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Scientists Marvel At 'Increasingly Non-Natural' Arctic Warmth (msn.com)
mmell writes: Recognizing that this is a dreadfully old story (at least by Slashdot standards), current developments make this once more a current story. Scientists studying the Arctic environment are used to seeing broad variations in average temperature readings, but recent results have been so far beyond the normal range that they are only able to conclude that they are being caused by human activity. The temperature data (which includes a great many days with readings above 0C) is bolstered by measurements showing that the Arctic ice shelf is both thinner and less extensive than has ever been previously recorded. I wonder if the Arctic ice cap will reform in the winter, or if it's possible that its absence will cause irreversible changes to the Earth's ocean currents (and by extension, Earth's climate)? "[A]fter studying the Arctic and its climate for three and a half decades, I have concluded that what has happened over the last year goes beyond even the extreme," wrote Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, in an essay for Earth magazine. According to The Washington Post, the scientists' simulations predict some places in the high Arctic will rise over 50 degrees above normal. One chart, embedded in the report and shared by several meteorologists online, shows a "jaw-dropping and emblematic display of the intensity and duration of the Arctic warmth. It illustrates the difference from normal in the number of 'freezing degree days,' a measure of the accumulated cold since September."
Homo sapiens, R.I.P late 21st century "they denied the truth of their actions to the very end"
Long story short. We're all fucked..despite what president Cheeto says.
In geological terms, the Earth normally doesn't have ice caps.
In geologic terms humans don't exist.
How exactly does combating climate change "cripple Western civilization"? I think what you really mean is that it inconveniences you and threatens your greedy opulent lifestyle as a privileged species. How can you possibly live without hamburgers and your Ford F350?
It's weird to see the cultural difference between comments here and on Ars Technica. Ars seems to have a better educated and less politicised readership. Slashdot mostly doesn't accept climate change, apparently because they don't want to. The amazing power of motivated reasoning all over the comments on these articles. Weirdly, there is a dark matter denialism at work as well - but that one isn't going to fuck the planet up, so who cares.
I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
On the other hand, were Greenland's ice sheet to totally melt, we get roughly 24 ft of sea level rise. So if only 10 % of it melts, we get 2.4 ft rise. There goes Miami and most of southern Florida, Louisiana is...reduced. Virginia can kiss Norfolk goodbye. And if that rise also causes a shift in ocean currents, we can expect more effects.
So please, let's gamble with the future. What do we have to lose, eh?
Better a "coward" than an attention-whoring idiot with an embarrassing username.
In order for my username to be embarrassing, I would have to be embarrassed by other people's cultural ignorance.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The problem is that the delay while we debate this issues is costly. The cost for new infrastructure is cheaper the sooner you start. The potential risk is to the tune of trillions of dollars, a major fraction of GDP, and extremely disruptive to business was and society. The threat of this problem, just fiscally, warrants attention at least equivalent to the other big US economic issues, eg military and social service spending.
It's also deteriorate US leadership in the world and doubling down on dead industries (fossils are dying for increasingly non agw reasons, eg coal is not competitive, EVs will diminish oil demand) in a world that is moving on. Economies like China are going to control the Industries of tomorrow, control that the US obviously takes for granted today
We are giving away if not out right destroying future prosperity and leadership. Add to this new policy of provoking allies, trade protectionism, ceding trade relationships, and threatening military invention, defying courts on immigration. What is the play here, to be come the isolated asshole no one likes?
Yeah, Ironically, the worry is global warming will make Europe colder (it is at the same latitude as Canada but is saved the brutal cold because of warming ocean currents).
If the ice melts, especially if it melts quickly, the relative lower salinity that results in the Northern Atlantic could screw up the ocean currents. That warm water that makes Europe warmer than say, Mongolia and Siberia no longer warms Europe. Europe freezes over like much of Canada.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Because you can follow the money. Our nutritional science was cocked up by those with money. There's not a "fat" industry, but there is a sugar industry. Sugar is literally the product. In the field of climate change, who is the one with nearly all of the money: the folks who deny climate change exists or the scientists who claim it does exist?
There's another thing going on with climate change that you don't see in nutrition. Sugar is making us fat. Take a 400 lb person. That's like the sugar industry coming in and saying "How do we know that scale works? Scales work with gravity and aren't an accurate representation of total real mass. How do we know this person's bone density and size isn't higher than normal?" Those who deny climate change is a legitimate phenomenon that is happening constantly assail obvious fact such as measurements. Climate scientists are becoming worried that the Trump Administration will shut off the stream of temperature data et al coming from the EPA and NOAA for these scientists to use. Why? If science is to be self-correcting and it turns out this whole climate change thing is overblown, it will be shown with data. It will never be shown without data.
People who have been hammering this point home for nearly 30 years are sick of it. Because to deny these data and to deny these trends, it takes willful ignorance, most likely due to financial incentive. And there is plenty of evidence for that. There is 99% certainty that a person who denies climate change is financially incentivized to do so.