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Koch Bros Study Finds Global Warming Is Real And Man-Made
bledri writes "The results of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature are in and Richard Muller, the study's director (formerly an AGW skeptic) declares, 'Call me a converted skeptic. Three years ago I identified problems in previous climate studies that, in my mind, threw doubt on the very existence of global warming. Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.'
The study was funded by the Folger Fund, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, the Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (created by Bill Gates), the Bowes Foundation, the Koch Foundation, and the Getty Foundation."
isnt that special
...is global warming good or bad.
For some it will be good. For some bad. The diversity of life has historically increased with warming. Coastal cities won't like a sea level rise though.
A dollar for your dick!
The warming trend is happening since the last mini- ice age (around 1750); this trend is nothing to get excited about. If you want to prove Man-Made Global Warming you have to specify which part of this warming trend is unusual and likely man-made. This study did not do that.
But we have caused both a reduction and then an increase.
Reduction was killing off so many animals.
Increase was plastering the entire planet in dark material. AKA tars, roads, dark sidewalks, etc.
Also killing off far more oxygenators such as trees, and increasing CO2 production.
Our increase of CO2 is still far below any volcano or even mass-scale wildfires that happened before we manually burned forests to prevent them spreading so far. (we only screw up with that occasionally and fires grow out of control)
In fact, given how many animals we have killed off, especially the larger ones, we probably slowed down the process overall.
We should, going by core samples alone, be more-or-less in the beginnings of another ice age right at this moment. Nope, we are still in the climate warming stages. Sea-water currents are still very stable.
But whether or not we have damaged the planet, or helped it, by slowing down this process is another question.
We could well cause the core to slow down, causing all kinds of havoc. We could cause it to speed up, equally causing havoc.
We could cause a run-away greenhouse effect similar to Venus.
We could cause a permafrost that actually is a permafrost, not just some lying permafrost who wants to be all cool and stuff.
All we know is we were involved, but it isn't something we done. Climate change has happened several times before. It will happen again with or without us.
AFAIK The Koch Foundation isn't the same as the Koch Brothers (the folks who donate to conservative political candidates.)
Bark less. Wag more.
Those of us who live along coastal cities are f*cked. If more evidence turns up to support man-made global climate change, and the ocean levels rise, then climate deniers in congress and the senate should have to pay to relocate everyone living in coastal cities. Fair is fair but, it won't work out that way. -- Without coastal cities, import/export trade and many industries the nation relies on will be crippled. It could very possibly crush the economy and destroy civilization as we know it.
The Koch Brothers were among several funders, some of whom actually had decent motives. For example, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab are not partisan conservatives. And FICER (the Gates-funded organization) actively depends on global warming existing, because their whole raison d'etre is pushing geoengineering as a solution, which would obviously be unnecessary if there were no problem for geoengineering to solve.
In fact that's probably why the outcome was actually scientifically legit: it was a study by actual scientists with a fairly broad set of backers, done at a university rather than in the private sector.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
TFS obviously tries to throw the results of this study back in the Koch Foundation's face, by singling them out when the study was funded by numerous other groups. It's just another insufferable "I told you so", which we can all relate to as making people cling ever more tightly to their beliefs or just refuse to change their ways for spite.
So wouldn't it make more sense first to sit back and see if the Koch brothers become converted skeptics like Muller? Imagine having their billions behind efforts to advance alternative energy.
(Bjorn Lomborg) as two prominent if not THE most prominent AGW skeptics to change their minds. (I've heard of these guys and if I've heard of them, since I'm not a specialist, I figure they must be prominent).
So what's it going to take? Convincing every last person that this isn't real? That's going to be pretty damned impossible because as Upton Sinclair wrote: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.". Substitute the word "salary" with "lifestyle" (or even "SUV") and you'll see how the average American thinks.
I've read that a ten percentage increase in electrical costs would be enough to sequester all the CO2 we're currently emitting. So the fact that a ten percentage increase in something that is not a big item in the average American budget is keeping us from potentially preventing great harm to our ecology, biosphere and a great number of species on this planet (including us!) makes me realize that we will deserve the hell on earth we get.
Weather and climate related reports and articles are missing key informations.
Please do your own calculation, cross-references and double check, triple check of numbers and info.
Earth Magnetic Poles shifted 400 Miles in the last 11 years (some 800 miles in last 100 years): real cause for changing weather patterns, not Carbon Dioxide (CO2). North America shifting South. Northern Europe shifting North.
Here are some info:
---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Magnetic_Pole
The North Magnetic Pole moves over time due to magnetic changes in the Earth's core.[1] In 2001, it was determined by the Geological Survey of Canada to lie near Ellesmere Island in northern Canada at 81.3ÂN 110.8ÂW. It was situated at 83.1ÂN 117.8ÂW in 2005. In 2009, while still situated within the Canadian Arctic territorial claim at 84.9ÂN 131.0ÂW,[2] it was moving toward Russia at between 34 and 37 mi (55-60 km) per year.[3] As of 2012, the pole is projected to have moved beyond the Canadian Arctic territorial claim to 85.9ÂN 147.0ÂW.
---
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/12/1215_051215_north_pole.html
North Magnetic Pole Is Shifting Rapidly Toward Russia
December 15, 2005
New research shows the pole moving at rapid clipâ"25 miles (40 kilometers) a year.
Over the past century the pole has moved 685 miles (1,100 kilometers) from Arctic Canada toward Siberia, says Joe Stoner, a paleomagnetist at Oregon State University.
---
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2003/29dec_magneticfield/
Earth's Inconstant Magnetic Field
The pole kept going during the 20th century, north at an average speed of 10 km per year, lately accelerating "to 40 km per year," says Newitt. At this rate it will exit North America and reach Siberia in a few decades.
---
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap020818.html
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Indicated in the above picture is Ellef Ringnes Island, the location of Earth's North Magnetic Pole in 1999.
--- --- ---
Now the reasoning part...
Distance between 2001 and 2012 coordinates of the "Earth magnetic North pole":
81.3ÂN 110.8ÂW (2001)
85.9ÂN 147.0ÂW (2012)
is about 401.9 Miles, or 646.9 Km. That's an average of 36.5 miles per year for the last 11 years. 36.5 miles per year is about 1 mile for every 10 days. Imagine your house moves 1 mile every 10 days, that's quite a distance.
North America is shifted South, a rough estimate from a map, 400 miles is about distance between these cities:
Quebec -- New York city.
New York city -- Atlanta/Savanah.
San Francisco -- San Diego/Tiejuana.
Again, back in 2005, "Over the past century the pole has moved 685 miles (1,100 kilometers)". Which means for 2012, over the past century the Magnetic North Pole would have moved away from Canda and the USA some 800 miles. Which is about the distance of:
Washingon DC -- Fort Lauderdale
When people claim the weather has been the worst on record of the last 50 years, or 100 years, they don't even know that the comparison is invalid. The location they are now in North America is well over 800 miles South of where they were 100 years ago. Comparing such records with a city
Anyhoo - the more people on _both_ sides of the argument who actually look at the data rather than just attack the conclusions, the better for everybody concerned.
Please remain calm, there is no reason to pani... wait, where are you all going?
This DVD goes over the planet's natural warming and cooling cycles in great detail, says humans account for less than 2% of global CO2 emissions (most comes from nature), and exposes the political nature of the IPCC and how they cook their pseudo-science for the political outcome they are pushing.
http://www.globalwarmingclassroom.info/
Debate is healthy, and I think anyone who is absolutely convinced that man is responsible for global warming should at least watch this documentary to see if it changes their mind, and if not point out exact flaws. This DVD has me convinced that man is not responsible and we are experiencing natural planetary cycles.
Richard Muller is a lot of things (a fairly good scientist for one), and the press keeps insisting he's a "former skeptic," but nobody seems to be able to find anything he's ever said that put him in the "skeptic" camp...
I was confused. I am prepared to believe the Koch Foundation on this because I think Global Warming exists and we are the primary cause of it. We would be the solution but I don't think we can ever organize ourselves enough to solve the problem - politicians think too shortterm and only want to be reelected. Pushing policies that will be unpopular with their constituents and their supporters (Corporations) will not result in reelection.
I think that people who believe the Koch Brothers on anything are being suckered - i.e. they are "Koch Suckers" :)
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
Soon we will engage in apocalyptic greed, panic and defensiveness. Stock up on canned and dry foods... and ammo.
Step one was to deny it was real. Now we are on step two: admit it is real but that it is too expensive for us to fight it. Step three is to build another mansion on higher ground and put in larger A/C units.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Thanks for that. One thing, though -- some massive melting we are seeing goes WAY beyond typical cycles and goes into melting ice formed long before the first animals walked the earth.
I don't care about the cause. I care more about the solution. We're looking at a global extinction event and I'd like man to be able to survive it.
Global warming will also destroy crop yields - just look at the corn yield THIS YEAR.
which will affect beef production/
Global Warming will also affect fisheries. Between GW and over fishing around the World, we're going to see some real devastation there - and fisheries around the World are already in trouble. That's why you keep seeing new and different species of fish behind the counter - the other ones have been almost wiped out. (Farmed fish is an environmental and nutritional joke. But that's for another time.)
See, that's the thing that annoys me. Just about all of the "debate" in the popular media about global warming is about "lifestyle", taxes, nationalism, ... everything but food supply except when it comes to ethanol. (The corn lobby needs to be destroyed. Farm subsidies mostly enrich Cargil, Monsano, Tyson, and other huge corporate food processors. It lowers input their costs.)
So, while the general public is being distracted my non-issues about GW like losing control of our government to the UN, higher taxes and other non-sense, the folks who are profiting dearly from our current policies are getting away scott free.
And the above is just ONE facet of the true forces behind the issue.
Well, OK, but what are we going to do about it? Nuclear? Fracking gas?
Or will we keep throwing money at Democrat fundraisers while blocking productive solutions?
I just don't care, either way. AGW or not, there are much more important things in my life to worry about.
"How definite is the attribution to humans? The carbon dioxide curve gives a better match than anything else we’ve tried. Its magnitude is consistent with the calculated greenhouse effect — extra warming from trapped heat radiation. These facts don’t prove causality and they shouldn’t end skepticism, but they raise the bar: to be considered seriously, an alternative explanation must match the data at least as well as carbon dioxide does. "
Which has pretty much been my position for a long time now. Correlation != Causation, and while therefore we have enough to go on to start taking action, we can't treat AGW like a religion. Universities can't defund people who question the status quo. We do need to keep validating this further and explaining the causality better.
Weather and climate related reports and articles are missing key informations.
Please do your own calculation, cross-references and double check, triple check of numbers and info.
Earth Magnetic Poles shifted 400 Miles in the last 11 years (some 800 miles in last 100 years): real cause for changing weather patterns, not Carbon Dioxide (CO2). North America shifting South. Northern Europe shifting North.
Here are some info:
---
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Magnetic_Pole
The North Magnetic Pole moves over time due to magnetic changes in the Earth's core.[1] In 2001, it was determined by the Geological Survey of Canada to lie near Ellesmere Island in northern Canada at 81.3ÂN 110.8ÂW. It was situated at 83.1ÂN 117.8ÂW in 2005. In 2009, while still situated within the Canadian Arctic territorial claim at 84.9ÂN 131.0ÂW,[2] it was moving toward Russia at between 34 and 37 mi (55-60 km) per year.[3] As of 2012, the pole is projected to have moved beyond the Canadian Arctic territorial claim to 85.9ÂN 147.0ÂW.
---
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/12/1215_051215_north_pole.html
North Magnetic Pole Is Shifting Rapidly Toward Russia
December 15, 2005
New research shows the pole moving at rapid clipâ"25 miles (40 kilometers) a year.
Over the past century the pole has moved 685 miles (1,100 kilometers) from Arctic Canada toward Siberia, says Joe Stoner, a paleomagnetist at Oregon State University.
---
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2003/29dec_magneticfield/
Earth's Inconstant Magnetic Field
The pole kept going during the 20th century, north at an average speed of 10 km per year, lately accelerating "to 40 km per year," says Newitt. At this rate it will exit North America and reach Siberia in a few decades.
---
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap020818.html
Astronomy Picture of the Day
Indicated in the above picture is Ellef Ringnes Island, the location of Earth's North Magnetic Pole in 1999.
--- --- ---
Now the reasoning part...
Distance between 2001 and 2012 coordinates of the "Earth magnetic North pole":
81.3ÂN 110.8ÂW (2001)
85.9ÂN 147.0ÂW (2012)
is about 401.9 Miles, or 646.9 Km. That's an average of 36.5 miles per year for the last 11 years. 36.5 miles per year is about 1 mile for every 10 days. Imagine your house moves 1 mile every 10 days, that's quite a distance.
North America is shifted South, a rough estimate from a map, 400 miles is about distance between these cities:
Quebec -- New York city.
New York city -- Atlanta/Savanah.
San Francisco -- San Diego/Tiejuana.
Again, back in 2005, "Over the past century the pole has moved 685 miles (1,100 kilometers)". Which means for 2012, over the past century the Magnetic North Pole would have moved away from Canda and the USA some 800 miles. Which is about the distance of:
Washingon DC -- Fort Lauderdale
When people claim the weather has been the worst on record of the last 50 years, or 100 years, they don't even know that the comparison is invalid. The location they are now in North America is well over 800 miles South of where they were 100 years ago. Comparing such records with a city
Some people will cope with irrefutable evidence that conflicts with their world view, i.e., cognitive dissonance, by going insane.
Does this explain the current behavior of the (far) Right? Or will things get even worse in our politics?
How is this a Koch Bros Study? Did they have a hand in choosing to do it or were they opposed to it? Did they set ground rules?
Let's quote from the OP:
"...I still find that much, if not most, of what is attributed to climate change is speculative, exaggerated or just plain wrong. Iâ(TM)ve analyzed some of the most alarmist claims, and my skepticism about them hasnâ(TM)t changed.
Hurricane Katrina cannot be attributed to global warming. The number of hurricanes hitting the United States has been going down, not up; likewise for intense tornadoes. Polar bears arenâ(TM)t dying from receding ice, and the Himalayan glaciers arenâ(TM)t going to melt by 2035. And itâ(TM)s possible that we are currently no warmer than we were a thousand years ago, during the âoeMedieval Warm Periodâ or âoeMedieval Optimum,â an interval of warm conditions known from historical records and indirect evidence like tree rings. And the recent warm spell in the United States happens to be more than offset by cooling elsewhere in the world, so its link to âoeglobalâ warming is weaker than tenuous...."
I find his methodology and approach persuasive.
The only question I have is that historically, we've seen 'pulses' of temperature/CO2 spiking about (roughly) every 100,000 yrs for about the last million years. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:EPICA_temperature_plot.svg) The last one was about 120,000 yrs ago, and we're in a similar climbing spike right now.
I haven't heard anything about what causes these spikes, nor what mechanism offsets them. It stands to reason that this pattern would continue, which would suggest that today's warming is systemic and cyclical WITHOUT human input.
-Styopa
Sequestering carbon is dang expensive, not well understood, and we're decades from it scaling up to the 100s of GW of capacity necessary given our current generation infrastructure.
We could shut down lots of coal for a 10% increase in electricity rates, replacing it with natural gas, wind, and energy efficiency. That might reduce our carbon footprint from electrical by 10%. For another 10% increase in electricity rates, we could probably roll out GWs more storage [hydro or compressed air], roll out more wind and some solar and more energy efficiency, and cut another 10% from our electrical carbon footprint. Wind and solar prices continue to fall. The "easy" answer is to stop building coal plants, invest in energy efficiency and co-generation, improve building codes, and complement new wind and solar with storage and fast-ramping combustion turbines [which are inexpensive to build, but more expensive to operate], and useful for dealing with the intermittency of some renewables. It need not be done all at once, and some parts of the country can be done economically faster than others, but that's the way to do it at a cost which would be manageable.
Now, before I elicit the nuclear fanboys, I'll make two points: (1) nuclear power is more expensive than solar PV per kWh at a levalized cost without any subsidies for either, and (2) just as the sun doesn't shine at night, the nuclear power plants don't turn off at night. Nuclear is already more expensive than PV -- if you've got to build storage too to shift some of that unusable nighttime production to daytime, you might as well build storage and shift some of that extra PV to nighttime. Want to encourage small, identical reactors to lower cost? Sure -- but you're looking at 10-15 years before the first one is online. In the meantime, we've got to cut CO2 now, and it's far easier, cheaper, and politically possible to do it at point sources like electrical generation than it is at distributed sources like tailpipes and home furnaces.
Firstly, let us be clear on what we're talking about: current temperature appears as a statistical blip in the historical record.
Secondly, Richard Muller is not and never was a skeptic. Way back in 2003 he was saying things like, "Let me be clear. My own reading of the literature and study of paleoclimate suggests strongly that carbon dioxide from burning of fossil fuels will prove to be the greatest pollutant of human history. It is likely to have severe and detrimental effects on global climate." and even more incredibly, "If Al Gore reaches more people and convinces the world that global warming is real, even if he does it through exaggeration and distortion - which he does, but he’s very effective at it - then let him fly any plane he wants."(2008).
Thirdly, even William Connolley, the guy banned from editing Wikipedia for 6 months due to his attempts to rubbish skeptics, thinks Muller is a wazzock for making the claims he has. So, slashdot, the excitement you are experiencing here is really quite misplaced.
Didn't one of the researchers claim he made things up? I remember one of the researchers in his study left and said he leapt to the conclusion.
NOTE I AM NOT saying is or is not real. I don't know. I'm not a climate scientist. Flip a coin and that will be as good as my guess.
That said, there was drama with this study months ago.
Also... did they release the Berkeley earth data yet? Because last time I checked they didn't disclose everything yet. Maybe they did and I just don't know how to look. Not sure. But that's sort of a key issue here.
Anyway, I'm glad it's being researched. Either way this is something that needs to be researched comprehensively.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
What a misleading summary. What Muller claims to have shown is:
1. Warming is happening; criticisms of statistical methods can either be worked around or are shown to not be valid.
2. Solar activity and/or other proposed non-CO2 warming drivers are not responsible for the observed increase.
3. Atmospheric CO2 is by far the best correlate with global surface temperatures.
However, he then adds, "These facts don’t prove causality and they shouldn’t end skepticism," and goes on to reject a number of "alarmist" (his word) consequences of warming (more frequent hurricanes, the U.S. drought, polar bears dying, etc.)
THIS explains the whole thing, was settled physics long before the UN did its absurd IPCC thing (and all for trying to institute global taxation.).
From a major physics textbook when men where men and idiots weren't in charge screaming every inane flavor of FUD.
***
Celestial Mechanics is the crowning glory of Newtonian mechanics. It has
revolutionized man’s concept of the Cosmos and his place within it. Its
spectacular successes in the 18th and 19th centuries established the unique
power of mathematical theory for precise explanation and prediction. In the
20th century it has been overshadowed by exciting developments in other
branches of physics. But the last three decades have seen a resurgence of
interest in celestial mechanics, because it is a basic conceptual tool for the
emerging Space Age.
The main concern of celestial mechanics (CM) is to account for the motion of
celestial bodies (stars, planets, satellites, etc.). The same theory applies to the
motion of artificial satellites and spacecraft, so the emerging science of space
flight, astromechanics, can be regarded as an offspring of celestial mechanics.
Space Age capabilities for precise measurements and management of vast
amounts of data has made CM more relevant than ever. Celestial mechanics
is used by observational astronomers for the prediction and explanation of
occultation and eclipse phenomena, by astrophysicists to model the evolution
of binary star systems, by cosmogonists to reconstruct the history of the Solar
System, and by geophysicists to refine models of the Earth and explain
geological data about the past. To cite one specific example, it has recently
been established that major Ice Ages on Earth during the last million years
have occurred regularly with a period of 100,000 years, and this can be
explained with celestial mechanics as forced by oscillations in the Earth’s
eccentricity due to perturbations by other planets. Moreover, periodicities of
minor Ice Ages can be explained as forced by precession and nutation of the
Earth’s axis due to perturbation by the Sun and Moon.
We are the primary cause of global warming, we are the primary cause of accelerating it
"The hands that help are better far than lips that pray." - Robert Ingersoll (1833-1899)
That global temperature have risen during the past 100-150 years is a fact, and that greenhouse gas emissions are at least partly responsible for it was also likely. The real question is the rate of it. A 0.1C warming is harmles, a 10C warming is apocalyptic. In the past 150 years we have burned about 10% of the fossil fuels in the ground, which amounts to about 50% of the reserves we can actually extract. This resulted in a 40% increase in CO2 concentration and about 1C of warming. So if we burn the second half, it won't even rise the temperature with another degree. On the other hand, if technological advances will allow us to exploit more than that, it would result in a bigger warming, which could melt the permafrost releasing all the methane stored there in the athmosphere resulting in an unstoppable warming. Now these numbers are horribly imprecise, and to be able to plan ahead climate research should focus on getting much more accurate data.
"...Skewed for the interests of one set of billionaires.
"I have now been flipped, and am rewarded for serving the competing interest of an entirely opposed set of different billionaires.
"Everything you read is true. Especially if it is funded by large foundations."
FNORD
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
This is all just liberal propaganda paid for by... ...oh wait...
It's pretty clear that a huge part of this study was driven by intense distrust of the academic world by the right. But, by the same token, they were a bit worried that the hippy scientists might be onto something. After all, while we might notice, that, it seems warmer in New Jersey during the winter than in our childhoods, they, by the virtue of their wealth, have to be noticing the same things for themselves worldwide. So, they found a scientist that they could trust, and have a look so that they could get the truth. One wonders if this will be the beginning of a sea change in policy making.
In my first post I assumed that the paper was correct, but now after reading the article I'm much more sceptical. They have measured the warming during the past 250 years, that is, their reference point was right in the middle of the Little Ice Age! This may not discredit everything they claim but it sure raises some serious doubts about the professionalism of the researchers involved.
If you didn't think the argument involved multiple parts, then you weren't paying attention. I find this to be one of the biggest problems with many self-proclaimed proponents of AGW is that they think if they prove something, then the argument is done, over, everything else follows logically and there can be no question. No, not at all. There are multiple stages to the argument.
The first is the claims of fact: That average surface temperature is increasing and that CO2 levels in the atmosphere are increasing. These are claims of facts about the world, things to be observed or measured. CO2 is pretty easy given the nature of gasses diffusing to uniform, temperature is quite a bit harder. However, it looks pretty solid that yes, temperature has been increasing. So that's step one, verify the facts behind the theory.
The next step is the central theory: That the primary or exclusive cause of the observed warming is the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere due to human emissions. Like all theories, it attempts to explain the connection between facts, how things relate. So that the facts are true does not automatically imply the theory is correct. That is the point of this (and other) studies. See if there are facts that would falsify this theory, or are there other theories that would fit the available facts better. So far, it does not seem so which means that this theory is probably correct.
This is not the end of the argument though. All you've done is shown why something is happening. That doesn't mean anything in and of itself. The next part of the argument is where things get more specious: The claim that this will be a bad thing for humanity as a whole. That's not a scientific theory, that's an over-arching claim, a judgement call. It is based on a number of theories and hypothesis out there. However to be accurate it needs to be backed up by theories with evidence that indicate that things will change in negative ways. Also you have to weigh just how positive and negative all the predicted changes will be. Anyone who pretends something is all positive or all negative is pushing an agenda and/or ignoring reality. Everything has a downside, a cost. The question is how does it weigh overall?
This is a discussion that doesn't seem to happen much. The "It will be a bad thing," seem to be parroted as dogma. You accept or you get shouted down. Any hypothesis that says something bad will happen is accepted as true, any hypothesis that says something good will happen is said to be false. Sorry, but it doesn't work that way.
Then, after you've shown it is a net negative overall, that it is something that would be better if it didn't happen, you get down to the policy of what to do about it. This is not science at all, there is no one right answer. It is a matter of deciding what we wish to do based off of costs, likelihood of success, other downsides and so on. "Just stop burning fossil fuels," isn't the "correct" answer. It is a possible course of action, but not the only one. Geoengineering solutions would be others. Still others would be not to try and change what is happening, but rather to change ourselves and prepare to deal with the changes since though this change may be human caused it is likely at some point another will happen that isn't and thus we may not be able to affect.
So if you are hoping for the magic moment of "All debate ends and everyone agrees with me," well sorry you aren't going to see it. As I alluded to, the big thing at this point would be to show that this change is going to be a net negative for humanity. That's complex, so no surprise it is hard. Even once that is in the bag, the question remains as to what to do. To that there will never be a final "correct" answer, only possibilities that eventually will need to be weighed and chosen from (including the possibility of doing nothing).
I'd be careful about being so trivial about a 10% increase in electricity prices. It might be trivial for you, it's a fairly non-elastic good in most of the states, and increases in it, much like fuel prices, tend to hit the poor the hardest.
You could double my electricity bill and while I'd wince, I wouldn't need to substantially change my budget. Increase the bill of my grandparents on social security even 50% and they'd be cutting into the grocery money. Maybe even at 10%, but I don't know their finances that well.
Then you get into businesses and manufacturing and it's one more reason to leave the area. Civilization depends on cheap energy, the cheaper the better.
This brings up another argument - sure, global warming is happening. There will be both positives and negatives. Coastal cities might need to adjust their infrastructure in major ways; but at the same time a few degrees warmer average temperatures can add weeks to the growing season of major areas of North America, Siberia, and other regions. The studies I've seen predict warmer temperatures to increase potential farmland, not decrease it. So the question becomes: Is the economic cost of preventing global warming worth it, and by how much? I'll note that I'm in the camp of global warming is happening, and that we should do stuff about it, but the question becomes one of 'how much?'. There are easy fixes out there, and I think we should be doing more of them. But some of the proposals are crazy.
Finally - We don't ever want to become dependent upon one source of electricity. My 'ideal' carbon-neutral electrical mix is 40% nuclear, 20% solar(~20% of electricity is spent on cooling anyways, and demand is something like 50% higher during the day, so when you figure that solar only works during the day, it pretty much works out*), 20% wind, and 20% other(such as hydro, geothermal, biomass, etc...).
Another point is that if we massively go towards electrical vehicles(to get rid of that carbon), my estimates are for an average increase in electricity usage for househoulds of 50%. I figure that 'most' households, especially areas with more expensive electricity, have taken the easy fixes already - saving more juice will take things like replacing windows and putting more insulation in. Reducing a household's electrical usage by 50% to keep usage even after switching to EVs - that takes stuff like getting rid of electric heat, including the water heater(If they're on gas or oil, carbon could be avoided by switching to a heat pump, but again, that would increase electrical usage). This can be done, but isn't an 'easy fix' in most areas.
*Night usage: 1, Day usage: 1.5. Total: 2.5. 20% of 2.5 = .5, or the increase during the day.
I don't read AC A human right
I do not really care much about Global Warming or Climate Change, which seems to be the preferred term nowadays. I care even less about hippies and tree huggers telling me that I should go back to a hut in the middle of a forest.
We have to look at this from an economic perspective. The reality is that, places like China will continue to pollute a lot for as long as they possibly can. It is cheap for them to forego how this will impact their future generations. It is cheap for us to buy crap made in China when they do not have to worry about environmental standards and labor law. We cannot compete with them unless we sink to the same level, which we most definitely do not want to do. Hence I would say it is time for us to divide the World in two again (just like the good old soviet times). I believe we should creat a "Green Wall". On our side of the Green Wall, only countries that are democratic and comply with certain environmental standards can be admitted. We will only trade with them and they are only allowed to trade with us. If they trade with anyone else over the Wall, we will cut them off. Countries on the other side of the wall, could apply to join us on this side of the wall. In their case, the trade barriers would be dropped slowly until they finally become full democracies and comply to all of our standards.
The markets are here in West. Countries like China, cannot survive without access to them. Let's make this World a better place by forcing them to change if they want to continue to have access to our markets.
Green protectionism has also another advantage. Chances are that these countries would only be able to meet our envrionmental standards if they bougth technology from us. That would in essence create a huge demand for some of our exports.
BTW: I am sick and tired of stories that talk about some Western company that helped China crack down on their dissidents by selling them sniffing technology yadda... yadda...yadda. What the heck do you want our companies to do? They do not have the luxury of ignoring a market such as China if access to it as not closed to their competition. If they ignore it, the competition moves in. By allowing our country to trade with countries such as China and Equatorial Guinea, we leave our companies with little choice. If we care that we fill our tanks with oil that came from Equatorial Guinea (one of the most brutal, corrupt, and repressive regimes in the history of mankind), why not completely cut them off from access to our markets? If Europe, Japan, and North America did so, the World would be a much better place.
I am thinking Bill Gates this time, he doesn't have one yet - in fact Nobel Prizes for everyone !
There are lots of corporations that might be very happy with the massive infrastructure improvements needed to move to a more energy efficient economy. The coal industry is going to be against it, but even the oil industry getting excited about the potential of natural gas.
We're looking at a global extinction event and I'd like man to be able to survive it
I don't know about all that. Most people think low lying coastal areas and much of Florida are screwed, but we should have plenty of advance warning that the coastlines are receding, so I doubt many people will die due to that. The southern US won't be as productive as it has been, and the California agriculture miracle will dry up, but there is going to be plenty of land opened up too. Canada will benefit, along with the northern prairie in the US. Russia will see longer growing seasons and may become a major food exporter in the next 30-50 years. The tropics will be less inhabitable, possibly becoming more desert-like than today.
Oh, it will be wet. more heat means more water vapor and bigger rain events. That's happening now. If we're smart we will build more fresh water reservoirs and water pipelines. But I'm sure we won't do anything but complain.
"Well, good luck finding a judge that doesn't run a bestiality site."
It's not as if the Koch brothers are in the carbon emission credit trade... oh wait
Since this is the second time that line is misread that particular way, I'll offer an explanation, even though it should be obvious. California's government happens to go bankrupt from time to time. That doesn't make the state poor, because there are also people and companies in the state who own and produce assets that are valuable. Interesting that you would think that only the government can create or maintain value ;-)
As for why the state of California regularly goes bankrupt: having the populace vote on every tax increase is a surefire way of never getting taxes increased. If at the same time people vote pro-spending, government becomes unsustainable. Not that hard to figure out, definitely a construction failure, and fairly unrelated to the question of regulations.
(BTW slashdot sitll doesn't allow unicode? Why can't I put something as innocous as the not equal sign into the subject? It's 2012, not 1992)
Both? Seriously? Both sides? You're saying BOTH sides are not looking at the data???
Both sides don't have a problem reading the data, the data is clear cut. It's the anti-global warming lobby that's not looking at the data, using incoherent arguments, arguments based on religion, and when all else fails, pretending that *BOTH* sides are ignoring the data.
politicians think too shortterm
...but a proffesional public service doesn't, the long term energy plan for most industrial nations is to spend the next couple of centuries burning every last ounce of coal they can find.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
It’s a scientist’s duty to be properly skeptical. I still find that much, if not most, of what is attributed to climate change is speculative, exaggerated or just plain wrong.
In other words, he has serious doubts that hurricanes and other disasters will be the result of AGW.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
NAH, people switched to SUV's because they WORK to earn a living rather than than being paid by their patricians to TALK.
I, with great gnashing of teeth, switched from a 16 year-old Subaru GL wagon to a Jeep Cheokee because my tools were too damned heavy for the Subaru to haul without growing mechanical performance issues. Now on 11 years and LOVE the "iron DUKE".
OH, and yeah, the 4WD is a NECESSITY for the 0300 morning drive through the snowbanks, or tornado warning, or high profile vehicle wind warnings to "the plant" to keep the light on and the water flowing.
Sell stocks in insurance companies and buy construction companies.
Undetectable Steganography? Yep, there's an app fo
http://www.populartechnology.net/2012/06/truth-about-richard-muller.html Richard Muller has never been a skeptic, at best he had a moment of intellectual honesty towards skeptics when he acknowledged Steve McIntyre's debunking of Mann's Hockey Stick, only to later dismiss this as irrelevant to the global warming debate, "This result should not affect any of our thinking on global warming". Hardly surprising, as Muller considers the carbon dioxide produced from burning fossil fuels to be, "the greatest pollutant in human history" and likely to have, "severe and detrimental effects on global climate". The future outlook for global warming according to Muller is that, "it’s going to get much, much worse" and thus advocates that the United States immediately pay China and India hundreds of billions of dollars to cut back their carbon emissions or, "it'll be too late". No wonder he endorsed "The Earth is the Great Ship Titanic", Steven Chu as "perfect" for U.S. Energy Secretary and Al Gore's hypocritical alarmism...
Anthropogenic sources of greenhouse gases (0.28%) are a drop in the bucket compared to natural sources(99.72%).
Volcanoes are only a small part of nature's contribution to greenhouse gases. Forests and decaying vegetation are far more significant contributors.
" The diversity of life has historically increased with warming".
Sure, but the same can be said of asteroid impacts; new studies have indicated that after as short as 10 million years, the biosphere has recovered and maybe even opened up a few new ecological niches by dislodging the old dominant species (bye bye dinosaurs!).
The problem is the word "short". On any human timescale, ten million years is a long time. In a few centuries which really is the blink of an eye in a geological sense, we'll be altering the climate substantially. For many species (millions?) it will be too fast for them to evolve.
So they'll die.
Global warming will NOT extinguish life on earth (well not unless we manage to cause a runaway greenhouse effect like Venus). It does have the potential of creating a less diverse world filled with crabgrass, cockroaches and rats and other generalist species (like us) that will take over. Our descendants for TENS OF THOUSANDS of generations may curse their selfish, short-sighted ancestors of the 21st century.
And Americans in particular.
BTW slashdot sitll doesn't allow unicode? Why can't I put something as innocous as the not equal sign into the subject? It's 2012, not 1992
Do I have to explain the 2002 bidirectional override incident again?
DOD, and the US Navy in particular, have considered climate change to be a major national security issue for several years. There is no question that "climate change" is occurring. As usual, what is in question is:
— Precisely what part human activity plays in concert with natural global climate cycles, and
— Even if human activity is the exclusive cause, exactly how much the US and other First World nations should dramatically alter their economies and energy strategies while developing economies and other major economies (such as China and India) do comparatively nothing, absurdly sacrificing the ends to the means.
China is set to emit 50% more greenhouse gases than the US by 2015.
It doesn't matter that China has more people in the context of the climate change argument! If you identify some level x of greenhouse emissions as being a "bad" thing, then China emitting far more than the US is an extremely bad thing in terms of the effects that it would cause. One can argue that the US may be in a position to make the most impact, but with China set to significantly outpace the US in emissions and oil consumption, I think we need to take a look at what value the US taking a disproportionate hit in emissions control — and the dramatic impact that would have on our economy — would actually do for climate change that would be positive.
If the issue requires a global response — whatever the cause — then it necessarily must be a global response, not just First World nations sacrificing their entire economic and energy base, thus removing any influence they may have over the issue.
Put it another way: does anyone think that the evidence supports that China (or India, or any other developing economies) would be a better steward of this responsibility?
www.climatedepot.com
Marc Morano very clearly explains EVERY DAY why it's all a big con, he is happy to debate anybody, anywhere. LOL at the Slashdot sheep, going along with the 'party line' and acting all concerned about 'the planet' - idiots.
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/07/muller/
Mitigation strategies become more expensive as "we" delay efforts to develop and apply those strategies.
There is now a huge separation of interests between those control access to concentrated capital from those whose lives are most directly affected by environmental conditions.
The "capitalists" have a strong interest in preserving their existing revenue streams. The interests of the rest of society are irrelevant. The truly poor in other countries, many of whom live in low lying areas and depend on water supplies that are already turning brackish due to the current rise of only a few inches. Such people have almost negative value to high-concentration capital operators, usually being in the way when one investment or another involves their displacement.
The Koch brothers and their friends the major fossil fuel industries have a strong interest in their current business model, and will fuck the rest of the world if necessary to prevent losses in their investments.
The delays that the Heartland Institute, and other thinktanks advocate WILL cause mitigation strategies to become prohibitively expensive and count on it coming out of our asses. The longer we wait, the more painful the movement will be.
To those who are skeptical of government intervention, I hesitantly agree, for two reasons: 1) It's been bought off by highly concentrated capitalists expressing their "free speech rights" drowning out all others in the public square, 2) Too many people have a problem with learned helplessness and are unwilling or unable to see the effects of the endless talk of "freedom", failing to see that "freedom" usually means "free to fuck over those that do not have the countervailing power to prevent it".
The place where I flat out disagree with that logic is that the people who pull the strings of highly concentrated capital are *far* worse. My preference for "government" intervention is precisely because in a society that has not entirely lost its capacity for small-D democratic action, government is weakened by the constant re-election of legislators & "leaders". Throw away that feedback loop by *endlessly* whining about "government" with the effect of ceding control to the few lever-pullers, and you will have something way more interesting.
P.S. I am a white guy in my mid-fifties who has been working in corporate environments large and small for 35+ years. I have seen the effects of narrow interests screwing over the others for most of those years. When authority is not balanced by strong accountability WITH TEETH, that authority is misused one hundred-point-zero percent of the time. Those with insufficiently accountable authority have an absolutely perfect record of misusing it.
CFLs are cheaper to operate than incandescents. Attic insulation usually pays for itself in less than two years.
Geeks and businesses understand "cheaper to operate" and "pays for itself". A lot of the general public does not, seeing only the initial sticker price. That's how anything with a razor and blades business model gets bought.
A small turbo-diesel car is far cheaper than a gasoline powered SUV.
What automaker headquartered in the United States makes turbo-diesel cars for sale in the United States? A lot of nationalistic people won't buy a "foreign" car: a Toyota made in a neighboring state is more "foreign" than a Ford made in Mexico because "the money goes back to Japan". In addition, what a lot of families need is an efficient station wagon, but a CAFE loophole has forced automakers to make SUVs instead of station wagons.
My 2010 TDI "Sportwagen" gets 35+ under constant in-town acceleration/deceleration during rush hour, gets 40+ in off-hour in-town driving, and 52+ on disciplined long trips.
Plenty of room for a custom bicycle (I am 6' 4", and the bike's frame is enlarged to accommodate exceptionally long legs). Or alternatively room for 4 people and all their luggage for a long weekend at a family wedding.
Being a slashdot poster, you should know about "refactoring". Doesn't happen enough in the software world, and it for sure doesn't happen often enough in the legislative world. But the answer is not "deregulating": which merely cedes the power to those who really want to socialize their responsibilities while privatizing their profits.
There has never been a free market. The only question to be answered is "who controls the market"? It could be, and usually is, the group who have the concentrated market power, or an entity that should be responsible to the society at large, whose capacity to design and implement the regulations is admittedly imperfect, but without that imperfect process, we're all fucked.
Uh... someone's reading a bit too much into that article.
If you read it correctly you'll see that his main conclusion is not that it's man-made at all.
It's that it exists(duh to those denying that) and that it's best correlated to CO2, and that CO2 is mostly man-made.
This is not causality though. And if you read well page2 you find out he's not going alarmist screaming like a headless chicken.
Good job slashdot on posting flamboyant titles to get attention.
and there's nothing new.
He says that temperature has definitely increased since 1753 (in the middle of the Little Ice Age!), and that he can't find anything which correlates with this apart from CO2. He doesn't appear to have heard of Svensmark.
And from this he claims that AGW is proven?
Blasphemy! You can't say such things because they are against the economic religion of the times; you must be a communist! If you are not with us 100% you are a blaspheming communist!
Tariffs are evil protectionism, the almighty holy market is the decider and how dare you contradict it's wishes!
The all mighty market and its prophets (PACs) run the government and control the ignorant populace; it is so rigged you can't introduce reasonable tariffs anymore.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
I believe you are mistaken. From my reading of the article, the start date for the study has no impact on the results.
What they did was to take the global temperature record and various subsets of it (e.g. discarding urban measurements, adjusting for poor-quality measurement stations and so) and compare it to the record for various factors, such as volcanic eruptions, solar activity, and CO2 emissions, that could potentially affect temperature. Basically, they compared curves. They found a clear signal corresponding to volcanic eruptions, nothing measurable from solar cycles, and the best match by far was with CO2
Keep in mind that scientists do not measure global temperature: as different measurement stations go on- and offline and large areas of the Earth lack monitoring, that would be virtually impossible. This is why you never see claims that the global temperature used to be X, now it is Y. Instead, they measure changes in temperature. So if a given station measured Z degrees last year and Z' degrees this year, delta T = Z' - Z. That change can be compared with changes in measurements at other stations to get an overall fluctuation for a given time interval.
I am rather surprised you got modded down. I don't see any reason why you should have been. You are clear about your interpretation and the reasons for it.
The diversity of life has historically increased with warming.
Huh? That contradicts everything I know about climate change, or any other kind of environmental change. When habitats change rapidly, many species find that their adaptations no longer apply, and go extinct. Google "warming diversity" and you'll see a lot of scientific studies with results along the lines of what I've just said.
I guess the logic of your argument is: evolution is life's way of adapting to change, therefore more change means more species. In the long run, that's actually true, but the process takes millions of years. In the short term, like the next few thousand years. we're looking at a planet with drastically reduced biodiversity. And guess what: that makes it a lot harder for humans to get by.
Which suggests that ultimately that nature will solve global warming for us, though not in a way that we'll be around to appreciate.
Has he found evidence of CO2 levels rising? Actual numbers?
Every single global warning study ignores the effect of the sun ... turning the study into nothing but propaganda. You have studies claiming numbers .... based on years where solar activities were at its highest point. Then totally ignore temperatures of years when solar activities were at a minimum.
The sad part is that many items in most studies could be considered in a serious way, if it was done in the content of environmental pollution and not GW.
Another thing that is ignored ..... all the talk about glaciers melting ... but zero talk about the fact that under most glaciers there is evidence of plant and animal life. What does that mean?? It means that the area WASN'T frozen from the beginning. So is it that we are warming up beyond natural temperatures or are we at the end of a recovery from an ice age?
Is it really so hard to identify the characters that cause problems and outlaw them?
Yes, because a future version of Unicode may introduce more such characters. Google blacklist vs whitelist for the security principle involved.
The corn yield this year is due to the "largest drought in 50 years". http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-07-27/news/sns-rt-us-usa-grains-tourbre86q1hf-20120727_1_crop-tour-soy-crops-corn Our records on droughts in the continental US only go back about 110. The climate models predict continental centers drying out - a cycle of drought does not disprove or counter this.
Please help metamoderate.
Why can't I put something as innocous as the not equal sign into the subject?
No problem for me!
CO2 follows the rise in temperatures.
I won't believe it until we've watched most of the world's crops wither away causing widespread famine. And even then I won't believe it. It would have happened anyway. Nope nope nope. Science is a sham.
I don't think you get what happens when the global climate changes. Sure things get hotter or colder, but also, water distribution changes drastically as well. This is partly why we find marine life fossils in deserts. So it's not just that water levels change, but rain and weather patterns (which is really just a fancy way of expressing rain) change, temperature changes and all that. With this, wild plant life will suffer as will the lower animals which depend on those plants... and neither will migrate on their own so easily.
Man will, no doubt, be able to keep up with some elements of the changes in eco systems, but we're not particularly good at it as we still make really stupid mistakes on a frequent basis... you know, like putting frogs where they don't belong or creating GM foods which, in theory, kill insects but which actually end up breeding super-resistant insects that are even harder to kill than before. (Harder to kill and quick to reproduce means potential plagues of biblical proportions)
People are NOT looking forward enough and not seeing the whole of the world.
That may be Muller's own opinion, but that is NOT what the Berkeley study says.
The only thing Berkeley has done so far is to gather their own statistics about land surface temperatures. That data does -- roughly -- tend to support other climate scientists statistics about PAST surface temperatures. But that's ALL it does. So far they have not even compiled ocean temperatures yet... much less come to any conclusions about CAUSE.
This article is nothing but more propaganda. The Berkeley study ONLY tends to confirm PAST, LAND, temperatures. That's all it does. They do not even have the data yet to even TRY to make conclusions about causes.
It clearly sounds like the end-times.... ;o)
I think the biggest danger may well be (as it has always been) religious nutters
Most Unicode characters are more useful for making what used to be called ASCII art than for conveying thoughts in English. The letter in Oriya script representing long î (U+0B08) looks more like the head of a Smurf than anything else. And Slashdot used to have serious problems with vandals posting ASCII art of obscene gestures.
Anthony Watts just posted some new information regarding errors in the BEST data. Perhaps Richard Muller will need to re-evaluate his "skepticism." http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/29/press-release-2/
The IPCC has purposely engineered a massive scientific fraud.
There are two glasses of water that have just been poured from the same carafe. The water is the same temperature, but one of the glasses contains ice poured from the carafe. They are both sitting next to each other on the same table in the sun. Add thermometers to take the temperature every minute. Chart it. Predict the result?
You see, the Earth is like a big glass of water with huge ice cubes on either end. The real question is what will happen to the temperature of the Earth after the poles and glaciers lose all of their ice?
Milutin Milankovic found this out (published in 1930?), however (according to the Wikipedia page; I'm not an expert) these "orbital forcings" produce temperature oscillations on the timescale of tens of thousands of years! The quickest of the three cycles described says, that the orbital forcing by axial tilt produced a maximum warming effect at 8 700 B.C. (think: before Jerusalem and before Babylon, in the time of Jericho when there were still woolly mammoths and agriculture was invented etc.) and is now slowly "cooling down" (predicting a DOWNWARD temperature trend) until the minimum at the year 11 800 (think: the Plutonium in Yucca Mountain nuclear waste has decayed to 75% of its current strength).
Therefore, orbital forcing can not be used to predict or explain a temperature change that occurs in the time period of only 200 years.
Your timescale is wrong.
To be, or not to be: isn't that quite logical, Slashdot Beta?
I see that the BEST data shows that there has been a significant rise in the Earth's temperature. But this may not be important any more.
Anthony Watts has just come up with his big 'Surface Stations' study, using the new Leroy methodology. This show that all the US temperature trend figures are 'spuriously doubled'.
If this paper holds, it will be a huge hole driven in the whole basis of the Global Warming hypothesis...
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/29/press-release-2/#more-68286 refers...
There really isn't much at all.
Now, I can hear it now..."It's Watts...disregard".
But if you fuckers believe even a little bit of what you spout about science you will at least check the link. I doubt you will because you fucks are the most closed minded people around. If something doesn't support your position, you disregard it. Closed minded, dogmatic and ignorant.
I agree that if I were to see nothing but that graph and then those two predictions, I'd say that the more conservative one seems more likely. However, the fact that most of the scientific community doesn't agree with me sounds like pretty convincing indication that there is something more complicated going on and that I - having no expertise in this subject - shouldn't give much weight to my own guesses over the predictions of those who study the subject for living.
So... do you happen to have any actual expertise in this field, so that it would make sense for me to care about your thoughts here?
The bit of unfortunate sensationalism could justly back-fire all over our esteemed Dr. Miller and his ... 'findings'.
Curve fitting is not Science.
Belief is a word of Religion, not Science.
Journalism however well intentioned the News Paper Organization, a Web Site or a Blog Post is not Science.
Unfortunate that these simple truths escape our esteemed Doctor.
LoL
But Bush-the-Elder's friends? Now that carries some weight!
That would sound reasonable, but alas, that is not how the cognitive bubble works. It will be more like this:
Yes, indeed, expect Muller's BEST to have no practical effect on the cognitive bubble. That is why it is called denial.
If history has any lessons, it is that we will literally have to wait until the deniers die of old age before their "discourse" disappears into history.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Now, wake me up when the AGW loons decide that nuclear is better than coal, and I'll start taking them seriously.
Since you already have the solutions, you may have missed the fact that wind-power is just about to become cheaper than coal. And that's when we /don't/ factor in coal subsidies, which /includes/ treating the atmosphere as a free garbage dump.
It'll only be 5 years or so.
Would that make a difference to your fantasy-land? Or do you believe that we should let coal pollute for free, get additional government subsidies, and then only be replaced by nuclear, because only liberals like wind. Well??
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
But the cheap and dirty solution is always going to be cheaper than the economically responsible and affordable solution.
That would be depressing if it were true. But coal will become more expensive than wind in about 5 years. And we have every reason to expect that it will soon be more expensive than solar, but that will take longer.
Sure we need base-load power as well; however, there are many possible solutions in the works for that too.
I believe that conservatives are rightly suspicious of environmental paranoia; however, the suspicion goes too far. AGW is a real and present danger to our civilization, as the science clearly demonstrates. Also, the economics of addressing climate change really aren't that bad. Germany has been doing it, and they managed to grow their economy 3% p.a., during a global recession. Cap-and-trade has been shown to have a negligible (if any) impact on the economy, and it does reduce emissions. In short, conservatives are guilty of economic alarmism.
But I also believe that we would have been ill-served by rolling out massive wind/solar installations in the 80s/90s. (We had consensus in the scientific community in 1979, according to a NAS report from that year.) The technology was too immature. The system of grants and subsidies has helped move these technologies along tremendously, and they are almost ready for prime-time. We are less then a decade from a major shift in energy policy.
With the benefit of hindsight, I believe that we would have been best served by a carbon tax that went directly into technology R&D project, small-scale installations, and subsidies for quality energy efficient housing. It is difficult to know if this would have sped the development of technology, since society has already invested heavily in such projects. However, it would have prevented the misallocation of resources by those who -- for ideological reasons -- believe that the fossil-fuel party will last forever.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
2. Anonymously leak memos that show "scientists" you funded were making up data
3. Have FoxNews report "Scientists make up data, Global Warming a Fraud!" without reporting who paid the scientists.
4. Completely discredit all global warming research by association.
5. Profit!!
6. ??????
-- Let us endeavor so to live that when we pass even the undertaker shall be sorry. -- M. Twain
On this very day, two years ago, the Koch bothers both scoffed at the news: http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/29/167253/global-warming-undeniable-report-says?sbsrc=thisday
No sig for you! Come back one year!
If poor countries can't grow their own food, subsidizing developed countries to grow it for them is not the solution. It's the fucking problem.
Beautifully put. In a bitterly beautiful way
Imagine the climate is a glass of water, and the water level is temperature.
I was going to briefly post somewhere under this story to mention that measured temperature changes were accidentally doubled
But then I saw your post and realized that real science is totally lost upon the race of fear-inducing mouth breathers that are the core that remains of the AGW Warmists. I'll read no more Warming Cult stuff on Slashdot, you all are beyond hope.
I mean, can you even dress yourself? "Climate is like a glass of water, we are adding more water"....
HOLY CRAP SLASHDOT is 4CHAN.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
How are you going to sequester the C02 coming out of your tailpipe
Electric cars displace emissions to the power plant.
and going up your furnace flue?
Heat pump (air conditioner run in reverse) and/or geothermal heating, at least for those months when outdoor temperatures aren't literally freezing.
One of the distinguishing features of self-styled "skeptics" of climate science is that their skepticism is amazingly one sided; they seem to become utterly credulous regarding any argument, no matter how blatantly lame, that seems to cast doubt on the reality of global warming. The "It's warming on Mars!" claim (accepted by many "skeptics" as unquestioned truth) is an excellent example. Of course, a genuine skeptic would immediately think, "Wait a minute. There can't be a lot of thermometers on Mars, and they can't have been there very long. I wonder how you measure a multi-decadal temperature trend on Mars? Just how good is the evidence for a warming trend on Mars, anyway?" Not very good, as it turns out.
Similarly, any genuine skeptic, hearing the claim that warming is due to the sun being a "mildly variable star" would immediately think, "Wait a minute. Thus sun is clearly visible up there in the sky. It can't be that hard to measure solar radiance. Is it really plausible that scientists haven't thought to check that?" They have. It's not the sun.
Most of the time anything with the word " Berkeley" in it indicates the presence of biased leftists.
SO Im sure that this 'study' will be releasing all its data and analysis methodes and data collection methodologies the way REAL science is supposed to so that others can inspect its validity.
Sorry if you already destroyed the data and wont disclose method and process, but thats what REAL science expects.
Just more lemmings for Algores moron parade ???
Seriously, where was this guy 20 years ago? The basic idea of global warming is not that hard to understand, and we've had decades to work it all out, now. Frankly, this guy's rejection of the "large, complex global climate models, the huge computer programs" in favor of shape fitting (one of my former profs joked that he could fit a curve to the New York skyline with only 3 free variables) has all the hallmarks of a student laboriously working out for himself the implications of the reading he chose not to do; it works, and maybe he himself has a better appreciation of some of the finer points of the gross theory, but otherwise it was nothing but a waste of time and money. I am frankly convinced that it is too late to stop the worst consequences and that we need to start preparing to deal with the it. Personally, I won't miss Florida... As for what we could have done, my not-so-humble opinion is that subsidizing energy lead to profligate use and that people would drive smaller cars less often if gas cost $15/gal.
You may be correct about the whole "global weirding" thing ... but where's the evidence that us spending billions on "drastically reducing our consumption of carbon" would provide benefits in a reasonable time-frame??
That's the "sticking point" I see that's not adequately studied or addressed. It's too easy to spread fear around, and motivate people to "Start acting now!" (which usually equates to convincing government to fork over big subsidies to specific industries who claim to sell some of the solutions).
Let's not forget, for example, that this is GLOBAL warming we're talking about (even if it's popular now to call it "climate change" instead). It's not USA warming. With nations like China having far larger populations than the U.S. does, I fail to see how even a drastic reduction on the part of the U.S. would necessarily turn the problem around before it can cause the negative impact people are trying to prevent? You'd have to get the entire world on-board with these drastic changes, and I don't imagine some of the biggest contributors will show much interest.
On top of that, it seems to me like cleaner alternative forms of energy are going to come about as a natural progression of things, regardless of trying to "force" them to come about with legislation. We're fairly certain we're not going to see the price of oil dropping significantly in the future. Long before we actually use it all up, we'll hit the point where extracting it is simply a costly enough process that other alternatives start making more economic sense. Many places already want to move away from burning coal, simply because it creates pollution in the vicinity of where it's burnt (AND because cleaner burning natural gas is currently cheaper and more plentiful). This would hold true even if the climate change theory never even existed.
I'm not one of the "deniers", but I *do* know from history that government often rushes to provide solutions without realizing all of the ramifications of implementing those new changes and laws. I'd say that in most cases, it turns out we were better off without the artificial interference. (Remember the "oxygenated gasoline" mandate not that long ago, that demanded people use the alternate mix of fuel because it didn't cause as much air pollution? Not long after it was put into law, they discovered the oxygenated mix had an increased tendency to leech into ground-water and cause pollution that way, AND it gave cars less miles-per-gallon than the traditional mixture, meaning people burnt more of it. So essentially, we were better off not mandating the change at all.)
I strongly believe our plant is pretty capable of balancing things out in the long run. We only have so many natural resources of a given type to utilize, and the basics laws of physics make certain guarantees too (such as us being unable to create or destroy matter ... the finite amount we have is simply converted from one substance to another). I think I'd rather trust that than making drastic lifestyle changes that could horribly impact the quality of our lives. Scientists just decided in the last decade or less that humans created this scenario over 200-some years that we THINK we can MAYBE reverse in short order by giving up our primary forms of energy. THAT sounds less that convincing.
People who "switched to SUVs" almost always did so because they found a larger vehicle useful, and the trend was to move away from such options as full-size conversion vans or full-size station wagons.
It's ridiculous to pretend that before the SUV, everyone only drove small, economic vehicles.
What's actually happening now is we're seeing the fuel economy improve on such vehicles, since high sales volume leads to justification to invest more R&D in improving them. My Jeep Patriot 4x4 with an automatic (technically CVT) transmission got an average of 26-27MPG. That's really not too horrible for a box-shaped 4 wheel drive SUV.
The fact that modern economy cars give more leg room or more comfortable back seats than in the past isn't that relevant. What about pet owners, for example? A lot of SUV drivers I know have 1 or 2 large dogs they need to transport around regularly, and they want that enclosed space in the back of an SUV, vs. dogs laying across back seats intended for humans.
just a couple years ago here i thought we came to a consensus that we could never trust anything koch bros-related...
How big bribe did this required?
we have a Ford Focus hatchback - easily seats 5 with a fair amount of cargo space, maybe 6 if the people in the back seat are small. Gas mileage is something in the mid-20s.
Also, you could fold down one or two of the back seats for a lot more cargo space, especially if you need the extra cargo space only occasionally.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Watts squirming?
That ain't half of it. The tag wattsupwiththat.com/tag/berkeley-earth-surface-temperature/ should point to BEST but currently directs to Watts' OWN new paper.
The guy just went over 9000.
...doesn't exist. The Kochs donate to a lot of things beneficial to society...actually more than they donate to politicians. I can boldly say this, because, yes...I worked for a Koch funded organization. Hardly anything "conspiratorial" about it. I don't agree with some of their political donations, (though their political views are actually quite different that the GOP candidates they donate to; since they are very Libertarian, pro-gay marriage, legalization of drugs, etc.) but they do a lot of good things...that you will NEVER hear in the press. I'll even say this without being anonymous, because why should I? They've done a lot more good than they've done bad. Soros probably has too.
... eliminate its cause. Now that its cause has been decided upon ... something a nuclear winter can fix.
Seriously, reducing a carbon footprint is often expensive. I'd put enough solar panels on my house to forget about electric bills, if it didn't cost tens of thousands of dollars and over 40 years to offset the cost (even with tax incentives). Three things keep me from a Prius/electric cars; 1. The look (I know, I'm superficial or whatever) and 2. Again, price. I can't just up and buy a new vehicle. I already did that once and I'm paying for it, 3. All electric crap, no charging stations/few and far between. Supporting free range/vegan vegies/etc., costs a shit ton. Ten bucks for 2 carrots, 20$ for half a dozen eggs. I can bike around town, sure, if I had a bike (the cost of that is not included in "too expensive, fuck green" post.) If anybody has ways I can reduce my carbon footprint without breaking my bank (preferably free), feel free to tell me.
Just retreat into your own little world making up new words to talk to your fellow reality refugees, words like warmists.
Your religion of greed and denial and suppressed guilt is so strong it has overthrown your reason, and you mumble nonsense in your fever.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Dude, seriously, don't post links from the "wattsupwiththat" site. Its almost as bad as posting links from creation science ministries or a homeopathy site.
Bad cranky un-science from a noted pseudoscience peddler.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
Our descendants for TENS OF THOUSANDS of generations may curse their selfish, short-sighted ancestors of the 21st century.
And Americans in particular.
This imply the assumption the human race survives GW.
Questions raise, answers kill. Raise questions to stay alive.
I could feel a shift in the weather patterns in my bones from mid 70s into the 80s. Things changed, the Winters had changed, and they haven't been the same since. I used to talk about this back then, and people thought it was paranoid bullshit. If you paid attention to environmental issues, it wasn't surprising.
I've been giving this all some thought over the decades as we shift into twilight, and here are my thoughts on it all. Hydrocarbons, we are goofy when it comes to burning them for fuel. Our footprint is too big, and we don't have enough deep green foliage to do deep photosynthesis. We need to reside under the canopy of deep green if we can. If not, we build under what foliage we can find. Our thermal/heat sink footprint is too high. It's our structures and a lot of it is concrete.
We set by and watched Brazil trash the Amazon rain forest. We have patches of trash in our ocean the size of Texas. Forests of smoke stacks puke God only knows what into the sky. We burn the fuck out of hydrocarbons in about everything. Start adding it all up and it's insanity.
Too big to fail. Does that work with ecosystems?
Take the Red Pill.
That story reads like a testimonial and I could hardly get off of the ground with it.
1. I am a "converted skeptic", after...
2. "I intepreted the data" from a study...
3. conducted by a research center that "I founded with my daughter"..
4. that used new mathematical models "created by our lead researcher."
I stopped reading after that.
Oh lemme see....now.
The global banking system has been looted, and is in collapse and guess what? A bunch of bankers decide they need a carbon credits trading system to tax all living things on the planet and just can't figure out how to do it?
Oh I know, lets just make a study up and tell everyone no no, Man made climate change is real and everyone has to pay us a carbon tax so that we can save the planet. You know....only BANKERS can save the planet.
What a BUNCH OF CRAP.
-Hackus
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
There are lots of corporations that might be very happy with the massive infrastructure improvements needed to move to a more energy efficient economy. The coal industry is going to be against it, but even the oil industry getting excited about the potential of natural gas.
Any time there is change you can predict, corporations want in. Actually, most investors will want in. Everyone wants to be an early investor in something that will pay off.
Yes I am a tree-hugger, but I am also a realist. If we continue to screw up this world, WE will die out, not nature.
To quote the great George Carlin: 'Nature will shake us off like a bad cold. Another failed experiment'.
Kinda makes you sad to think that we have come this far, simply to fall on the last few meters.
I wonder why the US is the only country which claims that there is no human made global warming. Everywhere else the discussion has ended and we all 6.5 billion people think that we have to do something about it. A) we have to reduce CO2-production (which we have to reduce anyway, as the resource is limited) and B) prepare for the impact of the already ongoing climate change.
Depending on the rise of the sea level, we have to move cities like Beijing, New York, London, Hamburg, and L.A.. Furthermore we will loose a lot of agricultural usable land. Instead of discussion if there is a global climate change or not, we should address the issues.
not unless we manage to cause a runaway greenhouse effect like Venus
Even then, life will go on. It may not be very complex life (then again, who knows?), but something will survive.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
Your attitude shows you have no regard for real science. You are simply one of those enviro-wackos who will spout any line available as long as it promotes your extreme agenda of government control, higher taxes and less freedom.
Time to set up your own food system if you think this is the future. I say aquaponics seems like a good plan, at least until the atmosphere turns to hell.
Perhaps this time Mr. Muller has bothered to send his stuff through peer review before issuing press releases.
Except that the public opinion IS changing.
http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/03/the-generation-gap-and-the-2012-election-3/11-3-11-101/
http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/03/the-generation-gap-and-the-2012-election-3/11-3-11-104/
http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/03/the-generation-gap-and-the-2012-election-3/11-3-11-105/
Also, the price of solar power is falling fast, and wind price is going down too. It is predicted that half the world will reach residential solar grid parity as early as *2015*; wind will reach grid parity by 2025. And there are even other options such as next-generation nuclear.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_parity
So even though AGW is probably real, rest assured that free market is moving in the right direction. Also, public opinion is becoming ever more willing to have the government interfere and accelerate the process.
See http://www.people-press.org/2011/11/03/the-generation-gap-and-the-2012-election-3/11-3-11-102/
Of course we are causing global warming, and so what? It is the natural result of nature's experiment with high intelligence. And nature is finding out that high intelligence is pathological in a species and always results in its self destruction. Peabrained dinosaurs lived for hundreds of millions of years because they conformed to their environment and were killed by it when it wanted them dead. Not so humans. We alter the environment to suit our own survival and increase. We exploit its resources to that end. We spend our lives creating order out of chaos and beltching entropy out the tailpipe. Our behavior is natural, unavoidable, and inevitably fatal. Shrug.
E Proelio Veritas.
Global warming by itself might not end life on this planet. But human beings using conventional and/or/eventually nuclear weapons to persuade other human beings to surrender their arable land and/or water...that's a different - but consequential - extinction event altogether.
It would be difficult to assert that humans would not make war for survival given that they have demonstrated a willingness to make war for oil - oil that is more of an enabler of human leisure activities, in reality, than a survival prerequisite like food and water.
(Although - to continue the emphasis on reality - oil wars are more about enabling or continuing the harvesting of the effectively imaginary wealth that is generated by the trade in oil.)
Orwell: "In a Time of Universal Deceit, telling the Truth is a Revolutionary Act"
NOAA overstates warming: study
What was once true, is no longer so
1) This is very old and FAILED the review process and didn't get published
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/29/why-the-best-papers-failed-to-pass-peer-review/#more-68366
2) It has been superceded by some correctly done science that shows "New study shows half of the global warming in the USA is artificial"
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/07/29/press-release-2/#more-68286
3) Even one of his co-researchers on some are unimpressed
http://judithcurry.com/2012/07/30/observation-based-attribution/
That's the real problem with deniers- they're essentially throwing in their lot with likes of the Young Earth believers and evolution deniers. For all these groups the sheer number and the basic nature of things that would have to be fundamentally misunderstood and actually different from what they are, yet somehow all conspire to give the same results as if the scientists were correct is impossible.
For Young Earthers, you can't deny carbon dating, for instance, because the follow on consequences of it being wrong in completely different fields would imply even MORE basic things were wrong and in need of a new set of explanations which coincidentally give us the same results. The fan out from carbon dating being an error essentially leaves only magic as a possible explanation for all of science.
So also with human caused global warming. The burden of having to account for the observed events and findings as the pieces start to lock together into a coherent whole, the odds that you'll be able to do that and still be doing what we call science are effectively nil.
Even Einstein was wrong about quantum mechanics and God playing dice. At some point, the mountain of evidence is not just too high, but too casually interlinked to supporting lines of evidence and in fact to facts which are not even related to the field in question that any future explanation is only an elaboration of the theory, not a refutation of the theory.
Blaming America for this is strange. Other countries have contributed a lot more (overall and per GDP) CO2.
I'm sure the Koch Brother's personal shill and PR blatherers (Limbaugh, Hannity, and Co) are already diiging into Dr Muller's past to find any Socialist Sympathies.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
"Our descendants for TENS OF THOUSANDS of generations may curse their selfish, short-sighted ancestors of the 21st century.
And Americans in particular."
Depends who writes the history books.
I wish I could be treated by them, but I want properly evaluated evidence that their claims are true. Without regulation, who know what that treatment could do to what's left of my knees?
Our descendants for TENS OF THOUSANDS of generations may curse their selfish, short-sighted ancestors of the 21st century. And Americans in particular.
Then fuck them. We are to squander our opportunities now (Which I might had has the potential to improve those lives far beyond mere biodiversity) because of TENS OF THOUSANDS of incompetent generations? If they want biodiversity, then they can make it.
As I see it, if we curb our civilization we can make one world with a huge diversity of life. If we don't hold back, we potentially can make millions of such worlds.
Curious that you didn't mention the Chinese, whose emissions are actually greater at this point
"Last human on earth whose mind is not made up about AGW one way or the other finally vets data from 1990-era correlation argument to his satisfaction, decides to save time by accepting microscopic scrutiny of mechanism which has occupied the rest of us since then as valid"
I don't think I'm twisting logic at all here....
First of all, most of the researchers studying climate, I'd say, are primarily motivated to report all of the details they come up with of negative implications of the situation (from doing extensive computer modeling, making charts with predictions based on previously gathered data put in a sequence, etc.). Understandable, but that can be a "can't see the forest for the trees" situation. Does anyone know for CERTAIN what the eventual outcome will be? No... but throughout history, scientists have been making predictive models and been largely incorrect.
For example, back in WWII, the military consulted with scientists when developing the atomic bomb, and were warned that detonating a nuclear bomb in the air could cause the upper layers of the atmosphere to catch on fire and literally burn away, pretty much ending life as we know it. The military obviously decided to ignore that advice and continued testing their nuclear weapons anyway -- and it turns out that no, those scientists predicted incorrectly. On a more mundane, daily basis, I get weather forecasts that are almost invariably wrong. Expect rain on Thursday? Nope... it's bright and sunny all day! Highs in the low 90's? Nope, 104! Despite all the research going into weather prediction, I can give a guess that's as good as anything they come up with for the next day's forecast, and beyond that -- nobody seems to provide anything much better than random guesses.
Where you and I disagree seems pretty simple. You feel it's got to be worthwhile to "do something" vs. "sitting back and doing nothing". I, on the other hand, feel that most of us think a little bit too highly of ourselves and our ability to "save the planet" or "save us from ourselves" in various situations. I'm not denying the fact that our collective choices for generating energy appear to be resulting in some climate changes. But I'm questioning how rational it is to believe that when we can't even come up with an accurate weather forecast a WEEK out from a given day, we somehow have the ability to reverse these temperature increases in time to prevent the proposed catastrophes we predicted MIGHT happen otherwise.
Trying to do something would be a simple "no brainer" if the stakes weren't so high. The proposed solutions involve HUGE expenditures, an assumption that the rest of the civilized world will agree to implement similar plans at correspondingly HUGE expenditures, and in some cases (such as dumping chemicals in the oceans to encourage more algae growth?), questionable side-effects that aren't being taken into account. (What would such a change do to the aquatic life, for example?) A demand to a near immediate halt to energy production done with oil and coal puts many people out of work, causes costs to skyrocket to build alternatives in a short time-frame, and could basically destabilize an entire economy. Would it even work though? Probably not if other countries just say, "Cool! Cheaper oil and coal for us to use now that the USA doesn't want it anymore!")
What about all those ice and seabed cores that show elevated carbon dioxide as a Trailing Indicator? Following that scenario, warmth causes increased life activity which, in turn, sequesters carbon dioxide as carbon compounds. Then, something changes and the place goes into a cooling phase coupled with a die-off which releases decomposition gasses including, ta-tah(!), carbon dioxide.