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Last January Was the Hottest Global Temperature Anomaly In Recorded History
merbs writes: NASA has released its global temperature data for January 2016, and, once again, the record for the hottest month in recorded history has been shattered. At a time when these kinds of records are broken with some regularity, it takes a particularly scorching month to raise eyebrows in the climate science community. It has to be the hottest hottest month by a pretty hot margin. Sure enough, last January did the trick: It was 1.13 C warmer than the global average of 1951-1980 (the benchmark NASA uses to measure warming trends)—in other words, a full 2F warmer than pre-1980 levels.
Yeh, just remember Valantines day in the US was -14C: the Hottest Febuary 14th 2016 ever!!
Global temperature isn't weather. Regional temperature is.
I don't believe it really has to do with climate scientists. Their descriptions consistently speak of increasing extremes, and a shifting of climates to from one location to another. I think the focus on heat is more of a media issue. The media for presumably historical reasons is stuck on the "global warming" notion and has a bias towards reporting stories about heat extremes, not cold extremes, not wet extremes, though sometimes dry extremes.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
"For rational people or the other kind?"
Rational people I'm assuming are the ones who can keep the argument straight.
And the argument is about *causality* not some hilariously non-specific concept called "climate change".
The Earth's temperature has never not been changing. With or without mankind it's going to get much, much hotter and much, much colder over the next 5 billion years. And it's going to happen both gradually and occasionally very suddenly. Because that's how Earth works.
I for one don't think we should attempt to control nature. Or save beachfront real restate investors, for that matter.
Carry on.
Slashdot is wondering what happened to their old tech/geek audience, while allowing the radical liberal activists and brainwashed "global warming" propagandists to take over the site - the same way Digg was destroyed.
If the new owners want to see a future for slashdot, the first thing to do is kick out these idiot Global Warming activists.
You know what? I'm a radicalised global warming (no scare quotes) activist. You know why? Because I live in a perfect island paradise in the South Pacific.
Only these days, it ain't so perfect. First, we got hit with the most powerful cyclone in the history of this region. Then we got 8 months of extreme drought thanks to the most powerful El Niño event in recorded history.
Neither cyclones nor the ENSO cycle are abnormal here. We are situated just south enough of the equator that we get an average of about 1.5 cyclones in our territorial waters every year. And ENSO has pretty much defined our climatic cycles since before humans ever inhabited here.
But the severity of these events, and the abnormality of weather events in recent years, is indisputably increasing. This year alone, we've seen record high regional temperatures, cyclones crossing the equator—an hitherto unknown event—and just this week, we saw a weak hurricane reverse its path, redouble its strength to Category 3/4, and now we're waiting for it to make landfall in a country that is about 1000 miles from where the storm's typical path would be. We've also seen cyclonic storms forming outside of the tropical belt, and... well, the list goes on.
Have I been brainwashed? Yes. Brainwashed by the evidence. You can cite all the skepticist bullshit you like, because I'm watching my climate change right in front of my eyes. And yes, I know the difference between weather and climate. I also know that virtually all of the climate prediction models call for increasingly wide fluctuations in weather behaviour, and that fits pretty much perfectly with the evidence in front of me.
So respectfully: If I and my ilk have ruined Slashdot for you, then good. Feel free to fuck off out of here and leave the conversation to rational adults.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
And everyone warmist knew that the so-called "pause" was due to a series of mild La Niñas following the extra-strong El Niño in 1998, but that didn't stop the denialists crowing over it.
Every record-breaking hottest year/month/whatever will be during a strong El Niño; that's obvious, as that's the hottest point in the ENSO cycle. What's important is that this El Niño-boosted January was hotter than every other El Niño-boosted January we've ever seen. Again.
We've had so many hottest-ever records recently that people are apparently getting blasé about them. Reminder: in the absence of a rising trend, record-breaking temperatures become steadily less common - each new record would require an ever-more unlikely confluence of factors to boost temperatures still higher than the last record.
A constant stream of highest-yet record temperatures is more than just weather; it's a rising trend.
Why would anyone engrave "Elbereth"?
Here in the western part of Germany we had no winter for at least three consecutive years. We had just a late autumn going over to a very early spring. In fact, we had such a warm december (up to +15C) that blackbirds started to breed and the offspring was quickly killed by the lack of suitable food in january.
I have several pairs of cross country skis in the cellar that haven't seen snow for years even though I live in the mountains. I didn't even have to change my bicycle tyres to studded tyres this winter and last two winters I had to change tyres only for two days or so.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap