Slashdot Mirror
Why Groundwater Use May Not Explain Half of Sea-Level Rise
New submitter Sir Realist writes "A recent Slashdot scoop pointed us at a scientific study that claimed 42% of global sea-level rises could be due to groundwater use. It was a good story. But as is often the way with science, there are folks who interpret the data differently. Scott Johnson at Ars Technica has a good writeup which includes two recent studies that came to remarkably different conclusions from mostly the same data, and an explanation of the assumptions the authors were making that led to those differences. Essentially, there is some reason to think that the groundwater estimates used in the first study were too high. However, that's still under debate, so it's worth reading the whole argument. Scientific review in action!"
So, we can review groundwater/sea-level scientific studies, but 'Climate Change' is a done deal.
Got it...
m
In the immortal words of Socrates, who said; 'I drank what?'
As soon as a politician with no scientific qualifications weighs in, however, I reserve the right to be annoyed.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
We certainly HAVE pumped a lot of groundwater out and I presume most of it ends up in the atmosphere or the oceans one way or the other.
Glad to see REAL scientists questioning AGW tenets.
Ferret
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
I could have told you that 42% 1/2.
The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!
Climate Change has been studied for decades with thousands of studies that keep coming to similar conclusions.
And how many studies have been done on this hypothesis that ground water is the cause of higher sea levels?
When this hypothesis gets a few more studies behind it and mostly come to the same conclusion, then I'll give it the same credence as Global Climate change. I won't hesitate - I have no political, religious or any other dogmatic interest in either; I take that back, I am dogmatic about scientific rigor.
Go carve blocks of ice out of Antarctica and drop them down into massive man-made vertical drops.
The circle of life continues. For another season!
Hurry up and make me King of Existence already.
But really:
1) find hot areas
2) massive mirrors
3) black heat absorber half a meter under the water
4) point mirrored sunlight at the heat absorber
5) capture the steam
6) ????
7) profit.
Hell, even the black heat absorber under the water would do in all honesty. It just needs to be slightly under the surface so more water is likely to fall loose of the rest and fly upwards in the updraft from the rest of the steam.
Funnel all that water in to the deserts and put it through a massive solar tower, comes splashing down over lots of dynamos, free water and power at the same time, sorted.
Just finished the article. These scientists can't even reach a conclusion of how much groundwater was pulled from reservoirs *even when directly measuring it*. Some say 0% loss. Others 40% loss.
And yet these same people claim they can predict the temperature 100 years from now. :-| Riiiight. If they can't get *current* numbers right, even when pulling out their rules and measuring, how can we trust anything they say about the future water level, temperatures, et cetera? The Greeks called this "hubris".
FREE magazine : http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/prior/
Holy smoke batman, the ground doesnt absorb anymore, this must be the work of the joker!
That being said if you believe this so strongly should you not be out spruiking that rainwater tanks for everyone [and greater underground reservoirs] is the only way to stop the sea from covering all the land on the planet, it's not like the corporations are going to stop using ground water amirite and there is alot of ground underneath the ocean that we can take the water out of.
[That the capture is puddling seems somewhat ironic]
The cause of Global Warming is Simple; Humans.
I think a 3rd grader better review all this data, because according to the current grade-school curriculum, water evaporates, condenses into clouds, rains, fills lakes, rivers, aquifers, etc, and then evaporates again in a seemingly recurring cycle.
With global warming, shouldn't the rate of evaporation increase causing more water to evaporate, increasing cloud cover and rain and filling up groundwater reservoirs?
Doesn't more cloud cover block the suns heat thus reducing Global warming?
I know everybody thinks the world is going to sh*t and we are living in Hell and the planet will be destroyed in a matter of decades, but I find it hard to believe that after a few billion years of water evaporating, condensing and raining that suddenly this basic concept of a global ecosystem some-how no longer applies.
If a 3rd grader can just step up figure this sh*t out for us cause obviously the "scientific" community doesn't have a f*cking clue
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
There are massive unknowns in the dataset, and the two groups used different numbers for their estimations. Then they came to different results. It's not surprising.
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To summarize: "We assume that the previous study guessed the wrong data, but we assume that we guessed correctly, since our guess is closer to actual measurements. And when the paper of our objections gets published, we'll find out who made an ass out of whom."
They start with the statement of "It is a scientific fact that global warming is happening," which is true. That the Earth is getting warmer outside of known cycles is a claim of fact, something you can measure, and measurements show it is indeed correct. No problems there.
However the problem then starts that they make a bunch of other claims, such as that if the warming continues Earth will be inhospitable, and so on, and want to claim that is all scientific fact too. No, not so much. That things will get worse would be an assertion or judgement call that would be based on a bunch of theories and hypothesis about what will happen if the warming continues. It is the kind of thing that is actually up for a lot of debate since you have to evaluate all the different theories of what might happen, how well supported they are, and then pass a judgement call as to if it would be better or worse.
Thing is, they present it as just something you have to accept part and parcel. A situation of "If you deny any of this, you are denying the facts." No, not really. Anyone who says the Earth isn't warming is denying facts, unless they can show how the measurements that we use to reach that conclusion are flawed (given the measurements are world wide and spanning a century, it is possible, though unlikely, the conclusion is incorrect). However from that it does not automatically follow that things will be horrible.
We let our lawmakers decide. No need for science, we just pass a law to stop sea level rise from being planned for.
Just goes to show: correlation doesn't imply hydration.
FACT: Earth didn't always have CO2 in atmosphere
FACT: Over time CO2 has increased
FACT: Earth didn't always have complex life
FACT: Over time complex life has increased
THUS: The more CO2 we have in Earth's atmosphere the more abundant and complex life we have.
I'd make you a pretty graph but I'm too lazy, instead I'll describe it: It involves two correlated lines closely mirroring each other upwards.
There take that!
Is that the whole story? Probably not.
Yes, this is scientific review in action.
And it's Slashdotters tagging it with "manbearpig", too. People whose "science" is really "politics" is really "ideology" is really "cartoons" is really stupid. And they have the same vote you do.
--
make install -not war
Have they taken that into account?
Nah, that's just a vagina with hare.
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The "contraversy" started when alternative energies that don't produce much carbon dioxide started to get a foothold in markets and threaten established companies that could afford some highly amoral PR groups.
Geophysics and geology are related to climate science and contain almost exclusively "oil-friendly individuals", yet apart from a small handful of loonies (eg. Plimer) they are not saying what the Heartland Institute is paying for.
Wow, both ignorant AND too immature to own your mistakes. You know... I wasn't born when they discovered and named hydrogen, yet miraculously, I can spell it. But, then... I'm not talking out of my ass, pretending that having an opinion on science is the same as having knowledge.
I don't need your entire life history and temperature records to be able to tell when taking your temperature that you're running a fever.
Ignorant prick.
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