Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: DeepSpace9er on March 12, 2007, 05:11:01 pm
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http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9005566792811497638&q=the+great+swindle&pr=goog-sl (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9005566792811497638&q=the+great+swindle&pr=goog-sl)
Questioning authority
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Yup, it's clear that humans can't impact the environment or make natural cycles worse:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6288445.stm
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Yup, it's clear that humans can't impact the environment or make natural cycles worse:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6288445.stm
Different situation :p
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Oh of course, because those are 'micro climates' being effected. It's not like when a lot of 'micro climates' are being altered there's a global impact.
Just like 'oh, that's micro evolution! It's not like that has a larger impact!'
::)
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I still want to check the validity of the data presented in the video. If it's true, I guess it will give me something to think about.
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Ace, you're going off on a completely irrelevant tangent -- incorrectly inferring the general from the specific.
Global weather patterns are incredibly chaotic. It's not at all clear how the causes and effects work. The vegetarianism lobby is even claiming that the meat industry is responsible for more CO2 output than all industrial pollution combined, which highlights how ludicrous the entire political situation is.
I found this article to be interesting:
http://abcnews.go.com/International/print?id=2938762
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Makes me hang my head in shame...we deserve what we get...
Forget the temperature...forget global warming...this isn't just about that. Its about screwing up our environment. Just locally I can list a half dozen different things that have been done horribly wrong and its done so much harm to the environment. I'm only thankful that local leaders have managed to do something about it. There are fish in the bay that haven't been there for 25 years that are returning. We might one day be able to swim in the lakes again...not yet but maybe. Doesn't that make anyone sick that we've made things that bad?
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Makes me hang my head in shame...we deserve what we get...
Forget the temperature...forget global warming...this isn't just about that. Its about screwing up our environment. Just locally I can list a half dozen different things that have been done horribly wrong and its done so much harm to the environment. I'm only thankful that local leaders have managed to do something about it. There are fish in the bay that haven't been there for 25 years that are returning. We might one day be able to swim in the lakes again...not yet but maybe. Doesn't that make anyone sick that we've made things that bad?
Well yeah, you dump mercury in a lake, and the fish will die.
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The question is: did you all sit for an hour and 15 minutes and watch the whole thing?
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I did! :)
I've got such great friends:
********_2004: need to make a gaint trojen comdom and strech it over the the earth! and instead of spermacide..need to use sunscrean 1000 proof
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http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9005566792811497638&q=the+great+swindle&pr=goog-sl (http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9005566792811497638&q=the+great+swindle&pr=goog-sl)
Questioning authority
Maybe you should question TV, first? Or 'documentaries' made by men with a history of misrepresenting scientific experts to prove their point even when refuted?
http://www.badscience.net/?p=383
On Thursday night, Channel 4 broadcast what it described as a “controversial documentary”. It was essentially the same rather elderly climate denialist arguments that have been seen many times before - and assessed, and refuted - but packaged up with a bit of drama, as if they were new and unheard of.
That wasn’t the only problem with it.
Climate scientist ‘duped to deny global warming’
Ben Goldacre and David Adam
Sunday March 11, 2007
The Observer
Annoyingly this got very badly cut for space in the paper. Link above is to the paper’s version, pasted here is the last version me and David saw, with lots more quotes from Wunsch. There’s excellent coverage in the Independent below too.
A leading US climate scientist is considering legal action after he says he
was “duped” into appearing in a “misleading” Channel Four documentary,
which claimed that man-made global warming is a myth.
Carl Wunsch, professor of physical oceanography at MIT, said the film, The
Great Global Warming Swindle, was “grossly distorted” and “as close to pure
propaganda as anything since World War Two”.
He says his comments in the film, screened on Thursday night, were taken
out of context and that he was misrepresented. He also says that the
project was misrepresented to him by the film makers, and that he would not
have agreed to participate if he had known what it was to be called, or
that it would argue that man-made global warming was not a serious threat.
“I thought they were trying to educate the public about the complexities of
climate change,” he said. “This seems like a deliberate attempt to exploit
someone who is on the other side of the issue.”
He has demanded that his comments are removed from the program, and says
that Channel Four “owes an apology to its viewers”. He is also considering
legal action and a complaint to Ofcom, the broadcasters regulator.
The film was made by Martin Durkin. In 1997, Mr Durkin produced a similar
series for Channel Four called Against Nature, which attacked many of the
claims of the environmental movement, and characterised them as comparable
to Nazis.
Channel Four was forced in 1998 to broadcast a lengthy apology after
several interviewees complained that they had been deceived . The
Independent Television Commission (now part of Ofcom) upheld the complaint
and found that “the views of the four complainants, as made clear to the
interviewer, had been distorted by selective editing”, and that they had
been “misled as to the content and purpose of the programmes when they
agreed to take part.”
Professor Wunsch did not see Thursday’s program before it was broadcast,
and watched it only after colleagues in the UK contacted him with their
concerns. “The company I keep in this film makes me very uncomfortable,” he
said. “Why Me? I was duped. Perhaps my English colleagues might have
recognised Martin Durkin’s name and said no. I didn’t recognise the name.”
The film claimed that the role of human emissions in climate change has
been exaggerated, and that changes in the sun and cosmic rays could be to
blame instead — claims that have been repeatedly discussed and rejected by
climate scientists. In February, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change said that a sharp rise in temperatures seen in the twentieth
century was “very likely” to be caused by human activity.
The film introduced Professor Wunsch by describing his current and previous
academic affiliations. He was then shown talking about how the oceans
release carbon dioxide as they warm.
He told the Observer: “I explained that warming the ocean was damaging
because it will release more carbon dioxide. They used it to claim that
carbon dioxide is all natural.” He added: “I could forgive someone not
understanding the issues. This seems like a deliberate attempt to exploit
someone.”
“We should be trying to explain to the public what we do and do not
understand. I feel my time was wasted, the public were misled, and an
opportunity was kicked away.”
Martin Durkin said: “Carl Wunsch was most certainly not “duped” into
appearing in the film, as is perfectly clear from our correspondence with
him. Nor are his comments taken out of context. His interview, as used in
the programme, perfectly accurately represents what he said.”
Channel 4 said: “The film was a polemic that drew together the well
documented views of a number of respected scientists. We feel it is
important that all sides of the debate are aired. If one of the scientists
featured now has concerns about his contribution, we will look into it in
the normal way.”
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Global weather patterns are incredibly chaotic. It's not at all clear how the causes and effects work. The vegetarianism lobby is even claiming that the meat industry is responsible for more CO2 output than all industrial pollution combined, which highlights how ludicrous the entire political situation is.
There's actually truth to that, if you consider the average methane output of, say, a cow.
The cows are destroying the world, followed by the goats.
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Maybe you should question TV, first? Or 'documentaries' made by men with a history of misrepresenting scientific experts to prove their point even when refuted?
Like Al Gore?
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Maybe you should question TV, first? Or 'documentaries' made by men with a history of misrepresenting scientific experts to prove their point even when refuted?
Like Al Gore?
What the **** has Al Gore got to do with this?
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Maybe you should question TV, first? Or 'documentaries' made by men with a history of misrepresenting scientific experts to prove their point even when refuted?
Like Al Gore?
Except he's, you know - right. And none of your right wing ear covering and shouting while you try to drown him out can change that.
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Im not on the political side of the fence that trys to silence and intimidate. I want Al Gore to say more about it, get more extreme, more shrill so that everybody will see him for who he truly is. Actually, im going to watch An Inconvenient Truth to better inform myself. Its not going to change what I think about global warming, because i know its a crock.
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EDIT: Nevermind...you guys don't get it and never will.
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Amazing, when it comes to Terrorism, we spend billions in intelligence, defence and surveillance in case of million to one chances happening, and everyone is fine with it. Yet with things like Global Warming, which have certainly got more evidence than there was for, say, WMD's in Iraq, and its time to get out the Fiddle.
Is Global Warming a man-made phenomenon, I couldn't say. Is human industry having a detectable effect on the Environment? Yes, and since we all live on the same planet, those effects are Global. Now you can wrap that up in any name you so feel inclined, don't call it Global Warming if you like, that's an incorrect definition anyway, but it IS happening. Personally, I don't care who's fault it is, I'm not even sure if we can do anything about it if it is, but we need to take these things seriously and not shrug them off in the hope they will conveniently go away, there's is mounting evidence they will not in the short term.
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Im not on the political side of the fence that trys to silence and intimidate. I want Al Gore to say more about it, get more extreme, more shrill so that everybody will see him for who he truly is. Actually, im going to watch An Inconvenient Truth to better inform myself. Its not going to change what I think about global warming, because i know its a crock.
Explain what the hell Al Gore has to do with any of this?
You posted a link to a documentary that is effectively propaganda - and that's according to the principal climate scientist featured in it, who is considering legal action and requesting his comments be removed. He is saying, in actuality, that this 'enlightening' program not only misrepresented him, but that it is without scientific merit and twisted his comments. Moreso, the maker of this documentary has in the past been in trouble for exactly the same thing - he made a late 90s documentary which saw 4 of the principal contributors succesfully complain to the TV regulator that their statements had been twisted out of all meaning and selectively edited.
Here, for example, is a critique of said documentary from actual proper scientists (not Al Gore, who you seem to presume is some sort of leading authority driving the current concern towards climate change); http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/03/swindled/
So before you throw about rubbish like 'it's a crock' - and this isn't even touching on the issue of localised economic and health damage due to pollution, as Icefire mentioned, which anyone with half a brain can see - maybe you should stop throwing up idiotic fluff like this documentary as 'enlightening' or some sort of proof. Then perhaps drop the 'Al Gore blahblahblah' hissy fit when you're called on it, and at the very least look at the scientific rationale like sensible people should - not how much you like or dislike one reasonably famous ex-vice-presidents' documentary.
The idea - and science - for man-made climate change existed well before Al Gore started going on about it, and tagging it onto one famous personality is pretty obviously an attempt to avoid the issue by attacking a personality instead. Shame on you.
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Just remember kids, science is good and fine until it says something you disagree with be it anthropogenic climate change, the universe being 13.7 billion years old, or aliens not being the ones who built the pyramids.
On the topic of enlightenment: hallowed are the Ori.
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Right. Because, of course, scientists always agree, and every scientific interpretation must always be accepted without question.
Neither science nor religion should be mixed with politics.
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I think the difference was best explained as 'In science, everyone wants to prove one of the old established truths wrong, in religion, everyone is terrified they might.'
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Explain what the hell Al Gore has to do with any of this?
if you don't know, he made a documentary about global warming recently and like won an emmy and ****. to be honest even if I agree with a position ANY politition makeing a "the world is comeing to an end" style documentary about it gives me cause to question it.
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I think the point Aldo was trying to make was that Al Gore did not invent Global Warming. Yes he probably used it as a platform for personal gain, it was, and obviously still is, a contentious issue, but whilst Al Gore might be a moron, that does nothing whatsoever to affect the Global Warming case, it merely means that someone tried to profit from it.
You only have to see the sheer volume of books coming from both sides of the Evolution debate to realise where the current Gold Mine is.
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in any event
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BjrOi4vF24
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Global warming is an issue with so much political blarney attached to it it's impossible to get an accurate scientific assessment (if such a thing actually exists to begin with).
Look on the bright side: no matter what humans do to this rock, life will go on. Just maybe not human life. And really, is that such a bad thing?
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Eh....
Yes?
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Explain what the hell Al Gore has to do with any of this?
if you don't know, he made a documentary about global warming recently and like won an emmy and ****. to be honest even if I agree with a position ANY politition makeing a "the world is comeing to an end" style documentary about it gives me cause to question it.
As Flipside pointed out already, my point is that Al Gore has nothing to do with the realities of global warming - at best he cobbled together the 'cream' of scientific awards into a documentary, at worst twisted them. In any case, a serious discussion about this issue does not reference Al Gore nor the 'documentary' linked at the top of this thread, but uses actual first-hand sources. Otherwise you get into the risk - as we see in this case - of these authoritative sources having their words and work edited into a soundbite that says the opposite of when it really means.
Al Gore is just handy for the Exxo-Mobil mob et al because it attaches a personality to the issue - and it's far, far easier as we can see here to attack a 'figurehead' personality than actually discuss the science behind the whole controversy.
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the temperature has gone up 0.6* C in the last century as a global average and you are talking about the end of human life? You do realize that people live in the desert and the most fridgid of temperatures? I dont deny that the world is warming but what i do think is bogus is the apocalyptic outcome if we dont do the silliest of things like switch to florescent lighting, put bricks in our toliets, unplug electronics that are off, even building houses out of recyables like tires. If we dont do that, oh and stop driving SUVs we will all die! (not now, but in 100 or 200 years so we dont have to be held accountable when our predictions are wrong)
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the temperature has gone up 0.6* C in the last century as a global average and you are talking about the end of human life? You do realize that people live in the desert and the most fridgid of temperatures? I dont deny that the world is warming but what i do think is bogus is the apocalyptic outcome if we dont do the silliest of things like switch to florescent lighting, put bricks in our toliets, unplug electronics that are off, even building houses out of recyables like tires. If we dont do that, oh and stop driving SUVs we will all die! (not now, but in 100 or 200 years so we dont have to be held accountable when our predictions are wrong)
Firstly, 0.6C is a very significant change in global terms. Secondly, the average global temperature has risen (based on the latest IPCC report, which determined a >90% probability of human cause) 0.15-0.35C alone since the last IPCC report in 2001; that's at the very top end of estimates. Thirdly, we're not talking about humanity raising the temperature to, say 5C - we're talking about humanity raising the temperature enough to go past the 'tipping point' into a self-reinforcing heating (followed by ice age due to the heat creating more cloud cover) cycle. Fourthly, it's daft to suggest the survival of a limited number of people in the desert (sand or ice version) means the human race could survive the conversion of the planet to such a state (one which would wipe out most ecology and agriculture) - just look at mass starvation and famine already happening in Africa thanks to record droughts.
The IPCC report - which, being a multi-governmental document is conservative by nature - predicts climate changes will result in major increases in tropical storm intensity, seal level rises of up to 50cm, more frequent deadly heatwaves, and the acidity of the sea rising and wiping out corall atolls. The consequent ecological as well as physical (storm) damage would create hundreds of millions of refugees, who would inevitably seek to move to industrialized 1st world countries, creating an economic and humanitarian crisis.
This is ignoring, of course, the possibility of the release of methane from Siberian peat or trapped under the ocean, which would be disasterous and would mirror the likely cause of the Permian mass extinction.
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I think the difference was best explained as 'In science, everyone wants to prove one of the old established truths wrong, in religion, everyone is terrified they might.'
Uh, no. The only religious people who are afraid of being proved wrong are those who use religion as a means to exert control. Since they're afraid of losing control, they stifle dissent.
And guess what -- you can say the same about science too. Watch:
The only scientists who are afraid of being proved wrong are those who use science as a means to exert control. Since they're afraid of losing control, they stifle dissent.
In any case, those who use religion as a belief system rather than a political system aren't afraid at all of being proved wrong. If they happen to doubt something enough to disbelieve it, they would most likely switch to a more compatibile belief system. The core beliefs aren't really something that can be "proved" or "disproved" anyway.
The IPCC report - which, being a multi-governmental document is political by nature
Fixed that for you.
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The only scientists who are afraid of being proved wrong are those who use science as a means to exert control. Since they're afraid of losing control, they stifle dissent.
I actually completely disagree with that statement. Some scientists don't like to be proved wrong because of ego, but any scientist who thinks their arguments are infallible or give them some kind of 'control' over what they are studying is no scientist at all. Science is the art of Theory and Research, the first job of a scientist is to prove themselves wrong, the second job is to try and find someone else who can prove you wrong. That is how science tests itself.
Yes, you get 'political' scientists, just as you get 'political' religions, but I don't think science has ever gone for 'control', that's been far more a case of Media using science. Which is a long long way from the case in religion.
Look at it this way, last time someone tried to say the Quoran may be wrong they got Death threats, last time someone said Newton was wrong they got told, 'Ok, we're game, prove it.'. And they did. That guy was called Einstein.
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The IPCC report - which, being a multi-governmental document is political by nature
Fixed that for you.
Yes, because the politicians have shown great impetus and desire to tackle the issue of emissions control.
Oh, wait, the other one.
What, may I ask, on earth was your point?
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they have shown great impetus and desire to act like they will tackle the issue of emissions control as a means of gaining power. well half of them have the other half have done everything in there (vast) power to to twist any science and/or scientist into 'proving' that global warming either doesn't exist or is a natural phenomenon, to which the first group counters with similar tactics. in the end it becomes imposable to tell with any degree of certainty what you can actually believe, because there are so many people on both sides of the issue who take there position as fact and consider any decent from there position on the issue as a political power play, and the greatest tragity is it might very well be. it's pretty much imposable for anyone outside of the people actually drilling in Antarctica to know with any certainty how accurate there research is.
thus: politics + science = politics.
also: politics + religion = politics
and: war = politics^n
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Except that the IPCC has historically [/i]under[/i] estimated climate change, and the Bush administration has in the past lobbied a change of IPCC chairman on behalf of ExxonMobil.
I'd still like to know why 'political' is replacing 'conservative'.
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Unfortunately, some people are not going to accept Global Warming, whether man-made or Natural cycle, until they are wading their way to higher ground in 40 years. The sad fact is that even if those who are accepting that there is a problem manage to turn matters around, that just means that in 50 years time the people who don't accept it will be saying 'See! We told you it wasn't going to happen!'
Unfortunately there appears to be only one way to find out for sure, and, being humanity, I have little doubt we will blunder ever onwards and make a half-assed attempt at too little too late. It's odd, the North Pole has melted entirely away in the last few years and people still don't think there is a problem.
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=1678441&page=1 - Report on the melting of both poles.
http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update8.htm - More info on the above, obviously biased.
http://www.geni.org/globalenergy/library/media_coverage/SanDiegoUnionTribune/Ice-has-melted-at-north-pole-site/Ice-has-melted-at-north-pole-site.shtml
- Report on the North Pole melting entirely for the first time in an estimated 50 million years in 2000.
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I'd still like to know why 'political' is replacing 'conservative'.
because 'conservative' is only one half of the problem.
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Just a slightly abstract thought, but wouldn't people who oppose Evolution have to be in favour of Global Warming, after all, a lot of the alleged defence for it not happening seems to come from before the Earth was created?
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The only scientists who are afraid of being proved wrong are those who use science as a means to exert control. Since they're afraid of losing control, they stifle dissent.
I actually completely disagree with that statement. Some scientists don't like to be proved wrong because of ego, but any scientist who thinks their arguments are infallible or give them some kind of 'control' over what they are studying is no scientist at all. Science is the art of Theory and Research, the first job of a scientist is to prove themselves wrong, the second job is to try and find someone else who can prove you wrong. That is how science tests itself.
Aside from the fact that you came rather close to the No True Scotsman fallacy there, you don't seem to have followed my post. If the only scientists who are afraid of being proved wrong are those who use science as a means to exert control, then logically, those who don't use science as a means of control are not afraid of being proved wrong. So we agree on that principle. Where we seem to disagree is whether the "stifling of dissent" is actually taking place.
Yes, you get 'political' scientists, just as you get 'political' religions, but I don't think science has ever gone for 'control', that's been far more a case of Media using science. Which is a long long way from the case in religion.
You can't have it both ways. If you can argue that science has never gone for "control", that it's all the fault of unscrupulous people hijacking it for their own ends, then I can argue the same for religion.
Look at it this way, last time someone tried to say the Quoran may be wrong they got Death threats, last time someone said Newton was wrong they got told, 'Ok, we're game, prove it.'. And they did. That guy was called Einstein.
Okay, then given that claim, explain why global warming is currently presented as a foregone conclusion, proven beyond all doubt, despite the considerable number of scientists who can't agree on whether global warming exists, what the extent of humankind's impact on the climate is, and what sort of results we can expect.
Science has been co-opted for control before, and will be again. Phrenology has been used to justify jailing innocent people, Darwinianism has been used to justify eugenics and racial cleansing, and global warming is being used to justify, as Bobboau said, increased government power.
Oh, and the last time someone said global warming was wrong, he got death threats. Not "okay, we're game, prove it".
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/03/11/ngreen211.xml
Except that the IPCC has historically under estimated climate change
Under-estimated by whose definition? Their own. (Or, equivalently, other global-warming proponents.) Nobody has yet offered any sort of hypothesis that has borne out under testing; all we have is wild speculation. Back in the seventies the climatologists' claim was that the Earth would undergo a new ice age within twenty years, and that prediction turned out to be completely false.
because 'conservative' is only one half of the problem.
I'm pretty sure he meant conservative as in "erring on the side of underestimation", not conservative as in politically conservative.
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I'd still like to know why 'political' is replacing 'conservative'.
because 'conservative' is only one half of the problem.
Oh, FFS.
Go read a dictionary.
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You can't have it both ways. If you can argue that science has never gone for "control", that it's all the fault of unscrupulous people hijacking it for their own ends, then I can argue the same for religion.
I'm not saying that there are no unscrupulous scientists, but science is about testing and retesting axioms. Scientists don't just call out other people's theories for the attention, at least not unless you find Cold Fusion, they do it because those Axioms must constantly be tested As for Global warming, most scientists don't disagree that it is happening, most scientists disagree on the level of impact that humanity is having, and that is becoming more and more an argument of 'how bad is it?'.
As for the death threats. Are scientists calling for the immediate tracking down and execution of the heretic? You'll also notice that particular article quotes from the program at the start of this thread and fails to mention the ensuing lawsuit from the scientist who's quote is, I note, mentioned in the article, which casts further doubts on exactly how accurate that report is. When Salman Rushdie wrote Satanic Verses he wasn't just sent death threats, he had an entire institution baying for his blood.
Psuedo-Science has obviously been used before for great evil, though I hasten to add that Phrenology and other such methods were favourite tools of Religious institutions, who are, quite frankly, used to believing things on faith and without question, not testing those axioms to say whether they are true or not.
You could say that Ethnic cleansing has been based on Darwinism, but does that buy any more salt than 'Invading Iraq was God's will'? They are both obviously third parties misusing a tool, but that doesn't mean that the tool is invalid or it's readings are wrong.
Oh, and as for that report at the top, even the worlds top meteorologist is calling it rubbish...
http://icwales.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0200wales/tm_headline=top-meteorologist-pours-scorn-on-tv-s-debunking-of-global-warming&method=full&objectid=18749397&siteid=50082-name_page.html
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You can't have it both ways. If you can argue that science has never gone for "control", that it's all the fault of unscrupulous people hijacking it for their own ends, then I can argue the same for religion.
Except you can't.
People go for control, yes. But science as a process is not one of control but investigation and rationale. Religion, in contrast, is dedicated to control - controlling the act of worship. Now, I don't see the 'science vs religion' argument as relevant here - unless you're one of the nutcases who believe ****ing up the planet will be rewarded by god with a brand new one - but I'd say it's a fundamental misunderstanding to place science as analagous to religion in this context.
Okay, then given that claim, explain why global warming is currently presented as a foregone conclusion, proven beyond all doubt, despite the considerable number of scientists who can't agree on whether global warming exists, what the extent of humankind's impact on the climate is, and what sort of results we can expect.
It's not as simple as you're making it.
We have observed a warming trend in the planet beyond that which you would expect. Particularly once global dimming is factored in. Computer simulations, amongst other things, have been used to establish a strong degree of certainty that man-made actions are affecting the climate of the planet on an atmospheric scale.
Given the vast damage that global warming would inflict (climatological, economic, social devastation) when it hits (not this century, probably, but in time for our grandchildren), and given the established likelihood of a human role (i.e. very), then the only safe conclusion is that we avert this already very likely risk or face catastrophe.
I would remind you that the IPCC has a role which requires considering every single piece of research, is naturally conservative by nature of its existence, and yet has come to the conclusion we are in severe danger.
Science has been co-opted for control before, and will be again. Phrenology has been used to justify jailing innocent people, Darwinianism has been used to justify eugenics and racial cleansing, and global warming is being used to justify, as Bobboau said, increased government power.
Except none of this has a bearing upon the science, so I'm not sure why you're bringing it up except for FUD purposes.
Except that the IPCC has historically under estimated climate change
Under-estimated by whose definition? Their own. (Or, equivalently, other global-warming proponents.) Nobody has yet offered any sort of hypothesis that has borne out under testing; all we have is wild speculation. Back in the seventies the climatologists' claim was that the Earth would undergo a new ice age within twenty years, and that prediction turned out to be completely false.
Under-estimated by recorded fact since reports were made (for example, the 2001 reports' maximum estimate was just about the recorded rise that actually occured in the relevant time period) - I'm pretty sure I already mentioned this.
As regards to the 1970s ice age; I'm afraid you are simply wrong - http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/sci/iceage/. See http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=94 for the summary (in essence, the media, not scientists, were making this prediction).
Moreso, do you really think science can't improve in 20 years? (this is ignoring the use of more and more advanced - and plausible - computer simulations, which can provide a more accurate predictions simply by using known past climate data as a test model group)
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What was actually said was that we are on the run-up into another Ice-Age, and, if anything, that fact is more firmly established now.
The problem is here is that when a Geologist talks about 'Soon', people automatically assume that means 'within our lifetime'. Geologically speaking, 'Soon' means within about 20 thousand years.
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The religious right in America wants to destroy the environment. Why? Because they believe that their "savior" will come soon and so none of this will matter. They want the world to end. It's scary that a country with the power and wealth that the US has is effectively run by people with a deathwish.
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Are scientists calling for the immediate tracking down and execution of the heretic?
No, but religions -- like science -- seldom call for the immediate tracking down and execution of individuals, and even seldomer follow through with it. The point is that dissenting opinions, far from being treated as challenges, are treated as threats.
People have much more subtle ways of suppressing dissent than simply killing people. Scientists who don't toe the line on global warming are being ostracized, and their opinions are downplayed in the media while those of the establishment are played up.
Again, this is not to malign science at the expense of religion, or vice versa, simply to say that religion and science are both tools, and morally neutral in and of themselves. It is what people do with them that matters.
[Religious institutions] are, quite frankly, used to believing things on faith and without question, not testing those axioms to say whether they are true or not.
What rubbish is this? Religion is not based on accepting things without question. Religious people test stuff all the time -- we pray in the expectation that prayers will be answered; we use theology to predict people's behavior. Faith is proceeding based on an assumption, or an incomplete understanding of a situation. Not credulously swallowing dogma with glazed eyes.
I presume you aren't acquainted with many religious people?
You could say that Ethnic cleansing has been based on Darwinism, but does that buy any more salt than 'Invading Iraq was God's will'? They are both obviously third parties misusing a tool, but that doesn't mean that the tool is invalid or it's readings are wrong.
I've never seen anyone claim that the Iraq war was God's will, except in parodies. Eliminating WMDs, liberating the Iraqis, deposing a dictator, taking over the Middle East, stealing oil, manipulating the economy, etc., are a far cry from "God wants me to do this" or even "This should be done because it is in accordance with the moral imperative that God has laid out".
As for misusing a tool, that is something I agree with. That's actually the point I believe I was trying to establish all along, but whether that was your original position or something you just now decided, then fair enough -- we can conclude that part of the debate.
Oh, and as for that report at the top, even the worlds top meteorologist is calling it rubbish...
So far, I've only seen people attacking the people who produced it, trying to discredit their reputations. Or people simply saying the documentary is incorrect without providing proof. Show me a refutation of the science involved.
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You can't have it both ways. If you can argue that science has never gone for "control", that it's all the fault of unscrupulous people hijacking it for their own ends, then I can argue the same for religion.
Except you can't.
People go for control, yes. But science as a process is not one of control but investigation and rationale. Religion, in contrast, is dedicated to control - controlling the act of worship.
Religion is not dedicated to control. Religion is about discovery, both about the self and about God, or Nirvana, or the Ultimate. It is people who decide to use science as a tool for control, and it is people who decide to use religion as a tool for control.
Now, I don't see the 'science vs religion' argument as relevant here
I don't see it as relevant either, if we're talking about global warming. I wasn't the one who started it, though.
It's not as simple as you're making it.
We have observed a warming trend in the planet beyond that which you would expect. Particularly once global dimming is factored in. Computer simulations, amongst other things, have been used to establish a strong degree of certainty that man-made actions are affecting the climate of the planet on an atmospheric scale.
What sort of warming trend have we "expected"? Twenty years ago people thought the world would be cooling. Their expectations were certainly proven wrong.
People agree that the climate is fluctuating -- as it has always done -- but disagree on what the short-, medium-, and long-term trends are. Volcanic activity, solar activity, and livestock digestion have all been cited as causes of global climate change too. Many scientists argue that any human contribution is just a drop in the bucket -- on par with peeing into Niagara Falls.
The global temperature isn't historically unusual anyway. It's about the same today as it was in 1600.
Given the vast damage that global warming would inflict (climatological, economic, social devastation) when it hits (not this century, probably, but in time for our grandchildren), and given the established likelihood of a human role (i.e. very), then the only safe conclusion is that we avert this already very likely risk or face catastrophe.
The earth has survived meteor impacts, cataclysmic solar events, hypercanes, and supervolcanos with life coming through unscathed. Humans have survived plagues, wars, earthquakes, tsunamis, and an ice age. Neither people nor life is in any danger from global climate change.
If the effects of global warming will take 100 years or more to manifest, then there's no harm in waiting 20 years for testable hypotheses to be proven true or false before taking action. If we're already past the point of no return and irrevocably doomed, then there's no point in taking any action, and we may as well sit back and enjoy it.
The point is, global climate change is very poorly understood, even by the standards of the most radical proponents. Reacting in a knee-jerk fashion, or running around doing something just to look busy, is a recipe for disaster. We'd be just as likely to do harm as good.
I would remind you that the IPCC has a role which requires considering every single piece of research, is naturally conservative by nature of its existence, and yet has come to the conclusion we are in severe danger.
So we're fine for the time being then. We should keep studying this so we know exactly what's going on. We certainly shouldn't make needlessly restrictive regulations on something we have incomplete understanding of.
Science has been co-opted for control before, and will be again. Phrenology has been used to justify jailing innocent people, Darwinianism has been used to justify eugenics and racial cleansing, and global warming is being used to justify, as Bobboau said, increased government power.
Except none of this has a bearing upon the science, so I'm not sure why you're bringing it up except for FUD purposes.
I'm saying it to establish that science has been mistaken in the past, will be mistaken in the future, and is likely mistaken now. We need to understand what we're dealing with before we start dealing with it.
Except that the IPCC has historically under estimated climate change
Under-estimated by whose definition? Their own. (Or, equivalently, other global-warming proponents.) Nobody has yet offered any sort of hypothesis that has borne out under testing; all we have is wild speculation. Back in the seventies the climatologists' claim was that the Earth would undergo a new ice age within twenty years, and that prediction turned out to be completely false.
Under-estimated by recorded fact since reports were made (for example, the 2001 reports' maximum estimate was just about the recorded rise that actually occured in the relevant time period) - I'm pretty sure I already mentioned this.
The full report isn't out yet. What we have now is a series of summaries that may have been misinterpreted for political expediency. Perhaps we can defer a conclusion until May 2007, when the full report comes out?
Anyway the IPCC is a political institution, not a scientific one. It's run by the UN, after all.
As regards to the 1970s ice age; I'm afraid you are simply wrong - http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/sci/iceage/. See http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=94 for the summary (in essence, the media, not scientists, were making this prediction).
From Wikipedia:
"In the 1970s, there was increasing awareness that estimates of global temperatures showed cooling since 1945. The general public had little awareness about carbon dioxide's effects: at the time garbage, chemical disposal, smog, particulate pollution, and acid rain were the focus of public concern, although Paul R. Ehrlich mentions climate change from the greenhouse gases in 1968. Not long after the idea of global cooling reached the public press in the mid-1970s, the temperature trend stopped going down."
So the temperature was decreasing from 1945 to 1970, at least. And the temperature has been increasing from 1970 to today. I made the mistake of sensationalizing the trend (cooling = Ice Age), but by the same token, the global warming activists should be wary of making the similar mistake (warming = catastrophe).
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The religious right in America wants to destroy the environment. Why? Because they believe that their "savior" will come soon and so none of this will matter. They want the world to end. It's scary that a country with the power and wealth that the US has is effectively run by people with a deathwish.
Patently ridiculous. Are you going to debate, or would you rather toss strawmen around?
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Patently ridiculous. Are you going to debate, or would you rather toss strawmen around?
Ok, got any proof that I'm wrong?
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I have extensive dealings with the religious right in the US, and let me assure you they do not want to end the world via ecological disaster, some of them may want to bring about a war to end all wars, but as far as the climate is concerned they just don't care, they think global warming is a trick by the librals and the commies to try and take away america's industrial capacity and thus cripple it, I can see were they get that from and can agree that there are probably (a relatively small number of) people who want to use it for a similar goal but they are insane if they deny it's happening.
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Ok, got any proof that I'm wrong?
He frankly doesn't have to, Kosh. You made a claim, the burden of proof of it is on you.
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I would remind you that the IPCC has a role which requires considering every single piece of research, is naturally conservative by nature of its existence, and yet has come to the conclusion we are in severe danger.
So we're fine for the time being then. We should keep studying this so we know exactly what's going on. We certainly shouldn't make needlessly restrictive regulations on something we have incomplete understanding of.
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Human understanding will allways be incomplete. A perfect argument to never do anything.. :lol:
Think of it this way - you test some drug on people. Your initial summaries predict that there's a high chance it will be harmfull. Will you stop with the drug test or will you continue giving it to the people untill you achieve "complete understanding" of it?
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Religion is not dedicated to control. Religion is about discovery, both about the self and about God, or Nirvana, or the Ultimate. It is people who decide to use science as a tool for control, and it is people who decide to use religion as a tool for control.
Then what are things like the Ten Commandments if not, y'know, controlling commands?
Anyways, irrelevant to this topic.
What sort of warming trend have we "expected"? Twenty years ago people thought the world would be cooling. Their expectations were certainly proven wrong.
People agree that the climate is fluctuating -- as it has always done -- but disagree on what the short-, medium-, and long-term trends are. Volcanic activity, solar activity, and livestock digestion have all been cited as causes of global climate change too. Many scientists argue that any human contribution is just a drop in the bucket -- on par with peeing into Niagara Falls.
The global temperature isn't historically unusual anyway. It's about the same today as it was in 1600.
It's not possible to plausibly estimate the global mean before 1600, and this most definately is the highest (global average) temperature in 400 years with (notably) increasing rates of heating. And let's not forget the role of global dimming in masking the actual rise. Also, IIRC the middle-ages warm period was localized to europe (and in any case may have been correlated to the medieval maximum in solar activity; solar activity has been theorised as contributing to global climate change, also said theory also decided that the effect was less than that of greenhouse gases).
If you read the (particularly 2nd) links I posted earlier, it should help clear up you misunderstanding of what was being predicted in the 70s, and where the limitations of the science and research lay. I'd note that the attitude of 'we got it wrong* 20 years ago, hence can never be right' is one that flies in the face of both common sense and scientific endeavour.
*if we did, which we did, but not in the way you seem to think
The earth has survived meteor impacts, cataclysmic solar events, hypercanes, and supervolcanos with life coming through unscathed. Humans have survived plagues, wars, earthquakes, tsunamis, and an ice age. Neither people nor life is in any danger from global climate change.
If the effects of global warming will take 100 years or more to manifest, then there's no harm in waiting 20 years for testable hypotheses to be proven true or false before taking action. If we're already past the point of no return and irrevocably doomed, then there's no point in taking any action, and we may as well sit back and enjoy it.
The point is, global climate change is very poorly understood, even by the standards of the most radical proponents. Reacting in a knee-jerk fashion, or running around doing something just to look busy, is a recipe for disaster. We'd be just as likely to do harm as good.
I think you misunderstand the issue; the earth will survive, humanity will - already is - be put under great pressure to survive. Not in our lifetimes, yes, but if we don't act to counteract something which there is already very strong scientific evidence for then we will have pushed ourselves past a point of no return. Every climatological assessment over the last decade or so has pointed to increasing, not decreasing change. We're already seeing record droughts in Africa - just because it doesn't touch you or my cosy little industrialized nation doesn't mean people aren't suffering, and it doesn't mean we can't sit on our arse waiting for the responsibility to pass onto the next generation - because there is a great harm in waiting 20 years.
And the whole 'sit back and be doomed' is simply an idiotic statement to make. I expect better from you.
So we're fine for the time being then. We should keep studying this so we know exactly what's going on. We certainly shouldn't make needlessly restrictive regulations on something we have incomplete understanding of.
You didn't actually read what I wrote, did you?
I'm saying it to establish that science has been mistaken in the past, will be mistaken in the future, and is likely mistaken now. We need to understand what we're dealing with before we start dealing with it.
Sounds like an excuse, to me. We don't fully understand HIV/AIDS (and may never), but we still have to try and treat it and coutneract it.
The full report isn't out yet. What we have now is a series of summaries that may have been misinterpreted for political expediency. Perhaps we can defer a conclusion until May 2007, when the full report comes out?
Anyway the IPCC is a political institution, not a scientific one. It's run by the UN, after all.
It was the executive summary of the IPCC report. Try http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/02_02_07_climatereport.pdf if you want to look at it, you'll find it hard to misinterpret the likes of "warming of the climate system is now unequivocal" and the section of 'discernable human influences' on page 8.
If you want to look at the scientific reports, a report published on the eve of the IPCC report in Science stated that the IPCC was underestimating climate change and being too conservative in its conclusion.
Also, I'm guessing if I pointed out any source you'd find complaints. The IPCC, which considers hundreds of pieces of research, is 'political'. If I pick out an individual scientist, you'll invent some magic dissenter without any reference. If I point out an ecological group, they'll become political too. Anything, in reality, so you can avoid tackling the conclusions made on a scientific level.
From Wikipedia:
"In the 1970s, there was increasing awareness that estimates of global temperatures showed cooling since 1945. The general public had little awareness about carbon dioxide's effects: at the time garbage, chemical disposal, smog, particulate pollution, and acid rain were the focus of public concern, although Paul R. Ehrlich mentions climate change from the greenhouse gases in 1968. Not long after the idea of global cooling reached the public press in the mid-1970s, the temperature trend stopped going down."
So the temperature was decreasing from 1945 to 1970, at least. And the temperature has been increasing from 1970 to today. I made the mistake of sensationalizing the trend (cooling = Ice Age), but by the same token, the global warming activists should be wary of making the similar mistake (warming = catastrophe).
Wikipedia?
See my previous comment about reading the links I posted in the prior post; may I add that I love how anyone publicising (or performing) research indicating dangerous climatological change has now been labelled as an activist by you? Also, the 1945-70 period is regarded as a cooling blip in an overall warming trend, and one which was predominantly in the Northern Hemisphere.
Perhaps, to also examine wikipedia, I might point out the following parts of the 'Global Cooling' page;
1970s Awareness
Concern peaked in the early 1970s, partly because of the cooling trend then apparent (a cooling period began in 1945, and two decades of a cooling trend suggested a trough had been reached after several decades of warming), and partly because much less was then known about world climate and causes of ice ages. Although there was a cooling trend then, it should be realised that climate scientists were perfectly well aware that predictions based on this trend were not possible - because the trend was poorly studied and not understood (for example see reference[8]). However in the popular press the possibility of cooling was reported generally without the caveats present in the scientific reports.
The term "global cooling" did not become attached to concerns about an impending glacial period until after the term "global warming" was popularized. In the 1970s the compilation of records to produce hemispheric, or global, temperature records had just begun.
A history of the discovery of global warming states that: While neither scientists nor the public could be sure in the 1970s whether the world was warming or cooling, people were increasingly inclined to believe that global climate was on the move, and in no small way.[9]
In 1972 Emiliani warned "Man's activity may either precipitate this new ice age or lead to substantial or even total melting of the ice caps".[10] By 1972 a large majority of a group of leading glacial-epoch experts at a conference agreed that "the natural end of our warm epoch is undoubtedly near";[11] but the volume of Quaternary Research reporting on the meeting said that "the basic conclusion to be drawn from the discussions in this section is that the knowledge necessary for understanding the mechanism of climate change is still lamentably inadequate". Unless there were impacts from future human activity, they thought that serious cooling "must be expected within the next few millennia or even centuries"; but many other scientists doubted these conclusions.[12][13]
1970 SCEP report
The 1970 "Study of Critical Environmental Problems"[14] reported the possibility of warming from increased carbon dioxide, but no concerns about cooling, setting a lower bound on the beginning of interest in "global cooling".
You can examine that in more detail should you choose.
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I wonder how much it'll take for people to start getting worried. I mean, we only started getting worried about the ozone hole when we actually saw the damn thing floating around the southern hemisphere, so I just wonder at what point even the most stalwart opponent to Global Warming will admit they may be wrong? The complete bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef perhaps? A waterlevel rise of 1 metre and the subsequent creation of 100,000 refugees from the South Pacific alone? Or perhaps a massive release of frozen methane hydrate from the oceans resulting in a repeat of the Permian extinction?
Who knows, eh?
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I wonder how much it'll take for people to start getting worried. I mean, we only started getting worried about the ozone hole when we actually saw the damn thing floating around the southern hemisphere, so I just wonder at what point even the most stalwart opponent to Global Warming will admit they may be wrong? The complete bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef perhaps? A waterlevel rise of 1 metre and the subsequent creation of 100,000 refugees from the South Pacific alone? Or perhaps a massive release of frozen methane hydrate from the oceans resulting in a repeat of the Permian extinction?
Who knows, eh?
Well, I'm sure you'll still be able to get a tax break on a hummer, so it's not all bad.......
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Patently ridiculous. Are you going to debate, or would you rather toss strawmen around?
Ok, got any proof that I'm wrong?
I would like to see where in religious right or Christian doctrine it says that American policy should focus on destroying the world through environmental reasons.
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Patently ridiculous. Are you going to debate, or would you rather toss strawmen around?
Ok, got any proof that I'm wrong?
I would like to see where in religious right or Christian doctrine it says that American policy should focus on destroying the world through environmental reasons.
I remember - vaguely, may I add - a survey that shown a shocking number (granted, this would be any number >1, but I'm pretty sure it was a substantial number) of Senators actually believed in the/a Rapture and thus didn't care about the planet as God would gift a new one.
Albeit I don't think the current US right (not sure the Democrats qualify as 'left', may I add) are intent on destroying the planet to bring about a new one - I just think they don't give a ****, particularly when Exxon & Texaco pay better than Greenpeace & FOTE. Not, of course, an usual scenario in any country - but a pronounced one in the worlds greatest polluter*.
*Until china catch up
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You can demonize Exxon all you want, but keep in mind that without their shipping, piping, refining to gas stations all around the country every single day there would be no economy in the US.
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You can demonize Exxon all you want, but keep in mind that without their shipping, piping, refining to gas stations all around the country every single day there would be no economy in the US.
That doesn't mean they shouldn't be subject to regulation or not take responsibility for environmental damage caused by their business, same as any other. And somehow i doubt imposing anti-pollution legislation would destroy all these companies.
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I remember - vaguely, may I add - a survey that shown a shocking number (granted, this would be any number >1, but I'm pretty sure it was a substantial number) of Senators actually believed in the/a Rapture and thus didn't care about the planet as God would gift a new one.
I hardly believe that they think the Rapture will be close enough as to serve as a viable strategy. If Judgement Day is that close, then what's the point of being a Senator?
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I remember - vaguely, may I add - a survey that shown a shocking number (granted, this would be any number >1, but I'm pretty sure it was a substantial number) of Senators actually believed in the/a Rapture and thus didn't care about the planet as God would gift a new one.
I hardly believe that they think the Rapture will be close enough as to serve as a viable strategy. If Judgement Day is that close, then what's the point of being a Senator?
To help Gods work?
No-one ever said Fundies were rational.......
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Heh, in my brief Google search to find aldo_14's poll, look what I found! All Christians, you will be UNABLE TO PLAY FREESPACE IN HEAVEN! (http://www.raptureready.com/faq/faq361.html)
The site is actually rather creepy.
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Now that I have the time to address this in detail...
It's not possible to plausibly estimate the global mean before 1600
Of course it is. You don't have to be actually present with a time machine and a thermometer. You can measure the rate of growth of oceanic plants in temperature-sensitive areas. You can examine archeological evidence in mountain passes that were only accessible during warmer time periods. And so on.
And let's not forget the role of global dimming in masking the actual rise. Also, IIRC the middle-ages warm period was localized to europe (and in any case may have been correlated to the medieval maximum in solar activity; solar activity has been theorised as contributing to global climate change, also said theory also decided that the effect was les than that of greenhouse gases).
Actually, two of those are inaccurate and one is incorrect. Global brightness is not the only solar factor contributing to climate change; the medieval warm period affected China in addition to Europe; and solar activity may have more of an effect than greenhouse gases.
Here (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1363818.ece) is another interesting article:
When politicians and journalists declare that the science of global warming is settled, they show a regrettable ignorance about how science works. We were treated to another dose of it recently when the experts of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued the Summary for Policymakers that puts the political spin on an unfinished scientific dossier on climate change due for publication in a few months’ time. They declared that most of the rise in temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to man-made greenhouse gases.
The small print explains “very likely” as meaning that the experts who made the judgment felt 90% sure about it. Older readers may recall a press conference at Harwell in 1958 when Sir John Cockcroft, Britain’s top nuclear physicist, said he was 90% certain that his lads had achieved controlled nuclear fusion. It turned out that he was wrong. More positively, a 10% uncertainty in any theory is a wide open breach for any latterday Galileo or Einstein to storm through with a better idea. That is how science really works.
The climate change is not uniform around the globe:
The early arrival of migrant birds in spring provides colourful evidence for a recent warming of the northern lands. But did anyone tell you that in east Antarctica the Adélie penguins and Cape petrels are turning up at their spring nesting sites around nine days later than they did 50 years ago? While sea-ice has diminished in the Arctic since 1978, it has grown by 8% in the Southern Ocean.
Cosmic rays may have more of an impact than solar brightness:
Disdain for the sun goes with a failure by the self-appointed greenhouse experts to keep up with inconvenient discoveries about how the solar variations control the climate. The sun’s brightness may change too little to account for the big swings in the climate. But more than 10 years have passed since Henrik Svensmark in Copenhagen first pointed out a much more powerful mechanism.
He saw from compilations of weather satellite data that cloudiness varies according to how many atomic particles are coming in from exploded stars. More cosmic rays, more clouds. The sun’s magnetic field bats away many of the cosmic rays, and its intensification during the 20th century meant fewer cosmic rays, fewer clouds, and a warmer world. On the other hand the Little Ice Age was chilly because the lazy sun let in more cosmic rays, leaving the world cloudier and gloomier.
The only trouble with Svensmark’s idea — apart from its being politically incorrect — was that meteorologists denied that cosmic rays could be involved in cloud formation. After long delays in scraping together the funds for an experiment, Svensmark and his small team at the Danish National Space Center hit the jackpot in the summer of 2005.
In a box of air in the basement, they were able to show that electrons set free by cosmic rays coming through the ceiling stitched together droplets of sulphuric acid and water. These are the building blocks for cloud condensation. But journal after journal declined to publish their report; the discovery finally appeared in the Proceedings of the Royal Society late last year.
If you read the (particularly 2nd) links I posted earlier, it should help clear up you misunderstanding of what was being predicted in the 70s, and where the limitations of the science and research lay. I'd note that the attitude of 'we got it wrong* 20 years ago, hence can never be right' is one that flies in the face of both common sense and scientific endeavour.
I read them. They clarified some things, but my point is still valid. If we were wrong before, we should take care that we are not wrong now.
I think you misunderstand the issue; the earth will survive, humanity will - already is - be put under great pressure to survive. Not in our lifetimes, yes, but if we don't act to counteract something which there is already very strong scientific evidence for then we will have pushed ourselves past a point of no return. Every climatological assessment over the last decade or so has pointed to increasing, not decreasing change. We're already seeing record droughts in Africa - just because it doesn't touch you or my cosy little industrialized nation doesn't mean people aren't suffering, and it doesn't mean we can't sit on our arse waiting for the responsibility to pass onto the next generation - because there is a great harm in waiting 20 years.
I don't believe -- and neither do a significant number of scientists -- that we are approaching a point of no return, nor that the climate change we're experiencing is particularly remarkable. The earth undergoes a number of major temperature shifts, interspersed with a number of minor temperature shifts. If we're in a shift right now, it's a minor one. Human influence is irrelevant. We can't accelerate the change, and neither can we decelerate it. What we can do is deal with it as it comes. If there is a drought in Africa, then let's bring water to Africa. Let's not spin our wheels trying to move mountains.
And the whole 'sit back and be doomed' is simply an idiotic statement to make. I expect better from you.
You're misinterpreting my comments again. I said that there is no need to take action right now, at this very point in time. If we have 100 years to wait, we can afford to take a little time to study the phenomena more. If we're already past the point of no return, then there's no point in doing anything anyway. My point was that, whichever you believe, there is no need to take action immediately.
It was the executive summary of the IPCC report.
Indeed. What reputable scientific body releases their conclusions first, then waits three months to release the data that backs it up?
Try http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/02_02_07_climatereport.pdf if you want to look at it, you'll find it hard to misinterpret the likes of "warming of the climate system is now unequivocal" and the section of 'discernable human influences' on page 8.
If you want to look at the scientific reports, a report published on the eve of the IPCC report in Science stated that the IPCC was underestimating climate change and being too conservative in its conclusion.
Actually, previous IPCC reports have committed significant statistical errors:
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=12088
By how much did the IPCC overestimate the likely economic growth of poorer nations over the next century? For poorer nations as a whole to catch wealthier nations in economic output this century would require that average incomes on the entire continent of Asia increase over the next 100 years by a factor of 70 to 1 for the IPCC’s least-warming scenario, and 140 to 1 for its most-warming scenario.
Such dramatic economic growth by even a single country--let alone an entire continent--would be unprecedented, notes Castles. Examining growth rates in wealthier countries during their most dynamic periods of economic growth, Castles points out that “average real incomes in the United States increased by a factor of perhaps 5 to 1 in the nineteenth century, and average real incomes in Japan increased by a factor of almost 20 to 1 in the twentieth century.”
A second flaw in the IPCC story lines, according to Castles, is an underlying assumption that the greenhouse gas intensity per unit of global economic growth will remain as high as it is today. He documents that greenhouse gas intensity has been declining for quite some time.
“In Britain, the first developed country, average carbon dioxide emissions exceeded 2.5 tonnes of carbon per head of the population in 1880, before the motor age began. Now Britain produces at least five times the volume of goods and services per head as in 1880, but per capita emissions of carbon dioxide have not increased at all.” The carbon intensity per unit of economic production has fallen dramatically in Britain over the past 120 years.
Even before the statistical flaws in the IPCC assumptions were discovered, common sense should have dictated taking the projections with a grain of salt. The projected warming depended on numerous implausible and striking assumptions about the twenty-first century economic growth of developing nations.
For example, under even the most conservative story lines, the IPCC assumes that by the year 2100, per-capita GDP in the U.S. will be surpassed by the per-capita GDP of such countries as Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, North Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, and Argentina. The more extreme story lines assume that by the year 2100 U.S. per-capita GDP will fall behind even more disadvantaged nations than these.
This is from 2003. In 2005, a scientist resigned due to concerns over how the IPCC was being politicized and fudging data to conform to its expectations:
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html
...a scientist with an important role in the IPCC represented himself as a Lead Author for the IPCC has used that position to promulgate to the media and general public his own opinion that the busy 2004 hurricane season was caused by global warming, which is in direct opposition to research written in the field and is counter to conclusions in the TAR.
I personally cannot in good faith continue to contribute to a process that I view as both being motivated by pre-conceived agendas and being scientifically unsound. As the IPCC leadership has seen no wrong in Dr. Trenberth's actions and have retained him as a Lead Author for the AR4, I have decided to no longer participate in the IPCC AR4.
The 2007 summary report contains flaws as well:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007_02_01_archive.html
Where is the scientific work itself? As we have explained in IPCC AR4 (http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/01/ipcc-ar4.html), the climate scientists have improved the scientific method a little bit. In the past, scientists had to do their research before the implications for policymaking could have been derived from this research. It was very slow and inefficient. Who would like to wait for those slow scientists when all of us know from the media by now that the burning Earth is already evaporating?
Today, the vastly superior postmodern scientific method of the IPCC members allows them to publish the summary for policymakers first. As they told us (the precise quote can be found in the article under the IPCC AR4 link above), the technical justification - the scientific work itself - will be adjusted to agree with whatever conclusions for policymaking we hear today. The scientific report of the first working group will be released in May, more than 3 months into the future. We will have the opportunity to compare how it differs from the second-order draft linked in the previous sentence.
The error bars in their summary are smaller than before, including the error bars for their 2090-2099 predictions. Because the temperature and other quantities in 2090-2099 depend on many things that clearly can't be predicted - especially the scientific and technological breakthroughs of the 21st century - it is not hard to see that their 10% accuracy is completely unrealistic.
They don't seem to understand (or agree) that there exist various types of errors, especially systematic errors, and the statistical distribution of the outcomes of their computer game is just one source of the error among many.
Also, the report has changed some standards how to evaluate the confidence in science. Instead of 95% or 99% confidence intervals, they use 90% confidence. The probability that "A" (anthropogenic) belongs to "GW" (global warming) is 90%, the report effectively says: the verbal form of "more than 90%" is "very likely", according to a footnote. In all other branches of science, such a "high" confidence level would be viewed as a hint to start to consider a speculative hypothesis as a remote possibility: even the recent Higgs signal has a higher confidence. In climate science, 90% (calculated by not exceedingly transparent methods) is apparently enough to close the debate.
The procedures even state (http://www.ipcc.ch/about/app-a.pdf) that the data will be adjusted to conform to the summary!
Changes (other than grammatical or minor editorial changes) made after acceptance by the Working Group or the Panel shall be those necessary to ensure consistency with the Summary for Policymakers or the Overview Chapter.
More specific citations of statistical flaws:
Because the summary for policymakers is a Holy Scripture and the researchers now have 3 months to make the full report consistent, it is clear that they will have to change some rules of mathematics. Open the SPM (http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/WG1AR4_SPM_PlenaryApproved.pdf), go to the page 5 of 21 and you will find Table SPM-0 there. The fifth line claims to be the sum of the previous four contributions to the sea level rise. However, for example in the 1993-2003 column, it would require 0.16+0.077+0.21+0.21 to be equal to 0.28 instead of 0.657. Note that with the value 0.657, the predicted value would differ from the observed value by more than five observed sigmas.
Also, the sum of four terms seems to be 5-10 times more accurate than the error of the Antarctic contribution. What a miraculous way of adding things! An average climate scientist would fix these problems simply by adding some random zeros to the Greenland or Antarctic contribution, to obtain an agreement. However, you can't mess up with the summary, a Holy Scripture. So what must happen according to their rules is that the full report will prove that 0.16+0.077+0.21+0.21 = 0.28. I am sure that they will find some climate scientists if not mathematicians who will defend the consensus that this sum is different than your calculator would expect. I hope that many people will be looking forward to this new breakthrough in mathematics proving that the climate change is more catastrophic and the underlying science is more solid than anyone has ever anticipated.
Correct answer? Hint: the Antarctic contribution is actually significantly negative but it wouldn't sound too good to the policymakers.
Error via Sean Davis (sum) and Stuart Staniford (error margin), readers of RealClimate (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/02/the-ipcc-fourth-assessment-summary-for-policy-makers/). The sum-error was confirmed to be a bug by Stefan Rahmstorf.
Also, I'm guessing if I pointed out any source you'd find complaints. The IPCC, which considers hundreds of pieces of research, is 'political'. If I pick out an individual scientist, you'll invent some magic dissenter without any reference. If I point out an ecological group, they'll become political too. Anything, in reality, so you can avoid tackling the conclusions made on a scientific level.
Naturally, whichever source you or I cite, there will always be someone who disagrees with it. However, I hope you now realize that the IPCC report cannot be trusted as an informed scientific document.
Wikipedia?
Only because I had little time last night to do more than summarize. I have more time today.
The 1970 "Study of Critical Environmental Problems"[14] reported the possibility of warming from increased carbon dioxide, but no concerns about cooling, setting a lower bound on the beginning of interest in "global cooling".
You can examine that in more detail should you choose.
Noted.
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I remember - vaguely, may I add - a survey that shown a shocking number (granted, this would be any number >1, but I'm pretty sure it was a substantial number) of Senators actually believed in the/a Rapture
They're entitled to their belief.
and thus didn't care about the planet as God would gift a new one.
That's a false conclusion. The earth will be restored, yes, but in the meantime we have responsibility, as God's stewards of the planet, to take care of it. God is very harsh with stewards who treat their jobs with contempt.
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That doesn't mean they shouldn't be subject to regulation or not take responsibility for environmental damage caused by their business, same as any other. And somehow i doubt imposing anti-pollution legislation would destroy all these companies.
Imposing anti-pollution legislation is not a win-win scenario. Often, it causes more problems than it solves. For example, the Hummer is cheaper and leaves less of an energy footprint than most hybrids.
From Reason (http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20060719.shtml):
Spinella spent two years on the most comprehensive study to date – dubbed "Dust to Dust" -- collecting data on the energy necessary to plan, build, sell, drive and dispose of a car from the initial conception to scrappage. He even included in the study such minutia as plant-to-dealer fuel costs of each vehicle, employee driving distances, and electricity usage per pound of material. All this data was then boiled down to an "energy cost per mile" figure for each car (see here (http://cnwmr.com/nss-folder/automotiveenergy/) and here (http://thewatt.com/article-1070-nested-1-0.html)). Comparing this data, the study concludes that overall hybrids cost more in terms of overall energy consumed than comparable non-hybrid vehicles. But even more surprising, smaller hybrids' energy costs are greater than many large, non-hybrid SUVs.
For instance, the dust-to-dust energy cost of the bunny-sized Honda Civic hybrid is $3.238 per mile. This is quite a bit more than the $1.949 per mile that the elephantine Hummer costs. The energy cots of SUVs such as the Tahoe, Escalade, and Navigator are similarly far less than the Civic hybrid. As for Ford cars, a Ford Escape hybrid costs $3.2 per mile – about a third more than the regular Escape. But on the whole, ironically enough, the dust-to-dust costs of many of the Ford non-hybrids – Fusion, Milan, Zephyr – are not only lower than comparable Japanese hybrids – Prius, Accord -- but also non-hybrids – Seville, Civic.
...
As for Hummers, Spinella explains, the life of these cars averaged across various models is over 300,000 miles. By contrast, Prius' life – according to Toyota's own numbers – is 100,000 miles. Furthermore, Hummer is a far less sophisticated vehicle. Its engine obviously does not have an electric and gas component as a hybrid's does so it takes much less time and energy to manufacture. What's more, its main raw ingredient is low-cost steel, not the exotic light-weights that are exceedingly difficult to make – and dispose. But the biggest reason why a Hummer's energy use is so low is that it shares many components with other vehicles and therefore its design and development energy costs are spread across many cars.
Also, government regulations are negatively impacting car manufacturers. California, for example, requires that 10 percent of all vehicles sold after 2003 be zero-emissions vehicles, though it grants equivalency credits to partial-emissions vehicles like hybrids. Unfortunately, this has a serious impact on profitability -- Ford loses an estimated $2000 to $3000 for each hybrid it sells, because it has to sell below cost in order to entice customers who still prefer traditional cars.
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Its all about economies of scale...if Ford can build near zero emission cars in volume then cost goes down. Governments need to act so that there is as much R&D possible to make it happen so that the technology to do so is as cheap as possible too. Right now its a bad deal because Ford wants/has to do business in California which is a large economy but its still piecemeal. If everyone had to do it everywhere then it would hurt a bit at first but ultimately be better. The latest thing I read today was that with better ignition systems in cars you can do something called a 'microhybrid" which is a regular gasoline engine but with a shutoff at idle so that the engine is off when you're not using it and then when you need it...re ignition and away we go. Its already in some BMW's and its apparently fairly cheap to implement en masse. The trick is to get it so that the ignition is fast and imperceivable...which they feel will come soon. The savings on fuel economy are a few percent as I read...and every bit counts.
I'm a car guy...love cars...am a fan of people driving what is necessary. The auto industry has fantastic ideas but without incentives they tend not to do anything unless it makes them money in this fiscal year. Thats how things work. Laws and regulation can last long and is required to make these things happen in the first place. But already we're seeing how the Japanese automakers, with cars that have generally better efficiency (and sometimes power too) are winning over sales of American cars. Fuel economy is a factor. So the market is now finally driving the American auto makers to get a clue and work on some of these issues. And they have...not that many new SUV's announced. Lots of Crossovers...which have much better emissions standards (because they are technically cars and not trucks), better fuel economy, etc. The new Ford Fusion according to consumer reports is a huge surprise for quality/reliability and with good fuel economy too.
So there is some hope...stuff needs to be done instead of sticking our heads in the sand which is what was done 25 years ago. Tons of little things will add up...if we can get the carbon emissions down to a certain level then the environment can deal with the rest fairly handily from whats been written.
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You're misinterpreting my comments again. I said that there is no need to take action right now, at this very point in time. If we have 100 years to wait, we can afford to take a little time to study the phenomena more. If we're already past the point of no return, then there's no point in doing anything anyway. My point was that, whichever you believe, there is no need to take action immediately.
What if we're just on the brink of spilling over into death and destruction? Is there a need then?
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Of course it is. You don't have to be actually present with a time machine and a thermometer. You can measure the rate of growth of oceanic plants in temperature-sensitive areas. You can examine archeological evidence in mountain passes that were only accessible during warmer time periods. And so on.
Temperature proxies such as this aren't reliable indicators after more than 3-400 years (I believe this is referenced in a number of places I linked to).
Actually, two of those are inaccurate and one is incorrect. Global brightness is not the only solar factor contributing to climate change; the medieval warm period affected China in addition to Europe; and solar activity may have more of an effect than greenhouse gases.
Here is another interesting article:
Why are you taking an opinion piece from the Times, written by someone whose primary credential (editor of New Scientist) dates from 1966 (After which he quit), as if it is more authorative than the current working scientists on the IPCC review board? (who, if anything, are constrained to be conservative due to political pressures)
Moreso, I'd say a 90% chance of catastrophic environmental damage from a body which traditionally shies away from making such dire predictions, is itself indiciative of a need for action. Presumably you'd like the 100% 'earth totally ****ed' state before worrying yourself?
I would, though, note that no global warming prediction has ever predicted uniform rises in termperature, but global rises.
On the subject of said article; (might I add how much I love these statements provided without any sort of reference to back them up?)
"The early arrival of migrant birds in spring provides colourful evidence for a recent warming of the northern lands. But did anyone tell you that in east Antarctica the Adélie penguins and Cape petrels are turning up at their spring nesting sites around nine days later than they did 50 years ago? While sea-ice has diminished in the Arctic since 1978, it has grown by 8% in the Southern Ocean."
On the subject of Adelie penguins, studies indicate the delay is due to warming; http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0403_060403_penguins.html
"The researchers say the disappearing sea ice, combined with a longer sea-ice season, has interfered with the birds' breeding cycle by reducing the amount of krill and other prey available in early spring in Antarctica. Because Antarctica's seasons are opposite those in the Northern Hemisphere, spring on the icy continent begins in October."
(nice to see science presented without context)
Increased sea ice in the southern ocean does not contradict global warming - in fact, it's supported by it; http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2005/sea_ice.html
"Typically, warming of the climate leads to increased melting rates of sea ice cover and increased precipitation rates. However, in the Southern Ocean, with increased precipitation rates and deeper snow, the additional load of snow becomes so heavy that it pushes the Antarctic sea ice below sea level. This results in even more and even thicker sea ice when the snow refreezes as more ice. Therefore, the paper indicates that some climate processes, like warmer air temperatures increasing the amount of sea ice, may go against what we would normally believe would occur."
"Disdain for the sun goes with a failure by the self-appointed greenhouse experts to keep up with inconvenient discoveries about how the solar variations control the climate. The sun’s brightness may change too little to account for the big swings in the climate. But more than 10 years have passed since Henrik Svensmark in Copenhagen first pointed out a much more powerful mechanism.
He saw from compilations of weather satellite data that cloudiness varies according to how many atomic particles are coming in from exploded stars. More cosmic rays, more clouds. The sun’s magnetic field bats away many of the cosmic rays, and its intensification during the 20th century meant fewer cosmic rays, fewer clouds, and a warmer world. On the other hand the Little Ice Age was chilly because the lazy sun let in more cosmic rays, leaving the world cloudier and gloomier.
The only trouble with Svensmark’s idea — apart from its being politically incorrect — was that meteorologists denied that cosmic rays could be involved in cloud formation. After long delays in scraping together the funds for an experiment, Svensmark and his small team at the Danish National Space Center hit the jackpot in the summer of 2005.
In a box of air in the basement, they were able to show that electrons set free by cosmic rays coming through the ceiling stitched together droplets of sulphuric acid and water. These are the building blocks for cloud condensation. But journal after journal declined to publish their report; the discovery finally appeared in the Proceedings of the Royal Society late last year.
Firstly, I believe already mentioned this as a less significant contributor than greenhouse gas emissions. And of course this study; http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-09/ncfa-cis091106.php
I read them. They clarified some things, but my point is still valid. If we were wrong before, we should take care that we are not wrong now.
Evidently not, because you missed the whole point - the 'wrong' bits you spoke of were solely what was perpetuated by the media; not what the science said.
I don't believe -- and neither do a significant number of scientists -- that we are approaching a point of no return, nor that the climate change we're experiencing is particularly remarkable. The earth undergoes a number of major temperature shifts, interspersed with a number of minor temperature shifts. If we're in a shift right now, it's a minor one. Human influence is irrelevant. We can't accelerate the change, and neither can we decelerate it. What we can do is deal with it as it comes. If there is a drought in Africa, then let's bring water to Africa. Let's not spin our wheels trying to move mountains.
Back up that 'significant amount of scientists' argument. Also, the recorded trends show a clear and increasing warming of the climate.
You're misinterpreting my comments again. I said that there is no need to take action right now, at this very point in time. If we have 100 years to wait, we can afford to take a little time to study the phenomena more. If we're already past the point of no return, then there's no point in doing anything anyway. My point was that, whichever you believe, there is no need to take action immediately.
And what if we're right bloody next to the point of no return? - which is exactly what the scientists are warning.
Indeed. What reputable scientific body releases their conclusions first, then waits three months to release the data that backs it up?
Why not? Ever heard of an abstract?
Actually, previous IPCC reports have committed significant statistical errors:
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=12088
I can already note a significant error in that page - it totally ignores the emissions of nations outside europe and North America. And, insofar as I can tell, it cherrypicks data to make that point. There is absolutely no scientific debate that greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere have increased (280 ppm pre-industrial revolution to ~370ppm as of 2001)
That, and you're quoting a website run by an organization with an Exxon lobbyist and a General Motors executive on its board. Oh, and see this for a rebuttal to Castles - http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2006/01/27/castles-and-henderson-again/
Frankly....I'm bored. I've been reading all your stuff and it's biased, from unreliable media sources carrying an agenda and presented as absolute fact when a good 10 mins webhunting provides a rebuttal. As one last point, I'd note this quote from chris Landsea "We certainly see substantial warming in the ocean and atmosphere over the last several decades on the order of a degree Fahrenheit, and I have no doubt a portion of that, at least, is due to greenhouse warming. The question is whether we're seeing any real increases in the hurricane activity." He went on to say "with the Atlantic hurricanes in particular, they're due to changes both in the ocean as well as the atmosphere. Just changing the ocean where it's a little bit warmer isn't sufficient. ".
Oh, and re: the Hummer - reason.com is funded by the likes of ExxonMobil, BP Amoco, Americal Petroleum Institute, Daimler-Crystler, Ford, etc - scarcely a reliable source for information on which are polluting vehicles. And its source - Art Spinella, a president of a marketing company called CNW Marketing Research (which does lots of work for car companies). So that makes it 2 financially motivated, biased sites you've cited now. See why I'm tired?
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Frankly....I'm bored. I've been reading all your stuff and it's biased, from unreliable media sources carrying an agenda and presented as absolute fact when a good 10 mins webhunting provides a rebuttal. As one last point, I'd note this quote from chris Landsea "We certainly see substantial warming in the ocean and atmosphere over the last several decades on the order of a degree Fahrenheit, and I have no doubt a portion of that, at least, is due to greenhouse warming. The question is whether we're seeing any real increases in the hurricane activity." He went on to say "with the Atlantic hurricanes in particular, they're due to changes both in the ocean as well as the atmosphere. Just changing the ocean where it's a little bit warmer isn't sufficient. ".
Oh, and re: the Hummer - reason.com is funded by the likes of ExxonMobil, BP Amoco, Americal Petroleum Institute, Daimler-Crystler, Ford, etc - scarcely a reliable source for information on which are polluting vehicles. And its source - Art Spinella, a president of a marketing company called CNW Marketing Research (which does lots of work for car companies). So that makes it 2 financially motivated, biased sites you've cited now. See why I'm tired?
You seem very quick to point out that certain research is being funded by gas companies, but not so quick to point out that most of the scientific data linking greenhouse gases to climate change is funded by governments giving research grants to net a positive result on the connection and not to disprove it.
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Frankly....I'm bored. I've been reading all your stuff and it's biased, from unreliable media sources carrying an agenda and presented as absolute fact when a good 10 mins webhunting provides a rebuttal. As one last point, I'd note this quote from chris Landsea "We certainly see substantial warming in the ocean and atmosphere over the last several decades on the order of a degree Fahrenheit, and I have no doubt a portion of that, at least, is due to greenhouse warming. The question is whether we're seeing any real increases in the hurricane activity." He went on to say "with the Atlantic hurricanes in particular, they're due to changes both in the ocean as well as the atmosphere. Just changing the ocean where it's a little bit warmer isn't sufficient. ".
Oh, and re: the Hummer - reason.com is funded by the likes of ExxonMobil, BP Amoco, Americal Petroleum Institute, Daimler-Crystler, Ford, etc - scarcely a reliable source for information on which are polluting vehicles. And its source - Art Spinella, a president of a marketing company called CNW Marketing Research (which does lots of work for car companies). So that makes it 2 financially motivated, biased sites you've cited now. See why I'm tired?
You seem very quick to point out that certain research is being funded by gas companies, but not so quick to point out that most of the scientific data linking greenhouse gases to climate change is funded by governments giving research grants to net a positive result on the connection and not to disprove it.
Can you prove or evidence that statement?
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Of course it is. You don't have to be actually present with a time machine and a thermometer. You can measure the rate of growth of oceanic plants in temperature-sensitive areas. You can examine archeological evidence in mountain passes that were only accessible during warmer time periods. And so on.
Temperature proxies such as this aren't reliable indicators after more than 3-400 years (I believe this is referenced in a number of places I linked to).
That's a rather strange argument, because that implies we can't use them as reliable indicators about global warming either. Here we go with the double standard again.
Why are you taking an opinion piece from the Times, written by someone whose primary credential (editor of New Scientist) dates from 1966 (After which he quit), as if it is more authorative than the current working scientists on the IPCC review board?
I'm not basing my argument on his article alone. I'm using his article as one of many individual opinions that, collectively, cast significant doubt on the popular political view of global warming as typified by the IPCC review board.
This man is a scientist, who is much better acquainted with the scientific establishment than you or I, and who knows how to read scientific documents. He is an excellent authority. There are many other authorities like him who share his opinion.
Moreso, I'd say a 90% chance of catastrophic environmental damage from a body which traditionally shies away from making such dire predictions, is itself indiciative of a need for action. Presumably you'd like the 100% 'earth totally ****ed' state before worrying yourself?
You're misinterpreting things. Again. The 90% figure is used to match patterns with other patterns. If two patterns differ by 10%, that's a significant statistical anomaly which implies that other models may be better fits.
I would, though, note that no global warming prediction has ever predicted uniform rises in termperature, but global rises.
The key claim, though is whether this is part of a regular cycle or not. More specifically, whether it is caused by humans or not.
On the subject of said article; (might I add how much I love these statements provided without any sort of reference to back them up?)
"The early arrival of migrant birds in spring provides colourful evidence for a recent warming of the northern lands. But did anyone tell you that in east Antarctica the Adélie penguins and Cape petrels are turning up at their spring nesting sites around nine days later than they did 50 years ago? While sea-ice has diminished in the Arctic since 1978, it has grown by 8% in the Southern Ocean."
On the subject of Adelie penguins, studies indicate the delay is due to warming; http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0403_060403_penguins.html
So migrant birds nesting earlier supports global warming, and Adelie penguins nesting later also supports global warming? I'm sorry, but that reeks of BS.
Increased sea ice in the southern ocean does not contradict global warming - in fact, it's supported by it; http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2005/sea_ice.html
"Typically, warming of the climate leads to increased melting rates of sea ice cover and increased precipitation rates. However, in the Southern Ocean, with increased precipitation rates and deeper snow, the additional load of snow becomes so heavy that it pushes the Antarctic sea ice below sea level. This results in even more and even thicker sea ice when the snow refreezes as more ice. Therefore, the paper indicates that some climate processes, like warmer air temperatures increasing the amount of sea ice, may go against what we would normally believe would occur."
So the proposed process is that warming leads to increased precipitation which leads to more sea ice. The problem is that Antarctica isn't warming, it's cooling.
http://www.cgfi.org/materials/articles/2002/feb_6_02.htm
According to the Nature paper on Antarctic cooling, “Climate models generally predict amplified warming in the Polar Regions, as observed in Antarctica’s peninsula region over the second half of the 20th century.” However, the researchers found “Antarctic meteorological data demonstrates a new cooling on the Antarctic continent between 1966 and 2000, particularly during summer and autumn.” The researchers say that the McMurdo Dry Valleys, for example, have cooled about 0.7 degrees Celsius per decade during this period.
And it's not just Antarctica. Greenland -- which is in the northern hemisphere, if you weren't aware -- is also cooling:
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2006/11/17/cooling-the-debate-a-longer-record-of-greenland-air-temperature/
The extended surface air temperature record was constructed and analyzed by a group of researchers from the University of Copenhagen (Denmark), and the aforementioned CRU (United Kingdom) and DMI (Denmark) (Vinther et al. 2006). In satisfying a major priority of the work, the temperature record clearly verifies ice core records for Greenland. A second priority of contextualizing the recent climate of Greenland has resulted in further complication of the global warming debate. As the popularized side of the debate has led us to expect, the authors found that the coldest year (1863) and the coldest decade (1810s) are early in the record, well before the ballyhooed warming of the 20th century. Problematic from a climate change standpoint is the fact that the two distinct cold periods that made the 1810s the coldest decade followed an 1809 “unidentified” volcanic eruption and the eruption of Tambora in 1815 – unusual geologic events that defined the climate. However, of greater importance is the fact that the researchers found the warmest year on record to be 1941, while the 1930s and 1940s are the warmest decades on record. This represents very bad news for climate change alarmists, since the warmest period was NOT the last quarter of the 20th century. In fact, the last two decades of the 20th century (1981-1990 and 1991-2000) were colder across the study area than any of the previous six decades, dating back to the 1900s and 1910s (Table 1). When examining the instrumental records of the stations it is apparent that no net warming has occurred since the warm period of the 1930s and 1940s (Figure 1).
"Disdain for the sun goes with a failure by the self-appointed greenhouse experts to keep up with inconvenient discoveries about how the solar variations control the climate. The sun’s brightness may change too little to account for the big swings in the climate. But more than 10 years have passed since Henrik Svensmark in Copenhagen first pointed out a much more powerful mechanism.
..."
Firstly, I believe already mentioned this as a less significant contributor than greenhouse gas emissions.
And my point was that there are studies that suggest that they are more significant contributors than greenhouse gas emissions.
Back up that 'significant amount of scientists' argument.
Anyone can do that fairly easy by looking up the list (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming) on Wikipedia.
Also, the recorded trends show a clear and increasing warming of the climate.
Recorded trends are inconclusive.
http://friendsofscience.org/index.php?ide=4
Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the last three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term rate of increase in global temperatures. Average ground station readings do show a mild warming of 0.6 to 0.8C over the last 100 years, which is well within the natural variations recorded in the last millennium. The ground station network suffers from an uneven distribution across the globe; the stations are preferentially located in growing urban and industrial areas ("heat islands"), which show substantially higher readings than adjacent rural areas ("land use effects").
There has been no catastrophic warming recorded.
You're misinterpreting my comments again. I said that there is no need to take action right now, at this very point in time. If we have 100 years to wait, we can afford to take a little time to study the phenomena more. If we're already past the point of no return, then there's no point in doing anything anyway. My point was that, whichever you believe, there is no need to take action immediately.
And what if we're right bloody next to the point of no return? - which is exactly what the scientists are warning.
We're not. The earth was much hotter at the time of the dinosaurs and life got along just fine. There's no imminent catastrophe. You said yourself you don't believe it's imminent ("not this century, probably, but in time for our grandchildren").
Indeed. What reputable scientific body releases their conclusions first, then waits three months to release the data that backs it up?
Why not? Ever heard of an abstract?
This is far from an abstract. It is a summary for policy makers. Meaning that it is meant to be relied upon in order to set public policy. For that, relying on conclusions without data to back it up is plainly irresponsible.
Actually, previous IPCC reports have committed significant statistical errors:
http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=12088
I can already note a significant error in that page - it totally ignores the emissions of nations outside europe and North America.
So, North Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, and Argentina are now located in Europe and North America?
It seems to me that by accusing me of not reading your articles, you're attempting to conceal the very opposite -- that you're not reading my articles.
There is absolutely no scientific debate that greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere have increased (280 ppm pre-industrial revolution to ~370ppm as of 2001)
You're confusing data with conclusions. If by greenhouse gases you mean carbon dioxide and other industrial pollutants, that's rather evident. Where the disagreement appears is when scientists attempt to draw conclusions from that data.
That, and you're quoting a website run by an organization with an Exxon lobbyist and a General Motors executive on its board.
And you're quoting a document published by an organization with global warming advocates on its board. Good thing we both know how to determine sources.
Oh, and see this for a rebuttal to Castles - http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2006/01/27/castles-and-henderson-again/
And Castles provided his own rebuttal (http://johnquiggin.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/01/Castles.pdf) to that.
Frankly....I'm bored. I've been reading all your stuff and it's biased, from unreliable media sources carrying an agenda and presented as absolute fact when a good 10 mins webhunting provides a rebuttal.
Projecting, are we?
As one last point, I'd note this quote from chris Landsea "We certainly see substantial warming in the ocean and atmosphere over the last several decades on the order of a degree Fahrenheit, and I have no doubt a portion of that, at least, is due to greenhouse warming. The question is whether we're seeing any real increases in the hurricane activity." He went on to say "with the Atlantic hurricanes in particular, they're due to changes both in the ocean as well as the atmosphere. Just changing the ocean where it's a little bit warmer isn't sufficient. ".
He's presenting a balanced viewpoint. He sees warming, but doubts that it has significant effect on the weather. That should indicate that he's a reputable source. His primary concern is the politics and procedures of the IPCC.
Oh, and re: the Hummer - reason.com is funded by the likes of ExxonMobil, BP Amoco, Americal Petroleum Institute, Daimler-Crystler, Ford, etc - scarcely a reliable source for information on which are polluting vehicles. And its source - Art Spinella, a president of a marketing company called CNW Marketing Research (which does lots of work for car companies). So that makes it 2 financially motivated, biased sites you've cited now. See why I'm tired?
Who else is going to make a serious effort to refute the global warming evangelists' claims? Global warming advocates have repeatedly and consistently demonstrated their willingness to fudge scientific data and claim consensus where none exists. They're certainly not going to want to reveal the flaws behind their own reasoning.
One final point. The reliability of a study is determined by the methods and practices they use. Not by their point of view. A biased agency is capable of performing a balanced study, but an unbalanced study is worthless whether it comes from a biased or unbiased source.
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Goober, if you're going to keep ignoring or misunderstanding the sources I cite, and posting biased sources who derive significant funding from interest groups from mass industry (Friends of Science receives significant funding from the oil lobby and is effectively an anti-Kyoto lobbyist group; http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Friends_of_Science), I don't see any point in engaging with you seriously. The very issue of that link bringing up the 1940-70 period as 'disproof' shows it is bunkum.
The overwhelming majority of climatologists are very clear on this, and throwing away a piece of global consensus work like the IPCC report is simply narrowminded selfishness.
Oh, and the heartlands link cited only greenhouse gase levels in europe. Another thing is that the 'tipping point' of irreversable change is imminent (in terms of requiring urgent action), which you seemingly failed to understand - the basic concern of global warming is not of mankind artificially warming the earth into a new warming period, but of mankinds contribution 'artificially' reaching the point where it starts the feedback cycle that forms these warming/cooling periods (already evidence by the rate of change in the global mean). It's really a very basic principle :sigh:
Moreso, Landsea was expressing doubt of the role in warming on hurricane activity - not commenting on any role on the weather, and for you to stretch it out to mean as wide a conclusion as that is really very misleading.
Oh, and finally, I believe I already posted a link and quote explaining how global warming can lead to localized cooling at the artic.
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The overwhelming majority of climatologists are very clear on this, and throwing away a piece of global consensus work like the IPCC report is simply narrowminded selfishness.
THERE IS NO SCIENCE IN CONSENSUS
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The overwhelming majority of climatologists are very clear on this, and throwing away a piece of global consensus work like the IPCC report is simply narrowminded selfishness.
THERE IS NO SCIENCE IN CONSENSUS
What the hell do you think peer review is? The very essence of science is reaching a consensus, if not on absolutes, on the most likely conclusion.
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Goob and DeepSpace9er, I'm very disappointed of what you two posted. Who old are you?
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Goober, if you're going to keep ignoring or misunderstanding the sources I cite
I have read every source you've linked to. And I read the IPCC summary. I don't pretend to be a climate scientist, but I do know how to read and analyze arguments. And I have seen that the global warming advocacy arguments are seriously flawed.
and posting biased sources who derive significant funding from interest groups from mass industry (Friends of Science receives significant funding from the oil lobby
Boo hoo. As if there aren't dozens of global warming interest groups funding their own studies on the other side.
The overwhelming majority of climatologists are very clear on this
Indeed? Over 17,000 scientists (http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm) signed a petition (http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p37.htm) to reject Kyoto on the grounds that human contribution to global warming cannot be verified. That's no insignificant number.
and throwing away a piece of global consensus work like the IPCC report
As I've shown, through numerous links from various sources, the IPCC report is flawed on both a statistical and political level. It would be irresponsible not to discard such a flawed document.
is simply narrowminded selfishness.
Or a desire to protect the truth from being stifled. Whatever floats your boat.
Oh, and the heartlands link cited only greenhouse gase levels in europe.
I've already addressed this.
Another thing is that the 'tipping point' of irreversable change is imminent (in terms of requiring urgent action), which you seemingly failed to understand - the basic concern of global warming is not of mankind artificially warming the earth into a new warming period, but of mankinds contribution 'artificially' reaching the point where it starts the feedback cycle that forms these warming/cooling periods (already evidence by the rate of change in the global mean). It's really a very basic principle :sigh:
So mankind is going to initiate a feedback cycle that will turn Earth into Venus? Hardly. The Earth was warm enough at the turn of the 1000s that Norse settlers were able to sustain an agricultural community in Greenland for nearly 500 years. We haven't warmed back up to that level yet.
In any case, the primary greenhouse gas is water vapor, not carbon dioxide or methane or any other industrial gas. There's no danger of setting off a runaway greenhouse effect through industry.
Moreso, Landsea was expressing doubt of the role in warming on hurricane activity - not commenting on any role on the weather, and for you to stretch it out to mean as wide a conclusion as that is really very misleading.
Landsea was expressing reservations about the political and unscientific nature of the IPCC. Again:
Because of Dr. Trenberth's pronouncements, the IPCC process on our assessment of these crucial extreme events in our climate system has been subverted and compromised, its neutrality lost. While no one can "tell" scientists what to say or not say (nor am I suggesting that), the IPCC did select Dr. Trenberth as a Lead Author and entrusted to him to carry out this duty in a non-biased, neutral point of view. When scientists hold press conferences and speak with the media, much care is needed not to reflect poorly upon the IPCC.
I personally cannot in good faith continue to contribute to a process that I view as both being motivated by pre-conceived agendas and being scientifically unsound.
If the IPCC had no qualms about so blatantly misrepresenting one scientist's conclusions, then there's no guarantee they will not equally misrepresent other conclusions.
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What the hell do you think peer review is? The very essence of science is reaching a consensus, if not on absolutes, on the most likely conclusion.
The very essence of science is challenging the common perception or 'consensus' to further understand. If not, then the world would still be flat.
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I think you're confusing Consensus with Dogma. For example, science quite easily proves the world is round, but how big is it? How much does it weigh? How far away is the nearest Star?
For all those questions, the answer everyone is taught is not as accurate as we are led to believe, many of them rely on Consensus of what is the most likely value attained from the research of several scientists.
Oh, and I may be wrong here, but from what I recall, apart from a few religions out in the Caribbean, most religions have never thought the world to be flat. There were a few tubes and other odd shapes out there, but very very few believed in totally flat. Just an interesting fact ;)
Edit : Double checked that, basically, most of the Western world has apparently accepted round since about 100 AD.
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DeepSpace9er: I would say, rather, that the essence of science is asking questions. Question what you don't know; question what you do know even more. If what you know is wrong, your questions will illuminate the way to the answer. If what you know is right, your questions will make the picture even clearer.
Flipside: Indeed. Eratosthenes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erastothenes_of_Cyrene) even measured the circumference of the Earth fairly accurately in 240 BC. :)
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Ok, got any proof that I'm wrong?
He frankly doesn't have to, Kosh. You made a claim, the burden of proof of it is on you.
Give me a couple of days until I can go back to my computer at work. Google isn't working for me on this one.
Indeed? Over 17,000 scientists signed a petition to reject Kyoto on the grounds that human contribution to global warming cannot be verified. That's no insignificant number
Which means nothing unless they are qualified in this particular field, and I'm not seeing any evidence that they are. I looked at the petition page and it does not tell you what fields these people are in.
I saw "An Inconvieniet Truth" at the DVD store today, so I'll check it out tonight.
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So mankind is going to initiate a feedback cycle that will turn Earth into Venus? Hardly. The Earth was warm enough at the turn of the 1000s that Norse settlers were able to sustain an agricultural community in Greenland for nearly 500 years. We haven't warmed back up to that level yet.
In any case, the primary greenhouse gas is water vapor, not carbon dioxide or methane or any other industrial gas. There's no danger of setting off a runaway greenhouse effect through industry.
Please stop deliberately misinterpreting my statements to create a strawman argument; you clearly have ****-all idea what I'm talking about.
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Why isn't it worth erring on the side of caution?
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Indeed, in fact, one of the main arguments for religion given to atheists is 'What if you're wrong?'.
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Why isn't it worth erring on the side of caution?
It's expensive.
Imagine it this way. There's an asteroid heading towards earth with a 90% chance of hitting us in 2100, and we can only stop it by diferting it's course with a highly expensive rocket before 2015. Given that there's a 10% chance the human race won't be wiped out in a cataclysmic explosion, isn't the sensible thing to do nothing and save our money? I mean, after all, all these astonomers and astrophysicists are all lefty-liberals scaremongering because the government(s) love giving money to scientists who forecast events requiring politically difficult and expensive actions.
...
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Instead, they will make the 'tough' choice that they deserve to get the nice deep bunker with years of food supplies, because, obviously, they are so deserving of preserving the best of humanity for the future....
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What the hell do you think peer review is? The very essence of science is reaching a consensus, if not on absolutes, on the most likely conclusion.
The very essence of science is challenging the common perception or 'consensus' to further understand. If not, then the world would still be flat.
As stated before, scientists try their hardest to disprove their own theories, then submit it to others for the same. If all these overly critical people think something, then that's got to count for something. The consensus can be wrong at times, granted. But most people on Earth think it revolves around the Sun. The crazy homeless man on your street thinks it revolves around Neptune. Just because he challenges consensus does not mean he's right.
Oh, and I may be wrong here, but from what I recall, apart from a few religions out in the Caribbean, most religions have never thought the world to be flat. There were a few tubes and other odd shapes out there, but very very few believed in totally flat. Just an interesting fact ;)
Edit : Double checked that, basically, most of the Western world has apparently accepted round since about 100 AD.
Actually, that's incorrect. Until the 1000s, the world was commonly thought to be banana-shaped.
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So migrant birds nesting earlier supports global warming, and Adelie penguins nesting later also supports global warming? I'm sorry, but that reeks of BS.
So what's your proposed hypothesis other than the easy "BS"? Climate is one of the key factors affecting bird nesting; the nesting habits of each bird species have evolved over the ages to be matched to the climate so as to ensure a better offspring survival rate. Changes in bird nesting are very much reactions forced by the change of climate.
Still wanna stick with "BS"?
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The very essence of science is challenging the common perception or 'consensus' to further nderstand. If not, then the world would still be flat.
No, the essence of science is understanding. If science only existed to challenge consensus, then we'd have a flat earth, then round earth, then star-shaped earth, then trapezoid earth........ if science is pointing in one way, then scientists don't disregard it because 'this must be challenged!', they merely keep investigating. Much like how gravity and evolution are proven (insofar as any theory can be) through continual work and refinement.
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No, the essence of science is understanding. If science only existed to challenge consensus, then we'd have a flat earth, then round earth, then star-shaped earth, then trapezoid earth........ if science is pointing in one way, then scientists don't disregard it because 'this must be challenged!', they merely keep investigating. Much like how gravity and evolution are proven (insofar as any theory can be) through continual work and refinement.
The difference is, that gravity is proven. Jumping out a window will show you that. I think you misunderstood my point. There is very little definite fact in global warming and what affects climate change beyond individual scientific theory. The point i was trying to make was the anyone who challenges this 'consensus' on man-made global warming ie. IPCC report, is demonized and discredited in the scientific community. Wasnt Copernicus demonized for his theory on heliocentrism (when geocentrism was the consensus) which proved to be right?
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Gravity was not proven until Newton did his little demonstration off the top of the Tower of Piza, all everyone thought Gravity was, was a tendency for things to head towards the ground because they were heavy, not because they were physically being pulled there by the Earth. After Newton did his little demonstration and the results were analysed, the consensus was that Newton had hit on something very very important.
Scientists aren't perfect, it took the US Geological society years to accept Tectonics because it hadn't been suggested by a Geologist, that was pretty much purely down to ego by the Geologists, but, once again, scientific consensus won out.
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No, the essence of science is understanding. If science only existed to challenge consensus, then we'd have a flat earth, then round earth, then star-shaped earth, then trapezoid earth........ if science is pointing in one way, then scientists don't disregard it because 'this must be challenged!', they merely keep investigating. Much like how gravity and evolution are proven (insofar as any theory can be) through continual work and refinement.
The difference is, that gravity is proven. Jumping out a window will show you that. I think you misunderstood my point. There is very little definite fact in global warming and what affects climate change beyond individual scientific theory. The point i was trying to make was the anyone who challenges this 'consensus' on man-made global warming ie. IPCC report, is demonized and discredited in the scientific community. Wasnt Copernicus demonized for his theory on heliocentrism (when geocentrism was the consensus) which proved to be right?
I think you misunderstand what science is. Gravity is not 'things fall'. It is 'why things fall'. I'd like you to cite an instance of demonization, though.
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Gravity was not proven until Newton did his little demonstration off the top of the Tower of Piza, all everyone thought Gravity was, was a tendency for things to head towards the ground because they were heavy, not because they were physically being pulled there by the Earth. After Newton did his little demonstration and the results were analysed, the consensus was that Newton had hit on something very very important.
Scientists aren't perfect, it took the US Geological society years to accept Tectonics because it hadn't been suggested by a Geologist, that was pretty much purely down to ego by the Geologists, but, once again, scientific consensus won out.
Erm...Surely you are refering to Galileu's experiments with spheres down slopes perhaps? The Tower of Piza stuff is just an urban myth.
Also, the current theory of gravity is not proven. The graviton is still to be found and it's non-union with quantum mechanics means that one of them (if not both) are in a way, wrong.
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Gravity was not proven until Newton did his little demonstration off the top of the Tower of Piza, all everyone thought Gravity was, was a tendency for things to head towards the ground because they were heavy, not because they were physically being pulled there by the Earth. After Newton did his little demonstration and the results were analysed, the consensus was that Newton had hit on something very very important.
Scientists aren't perfect, it took the US Geological society years to accept Tectonics because it hadn't been suggested by a Geologist, that was pretty much purely down to ego by the Geologists, but, once again, scientific consensus won out.
Erm...Surely you are refering to Galileu's experiments with spheres down slopes perhaps? The Tower of Piza stuff is just an urban myth.
Also, the current theory of gravity is not proven. The graviton is still to be found and it's non-union with quantum mechanics means that one of them (if not both) are in a way, wrong.
It is, however, as close to proven as you can define a scientific theory as being. Obviously the very nature of science means that no theory is ever marked off as completely known, but you can still say things like evolution, gravity etc are "proven" under that implcit caveat thanks to overwhelming evidence supporting them.
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Erm...Surely you are refering to Galileu's experiments with spheres down slopes perhaps? The Tower of Piza stuff is just an urban myth.
I had a suspicion it was Galileo, but regardless of method, the point still stands, it was done to prove to a body of scientists and thus create a consensus of the behaviour of bodies. And whilst Gravity is far more complex than the original experiments revealed, we would never even have suspected had it not been accepted in the first place.
The important part is that a great many scientific standards have only been accepted once consensus is reached among the scientific community, which usually involves taking the problem apart several times and putting it back together.
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Which means nothing unless they are qualified in this particular field, and I'm not seeing any evidence that they are. I looked at the petition page and it does not tell you what fields these people are in.
If you had followed both links in that sentence, not just the second, you would have seen a breakdown (http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm) of the scientists who signed it. Their names and specialties are both indicated.
Please stop deliberately misinterpreting my statements to create a strawman argument
How is this misinterpretation? The Earth has warmed in the past; the Earth has cooled in the past. The Earth was much warmer 1000 years ago than it is today, and no runaway greenhouse effect occured. What sort of catastrophe are you worried about?
Why isn't it worth erring on the side of caution?
It is always worth erring on the side of caution, if this were a typical scenario. But it's not -- it's a bunch of political demogogues hijacking science to increase governmental control. It's a political struggle, not a scientific one.
So what's your proposed hypothesis other than the easy "BS"?
I don't have one, because I'm not a climatologist. But as I said earlier, I know how to read the arguments of clientologists, and I have a not-too-shabby BS detector.
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I don't have one, because I'm not a climatologist. But as I said earlier, I know how to read the arguments of clientologists, and I have a not-too-shabby BS detector.
So in other words you don't really know what you are talking about too well, but are going to go with your "intuition"?
If you had followed both links in that sentence, not just the second, you would have seen a breakdown of the scientists who signed it. Their names and specialties are both indicated.
How do we know these people really are who they say they are?
The Earth was much warmer 1000 years ago than it is today,
Prove it. Show us some evidence from an organization not funded by the oil industry.
It is always worth erring on the side of caution, if this were a typical scenario. But it's not -- it's a bunch of political demogogues hijacking science to increase governmental control. It's a political struggle, not a scientific one.
This whole thing is part of an attack on science by the fundies. The real goal of this is to discredit science.
If this were a "political struggle", then why is it that many people in Europe accept global warming? And do you have any evidence that it is just "a bunch of political demogogues hijacking science"?
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It is always worth erring on the side of caution, if this were a typical scenario. But it's not -- it's a bunch of political demogogues hijacking science to increase governmental control. It's a political struggle, not a scientific one.
Governmental control of what? If the goverment accepts global warming, then there is pressure on the oil companies. If politicians use the issue as leverage to get the masses on their side, who cares? That's the same thing they've been doing forever! I think what you're saying is that politicians exaggerate the effects of global warming to get people scared and on their side, and that this exaggeration is totally separate from the scientists. But a vast number of scientists agree with this exaggeration. Some don't. Therein lies the real issue. The only reason that politicians are all over this is because that it's a very hot topic. It's semi-apocalyptic, for heaven's sake!
Al Gore knows that the vast majority of scientists believe global warming is caused by humans. I don't think he simply wanted to help people. Nobody ever simply wants to help people. But, as previously stated, just because it's a hot political topic doesn't mean the issue doesn't exist. The politicians aren't necessarily wrong, just as the scientific consensus doesn't necessarily have to be wrong. Sure, Copernicus challenged the world and got it right. But, for example, S. Warren Carey and a handful of other people thought (and still think) the Earth expanded over time. You believe in plate tectonics, right? S. Warren Carey didn't. S. Warren Carey was a minority. But that doesn't mean he's right.
And Kosh, present some real arguments.
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Kosh, if you're just going to act like an asshole, you can kindly take it somewhere else. Consider this a warning.
Governmental control of what? If the goverment accepts global warming, then there is pressure on the oil companies. If politicians use the issue as leverage to get the masses on their side, who cares? That's the same thing they've been doing forever! I think what you're saying is that politicians exaggerate the effects of global warming to get people scared and on their side, and that this exaggeration is totally separate from the scientists. But a vast number of scientists agree with this exaggeration. Some don't. Therein lies the real issue. The only reason that politicians are all over this is because that it's a very hot topic. It's semi-apocalyptic, for heaven's sake!
It's not apocalyptic, though, or even semi-apocalyptic. We're nowhere near the highest temperature the Earth has experienced. There is no such thing as an "ethically ideal" temperature anyway.
The problem with global warming is that it's politically correct to say that humans are behind it. If scientists want to continue to receive government funding, they need to find evidence to support this position. If they don't find evidence, their funding gets cut off.
The problem is, there's more evidence that humans aren't behind it, but no government want to fund that. So scientists have to find their funding from somewhere else, or go hungry.
As to why governments are interested in global warming: it's a means of control. It gives them an excuse to impose taxes (e.g. on pollution) and it allows them to pass regulations and create bureaucracies.
But, as previously stated, just because it's a hot political topic doesn't mean the issue doesn't exist. The politicians aren't necessarily wrong, just as the scientific consensus doesn't necessarily have to be wrong.
Agreed. But everything I've read suggests strongly that the politicians are making a much bigger deal out of this than they should. And when I read articles and documents that show significant disagreement between climatologists on what exactly is going on, I get very suspicious of the motives of people who are promoting a single exclusive interpretation.
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Actually, that's incorrect. Until the 1000s, the world was commonly thought to be banana-shaped.
Columbus also believed it was shaped like a pear... or breast... with the "Indies" at the teat.
Pretty different from the little kiddie books, eh?
...and we all know that the southern hemisphere is uninhabitable... far too hot. (this part is what educated people debated, as they did know the general shape and size from Greek mathematics and early experiments... and Columbus botched his math saying the world was smaller than it was known to be... let alone the wrong shape...)
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Please stop deliberately misinterpreting my statements to create a strawman argument
How is this misinterpretation? The Earth has warmed in the past; the Earth has cooled in the past. The Earth was much warmer 1000 years ago than it is today, and no runaway greenhouse effect occured. What sort of catastrophe are you worried about?
I don't see any point explaining myself or the fears global warming entails for the nth time, given that you've clearly been ignoring them thus far. Quite how you can claim to be a 'bs detector' without even knowing what the risk entailed by global warming is, is beyond me.
Also, you have absolutely no evidence for that 1000 year figure, given that temperature proxies beyond the 1600s or so are known to be unreliable and there is no basis for stating the MWP existed on a scale outside medieval europe. Strangely, I've pointed this out before - still not reading?
Why isn't it worth erring on the side of caution?
It is always worth erring on the side of caution, if this were a typical scenario. But it's not -- it's a bunch of political demogogues hijacking science to increase governmental control. It's a political struggle, not a scientific one.
Yes, because the US administration is sooooooooo interested in strenthening itself by hurting the major party political donors...... oh, wait, the other one. It's always struck me as utterly bizarre to attack global warming as 'political' when the most powerful economic - and hence political - groups in the world are the polluting industries. We have instances like a former Exxonv lobbyist, now White house aide watering down (http://www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/0,11319,1502486,00.html) climate reports, or the White House stifling discussion of the effects of climate change on polar bears (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/09/AR2007030901986.html), yet somehow we're expected to believe in some bizarre Michael-Chricton wet-dream of massively powerful environmentalists controlling the worlds' governments.
So what's your proposed hypothesis other than the easy "BS"?
I don't have one, because I'm not a climatologist. But as I said earlier, I know how to read the arguments of clientologists, and I have a not-too-shabby BS detector.
Then why do you quote links from paid & funded industrial lobby - dare I even say political - groups as if they were unbiased science? To me that's where the BS detector should be going PING PING PING PING, same as it does with other fundamentally biased groups like the Discovery Institute.
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"...temperature proxies beyond the 1600s or so are known to be unreliable..."
well now your side of the argument can't say the earth is hotter than it's been in a million years. :)
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"...temperature proxies beyond the 1600s or so are known to be unreliable..."
well now your side of the argument can't say the earth is hotter than it's been in a million years. :)
I don't believe it did say that....... the only claim is that it's hotter than it's ever been in reliable recorded history (i.e. until the proxies become unreliable).
The point is that the proxies used to claim a medieval warm period are simply not suitable for such a claim, because (for example) they are limited to the northern hemisphere. Things like global climate cycles are, I believe, based on a geological timescale of thousands and millions of years; the methods used for them aren't amenable to such a 'short term' period as, say, 1000 to 1600AD.
Although checking this graph (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:1000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png) (I know, I know - Wikipedia. It's sunday, I'm lazy) indicates that we're still in a stage of being hotter than the MWP which, AFAIK, has only even been confirmed as a european phenomenon.
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The problem with global warming is that it's politically correct to say that humans are behind it. If scientists want to continue to receive government funding, they need to find evidence to support this position. If they don't find evidence, their funding gets cut off.
Isn't it the other way around?
The problem is, there's more evidence that humans aren't behind it, but no government want to fund that. So scientists have to find their funding from somewhere else, or go hungry.
If such evidence exists I havn't seen it yet. I live in a small, clean town (a village by US terms). Or at least I used to. I remeber how it was 20 years ago and how it is now. My parents and grandparents remeber far further back.
And it's getting worse - not only the local pollution, but the climate itself - it's geting more extreeme and unpredictable.
While planetary cycles do exist, only a blind man could fail to see we're speeding it up drasticly.
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If such evidence exists I havn't seen it yet. I live in a small, clean town (a village by US terms). Or at least I used to. I remeber how it was 20 years ago and how it is now. My parents and grandparents remeber far further back.
And it's getting worse - not only the local pollution, but the climate itself - it's geting more extreeme and unpredictable.
While planetary cycles do exist, only a blind man could fail to see we're speeding it up drasticly.
First part: anecdotal evidence that doesnt hold much for proving the world is warming because it was warm last week at home.
Second part: Calling people blind in not believing in man made global warming is pretty much turning the whole movement into a religion, and that any scientist who disagrees with it is stupid, ignorant, and a 'blasphemer' of the religion.
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well, my biggest problem with either side claiming to have an answer is it simply is imposable at this point for us to have enough data to make a causality, or for that matter even a strong corelational argument, the earth is 4 billion years old, if humans have been impacting the environment in a significant way it wouldn't have started shooting up until the most recent 50 years, 50/4 billion is not a lot of data. about all we can say for certainty is that the earth is a bit warmer now than it has been on average for the last few thousand years. if you through in all the variables and ice ages and the fact that humans are more productive when the planet is warmer, I find it hard to accept that a strong causal relationship can be shown at this point.
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So what's your proposed hypothesis other than the easy "BS"?
I don't have one, because I'm not a climatologist. But as I said earlier, I know how to read the arguments of clientologists, and I have a not-too-shabby BS detector.
I am impressed by your not-too-shabby BS detector. May I guess? It's a gift, from a friend from high places?
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Be Nice :)
We all have BS detectors, problem is most people don't realise that it is self-tuned. For example, I consider sections of the Bible to trigger my 'BS Alert', but then, I am looking for things to trigger it. When it comes to science and religion, I think both sides could be accused on occasion of being so obsessed with minutae that they fail to see the bigger picture.
Maybe I'm one of a reducing few who still have faith in humanity itself, rather than in science or religion, I'm not sure, but in cases such as this, just as people attend church in the hope of redemption for their sins with only their own faith in what they believe to be right, I am perfectly prepared to apply the same conditions to Global Warming. Something is going on which is odd, the North Pole has melted, and the ice cores taken from them is estimated at 2 million years old.
Ice caps that have hung around for a couple of million years dont just melt. Something caused it. Was it man or natural causes? Does it matter? There are a number of techniques that man can use to reduce the number of damaging materials he puts into the atmosphere, even if those materials only have a small effect on the overall change, wouldn't the sensible thing be to take every precaution we can to delay the event until we can learn more of its nature and how to deal with it?
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Additionally, who here likes smog? (don't raise you hands all at once, now)
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First part: anecdotal evidence that doesnt hold much for proving the world is warming because it was warm last week at home.
Fisrt part - effects on nature that I can see for myself with my own two eyes.
It is easily deduced that humanity has a bad influence on the enviroment. Logic dictates that by increasing the pollution you're increasing the bad effects and sooner or later you'll reach some treshold where really bad things will start to happen.
What you're saying is that treshold hasn't been reached - I sugegst you look around and informed yourself.
B.t.w - where do you live if I may ask? In a big city?
Second part: Calling people blind in not believing in man made global warming is pretty much turning the whole movement into a religion, and that any scientist who disagrees with it is stupid, ignorant, and a 'blasphemer' of the religion.
WTF has religion to do with this?
Lemme ask you this:
If I were to put my hand on a puppy I would feel it's warm. If I'm to mesure it's temperature I'd know exactly how warm it is.
So if you were to say that the puppy is not warm and I say you must be blind or something - that somehow makes me religios fanatic? :wtf:
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well, my biggest problem with either side claiming to have an answer is it simply is imposable at this point for us to have enough data to make a causality, or for that matter even a strong corelational argument, the earth is 4 billion years old, if humans have been impacting the environment in a significant way it wouldn't have started shooting up until the most recent 50 years, 50/4 billion is not a lot of data. about all we can say for certainty is that the earth is a bit warmer now than it has been on average for the last few thousand years. if you through in all the variables and ice ages and the fact that humans are more productive when the planet is warmer, I find it hard to accept that a strong causal relationship can be shown at this point.
I'm not sure what your point is; there's pretty strong evidence of a rapid rise (the rise being the important part) in average temperature correlating to human industrial output (i.e. pollution). And I don't think it's really applicable to assume that humans would have affected the climate earlier, because you have to consider the increasing industrialization of the southern hemisphere; not just the likes of China and India (I know, not SH) but South America, the Middle East, Africa et al have begun to contribute significantly (in case you're wondering, the argument for 'western' nations taking action first is that we've been lead pollutors for a long time, and are relatively rich so can afford to make the 'clean' change, allowing this adaptation to be passed on to poorer nations - but that's not a call to let the likes of China off the hook, just one to set an example to them)
Granted, correlelation is not causality, but there's a lot of work been done on the mechanics how things like emissions can cause climatic change, and surely it doesn't take a Nobel prize to go "carbon (etc) emissions can result in warming + emissions are continually increasing + temperature is notably increasing and at an increasing rate => emissions are likely to be impacting the global temperature"? The other thing is, of course, that it's worth noting the temperature is reduced by pollution or atmospheric contrails (from planes), namely the 'global dimming' effect (which has been suggested as a cause for the 40s-60s dip, incidentally, although I don't know how strong the science is for that one) which has significantly reduced sunlight reaching the planets surface (I think by 22% in Israel over, ummm, the last 20 or so years). Of course, it's hard to judge global dimmings' effect; one attempt was after 9/11, which was the only time there was no flying over the US, and the temperature rose over 1C on average - I think the largest jump in over 30 years.
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Also, you have absolutely no evidence for that 1000 year figure, given that temperature proxies beyond the 1600s or so are known to be unreliable and there is no basis for stating the MWP existed on a scale outside medieval europe. Strangely, I've pointed this out before - still not reading?
As Bobboau said, the temperature proxies argument undermines your own case. :)
But you don't need temperature proxies to establish the 1000 year figure. Just history. Greenland was named for its verdant pastures, which Eric the Red and the Norse discovered when they settled there at around the year 1000. They stayed there for nearly 500 years until they were driven off by the Little Ice Age.
It's always struck me as utterly bizarre to attack global warming as 'political' when the most powerful economic - and hence political - groups in the world are the polluting industries.
Yes, the industries are major political forces. But they're only the reason why the regulations aren't being imposed faster. California had incredibly strict zero-emissions regulations until the automobile lobbies convinced them to loosen them. Kyoto had been signed under Clinton but was unsigned under Bush.
Then why do you quote links from paid & funded industrial lobby - dare I even say political - groups as if they were unbiased science? To me that's where the BS detector should be going PING PING PING PING, same as it does with other fundamentally biased groups like the Discovery Institute.
They're on the defensive, and typically groups on the defensive are more accurate because they're under more scrutiny. But since I've seen criticisms of the IPCC report as well, it's had for me to believe that no group is unbiased in this whole political environment.
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I've already explained the temperature difference and the danger of using the localised MWP as a global indicator. In my previous post, which you seem to have missed the point of :sigh:. I think I linked to it, too....
So why are regulations being imposed atall? Because, what you're saying is that the various governments of the world are strengthening their power....by pissing off the very groups that fund them? Hell, we've done ****-all to tackle emissions in the UK or US (I'd say the whole world, but I'd guess the Scandinavians are active in particular), in the former case even despite Kyoto. All national governments have really done is piecemail looks-good-does-****-all legislation so far, setting 20 year targets so the next guy in power has to worry about it. The prevailing attitude is one of selfishness and political expediency, and that extends to the population. What the **** is wrong with zero-emissions or alternative fuel-source cars, anyways? Why not push to have them regardless of global warming?
Also, "groups on the defensive are more accurate because they're under more scrutiny"? I can't see a way in which you can possibly justify that; I've already cited the Discovery Institute, which is a perfect example of a 'defensive' group which is horrifically inaccurate and simply doesn't give a **** as long as it can get people to believe the tosh it trots out. Are you seriously suggesting advertising - which is what a lobby group is, after all - is about accuracy?
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Why are Pluto, Mars, and other planets getting warmer?
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Why are Pluto, Mars, and other planets getting warmer?
Pluto (http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/pluto_puzzle_020816.html) is a little more complex than that, the atmosphere is cooling but the surface warming. Another more recent article (http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060103_pluto_cold.html) suggests Pluto is colder than expected.
It doesn't seem clear to me that Mars (http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mars_ice-age_031208.html) is warming, because 'clear' (dark) areas previously covered with ice still have frozen CO2 (hence the darkness). AFAICT not enough is known about the Martian climate (http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/mars_snow_011206-1.html) to say what's going on; I don't think it's even known how tectonically active it is. Apparently it's been argued, though, (because I can guess at least one of the other arguments going on in someones head ;) ) that climatic change on Mars can be considered evidence for ways humans can affect Earths' climate - namely that if climatic change on Mars is being caused (exponentially/reinfocing..er..ly) by the evaporation of CO2 into the atmosphere, then it's also evidence that 'artificial' CO2 output here would affect our climate.
what other planets?
EDIT; oh, back on the subject of yon documentary; http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/climate_change/article2355956.ece
See http://www.badscience.net/?p=386 for print scans with graphs. This also mentions the flaws within MWP and sunspot arguments.
EDIT2; oh yes, and on the subject of this documentary and debate, let's see an email chain from when someone sent a critique to Martin Durkin (the documentary maker) pointing out his error - http://ocean.mit.edu/%7Ecwunsch/papersonline/durkinemails.htm (I'll quote it - Durkins' response is in bold)
-----Original Message----- From: Armand Leroi [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 09 March 2007 02:38 To: Martin Durkin; [email protected] Cc: [email protected]; [email protected] Subject: The Global Warming Swindle
Dear Martin,
I thought that your programme made some good points (the politics of the IPCC) and some bad points (anthropogenic global warming is a conspiracy to keep Africa underdeveloped). But what fascinated me were your scientific claims, in particular, your display of Friis-Christensen's time-series correlations between solar activity and terrestrial temperatures since 1860. The correlation was, indeed, amazing -- the two variables track each other perfectly! Maybe you're right: maybe it's all just the sun.
So, I looked up the paper. It was published in 1991 -- in SCIENCE -- and you can't get better than that. ( SCIENCE 254: 698-700). So looked to see who had cited it -- and promptly came across a series of papers by Peter Laut who argues that Friis-Christensen's data are wrong. And by that I mean bogus.
Now, I am no climate scientist -- but I can read these graphs; there's nothing complicated about them. And what Laut has to say is shocking and convincing (see attached summary article but there's also a much longer, and much more damning, technical article). He says that Friis-Christensen repeatedly engaged in "unacceptable handling of observational data". To put this bluntly: the data that you showed in your programme were wrong -- and may have been deliberately faked, for they were wrong in several different ways. And if you correct the data, the correlation in recent years goes away.
Fascinatingly, Laut points out that Friis-Christensen's data, far from having been suppressed, have received widespread media coverage (and they've been cited over 300 times in the scientific literature). Indeed, in 2001, Friis-Christensen and colleagues were the subject of a Danish TV doc in "The Climate Conflict", which presented them as an "ingenious mavericks who...now fight a scientific establishment represented by the IPCC." Gosh. Sounds familiar.
There is much more that could be said about your programme -- such as the gross caricature that it gave of a scientific community which, contra your film, continually debates the various causes of global warming -- but, as I said, I am not a climate scientist. But it does show -- what abundant experience has already taught me -- that, left to their own devices, TV producers simply cannot be trusted to tell the truth. I am very disappointed.
I am copying this to Lou Bolch. And to Simon Singh, Ben Goldacre, and Olivia Judson -- fellow connoisseurs of this sort of thing.
Best
Armand
-----Original Message----- From: Martin Durkin [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 09 March 2007 09:53 To: Armand Leroi; [email protected] Cc: [email protected]; [email protected] Subject: RE: The Global Warming Swindle
You're a big daft cock
-----Original Message----- From: Simon Singh [mailto: [email protected]] Sent: 09 March 2007 10:48 To: Martin Durkin Cc: [email protected]; 'Armand Leroi'; [email protected] Subject: RE: The Global Warming Swindle
Dear Martin,
I have not paid the same attention to your programme as Armand has done, but from what I did see it did indeed seeem to be an irresponsible piece of film-making. If you can send me a copy of the programme then I will examine it in more detail and give you a more considered response - my address is below - thanks.
I suspect that you will have upset many people (if Armand is right), so it would be great if you could engage in the debate rather just resorting to one line replies. That way we could figure out what went wrong/right and how do things better/even better in the future.
Best Regards, Simon. Ps. Armand, I think you missed Olivia Judson off your (cc) list.
----Original Message----- From: Martin Durkin [mailto:[email protected]]
Subject: RE: The Global Warming Swindle To: Simon Singh < [email protected], [email protected]
The BBC is now a force for bigotry and intolerance. Most of the temperature rise in the past 150 years happened before 1940. Most of the human CO2 happened in the latter part of the 20 century.
Since 1940 we have had four decades of cooling, three of warming, and the last decade when temperature has been doing nothing. The IPCC's own figures show the hottest year in the past ten was 1998, and the temp has been flat-lining now for five years. If it's greenhouse gas causing the warming the rate of warming should be higher in the troposphere than on the surface. The opposite is the case. The ice core data shows that temperature change causes the level of atmospheric CO2 to change - not the other way round.
Why have we not heard this in the hours and hours of **** programming on global warming shoved down our throats by the BBC?
Never mind an irresponsible bit of film-making. Go and **** yourself.
you can see some more info at http://ocean.mit.edu/%7Ecwunsch/
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Other planets: Jupiter, and Neptune's moon Triton.
Question: If weather models can't accurately predict even a few days in advance, how can they be relied upon to predict even longer periods into the future?
Also, Dr. Claude Allegre changes his mind: http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=2f4cc62e-5b0d-4b59-8705-fc28f14da388
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Because Weather Models are completely different from Environment models. We can't tell you where it's going to rain next, but by looking at each years rainfall, we can tell you whether the trend in rainfall is going up and down.
Oh, and...
Calling the arguments of those who see catastrophe in climate change "simplistic and obscuring the true dangers," Dr. Allegre especially despairs at "the greenhouse-gas fanatics whose proclamations consist in denouncing man's role on the climate without doing anything about it except organizing conferences and preparing protocols that become dead letters." The world would be better off, Dr. Allegre believes, if these "denouncers" became less political and more practical, by proposing practical solutions to head off the dangers they see, such as developing technologies to sequester C02. His dream, he says, is to see "ecology become the engine of economic development and not an artificial obstacle that creates fear."
That's not exactly a change of mind from what I read there, it's merely a warning that Global warming is a scientific problem and should be tackled as thus, not a political one which should be used to generate fear and panic. But he's not saying there's nothing to be worried about, he's effectively saying 'Get up off your arses and DO something!'.
As for Jupiter and Triton, measuring the temperature of planets halfway across the Solar System is hardly an exact art. Jupiter is a 'warm' planet, but a very turbulent one, we can only really tell the surface temperature at any one time. Triton is much the same, we really don't have accurate enough graphs to start making definitive comments on the matter.
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Other planets: Jupiter, and Neptune's moon Triton.
Question: If weather models can't accurately predict even a few days in advance, how can they be relied upon to predict even longer periods into the future?
Also, Dr. Claude Allegre changes his mind: http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=2f4cc62e-5b0d-4b59-8705-fc28f14da388
My understanding is that it isn't really analogous to compare short term local forecasting with long term weather modelling; AFAIK they are actually radically different prospects. Normally, IIRC, the long term climate models are tested by shoving the variables back to that of, say, 100 years ago and then ran forward - from what I've seen they're pretty accurate in doing so.
The thing about Jupiter is that it's a vast planet hit by a comet fairly recently, so i'm not sure it's a very good model for earth climatology.
Incidentally, apparently Mars warming is suggested to be due to Malkovitch Cycles, regular 'wobbles' in the tilt of the planets orbit that are believed to have led to similar ice/warm ages on Earth.
This page (http://www.livescience.com/environment/070312_solarsys_warming.html) has a little bit on it, anyways
In fact, scientists have alternative explanations for the anomalous warming on each of these other planetary bodies.
The warming on Triton, for example, could be the result of an extreme southern summer on the moon, a season that occurs every few hundred years, as well as possible changes in the makeup of surface ice that caused it to absorb more of the Sun’s heat.
Researchers credited Pluto’s warming to possible eruptive activity and a delayed thawing from its last close approach to the Sun in 1989.
And the recent storm activity on Jupiter is being blamed on a recurring climatic cycle that churns up material from the gas giant’s interior and lofts it to the surface, where it is heated by the Sun.
Reading the thing about Allegre is curious - for one thing, Kilimanjaro (http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003100/a003125/index.html) isn't gaining snow AFAIK (more recent report (http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=31&art_id=nw20070216094020966C957102), although Kilimanjaro is only a footnote)... it'd be nice to see some more direct quotes (apparently, his claim about the snows of Kilimanjaro was based on a piece of work covering glaciation over millions of years, and his other claim to support his position was based on a misunderstanding of what climate models predict for snowfall on the artic ice sheet). I've read that he actually hasn't published anything on climate change and perhaps isn't best qualified (supposedly qualified by a geologist), although I'd note the source wasn't the best (http://boards.historychannel.com/thread.jspa?threadID=700010352&tstart=45&mod=1173243321167). There's always a feeling of being a hypocritical bastard pointing this out for an eminent scientist, but it has been suggested elsewhere, and I guess it's up to you to consider when weighing his opinion (namely, retired scientist-turned-politician who hasn't published any work in climate change/climatology) - although it's likewise worth tempering that with his original position and saying that, yes, there have been non-climatologists (and indeed politicians or other media peeps) who have been involved in actively 'promoting' global warming without knowing the science themselves.
Anyways, like Flip said, it's hard to judge what he meant anyways without a full set of quotes, in context. I would agree that (mostly political) scaremongering about global warming has threatened to create a boy-who-cried-wolf effect; whilst I believe the scientific consensus is that the risk is we will relatively soon put the climate into a reinforcing heating phase, the impression people are given is of humanity raising the temperature all by itself (rather than 'skewing' natural changes into a heating phase), and that things like hurricanes can be directly approportionted (which is wrong; it's possible, plausible even, but it's only a hypothesis until research can be done). The risk is still huge - one that threatens the long term survival of humanity - but not the All life Will Die / 'Day after Tomorrow' style threat that is pushed. Y'know, like the difference between humanity being pushed to the brink of extinction (possible, and economic and social collapse is a real risk in the long term), and all life on earth being wiped out (not so likely).
(incidentally, on the '90%' thing earlier. The 90% example given in the quoted times article was a personal guess by the scientist involved, and retracted when he was unable to repeat his experiment - the 90% figure given in IPCC reports is based on the consensus of, I believe, about 450 scientists)
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Why are Pluto, Mars, and other planets getting warmer?
The Martians just hit their own industrial revolution, duh. :p
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So Triton, Pluto, Jupiter and Earth are all warming, but for four different reasons?
Measuring planets far away may be more difficult, but is there any difference in the techniques used to measure weather on Mars or Jupiter than on Earth?
Also, you mentioned a tipping point, a reinforced heating phase. Has such a thing ever happened before?
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So Triton, Pluto, Jupiter and Earth are all warming, but for four different reasons?
Measuring planets far away may be more difficult, but is there any difference in the techniques used to measure weather on Mars or Jupiter than on Earth?
Uh huh, I believe so. I think it's mainly infared radiation for the planets (but this is complicated with distance as stellar radiation can 'swamp' the signal), but for earth a number of measurements are used (such as ground-station thermometers). Apparently ground & satellite measurements show a marked difference on earth (the temperature change appears significantly 'colder' from space, some global warming skeptics cherry pick this as 'proof'). Annoyingly, it's somewhat difficult to find a good source to explain exactly what goes on, but methinks you'd be looking at a massive ground-station factor.
It's quite plausible you can have several planets warming at the same time for different reasons. For one thing, surely Pluto is one of the least likely planets to be affected by (as I think you're intimating) changes in solar activity (which AFAIK is in a cooler period than a few decades ago)? Also, for it to be something sun-related, every planet would surely need to be warming up? Finally, if Mars is - as I understand it - wobbling, then it's pretty likely to be down to a Malinkovich cycle (if that's the correct term to use). Also, vis-a-vis Triton, surely it'd also imply every one of Jupiters satellites warming too? Unless you imply theres a strong cooling trend on every non-warming planet/satellite observed, which is surely less likely than coincidental warming on, I dunno, 4?
Also, you mentioned a tipping point, a reinforced heating phase. Has such a thing ever happened before?
Yes; IIRC all climate cycles have this; specifically a point where the climatic change is such that it creates a reinforcing effect, for example melting frozen peat bogs holding methane gas, releasing carbon frozen in artic ice, etc. This - http://climatesci.colorado.edu/2005/09/30 - gives a bit more detail. It's a natural part (positive feedback) of the warming (and cooling) cycle process; it's just that we risk starting it 'artificially', i.e. kick starting a new ice age (an ice age because what happens is the heat eventually causes evapouration, then this blocks sunlight which allows more snow formation, etc, and eventually the whole planet cools).
Venus is an extreme example of a self-reinforcing heating phase going to far; AFAIK that's unlikely in this case, but you'd still see conditions not particularly comfortable for human habitation...
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Normally, IIRC, the long term climate models are tested by shoving the variables back to that of, say, 100 years ago and then ran forward - from what I've seen they're pretty accurate in doing so.
So it's possible to model what has already happened. When will this method allow us to do a reliable forecast?
but methinks you'd be looking at a massive ground-station factor.
How many ground stations are on Earth now?
For one thing, surely Pluto is one of the least likely planets to be affected by...changes in solar activity
Of course---it's further from the sun, but affected nonetheless.
(which AFAIK is in a cooler period than a few decades ago)?
I don't know, but if I google "Pluto warming" I find many articles which state otherwise.
On the self-reinforcing thing, I ask again, has such a thing ever been proved to happen before?
It's quite plausible you can have several planets warming at the same time for different reasons.
Possible yes, but isn't plausible a strong term? Occam's razor and all that.
Also, vis-a-vis Triton, surely it'd also imply every one of Jupiters satellites warming too?
Yes, but I don't know if the other satellites are being monitored or to what degree, so I can't say.
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http://www.astronomy.com/asy/default.aspx?c=a&id=3830
Gurwell believes this discrepancy is due to Pluto's surface being composed primarily of nitrogen ice while Charon's is mainly water ice. The small amount of sunlight reaching the planet converts nitrogen ice to gas but doesn't heat the surface. There isn't enough solar energy to melt the moon's water ice.
"The atmosphere, although thin, creates a buffer," Gurwell told Astronomy. "Energy vaporizing the nitrogen-ice surface makes for a colder temperature in what I call an 'anti-greenhouse effect.'"
So, oddly enough, it's another of these misunderstandings that seems to be happening on both sides. Pluto is not getting colder, it is merely colder than expected.
Edit : Although, in all fairness, they did recieve a shock later when they found out that it was, in fact, getting warmer...
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/pluto_warming_021009.html
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For one thing, surely Pluto is one of the least likely planets to be affected by...changes in solar activity
Of course---it's further from the sun, but affected nonetheless.
Ummm... inverse square law. The effect is quite... quite... minimal.
Also on the 'Jupiter is warming' keep in mind that Jupiter produces more heat and radiation than it receives from the sun.
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Also, remember that Pluto's orbit is quite unlike that of other planets. Hell, sometimes it's closer to the sun than Neptune is.
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ok, the thing with the other planets is, if they are getting warmer by a similar degree as the earth is getting warmer, then the cause of the earth's additional warmth is caused most likely by a change in the sun and human activity will have little effect on earth's climate change.
as of now I have seen no evidence to support this, and I bet there's only a very small amount of anecdotal evidence (prove me wrong), our understanding of other planet's climactic history is so much vastly worse than our understanding of earths that I can't see how it could be posable for someone to even suggest that any other planet is getting warmer or colder on any useful scale. hell we don't even have complete data for a full year for some planets.
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Well, I know for certain that our atmosphere isn't going through anywhere near the changes that Pluto's is.
Pluto's atmospheric pressure has tripled over the past 14 years, indicating a stark temperature rise, the researchers said. The change is likely a seasonal event, much as seasons on Earth change as the hemispheres alter their inclination to the Sun during the planet's annual orbit.
It could also be to do with where Charon is in orbit, I would suspect, something the size of Charon probably causes turmoil either tectonically or atmospherically to Pluto, not entirely dissimilar to the 'squeeze and stretch' effect that Jupiter has on Io.
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Bah, it's not like Pluto is actually a planet, so what's the fuss? ;)
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yeah, so like I said, Pluto is getting warmer than it's been in 150 years! because now it's spring time there :nervous:
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So it's possible to model what has already happened. When will this method allow us to do a reliable forecast?
Short term? I'd imagine 'never'. It's like, in layman terms (because I'm a layman :D), forecasting the result of a coin-toss. You can toss the coin a million times, and it'll give you a good idea of the frequency of heads vs tails (I'm assuming tiny imperfections in the coin make this a non-50/50 chance, incidentally, otherwise it's a daft analogy) over time. But it won't give you a reliable indicator of the next toss.
How many ground stations are on Earth now?
Not sure. A cursory check shows - for example - 62 automatic and 4 manned in Hong Kong, and 11,000 co-operative observers (I'm not sure exactly what this means; FYI each weather station has a 6-digit identifier, but I'm not sure if this applies internationally) in the US. Greenland has 18. I believe, though, it is a known problem that places like Africa have too few automatic weather stations (by about 200)
The recommended density of these stations is one every 3250 square miles (Africa is every 26000); they all get linked as part of the Global Climate Observing System (http://www.wmo.ch/web/gcos/whatisgcos.htm). This (http://dapper.pmel.noaa.gov/dchart/) page gives a pretty neat indication of their spread.
Of course---it's further from the sun, but affected nonetheless.
But how affected? I mean, what's the theoretical maximum?
I don't know, but if I google "Pluto warming" I find many articles which state otherwise.
Well, if I search for the converse what I find is that the surface is warming
On the self-reinforcing thing, I ask again, has such a thing ever been proved to happen before?
Modelled, yes; I believe things like the Permian extinction have been attributed to it (in that case volcanic emissions). If what you're asking is whether it can be lab duplicated, you'd need a whole planet methinks before you could be definitive. But they have done studies and AFAIK there is no dispute that the earth goes through cycles of positive-feedback climate change (warm-cool-warm-etc), the dispute is a) is it happening justnow and b) if so is it down to human activity.
Possible yes, but isn't plausible a strong term? Occam's razor and all that.
I'm not sure Occams razor applies unless it's the simplest possible solution, and I think to say the same factor was affecting every planet would not be the simplest solution given that you're talking about 4 disparate bodies, seperated by significant orbital distance (with other inbetween), with massively different geological (Mars might not even be molten core, and as for jupiter..) compositions, different orbits (Mars is apparently undergoing a periodical wobble), and different atmospheric conditions (for example, heavy CO2 in Mars).
Apparently for Jupiter it isn't warming globally, anyways, but experiencing a 'migration' where the equator is becoming hotter and the poles cooler.
Also, it's particularly relevant for Pluto, because Pluto is one 'planet' definately affected by the sun simply because it's in such an elliptical orbit that its distance changes; insofar as I can see that's the simplest explanation and indeed the astronomers (etc) one, that the response of Pluto to this changing distance is simply a wee bit more complicated than anticipated.
(also, as Flip noted, Plutos inclination towards the sun changes, so this could be a seasonal affect)
Yes, but I don't know if the other satellites are being monitored or to what degree, so I can't say.
Well, how likely do you think it is?
I'm assuming you're referring to solar radiance here affecting 'all' (well, 4 planets, one of which is undergoing a Malinkovich cycle and the other of which isn't warming globally but regionally) the planets. But the warming on earth isn't in tandem with solar radiance;
(http://www.mps.mpg.de/images/projekte/sun-climate/climate.gif)
(source; http://www.mps.mpg.de/en/)
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One thought that also occured to me about Pluto, since the surface is frozen nitrogen, and the cooling effect is by the evaporation of that draining away heat, is it possible that, as Pluto orbits in such a strange way, that as it moves further away it passes beyond the temperature band of the melting point of Nitrogen, and therefore the 'warming' and 'pressure' recorded are really more of a return to the outer-orbit norm?
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One thought that also occured to me about Pluto, since the surface is frozen nitrogen, and the cooling effect is by the evaporation of that draining away heat, is it possible that, as Pluto orbits in such a strange way, that as it moves further away it passes beyond the temperature band of the melting point of Nitrogen, and therefore the 'warming' and 'pressure' recorded are really more of a return to the outer-orbit norm?
I think that was one of the explanations I mentioned earlier, effectively a delayed reaction (due to the complexity of the interactions blah blah) to passing closer to the sun earlier. to be honest, I can't help but think that comparing climate changes between Earth, Mars, Pluto, Jupiter, etc is a bit of an apples and oranges case.
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Be Nice :)
We all have BS detectors, problem is most people don't realise that it is self-tuned. For example, I consider sections of the Bible to trigger my 'BS Alert', but then, I am looking for things to trigger it. When it comes to science and religion, I think both sides could be accused on occasion of being so obsessed with minutae that they fail to see the bigger picture.
Yes, sir :D *salut* (I did sound a bit mean)
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I kind of doubt that the nitrogen is sublimating just because Pluto gets closer to the sun. I mean, yes, it does have a highly eccentric orbit that will vary incident solar radiation intensity, but I would suspect it has more to do with axial tilt. Pluto's axis is tilted ~120 degrees from perpendicular to its orbital plane. With a tilt like that, at some point in its orbit one pole is going to be almost constantly under the sun's glare. Without day / night cycles to take in heat from the sun and release it at night (or a significant atmosphere to convect the heat away), the temperature will rise. The nitrogen will sublimate, and then you'll start getting more significant convective cooling.
Only catch is I haven't been able to find mention anywhere of where Pluto's axis is pointing right now relative to its orbit, and I kind of need to get back to work. Anyone want to check me on this?
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that the south pole of Pluto came out of shadow for the first time in 120 years in 1987, and extra nitrogen sublimated from a polar cap. It will take decades for the excess nitrogen to condense out of the atmosphere.
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Well there you go, then. I was looking more for an orbital chart, but that works just as well.
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has this been posted yet?
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/washington/20climate.html
just thought it was both interesting and relevant to this particular thread.
basic summary, a former white house expert, now an oil lobbyist, admitted to fudging figures in his speeches to various government groups, and might be taking some heat.
personally i think that people releasing a crapload of carbon into the atmosphere will change the climate for sure, but i dont feel like doing the kind of research needed to argue on your level.
have fun with this guys (come on deepspace9er, dont run away so easily)
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I thought that was quite old news, actually, or perhaps I'm thinking of another scandal along the same lines.
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But the warming on earth isn't in tandem with solar radiance;
(http://www.mps.mpg.de/images/projekte/sun-climate/climate.gif)
I don't think that graph makes your point very well. For 120 years there's a good correspondence, then for the last 25 it diverges but is now converging again. Unless you're saying that only the last 25 years counts. As a layman they look way more similar than dissimilar to me.
From http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/3434 (http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/3434):
(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/132/371632655_6037f3dee0.jpg)
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The lack of any correspondence in a period of exponential (EDIT; ok, not exponential but certain significant, and arguably exponential if we estimate the dimming effect of pollution etc upon global temperature) warming is surely enough? Also, note the divergence from 1880-1910 in particular and 1860-1880.
Without any source cited for the Antarctic / Greenland sunspot figures, I can only look at the Usoskin values. THis article - http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/08/did-the-sun-hit-record-highs-over-the-last-few-decades/ - discusses it a bit, and notes that Usokins values (also IIRC garnered from ice cores) do not match the tree-ring records (perhaps this is pretty indicative, that the graph doesn't appear to mention the tree ring method of measuring solar activity, or Solanki who did a combination work for estimating solar activity using multiple sources AFAIK);
"However, regardless of these uncertainties the conclusions by Usoskin et al. (2003) and Solanki et al. (2004) cannot be confirmed by the analysis of the 14C records (Muscheler et al., 2005). The 14C tree ring records indicate that today’s solar activity is high but not exceptional during the last 1000 years."
This is a graph of tree ring records from that page;
(http://www.realclimate.org/muscheler_14C.gif)
and a paper - http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/ccr/raimund/publications/Muscheler_et_al_Nature2005.pdf
One important point I think the article makes is that sunspots are only a proxy for solar activity; see the end quote
"Regardless of any discussion about solar irradiance in past centuries, the sunspot record and neutron monitor data (which can be compared with radionuclide records) show that solar activity has not increased since the 1950s and is therefore unlikely to be able to explain the recent warming."
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FYI, the whole "Hummer has a smaller energy footprint than a Prius over vehicle lifetime" argument is getting shredded at /.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/07/03/20/1858204.shtml (http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/07/03/20/1858204.shtml)
Perhaps not a reputable source for accurate information, but I confess to some feelings of vindication anyway. Especially seeing someone else (for once) espouse the idea that to get the true advantage a hybrid can offer, you need to completely decouple the combustion engine from the drive train. I felt like jumping up and shouting, "FINALLY! Someone else gets it!" You run an internal combustion engine strictly as a generator, it only has to run at one speed. The design can be optimized. Better still, you aren't limited to a piston-cylinder engine either. A turbine would be better still.
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