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Climate Change is Turning Antarctica Green, Say Researchers (theguardian.com)
Researchers in Antarctica have discovered rapidly growing banks of mosses on the ice continent's northern peninsula, providing striking evidence of climate change in the coldest and most remote parts of the planet. Amid the warming of the last 50 years, the scientists found two different species of mosses undergoing the equivalent of growth spurts, with mosses that once grew less than a millimeter per year now growing over 3 millimeters per year on average, (the link could be paywalled; alternative source below) the Washington Post reported on Thursday. From a report: "Antarctica is not going to become entirely green, but it will become more green than it currently is," said Matt Amesbury, co-author of the research from the University of Exeter. "This is linking into other processes that are happening on the Antarctic Peninsula at the moment, particularly things like glacier retreat which are freeing up new areas of ice-free land -- and the mosses particularly are very effective colonisers of those new areas," he added. In the second half of the 20th century, the Antarctic Peninsula experienced rapid temperature increases, warming by about half a degree per decade. Plant life on Antarctica is scarce, existing on only 0.3% of the continent, but moss, well preserved in chilly sediments, offers scientists a way of exploring how plants have responded to such changes.
The Greens Party should be happy, Antarctica is becoming Green, after all. Much better than that PC-incorrect all White!
More BS from the AGW crowd. MOSS! Give me a break!
I guess we need to get those wheat seeds in the ground.
The problem with climate science, as always, is explaining the significance to the general voter, who might be unlikely to attach the same degree of concern for a +/- 2mm annual growth spurt... even if the millimeter is a measurement the voter understands.
Further complicating the dilemma is exaggerations like the click-bait title, as you have to read down a ways to discover that "Antarctica is not going to become entirely green, but it will become more green than it currently is." Stooping to the same level of deception as your adversaries backfires, more often than not.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Let's see how the deniers try to explain away this one.
i'd love to build a home there.
https://www.skepticalscience.com/ice-age-predictions-in-1970s.htm
.Scientists would agree that this is an alarming trend.
"Scientists" might but I don't think real scientists would.
What is alarming about moss taking advantage of warmer weather for a rapid growth splurge? There are lots of examples in nature of things that grow very slowly with an incredibly rapid ramp-up when conditions are even a tiny bit more favorable.
Alternatte headline "warming expands zone of habitability for species". It's a headline that is equally true but one you will never see in the current climate of fear-mongering.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The most surprising thing here is that Antarctica has a northern peninsula. How do you find it? Isn't the entire place 'north'?
Didn't Larry Niven already predict this?
Although as I recall now Earth was orbiting Jupiter and the Sun was a red giant in that book.
It loses all the ice.
One of those places was supposed to be ice Free by now. I know because Algore said so.
Wow! Those journalists can do anything - even cutting edge science! If you think that just give up your job and let a journalist do it.
Outside of a TIME magazine article thrown together by a hack to provide "balance" you've got nothing. I'm a little disappointed that with that low an ID that you are not old enough to remember that the article was seen as utter bullshit at the time. I'm not quite old enough to get it first time but hit a huge pile of Scientific American back issues in my teens to make up for it, and there was no ice age bullshit in that, only TIME where a journalist out of his depth printed bullshit so that there would be the excitement of something opposing the mainstream view.
https://www.ras.org.uk/news-an...
About to go into a mini ice age... so get ready.
Settled Science.
5 out of 6 people enjoy Russian Roulette & 6 out of 7 Dwarfs are not Happy
Has it uncovered the petrified vegetation that Antarctica used to be covered with?
-Styopa
"Climate Change" is definitely turning Al Gore's pockets green.
So sick of this common refrain.
In the early 80s during the earlier shuttle years, it was commonly predicted that there would be a booming space tourism industry in the coming couple decades.
Around this time, someone also said something about DOS's upper memory limit was enough too. That doesn't mean the basis of all computing is wrong today.
etc. etc.
Just because someone was wrong early in the process doesn't mean the entire forward looking predictions are all wrong or that even the fundamental basis is incorrect too.
Or are you really arguing the humans do not adapt, gain knowledge, and progress? You cannot properly place into context one wrong prediction from decades ago? That's what study and learning is all about.
Similarly, not all early reports were wrong. There was a purely speculative newspaper story back in the 1890s that indirectly predicted global warming. If you don't know that, maybe it's because you tend to have an anti-climate change bent and choose what you want to put forward rather predictably to suit your own "argument."
Not so much expand as shift the zone of habitability
We need to open Antarctica up to Real Estate speculation. This is too good an opportunity to profit to allow now outdated Antarctic treaties to stymie.
"are you really arguing the humans do not adapt, gain knowledge, and progress?"
no. where did you get that? lol
nor do i say "because someone was wrong early in the process" "forward looking predictions are all wrong or that even the fundamental basis is incorrect"
again why do you assume all that?
but i am properly placing "into context" one example of a widespread "wrong prediction from decades ago ".
and in the interest of "study and learning" i am merely drawing attention to validity of skepticism about new speculations (lead post here) given the history of such speculations.
FUUUUCCCKKKKKKK It was a news week article about a crack pot idea from a single crack pot guy that had no backing from the scientific community. GAH....this talking point needs to die....it makes people look stupid.
a fucking news article....dumb shits.....
from TFS: "on the ice continent's northern peninsula"
Antarctica is south. As far south as you can go. There is a tiny spot called the south pole. Stand on that spot and move in any direction and you are going north. Now this 'northern peninsula' ... isn't every peninsula in Antarctica a northern peninsula?
Likewise, there are "About 330,000" references to west Antarctica in my Google search results. Can someone please direct me to the spot on the globe that is 'west'?
...omphaloskepsis often...
Finally, Greenland will be green! Look at all that water front property, buy now, HUUUUUGE savings, but only for early investors.
The "research" for this submitted paper was fabricated, i.e. it is fraud. Sad.
... and that includes the climate scientists. I imagine it would be hard to find a climate scientist who would be willing to bet his house on a measurable and non-trivial prediction about the future -- one that he would make from his climate models in the span of a few years.
Because that's what it's all about: would you Mr. Scientist assert that A will follow B and vouch for it? Physicists and chemists would do it, biologists would do it for some things, medical researchers might do for some others, but sociologists, economists, and climate scientists wouldn't, it is just too complex. Engineers would do it: in England some centuries ago bridge builders were required to live and sleep under the bridge they'd just built along with their families. Afterwards you had less doubt the bridge was reliable and you could start planning to transport heavy stuff over it.
I may be wrong but outside of its models (and anyone can have models) climate science doesn't have enough to establish trust for making a major decision.
I take comfort in thinking that most civilizations on planets start with burning fuels such as we are. This should be accounted for in the grand scheme of things. I like to think about what we would in share in common with other folks in our galaxy, and this is one of them.
[($)]
Gosh, I hope nothing unpredictable and horrible comes out of the ice with all these changes... like smallpox and anthrax that is coming out of the arctic.
https://news.vice.com/article/...
Basic explanation of how science works.
1) We hypothesize.
2) We test
3) We throw out the bad ideas and try again till we get it right.
Basic explanation of how partisans fools think.
1) They come up with an idea.
2) They defend it to the death, ignoring counter evidence.
3) They insult smart people for realizing they were wrong and fixing the problem.
Thank you for noticing that the environmentalists are intelligent scientists, rather than partisan fools.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
"Another"? Ice age is defined by the pole being covered in ice. We TODAY are living in an ice age.
Where's the control group of earths (and suns, and moons) they did the tests with?
I'm not saying it's aliens with knees that bend the wrong way which enables them to leap twenty feet into the air, but it's probably aliens with knees that bend the wrong way which enables them to leap twenty feet into the air.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I don't believe climate change is a bad thing. With the amount of damage that raw crude oil and methane does to the environment, i think that burning it is probably the cleanest thing to do with it. Sure, it's much better to leave it where it is, but the earth is changing all the time, and that crude oil may indeed make it to the surface to pollute the oceans naturally. Also, given the amount of forests we chop down and don't replace, the Arctic (and Antarctic) becoming greener, gives us some new carbon sinks where we never had them before. We're heading for warmer times, sure, but is it really all doom and gloom? I Think that all the other life on the planet will thank us in a few thousand years (probably because we've starved ourselves to death, due to all our crops dying out due to climate change, or maybe skip the middle man and just nuke ourselves)
If you gave me a choice between a printer and a giraffe with explosive diarrhoea, i'll get my ladder and my raincoat
As far as basic laws of physics are everywhere the same, you don't really need that control group in the overwhelming majority of useful applications of these laws. What would you suggest that we check it against, different atmospheres that we don't really have so they don't bother us in our particular case? How would that help?
Ezekiel 23:20
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
For the longest time earth was flooded with CO2 18 times higher than we have today, and it was colder.
We had more CO2 in THE FUCKING ICE AGE.
Stop spreading the CO2 global warming nonsense already.
I don't know why you idiots just don't do your own research but keep repeating nonsense just because someone else said so.
CO2/Temp Graph
There has historically been much more CO2 in our atmosphere than exists today.
There has historically been much more CO2 in our atmosphere than exists today. For example, during the Jurassic Period (200 mya), average CO2 concentrations were about 1800 ppm or about 4.7 times higher than today. The highest concentrations of CO2 during all of the Paleozoic Era occurred during the Cambrian Period, nearly 7000 ppm -- about 18 times higher than today.
The Carboniferous Period and the Ordovician Period were the only geological periods during the Paleozoic Era when global temperatures were as low as they are today. To the consternation of global warming proponents, the Late Ordovician Period was also an Ice Age while at the same time CO2 concentrations then were nearly 12 times higher than today-- 4400 ppm. According to greenhouse theory, Earth should have been exceedingly hot. Instead, global temperatures were no warmer than today. Clearly, other factors besides atmospheric carbon influence earth temperatures and global warming.
Global Temperature and Atmospheric CO2 over Geologic Time
Late Carboniferous to Early Permian time (315 mya -- 270 mya) is the only time period in the last 600 million years when both atmospheric CO2 and temperatures were as low as they are today (Quaternary Period ).
The Global Warming Scam
Now then, looking at Carbon Dioxide, we find that only .117% of atmospheric carbon dioxide is directly attributable to human technology such as automobiles. .117% is a rather small amount. If we were to measure out .117% of a football field, it comes out to 4.212 inches, barely long enough to get off the touchdown line.
CO2 Is Not Causing Global Warming
The Possessive Belief
CO2 (carbon dioxide) is not causing global warming or climate change. I canâ(TM)t say it more boldly, but it doesnâ(TM)t seem to matter; the belief persists that CO2 is the cause and therefore a problem. The belief is enhanced by government policies and plans, which spawn businesses to exploit the opportunities they create. A majority of the mainstream media pushes the belief because of political bias rather than understanding of the science. Evidence continues to show what is wrong with the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), but it is complex and so most donâ(TM)t understand. The fact they hold definitive positions without understanding is disturbing. However, ignoring the fact that IPCC predictions are always wrong doesnâ(TM)t require the understanding that the science is completely unacceptable and proof of the political bias.
Contradictory Evidence
So the northern peninsula they talk about must be either Anvers Island (wich would be north west, obviously) or one of the very small peninsulas at the "upper edge of the map" which non nitpicking people call: north.
There is one place called "the Antarctic Peninsula", which is the one referred to. It's clearly evident on any map of Antarctica. The journalist writing the article called it "north," which is correct.-- it is the northernmost extension of Antarctica.
I'm not old enough to remember the 70s, but I am old enough to remember science books, articles, videos etc. referencing such science from the 70s.
I am old enough to remember the 70s. There was no controversy over the greenhouse effect then. It was well understood (having already been known for most of a century), and nobody doubted that if we added greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere, the temperature would warm according to theory. This was most evident in astronomy classes, where the greenhouse effect was taught usually with a textbook that concluded with a paragraph saying "by burning fossil fuels we are adding carbon dioxide to the Earth's atmosphere, and if we burn enough fossil fuels, this effect may be large enough to measure by the late 20th century." (Which is what my astronomy text said.)
There was absolutely a "new ice age" idea/theory that was given broad consideration and even acceptance.
No, there wasn't. There was the occasional pop science article, almost always ending with a question mark. Betteridge's law of headlines applied.
You are confused by the particulates from ash in industrial exhaust. They were and are a major problem able to cause global dimming, which THEN causes an ice age by blocking heat and light from reaching the surface. Same reason nuclear war does it - ash IS particulate matter.
Particulates, partly, but mostly this is sulfate aerosols. They're highly reflective. You can see the temperature effect by looking at global temperature after major volcanic eruptions (which can blast a large amount of sulfates into the stratosphere).
A side effect of the move to low-sulfur coal (to reduce pollution and acid rain) was a reduction in sulfate aerosols. The atmosphere really cleared up in the 70s.
Wikipedia is not a source of truth. Dear God, what has the world come to when people seriously refer to wiki as a source in a political debate and really don't see anything wrong with that.
It's not a "source of truth," but the nice thing about Wikipedia is that the articles are usually is backed up by citations.
It's a good place to start if you want to find links to the actual science, and then form your own opinions.
(I am going to make the phrase "citation needed" my motto. https://xkcd.com/285/)
Thank you for noticing that the environmentalists are intelligent scientists, rather than partisan fools.
I don't know that "environmentalists" per se are always "intelligent scientists". But it does happen that in this particular phase of the political see-saw, the people embracing the "environmental movement" are the one quoting real science, and the anti-environmentalism movement the ones trying to muddy the waters to score political points.
Likely as not the see-saw will tip in another few decades.
(I'm assuming that the word "environmentalist" as you use it means the commonly used meaning, and not "biologists who study the environment and ecology of the Earth/")
Where's the control group of earths (and suns, and moons) they did the tests with?
Every body with an atmosphere in solar system.
You still don't understand why we voted for Trump.
What is sweet is watching the media and opposition finally doing their jobs and not accepting blindly all the crap politicians spew out.
Maybe next time the democrats will nominate an electable candidate, not some crazy, un-indicted, rape-apologist criminal.
Or they can keep losing.
Nope, because in contradistinction to the near certainty of increasing desertification
As the Earth warms desertification lessens because there is a LOT more water vapor being put into the atmosphere and then dispersed.
If you want to pretend to support "science", you should at least try and know some of it.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That word... I do not think it means what you think it means.
An increase of 3x is not "exponential" and there is no sign the grown is turning so.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley