would be expected. Humans started messing with the climate significantly only in the past 200 years, but something unprecedented in the 400,000 years of good data we have happened 10,000 years ago - we should have been back to the norm for the Current Ice Age by now. What happened? During the previous cycle CO2 levels stayed at the ~275ppm level for 10,00 years but temperatures dropped nearly 10 degrees during that time anyway - why?

Yes, indeed, as I said repeatedly, the volcanic cycle is far slower than the timescale we care about. But CO2 level changes driven by the big geological cycle dominate the geological data. There have been geological periods when CO2 levels were 6-7 times as high as they are now (we think), but temperatures were about the same. Why? We really know very little about the factors that govern the climate.

What we *do* know is that it's a historical anomaly during the past 50,000,000 years for temperatures to be this warm for even 1,000 years at a stretch - the climate simply isn't naturally stable.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[mickwd]

"I think it is Hubris for humans to think that we can destroy the Earth."

I think it is Hubris for humans to think what we can't.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[AKAImBatman]

I disagree. The solution is to mediate the impact we've had as best we can, and then try to minimize our current and future impact. We should not be in the business of preserving life as we know it; we should be preserving the ability of life to 'choose it's own destiny', for lack of a better term.

I disagree with your disagreement. I hope we don't disagree on tha? :-P

The problem with mediating the impact is that it's an "us or them" situation. Your choices for mediation are:

1. Stop using technology. Since humans are ill-suited as anything but tool users, the animal kingdom will "choose its own destiny" and wipe us out. If they don't get us, disease and sudden climate changes will.

2. Continue to use technology, but mitigate the effects through defensive planning. We won't catch everything (as with Katrina), but the survivability of the human race (as well as whatever plants and animals we bring under our protection) will be statistically far higher.

I'm afraid that the laws of physics say that there can't be a middle. We use energy on a daily basis. That energy usage rejects massive amounts of thermal waste heat into our environment. We also rely on inexpensive chemical processes. That requires that we also reject large amounts of "burned" chemicals like CO2 and water into the atmosphere. Since the energy for powering our infrastructure *must* come from somewhere, we're on a losing path to think that we can develop miracle solutions that will somehow make the problems go away.

Slightly on a tangent, but relevant -- the rebuilding of New Orleans. I believe we have a unique opportunity to let the Mississipi delta reclaim some if its natural state. I believe resources directed to rebuilding should instead be directed to relocating to an area with a lesser impact.

I agree with you from a practical standpoint. The amount of engineering that's required for moving rivers is astounding. Unfortunately, New Orleans has a rich history on its current land. I don't think you're likely to get people to move. Thus the only pragmatic thing to do is learn from the tragedy and build new levees where weaknesses were found in the infrastructure.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Rei]

I see no conclusion that suggests humans are responsible for the warming

From the third TAR (the most recent that they have published on their site)'s summary:

"Human activities have increased the atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gasses and areosols since the pre-industrial era" (goes on to discuss how)

"There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities." (goes on to discuss why)

etc. Did you even read the TAR?

A quick Google Scholars search

Ok, lets look at the first page:

Pro global warming by human causes: 10
Anti-global warming by human causes: 0

Perhaps that page was a fluke. Lets look at the second.

Pro global warming by human causes: 10*
Anti-global warming by human causes: 0*

* - Two papers make the argument that global warming is more due to gasses like methane and CFCs, and thus will be easier to control; one of them argues further that while the models show clearly that global warming will continue, people shouldn't take dire actions because of the uncertainty of rates in the predictive models.

One more page? 10:0

While several of the covered papers in the search are somewhat tangential (for example, the effects of global warming on forests or birds), you're going to have to do better than that.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[OwnedByTwoCats]

Humanity cannot destry earth, as in the 8,000 mile sphere of iron and rock.

Humanity is also very unlikely to eradicate life on earth. There's too much, and life is too clever.

We do stand a good chance of affecting global climate in such a way that the trillions of dollars in investments we've made in food production suddenly becomes inappropriate because the climate changes over years-to-decades. And then hundreds of millions to billions of people starve or dehydrate or die in migration to places where there are food and water and people consuming that food and water who don't want no foreigners crossing the border.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Rei]

In 998 when the Vikings go a Vik'ing over to Greenland, the planet is warmer by many accounts...

Nope.

*Greenland* was warmer. But we're talking about *global warming*. The Sahara, by contrast, used to be cooler and less dry than it is today.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Karhgath]

That was exactly my point. The administration never directly said that Saddam was responsible, but people spun that for their own propaganda. Maybe only a small % of people were affected by the propaganda, but activists from both side spun the issues. Same with Ozone and GW.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[OwnedByTwoCats]

This post is one of the most insulting posts I've seen in ages.

It seems to assert that the people who make computer models are too stupid to avoid linear extrapolations from cyclic data.

You can't have a consensus among reputable, peer-reviewed scientists when discussing new results.

Yes, the article reports a prediction of an ice-free arctic (at the end of summer) in 65 years. That's the result of a model. But the article also reports that the September ice coverage of the arctic was at a record low in September 2004, which followed a record low in September 2003, which followed a record low in September 2002. Ice coverage at the end of August, 2005 is 1/6th lower (2.0 million square miles vs. 2.4 million square miles) than it has averaged since we've had satellites watching. And that the more of the arctic ocean that is ice free, the more of the ice melts.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[ZeeExSixAre]

we're getting four times the normal number of hurricanes in a year -- and they are stronger, for the waters are warmer than they have been in centuries.

You need to check your numbers because you're very, very wrong:

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastdec.shtml

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Golias]

In an August 2002 Gallup survey, 86% said they think "Saddam Hussein is involved in supporting terrorist groups that have plans to attack the United States."

The statement used in that poll:

1. Does not mention 9/11

2. Is known to have been completely true.

Therefore, you are merely echoing the same mistake I was railing against: that people must think Saddam was behind 9/11 because some poll says that people believe he supported anti-US terrorism.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[ultima]

Your argument is flawed in that you neglect to mention that computer-driven models can generate hypothesis that can be *tested*, both retrospectively, and in the future.

In your example, you'll know the computer model is wrong if in a week you are still alive. On the other hand, if the model can make accurate predictions about historical data, without being based on that data, then you have evidence to the model's accuracy. For example, use a machine learning technique to train a system to predict a 1-year climate trend using data from 1900-1990. Then, see if the system can accurately predict trends from 1990-2005. If so, there's no evidence that it would be wrong when predicting a trend from 2005-2015, when trained from 1990-2005. Other similar tests might include training on even-numbered years, and then predicting climate for odd-numbered years, or training on non-leap years, and predicting for leap years.

When you have sufficient data, you can use rigorous statistical methods to say with a known confidence how accurate your methods are likely to be in making predictions (and I'm not just talking about accuracy and recall; you can validate a hypothesis much more rigorously). You can then make rational, scientific statements.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[Golias]

The thing that people forget is that "slow down a little" also has a cost.

This is not a matter of greed. Macro-economics is about survival. When economic times are bad, rich people get by fine, but poor people suffer and die.

Restricting the use of oil raises the cost of both energy and transportation, which means that those people who could just barely afford to eat, heat their homes, ride the train to work, etc., will suddenly be able to almost afford to eat, heat their homes, ride the train to work, etc.

So we should only damage the economy in the fight against global warming after several important assumptions have been demonstrated to be correct:

1. Global warming is happening and will continue.
2. Changing our behavior can prevent it.
3. Allowing it to continue will result in greater harm than the measures it will take to prevent it.

Some people are still arguing over points 1 and 2, and nobody I've seen has made a convincing case for point 3.

In fact, it could well be that we will all be far better off in the long run if the global climate rises four or five degrees. Most of the land in the world lies outside the tropics, where warmer temperatures means more productive agriculture and less need for heating fuel.

Yes, our behavior is impacting nature, but that is as it should be. As a species, we have always been better at adapting our environment to ourselves than ourselves to the environment. We can't grow thick hides so we farm for cotton. We can't run down enough antelope to keep us fed so we raise cattle. We can't communicate across vast distances by howling, so we run copper wire all over the place. This is simply part of what we are.

So while I agree that there is cause for concern, it would be simply reckless for us to negatively impact the lives of people today without first making a very solid case that the way we are currently changing our environment will ultimately do us harm, and that the cure is not worse than the disease.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[mengel]

According to USGS in Hawaii

Kilauea volcano emits more than 700,000 tons of CO2 each year, less than 0.01% of the yearly global contribution by human sources. For some local perspective, this is about the same amount of CO2 as is emitted by 132,000 sport utility vehicles (there are 118,000 registered vehicles on the island).

So that means for the island of Kilauea, Hawaii, USA, which I suspect has one of the highest volcano:human CO2 ratios, it's almost even. That is to say, humans on Kilauea are putting out approxomately as much C02 (just from their cars) as volcanos are.

According to US DOE EIA

U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2003 were ... 6,115.2 million metric tons carbon dioxide equivalent...

So that's 6 billion metric tons of C02. There are about 1,500 active volcanos in the world, so if Kilauea is representative at 700,000 tons of C02, that makes about 1 Billion metric tons of C02 from volcanos.

So that makes the volcanos:USA ratio about 1:6.

Does that help clarify?

Re:Doom and Gloom

[dpilot]

Couple of points...

I'll lump you in with others, perhaps unfairly, who seem to think that any attempt at conservation will DESTROY OUR ECONOMY, and therefore must be avoided until absolute evidence is found otherwise. Funny thing, it seems to me that energy is an *expense*, and perhaps in other less car-happy societies, it's a good idea to reduce expenses. I've done what I can do insulate and seal my house, or instance. When I buy a car, I take mileage into account. I buy incandescent lights, but that's because my wife doesn't like the color balance of the compact fluorescents. I drive to work, because I'm too far to bike, alone because I usually need time flexibility.

There are *many* things that can be done to reduce energy usage without compromising lifestyle.
There are more things that can be done without serious impacts to lifestyle.
Yet as a nation we practically refuse to do anything at all - perhaps because the terrorists will WIN if we do. (unfair remark, I admit) One thing from the past that really FROSTED me was when Reagan cut $5e7 from the budget to help people insulate their homes, to save money, then ran up gigantic defense deficits. The $5e7 wasn't even a pimple on the deficit, and would have done some serious good.

If our economy can't tolerate efforts to consume energy wisely, then something's wrong. In that case, we ought to be fixing it.

Re:Doom and Gloom

[BKX]

Do you not believe these mechanisms are self-limiting and have feedback loops?

That's the problem. What is projected is that the feedback loop has flipped to positive feedback meltdown mode. When the icecap starts melting, it becomes less of a heatsink (simply because there isn't as much cold mass) and, as such, cannot sink as much energy. However, the amount of energy it needs to sink isn't going down. It's going up due to greenhouse gases or, at a minimum, staying the same. When the icecaps sink heat they warm up and partially melt. Having a smaller heatsinking capacity means that more ice will melt. Less ice equals less heatsink capacity. But we still need to sink the same energy so even more ice is melted.

Once this tipping point hits, the icecaps go into a feedback loop causing them to melt completely. After they melt, the Earth eventually recools (since it's oceans are cooled by the melted icecap). Unfortunately, the icecaps will be melted before the other loops kick in to restore order. Meanwhile, our coasts are eaten up by the rising oceans causing around 80% of humans to die or relocate since 80% of humans live on the coast.

Don't think that only the North Pole is affected. This same thing has also been projected for Antartica. The data suggests that Antarctica has also entered a meltdown loop.

This isn't all bad though. It's likely that such a shift of water mass on the Earth's crust would cause volcanic activity and seriously change our lands' layout. Old land, polluted and sucked dry of nutrients, would be covered by cleansing and healing water, while new fertile land will be exposed for human use. With a large portion of our population gone, the survivors would have ample farmland to start over.

It is doubtful that enough technology or oil would remain for them to be industrialized. This isn't to say that we will loose our knowledge, just our commercial crap. The currently industrially produced goods would be procured on a stricly need-to-use basis.

Remember, this has already begun and cannot be stopped. Only survived. Beyond the caps, oil has peeked, and both natural gas and coal aren't far behind. Without oil, we can't support more than a billion or so humans on Earth anyway, half that comfortably, so one way or another, a lot of people are going to die before the first half of this century is out. I would be surprised if more than 100 million people survive past 2020.

Waterworld

[Anonymous Coward]

And you thought it was a bad movie, it's a FEMA training film now!!!

283,750 Roubles

[nmb3000]

I wonder if the Russians have started counting their roubles yet?

Oh, thank you very much

[daniil]

As if it wasn't bad enough, the flamewar that's about to erupt here will further speed up the process...

Re:Oh, thank you very much

[FidelCatsro]

I could condense the entire flamewar to one post...

10:Global warming is not happening
20:yes it is you ignoramus
30:I agree but it's not caused by man
40: Yes it is you ignoramus
50:no it isn't
60: GOTO 40
RUN

Re:Oh, thank you very much

[mdielmann]

And in the process you start an even bigger flamewar by using basic to describe the other one.

Do you understand how chaos theory works now? Stop trying to kill butterflies until you know the full consequences!

Re:Oh, thank you very much

[Quiet_Desperation]

I've modified your code. It was open source, right?

Global warming is not happening!
Yes, it is, you ignoramus!
I agree, but it's not caused by man!
count = 0
while (count < 10)
   Yes, it is, you ignoramus!
   No, it isn't!
   count = count + 1
wend
do
   Hitler!
   Mao!
loop

Re:Oh, thank you very much

[Zigg]

Shouldn't you be catching a Godwin exception somewhere in the last few lines?

Re:Oh, thank you very much

[JohnFluxx]

>Are you blaming Katrina on global warming?
Partly, yes.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/science/09/01/katrina .warming.ap/

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,109 9102,00.html

Yes!

[justforaday]

Soon I'll be able to sell my vial of ice-9 for billions!

Awesome news!

[dstewart]

Now I won't have to hear them drone on about the threat of global warming anymore!

Thanks, polluters! The power is yours!

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

What Global Warming?

[CarbonPath]

Hey, I've got some oceanfront property in Arizona!

Schadenfreude

[YankeeInExile]

Talk about your schadenfreude experiences, eh? Either these scientists are wrong, or they get to gloat about how nobody listented to them.

I am just waiting for President Schwarzenegger's address from the beaches of Las Vegas explaining that global warming is not a serious problem, and there was never a place called Venice.

This is EXCELLENT News!

[14erCleaner]

Now that global warming is irreversible, we don't have to modify our behaviour! No more Kyoto treaty, I can buy that giant SUV I've always wanted, and it doesn't matter! Yay! No more guilt!

On a tangential note, does anybody else get annoyed by the overuse of the phrase "tipping point"? It's like "perfect storm" was a few years ago, everybody's favorite trite phrase-of-the-moment. It's like we've reached a tipping point of "tipping point" usage, and this perfect storm of "tipping point"s has driven out the "perfect storm" meme.

Re:This is EXCELLENT News!

[lucabrasi999]

You also used "Excellent" in your Subject Line. So 1992.

Re:This is EXCELLENT News!

[LightningBolt!]

Your complaint about the phrase "tipping point" has become "ground zero" for a whole new "war on cliches".

Re:This is EXCELLENT News!

[jim_v2000]

On a tangential note, does anybody else get annoyed by the overuse of the phrase "tipping point"?

Yeah, it annoys me. How do they know where the "tipping point" is? Seems pretty arrogant to make such a claim when we understand so VERY little about the planet's various systems work.

Re:This is EXCELLENT News!

[SlothB77]

We've been at the 'tipping point' or 'on the verge' of disaster. It never pans out. But it does scare up an increase in fundraising. Thats why you keep saying it. Environmentalism is a billion dollar industry - of tax-free donations.

Myths and Ice Age

[SumDog]

We really have a huge lack of evidence about global warming. The earth is warming yes, but are we causing it? The eart has gone to drastic changes over the course of several million years. Within the past 10,000 years, glaicers have formed and receeded in northern Europe and North America. Not too long ago, Chicago was covered in ice. It's why there is so much good farm land up near Indiana.

The fact is that humans, even with all our pollution, can't put a dent in our planets ecosystem compared to the power of one rhylothetic (sp?) volcanic eruption.

On top of this, many geologists believe that we are currently in an Ice Age and we're on the cooling side of it!

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[north.coaster]

I don't think that it really matters whether humans are causing it. What matters is whether humans are impacting it. If there is something that we can do to slow it down or reverse it, then we should. Period.

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[p2sam]

False Dilemma.

Fact: we are living on this planet
Fact: this planet is warming
Fact: weather patterns will change
Fact: we better damn well do something about it.
Fact: whether we are the ones who are causing the change is irrelevant.

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[mhamel]

The fact is that humans, even with all our pollution, can't put a dent in our planets ecosystem

Have you ever eard about the holocene extinction event? From wikipedia: A 1998 survey by the American Museum of Natural History found that 70% of biologists view the present era as part of a mass extinction event. Some, such E. O. Wilson of Harvard University, predict that man's destruction of the biosphere could cause the extinction of one-half of all species in the next 100 years. Research and conservation efforts, such as the IUCN's annual "Red List" of threatened species, all point to an ongoing period of enhanced extinction, though some offer much lower rates and hence longer time scales before the onset of catastrophic damage. The extinction of many megafauna near the end of the most recent ice age is also sometimes considered a part of the Holocene extinction event.

Well, 70% of biologists think that we are going thtought a massive extinction event and you say that humans can't put a dent in the ecosystem. With that, you get modded +5 Insightful..

We could at least say that your thinking is not shared by the science community, even if it seems to find echo on slashdot.

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[Decaff]

We really have a huge lack of evidence about global warming. The earth is warming yes, but are we causing it?

It would be odd if pumping millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere had no effect, wouldn't it?

The eart has gone to drastic changes over the course of several million years. Within the past 10,000 years, glaicers have formed and receeded in northern Europe and North America. Not too long ago, Chicago was covered in ice. It's why there is so much good farm land up near Indiana.

How is this relevant? During most of that period there were not that many people around (a few millions at most) and they lived tough lives. Now we have hundreds of millions living within a few metres of sea level, and we rely on subtle aspects of rainfall and climate to grow our food. Even a minor climate change could have a dramatic and very unpleasant effect.

The fact is that humans, even with all our pollution, can't put a dent in our planets ecosystem compared to the power of one rhylothetic (sp?) volcanic eruption

I can't check what you mean because of the spelling :)

However, we are having an impact. In a few decades we will have doubled the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere - that is a major change.

On top of this, many geologists believe that we are currently in an Ice Age and we're on the cooling side of it!

We were on the cooling side of it!

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[m50d]

The fact is that humans, even with all our pollution, can't put a dent in our planets ecosystem compared to the power of one rhylothetic (sp?) volcanic eruption.

That's a complete lie. If you disagree, find me your nearest buffalo.

On top of this, many geologists believe that we are currently in an Ice Age and we're on the cooling side of it!

Not so long ago there was a wooly mammoth saying the same thing. Newsflash: we've been living in an ice age for our entire evolutionary history. We're not adapted to live in other circumstances. The fact that the Earth hasn't always been like this means nothing because it's always been like this when we were living on it. When ice ages end species go extinct, and we could well be one of them. Sure it's going to end eventually, but we could have the technology to stop it, or colonise other planets, by then.

Re:Myths and Ice Age

[d474]

Myths? Really. You said:

"The fact is that humans, even with all our pollution, can't put a dent in our planets ecosystem compared to the power of one rhylothetic (sp?) volcanic eruption."

That's a nice little myth you are creating there.

First of all, there is no such type of volcanic eruption termed "rhylothetic" (bad spelling nor otherwise). What in God's name are you doing, making up words?

Your choices are: Strombolian, Vulcanian, Vesuvian, Peléan, Hawaiian, Phreatic, and the most powerful, Plinian.

So, maybe your are right. There is no way human pollution can put a dent into the ecosystem the way a rhylothetic eruption can, because there is no such thing as a rhylothetic eruption!

We'll let the rest wonder about the validity of your other fantasy conclusions...

Global warming isn't necessarily our fault

[ikewillis]

Not all scientists agree that anthropogenic climate forcings are the primary cause of global warming. And hey, this guy is director of the American Association of State Climatologists and he's peer reviewed. He also resigned Bush's panel on climate change because no one else wanted to listen to a dissenting opinion, they were too up in arms about global warming alarmism like this dude

Re:Global warming isn't necessarily our fault

[FhnuZoag]

Ah, Pielke.

Why he is an idiot: http://mustelid.blogspot.com/2005/08/pielke-senior -has-blog.html#comments

He certain has been peer-reviewed, though. The feedback he got from his papers include:

The exchange is not worthy of publication. In fact, I do not understand why P&C even wrote their piece in the first place. They continually destroy whatever point they had in mind by noting Hansen 'did it right'... None of the participants in this pathetic exchange seem to have the slightest clue about the large decadal noise that exists in the oceans and some ocean models.

Which bring up the question about why he resigned, which in his own words:

The current discussion in the media based on the three Science Express articles misses the more significant issue of spatial trends in tropospheric temperature trends.

He quit because the committee was focusing on trends in the global average, and he was more interested in geographical locations.

Realclimate is a group blog focusing only on scientific analysis and which gives no recommendations for policy change. The views they give strike me as typically very cautious - so what do you consider to be alarmism?

Re:Global warming isn't necessarily our fault

[Karhgath]

So, deforestation, land use and land coverage aren't our fault? I wonder whose fault it is.

Local to regional land surface processes related to land cover/land use change represent an important first-order forcing of climate variability. Changes in land cover due to urbanization, agriculture, and engineering projects have important consequences for vegetation, soil moisture, sensible and latent heat fluxes, air temperature, precipitation, atmospheric circulation, the distribution of frozen ground (in high latitude/altitude regions), etc. In areas where rapid and extensive alterations to the land surface have occurred, such as China, parts of North America and Europe, high-latitude areas, as well as many other regions, the analogous land surface processes can have
widespread climatic and environmental consequences.

Hell, he's posting articles that are attributing the problems much more directly to humans than on http://www.realclimate.org/ , which, contrary to your comment, I find to be pretty good as it tries to stay away from politics and economics, focusing on the science itself. Hardly alarmist IMHO. All in all, I find both sources complementary.

However, YMMV.

The fact remains: Global Warming is happening. There are very strong indications that we are responsible, but in what capacity and what are the political/economical consequences of such a thing? That's something else. The core problem still remains: there is global warming. That has direct consequences on the fauna and flora of Earth. Whether we are responsible or not, there is still a problem and it's not by still dumping tons of CO2 that it's going to go away.

Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[StefanJ]

The useful idiots who repeat the spin and F.U.D. from the Global Climate Coalition, Club for Growth, Cato Institute and other tools of the fossil fuel industry have a huge variety of talking points at their disposal.

Many of these have been disproven, but they keep coming up. New ones occasionally replace them. But they all amount to the same basic concepts:

• It's not happening!
• It's happening, but it is not our fault!
• It's happening, and it's our fault, but it's a good thing!
• OK, It's happening, we're to blame, we're royally screwed, but the invisible hand of the market wanted it to be this way and just think of the investment opportunities!

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[e1618978]

No matter how much oil you personally burn, the total global human population will use a fixed amount of oil (we use as much oil as you can pump out of the ground, and we have reached the point where it is very hard to use more oil). So conservation does not help global warming, it just lowers the price so that the Chineese can burn more, and it discourages alternative fuel research. For the good of humanity, it is important that you burn as much oil as you can afford to, in order to bump up prices and encourage alternatives to oil. If consumption is really high, we will switch to other sources while there is still a lot of oil in the ground. Worst case is conservation that keeps the price of oil low enough so that we pump and burn all the oil available to us over the next 50 years.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[1u3hr]

(we use as much oil as you can pump out of the ground,

Not true, Saudi Arabia could pump rather more (a big percentage, but I can't recall) more than it usually does, but it limits its output to stabilise prices.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[Decaff]

But hell lets blame everything but the SUN. Which by the way has been getting hotter lately.

No it hasn't.

Not to mention have been in a hugely active solar flare cycle.

Which has absolutely no effect whatsoever, other than to cause intense aurorae - thanks to the Earth's magnetic fields.

But hell why would we take our main source of life and energy on the earth into account?

we have.

Because maybe you would have to deal with the facts...

Like all that human-produced CO2 in the atmosphere?

Maybe science can be twisted and used as a tool for the environmentalisst.

Or ignored by those who don't want to face the truth.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[tabdelgawad]

Please take a look at the first three graphs on this page from a NASA website:

http://vathena.arc.nasa.gov/curric/land/global/cli mchng.html

Can you really look at this information, then confidently declare that human actions are the main determinant of climate change?

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[stlhawkeye]

The useful idiots who repeat the spin and F.U.D. from the Global Climate Coalition, Club for Growth, Cato Institute and other tools of the fossil fuel industry have a huge variety of talking points at their disposal.

What really sucks is when people who are sensible skeptical about controversial research also have data. Because then you have to actually put up some of your own instead of firing off snide comments about people whose views are inconvenient.

It doesn't take much effort to look at historical temperature readings and notice that there is a cycle of warming and cooling that the planet undergoes, and the modern industrial age happens to coincidence with one rather closely. In fact, the current warming trend started about 10,000 years ago. While I can't say with complete authority that auto emissions and industrial pollutants weren't present at the time, I feel comfortable in hazarding a guess that the small population of humans were contributing negligably to the planet's greenhouse gases.

What IS interesting is that this warming cycle, ramps up over about 10,000 years and then gradually cools. Repeated melting and refreezing of the ice caps appears to be normal and we do not currently know whether climate change causes greenhouse gases to increase or the other way around. Or if they both occur in synchrony and are caused by something else entirely.

The danger here is that the cooling mechanism has failed to kick in, and it normally would have begun LONG before American capitalism and human greed stepped in to fuck up the planet.

Doubtless that our own contributions to global GTG content is not helping any, but I do not believe that there is conclusive evidence that our planet's temparture is primarily or even partially influenced to any significant degree by the behavior of its inhabitants at the current time. Something is different right now, that's for sure. We may or may not be the cause of it. There's at least a few components at work here, however, that we are not responsible for and cannot do anything about.

Sadly, there's a vacuum of intellectual integrity in the global warming debate precisely because of smug shitheads like you.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[rxmd]

we use as much oil as you can pump out of the ground

Not true, Saudi Arabia could pump rather more (a big percentage, but I can't recall) more than it usually does, but it limits its output to stabilise prices.

Yes, but at present Saudi Arabia the only oil-producing country that can actually do this. The others are at their limit, and any disruption to Saudi oil production (for example, through terrorist attacks) could have a significant impact on the oil price. The article I quoted expects oil prices around $100 - it's always bad to have a single point of failure. In addition, the Saudis can only produce more crude oil, not refined gasoline and heating oil, so even their production increases won't help all that much in the short run.

Also, it's doubted whether the Saudis can actually keep their promises.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[Lars T.]

The good old "There have always been natural changes in climate, so this has to be one too" argument. Time to look at some graphs were "today" isn't 1950. Or maybe to actually read that page instead of just looking at the purty picshures.

Re:Climate Change Objections, Simplified

[centipetalforce]

Nobody is DECLARING anything. What people (sicentists) ARE saying is this: "Humans are putting the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into the air by burning fossil fuel or wood. We also add CFC (that is chlorofluorocarbons) compounds like Freon, used in refrigeration systems. CFC's are greenhouse gases as well as destroyers of ozone. We measure that carbon dioxide is currently increasing, and it seems to be getting warmer the last few decades. Although this suggests that increased greenhouse gases are causing the warming, it is not certain." Nobody is saying it is 100% certain man is causing it. The question that should be in every one's mind is "is it better to be safe or sorry?"

The Earth does not care

[cerelib]

When will people learn that this kind of crap will happen with or without human intervention? The Earth has been changing constantly for millions of years and will continue to change past our existence. Holy crap, a climate shift!! I am sure it was the Neanderthals who brought on the ice age by causing nuclear winter. How else could that have happened?

Sick and tired of the volcano comparison

[vlad_petric]

Volcanos also spit SO2 in addition to CO2, which basically has the opposite effect (it increases albedo). Furthermore, when they erupt, the ash they throw into the atmosphere reflects sunlight to the extent that major eruptions effectively cool down the Earth. When Pinatubo erupted, it lowered the global temperature by a fraction of a degree. When Thera/Santorini erupted about 3600 years ago, the sempervirens trees from California recorded a sharp drop in temperature.

No Problem

[earthforce_1]

We just need to groundburst a few hundred large nukes somewhere and voila! Instant nuclear winter to counteract the global warming. Too bad about the fallout....

Actually, here in Canada we might be one of the few countries in the world to benefit from global warming. Just think, orange and bannana groves in Ontario, wheat farms in Nunavit, and we can put Panama out of business when the north west passage becomes ice free. We won't need to fly south anymore for warm weather, although the skiing would positively suck.

Re:No Problem

[Jeff Hornby]

Not really.

Orange and banana groves in Ontario, well, maybe. But then that doesn't really increase the amount of food since there are already orchards all over Ontario (I have four fruit trees and six grape vines in my backyard in Toronto).

But there isn't going to be any wheat in Nunavut any time soon. Soil profiles in the tudra are very poor. You need somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 years (depending on your source) of grasses growing, dying, rotting into the ground, fixing nitrogen and building up a proper soil profile before you can grow wheat or any other major crop.

So if you're thinking that we'll be OK because agriculture can just shift northward away from the desertification, think again. The limit for agriculture for the foreseeable future is the tree line where the tundra starts.

Re:No Problem

[Damek]

Not really. Just because the temperature rises doesn't automatically mean you have good soil.

"You'll pay for this Captain Planet"

[Luke Psywalker]

It looks like Lutin Plunder has finally held true to his word.

Greenland Ice Sheet

[molo]

According to wikipedia, the greenland ice sheet, if fully melted, will raise global sea level by 7.2 meters (23.6 feet). This would put large portions of many coastal cities underwater.

Fortunately, there are other factors that should mitigate this, such as increased mass of the antarctic ice sheet due to increased moisture levels. See sea level rise.

-molo

Here is the "logic" I object to

[SengirV]

If it's too hot = Global Warming
If It's too cold = Global Warming
If It's a Monsoon = Global Warming
If It's a drought = Global Warming
If a part of a glacier breaks away from Antartica = Global Warming
If the rest of Antartica is getting colder = Global Warming

If you replace "Global Warming" up there with "It's Bush's fault" then you have the left's political platform as well.

Come up with some REAL science that is not funded by politically oriented "science" organizations, then MAYBE there would be more support for change.

Re:Here is the "logic" I object to

[CheddarHead]

A Bush supporter calling for "some REAL science"? Boy, there's some irony for you!

Point of No Return

[linguae]

Past the point of no return, no backwards glances
Our days of global warming have now begun
Past all thoughts of right or wrong, no going back now
Abandon thoughts, and let the warmth begin
When will the fires shall burn the forest, when will the flood hit my costal mansion
When will the warming at last consume us?

Past the point of no return, the final threshold
The iceberg is crossed, so stand and watch it melt
We're past the point of no return.

(with apologies to the Phantom of the Opera musical).

Re:Human greed knows no bounds

[stlhawkeye]

Actually they've been warning us for a longer time than that, that there's global climate change coming and mankind is to blame for it, so we'd better change our ways. Except it was global cooling that was all the rage. Now that we have better data, it's easier to find correlations, although we haven't proved causation yet. Regardless, I am confident that as we move forward, the anti-intellectualism present in the global warming debate will decline and we'll be able to have a more open and honest scientific discussion on the topic. I mean "we" as in "we humans," not "we slashdot readers." There will never be an open, honest, intellectual debate about anything on Slashdot. :)

Hey this is a good thing...

[3seas]

More Bikini's

I don't believe I'm familiar with that term

[uberjoe]

it's a FEMA training film now

Training implies that there are competent people at FEMA. An assertation I'm not sure a certain region of the US would agree with.

Re:I don't believe I'm familiar with that term

[AndersOSU]

It kind of bothers me when people blame NO for being below sea level, the people that live there now didn't build the city, and most live there because that is where they were born.

Furthermore, if you were in a position to relocate, and were offered a better job in NO, would you really turn it down because it's below sea level? What about California, Florida, or Tornado ally?

Most people aren't fortunate enough to be able to choose what city they live in, and those with a choice will rarely consider natural disasters as a factor in that decision.

That said if you build a mansion on a cliff that is eroding at the rate of feet/year, and your house is destroyed I have no sympathy for you.

Re:I don't believe I'm familiar with that term

[xero314]

It kind of bothers me when people blame NO for being below sea level, the people that live there now didn't build the city, and most live there because that is where they were born.

You going to have the same comments next time when everone who lives there already got pushed out by floods once and then moved back?

Furthermore, if you were in a position to relocate, and were offered a better job in NO, would you really turn it down because it's below sea level? What about California, Florida, or Tornado ally?

If the job was significantly better (3 to 4 times what I make now) I would consider it. But I would then use that money to invest in property in a safer area, and be prepaired to move when the next hurrican was heading that way.

Most people aren't fortunate enough to be able to choose what city they live in, and those with a choice will rarely consider natural disasters as a factor in that decision.

WTF, who is so unfortunate they can't move? seriouslly it cost $25 to get on a bus to move to higher land. You could probably hitch it for free. And finding a job paying minimum wage is pretty easy to do anywhere in this country.

That said if you build a mansion on a cliff that is eroding at the rate of feet/year, and your house is destroyed I have no sympathy for you.

I would have no sympathy either, I find people that waste money by building in/on on safe land to be pretty worthless. I should point out I live in an area that has not been struck by significant natural disaster in my life time (there were floods previously but with very little damage).

In the end, until the US is a socialist country, or the government mandates where you live, you have the choice to move and the government should not be responsible if you chose to live in a high risk area (like some where that you look up too see ships!).

Huge ice cubes

[ndogg]

Time to start dropping huge ice cubes into the ocean. That will solve global warming once and for all.

Little Girl: But...

I SAID ONCE AND FOR ALL!

overplaying one's hand

[technoCon]

i recall reading Environmentalists in the '70s who would point to the Jimmy Carter gasoline lines and overpopulation, and claim that if we didn't Do Something Now (that generally included sending them money), the acid rain would kill us all by 1990. But I was busy with work and didn't notice the end of everything. How was it?

The Global Warming Problem was presented as a problem that was SO BAD we had to Do Something before we fully understood the problem. Then Kyoto came along and told us to sacrifice trillions on the altar of C02 emissions. NO, we must understand the problem before we can effect a solution thereto, otherwise we're no smarter than savages before a stone idol manipulated by its priests.

Environmentalism is not a new response to natural phenomena: "Behold! Moon goddess is eating the sun god. We'll all die unless you give me a sacrifice to appease her wrath." False prophets always run the risk of overplaying their hand. They get modest returns from modest promises and threats. Then they get greedy and escalate the promises/threats. But they feel control slipping from their grasp and then the threats become even more dire and their cries more shrill. All right, enviro-prophets, you've said the world shall surely end. Here's your haiku:

Rachel Carlson's
Jeremiad predicts doom.
Where are the Persians?

Re:overplaying one's hand

[fred fleenblat]

>> the acid rain would kill us all by 1990. But I
>> was busy with work and didn't notice the end of
>> everything. How was it?

They actually *did* something about it and mandated pollution controls on coal-fired plants. You were probably too busy with work to notice that too.

Re:Motive for making this stuff up?

[WhiteWolf666]

I'm not sure I agree with it, but the theory is that there is big money in global warming research, both for and against.

If you want to cash-out with the oil companies, you have to be saying that there ISN'T any global warming, and you have to spend a lot of time/money criticizing the environmentalists. If there wasn't anybody making noises about global warming, than you, as an anti-global warming researching wouldn't get millions in grants.

If you are an environmentalist, you have to be saying that there IS global warming, and you have to spend a lot of time/money criticizing the people I just described above. If there wasn't anybody disputing your facts, than you, as a global warming research, wouldn't get millions in grants.

Both sides have an incentive to say that both sides should get more funding. As both sides get more funding, they make *yet more noise*.

There hasn't been a single article from either side saying 'cut off funding for the other'. All the scientists agree that 'more research, more funding, more computer models, etc. . .' are needed.

Never forget, big science research ITSELF is fairly big research. The largest computing clusters in the world have been built for the purpose of analyzing global warming. Literally fleets of ships, along with mounds and mounds of atmospheric measuring equipment, and dozens of satellites have been constructed for the purpose of studying warming. Not to say that they don't find a bunch of intresting conclusions/data. But don't expect ANYONE tied up in the debate to ever say, "We're done researching, time to act, no more money for science, lets just spend it on lobbying, etc. . ."

Want to fund your ancient petrifyied tree research project? Link it to global warming, say that you are looking to see past temperature data. Shop it out to both sides, the IPCC people, the sierra club, and the oil companies, and make sure you release *very* high quality, but moderately ambiguous data.

Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

Re:Equilibrium mechanisms

[The Ape With No Name]

Three words: Mass Extinction Events. Just because there is life left behind afterward doesn't mean that life will be anything approaching what you may consider 'normal.'

Another thing: How do you derive equilibrium in such a complex system? The term is meaningless.

Fact: anthropogenic global climate change is occuring and is characterized by higher temperatures during a period when the Earth should be cooling into another Ice Age as indicated by long-term climate data collected from ice coring.

So is this based on one of those flawed models

[ifwm]

That failed to account for how much CO2 is being released by the earth?

Or is it based on one of those other flawed model that failed to take something else into account, only we aren't sophisticated to detect it yet?

Seriously, wake me when you have some useful information.

Some real scientific things to ponder

[WillAffleckUW]

1. The energy stored in the Carribean has raised the sea temperature by one degree - and hurricane/storm strength is directly impacted by the heat storage in the sea/ocean.

2. Half of the damage - or more - is caused by the destruction of the surrounding wetlands around cities.

3. Much of the dollar cost of the damage is caused by the anti-environmental building policies that encourage the construction of expensive properties (like those of a certain senator) and their rebuilding after storms and hurricanes. As we provide economic incentives that override the normal economic disincentives, the wealthy move to the coast and build fancy developments that are more exposed, and sink more wealth into coastal areas.

4. The US population on the coast is growing faster than the rest of the country, while the empty areas that are in the middle are emptying out.

5. The quantity of hurricanes of significant level has not increased worldwide, but the strength of those major storms has increased dramatically (double).

6. The Carribean goes thru cycles of hurricanes - according to ship registries and historic records, we were in a lull for a while and now return to a long period of more hurricanes. Since the power of these is now double the usual amount (or more), and more property is exposed, and fewer barriers exist since many have been removed or the silt not permitted to dump on the land as used to happen in NOLA and coastal areas - well, basically we should expect a lot of massive hurricanes that we have never seen before.

baffled

[micromuncher]

Its odd that so many people think this isn't a big deal, siting issues like "we don't know enough" or "its happened before in our geological history"...

If you actually put some common sense into, that is the carbon cycle over millions of years has store sh1tloads of carbon away underground, and that in the next hundred years its very likely we will have put it all up in the atmosphere... and that carbon contributes to global warming, that has the side effects of unpredictable violent weather, and a general slowing of the earth on its axis (like Venus)... you would think that even the SUGGESTION that we should be conscious over what is in our control would be an action item.

An analogy is forest fires... forests have burned forever, contributing to the nitrogen cycle and carbon cycle. But now we're hell bent on putting them out. Sure, it means not-so-much carbon, but the result is a f4cked up nitrogen cycle and a build up of biomass just waiting to be a serious blaze. Why do we fight the fires then? Protect peoples homes? OR to protect the forestry industry?

So the ocean rises a few inches, and a bunch of well established species get extinct; just think of how many times we get to rebuild New Orleans, Miami, and such...

Re:baffled

[ednopantz]

you would think that even the SUGGESTION that we should be conscious over what is in our control would be an action item.

Unless focusing all our efforts on effecting a trivial dent in climate change prevents us from working on more important things like malaria or HIV, or malnutrition. All the politcally convenient sturm and drang (we get to blame America for something else!) ignores the more important problems.

The shrieking hysteria of the British press is amazing. The Independent needs to just get it over with and start running the same headline every day: "The Sky is Falling and it is all America's Fault!" It would save a whole lot of trouble.

Not the reason for good farm land....

[postbigbang]

Northern Indiana, while it survived the ice age, was once a huge marsh through the various river valleys that ran through the area. These marshes were drained, just ike Chicagoland was, in the 1800's and 1900's. The remaining silt made for good farm land. The withdrawal of glacial activity merely made it flat and sucseptable to contours that made the marshes and flow. It took several thousand years to make that dirt as black as it is, prarrie grasses, fowl, and trillions of shellfish lived up there. No more.

Now you can have corn chips.

We've put a SERIOUS dent into our plant's ecosystem. Look at all of the species gone, do to man. Look at all the ones on the endangered list(s).

There's overwhelming evidence. Just look at it. It's not disjointed, it's not anecdotal, it's scientific evidence.

Please go back to your job in the Bush administration and stop playing with your computer on the government's time.

Karl Rove + Lex Luthor

[bmajik]

Remember Lex Luthors plan to get rich ? Buy all the property on the east side of the san andreas fault, then set off nukes in the fault to sink the west half of the state. Lex would overnite own the majority of waterfront property in california.

According to the sinless triumverate of truth (moveon.org, indymedia, and dailykos), Karl Rove has almost completed his master plan of melting all global ice to raise the world sealevel by 23ft.. which in a single stroke would wipe out almost all democratic voters in the US, as well as place all socialist-european countries in state of total turmoil whilst they tried to rebuild their cities and save their tax base (their population).

The republicans would then RULE THE WORLD!

Who is falling for the media hype?

[patomuerto]

As someone who has done some work in this field I have to say I hate these articles. Chances are it is media hype. But it works because both sides dig in and either call them alarmists or prophets.

It would be nice if those who jump to say 'I told you so' would recongnize that this is the one of the first articles that claim to have evidence decided we are past a tipping point. The people involved are reutable but we need more research.

It would also be nice for those denying that there is a problem to get some of their facts straight. While the media only reports on catastrophic events like massive flooding and hurricanes those are the worst case predictions. Many of the scientist more realistic predictions made in the past are on tract. West Nile virus, Avian flu, malaria are showing up where it never has before. 20 years ago climate scientist had claimed that this would be an indirect result. There is also other indirect evidence like bird/fish/herd migration changes, species sensitivity and so on. As well as direct evidence as found in telecontection analysis, outgoing longwave radiation, etc (just google climate studies).

The biggest problem is everyone wants or expects a definetive answer right now. It is probably the most complex system that is currently intesivly studied. That is why they need massive supercomputers and incredible amounts of data. You are not going to get an easy answer for about 100 years.

In my opinion it should be more like a health problem. I personally would like to live a long health life. There are now the obvious things to avoid like smoking and drugs, but I also might at least listen when someone talks about chloesterol, heart disease, and bbq pork ribs (mmm, ribs).

Re:Oh please.....

[m50d]

The first is, yes the earth is getting hotter, it's getting closer to the sun. Each year we move just a bit closer to the sun due to it's gravitational pull. Does anyone not realize that we aren't orbiting on a perfect path???

Looks like someone needs to brush up on their basic calculus. Even if you were right, why are you so sure we're spiraling in rather than spiraling away from the sun like the Moon is from us?

The biggest problem by far is, who cares!!! It'll be thousands of years before it happens, and by then we'll all have our brains digitized and installed into servers. The smartest into Linux servers, the most artistic into Macs, and the dumbest into windows!!!!!

It's happening right now, just ask anyone outside the US. Most predictions are for about a 2 degree temperature rise throughout the world. That's going to be enough to make a huge difference. Do you know how many people live less than 10m above sea level? And do you know how big an ice cap is?

Re:Equilibrium mechanisms

[the eric conspiracy]

. HUGE changes have occurred, yet the earth has always pulled back to an equilibrium point that has provided life.

Right, but what makes you think that life will continue to include homo sapiens as a species?

speaking of ice core samples

[frankie]

Although global climate might be within plausible variation, here's one undisputed fact of human effects. We have royally mucked up the atmosphere.

For at least the past 400000+ years, global CO2 concentrations fluctuated solidly in the 180-300ppm range. Methane flucutated 300-700ppb on a matching path, and both correlate strongly with temperature (r about .8) over that time.

Today, CO2 has shot up to 380ppm and methane above 1700ppb. Any rational observer should conclude this is A Bad Thing(tm).

BTW, we're currently towards the high end of average temperature, not low. What is the phrase "still coming out of an ice age" is being measured against?

Re:Doom and Gloom NO, Just one of 5 CO2 Peaks

[BoRegardless]

People think "the ice age" is a defining moment. There was a mini-ice age in the 17th century. There was one that ended maybe 14,000 years ago. Those are NOT the LONG TERM cycles that repeat on earth.

Those 5 CO2 peaks over the last 400,000 years came from the
Vostok Antarctica ice cores (about every 100,000 years). Our actual CO2 might be expected to go a bit higher based on the prior peaks, but then something repeatedly changes in the world's ecosphere in the past cycles and there is an ABRUPT drop in CO2 in the past history.

Why did it go up?
Why did it turn?
What long term sun cycles or sun spots only exist, which we have not detected yet?
Does a direct hit by a large coronal mass ejection/s offer a drastic change to the earth's enviroment?
Why did it go down precipitously?
Once you know what caused it, does it have so much power behind it that man can or can NOT change it?

If you look at facts instead of blathering, it becomes apparent that scientists and interested laymen yet today have no proof of what moves the momentum of the truely long term ecosystem's atmosphere.

I personally believe we will find that man is incapable of altering the long term climatic cycles, and at some point Canada & Northern Europe and Asia will again go under kilometers of ice, and man (just like the Vikings in Greenland), will only be able to look on in horror as the ice relentlessly takes over the land they used to work and live on.

You can easily see the CO2 charts on the web, but I won't post any URLs.

Bo

Re:Equilibrium mechanisms

[mikey_boy]

surely the point is not that the earth is fragile, but that our (human) existence on the earth is fragile.

Re:Equilibrium mechanisms

[Kupek]

The evidence for these is that life on earth has survived for BILLIONS of years.

Sure, but not necessarily us. The Earth itself will be fine and life will survive. However, the Earth might be in a condition that we won't survive. You're assuming that the Earth's environment will stabilize back to where it is now (or was pre-Industrial Revolution). There is no reason for this to happen.

Re:U.N. Says It's Healing

[Karhgath]

There is no correlation between the ozone layer and global warming and there never was any. Some people might have led you to believe that, but it's simply not the case, when you look at the science itself and what the scientists are saying.

In a ideal world...

[tinkerton]

the point where you have to admit you have a problem lies beyond the point of no return. Either way, no worries.

Re:Doom and Gloom NO, Just one of 5 CO2 Peaks

[Gulthek]

Exactly the point I was trying to get across. We have so many questions about the Earth's climate over the long term that it's not even funny.

Re:"According to wikipedia..."

[16K Ram Pack]

No, I don't.

Are the facts they are quoting wrong? Do you have some corrections? Post them in the discussion or correct on Wikipedia, but don't just try and attack the source.

Re:Equilibrium mechanisms

[rtaylor]

The earth is NOT fragile.
Humans are fragile though. Nobody really cares about what the earth will become outside of how it impacts us.

Whether human created or not, we're going to have to make a serious investment in relocation soon. The price tag tied to Katrina was high, but just wait until we get to move New York, Miami and other coastal cities.

MOD PARENT UP!

[Sensible Clod]

This has got to be one of the most insightful comments on the whole page. We need TONS more data, over a LONGER period of time, before doing Chicken Little impressions. Yeesh.

Re:co2 emissions from volcanos

[Rei]

400-1200 metric tons per day is absolutely nothing. Humans release 16 million metric tonnes per day (and displace additional absorption). As a long term average, volcanoes produce about 500 million tonnes of CO2 annually, compared to ~6 billion for humans. Furthermore, volcanoes are overall coolers because of the aerosols and sulfuric gasses they release, unlike humans.

Re Global warming

[anand78]

A professor gave a presentation on Global warming in our company yesterday. One of the key points he raised was that we contribute 5.5 times carbon di-oxide as compared to the rest of the world. He also gave a statistics on what is the best fuel, turns out it is not Hydrogen but rather it is Natural gas. He painted a piture where by 2300 Toronto would be like A(Hot)tlanta. I hope Bush thinks twice before neglecting the Global warming. I hope he does not attribute it to some other Intelligent Design.

The Earth may not care, nor owe us a living

[WillAffleckUW]

When will people learn that this kind of crap will happen with or without human intervention? The Earth has been changing constantly for millions of years and will continue to change past our existence. Holy crap, a climate shift!! I am sure it was the Neanderthals who brought on the ice age by causing nuclear winter. How else could that have happened?

The earth doesn't owe humanity a living. We're just the latest infestation on the surface of it. Species have been eliminated during glaciations or killed off or adapted to other warming cycles, so if we choose to accelerate the speed of the warming cycle, we get the consequences.

And, actually, there were never that many Neanderthals in the first place. Ninety percent of all the people that have ever existed on the earth have existed since WW II.

We don't know...

[cr0sh]

I see many posts about how there is so much flip-flop over the years over global warming...or is it cooling...or warming again - you get the point. This is the truth - we don't know for certain. We don't know if this is all something caused or helped along by mankind, or whether it is a natural thing, or a mixture of both.

The fact is, we are talking about changes that are happening on a scale near geological time - possibly processes that take 10,000+ years to occur. Now, I wouldn't rule out the possibility that mankind hasn't done something. Considering everything that we do on an industrial and personal scale - the amount of stuff we use, the amount of garbage we produce, what happens to that garbage (some of it buried, some of it blows around, some of it is recycled), the stored carbon (from so-called "fossil fuels" and other such sources) we release into the atmosphere, the pavement we put down, the light at night we put out - on and on - we can't be having zero impact on the planet. We ultimately must be having some impact. How large that is, we don't know.

Ultimately, we are running a huge experiment here, for which we have no other precedent to compare to. It is akin to when they were planning on setting off the first nuclear bomb test - some thought (obviously erringly) that the entire atmosphere of the planet would ignite. Of course, there was more data prior to the blast that seemed to indicate this wouldn't occur, at least on a planet-wide scale - but it did worry some people. The same thing is happenning here, but we barely have any precursor knowledge and measurements, especially for the time scale we are looking at. Most of the data has to be studied from ice-core samples and other such means to go back in geological time to see what is possibly happenning. Even so, it isn't possible to compare the last 200 or so years on such a fast time scale - the period of the industrial and post-industrial revolution is but a blip on the radar. The output of this on-going period isn't a blip, but whether it matters or not - we don't know.

A wise man once said something akin to "The planet will be ok - it is the humans who are f*cked" (IIRC, George Carlin) - so, we should be looking out for ourselves, but ultimately if we screw this chance up, we only get it once. Personally, I would think that if given the choice between: a) letting the experiment run without changing things, and if we die because of it, meh? and b) lets fix a lot of our pollution and other impact issues, so that if we are wrong, the worst thing we have done is make the environment a better place to live in... - one would think b) would be the best choice a supposedly rational, thinking species should make (that, and figure out how to get off this rock and on towards others so that the next 100km asteroid doesn't wipe us out). Unfortunately, we are also selfish and greedy a-holes who would rather go for option a) as the short-term gains are greater (who cares about the future, right?).

Only time will tell what we should have done - let's hope we are correct, whatever it turns out to be our answer...

But it's okay.

[erroneus]

I mean, look at those profits we made by not spending money to keep our environment clean and our emmisions low? Not to mention all those oil people employed!! And then there's the defense workers we kept employed because of all the weapons of mass destruction WE build for no particular reason except to serve as threat against anyone who wants us to bend against our own collective wills.

A dead planet is a small price to pay for the great profits that some .01% of the population can enjoy.

(oh yeah... sarcasm)

Re:co2 emissions from volcanos

[Rei]

Actually, I realized that I should have said "3Gt", because only half of the CO2 goes into the atmosphere. Here's just an example - or, you can search for "CO2" and "Gt", and you'll get more pages than you could ever possibly read. :)

"Global Warming" is just a measurement technique

[Medievalist]

Tracking the average rise in global temperature (or the percentage of carbon in the atmosphere for that matter) provides a useful measurement of how much we are modifying the Earth's albedo.

For at least a decade, reputable scientists have predicted that if the albedo is decreased, weather becomes more energetic; if the albedo is increased, weather becomes less energetic. More or less energy in weather systems results in changing weather patterns that do not necessarily warm or chill your immediate environment.

Blaming anything whatsoever on "global warming" is like blaming pollution on tons (because pollutants are measured in tons per year, get it?).

Hypermodification of the Earth's albedo will result in climate crash. Your particular microenvironment may get hotter, colder, erupt into magma, or sink underwater. But make a sufficent modification - regardless of whether it's a man or a planetary event that does it - and the human species will go extinct.

I prefer the phrase "climate crash" when talking about the possibility of catastrophic climate change due to albedo modification. "Global warming" is confusing, and it sounds too friendly - who doesn't want to be warm?

Not overplayed, under-rated.

[postbigbang]

In the times of the ancient Greeks and Latins, and other cultures in the before (and after) Christ era, people tried to explain the phenomenon they saw in odd ways. Viz your comment "Behold! Moon goddess is eating the Sun God!"

Now we have referential scientific instrumentation to find out what's actually going on. You can ignore the evidence if you want to. In doing so, you'll be the same as the cardinals at the Inquisition.

These models aren't specious. They're derived from a lot of evidence. Like evidence? Like going into a hospital to have complicated surgery done that saves your life? No modern surgery exists today without a lot of the same scientific discipline that's gone into what you've read, if you RTFA.

Your haiku is as idiotic as your denial of the damage already done, and the likelihood that much of the ill effects will last through history.

Re:Agreed

[fred fleenblat]

They don't have the article available online but it's worth tracking down the dead-tree version:

American Heritage of Invention and Technology
Winter 2004
"Doing the Impossible" by Tim Palucka
Reducing auto emissions by 90 percent in a few years looked easy to Congress. To engineers, it looked hopeless--until a few miraculous breakthroughs made the catalytic converter possible.

Chritchton as viewed by real scientists

[David Rolfe]

1. http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=74

Do we really have to have this debate every SINGLE time global warming pops up? State of Fear is a fiction from which no real-world guidance can be drawn. The only time Critchton's words should be changing your opinion on anything is whether or not you think being chased by a hungry dinosaur (or gorilla or alien-technology induced... whatever) might be scary.

In short -- Critchton is a horrible scientist. His mea culpa at the end is refreshing though -- after he's spent the entirety of the book telling you that global warming is bullshit and we shouldn't do anything (and all those scientists and physicists are misleading alarmists) he concedes he doesn't know anything, and winks at you.

"I have more respect for people who change their views after acquiring new information than for those who cling to views they held thirty years ago. The world changes, Ideologues and zealots don't."

Stroking the ego of your paying audience? Priceless.

In other news

[LPetrazickis]

Also, car accidents happen whether you walk across highways or not. Since walking across the highways is such a handy shortcut, we might as well keep doing that. Being hit by a car is just part of the natural cycle.

Climateprediction.net

[Burz]

That is what the Climateprediction.net project does:

It uses distributed computing (ala SETI@Home) to test climate models against the past and present in order to hone its climate forcast for the future (post-2050).

http://www.climateprediction.net/