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Rise In CO2 Has 'Greened Planet Earth' (bbc.com)
schwit1 quotes a report from BBC: Carbon dioxide emissions from industrial society have driven a huge growth in trees and other plants. A new study says that if the extra green leaves prompted by rising CO2 levels were laid in a carpet, it would cover twice the continental USA. Climate skeptics argue the findings show that the extra CO2 is actually benefiting the planet. But the researchers say the fertilization effect diminishes over time. They warn the positives of CO2 are likely to be outweighed by the negatives. The lead author, Professor Ranga Myneni from Boston University, told BBC News the extra tree growth would not compensate for global warming, rising sea levels, melting glaciers, ocean acidification, the loss of Arctic sea ice, and the prediction of more severe tropical storms. The new study is published in the journal Nature Climate Change by a team of 32 authors from 24 institutions in eight countries. A new study has also shown that ever since Americans first heard the term global warming in the 1970's, the weather has actually improved for most people living in the U.S. The study published in the journal Nature found that 80% of the U.S. population lives in counties experiencing more pleasant weather than they did four decades ago.
Yeah, if prefer mud and slush to nice powdery snow
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
As will be anyone who questions if the moon landings actually happened.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
.... who cares if some island nations are wiped off the map or a few thousand people drown in Bangladesh?
I get that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but it seems like nearly all of the "society ought to do X" suggestions for combating climate change equate to "reduce CO2 emissions." However, CO2 isn't the only greenhouse gas; methane is barely mentioned except in reference to livestock emissions, particularly from ruminants; and water vapor is practically ignored. Why isn't anyone suggesting interfering with the water cycle? Water vapor is a major greenhouse gas. Alternatively, since clouds cause global cooling, why not a plan to increase cloud formation? It's known that decreased albedo in the poles will lead to them getting warmer, why not a plan to artificially increase albedo? White paint or whatever. When it comes to "plans that require decades, cooperation between most of the world, and trillions of dollars", why are we so laser-focused on this one plan to decrease CO2 emissions?* It seems to me that big problems tend to be solved with dozens of smaller solutions, rather than one big "hurray, it worked!" solution; true, there are many ways of producing energy aside from burning carbonaceous materials, but as I've mentioned above that's just attacking the issue from one angle.
*I imagine a big part of the reason is "don't spend $billions on that, spend $billions on this (which I have a stake in) instead." But that doesn't fully explain the issue either, I think the 'call to arms' to rally scientists to consensus has caused a little too much groupthink, and bluesky ideas which should be seriously considered are being dismissed out of hand.
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
The reason is that there are really two issues rolled into the climate change debate. The first is man-made warming itself. The second is environmental conservatism in general. What many climate campaigners would like is for humans to stop destroying our natural environment - cutting down forests, polluting rivers and lakes, that sort of thing. Many of the same people/organisations who were drumming on about environmental conservatism since before the climate change debate, simply used climate change as their latest vehicle to get their message out. Nothing wrong with that.
However, the reason they don't want to talk about geo-engineering, is that if this is seen as a viable option, then the two issues separate again. In other words many people will see a much simpler third way which involves technology preventing global warming, while they continue burning oil and buying endless junk they don't really need.
Sadly, humans being humans, it is likely that this third way will be the one we take. However, the biggest risk I see is that while us rich westerners just buy a few more air conditioners and argue about whether climate change is a thing or not, some country that is bearing the brunt of the problem decides to setup an aerosol plant and begin feeding something into the atmosphere that they think might fix the problem for them. I mean, if your country is starving due to drought, or sea level rise threatens to wipe you out, and the rich western countries are busy arguing about whether they should be able to have enormous cars or giant cars, you might just get desperate and do something risky for the planet.
Ca we trust Slashdot to remain objective
I hope the recent change of ownership of slasdot.org does not mean we will now see pro fossil ideas fed to its fans.
HAHAHAHA , that's me really laughing.
The lack of self examination. Yes lets hope slashdot remains objective and doesn't promote any views you disagree with.
Once you're finished terraforming Earth, it will become habitable for intelligent life.
Sincerely, Your Neptunian Overlords
Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
Since when was the sea level predicted to rise so fast people would drown from it?
Sea levels rise, storm floods now start flooding areas that were previously farther from the coast and relatively safe, people cannot afford to just abandon their property and buy new land and build a new hose/farm in a safer place elsewhere because they are so poor they can hardly afford food, the government is to corrupt/apathetic/incompetent or just plain too poor to build flood defences which in many cases may even be a futile effort... result? Lots of people drown in storm floods in places like Bangladesh.
Try a month of 40c+ like we had a few years back in west australia. That was hellish.
And the fun part is some of the areas in the north of australia had regular 50c days. Thats the point where people start dying without some sort of cooling.
I should note the article states "Since we started talking about global warning in the 1970s" or something to that effect. No, we've been talking about it since the late 1800s when the greenhouse effect was first discovered and worried scientist started wondering if all the coal being sooted into the air from the industrial revolution might have unintended consequences. The science was always fairly solid. CO2 (and other gases like methane) absorb gases at various spectra, which then becomes either heat (warming) or disipates into kinetic energy (storms and general chaos). There has never really been any proposed new physics that would prevent this happening, nor reliable observations that it isn't, yet unfortunately a large population still thinks its this whacky idea invented by environmentalists in the 70s and then adopted by some spooky lizard people cartel looking to lie about physics for some reason nobody seems to be able to explain.So I still call it the greenhouse effect, because thats what it is.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
What would be the real long-term downside of global warming?
There are a lot of guesses, but aside from sea level rise there are few certainties.
Yeah, the homeless guy wakes to notice that it is suddenly comfortably warm in the shelter he built from cartons just before he realises that it actually on fire from a discarded fag end...
Rise In CO2 Has 'Greened Planet Earth'
Gah. Stop verbing adjectives. It really infuriationates me.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
When the elites start leading by example I'll get on board not before. Until then it reeks of "some animals are a little more equal." I am solidly convinced that reducing carbon emissions globally would be a good thing. You don't even need to buy into climate change to accept that, after all it can't be good manipulate the carbon cycle in closed system upon which we all depend that we barely understand.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...
Its a simple fact that flying first or business class has a terribly higher carbon foot print. If Obama cares so much about climate change he would set an example the new airforce one would have been a 737ER with all coach seats! Set up that way there would be plenty of room for his entourage and the press core, it would just be way less comfortable. Ah but you see sacrifices are for the rest of us to make.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
When the elites start leading by example I'll get on board not before. Until then it reeks of "some animals are a little more equal." I am solidly convinced that reducing carbon emissions globally would be a good thing. You don't even need to buy into climate change to accept that, after all it can't be good manipulate the carbon cycle in closed system upon which we all depend that we barely understand.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...
Its a simple fact that flying first or business class has a terribly higher carbon foot print. If Obama cares so much about climate change he would set an example the new airforce one would have been a 737ER with all coach seats! Set up that way there would be plenty of room for his entourage and the press core, it would just be way less comfortable. Ah but you see sacrifices are for the rest of us to make.
The elites don't need to lead by example. They can simply pick up and move to wherever things are pleasant, while all the "little people" die off. What, you actually thought they give a damn about you? If billions of us "little people" died off, all they would do is move somewhere until the bodies were done decomposing, so they wouldn't have to deal with all that annoying stench.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Did shamans of those days blame the sins of the humans — such as burning too many fires — for it? Probably...
Oh, I get it. Climate scientists are the same as "shamans" because you, on an emotional level, do not like their conclusions. How intellectually brave of you.
It's gotta hurt when you're literally stealing tactics of creationists.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
Since when does wattsupwiththat have credible evidence ?
Should we be all upset that some storm wipes out a bunch of people we don't know on the other side of the planet, probably not. We should care for the planet because we need it, we should want to leave a rich fertile world for our children, but we should look out for our own. If Nature acts to reduce massively over populated regions of the world we should probably just be thankful it was not us.
Generally I agree with that except the part about not giving a shit when people I don't know are drowning. "Thou shalt do unto others as thou would have others do unto you.... etc..." I'm an atheist but I will still freely acknowledge that the Christians have some words to live by in their ancient scrolls.
Did shamans of those days blame the sins of the humans â" such as burning too many fires â" for it? Probably...
The idea that humans could affect the global climate was one of the most difficult concepts to accept. The default position was that the Earth was too large for human activity to have any effect. That shift in scientific thinking happened about a century ago. Presumably you are late to the party.
Incidentally, while I note speculation that Kodiak may have been connected by glaciation to the mainland during the last ice age, I'm not finding any information about the last time there was a land bridge. Perhaps you can oblige me with a source?
Those who advocate genocide deserve every protection afforded by law, and none afforded by common human decency.
"They warn the positives of CO2 are likely to be outweighed by the negatives."
Like the negatives of CO2 are permanent. The increased green will mean more CO2 is taken out of the atmosphere.
I never understood this panic about CO2, it's harmless, there are so many pollutants that are obviously harmful.
Thank you, Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and so many others, for courageously defending humanity, my freedom and more!
Climate reparations.
What's more, the idea was not controversial until it was revealed that some powerful industries might need to change their ways and that the money trough of coal and oil extraction would have to be fenced off.
When I was a child (in the 70s) I was fascinated by discoveries in the solar system and our neighbouring planets. Why was Venus hotter than Mercury, despite the latter being closer to the Sun? Well, it turns out the Venusian atmosphere has large concentrations of CO2, a known greenhouse gas, and this made it much hotter on the surface of Venus than on Mercury. This was known, and nobody blinked an eye. There was no mention in any of the literature of that era about the idea being controversial when applied to Venus.
Facts don't cease to be facts because they later turn out to be inconvenient.
You appear to be under the impression there is only ever one possible reason for peninsulas to become full islands. Either that or you are trying to make a point, and failing massively. You really need to go back to school.