Where "normal" is defined as "what it was 10 years ago". I wonder if the descendants of Ice Age megafauna are wondering when the climate will return to their normal.
Err, you were claiming that Jones was stonewalling efforts to replicate the CRU temperature series. As it turns out Jones has no power to prevent that. Mueller is among the MANY scientists and hobbyists who proved that. Not sure what you are referring to above regarding proof of AGW.
The point is, Mueller required nothing of Jones to perform his research. This has been replicated time and time again. Most recently by Mueller, but also notably by NASA and NOAA - each of whom have provided their data and code. Whether Phil Jones wants to give his permission is irrelevant. It is easy to test whether he is right or wrong. Scientists have done this. Skeptics have harped over the personalities and ignored the science.
So in short there's pretty overwhelming evidence in favor of climate change causing problems in the future, there's only some evidence from some people so far that it's a problem right now.
Good point. Don't hang your hat on one study or another. Waiting for a consensus before jumping to conclusions is prudent. I agree wholeheartedly.
This only shows the consequences of an earth that heats up. It does not show that man is responsible for the earth heating up or that man has any control over it.
True enough. There are other papers that show the causality. The response to those papers will undoubtedly be "This only shows that man is responsible. It does not show that there are any negative consequences to a warming world"
The data is available. Anyone can attempt to replicate the temperature series. As a matter of fact, skeptic Richard Mueller did just that recently with the Berkeley Earth Surface temperature project. He found that warming had actually been under reported by Phil Jones. Being a true skeptic he was persuaded by the facts and now accepts that the rate of warming is very well understood. http://www.forbes.com/sites/petergleick/2011/10/20/breaking-news-the-earth-still-goes-around-the-sun-and-its-still-warming-up/
The unusual weather events we've been seeing around the world the last year aren't proof that global climate change is real... at least not yet. Weather != Climate
That is the opposite of the conclusion reached by these two papers. The papers found that the events in these regions are more likely with the current warming, and would not likely have occurred if it were not for the recent warming.
If ten or twenty years from now the temperature hasn't gone up any more and the weird weather events go away without us taking any action about it i'll be willing to stand up and say i was wrong.
You should expect to see another record year in two or three years (barring a super volcano). Waiting for 10 or 20 years before you reconsider your position is extreme in my opinion. On a somewhat related note, one of the interesting findings of the first paper is that we should expect fewer record years from temperature series that show greater natural variability. For instance, the UAH series exaggerates El Nino/La Nina events relative to other series, so we should expect fewer record years from that series, even though the trend is the same.
Critics of the first paper have questioned why a 100 year period was used and implied that this is cherry picking. These critics are ignoring the fact that the paper examined 100 years, 100 years excluding the last (very hot) year, and also the entire record since 1880 - each time coming to the same result http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2011/10/25/roger-pielke-jr-just-cant-help-himself/
Because that's the real issue that most skeptics have been questioning of late. Anyone who isn't an idiot knows that the earth's climate is ALWAYS changing (and always has been).
But even the "skeptics" were willing to accept the findings of the Berkeley study. Watts had famously promised “I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong.“
This team got the exact same answer as every other paper on the topic. What makes you think that all previous efforts were corrupt (but somehow got the right answer)? Perhaps someone has been feeding you a line of bull?
This study shows that the CRU team (who were the victims of the climategate hack) actually underestimated the warming. So instead of "hiding the decline" they were actually masking the warming. The red line on the following graph shows the CRU temperature reconstruction. http://www.berkeleyearth.org/images/Updated_Comparison_10.jpg
This study confirms that NASA GISS results are more reliable.
Michael Mann agrees with you that other processes better explain the little ice age. FTA:
Natural processes may have also played a role in cooling off Europe: a decrease in solar activity, an increase in volcanic activity or colder oceans capable of absorbing more carbon dioxide. These phenomena better explain regional climate patterns during the Little Ice Age, says Michael Mann, a climate researcher at Pennsylvania State University in State College.
Germany worked hard, became wealthy, and it's perfectly entitled to squander its own money
Actually Germany works much LESS than us. With a 35 hour workweek it's not like they have had to toil day and night to adopt these new technologies. Naysayers had predicted that adopting new technologies would destroy the economy. The Germans have proved them wrong.
Err, you were the one who thought that one or the other was clearly an outlier wrt to area. You have shown no evidence. I know that this type of data free analysis will convince the converted on Watts and other 'skeptic' sites. Here on Slashdot you will need to provide some kind of proof.
So that’s a change of about a centimetre of water that NASA says has fallen on land and been absorbed rather than returned to the ocean.
Well, if you read Watts then you will end up very very confused. The site is run by a bunch of armchair armatures trying to second guess NASA. It's laughable. Here is what NASA said:
Data from the NASA/German Aerospace Center's twin Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (Grace) spacecraft provide a clear picture of how this extra rain piled onto the continents in the early parts of 2011. "By detecting where water is on the continents, Grace shows us how water moves around the planet,...Water flows downhill, and the extra rain will eventually find its way back to the sea. When it does, global sea level will rise again.
Silly NASA with their data and measurements. Clearly they are no match for some guy named "Willis" and his superior scientific technique of "eyeballing a graphic". Why bother looking at the data (which is available) when you have such advanced analytic prowess. He should really publish his findings - except that those nasty scientists keep blocking the brilliant 'skeptics' from publication!
leaders in the new energy economy who get most of their power from nuclear plants across the river in France.
I'm glad we agree that Germany is not marching back to the stone age but rather blazing a trail towards the future. I'm not sure that shutting down nuclear is a great strategy. I'm also not sure that Germans would care if they imported nuclear from another country that was willing to take the risk. But the fact of the matter is that Germany is a net exporter of electricity:
Since nuclear power generates almost a third of the electricity in Germany, many thought that the country would have to import energy as the nuclear phase-out progressed. However, Germany is still selling more electricity than it buys, due to its renewable energy industry.[18] Renewable energy supplied a record 20.8% of Germany’s electricity in the first half of 2011, from wind power, solar power, biomass and hydro. Germany installed over 7,400 MW of solar in 2010 and another 7,000 MW will be added in 2011. Solar and wind capacity is expected to grow by 32% from 2012-2013. The surge in renewable energy is credited with driving down the price of electricity in Germany.[18] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Germany
Not really. Obama is shutting down oil extraction out of the gulf and is complicating extraction throughout the country.
Ok, time for a reality check. US oil production is at it's highest in nearly a decade. It was at it's lowest point in 2008 when Obama took office. What impact has Obama's "Drill baby, Drill!" policy had on gas prices? Nada. As it turns out we are a bit player in a global economy. Tapping new expensive and dirty sources is not going to change that. Drill, baby, drill fails: Oil prices soar in spite of sharp increase in U.S. production under Obama
Europeans (or at least Germans) might willingly march back to stone age lifestyles in the holy name of Mother Earth, but Americans (and Russians, and Indians, and China) won't stand for it.
Germans are hardly in the stone ages. They have some of the highest tech energy solutions available - and they have positioned themselves to be leaders in the new energy economy. They currently have 20% renewable energy sources and are on target to decarbonize midcentury. They are also the European country with the strongest economy. So how is Germany able to move beyond combustibles so far ahead of other modernized countries? Their primary advantage is that they don't have fossil fuel funded misinformation campaigns like we do here in the U.S. according to state minister Franz Untersteller.
If every man woman and child (assuming a global populations of 7 billion) turned off 10 industrial strength 5600 watt dryers that they had been running 24 hours a day 365 days a year, then yes, this would be a good strategy for ending global warming. This would be the equivalent of the current energy imbalance. That is, this would prevent the warming not yet realized from the CO2 already emitted. It would not address the already realized warming, We would also have to stop emitting CO2 (or find more dryers to turn off).
One sure bet is that this decade will be the warmest in history. Yes, some scientists assert that there is decadal variability and the next decade or two could be cooler. How do we know they are wrong? Because, as we show in reference 4, the planet is now out of balance by about ¾ of a watt per square meter of Earth’s surface averaged over the solar cycle. It may not sound like much, but that is a lot of energy (in an interesting unit suggested in a colleague’s paper, Sarah Purkey and Greg Johnson?), the ¾ W/m2 corresponds, assuming a global populations of 7 billion, to every man, woman, and child on the planet running simultaneously 40 industrial strength 1400 watt hair dryers 24 hours a day 365 days a year). This energy is enough to cause the ocean to slowly warm and ice to melt all over the planet.
Slashdot Mirror
You include that "region depopulating" bit, as if it were a "bad thing". Have you noticed that the earth is overpopulated?
"If they would rather die,'' said Scrooge, `"they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population." ;)
Where "normal" is defined as "what it was 10 years ago". I wonder if the descendants of Ice Age megafauna are wondering when the climate will return to their normal.
Nope. They're dead. Guess why?
Err, you were claiming that Jones was stonewalling efforts to replicate the CRU temperature series. As it turns out Jones has no power to prevent that. Mueller is among the MANY scientists and hobbyists who proved that. Not sure what you are referring to above regarding proof of AGW.
Warmer temperatures cause greater evaporation and greater precipitation
Yes. The greater evaporation is what causes the droughts. This is exactly consistent with the predictions.
This is something that is literally impossible to know today, so how do they claim to know it?
I suspect the answer may be hidden in the paper.
The point is, Mueller required nothing of Jones to perform his research. This has been replicated time and time again. Most recently by Mueller, but also notably by NASA and NOAA - each of whom have provided their data and code. Whether Phil Jones wants to give his permission is irrelevant. It is easy to test whether he is right or wrong. Scientists have done this. Skeptics have harped over the personalities and ignored the science.
So in short there's pretty overwhelming evidence in favor of climate change causing problems in the future, there's only some evidence from some people so far that it's a problem right now.
Good point. Don't hang your hat on one study or another. Waiting for a consensus before jumping to conclusions is prudent. I agree wholeheartedly.
Scam artist. Unfortunately.
This only shows the consequences of an earth that heats up. It does not show that man is responsible for the earth heating up or that man has any control over it.
True enough. There are other papers that show the causality. The response to those papers will undoubtedly be "This only shows that man is responsible. It does not show that there are any negative consequences to a warming world"
The data is available. Anyone can attempt to replicate the temperature series. As a matter of fact, skeptic Richard Mueller did just that recently with the Berkeley Earth Surface temperature project. He found that warming had actually been under reported by Phil Jones. Being a true skeptic he was persuaded by the facts and now accepts that the rate of warming is very well understood. http://www.forbes.com/sites/petergleick/2011/10/20/breaking-news-the-earth-still-goes-around-the-sun-and-its-still-warming-up/
The unusual weather events we've been seeing around the world the last year aren't proof that global climate change is real... at least not yet. Weather != Climate
That is the opposite of the conclusion reached by these two papers. The papers found that the events in these regions are more likely with the current warming, and would not likely have occurred if it were not for the recent warming.
If ten or twenty years from now the temperature hasn't gone up any more and the weird weather events go away without us taking any action about it i'll be willing to stand up and say i was wrong.
You should expect to see another record year in two or three years (barring a super volcano). Waiting for 10 or 20 years before you reconsider your position is extreme in my opinion. On a somewhat related note, one of the interesting findings of the first paper is that we should expect fewer record years from temperature series that show greater natural variability. For instance, the UAH series exaggerates El Nino/La Nina events relative to other series, so we should expect fewer record years from that series, even though the trend is the same.
Critics of the first paper have questioned why a 100 year period was used and implied that this is cherry picking. These critics are ignoring the fact that the paper examined 100 years, 100 years excluding the last (very hot) year, and also the entire record since 1880 - each time coming to the same result http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2011/10/25/roger-pielke-jr-just-cant-help-himself/
Because that's the real issue that most skeptics have been questioning of late. Anyone who isn't an idiot knows that the earth's climate is ALWAYS changing (and always has been).
Well, I don't like to call these prominent 'skeptics' idiots (those are your words, not mine), but they certainly have considered this to be questionable: Roy Spencer, Steve Macintyre, Joseph D'Aleo & Anthony Watts,
But even the "skeptics" were willing to accept the findings of the Berkeley study. Watts had famously promised “I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong.“
...Unless of course the Berkeley study proved them wrong that is. Watt's is now back peddling: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/10/20/the-berkeley-earth-surface-temperature-project-puts-pr-before-peer-review/
This team got the exact same answer as every other paper on the topic. What makes you think that all previous efforts were corrupt (but somehow got the right answer)? Perhaps someone has been feeding you a line of bull?
Which "warming" that we see are you talking about? Ground stations or satellites? They tell different stories.
There is no difference between the two. Here is GISS (station data) vs UAH (Satellite data): http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/mean:12/plot/uah/offset:0.3/mean:12
It turns out this was a flawed paper that was much exaggerated by the author of the paper and the media. http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/09/02/2037209/journal-editor-resigns-over-flawed-global-warming-paper
This study shows that the CRU team (who were the victims of the climategate hack) actually underestimated the warming. So instead of "hiding the decline" they were actually masking the warming. The red line on the following graph shows the CRU temperature reconstruction. http://www.berkeleyearth.org/images/Updated_Comparison_10.jpg
This study confirms that NASA GISS results are more reliable.
I'm moving all of my cash to tulip bulbs. They're due for a comeback ;)
Natural processes may have also played a role in cooling off Europe: a decrease in solar activity, an increase in volcanic activity or colder oceans capable of absorbing more carbon dioxide. These phenomena better explain regional climate patterns during the Little Ice Age, says Michael Mann, a climate researcher at Pennsylvania State University in State College.
Germany worked hard, became wealthy, and it's perfectly entitled to squander its own money
Actually Germany works much LESS than us. With a 35 hour workweek it's not like they have had to toil day and night to adopt these new technologies. Naysayers had predicted that adopting new technologies would destroy the economy. The Germans have proved them wrong.
Err, you were the one who thought that one or the other was clearly an outlier wrt to area. You have shown no evidence. I know that this type of data free analysis will convince the converted on Watts and other 'skeptic' sites. Here on Slashdot you will need to provide some kind of proof.
So that’s a change of about a centimetre of water that NASA says has fallen on land and been absorbed rather than returned to the ocean.
Well, if you read Watts then you will end up very very confused. The site is run by a bunch of armchair armatures trying to second guess NASA. It's laughable. Here is what NASA said:
Data from the NASA/German Aerospace Center's twin Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (Grace) spacecraft provide a clear picture of how this extra rain piled onto the continents in the early parts of 2011. "By detecting where water is on the continents, Grace shows us how water moves around the planet, ...Water flows downhill, and the extra rain will eventually find its way back to the sea. When it does, global sea level will rise again.
Silly NASA with their data and measurements. Clearly they are no match for some guy named "Willis" and his superior scientific technique of "eyeballing a graphic". Why bother looking at the data (which is available) when you have such advanced analytic prowess. He should really publish his findings - except that those nasty scientists keep blocking the brilliant 'skeptics' from publication!
leaders in the new energy economy who get most of their power from nuclear plants across the river in France.
I'm glad we agree that Germany is not marching back to the stone age but rather blazing a trail towards the future. I'm not sure that shutting down nuclear is a great strategy. I'm also not sure that Germans would care if they imported nuclear from another country that was willing to take the risk. But the fact of the matter is that Germany is a net exporter of electricity:
Since nuclear power generates almost a third of the electricity in Germany, many thought that the country would have to import energy as the nuclear phase-out progressed. However, Germany is still selling more electricity than it buys, due to its renewable energy industry.[18] Renewable energy supplied a record 20.8% of Germany’s electricity in the first half of 2011, from wind power, solar power, biomass and hydro. Germany installed over 7,400 MW of solar in 2010 and another 7,000 MW will be added in 2011. Solar and wind capacity is expected to grow by 32% from 2012-2013. The surge in renewable energy is credited with driving down the price of electricity in Germany.[18] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Germany
Not really. Obama is shutting down oil extraction out of the gulf and is complicating extraction throughout the country.
Ok, time for a reality check. US oil production is at it's highest in nearly a decade. It was at it's lowest point in 2008 when Obama took office. What impact has Obama's "Drill baby, Drill!" policy had on gas prices? Nada. As it turns out we are a bit player in a global economy. Tapping new expensive and dirty sources is not going to change that. Drill, baby, drill fails: Oil prices soar in spite of sharp increase in U.S. production under Obama
Europeans (or at least Germans) might willingly march back to stone age lifestyles in the holy name of Mother Earth, but Americans (and Russians, and Indians, and China) won't stand for it.
Germans are hardly in the stone ages. They have some of the highest tech energy solutions available - and they have positioned themselves to be leaders in the new energy economy. They currently have 20% renewable energy sources and are on target to decarbonize midcentury. They are also the European country with the strongest economy. So how is Germany able to move beyond combustibles so far ahead of other modernized countries? Their primary advantage is that they don't have fossil fuel funded misinformation campaigns like we do here in the U.S. according to state minister Franz Untersteller.
If every man woman and child (assuming a global populations of 7 billion) turned off 10 industrial strength 5600 watt dryers that they had been running 24 hours a day 365 days a year, then yes, this would be a good strategy for ending global warming. This would be the equivalent of the current energy imbalance. That is, this would prevent the warming not yet realized from the CO2 already emitted. It would not address the already realized warming, We would also have to stop emitting CO2 (or find more dryers to turn off).
www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2011/20110327_Perceptions.pdf
One sure bet is that this decade will be the warmest in history. Yes, some scientists assert that there is decadal variability and the next decade or two could be cooler. How do we know they are wrong? Because, as we show in reference 4, the planet is now out of balance by about ¾ of a watt per square meter of Earth’s surface averaged over the solar cycle. It may not sound like much, but that is a lot of energy (in an interesting unit suggested in a colleague’s paper, Sarah Purkey and Greg Johnson?), the ¾ W/m2 corresponds, assuming a global populations of 7 billion, to every man, woman, and child on the planet running simultaneously 40 industrial strength 1400 watt hair dryers 24 hours a day 365 days a year). This energy is enough to cause the ocean to slowly warm and ice to melt all over the planet.