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The 40,000-Mile Volcano (nytimes.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The NY Times reports on one of the wonders of the underwater world: the extensive web of volcanoes and hydrothermal vents present where tectonic plates meet and grind against one another. "Welcome to one of the planet's most obscure but important features, known rather prosaically as the midocean ridges. Though long enough to circle the moon more than six times, they receive little notice because they lie hidden in pitch darkness." The magma seeping through these cracks generate massive amounts of heat — enough to sustain incredible ecosystems.
But as scientists have gained a deeper understanding of this geological phenomenon, they realize it's more chaotic than they had imagined. "The old idea was that the eruptions of oozing lava and related activity occurred at fairly steady rates. Now, studies hint at the existence of outbursts large enough to influence not only the character of the global sea but the planet's temperature. Experts believe the activity may carry major repercussions because the oceanic ridges account for some 70 percent of the planet's volcanic eruptions. By definition, that makes them enormous sources of heat and exotic minerals as well as such everyday gases as carbon dioxide, which all volcanoes emit."
But as scientists have gained a deeper understanding of this geological phenomenon, they realize it's more chaotic than they had imagined. "The old idea was that the eruptions of oozing lava and related activity occurred at fairly steady rates. Now, studies hint at the existence of outbursts large enough to influence not only the character of the global sea but the planet's temperature. Experts believe the activity may carry major repercussions because the oceanic ridges account for some 70 percent of the planet's volcanic eruptions. By definition, that makes them enormous sources of heat and exotic minerals as well as such everyday gases as carbon dioxide, which all volcanoes emit."
when the volcano blows, Mr. Utley.
Where are the "private ocean exploration" people now? Surely there's money to be made at the bottom of the ocean? Think of the resources, think of the spinoffs, think of the inspiration!
By definition, that makes them enormous sources of heat
Well how much heat? TFA doesn't say. Enough to pilot El Nino or something similar? More?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Could that mean its not cow farts causing global warming?
Perhaps your right? I still think cutting pollution is good thing regardless of the motives.
Really, Clarissa? Just like that? Uh huh.
The evidence that humans are making a difference in the CO2 levels is found by checking the ratios of different CO2 isotopes. Plants have a different ratio of isotopes than fossil fuels. See this link for more info.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
This sounds like a very plausible source for the extra heat that's causing what environmentalists/leftists like to call "Global Warming".
These environmentalists/leftists have been blaming humans the whole time, yet now it turns out that it's undersea volcanoes that are responsible, and not people.
It actually makes a lot of sense that volcanoes would be responsible.
A single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives.
When there are many of these volcanoes, and they have ongoing eruptions day after day, they'd of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do.
Undersea volcanoes heat the water. The water melts the polar caps. The polar caps add more liquid water to the oceans, which is heated by these volcanoes. The water heats the air.
This explains all of the "Global Warming" that has been blamed on humans by environmentalists/leftists. It explains the sea level changes. It explains it all.
A layman saying "this could explain it" is not the same as years of tests by scientists saying "this could explain it." You have one theory that for all you know climate scientists had already considered. This is why climate change deniers are not utilizing science and reason to argue. They see something and say in the same thought "maybe it's this!" and "it is this!" Clearly your hurry to draw that conclusion is due to your anti left/anti climate change bias. Please science yourself.
The summary makes it seem like it's an issue about global warming, but it's really not - the article briefly touches on that point. The exciting thing here is that scientists have spent years building up a new sensor network, monitoring the underwater ridges. Now, the network is about to go live, and they are about to get tons of data. Before that, they mainly were able to investigate by dropping expensive subs down there (and by using data from the Navy's submarine detectors).
Also, check out this picture. If there is anything related to AGW, it's probably just a little nudge to open the door to more funding.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
"This sounds like a very plausible source for the extra heat that's causing what environmentalists/leftists like to call "Global Warming"."
So you acknowledge something's warming, and you have a hard time calling it global warming? In your first sentence, you already fail miserably.
"blamed on humans by environmentalists"
Yeah! Fuck the environment! We'll just private 3D print a new one by the job creators!
News: Check out these undersea volcanoes you hadn't heard of. Studies are hinting that their eruptions may be more sporadic than regular.
Assumption: Scientists hadn't heard of these volcanoes either.
Postulate: This must mean any effect they have is new & unaccounted for.
Factoid: A volcano puts out lots of smoke & hot stuff.
Assumption: Volcanoes put out more smoke & hot stuff than people.
Preconception: My lifestyle couldn't possibly be bad in any way, therefore humans couldn't negatively affect the environment.
Oblig. Politicisation: Anyone who says otherwise is a "leftist"
Supposal: All these new volcanoes are increasing temperatures far beyond what people could do.
Conclusion: THAT must be the real reason for global warming! I KNEW it couldn't be us! This explains EVERYTHING!
Congratulations on your data-free chain of reasoning. Wrong from the beginning, of course - as the summary says, these volcanoes are already known to account for 70% of eruptions, so their thermal & CO2 output is already factored in. Plus of course, the data already showed that average volcanic CO2 output is under 1% that of humans, and their thermal output is far smaller again. New studies "hinting" that these eruptions might happen in bursts rather than continuously doesn't change that.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
The summary is designed to generate page hits and replies.
Translation: Oh look, there's another source of CO2, so quickly let's blame it for everything and we can go on burning fossil fuels unimpeded!
I love deniers. On the one hand, they deny that CO2 has the physical properties every fucking physicist has understood for over a century, and then, on the other hand, every time some other source of CO2 is found, they declare "You see, that's why there's AGW!" The fact that they, like all other pseudo-scientific proponents can hold mutually exclusive views doesn't seem to bother them. All they care about is removing any responsibility human civilization might have for negative impacts on global climate, presumably so they can just carry on as usual, or in some cases, continue profiting from climate and environmental destruction.
Perhaps, good poster, you can point out where exactly in any of the material surrounding this research that it says "AGW is caused by the mid-ocean ridges." Go on, I openly challenge you to provide these citations.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
All that matters is cheap energy and investors making money. Fuck absolutely every fucking thing else. Money is the only fucking thing that matters.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
You people are the fucking worst, its like reading a fucking dystopian novel. Just call them Deniers and its all solved! No need for discourse, your either with or against us. Im guessing you just LOOOOOVE the warr on terra.
A single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives.
When there are many of these volcanoes, and they have ongoing eruptions day after day, they'd of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do.
Goddamnit, do I really have to go digging through my post history to find that data again?
Here, from all the way back in October, the last time I saw someone pull some stupid assertion out of their ass like you just did:
Throughout the world, in a year all volcanoes combined (above and below water) emit around 145 to 255 million tons of CO2. In the US, forest fires release around 290 million tons every year. That's great. Maybe people have contributed to worse fires in recent decades, maybe overall not so much. Either way, it's in the range of several hundred million tons of CO2 every year.
The largest coal power plant, in Taiwan, releases 40 million tons per year. That means that, at the low range of estimates for volcanoes, only 4 of those power plants would emit more CO2 than all volcanoes on the planet. China alone emits over 10 billion tons per year. That is far more than all forest fires. The US is about half that, about 5.3 billion tons. Overall, people emit over 30 billion tons in CO2 through burning of fossil fuels (power plants, cars, etc), and that level has nearly tripled in the past 15 years.
So, Mr. Fucking Genius, if you think that volcanoes would "of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do", tell me, is 255 million tons more or less than 30 billion tons? Because, and I'm not a math major or anything, but it sounds to me like we would need 117 times as many active volcanoes on the planet to reach the level of CO2 that is output by human activity. I'll post your assertion here again, just to highlight how goddamn stupid and completely uneducated it is:
A single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives.
When there are many of these volcanoes, and they have ongoing eruptions day after day, they'd of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do.
At 30 billion tons per year, it takes an average of FOUR DAYS for us to emit more CO2 than all volcanoes do in a year.
As soon as I read the summary I knew that some idiot was going to post something about global warming, I didn't expect that the very first post would be some idiot saying "therefore, this explains everything."
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
This sounds like a very plausible source for the extra heat that's causing what environmentalists/leftists like to call "Global Warming".
These environmentalists/leftists have been blaming humans the whole time, yet now it turns out that it's undersea volcanoes that are responsible, and not people.
It actually makes a lot of sense that volcanoes would be responsible.
A single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives.
When there are many of these volcanoes, and they have ongoing eruptions day after day, they'd of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do.
Undersea volcanoes heat the water. The water melts the polar caps. The polar caps add more liquid water to the oceans, which is heated by these volcanoes. The water heats the air.
This explains all of the "Global Warming" that has been blamed on humans by environmentalists/leftists. It explains the sea level changes. It explains it all.
The question you need to ask is has the rate of eruptions on the mid ocean ridges changed significantly over the past century. The mid ocean ridge in the Atlantic has existed since the breakup of Pangaea 150-175 million years ago. There have undoubtedly been times of greater and lesser activity over that time period but to postulate that all of a sudden 100 years ago or so the activity increased enough to force the changes we're seeing is pushing it. You will definitely need some scientific evidence to back that up.
The thing about volcanoes is yes, they are spectacular from a human perspective but the amount of CO2 they emit and heat they release is relatively insignificant compared to human emissions and the amount of heat pouring on to the Earth daily from the Sun. Even a 40,000 mile long volcano is not going to release much heat compared to daily insolation.
You're on the right track but actually plants and fossil fuels (which after all are largely derived from plants) have similar isotopic ratios. This is because organic processes prefer the lighter 12C to 13C isotope. But in the non-organic area there is no such preference so the 13C/12C ratio is higher than in organic sources. The dropping 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere is an indication that much of the extra CO2 comes from fossil fuel burning. Sources of non-organic CO2 include volcanoes and making cement.
right on.
Don't step on the baby.
And all those volcanoes just happened to start really acting up at the start of the industrial revolution, thus explaining climatic change without implicating human activity...
Sure.
Don't step on the baby.
Right, thanks
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Issues like polluting and deforestation are separate from carbon.
On a slight tangent: I think it's worth saying though that those who are against GMO food and/or those in favor of organic food (which it seems a lot on the left are) are inadvertently proponents of deforestation. The reason why is because making way for farm land is the biggest cause of deforestation. Modern farming techniques are the reason why food yield is up 300% since the 1950's, while farm land used for food has only increased by 12%. Organic farming basically mandates that we go back to 1950's style agriculture, which means that if we do that, we have to choose between more destruction of natural landmass OR starvation. And to feed the growing world population, GMO food will be required to squeeze even higher yield out of existing landmass.
And by the way, paper and lumber are produced on tree farms these days; that is, they come from trees bread specifically for that purpose because you get better paper and better lumber from them, and we aren't going to run out of those trees any sooner than eating potatoes will make us run out of potatoes. Also by the way, the World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, United Nations, Academy of Sciences, and American Medical Association have all spoken in favor of GMO food.
Umm...I'm not an expert on the subject, but I think I wouldn't be wrong if I suggested that volcanic CO2 is neither plant nor fossil fuel based.
Yea, no shit... Did you notice how fast the fucking warmanistas jumped in here to shout down questions?
They dont fucking know how many volcanoes are on the ocean floors. Yes there is a group large enough to make el nino happen in the pacific. They are fucking everywhere and they have no idea how many. NO FUCKING CLUE!
But they are absolutely god damn sure that human co2 emissions are the major driver of global warming despite the decline in the warming trend since 1998. They fucked with temperature records to 'hide the decline'. As I recall, one prominent scientist was BANNED from editing wikipedia over erasing things like the medieval-warming period to reinforce the hockey stick!
So to be clear... climate has not a god damn fucking thing to do with the sun, or any other unknown undiscovered heat source and is a direct result of humans and their evil co2. No new discoveries will ever change this problem nor ever be reason to question the theory. Go home, nothing to see.... Yea, and the layers upon layers of BULL SHIT and exaggerated predictions dont mean anything. You cannot trust scientist paid by oil companies, but you must trust scientist who lose their funding if they found AGW to be the horse shit it is.
The real conspiracy here is that they are selling a rather expensive book about this ridge: http://www.amazon.com/Discovering-Deep-Photographic-Atlas-Seafloor/dp/052185718X/ref=sr_1_1
I want to see the pics, but not for that much
In this type of scenario, if the case is sharing the profits to the masses... Then we should mine all that sweet sulfur and make a lots of fertilizer right away.
Plants have a different ratio of isotopes than fossil fuels.
But that difference is due to the age of the carbon released. Plants absorb carbon isotopes (CO2) from the atmosphere in ratios similar to its recent creation by cosmic rays. Animals that eat those plants release the same spectrum of carbon isotopes. Geological carbon that which has aged, changing isotope ratios (see carbon dating) and emitted by volcanic sources may be indiscernible from carbon which has aged in geological formations, pumped to the surface, processed and burned in internal combustion engines.
Have gnu, will travel.
climate scientists
... whose tenure and research grants depend on towing the party line.
Sorry, but I'm going to put my faith in chemists, physicists and meteorologists who have a broader educational experience and less professional reputation tied up in 'climate science'. More chance of an objective opinion. That's why they brought Feynman in to help investigate the Challenger accident.
Have gnu, will travel.
This is about Global Warming.
Prepare to be disappointed. It isn't about global warming in any way. Talk about motivated reasoning.
Can I be pedantic for a moment and point out that IF volcanoes cause it (I'm not taking that position, though I am a skeptic), AGW is a misnomer, since that stands for "Anthtropogenic [i.e. Man-Made] Global Warming?"
I'm sorry (actually I'm not), but that is incredibly stupid. Do you think that this hasn't been going on for geologic timeframes? That just, coincidentally they start acting up right at the time we start burning a bunch of fossil fuels?
toeing the party line.
FTFY
Probably there are no citations. However, if this is a significant factor in global climate and it is not included in current climate models, current climate models would be, at the least, questionable. It would also raise the question as to whether there are other significant unknown factors.
linquendum tondere
The usual denialist claptrap, how's it feel to be so incredibly stupid?
If you had any real courage of your convictions, you wouldn't post as AC.
So fuck off retard and let the adults talk.
While development does play a role, it uses considerably less landmass than farmland.
Toilet paper and mansions (or even mcdonalds stores) are created from trees that are selectively bread like these:
http://lh5.ggpht.com/-6yvLBQRO...
Notice how they're perfectly straight with no branches? Guess what, normal trees don't grow that way. They grow these trees like this because it results in a better product. Nobody is cutting down forests to make that kind of stuff. If they are, then it's of such a small amount to be insignificant.
Also I'm not a republican, but you can take your greenpeace anti-science propaganda and shove it up your hippie ass.
Alas, research reveals that some 30% of 'canadian' FSC-labeled wood is actually illegally cut tropical hardwood. That's cheaper than growing perfectly straight trees in a tree-farm. I'd guess that everything that has no such label would do even worse.
All that matters is cheap energy and investors making money. Fuck absolutely every fucking thing else. Money is the only fucking thing that matters.
Um, didn't Wall Street barf over the price of oil dropping?
Just another day in Paradise
This sounds like a very plausible source for the extra heat that's causing what environmentalists/leftists like to call "Global Warming".
No it doesn't.
It's not heat that's causing global warming, it's extra heat.
There is no trend in the heat coming from these volcanoes, therefore they can't be the cause of the observed trend in temperatures.
Simultaneously if the observed warming was being caused by undersea volcanoes what is the mechanism that is stopping warming due to the observed increase in greenhouse gasses?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
The evidence that humans are making a difference in the CO2 levels is found by checking the ratios of different CO2 isotopes.
That's doing it the hard way.
The evidence that humans are making a difference in the CO2 levels is found by double entry book keeping -- we know how much coal, oil and gas is being burned because we know how much money is being spent on it. From that, plus simple chemistry we can calculate how much CO2 we are emitting. That turns out to be about twice the observed CO2 increase, so we know 100% of the increase in CO2 is coming from fossil fuel burning.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Sorry, but I'm going to put my faith in chemists, physicists and meteorologists
What exactly do you think "climate scientists" are if not "chemists, physicists and meteorologists"?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Rest easy good sir.
Volcanoes are already a known factor.
And they are not significant.
Average yearly CO2 output from all volcanoes worldwide: ~300 million tons.
Average yearly CO2 output from all of humanity: 40+ billion tons.
In fact, because the overwhelming majority of what volcanoes release is ash and other particulate matter, in far greater quantities than the CO2 they release or cause to be releases through combustion, the effect of volcanoes on climate is actually a cooling effect rather than a warming one.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
your grasp of science is weak.
no, volcanoes don't emit more than people.
no, it doesn't explain it all.
no, you haven't miraculously discovered the mechanism not seen by the entirety of the world's scientists.
Average yearly CO2 output from all volcanoes worldwide: ~300 million tons.
Average yearly CO2 output from all of humanity: 40+ billion tons.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
That turns out to be about twice the observed CO2 increase, so we know 100% of the increase in CO2 is coming from fossil fuel burning.
So you're implying (unintentionally) that the math doesn't add up (we emit twice the observed increase), and the conclusion is 100% manmade GW, rather than, "oops, we might've goofed the math somewhere", let's redo this? Where's the other 50% that we're emitting going? If it's absorbed, how do you know exactly 50% of is absorbed, i.e. how does that prove CO2 isn't also coming from other sources such as this volcano? I'm not disputing that man is belching CO2 into the atmosphere, and that pollution is bad. But there seems to be a few assumptions at play here.
Speaking of, we always see this "97% of scientists agree on AGW.. but which scientists are those? Of what subset? Surely not every scientist on the planet, since not every field of science is relevant or qualified to judge. It might help the argument if this was more readily specified.
Not even slightly. Organic farming is perfectly compatible with all sorts of intensive farming techniques, such as hydro- and aero-ponics, permaculture, etc. as well as conventional row-cropping. I could even achieve 100% subsistence, organically, using only what I grow on my 0.2 acre (including buildings) urban lot, if I wanted to put in the effort.
In other words, land is not the barrier to sustainable agriculture. The problem is that unsustainable agriculture is too cheap (in the short term) because its negative externalities aren't being properly accounted for.
You don't get "better lumber," you get more lumber, faster and therefore cheaper. Most people in the construction industry agree that the lumber used in houses a century ago was stronger than the stuff we use today (mostly because slower-growing trees tend to have denser wood).
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
But we don't know how much is naturally being absorbed.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
So you're implying (unintentionally) that the math doesn't add up
No, I'm implying that about 50% of what we emit is taken up by carbon sinks (ocean acidification, vegetation and so on).
It's simply not possible that the math doesn't add up -- we know how much CO2 is emitted when a given quantity of coal, oil or gas is burnt, that's simple chemistry. We know how much money is being spent on buying that coal, oil and gas, that's simple accountancy.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Yes we do.
We know how much we're emitting. We know what the atmospheric increase is. The rest is "naturally absorbed". It turns out to be about 50% of what we're emitting. Nobody (sane) disputes this.
Watch this Heartland Institute video
Or it could be that 90% of the stuff we are emitting is getting absorbed, but that natural emissions had increased so much, that the absorption process has gotten overwhelmed (as has happened many times in history).
The reason no one sane disputes it is because we can look at the ratios.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Cut your pollution as much as you like, there are some people who will see the term exotic minerals and will make these areas the next playground of ripping resources up from the ground and devastate it all, only for it to be sold for gazillions of money to bedazzled fucks like you and me. Whatever for Global Warming..
Cut your pollution as much as you like, there are some people who will see the term exotic minerals and will make these areas the next playground of ripping resources up from the ground and devastate it all, only for it to be sold for gazillions of money to bedazzled fucks like you and me. Whatever for Global Warming..
Depends on what you call "farmland". People are not burning down rain forest to make vegetable gardens. It is being deforested to make room for beef grazing.
However there are other ways that GMO food is a positive environmentally. Less pesticides are needed, less fertilizers, as you say greater crop density, likely more successful in less suitable soil, etc...
In my own opinion, most mass market "organic" food is complete BS. "Organic" is more a brand label than anything. There was an expose sometime ago on branding things "Heart Smart" and the like, where a organization owns the trademark, products pay for the service of using it, and the standards they have to meet are so low as to be ridiculous.
While getting some locally grown food is great, the bottom line is we (as in everyone) do not produce enough food without using modern techniques. Though food security has certainly become an apparent topic as I guess due to a drought in California, we're seeing things like 7$ cauliflower up here in Canada...
Factoid: TFA says undersea volcanoes have enough heat to change global temperatures
Factoid: People bitching about global warming have LITERALLY NEVER taken undersea volcanoes under consideration when showing temperature changes
Postulate: You're a fucking idiot that's more fucked-up in his chain of reasoning than GP
Conclusion: Go fuck yourself.
Oh, so it's the CO2 from these volcanoes that causes the waters to warm? Really? That's all?
Because I would have guessed it was the FUCKING MAGMA, you dumb shit.
Fucking idiot. The only CO2 that's hotter than lava is the hot air belching from your fucking piehole.
Let me get this straight. You think that the reason that the climate has been warming over the past couple decades has nothing to do with the fact that humans have been pumping tens of billions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year at an increasing rate, but instead it's caused by volcanoes tens of thousands of feet below the surface of the oceans, because the magma is heating up the water at the point of eruption.
Tell me, what changed over the past couple decades to cause all of those volcanoes to become so much more active than they have been for the past several thousand years? Is that what you're suggesting, that there's some reason why all of these volcanoes are much more active lately? Or did the lava just get hotter for some other unknown reason? You're asserting that "a single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives", so I want to know exactly what the basis for your reasoning is.
Oh, so it's the CO2 from these volcanoes that causes the waters to warm?
No, it's CO2 in the atmosphere that is causing the climate to change, Mr. Anonymous Weatherman, not the volcanoes in mid-ocean ridges that have been erupting for the past few billion years, give or take. Those volcanoes are part of the relatively balanced system that is the reason why there is so much life on this planet to start with. What changed over the past century is not that all of the volcanoes got more active for some as-yet-unexplained reason, what changed is that people have pumped a ridiculous amount of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
Here's another part of my post from October, where I was trying to respond to someone suggesting that global warming is fake because dinosaurs used to fart, therefore we can't do anything to the atmosphere. Are you that same guy, now come back to spout ridiculous uneducated shit anonymously?
Since the 1880s we've been burning coal, fuel oil, and natural gas for power, non-stop. Since the early 1900s we've been driving gas-powered cars, non-stop, and also been flying gas-powered planes, non-stop. Since the early 1800s we've been driving CO2-emitting ships around, non-stop. Since the early 1800s we've also been operating CO2-emitting trains, non-stop. That's several hundred years of steam ships, steam trains, power plants, cars, and planes, and if you crack open one of your history books you'll notice that since the introduction of those until today the usage has actually increased. They have gotten larger, hungrier, and more numerous.
If you want to know why the climate has warmed up, there's your answer. It has less to do with the volcanoes that have been erupting for all of human history, and more to do with actual human history. I wonder, did you even bother to read the actual article or did you act like people who think like you normally act and just read the summary, think to yourself "now I'm educated!", and post some stupid crap that you pull straight out of your ass?
And *I'm* the idiot. Riiiiiight...
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Holy fucking shit. If you can't read TFA, please read TFS. Volcanoes aren't the constant that we thought they were. They're fucking with the global temperature -- both air and water. All the readings and graphs and models took it for granted that they always just bubbled out the same constant temperature all the time, but they were fucking wrong.
You ARE the fucking idiot because you can't fucking READ TWO FUCKING PARAGRAPHS, and yet you have the fucking AUDACITY to try to repeat yourself to me like a child? Get. Fucked. That's what's fucking wrong with you and your fucking Cult of Climatology. Take your fucking wall of text and cram it up your ass (it will fit in nicely next to your empty head, just above the foot in your mouth).
Sure, buddy. I'll just leave these here:
A single volcano can have a greater environmental impact in a single day than millions of people have over their entire lives.
When there are many of these volcanoes, and they have ongoing eruptions day after day, they'd of course have an absolutely massive impact, far beyond even what billions of humans could ever do.
Those assertions are laughable. Still. Blatantly wrong.
These environmentalists/leftists have been blaming humans the whole time, yet now it turns out that it's undersea volcanoes that are responsible, and not people.
Right, solid concrete proof that people have no impact, it's all volcanoes. Certain, undeniable proof that people are 100% blameless. Clear, unambiguous evidence that putting tens of billions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year has exactly zero impact on anything regarding the climate.
This isn't going anywhere, this isn't productive. You're going to continue making false claims regardless of what myself or anyone else says.
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
Hmm... I don't really want to argue but I'd like to point out a couple of interesting things.
I own a significant quantity of land, it was owned by the paper company prior to my purchasing the various parts at auction. Some of this is replanted some is natural regrowth. Some of it is still actively harvested, it gives me cause to say agricultural purposes for tax reasons and allows a small income stream that basically covers all the taxes on the property - and I have an obscene amount, numbers that might make you poop a little green brick.
Not all the trees harvested are what you'd call farmed, they're natural regrowth and the company uses something called "Timber Stand Improvement." (TSI) TSI is actually kind of neat, the goal is to manage the lot(s) and leave them better than they were when you encountered them. On a good portion of the land, they actually still use horses and oxen. It's kind of neat - I've gone out with them and "bucked up pulp" and whatnot. I'll have my chaps, steel caps, gloves, helmet, screen-visor, and ear muff hearing protection on and have a good time. I've actually gotten a bit adept at it.
Some goes to firewood. Some goes to the pulp mill, and some goes to specialty lumber or just plain pine lumber. Way out on the back side, on the other side of the pond and in the valley, there's another company that just does logs. Those are, for the most part, pulped or hit the saw mills - depending on who is taking what and at what prices. They often don't know until they hit the radio when they get out to the main road.
In general, you're correct. You're also technically incorrect. I'd not be surprised to find out that most people aren't aware that there are still worked natural regrowths and I'd surely not be surprised if few knew of TSI. That said, not a whole lot of people even do the animal hitch any more. They get paid very well for what they harvest and this is the time of year when they're busiest - even though I'm not home to go out and visit them. There's snow on the ground, the ponds and streams are frozen over, and they're hard at work from dark thirty to dark thirty. They also have some more relaxed regulations in crossing bodies of water, working in proximity to moving water, etc.
Hmm... I know I uploaded some video of them working - and even some video of me felling a tree. (Bedecked in my Husky outfit and my 545 - I can even service it and sharpen it myself now, thanks.) Alas, I can't find 'em. I'd have actually shared 'em 'cause this is an old(ish) thread so I figure few people will notice and make fun of me in my Mainer clothes. If I come across it, I'll link it. I just checked my usual haunts and I'm not seeing it. :/ It doesn't even appear that I was hosting it myself - if I was then I named them something funny or they got deleted.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I can confirm that the latter portion of your post is quite likely to be correct. I was mentioning above that I have a company that comes in and does TSI and they do it the old way with horses and oxen - at least as far as the yard. They are in old growth or natural regrowth (80+ years some of it) and those logs sell at a premium. In fact, they can't actually harvest enough to meet demand. The quality is higher and there's a subset of people who will pay for higher quality or higher perceived quality or even environmental impact.
Oddly enough, some of that wood does actually make it into the pulp trucks (not destined to be lumber). However, it goes into making regular paper and not toilet paper. You're not actually going to get to wipe your ass with any of my trees. There's a good chance that you've printed on paper that came from this same area but that would have been long ago - now much of the paper comes from China and Indonesia, or so I'm given to understand. I haven't actually looked.
At any rate, they get paid a healthy premium for that wood. My house is made from that wood - though it's rough cut and never hit the planes so they're real 2x6" or the likes. I also had the luxury of not limiting myself to pine. It's an envelope house, in salt-box style, so there are a lot of exposed surfaces internally. There's a lot of maple, ash, oak, and birch in my house, depending on the role. Almost all of the wood in the house was harvested and milled locally (as in, with a portable saw mill) and there's even a room done in ceder.
I am not familiar enough with the specifics to give details but I can recount anecdotes and I have it on good authority that the wood, such as that in my house or that harvested from old growth or even natural regrowth, is much stronger, tends to warp less, and tends to be both denser and more resistant to the elements. I can attest that, in my limited experience, this lumber is significantly heavier than commercial lumber (density, surely) even after it has gone through a kiln. I don't make much of a profit on it but it does pay all the taxes and allows me to claim agricultural purposes for taxation reasons. So, it works out in the end and it's a rather neat process to see 'em "twitch tha wood out 't yahd." I've been known to meander out and spend some time felling or "buckin' up lumbah." It's kind of fun.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I was under the impression that one of the major warming effects, from volcanoes, was not the CO2 but the particulates? What should be noted, of course, is these underwater volcanoes shouldn't actually be putting particulates in the air at all. It should also be noted that they're more sporadic than previously assumed which means the warming estimates are, if anything, too high and will need to be adjusted.
As I'm intimately familiar with massaging data and making adjustments, I'm quite positive that all sorts of folks will misinterpret it if they do adjust those values - those adjusted values will make the ocean warming trend a bit more alarming as now they have to account for some warming that is not actually being done by the volcanic activity. That's gonna go over about as well as a fart in church.
I do not hold an opinion on the accuracy of their models nor of do I offer an opinion on the validity of their measurements. I am, however, quite familiar with modeling chaotic systems, statistical modeling, data interpretation, data manipulation, and the inherent risks associated with making broad assumptions. Until I've spent more time reading and learning, I'm unqualified to opine.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
The aerosols that a volcano emits actually have a cooling effect, particularly in a major eruption that injects sulfate aerosols into the stratosphere. The effect can be seen in the temperature record with a 2 year drop in temperatures after the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in June of 1991 (an effect predicted and well modeled by climate models BTW). As you note these underwater volcanoes won't be putting any aerosols into the atmosphere.
I don't see any reason to believe these volcanoes on the mid-ocean ridges are having any more effect on ocean temperatures than they have been for thousands of years. Mostly they're so deep that any effect they might have on ocean surface temperatures would probably take hundreds or thousands of years to manifest.
That's what it was - cooling. And the thing I think might matter (and should be taken into account) is that these are sporadic while they were assumed to be constant. If anything, that means that the increase in ocean temperature (perhaps slight, perhaps localized, etc - they're at varied depths) is slightly less attributable to the volcanic activity. Also, they take temperature readings at more than surface depth - I'm sure you're familiar with that. In other words, this should impact the data even if only slightly. If anything, it'd skew the data more strongly to support AGW but probably only a tiny bit.
I'm a big fan of taking all externalities into account. Well, as many as you reasonably can. Is this difference reasonable? I have no idea. I'd wager it does have an effect, albeit a slow and minimal effect but one that scales as energy is retained. The prior data was adjusted to include regular additional energy being added to the oceans. It turns out that this is sporadic and less than previously thought. I don't know how much that will impact the data, the models, or the results - but it should probably be adjusted seeing as we can (probably) make more accurate estimates, given this new information.
So, however much energy was being modeled as being added by volcanic energy was incorrect and too high. It needs to be revised downwards or, well, should be. I don't know if it will be significant but it should be (in my humble opinion) revised to reflect the new data. As a curious onlooker - I'm guessing they used a set value, perhaps localized, as a normative increase to account for this. Whatever that number is (collective or localized) should be refined and new numbers crunched. That's science.
As stated; I doubt it's significant but, if they have the data and others indicate that the prior assumptions were already calculated into the totals, then they might just as well as refine it. If anything - it might make some of the math work out a little better. The more accurately you can model, the better the results get BUT that does have a point of diminishing returns. I'd assume that it'd be fairly trivial to adjust the value.
Which is why I figure it's gonna piss some people off. "They changed the numbers again!" Well, yeah, they should. I'm hoping that they continue to do so and I'd be right pissed if they weren't. (I'm assuming integrity here and I've no expertise to claim otherwise.) I'm not sure what sporadic means, I didn't see any numbers, but that could mean quite a lot of energy that's unaccounted for. Energy that exists but is no longer explained by the volcanic activity. Where it my data set, my models, and my call - I'd look to see, with the varied numbers, just to find out if it's a significant factor and if it might make something else more significant.
Do, if you wish, keep in mind the direction that I'm coming from. I was the author of, owner of, and user of a company that was modeling chaotic systems (namely traffic - and pedestrian traffic) or nearly chaotic (highly unpredictable) with data sets that neared a full terabyte in the late 1990s. I can speak only to the modeling process and the acquisition of data. If you're curious, traffic only appears to be reasonably sane and predictable when you see a small part of it. At a macro level, it's quite chaotic. (I know you're into the AGW thing - I'm sharing just to ensure that I've tossed it out there.)
I like to describe it like this: You can put up all the signs, you can account for the time of day, you can factor in weather, you can calculate the average age of drivers and vehicles, you can predetermine probable routes and throughput averages, but eventually some drunk bastard drives backwards down a one way street. You can't model that specifically, but you can find a normative and optimize for it. You can even then optimize around it - by date, by time, by gender, by vehicle make, by weather, by social events, and all sorts of things. The color of the sky has an impact on how traffic responds as a whole. What you
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
That is kind of rambling and I was wondering if you'd been drinking but then I saw you were ill which can have similar effects :)
I don't think geothermal energy output is much more than at the level of a rounding error compared to the incoming solar radiation. I doubt climate models take that into account at all except perhaps as a constant input. When averaged over climatological periods that seems to be a reasonable assumption.
At this point I see no reason to think that the mid-ocean ridges are doing anything different than they have for millions of years.