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Climate Changes Shift Springtime in Europe
gollum123 writes to mention a BBC article on a study of Europe's changing climate. The study collated information from 17 nations and 125,000 studies involving 561 species. The results indicate that, at least in Europe, 'Spring' is coming earlier and earlier every year. From the article: "Spring was beginning on average six to eight days earlier than it did 30 years ago, the researchers said. In regions such as Spain, which saw the greatest increases in temperatures, the season began up to two weeks earlier. The findings were based on what was described as the world's largest study of changes in recurring natural events, such as when plants flowered. The team of researchers also found that the onset of autumn has been delayed by an average of three days over the same period."
Wasn't there a cooling trend in the 70s, that one that made everyone concerned about global cooling? Wouldn't that skew their results? How is it compared to say 50 years ago?
Either move the official start date of spring up six to eight days or remove that many days from the calendar. Personally, I vote for the first week of the year, I always hated the first week of school back from winter vacation when I was a kid.
Europe was having trouble.
What a sad, sad story.
Needed a new climate to restore.
Its former glory.
Where, oh, where was it?
Where could that man it?
We looked around and then we found.
The pollution for you and me.
LEAD TENOR SCIENTIST:
And now it's...
Springtime for Europe and Germany
Deutschland is happy and gay!
Glaciers receding at a faster pace
Look out, here comes the heatwave race!
Springtime for Europe and Germany
Rhineland's a fine land once more!
Springtime for Europe and Germany
Watch out, Europe
Al Gore going on tour!
Our president assures us that this is both not a problem, and not happening.
The mods probably saw "cooling trend" and "1970" and assumed the poster was bringing up the tired old arguement that we used to think the earth was headed into a new ice age.
/. discussion involving climate change, the above arguement is made as a talking point by people who dislike the notion that humans are affecting global temperature. So, after a while I suspect that moderators get a wee bit trigger happy whenever someone mentions the words "cooling" and "1970" in a post about climate change.
The arguement usually goes that before 1970 we thought there was a new ice age coming, due to a global cooling trend. This is usually followed by the arguement that climate scientists don't know what they're talking about, and that man-made global warming is a myth. What this "talking point" ignores is that the so-called "new ice age" never had much scientific credibility; it is primarily remembered because it had a great deal of press coverage. Further, IIRC the global warming hypothesis goes back to at least 1968.
In every single
Note that the GP's point is valid, as there was an observed period of lower temperature 30 years ago (which is what sparked all the media speculation regarding a new ice age). However, I'm sure the scientists who did this study took that trend into account, and in any case the cooling trend was both brief and comparatively small.
Erotic is when you use a feather. Exotic is when you use the whole chicken.
I'm reading the article article you linked to, and it seems to support the greenhouse gas theory. For instance, in section 5 (split over pages 2 and 3):
I can't find any mentions of volcanism. Please point them out or provide a better source.
Come on people, don't be so gullible. It's only 125,000 studies, how could that be in any way conclusive?
Terrorists can't threaten a country's freedom and democracy. Only lawmakers and voters can do that.
Thats a pretty big risk. What happens if we find out that we are causing global warming but it's too late to do anything about it?
023AD01("Child", "Evil");
The Earth was cooler from 1940 to 1970 - this was due to diesel engines producing sulfate aerosols, which are highly reflective. Right now we gain about 4.0 watts/meter^2 due to CO2 and methane, but we lose about half of it due to the sulfate aerosols still in the stratosphere. The cleaner burning fuels we implemented in the 1970s resulted in lower amounts of that stuff in the atmosphere, hence the reversal of the cooling (dimming, actually) trend.
I am very easy to get along with, but I don't have time to waste being nice to people who are being stupid. -Theo
. . .the so-called "new ice age" never had much scientific credibility; it is primarily remembered because it had a great deal of press coverage.
Ahhhhhhhhhh, how ironic this could look in another 20 or 30 years.
KFG
We do not, of course, know for certain what is causing the observed changes. The best evidence we currently have, however, indicates that human actions play a significant role in the current warming. Attribution is a tricky question, so considerable study has taken place. There is quite a lot of data stacking up in favour of human factors being a primary cause. Take some time and read through the IPCC summary of climate attribution studies and bear in mind that this was as of 2001 - we know even more now. We're not talking about simplistic correlation based guesses, were talking about serious quantative analysis by a number of different methods, in a large number of different studies. None of that, of course, rules out other possibilities entirely - but we currently know of no natural phenomena that can successfully describe the current degree of change, and there is considerable evidence and explanatory power provided by anthropogenic changes. By all means keep an open mind, but face up to the fact that, to the best of our not inconsiderable knowledge on the matter, anthropogenic changes are the primary factor in current climatic change.
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Mars, just like earth, undergoes natural climate fluctuation. On Earth we have Milankovitch cycles, based on the eccentricity, axial tilt, and precession of the Earth's orbit. Mars also has interesting orbital variations, and significantly greater orbital eccentricity than the earth. This results in similar, though differently timed, significant variations in climate. Mars also suffers from severe dust storms which can have a large impact on climate due t changes in atmospheric opacity. Combine that with the current solar variation, to which the IPCC attributes around 30% of the Earth's observed warming, and it isn't that surprising that Mars might be experiencing some climatic change currently.
The real difference between climate change on Mars and climate change on Earth is that the degree of change currently observed on Mars is entirely explainable in terms of observed natural effects, while the climate change on Earth is not. Anthropogenic effects, to the very bestof our knowledge, are required to explain the currently observed warming on Earth.
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Which is to say, you didn't read it. Honestly, have a look at chapter 12 (Attribution) of the IPCC Third Assessment Report. You'll find just a single mention, buried in the qualitative section, of Mann's study, listed amongst 5 other different palaeological climate reconstructions by different authors, and only to note that "the 20th century warming is highly unusual." You can see those reconstructions (plus several others) charted together if you're curious. Mann's studies, let alone the "Hockey Stick", far from being "the centerpiece", get scant mention. Instead the attribution factor considers many studies using indices and time series methods, pattern correlation methods, and optimal fingerprint methods. This table provides a summary of the attribution studies considered, along with the method, the uncertainty, the timescale considered etc. You might care to note that Mann is not involved in any of the studies considered.
Of course calling Mann's work a "scientific fraud" is rather unfounded too. You may note, in the chart linked above, that there are many other historical temperature reconstructions, done indepdently by different people, that arrive at a similar result to Mann. There is also the recent National Academy of Sciences report on the subject which concluded, with high confidence, that the earth was the warmest it had been in 400 years, and that while there was less confidence in reconstructions going further back, they still point to the earth undergoing unusual recent warming. On the other hand you have the Chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and an economist and someone from the mining industry claiming it is all bunk. At least McIntyre and McKitrick wrote some semi-respectable papers, though there is considerable dispute about their methodology (at least as much, if not far more, than there is about Mann's).
Let's cast all of that dispute aside however, and assume that Mann was full of crap - that still makes no difference whatsoever to the content of the attribution chapter of the IPCC report I linked to, and which you so very clearly didn't bother to read. I don't mind people having differing opinions, but when they are based on apparently willful ignorance I am a little appalled.
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All the dishonesty that happens with the studies. People cry about the dishonesty and corporate backing that comes from anti-GW studies, but it really doesn't seem to be any better on the pro GW side. It's just not science that's being done in many cases. Science isn't about finding evidence to support your position, it's a process of knowing things and to do it right, you always have to try to prove yourself wrong.
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I think Feynman said it best:
"It's a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty--a kind of leaning over backwards. For example, if you're doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid--not only what you think is right about it: other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you've eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked--to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given, if you know them. You must do the best you can--if you know anything at all wrong, or possibly wrong--to explain it. If you make a theory, for example, and advertise it, or put it out, then you must also put down all the facts that disagree with it, as well as those that agree with it. There is also a more subtle problem. When you have put a lot of ideas together to make an elaborate theory, you want to make sure, when explaining what it fits, that those things it fits are not just the things that gave you the idea for the theory; but that the finished theory makes something else come out right, in addition.
In summary, the idea is to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgement in one particular direction or another."
(http://www.physics.brocku.ca/etc/cargo_cult_scie
This cherry picking of data, downplaying and/or ignoring of contradictory results and such is just not acceptable. It may very well be that there's something to the idea that humans are causing global warming and that it's going to lead to bad things, but the way to prove that is not to use bad science.
Because of all this crap floating around on both sides, I personally have just said "fuck it" in relation to global warming. I'm not looking in to it anymore, I don't know who to believe. I neither believe nor disbelieve the theory. I'll continue to conserve as much as possible in my personal life (biking to work, for example, which I highly recommend) since I believe in conservation for it's own sake and since it makes economic sense (use less, have more). However I'm not going to get all worked up about it because I just can't figure out if there's anything to get all worked up about.
It's interesting you say that - could you provide me a reference for where the IPCC TAR concludes that the changes are "entirely explicable" as natural forcings? When I read through the conclusion of the attribution chapter I don't see anything about natural forcings providing adequate explanations. On the contrary we have
The best I can grant you is: "Natural factors may have contributed to the early century warming." but the warming in the last several decades cannot adequately be attributed to natural factors alone.
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Nonsense.
If the climate change is minor and tolerable, we don't need to do much of anything, even if it's man-made.
If the climate change is going to be catastrophic, we should do something serious about it, even if it is natural.
Whether it's natural or not, has little bearing on whether humans (society) will be able to survive it.
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