Scientists Surprised to Find Earth's Biosphere Booming

radioweather writes "An article from the Financial Post says that recent studies of biosphere imaging from the NASA SEAWIFS satellite indicate that the Earth's biomass is booming: 'The results surprised Steven Running of the University of Montana and Ramakrishna Nemani of NASA, scientists involved in analyzing the NASA satellite data. They found that over a period of almost two decades, the Earth as a whole became more bountiful by a whopping 6.2%. About 25% of the Earth's vegetated landmass — almost 110 million square kilometers — enjoyed significant increases and only 7% showed significant declines. When the satellite data zooms in, it finds that each square meter of land, on average, now produces almost 500 grams of greenery per year.' Their 2004 study, and other more recent ones, point to the warming of the planet and the presence of CO2, fertilizing the biota and resulting in the increased green side effect."

Comments

Re:The cycle....

[Yetihehe]

Looks like just this will happen. But before CO2 levels decrease, there may be mass extinctions.

Is biodiversity also booming?

[sweet_petunias_full_]

Biodiversity is declining and that's a bad thing even if more weeds are growing in Oshkosh.

The arctic ice pack is melting and that will ultimately change the earth's albedo in a bad way. I don't see much optimism in that, even if some plants in some places grow better due to changing climate conditions.

Re:Is biodiversity also booming?

[Capt James McCarthy]

"you're either delusional or willfully ignorant."

I hate making tough decisions.....I'll go with waiting for science to get all the facts right and remove political/personal agendas.

Re:Is biodiversity also booming?

[synaptic]

Biodiversity is declining and that's a bad thing even if more weeds are growing in Oshkosh. The scientist is quoted in the article saying:

"The extent and diversity of plant and animal life have both increased substantially during the past half-century."

How do you arrive at the conclusion that biodiversity is declining? Have you personally observed this phenomenon and tracked it over time, over the entire planet, somehow better than the scientists with their satellites and field observations?

The arctic ice pack is melting and that will ultimately change the earth's albedo in a bad way. Please help us to understand the methodology that allowed you to reach your conclusions about the Earth's albedo. Could you also define "bad"?

I don't see much optimism in that, even if some plants in some places grow better due to changing climate conditions. I get the impression that you don't see much optimism in anything. If we can cut out the layer of "homo-sapiens-is-a-plague" bias while we continue to observe our biosphere, perhaps we can not jump to conclusions that the sky is falling and we're doomed. Or if we do reach that conclusion, we can take it seriously.

My experience, in the US anyway, is that if you live in a sprawling cityscape, it will seem like the Earth is dying around you at an accelerating pace. Live in a rural area though and you will find that plant and animal life seem to be doing OK.

The biosphere doesn't exist in a vacuum, it's constantly changing and adapting. We are part of our environment and our interaction with it changes it, sometimes in ways that can be considered "bad", sometimes in ways that can be considered "good". It is Heisenberg uncertainty on a macro scale.

Some species have had problems adapting to our activities (or our sheer ignorance), and we're doing some things to try to help those species recover, provided we can exploit the species for food or resources or it is somehow essential to the foodchain for other species we value. In doing so, we may also be condemning the populations of the same species that adapted.

My guess is that there are constant pressures on the climate and there are so many variables involved, we will continue to be surprised at the mechanisms in play and the adaptability of life. Our attempts to predict the outcomes of the change over time for all of these variables is likely to be futile. But we can theorize and then observe. Our attempts to control the environment are almost certainly naive, and quite possibly dangerously so. Should we really take action to prevent the pressure safety valve in the steam engine from opening? Can we accept the possibility of a new normal and the inevitability that we must adapt as a species or die?

Sapiens qui vigilat.

Re:Is biodiversity also booming?

[R2.0]

"science has got the 'facts'. the highest award that scientists give, a nobel prize, have been given to the global warming researchers. nobel committee consist of top of the field, topmost of the top, top of the flock (insert whatever here) scientists, and they dont give out any prizes to doubtable stuff."

Regardless of the reality of global warming, looking to that Nobel Prize as an imprimatur on Global Warming is ludicrous. First, it was the PEACE prize, not a scientific prize, and was awarded by a committee of the Swedish Parliament. Secondt, the Nobel committee broke their own rules in awarding it to more than 3 individuals.

The Peace prize has a long, storied history of being a politically motivated piece of crap; the fact that this time the politics revolved around a scientific topic doesn't make the Swedish Parliament experts at climatology any more than Al Gore became a climatologist after loosing the presidential election.

I smell bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

Quote from article "massive programs in an effort to remove as much as 80% of the carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere.

If these governments are right, they will have done us all a service. If they are wrong, the service could be all ill, with food production dropping world wide, and the countless ecological niches on which living creatures depend stressed."

Bollocks, governments are not removing emissions, they are reducing emissions. Thus we will still keep all the CO2 in the atmosphere, we will just pump less new CO2 into the atmosphere.

Thus the plants can keep growing all they like, we won't be removing their food anytime soon. All we are doing is slowing down the pace at which we are overfeeding them.

corn, wheat, soybeans, rice, are biomass

[0WaitState]

So how much of this increased biomass is due to higher yielding farming techniques over the past 20 years? And how much of the higher farm yield is due to fertilizers from crude oil? (hint, in 1st world countries, you cannot profitably farm bulk crops without oil originated fertilzer)

Re:The cycle....

[MrMr]

And after CO2 levels have decreased, there may be mass extinctions.
Perhaps mass extinction is the preferred process to upgrade the biopshere to cope with new conditions?

Return of the slime

[Ihlosi]

Biodiversity is declining and that's a bad thing even if more weeds are growing in Oshkosh.

That's a good point. I read an article a while ago stating that some parts of the oceans are experiencing a "return of the slime" - the higher life forms are disappearing, while simpler life forms are booming.

Probably not something we want to have. I'd rather have fish and seafood than algae slime, thank you very much.

Re:Return of the slime

[sweet_petunias_full_]

"I'd rather have fish and seafood than algae slime"

If sea levels continue to rise due to global warming, the spawning grounds for many fish will be flushed with excessive salinity which will wipe out those special ecosystems and drop fish stocks worldwide (...already in sharp decline). So as you say, the fish and seafood will be replaced with slime, and there will be more mosquitoes due to the lack of fish hatchlings to eat the mosquito larvae.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise

Biosphere booming indeed.

Twisted Conclusion

[estitabarnak]

An excellent example of taking raw data and jumping to a conclusion. Certainly, if the numbers show that plant biomass is up, then biomass could very well be up, but is that a good thing?

This does not take in to account bioDIVERSITY. While we may be increasing crop density, causing giant algol blooms, is monoculture something that we really want?

You can introduce an exotic species of grass to populations in the Moaje desert which are extremely prone to burning, but will grow back from the ground. All of the native plants, which are not accustomed to fires die off. What you're left with is an exotic grass that any number of animal species may need be able to utilize. Destroy biodiversity at the bottom and everything above it falls apart.

Same goes for giant algae blooms in the Gulf of Mexico due to high nitrogen runoff from agriculture. Sure there's a metric fuck-ton of algae growing there, but at what cost? If the death of every other living thing (or nigh on) in the surrounding area is good, then... great!

Furthurmore, last time I checked, Carbon was not exactly a limiting factor in plant growth. I've seen plants die from pH, salt poisoning, incorrect water levels, heat, cold, you name it. However, I don't think I've ever seen a plant suffer from lack of CO2.

In short: To say that plant biomass alone accounts for a healthy ecosystem and that increased carbon levels confers from magical "nutrients" to plants is far-fetched at best.

Re:So now we have the

[Xiroth]

Ya know, this is exactly the thing that shits me to tears about the whole greenhouse debate. Those who've been saying that we might want to do something about the greenhouse effect before it's too late have been characterised as leftist loonies who care more about the planet and other animals than humans and human civilisation. In some cases they're right - there is a liberal dose of the usual extremist greenie suspects in the climate change movement - but I really wonder whether those people actually know what they're fighting for. Because, frankly, the stated aims of environmentalists - improving the forests, saving the fuzzy animals, and so on, is actually served by the increasing CO2 in the atmosphere, as plants grow better in richer CO2 atmospheres and that leads to a stronger biosphere all round. By and large, there's very few better things we could have done with our intelligence for the continuance of life on Earth than releasing all of the trapped CO2 back into the atmosphere so that it can be used again.

The only species that are going to really be adversely affected by this sort of change are those who have set up permanent settlements right next to the water and can't easily retreat further inland as the water rises. Or has critical infrastructure that can be easily destroyed by hurricanes and tornadoes as the weather becomes more chaotic. Or relies on things staying the same, year in, year out, just because they have been for the last 200 years. Such a species would really be fucked by this sort of a change. One only hopes they wouldn't be stupid enough to cause it.

We're not doing this for the planet. We're not doing this for the plants, or even the fuzzy animals. We're doing it for us. Because if you look at the cold hard facts, we really don't have any other choices worth a damn.

I'm a moderate rightist, and I approve this message.

Re:So now we have the

[slim]

Because, frankly, the stated aims of environmentalists - improving the forests, saving the fuzzy animals, and so on, Where have you found these "stated aims"?

Most of the climate speculation I've seen concentrates on very human-centric concerns such as food production, extreme weather and the effect of rising sea levels on major cities.

Re:So now we have the

[FeepingCreature]

My personal take on it is that the Earth is a very complex system with interactions that still aren't nearly fully understood, and since it's kinda the only living room we have, it would be wise to keep our interference as low as we can, until we have attained a much more .. certain understanding.

Re:So now we have the

[erroneus]

I can't believe any scientists are surprised by the result of increased green in the presence of increased CO2. That's generally how it works. What I don't see is any break-down indicating that increased green is contributing to any increases in oxygen production or otherwise any consumption or reduction of CO2.

It has been observed through various forms of evidence that the earth has indeed cycled in this way many times. This event is significant, however, as evidenced by the melting of ice that hasn't been in liquid form for several cycles. If I understand and have read things correctly, then this is a melting of ice that has been in a frozen state for more than 5 million years. So while it's arguable that the earth naturally goes through these cycles, it's also evident that these cycles are responsible for mass extinction events on the planet.

So who cares?

1. If you care about "the planet" only, then you are pretty comfortable in knowing that the planet will be just fine. It has seen changes like these before and will not suffer or become lifeless as a result of this.

2. If you care about our current planetary ecosystem, then you are right to be concerned as it seems evident that it is being changed irreversibly. There is such a great depth to how inter-twined we are with the environment, that it is hard not to believe that any major change in the environment will not lead to a mass extinction event especially a mass extinction of humans. (If someone were to create a food substance completely out of raw, non-living minerals, then perhaps humans could stand a chance at survival.) (The very notion that only life in areas where the sea level changes is ridiculous and fails to account for other realities surrounding the change in sea level. There is, for example, the change in water temperature which has a direct connection with the patterns and intensity of weather events such as hurricanes. These weather changes are global, not only coastal. These weather changes affect the balance of plant and animal life which will inevitably lead to the rise of some and the fall of others, but consider what it means when the bees die... and they are dying. When the bees die, the stuff we depend on to make food dies with them. We will follow soon after we run out of food.)

3. If the question of cause or blame is important to you, then I believe the circumstantial evidence supports the notion that humans are responsible for what it going on.

Ultimately, I believe humans are responsible for what is going on and could stop this any time we are prepared to value life over profit. At every level, however, we're prepared to kill for money... kill for control over our own destiny. Isn't it ironic that its the human desire and instinct to dominate and control that will likely destroy us?

I love technology. I couldn't know what I know or learn what I may learn without it. I couldn't write this here without it. I'm contributing to our own demise simply by not giving up my own technology, quitting my job, destroying my car and living naked in the woods somewhere. But then, I'm just a drone like the majority of us. We're in no position to make those kinds of changes. It is the other classes of people who are in a position to make a change and their willingness to make changes...more specifically, to give up their existing business models in favor of those that will support the existence of humans. (For example, the airline industry should REALLY consider using their enormous profits to evolve into massive rail projects that can run on power sources other than those that emit greenhouse gasses. And the automotive industry should put currently known technologies to use.) We already know what is possible. We just aren't doing it. The market mentality drives us and even requires us by law to destroy ourselves for profit.

The stock market is not a maintainable model. In theory, it should be a reflection of supply and demand. In reality, it is driven by guesses, fears

Re:So now we have the

[Anonymous Coward]

You've giving credit to Gaia? Oh come on, that's not an explanation -- that's an invisible hand. It's as silly as explaining the planetary orbits by saying that "god did it". It's a non-explanation -- there's nothing to understand in your answer, there's no depth.

And will you have faith that "Gaia" will solve a future dilemma? How will you know? Will you take it on faith again?

Bah, humbug. What a mis-explanation.

Re:So now we have the

[baboo_jackal]

unless the Israelis start WWIII
Is there some corollary to Godwin's law that I don't know about? "As a Slashdot discussion grows longer, the probability that someone will randomly blame Jews for some imaginary travesty approaches one," or something like that?

Get a grip.

Re:So now we have the

[OeLeWaPpErKe]

Oh nice attempt at changing the subject. Actually only the peak-oil loonies are on about food production. "extreme weather" and rising sea levels is mostly the Goracle and the IPCC (let's bribe scientists, and when that stopped working, let's threathen them). Everybody else is still in denial, and I don't see all that much change in that.

Besides the only solution for the food and oil problem is "lowering the world's population". As they are about to realise that lowering birth rates won't work, people really need to die, I expect to hear VERY bad things from the "peak-oil" and greenhouse loonies anytime now.

Besides if you were really worried about food production (= oil imports) you wouldn't be a lefty these days, nor an environmentalist.

Then again the way Obama ("let's sue opec !", "let's drop defenses around saudi arabia unless they deliver 1 mbpd more oil") is harping on about oil, it seems to me the democrats are actually more likely to start the next oil war than the republicans.

And for gaia as an organisation at least it really is about the fuzzy animals, I assume you'd consider them environmentalists :

"What is GAIA?

GAIA, or Global Action in the Interest of Animals, unites human defenders of animal welfare and advocates for animal rights in Belgium."

http://www.gaia.be/eng/

(on gaia.com I was unable to find any stated aims, and this was the first hit on google for "gaia aims", since this does describe itself as part of gaia international, I assume it's the same aims)

Re:meh...

[thermian]

What level of catatastrophe has to befall us before you'll consider the case "proven?"

If he's like most people, it will have to cause noticeable damage within a few miles of his house.

Anything else is 'someone elses problem'

Re:The cycle....

[Socguy]

More CO2 => increased temperatures => more greenery => more CO2 absorption => decreased temperatures? More CO2 => increased temperatures => more greenery => more CO2 absorption => more biomass to decompose => more CO2 => increased temperatures

The trouble with digging up carbon and burning it, is that you're adding it to what is essentially a closed loop cycle. This leads to changes in climate and impacts life all over the planet. The more you alter the environment, the bigger the change in the inhabitants of that environment.

Re:So now we have the

[c6gunner]

Maybe you're a little too sensitive, especially as the GP was probably referring to the recent direct threats to sovereign nations that Israeli leadership was making in the last few days. Threats of military action.

lol

In case you haven't noticed, those "soverign nations" have been making threats against Israel for about six decades now...

I guess you just don't take Arabs seriously, huh?

Russia and Canada are the winners in this game

[Anonymous Coward]

There are two countries that have everything to gain from this warming, Canada and Russia. For the most part, they will not suffer from desertification like the USA, but they will benefit greatly from the limits of agriculture moving steadily northward. And in both countries, the huge forests will produce 6% more wood than a few years ago. Of the two, Russia is in the better position with bigger oil reserves compared to Canada's tarsands, and with a larger educated population that can leverage the benefits of being resource rich. Also, China is a resource poor country when you factor in its population size, but this market is much easier for Russia to reach than for Canada.

Couple this with political factors such as former Soviet countries now full members of the EU, increasing cooperation between the EU and former Soviet countries in Asia, Russia applying the EU model in a building up a dozen treaty organizations throughout former Soviet countries and beyond, and you have the makings of a real superpower. The hawkish position of many American politicians is the fuel that spurs Russia to take this road.

Broad brush...

[Slur]

Personally, I am concerned about the survival of as many life forms as possible, all of whom are being affected by Homo sapiens stomping blindly, willy-nilly all over the place, many spouting selfish bullshit like yours, eating up the world and being smug and self-satisfied with their designer beer. Whatever "favors" we may be doing by releasing carbon into the atmosphere are more than mediated by the fact that we are as a collective quite an ugly phenomenon vis a vis the rest of the biosphere.

Think of everything that life has learned up to now. It's all in the DNA. The DNA is everything life has learned about surviving and prospering and experiencing itself and the universe around. Evolved over billions of years, invaluable, irreplaceable information that interacts to sustain life. We are erasing that information, burning it up. We're not making a backup, and it sounds like you're saying it doesn't matter, it'll all work out in the end so it doesn't matter what we do. That's utter crap, because it does matter. It matters because what we do defines us, and as I look around, it seems that what we humans consider valuable runs quite counter to that which upholds the biosphere that sustains all life.

To me it seems like nothing less than a deep imperative to be concerned about all life and to treat all species as our beloved friends. At any rate, we should not dismiss every other species with banal cartoon characterizations like "fuzzy animals." Sure, you'll find plenty of people who'll pat you on your clever head for that one, but the biosphere is giving you the finger, pal. Life happens to be full, profound, and challenging for all living beings, whether you consider them cute, fuzzy, and ridiculous or not. To dismiss the deep experience of every other species, while exalting our own relatively banal imitation of life is hilarious to behold.

You should endeavor to give the deepest possible respect to all living beings. It may lead you to a deeper appreciation of life, where your concerns aren't bound purely by stylistic considerations: how large, how many fingers and toes, whether the being is fuzzy or "cute" or ugly, whether it can do calculus or get voted off American Idol.

Until you as a person give up your thoughtless species-oriented prejudices, you limit your access to the living world, make everything about "us" and "them," focus on differences, make life a war and a struggle, and closed off in a homo-sapien bubble.

You don't have to make it such an adversarial thing between you and those like me who are trying to love more broadly, but I can understand that some people prefer it that way, because they feel reasonably comfortable that they have the upper hand.

Well, congratulations on your hard-won success!

It just sounds like all you care about is you and yours, and you've got a very limited idea of who fits in that little group. Why would you not try to be an advocate for as many beings as possible? Most higher animals are quite helpless and oblivious in the face of all our madness, and without the intervention of concerned humans, they have no hope. Aren't the helpless, the voiceless, and the downtrodden exactly those who need us to wake up and work harder for them?

I mean, if you feel contempt or indifference towards the helpless.... well it has a fascist kind of spirit, doesn't it?

Re:So now we have the

[aurispector]

Remember, on the internet black is white, good is evil, zero is one, etc..

Re:Author with an Agenda

[Ktulu_03]

So what? Pro-global warming scientists certainly have an agenda to prove that warming does exist, to keep the grant money flowing. Al Gore certainly has an agenda, to keep promoting global warming, so that the carbon credits keep coming in, so that his movies/books keep selling. All sides in this are tainted by money, and this whole issue has created an industry around it. Everyone's trying to get their slice of it.

Re:So now we have the

[hey!]

If I disassembled you into your component cells, I could probably select a certain tissue -- let's say skin, and create a cell culture weighing several thousand kilograms.

Does that sound like an attractive proposition?

It's all about information. The quality of your life is not encoded in your biomass -- although your cultured self might disagree, if it had anything to think with.

This reminds me of a course I took in neuroscience in which we learned that after certain kinds of brain trauma, the forms new connections in the affected area. We all felt warm and fuzzy about the Wisdom of Evolution encoded in our DNA, until it was pointed out that the new connections were actually malfunctions. Brain function would be better preserved if the new connections were suppressed, than having it rewired by the local cells, which don't really know what the hell they are doing.

Anthropocentrism has its place. but not in determining what the natural world is up to. You are prefectly free to believe that the highest use of the natural world is the care and feeding of humans, and maximizing their amusements. But the natural world doesn't take any notice of that opinion. All things being equal, we humans prefer an ocean that is richly stocked with finned fish and full of things like coral reefs. However is conditions are bad for fish or reef building organism, Gaia can always fall back on generating algal mats. An ocean choked with algal slime would not be to most of our likings at all, although perhaps to yours because it would probably contain more biomass.

Concepts like "damage" and "disaster" are purely human opinions about matters; brain cells or ocean algae simply do what life does: they adapt. The idea that Nature in Her Wisdom intervenes to protect us from our own actions is rubbish. This is the junk religion part of the Gaia hypothesis, the romantic anthropomorphizing of what is basically a gigantic machine for maximizing entropy. Nature adjusts, and most adjustments are not going to be our liking.

What any single species "likes" is to encounter favorable conditions for growth and reproduction. However, since even the resources of the entire planet are limited, it doesn't get favorable conditions forever. It either overshoots its carrying capacity, or it settles into an equilibrium with other species. Even humans, the most adaptable of species, are no different. The difference is we can understand the consequences of our actions, and therefore we can choose which of these fates we will experience.

A species that can live on everything from African veldt to arctic permafrost, from the Amazonian rain forest to the Tibetan plateau, such a species will never go extinct. At least not so long as the Sun shines, and possibly longer than that. But our species can experience population decline. This is a perfectly normal event in the history of the biosphere, but it will be for us a "disaster".

"Disaster", after all, is just our species' word for something that is perfectly predictable, but only statistically so. Since it is "only statistically probable", we assume it's somebody else's job to deal with it when it happens and put everything back to "normal" afterwards. They can prepare for it if they like, so long as it doesn't cost money or require us to make any effort whatsoever.

If you are conservative, you can choose to be one of two kinds of conservative: one who wants to keep things more or less as they have been, or one who wants to keep doing things more or less the same way we always have. You can't claim that they are both the same thing, not without the intervention of a Benevolent Agency. Things aren't to rosy on that front either, since I seem to recall that Benevolent Agencies are often quite keen on meting out mandatory change on people who aren't so keen on mending their ways.

In a nutshell, Nature doesn't care about us, because it doesn't even know we exist, apart from being an bag of c

Not a Jew...

[PortHaven]

But I have this to say... you're a blatant biased pig.

I mean, you're getting on the case of a sovereign nation Israel threatening military surgical strikes against a nuclear weapons program at a neighboring sovereign nation that keeps expressing the intent to destroy their neighbor Israel.

You are the same sort of idiot as some of my elementary school teachers were who believed that the kid being picked on by bullies was just as much to blame as the bully and therefore should be suspended.

No, you'll raise your voice to decry Israel for their statements, but sit back and blindly ignore Iran's statements.

Sorry, you're thinking is just great for college classrooms. But gets people killed in the real world. Why don't you go put a "Free Tibet" bumper sticker on your car. Cause we all know that's going to help free Tibet.

No fecal matter for skull filling...

[PortHaven]

You missed the several thousand articles about Iran declaring their intent to wipe Israel and every Jew off the face of the planet.

And the fact that they are actively engaged in weapons development programs toward the accomplishment of that fact.

Or the fact that this will be one of a number of times the world has silently thanked Israel. You see, the chicken powers (U.S., U.K., Russia, France, etc) sit back going "We REALLY do not want this nutcase to have nukes. But we'll cause an international incident if we act. Let's just wait and see - knowing Israel will have to act since they're the target."

And then Israel does a surgical strike. The world condemns them publicly and thanks them behind closed doors for doing what none of us western nations have the balls to do.

Re:Leftist?

[nbates]

Only poor people has hard-earned money. Most middle to upper class people usually have to do some office job, sitting on a comfortable room with air conditioner or heating systems and then driving home in your own car. You may end your day with some headaches, but you don't end your day with actual bruises (like people working on fields, mines or construction sites).

The more money you have, the more pleasant is doing your job. As you get better payed jobs you also get the better office and better non-monetary retributions.

I agree that it is harder to GET better jobs, it is harder to GET to a place where you are payed more. But you don't end up doing HARDER work, you may work hard, but people that's under you is working hard too, only that in worst conditions.

So I think the rule is:

Poor people: hard-earned money
Rich people: hard-earned jobs

But I understand your position, games are always fun when you are winning. I also have one of those hard-to-earn jobs... I work at home, with a laptop, usually from bed or sitting on a nice chair on my garden.... while my cleaning lady has to spend her day going from house to house cleaning other people's shit.

So, when what I'm saying is three things:

1. Don't loose perspective of the place you stand compared to other people.
2. Don't say poor people doesn't work, or works less than you do.
3. Everyone is needed in society, everyone deserves to be recognized.

--
We are all Anonymous Cowards when online.

Re:So now we have the

[d3ac0n]

I think many alarmists forget that Earth was once significantly warmer than it is now, and had significantly higher levels of atmospheric CO2 than it has now. Was the Earth a desert? Hardly. The Earth was an even greater oasis of life than it is now. The warm Earth gave us the dinosaurs, and all the massive vegetation required to support such enormous animals.

After the death of the Dinosaurs and the rise of Mammals we have gone through several Ice and Warm ages, as our planet naturally swings back and forth from one temperature extreme to the other. We are still living within these natural trends, which we puny humans are powerless to stop or alter in any way. Indeed, we are as helpless as the Dinosaurs before the Natural forces at work on our world.

We shouldn't fear the changes, merely work to ensure that our societies and economies are as strong as possible so that we can weather the changes, adapt, and come out stronger than before. This is why I oppose ALL of the proposed "solutions" to the "anthropogenic climate change" hoax. EVERY ONE of them, without exception, leaves us in a weaker position to weather change than if we did not follow them. They all propose some sort of socialistic or communistic top-down managed approach, FORCING people to alter their lifestyles in some vain attempt to "live green". What a farce.

The plant suffocation cycle

[emil]

From what I've read, current CO2 levels are at the low end of what plant life can tolerate.

When dinosaurs walked the earth (about 70 to 130 million
years ago), there was from five to ten times more CO2 in the atmosphere
than today. The resulting abundant plant life allowed the huge creatures
to thrive. . . . Based on nearly 800 scientific observations around the
world, a doubling of CO2 from present levels would improve plant
productivity on average by 32 percent across species.

Past CO2 levels have been documented in peer-reviewed journals:

We find that CO2 emissions resulting from super-plume
tectonics could have produced atmospheric CO2 levels from 3.7 to 14.7
times the modern pre-industrial value of 285 ppm.

This discussion may prove enlightening:

We are talking about carbon dioxide levels 6 to 10 times
the present carbon dioxide level. When you have high amounts of carbon
dioxide in an atmosphere up to a certain limit, which is considerably
higher than it is now, the result is green plants grow very much better...
And it is precisely at this time that the recovery from the first dinosaur
extinction takes place. When the super plumes come and carbon dioxide
increases, and the oxygen correspondingly increases as a result of
photosynthesis... And yet the super plumes did not last forever and they
started to die at the end of Cretaceous.... In any event, large dinosaurs
really required to be living in an oxygen tent. An atmosphere in the
neighborhood of 35 percent oxygen would be considerably more compatible
with large dinosaurs than one in the neighborhood of 28. And so this
suggested to me that this was perhaps a significant reason for the first
dinosaur extinction, and probably one of the major factors in the second,
the terminal dinosaur extinction, other than the birds. It also neatly
tied together all of the really bizarre features about the Cretaceous...
The Cretaceous is clearly a green house period as opposed to the present
ice house that we have... Well, the rich carbon dioxide of course provides
for a much greater biogenic diversity.

Re:Leftist?

[electroniceric]

Your "hard-earned money" was brought you by all the infrastructure that the taxes "taken from you" by "force" provide. Or perhaps you prefer feudal warlordism as your form of government.

The mantra of "I should get to keep every penny I ever see" is beyond dated now, and it was petulant, and shortsighted to begin with. The things that make your life (including working hard to earn money) all come from a massive physical, legal, and social infrastructure. I have tried for a long time to keep away from the conclusion that people who espouse it are fundementally unaware of how much is being provided for them as a baseline, but I am inevitably stunned by the naivete to think that things run themselves.

And this is why righties continuous fail to find that magical pot of government waste that allows them to drown the government in the bathtub. It ain't there, because people like the services they receive: law enforcement, publicly accessible schools, roads, hospitals. Small-fry investors/mutual fund buyers like having their markets policed from rampant cheats and liars. People like military operations that defend them and support the global market infrastructure (provided they're not misconceived Napoleonesque military adventurism). And every last one of those activities costs money. So start talking to me about the sewers you don't want built, or the drug and medical device regulations you don't want (so any old $5.75/hr schmoe can dose you with X-rays) or the fishing permits you shouldn't have to get so anyone can dynamite all the fish out of a stream, or the defense contracts you don't want to pay for (there's a real bargain...), and anything you think you can convince a million of your neighbors that the government should never do. Let me know when you've got that list done.

It's evident that plenty of government spending is larded with graft, patronage, dumb ideas, and political posturing. But frankly, that's at least as true in any corporate setting as in the government, and that's supposed to be a virtue because, you know, the Free Market Fairy loves her some corporations and hates her some government. I actually do believe that public entities have a special obligation to spend money conservatively and wisely, since that money represents trust by the people at large. But that kind of good government with wise investment and stewardship of public resources nearly orthogonal to the vision the so-called Free Marketeers lay out (until, of course, their Bears Stearns collapse is upon them at which point they run mewling to the teat of the government they so despise).

This is an engineering site - we work in goals and tradeoffs, not things we don't like and the free lunch we wish was there. So let's talk public policy and real goals and real constraints - that's a debate well worth having.

Re:So now we have the

[GeffDE]

The reason that informed people are worried about global warming is not a fear that all life on Earth will die if it gets too hot. It is really freaking hard to destroy Earth. What gets informed people (i.e. people not being spoon-fed tripe from cable news and alarmist media outlets) scared is that the global warming induces climate change and that climate change and associated events can have a severe impact on human civilization.

An obvious example is that melting ice caps will raise ocean levels; a large portion of human civilization is centered on coastal cities that will be flooded by raised ocean levels, and thus global warming can have a huge impact on society and humans in general. A more non-obvious effect is that climates with large "breadbaskets" may change, thereby significantly reducing the amount of food that can be produced there; considering that many people are already starving in the world, any reduction in food production will lead to many deaths. Also consider that increased temperatures lead to a wider variability in weather, leading to more damaging hurricanes or blizzards.

Those are changes that should be feared because there is no way that human civilization can weather those changes in a graceful manner. Any of those changes will bring about massive need for change (especially if coastal cities get flooded; the huge increase in refugees would overload the infrastructure of any region they relocate too); adapting to avoid these calamities is not currently feasible or would take too long before the effects are projected to be felt. Solutions to anthropogenic climate change (ACC) are predicated on the belief that 1) human output of CO2 is having an effect on the global CO2 levels and thus the global climate in a way that is adverse to human civilization and 2) that reducing the anthropogenic component of climate change will make it easier to deal with any climate change that happens naturally.

Looking at this objectively, it is true that we as a civilization are fucked if the climate changes dramatically. Individuals will most likely survive, and probably in good number considering the wide variety of climates humans already successfully live in. However, the infrastructure that everyone takes for granted could be obliterated by severe change. It obviously needs to be fortified and I couldn't agree more with you about that. However, those changes cannot be enacted and implementing in a short timescale because they are radical changes (our infrastructure is pretty damn rickety). The idea of mitigating the effect of ACC is by doing so, we are buying ourselves more time to implement the changes necessary to ensure that our infrastructure survives. Decentralizing power generation (which "going green" with windmills or other non-fossil fuel burning power generation techniques) both reduces the impact of ACC and fortifies the infrastructure.

So really, I don't buy that reducing ACC is a bad thing, and I don't think that it's a farce to hold people responsible for their actions when their actions impact the lives of other people. I mean, good, exemplar democracies like the US of A have been FORCING people to alter their lifestyles for over 100 years: polygamy is outlawed, as are various psychotropic drugs; the Eisenhower Interstate system realized a radical change in lifestyle (the rise of the exurbs, the fall of trains, etc. Every decision from a governing body has the effect of radically altering lifestyles; that doesn't make all governing bodies communistic or socialistic.