Global Warming? are humans to blame? [Archive]

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 10:40 AM

Ice cores hold threat of climate timebomb

http://www.theage.com.au/news/world/ice-cores-hold-threat-of-climate-timebomb/2006/09/05/1157222131704.html

John Von Radowitz, London
September 6, 2006

A CLIMATE change timebomb may be just 10 years away from detonating, according to the latest global warming evidence.

Data from a deep ice core drilled out of the Antarctic permafrost reveals a shocking rate of change in carbon dioxide concentrations. The core, stretching through layers dating back 800,000 years, contains tiny bubbles of ancient air that can be analysed.

Scientists who studied the samples found that they left no doubt as to the extent of the build-up of greenhouse gases. For most of the past 800,000 years, carbon dioxide levels had remained at between 180 and 300 parts per million (ppm) of air. Today they were at 380 ppm.

In the past, it had taken 1000 years for carbon dioxide to rise by 30 ppm during natural warming periods. According to the new measurements, the same level of increase has occurred in the past 17 years.

Isotopic tests confirmed the recent carbon dioxide had come from fossil fuel sources and must be due to human activity.

Eric Wolff, from the British Antarctic Survey, who presented the findings at the BA Festival of Science in Norwich, was alarmed by the rate of change.

"We really are in a situation where something's happening that we don't have any analogue for in our records. It's an experiment we don't know the result of," he said.

Many experts recognise a "tipping point" of 440 ppm of carbon dioxide, after which climate change starts to run out of control.

Although opinions differ, it was generally accepted that at some stage a "step change" is reached after which global warming accelerates exponentially, Dr Wolff said. According to the new evidence, the threshold may now be only a decade away.

"We could expect that tipping point to arrive in 10 years' time," he told the meeting at the University of East Anglia. The ice core also showed a doubling in concentration of methane.

And in a more serious vein:

http://tailrank.com/posts/562949953911152/Ice_cores_show_co2_buildup

A White House spokesperson said the core samples hated freedom and loved the terrorists, reiterating their stance that the cost to business to remediate co2 buildup would be excessive. When asked to further explain the relationship between climate change and terrorism, and how, say, businesses in Manhattan would benefit if the streets were underwater, the spokesperson stated the president is committed to bringing democracy to Antarctica despite those who would force our great corporations like ExxonMobil and Halliburton to not make bloated windfall profits.

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 10:50 AM

westlawn5554X

09-11-2006, 10:57 AM

Due to scarier film of weather haywire, scientist get more fund to buy toys.:D

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 10:57 AM

Due to scarier film of weather haywire, scientist get more fund to buy toys.:D
Yeah, that's exactly what I think, too.

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 11:06 AM

Stonebreaker, I think you need to go check some facts. Try this link for a summary: http://www.thehcf.org/emaila1.html

From the link:

c. Have global temperatures already risen?

Yes. 2005 was the hottest year ever in the 100 years of recording the earth’s surface temperature, according to NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Worse, 2005 was a year without the El Nino effect, which usually contributes to warmer years. The temperature has risen 1 degree Fahrenheit in the last 30 years alone.

A mere 3-degree increase in Earth’s prevailing temperature would make the planet warmer than at any time in the last 125,000 years.

westlawn5554X

09-11-2006, 11:14 AM

So........ are we dying? approx. 65 years to go would be fine... next gen problem?

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 11:16 AM

A whole lot of alarmism with absolutely no data to back it up.

I think that this quote should have been attributed to Fox News, or possibly CNN.

As for data, how about these? (http://www.thewe.cc/weplanet/news/air/co2_record_high_levels_in_the_atmosphere.htm)

The ice core was drilled from a thick area of ice on Antarctica known as Dome C. The core is nearly 3.2km long and reaches to a depth where air bubbles became trapped in ice that formed 800,000 years ago.

"It's from those air bubbles that we know for sure that carbon dioxide has increased by about 35 per cent in the past 200 years. Before that 200 years, which is when man's been influencing the atmosphere, it was pretty steady to within 5 per cent," Dr Wolff said.

The core shows that carbon dioxide was always between 180 parts per million (ppm) and 300 ppm during the 800,000 years. However, now it is 380 ppm. Methane was never higher than 750 parts per billion (ppb) in this timescale, but now it stands at 1,780 ppb.

I know, I know, you can come back with a White House quote to the contrary. And George never lies, does he?

BillyDoc

Frosty

09-11-2006, 11:17 AM

I read some where,--please dont ask where I cant remember, that at the turn of last century ie 1900 there was a lot of methane from animals. Horses were the transport of the day and in big cities around the world was horses manure,--apparantly it was every where and the streets stunk of it.
The plains of America had huge herds of Buffalo along with Africa having herds of--of everything-- unimaginable today.

Would it not seem logical to assume also that millions of years ago there would have been more rotting corpes and more manure. Not to mention the huge forests and swamps also in decay resulting in the fosil fuel we so crave for today.

All I am saying is methane isnt new to the planet. If methane is responsable for the hole in the ozone layer I dont think we can blame it on busted fridges.

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 11:20 AM

Hey Westlawn,

The timeline just keeps shrinking as more data comes in. The article above talks about ten years to the "tripping point" (which is when all Hell will probably break loose).

I have the advantage on you there, I think, because I'm already 63 years old and won't lose all that much time.

BillyDoc

westlawn5554X

09-11-2006, 11:26 AM

Very funny:D, I was ticking you guys into frienzi backing up the issue, OF COURSE I believe it. To profit from LNG gas under the layer seem to give off more CO2. The biggest producer is Russia and the rest of the world. There is alot of Fresh CO2 under our feet to be let loose into the OZONE anyway.:) Is it 20% LNG : 80%n CO2

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 11:35 AM

You're missing my point. It's very simple.

Exactly what does a rise in global temps do? None of the articles you guys fling at me really bothers to mention what a rise in global temps does.

I think the reason climatologists are so quiet on the effects of a rise in global temps is because they're making a mountain out of a molehill; a tempest in a teacup.

I keep seeing these "worst case scenarios" on TV and in print, yet if you read the entire article, somewhere down near the bottom they always qualify their rabble-rousing with "we really don't know what will happen".

Their logic is inconsistent, as well. Everyone blames global warming on greenhouse gasses. Therefore, global temps should be proportional to the ratio of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. Yet, refering back to the above article that mentions the past global warming events, I notice that it claims that while PAST global warming events were three times more severe than the current warming event, CO2 and CH4 concentrations are higher now. If global warming is due to greenhouse gasses, as they claim, then temps should be higher now, instead of in the past; yet, by their own data, this hasn't occurred. Why not?

westlawn5554X

09-11-2006, 11:36 AM

Where there is smoke there is fire..... Heard that somewhere:)

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 12:36 PM

BTW, if anyone's interested, here's an article published in a peer-reviewed journal, Environmental Science, showing the type of BS these climatologists are trying to pull. It details both problems with the sampling methods for prehistoric CO2 levels, and data 'cooking' by climatologists to make the data fit the global warming theory. http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 02:18 PM

Stonebreaker,

Interesting link, and there are many like it. It's easy to see why you would hold the opinion you do. But remember that our oil companies have been paying for this sort of “report” for many, many, years now . . . exactly because they fear that any reasonable response to the problem would cut into their profits. I think if you look a bit harder you will find that somewhat more prestigious scientists are unanimous in their opinion that global warming is happening, and that the result is going to be quite a disaster.

For example, the study reported about in the article I cited above originates from data published (on paper, not on line unfortunately) by the United Nations World Meteorological Organisation (WMO http://www.wmo.int/). These data, in turn, are based on work by the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA) which is described on their web page (http://www.esf.org/esf_article.php?activity=1&article=85&domain=3) like this:

EPICA is a multinational European project for deep ice core drilling in Antarctica. Its main objective is to obtain full documentation of the climatic and atmospheric record archived in Antarctic ice by drilling and analyzing two ice cores and comparing these with their Greenland counterparts. Evaluation of these records will provide information about the natural climate variability and mechanisms of rapid climatic changes during the last glacial epoch.

I know you would like to think that Professor Jaworowski is right, and all those other scientists are wrong . . . but it just could be the other way around and it might be a good idea to factor in the self interest mentioned above as well.

As to the effects of global warming for you personally, consider this. A bunch of ice now currently resides above sea level in Greenland and in Antarctica, the volume of which can be estimated within a certain accuracy by seismic soundings from the surface to determine the ground level. This has already been done. Similarly, the volume of the oceans can be determined fairly well. Get on Google Earth and take a look at Antarctica, and keep in mind that all that white stuff is two miles deep, above sea level! When the two volumes are added together and the area of land adjacent to the oceans is added in and it's respective topology considered it becomes evident that the sea level will rise roughly 180 feet when all that ice melts. This probably won't effect you much in Shiloh, but then again, maybe it will. I grew up in Missouri and I used to find sea-creature fossils all the time. Anyway, it sure will get wet down where I live, which is currently at the incredible altitude of 45 feet above sea level.

But wait, there's more.

The increase in volume of the oceans will certainly result in a decrease in the available land area on the planet. As I said, Missouri used to be sea-bed and may well be again. Just to the west of Missouri is a large plot of farm land called Kansas. A lot of your bread comes from there. Mine too. The point I am trying to make here is simply this: all that additional water surface will not only change the topology of the shore line rather drastically, but it will change weather patterns as well. As things now stand we barely feed the human population on this mud-ball by expending fossil fuels to pull plows and to make fertilizer, and that is in turn based on a somewhat predictable pattern to the weather. This predictability will go out the window, and so will a large number of our sources for that oil we spend so freely. The inevitable result will be starvation on a large scale.

But wait, theres more.

NEVER in the history of this planet have humans simply sat down and starved to death if there was any chance at all of stealing some food from someone else. Are you quite sure that your guns are bigger than your many, many, hungry neighbors? As the “carrying capacity” of the planet for humans drops back drastically there will be a period of very violent “civil unrest” as we sort out who lives, and who dies. This period is what scares me the most about the upcoming events.

Oh, and by the way, lest you think I am just some loony with strange ideas about the future, the above scenario was culled directly from a CIA (or DOD, I don't remember) report that was published last year. Google around and I bet you find it.

The part of this that really “breaks my stones” is that none of it needs to happen. It WILL happen though, because a bunch of greedy bastards have decided to just loot everything in sight and use their gains to defend themselves while the rest of us are simply tossed overboard. They keep their propaganda up to drag this looting out as long as possible. And our current government, working directly for our corporations, not us, will continue to defend this looting, and will do absolutely nothing to help you, or to help me. Depend on it. For it to be otherwise would require an educated public. Not much chance of that is there.

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 04:02 PM

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 04:18 PM

EPICA is a multinational European project for deep ice core drilling in Antarctica.

<SNIP>

As to the effects of global warming for you personally, consider this. A bunch of ice now currently resides above sea level in Greenland and in Antarctica....

BillyDoc
Considering that EPICA's own data show 4 global warming periods hotter than now over the last 450,000 years, based on Antarctic ice cores, I have to seriously doubt your assertion that Antarctica is going to melt.

Vega

09-11-2006, 04:43 PM

You're missing my point. It's very simple.

Exactly what does a rise in global temps do? None of the articles you guys fling at me really bothers to mention what a rise in global temps does.

Yes of course, there are even some guys that say that the Global warming is a good thing:

"Casual analysis of the economic effects of climate change demonstrates that most modern industries are relatively immune to weather. Climate affects principally agriculture, forestry, and fishing, which together constitute less than 2 percent of U.S. gros domestic product (GDP). …..

oil drilling in the northern seas and mining in the mountains might even benefit. Banking, insurance, medical services, retailing, education, and a variety of other services can prosper as well in warm climates ….
Inhabitants of the advanced industrial countries would scarcely notice a rise in worldwide temperatures. …A few services, such as tourism, may be susceptible to temperature or precipitation alterations: a
warmer climate …new tourist opportunities might develop in Alaska, northern Canada, and other locales at higher latitudes or upper elevations.

In many parts of the world, warmer weather should mean longer growing seasons. Should the world warm, the hotter climate would enhance evaporation from the seas, leading most probably to more precipitation worldwide. Moreover, the enrichment of the atmosphere with CO2 would fertilize plants and make for more vigorous growth. Agricultural economists studying the relationship of temperatures and CO2 to crop yields have found not only that a warmer climate would push up yields in Canada, Australia, Japan, northern
Russia, Finland, and Iceland but also that the added boost from enriched CO2 fertilization would enhance output by 17 percent ...."
http://www.cato.org/pubs/books/climate/climatepdf.html

Perhaps he should pollute more to accelerate the warming process.... after all summer is better than winter, isn't it?

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 05:07 PM

Stonebreaker, you must have one hell of a sense of humor!

The data you cite in the graph above are adjusted data all right . . . data that has been adjusted to eliminate errors such as are incurred when you use thermistor based measurement rather than glass thermometer measurements, or as you would incur if you changed your time of measurement from, say, midnight, to ten o'clock. You may have noticed that the title of the section you cite is: "Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures," and you may have noticed that one example given is: "the temperature data are adjusted for the time-of-observation bias (Karl, et al. 1986) which occurs when observing times are changed from midnight to some time earlier in the day." and another one was: "Temperature data at stations that have the Maximum/Minimum Temperature System (MMTS) are adjusted for the bias introduced when the liquid-in-glass thermometers were replaced with the MMTS (Quayle, et al. 1991)." and a bunch of others all of which cumulative adjustment resulted in the minimal differences in the graph you present above. To say that this was done to introduce bias is simply wrong. It was, in fact, done to eliminate bias!

You are definitely right about the GS-15s though. I used to work with a bunch of them, as a research scientist, and they are almost always political animals. And often not much else, I fear.

As for funding leading to bias, in most cases this is entirely bull ****. Funding from private sources like the oil companies, sure, but funding from NIH, or NSF, or one of the other public funding agencies? Not bloody likely! The reason is very simple: to get that money in the first place the scientist has to write a grant proposal describing what he wants it for and describing in detail his proposed research procedure, etc. That proposal will be reviewed by top experts in the field, and if they do not approve it, it is dead. If approved, once the research is done and submitted for publication it is again reviewed, and here you have to realize that scientific papers all have a "methods" section detailed enough to allow replication of any experiment or procedure (which is exactly why the "Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures" is where it is). If the scientist finds something "off the wall" you better believe that his peers will be all over him like white on rice! And with something as "controversial" as global warming, where some big bucks influences are trying everything they can to prevent genuine knowledge from becoming common, EVERYTHING is gone over with a fine tooth comb. Furthermore, if any scientist is found cheating on his data (and they always do get discovered if they try it, because someone will always attempt to replicate controversial findings) his career is dead, dead, and dead. This fact tends to keep them honest.

There is another less tangible reason most scientists are honest. They work long and very difficult hours for abysmal pay simply because they are curious. They want to KNOW THE TRUTH! It is simply knowing the truth that keeps them going more than anything else. I know. I've been there. The joy of discovery is way beyond all others. And a correlary to this is the fact that most scientists deeply despise anyone who would get between them and the truth with lies and such. So the next time you run into some professor in some obscure college who is working his ass off trying to do research and to teach (all for less than a plumber would make) . . . please don't acuse him of lying for funding. That man and his predecessors has made the intellectual breakthroughs that gave you the technology you enjoy today, and they all usually got nothing but a load of **** for their trouble. They really don't need yours as well.

BillyDoc

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 05:26 PM

Vega, you obviously don't live in Florida! It's been hot as hell here this summer. I'm looking forward to winter!

BillyDoc

Vega

09-11-2006, 06:23 PM

Vega, you obviously don't live in Florida! It's been hot as hell here this summer. I'm looking forward to winter!

BillyDoc

well Billy,I bet that Portugal is not a lot better in Summer.:D

BillyDoc

09-11-2006, 06:33 PM

You are so right! I had the pleasure of visiting Lisbon once in summer, and it was beautiful.

stonebreaker

09-11-2006, 07:00 PM

Bill,

Claiming one funding source leads to bias while another does not, without data to back up your assertion, does not compute. And anyway, Jaworowski didn't do any original research. He merely pointed out obvious biases and cherrypicking from data sets to get the desired results.

On the NOAA data, from an outside perspective, if there were 4 or 5 adjustments, I could accept it. But looking at the graph, I guestimate there are 30 or 40 datapoints between 1950 and 2000, all but 3 or 4 of which trend upwards. Siince one would normally expect the movement from instrument adjustments to be random, the fact that 90% of the data trends upwards strikes me as extremely unlikely.

On the subject of scientists' honesty: I've said it before, scientists are no more honest, nor are they more dishonest, than any other people. While I agree with you that they get into science because of curiosity, the fact is, once money gets involved, other pressures than scientific curiosity come into play.

I don't believe that scientists intentionally lie to get money. As you said, they wouldn't be scientists if they were that interested in getting paid. HOWEVER, many scientists are passionate about their chosen field. Just think about the revolutions that went on in the last century over Einsteinian physics vs. quantum theory. THAT's where the bias creeps in - many scientists believe passionately in their pet theories, and not all of them are willing to change based on experimental results - that Korean fellow who got busted earlier this year for falsifying his stem cell research, for example.

Another way for bias to be introduced is which research projects are chosen. If the big shots only choose research projects that have the potential to prove a desired outcome, and non that can actually DISprove said outcome, then you can introduce bias simply based on what research you do, and which scientists you pick to do it.

Look at what you yourself did just a couple of posts up. You said you were a research scientist, yet you made what to me were obviously false claims in order to try and scare me into changing my mind. Claims that, if you had bothered to think about them instead of shooting from the hip, you wouldn't have made because they are proveably false - the melting of the ice caps, for example.

Toot

09-12-2006, 01:59 AM

What I know of bias is this. It's all over the place. One that I have personally dealt with is the NHTSA's alcohol-related deaths stats.

In a nutshell, the NHTSA publishes a list of factors in motor-vehicle accidents. Always, near the top of the list is alcohol-related accidents.

How do they compute it? Well... let's say I have a beer and I am driving home and I stop at a train crossing. After being completely stopped for over 5 minutes, a completely sober driver comes up and rear-ends me, pushing me into the train and killing me. That's an alcohol-related fatality, according to the NHTSA.

Let's say I have a glass of wine with dinner, sleep for 7 hours, and then hop in my car to get some breakfast where I inadvertently kill a kid as he crosses the street. That, too, is an alcohol-related fatality according to the NHTSA.

Frankly, I rarely go more than 24 hours without a drink, and I rarely have more than 2 in 24 hours. As a result the odds are very high that if I ever kill anybody, it will be alcohol related according to the NHTSA. And the odds are also that I will be stone-cold sober when it happens as I don't drink and drive.

I hate to say it, but I don't trust anything that isn't given to me as raw data. Or, the more footnotes, the better.

Frosty

09-12-2006, 04:28 AM

25% of road accidents are caused by drunken drivers??

That does mean then that 75% of road accidents are caused by sober drivers.

Therfore it would appear from the statistics that you are less likely to have an accident when your drunk?

Dan S

09-12-2006, 04:30 AM

I hate to say it, but I don't trust anything that isn't given to me as raw data. Or, the more footnotes, the better.
I agree with you totally. I have a B.S. in physics, and did a significant amount of re-search work as an undergrad, and you would be amazed at how many PhD’s have minors in data cooking. From my personal experience, most didn’t do it for grant money; they did it because they all have massive egos.

A good quote
“Use your own brain that’s what its there for”

Poida

09-12-2006, 07:04 AM

Global warming is alchol related?

Frosty

09-12-2006, 07:46 AM

Could be!!!!!!---hic

westlawn5554X

09-12-2006, 07:58 AM

more warm weather means more cool beeeeerssss! Or just lit a few candle to surport global warming?

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 12:35 PM

This is just bullsh!t. The more I look into this, the more evidence comes to light that climatologists are intentionally misrepresenting the data. Were any of you aware that water vapor, NOT carbon dioxide, is the most abundant and most dominant greenhouse gas?

This paper (http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/UniqueKeyLookup/SHSU5BUM9T/$File/ghg_gwp.pdf) is on the EPA's website. Scroll down to page 5. You'll see a table of greenhouse gasses. Water vapor is NOT in this table. Yet, right underneath the table, where they introduce a description of each greenhouse gas and its role in the atmosphere, the first greenhouse gas listed is water vapor. Let me quote them: Water Vapor (H2O). Overall, the most abundant and dominant greenhouse gas is water vapor. The other thing that floors me is that they mention in the same paragraph that water vapor has a self-regulating effect - that is, a hotter atmosphere means more water vapor, but more water vapor results in more clouds, which tend to reflect and absorb solar radiation. Says so right there in the EPA's paper!

Then, if you scroll down to page 9, they make an assessment of the warming potential of each gas - GWP, or Global Warming Potential, they call it. Yet, despite admitting in that very paper that water vapor is the most dominant greenhouse gas, they don't include its GWP! It's complete bullsh!t! They actually have the balls to state, right before they present the table, that because it's difficult to assess the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, they're basically just going to ignore it! Holy crap! This isn't bias! They're outright lying!

The more I read about this, the more it appears to me that this whole thing is a crock, and the Kyoto Protocol is nothing more than an attempt by the third world countries to get an ecomonic leg up on the 1st world countries. Sheesh!

westlawn5554X

09-12-2006, 01:29 PM

Increase in climate mean more heat, heat mean unbalnce pressure, where the pressure go? We are now getting near the hot pot version of a paradise.

Topside of the planet change would lead to bottom of the earth also in swing. Just a possibility I guess.

Edit: Are we doin Hans77's homework? Where is his view and comment?:)

hansp77

09-12-2006, 02:10 PM

Ok stonebreaker,
I am going to try to be brief.
(no wei, you are not doing my homework, rather keeping me away from it!)

Yes I am aware that H2O is the most abundant greenhouse gas.

For someone so opinionated and adamant as yourself, I am actually rather surprised that you didn't know that already.

The H2O argument is just one common one amongst many a climate change sceptic.
You are bound to find more, the internet is rife with such nonsense.

It is going to be a little exhausting to keep talking to you if don't at least try to do a preliminary critique of the information and theories that you are recycling here.

Do you really think that someone (as in a climatologist who has spent their lifetime studdying such) hasn't thought of that, or taken it into account?

Like you said, H2O does have a self regulating effect.
as a gas it lasts in the atmosphere for maybe a week. Then it turns to water again.
simplisticly,
the water vapour in the air traps more heat (remember those hot humid days?), temperature rises, evaporation increases, clouds form, shade forms, cooler patches forms, winds and weather form, clouds blow away and rain somewhere.
This is a shallow or quick feedback mechanism.
This will continue. Our weather probably couldn't without it.

CO2 is a different matter, along with some of the other pollutants.
CO2 will last in the atmosphere a lot LOT longer (up to 200+years).
This means that the gas is up there insulating heat in for that amount of time.
It gets pretty complicated to see how CO2 regulates itself, but it is a lot slower and a lot longer. A LOT.

I am not sure of the time frame, in millions of years, that it took for nature to remove the higher CO2 from the air that the dinosaurs breathed,
but it did take it out, by plants over millenia trapping it in their leaves and wood and burrying it in swamps where it condensed into coal and oil.
The same CO2 that we are pumping back out again- really really quickly.

I really got to sleep...
But do you see the difference?

You say that this evidence amounts to scientists "intentionally misrepresenting the data".
If anyone has done this, it is you.

You have completely isolated one piece of data from the context in which it must be understood.
data is not just data- it has to be presented within a theoretical framework, otherwise it can be made to look like proof for anything.

You say that this is ********.
That the more you look into this the more evidence comes to light proving it so.

Well, if you are happy to pounce upon theoretically dismembered facts, data and ideas, and hold them up against a broad consensus of scientific opinion, theory and practice-
then this is going to be an easy argument for you. You are already convinced you are right.
All you need to do is shift from one discrepency to the next, one misunderstood relation to a misinterpreted theory.
Plausable deniability is a wonderfull thing.

marshmat

09-12-2006, 02:23 PM

In the interest of scientific accuracy, I would like to encourage anyone replying to this thread with "facts" or "data" to provide proper references for this informaton. Please keep in mind that, from a scientific perspective, peer-reviewed journals are admissable, as are university papers, while newspapers, television and public Web media are not considered scientifically valid sources.
If anyone would like to take a scientific stance on the issue, I encourage you to also let us know what your scientific credentials are. It is very hard to take a supposedly scientific argument seriously unless sources and credentials are also present.
--
Matt
B.Sc.E (ENPH) candidate, Queen's University

Vega

09-12-2006, 03:20 PM

You're missing my point. It's very simple.

Exactly what does a rise in global temps do? None of the articles you guys fling at me really bothers to mention what a rise in global temps does.

I guess that one of the guys, if not the guy, that knows more about that is James E. Hansen

He is the head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, which is a division of the NASA and a unit of the Columbia University Earth Institute located on the Columbia campus in New York City. Dr. Hansen was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1995.

Dr Hansen primary research for the past 25 years has been on studies and
computer simulations of the Earth's climate, for the purpose of understanding the human impact on global climate.

This is what he says about the effects of Global Warming:

"The Time Bomb

The dominant issue in global warming, in my opinion, is sea level change and the question of how fast ice sheets can disintegrate. A large portion of the world’s people live within a few meters of sea level, with trillions of dollars of infrastructure. The need to preserve global coast lines, I suggest, sets a low ceiling on the level of global warming that would constitute DAI.

The history of the Earth, and the present human-made planetary energy imbalance, together paint a disturbing picture about prospects for sea level change.
To appreciate this situation we must consider how today’s global temperature compares with peak temperatures in the current and previous interglacial periods, how long-term sea level change relates to global temperature, and the time required for ice sheets to respond to climate change.
.....
This means that, with the 0.5°C global warming of the past few decades, the Earth’s average temperature is just now passing through the peak Holocene temperature level.

Furthermore, the current planetary energy imbalance of about ¾ W/m2 implies that global warming already “in the pipeline”, about another 0.5°C, will take us about halfway to the global temperature that existed at the peak of the Eemian period.

Sea level during the Eemian is estimated to have been 5-6 meters (16-20 feet) higher thanit is today.

Although the geographical distribution of climate change influences the effect of global warming on ice sheets, paleoclimate history suggests that global temperature is a good predictor of eventual sea level change. The main issue is: how fast will ice sheets respond to global warming?
....
(about 5 meters of sea level rise per century).

It can be argued that in this paleoclimate case the ice sheets had a long period of preconditioning before the ice collapsed. On the other hand, it should be noted that the forcing was small in the paleoclimate case and changed only slowly over millennia. Now, on the contrary, there is a continual relentless forcing caused by a large human-made planetary energy imbalance that provides ample energy to rapidly erase the cooling effect of melting ice that tends to slow the paleoclimate response.

.... Such a change would presage much larger sea level change over the next century or two, because of several long time constants in the system: (1) several decades required for major changes of energy systems and thus greenhouse gas emissions, (2) several decades to a century for the climate system to approach equilibrium with changed climate forcings, (3) the time required for ice sheets to respond in a substantial way to changed climate forcings and changed climate, which I suggest may be as small as several centuries or less.

Whatever the preconditioning period for ice sheet disintegration is, these long time constants and the associated system inertia imply that global warming beyond some limit will create a legacy of large sea level change for future generations. And once this process has passed a certain point, it will be impractical to stop. ....
I argue that the level of DAI is likely to be set by the global temperature and planetary radiation imbalance at which substantial deglaciation becomes practically impossible to avoid.

Based on the paleoclimate evidence discussed above, I suggest that the highest prudent level of additional global warming is not more than about 1°C. In turn, given the existing planetary energy imbalance, this means that additional climate forcing should not exceed about 1 W/m2.

Detection of early signs of accelerating ice sheet breakup, and analysis of the processes involved, may be provided by the satellite IceSat recently launched by NASA. IceSat will use lidar and radar to precisely monitor ice sheet topography and dynamics.

We may soon be able to investigate whether or not the ice sheet time bomb is approaching detonation......

A planetary energy imbalance of +1 W/m2, maintained for a century, would cause a sealevel rise of about 8 meters, if the energy went entirely into melting of ice (Box 4)."

http://www.sciam.com/media/pdf/hansen.pdf#search=%22defusing%20time%20bomb%20global%20warming%22

You can access many good scientific papers about the subject here:

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/hansen_timebomb.pdf#search=%22defusing%20time%20bomb%20global%20warming%22

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 03:27 PM

Toot

09-12-2006, 03:45 PM

The dominant issue in global warming, in my opinion, is sea level change and the question of how fast ice sheets can disintegrate.

Why aren't politicians debating questions of fine art or the intricacies of boat design? The answer is: Because there isn't much that politicians can really do about it. Sure, global warming should be studied. Heck, worm holes and warp drives, hypersonic aircraft, Van Gogh, Michaelangelo, and Salvador Dali should be studied too. But politicians only really get involved when there is something they can do about it. Politicians don't get involved with egyptology until permits or restrictions are necessary. They don't get involved in rocket science until there is a threat that someone is going to blow up the neighborhood or else there is a need which is greater than the private sector can muster. What does this have to do with global warming?

I agree that the dominant issue in the study of global warming is sea-level change. However, that overlooks the first question which is, "is this important for politicians?" In order for it to be important to politicians, there has to be something they can do about it.

I don't think anybody disputes that global warming can be troublesome. The dispute is whether we can do anything about it. What are the effects of greenhouse gases? Is a significant portion of greenhouse gases generated by mankind? Or by volcanoes and other natural events?

I fall on the side of believing that volcanoes and other natural events can have a larger impact on the macroclimate than mankind has had up to this point. Sure, we can dirty cities and foul mountain basins with pollution for awhile, but dear god, have you seen the size of some of the world's volcanoes??!!!! And we haven't even put catalytic converters on those things yet!!!!

This isn't to say that mankind's "assistance" is trivial, but I don't think we are the sole producers of greenhouse gases.

Cows fart a lot.

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 04:18 PM

Hans & Matt,

Hmmm, OK, so according to you guys, I shoud ignore this paper, because it's published by the Environmental Protection Agency, the main governmental policy maker for environmental law, and not in a peer-reviewed journal? Please.

Both of you guys failed to address the fact that the EPA paper magnified the impact of CO2 emissions by ignoring both the greenhouse effects and the buffering effects of water vapor. the fact that they were forced to acknowledge these effects exist, and yet still chose to leave it out of their calculations, simply underscores this as a deliberate misrepresentation.

Your assertion that I'm recycling old theories and misrepresenting data is patently false - since I didn't present any theories but simply pointed out obvious flaws in an existing paper; flaws so obvious that even a layman such as myself easily spotted them.

As far as not being informed, you are watching the process of me becoming informed. Up untill this discussion, I didn't really have an opinion about global warming. I sort of had a vague opinion that it was being blown somewhat out of proprtion, kind of like the Y2K bug, but that "we probably need to do something one of these days." Only after I got interested in this discussion did I start really checking up on it. And what I'm finding is convincing me that the liberal politics of environmentalism is getting in the way of hard, dispassionate science.

Scientists are resigning in protest over the political agenda of the IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. From an open letter from Dr. Christopher Landsea: (http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000318chris_landsea_leaves.html) "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."

In conclusion, from what I have been able to ascertain, global warming IS being blown out of proportion - but on a scale I would not have expected.

BillyDoc

09-12-2006, 05:07 PM

Hans and Matt,

Please don't bother with a response. He'll simply ignore any logic or facts you bring up and go on with something else. It was a familiar technique in Aristotle's time, and is known in some circles as "Argumentum Ad Ignoracio Elenchi." Which is to say, given that any points brought up are not addressed any further discussion is pointless.

BillyDoc

Vega

09-12-2006, 05:16 PM

I notice that the good Dr. Hansen bases his sea level rise on ALL the added heat from global warming over the next century going into melting ice. Dr. Hansen needs a refresher course in thermodynamics.

Dr Hansen has a B.A. in Physics and Mathematics, a M.S. in Astronomy and a Ph.D. in Physics. I don't think he needs a "refresher course in thermodynamics".

On the other hand if, after reading his article, you conclude that "the good Dr. Hansen bases his sea level rise on ALL the added heat from global warming over the next century going into melting ice", I think that it is not him who needs a refreshing course...and not exactly in Physics.

I will not continue this discussion (too political and not scientific), but let me point out Toot, that this issue is only a Political issue in the US. In Europe it is a big environmental problem and it is addressed at scientific level. A big problem that can jeopardize the future of our grand sons, and Politicians don't dare (and I think they have the good sense of not even trying) to go against the informed opinion of the vast majority of the scientific community.

Perhaps us, in the old world have a different conception of time. For a European, 200 or 300 years in the history of their countries is not a long time. We are surrounded with buildings and monuments that are a lot older than that (in the little town were I live the church is 750 years old). Perhaps that’s the reason we seem to care a lot more about what will happen in 100 or 200 years.

marshmat

09-12-2006, 05:33 PM

I will not continue this discussion (too political and not scientific)
Nor will I. Climate change is not a political issue, it's a scientific issue. Scientists aren't arguing over whether it's happening anymore, or whether or not we're causing it, they're arguing over how soon it will become unstoppable and how much more severe it might get. The political issue is what to do about it before things get worse. There has been no rational discussion on any thread so far on that front.

Vega- thank you for properly citing your sources. All others, please try to do the same. It's very hard to believe the word of an online random, with no evidence of education or research. Legitimate sources are good for credibility. (The EPA, by the way, is a political organization, not a scientific one. So is the IPCC. All published materials from them, even ones based on scientific studies, are written to fit the political will of the day.)

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 06:10 PM

Dr Hansen has a B.A. in Physics and Mathematics, a M.S. in Astronomy and a Ph.D. in Physics. I don't think he needs a "refresher course in thermodynamics".

On the other hand if, after reading his article, you conclude that "the good Dr. Hansen bases his sea level rise on ALL the added heat from global warming over the next century going into melting ice", I think that it is not him who needs a refreshing course...and not exactly in Physics.
Dude, Hansen said it, not me. Go back and read what you posted. He claims a 16-20 ft. rise in sea levels if all the extra heat coming from global warming went into the ice. I'd like to know how the idiot thinks the heat flow into the arctic is going to increase if the temperature of the temperate and tropic zones doesn't rise, which would have to happen for his statement to be true.

Every other site I accessed that favored global warming postulated a sea level rise between 10 cm and 1 meter over the next hundred years. Whether your guy has a Ph.D. or not, he's obviously not thinking things out before he speaks.

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 06:16 PM

Bill & Matt,

You guys need to show a little maturity and admit when you're wrong. I've busted you, Bill, when you threatened me with the polar caps melting; I've shown that the EPA deliberately ignored the dominant greenhouse gas in their estimate of anthropogenic effects on global warming; and Matt, you're attempt to dismiss my sources inadvertently proved my point - that the global warming issue has been politicized.

Toot

09-12-2006, 06:33 PM

One thing that bothers me about the whole framing of this issue is the name itself. "Global Warming". Now the name itself is easy to understand- is the GLOBE itself WARMING. Now there's plenty of data that indicates it is. But "Global Warming" is also the term applied to the science of studying the phenomenon. It has attached to it a variety of meanings. You ask a man on the street, "Do you believe in Global Warming?" and he might answer:

1. "Yes (I believe the globe is warmer than it was a decade ago)"; or
2. "Yes (I believe greenhouse gases are presently making the globe warmer)"; or
3. "Yes (I believe greenhouse gases are having some effect on the globe's temperature)"; or
4. "Yes (I believe greenhouse gases are making the globe warmer and it is the fault of human activity)"; or
5. "Yes (I believe that there truly is a group of scientists who study the warming and cooling cycles of our globe)".

Do you see the problem here with the very naming of the science? Science is supposed to be unbiased. There is a reason that Astronomy is called Astronomy instead of being called "The study of the objects which all revolve around the planet Earth". Biology isn't called "the study of animal magnetism and spirits which create life."

Looking back on it, a hundred years from now when high school students are taking a fourth mandatory science course, do you really think the field of study is going to be called, "Global Warming"? And yet, we accept that phrase today. That, to me, is just as much as bias as referring to Astronomy as "the study of celestial bodies revolving around the Earth".

What may be "obvious" at one period, may be ridiculous many years later. So science typically comes up with names that are impartial. Perhaps, "Global Climatology" would be a better name. Do I believe in "Global Climatology"? Yes! Just as much as I believe in Physics and Math. But asking whether I believe in "Global Warming", I must say, that is a very very loaded question.... :confused:

So any scientist who says they are studying "global warming" is already starting out from a biased point of view. It would be like me studying the mating habits of igneous rocks. If I were indeed studying such a thing, could you possibly convince me that rocks didn't mate? Do you not think my mind would have already been made up on the subject?

Vega

09-12-2006, 08:20 PM

Dude, Hansen said it, not me. Go back and read what you posted. He claims a 16-20 ft. rise in sea levels if all the extra heat coming from global warming went into the ice..

Stonebreaker, I believe that you honestly think that you are right, so I will answer... I don't mean to be rude or arrogant.

What you have said is: "the good Dr. Hansen bases his sea level rise on ALL the added heat from global warming over the next century going into melting ice".

Probably you haven’t read the article from which I have posted some quotes.

One of the quotes said that “A planetary energy imbalance of +1 W/m2, maintained for a century, would cause a sea level rise of about 8 meters, if the energy went entirely into melting of ice”.

I don’t know enough to know if this is true, but clearly he says in the article that it is not this what will happen; this is a maximum, if all imbalance energy goes into melting ice and that is obviously not possible.

In the article he says why he thinks that a lot more energy is going to be diverted into the melting, considering previous and more optimistic studies, but clearly not all the energy.

Even in the quotes I have posted he says :

"Sea level during the Eemian is estimated to have been 5-6 meters (16-20 feet) higher than it is today.

Although the geographical distribution of climate change influences the effect of global warming on ice sheets, paleoclimate history suggests that global temperature is a good predictor of eventual sea level change. The main issue is: how fast will ice sheets respond to global warming?....
(about 5 meters of sea level rise per century)."

And that is obviously a lot less than 8 m. That means that even in the worst scenario only a part of the “Imbalanced energy” is going to melting ice.

If you don’t have a political agenda and are really interested in understanding the problem, read the full article and you are going to see that he, like all scientists, is very cautious in the claims he makes (I have only posted the “worst” highlights).

Of course he can still be wrong (I hope he is wrong) but what a scientist does is (out of any political agenda) a study of the facts, and then produce a model to explain them, see if all future developments are in accordance with the predictions that his model inform, change the model to work better and so on.

This Scientist has been studying and making computer models and changing them to better adapt to the climate data for the last 25 years. Of course, he can still be wrong….but do you think that it makes any sense to put your confidence in studies “financed” by lobbies to conform to Political agenda?

stonebreaker

09-12-2006, 10:05 PM

OK, I'll be happy to address Dr. Hansen's observations in a little more detail.

1) Despite Dr. Hansen's assertions that the sea level should have risen 2.5 meters in the last century based on the increase in temperature, the sea level only rose about 20 cm from 1900 to 2000.

2) The sea has in fact been rising for the last 20,000 years as the last ice age has retreated. It has risen 120 meters in the last 14,000 years alone. Thus, a rise in sea level in and of itself does not indicate anthropogenic global warming - especially when you consider that the average sea level rise over the last 14,000 years was 85 cm per century - 4 times greater, on average, than the rise in sea levels in the last century. You can see by this graph that the rate of sea level rise is actually decreasing, not increasing, despite the fact that the earth has gotten steadily warmer over the same period.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/1d/Post-Glacial_Sea_Level.png

Therefore, the rise in sea level of the last century cannot be attributed to anthropogenic CO2 emissions, nor can any future rises that fit the long-term historic curve.

Raggi_Thor

09-13-2006, 05:14 AM

Have you discussed this two "facts" from the physics department?
(somewhat simplified)

1) CO2 absorbs or reflect energy (heat waves) of certain wave length(s?). We have passed the level of CO2 where it does a 100% job in this regard, so adding more doesn't mean anything (in this regard).

2) Temperatures measured on the earth the last 50 or 100 years follow closely the activity on the sun. This is probably more important than CO2 in the atmosphere.

Then you have the economics:
It is possible that human activity will change the climate and this will cost something, however, forcing countries to reduce CO2 emissions will (probably) cost more.

Then you have the ethics:
The "CO2 regime" is forcing poor countries to limit their growth. Is that fair? Shouldn't we, the rich, reduce our emissions before we buy quotes (spelling?) from them?

jimslade

09-13-2006, 08:55 AM

The core samples are BOGUS. the separation layers are not science based because the separation lines are compressed and without mineral distinction. Therefore it is very difficult to ascertain a definitive time line. Also in compression you have outgasing that can occur and corrupt your findings. The simple fact is that weather is cyclical. When the weather is cold, the global warmers disappear, when its hot , they are out there justifying their jobs. In a greenhouse enviroment the higher the CO2 levels the more oxygen the plants produce and the faster they grow.Its a problem the greens have yet to explain. I wonder what levels we were at when everyone was burning wood for heat. The pollution was as thick as mud in the citys.

stonebreaker

09-13-2006, 11:03 AM

Nor will I. Climate change is not a political issue, it's a scientific issue. Scientists aren't arguing over whether it's happening anymore, or whether or not we're causing it, they're arguing over how soon it will become unstoppable and how much more severe it might get. The political issue is what to do about it before things get worse. There has been no rational discussion on any thread so far on that front.

I don't see how you can say that. We've been discussing it rationally here for days. The problem I see is that the facts don't always fit your wishes. So you dismiss them as "politics instead of science".

What I've discovered over tha past few days is that people who want to blame humans for the recent rise in global temps only go back over the last 150 years or so, and say, "See! See! the temps have been rising over the last 150 years, coinciding with the Industrial Revolution!" They then go on to make dire predictions like the ice caps melting, despite the fact that the ice they get their data from is nearly a million years old.

Yet when other people point out that the recent rise in global temps is part of a millenias-long rise in temps as the earth has come out of the last ice age, and that there was a solar-induced Little Ice Age from the 1400's to about 1850, and from the 1000's to the 1300's the earth was actually warmer than it is now, they get shouted down and dismissed as tools of big business by the first group.

Actually, you're right. The liberals ARE politicizing it.

safewalrus

09-15-2006, 07:44 AM

Without being to fanatical - what does it matter who or what is causing it? We're all goint to cop a load of it! the question is really when? today, next year two hundred years? nobody no matter how clever he thinks he is is going to change it, the die is cast. All that most peole want to know is do I buy a pair of shorts for next summer or do I stick to decent trousers?

stonebreaker

09-15-2006, 09:52 AM

It matters because it determines how we deal with it. If it's man-made, then we have a moral responsibility to deal with it. If it's natural, then there's not really much we CAN do about it. The problem comes in when you have some eco-nut using shaky premises trying to dictate economic policy from his tree house.

As I've read up on this issue, I've found out several things:

1) Global warming is occurring.

2) Far from happening over only the last 150 years, as claimed by the eco-nuts, the globe has been getting steadily warmer ever since the end of the last ice age. There was a solar-induced cold spell in the middle ages called The Little Ice Age that ended about 1850. Before that, it was actually warmer than it is today - the Romans were actually able to grow grapes at higher lattitudes in Britain than it's possible to grow them today.

3) Based on geological evidence in the Caribbean, sea levels were 6 meters higher BEFORE the last ice age than they are today. Since we are still coming out of the last ice age, it is to be expected that sea levels will continue to rise. New Orleans will just have to deal with that.

4) For some reason, and this makes me extremely suspicious of the climatologists, their reports all fail to address the effects of water vapor in the atmosphere. This is significant to me because in the EPA paper I referenced above, as well as several others, they DO mention that water vapor is the most dominant greenhouse gas, but that it has a buffering effect on the global temperature - too hot and you get more water vapor, which leads to more clouds, which cools things down again. But they then make excuses that either water vapor is too short-lived to worry about, or that they will ignore it because a) they don't understand it, or b) they do not consider water vapor a greenhouse gas, not because it doesn't function as a greenhouse gas, which they admit it does, but because it is not produced by humans.

All of these taken together make me think that politics is getting in the way of science. Number 4, in particular, also leads me to the conclusion that the data are being deliberately misrepresented. Why? If the data for anthropogenic global warming is so strong, why do they need to obfuscate the data? Why not put it out there for everyone to look at?

Toot

09-15-2006, 12:07 PM

Then you have the ethics:
The "CO2 regime" is forcing poor countries to limit their growth. Is that fair? Shouldn't we, the rich, reduce our emissions before we buy quotes (spelling?) from them?

Actually, it was my understanding that, under the Kyoto Protocol, developing nations are given a "pass" on the emissions reduction- it only applies to already well-developed countries. The weird thing about this though, is that it creates a lop-sided appearance. Any signer to the agreement will say that they have 100-some countries signed on, when in fact, many of those countries don't have to do anything significant under the agreement (because they're developing). So why wouldn't they sign?

It seems to me that if you have a hundred people and you take a vote as to whether the 5 strongest ought to become weaker, you will get at least 95 people to agree. So it behooves the weaker countries to sign and hurts the stronger countries who will get bashed over the head if they don't sign and will be economically hampered if they do.

Please correct me if I'm mistaken on that.

BillyDoc

09-15-2006, 12:26 PM

Massive surge in disappearance of Arctic sea ice sparks global warning
Arctic meltdown is speeding up... sea ice is vanishing faster than ever before... polar bears face extinction... and America's top climate scientist warns we only have a decade to save the planet

By Michael McCarthy and David Usborne
Published: 15 September 2006

The melting of the sea ice in the Arctic, the clearest sign so far of global warming, has taken a sudden and enormous leap forward, in one of the most ominous developments yet in the onset of climate change.

Two separate studies by Nasa, using different satellite monitoring technologies, both show a great surge in the disappearance of Arctic ice cover in the last two years.

One, from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, shows that Arctic perennial sea ice, which normally survives the summer melt season and remains year-round, shrank by 14 per cent in just 12 months between 2004 and 2005.

The overall decrease in the ice cover was 720,000 sq km (280,000 sq miles) - an area almost the size of Turkey, gone in a single year.

The other study, from the Goddard Space Flight Centre, in Maryland, shows that the perennial ice melting rate, which has averaged 0.15 per cent a year since satellite observations began in 1979, has suddenly accelerated hugely. In the past two winters the rate has increased to six per cent a year - that is, it has got more than 30 times faster.

See the rest here: http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1603667.ece

And the lead-in article here: http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article1603643.ece

Toot

09-15-2006, 01:21 PM

BillyDoc- That's a fair and balanced article in my opinion.

The problem that I'm having, really, is the obfuscation of the term Global Warming in general. The globe is warming. Of that, I have no doubt. It's the cause, and whether such warming is unprecedented, that concerns me.

Such rapid shrinkage of the perennial ice has not been shown before. "It is alarming," said Joey Camiso, who led the Goddard study.I don't dispute that one bit. It IS alarming. But since we didn't have satellites during the previous warming period, it should be no surprise that the rapid shrinkage has not been shown before.

"We've witnessed sea ice reduction at 6 per cent per year over just the last two winters, most likely a result of warming due to greenhouse gases."

He does state above that greenhouse gases are the most likely cause. I really don't see how anyone can claim otherwise, except for the issue of the sun's natural cycles which, admittedly, I haven't researched at all.

Anyway, I take exception with the statement that all the ice will be gone by 2070. It's not that I don't believe it's possible, it's just that well.... as any Mayan will tell you, the world is going to end on December 21, 2012. ;)

BillyDoc

09-15-2006, 02:26 PM

Oh, oh!

I thought (hoped) I had a little longer than that. Only six more years?

As for the cause, or causes . . . it reminds me of predicting the weather! Our home 'spaceship' is a complex machine indeed. It is probably more difficult to predict the weather accurately for next week than to make general global predictions like: "it will be hot next summer in most of the Mid West."

The thing I fall back on to in my own mind is this chain of thought:

Sunlight has fallen on this planet for a long, long time. During the later part of that long period there have been organisms like plants that have effectively stored a portion of the energy from that sunlight in the form of chemical bonds, which in many cases ended up as oil, or coal, safely tucked away underground. This process thus sequestered a great deal of the heat and the carbon from our atmosphere and put it away where it can do no harm. When we burn some of this coal, or oil, we reverse the process of sequestration and release the carbon back into the atmosphere, as well as the raw heat.

So, by burning fossil fuels we are really enabling the delayed effect of ancient sunlight falling on the planet. But there is a 'rate' problem. It isn't hard to see the difference in effect that you would get from releasing a little bit of energy in the living room of your house, say from striking a cigarette lighter loaded with gasoline, and lighting a few gallons of gasoline all at once in the same place. You can absorb and live with the small effect from the lighter, but the large volume of gasoline has the potential to overwhelm any control systems that you may have in place, and really ruin your day. As a society we seem to be releasing our ancient sunlight at a pace that is overwhelming any existing natural control systems. Control systems like the water vapor cycle already mentioned: more vapor results in more clouds, which provides a more reflective planetary surface, which cools the planet, which results in less water vapor . . . and so on. We do this for one reason only: to assure oil company profits.

Then there is the problem of 'exponential' effects. You are probably aware of the fact that many natural processes or phenomena follow exponential patterns. Increase your speed and the air resistance goes up by an exponential factor of two. Melt the ice at the poles and the reflectance of the surface changes from highly reflective to highly absorptive, thus “feeding back” to cause more warming and melting. An increase in ice melting rate from 0.15% to 6% over a couple of years sure looks like an exponential effect. The thing is, exponential effects get away from you very fast.

If you are old enough you may remember a Disney demonstration of the principle behind atomic fusion where a room full of (Mickey) mousetraps were set with two ping-pong balls delicately balanced on each. Then the announcer casually tossed in a single ball . . . and an exponential progression proceeded. First two traps were sprung, then four more from those balls, then 8, then 16, then 32 . . . and within a second or two they had all gone off. With a great roar thousands of balls were tossed into the air all at once!

All of the evidence collected seems to indicate that we are on the cusp of just that sort of explosion in our environment. The CO2 in ice core samples, the melting ice at the poles . . . I saw Kilimanjaro in 1972 and it had a bunch of ice on it, with both the main peak and a lessor one to the West fully covered . . . but not now. Get on Google Earth and take a look. The oil companies (and all the big corporations, it seems) have proven many times that they will do absolutely anything to make a profit, and they don't like the idea of controlling those profits merely to save our spaceship. So they flood us with propaganda to sooth us and lull us into complacency. And, unfortunately, many people buy it. But I think you have to agree that the evidence is piling up that indicates a real problem exists and needs to be dealt with while there is still time.

If there is time, which personally I doubt. I think our Corporations and their Coin-Operated politicians have effectively killed us all with their abject greed.

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-15-2006, 02:57 PM

West Antarctic ice sheet is thickening
19:00 17 January 2002
Jeff Hecht, Boston

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The giant West Antarctic ice sheet, long the subject of warnings about its continuous melting and collapse, is actually getting thicker in parts. However no-one is sure how long the change will last.

A new radar study shows that the ice sheet feeding the Ross Ice Streams is growing. That is a dramatic change in an ice sheet covering about a third of West Antarctica and that has retreated nearly 1300 kilometres since the end of the last ice age. The big question is if the change marks the end of the retreat, or just a short-lived reversal.

The discovery comes a few days after another team claimed that most of Antarctica is cooling down, not warming up, a conclusion that conflicts with "greenhouse" climate models. Both studies show that despite decades of research, Antarctic climate patterns remain poorly understood.

Net gain
Geologists have previously traced the landward retreat of the line where the base of the ice in West Antarctica meets the ocean. This has averaged 120 metres a year since the end of the last ice age. The studies had estimated the Ross Ice Streams region was losing 20.9 billion tons of ice per year.

But now Ian Joughin of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Slawek Tulaczyk of the University of California at Santa Cruz report a net gain of 26.8 billion tons per year. This represents about a quarter of the annual snow accumulation.

Joughin measured flow rates along the ice streams emptying into the Ross Embayment with the Canadian Radarsat satellite. Then he compared the outflow volume with other measurements on surface accumulation to obtain the mass balance.

"It's solid work," says Robert Bindschadler of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Bindschadler had previously warned that the West Antarctic ice sheet could melt in 4000 years if long-term trends continued, leading to significant rises in sea level.

Bouncing about
What the measurements do not reveal is the long-term trend, says Richard Alley of Pennsylvania State University. "Is it the climate of the ice sheet going somewhere, or the weather of the ice sheet just bouncing about?"

Joughin points that his study would have yielded the opposite result only 150 years ago, before one major ice stream shut down. He also notes that any human-induced climate change is likely to take a long time to affect the ice sheet. The ice is a kilometre thick, so "it would take thousands of years for surface temperature to affect the bed of the ice stream."

Vega

09-15-2006, 03:39 PM

Ok stonebreaker,

Well, if you are happy to pounce upon theoretically dismembered facts, data and ideas, and hold them up against a broad consensus of scientific opinion, theory and practice-
then this is going to be an easy argument for you. You are already convinced you are right.

All you need to do is shift from one discrepency to the next, one misunderstood relation to a misinterpreted theory.
Plausable deniability is a wonderfull thing.

West Antarctic ice sheet is thickening

Jeff Hecht

"The giant West Antarctic ice sheet, long the subject of warnings about its continuous melting and collapse, is actually getting thicker in parts. However no-one is sure how long the change will last.

.......
That is a dramatic change in an ice sheet covering about a third of West Antarctica.....

Finally, Joughin says that two nearby West Antarctic glaciers are thinning rapidly, so the trend cannot be extended across the continent".
http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn1806

Raggi_Thor

09-15-2006, 05:13 PM

Actually, it was my understanding that, under the Kyoto Protocol, developing nations are given a "pass" on the emissions reduction- it only applies to already well-developed countries. The weird thing about this though, is that it creates a lop-sided appearance. Any signer to the agreement will say that they have 100-some countries signed on, when in fact, many of those countries don't have to do anything significant under the agreement (because they're developing). So why wouldn't they sign?
It seems to me that if you have a hundred people and you take a vote as to whether the 5 strongest ought to become weaker, you will get at least 95 people to agree. So it behooves the weaker countries to sign and hurts the stronger countries who will get bashed over the head if they don't sign and will be economically hampered if they do.
Please correct me if I'm mistaken on that.

From http://www.cicero.uio.no/media/100.pdf:
On 11 December 1997, delegates to the third conference of the Parties to the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change agreed upon the Kyoto Protocol. The protocol sets binding
emission targets for developed nations (Annex B countries). 1 The Protocol states that Annex
B countries may participate in emission trading. The rules for emission trading are to be
discussed at the fourth Conference of the Parties in November 1998.
The aim of the report is to discuss the potential gains from emission trading and to raise some
crucial questions. The advantages in the form of reduced abatement costs are a basic features
of emission trading. The numerical example presented shows that the total costs of the Kyoto
Protocol could be reduced by approximately 95% through emission trading. From the Nordic
perspective it is important to note that Denmark and Norway and to some extent also Sweden
are probably among the Annex B countries benefiting most from this trading.....

And from http://www.cicero.uio.no/fulltext.asp?id=3563&lang=en
Figure 1 shows the emissions quotas allocated on the basis of 1990 CO2 emissions relative to emissions in a business-as-usual (BAU) scenario in 2010 (DOE 2004). Note that the sum of the initial allocation is approximately equal to the BAU emissions of the participating countries (see the far right of the figure). The countries that fall short of meeting their targets will thus be able to buy the quotas they need at a reasonable price from Russia and Ukraine. In the short term (i.e., the first commitment period 2008–2012), there is thus no reason to expect that implementing the Kyoto Protocol will lead to significant global emissions reductions.

safewalrus

09-15-2006, 06:02 PM

So we're all going to die! whats new?

Raggi_Thor

09-15-2006, 06:23 PM

Nothing new. Living IS dangerous, you will die from it!

SamSam

09-15-2006, 07:22 PM

All of these taken together make me think that politics is getting in the way of science. Number 4, in particular, also leads me to the conclusion that the data are being deliberately misrepresented. Why? If the data for anthropogenic global warming is so strong, why do they need to obfuscate the data? Why not put it out there for everyone to look at?

Why indeed. With this many humans on earth, it is going to be a collosal problem no matter what, when the earth's systems change or collapse. Maybe I missed it, but what do people claiming it is man made have to gain over people claiming it is natural? Why keep adding to the problem? Why does free trade and capitolism and profit seem to rule over caution and common sense and moderation? Sam

Raggi_Thor

09-15-2006, 07:32 PM

stonebreaker

09-15-2006, 07:39 PM

All the Kyoto Protocol is, is welfare by another name.

Toot

09-15-2006, 07:57 PM

Maybe I missed it, but what do people claiming it is man made have to gain over people claiming it is natural? Why keep adding to the problem? Why does free trade and capitolism and profit seem to rule over caution and common sense and moderation? Sam

It's the tragedy of the commons. Basically, nobody wants to do anything because they gain a benefit whether they do something or not.

A simple example. There is an apartment complex with 10 residents. They all have access to a swimming pool. There is no pool service to clean it. When it is nice, everybody enjoys the pool. When it gets dirty, everybody says, "Why should *I* be the one to clean it?" And deep down, each and every person thinks to himself, "If I refuse to clean it, I can keep using the pool once one of the other suckers finally breaks down and cleans it... I just have to hold out longer than they do..." The end result is that nobody ever cleans the pool.

Here's an economics example...
Let's say everybody here has a business. We all depend on oil and we all need to produce widgets as cheaply as possible to remain competitive. Right now, we're each producing widgets at a cost of $10 each.

Now, my government says to me, "Toot, we need to cut greenhouse gases, so you need to spend money to make a cleaner widget plant. You won't gain any benefit from it, but we need it to save the environment." If I agree, my widgets will cost $11 each and I will be put out of business. So I say to my government, "There's no way in heck I can do that. I will be out of business within 5 years if I do. This will hurt the American economy, it will ship more wealth overseas. Do you really want that?" And the American government says no, they don't.

Who says "yes"? Countries at the bottom of the food chain. Countries who want the cost of goods to rise. Especially countries who are exempted from the more stringent requirements- because they will then be able to sell their widgets for less and will become a net-exporter of widgets.

The bottom line is, there can be no hold outs and there can be no exemptions for "developing countries". If there are exceptions, then you are putting the stronger countries at an economic disadvantage, there will be no level playing field, and, regardless of whether or not the strongest countries are competitive, it will still be a race to the bottom as each weaker country tries to cut corners. It won't stop widgets from being produced, it will just ensure that they aren't produced in America.

Either everybody has to be required to ante up a few bucks to hire a cleaning service, or else everybody has to show up at a specified time to pitch in to clean the pool. The moment one person is exempted from that "duty", another person will inevitably say, "Well if they don't have to, then neither do I!"

Either we have to all agree to abide by the same rules and do it together regardless of position, or else, like someone else said, it's just a form of international welfare.

Raggi_Thor

09-15-2006, 08:12 PM

Toot, while your thinking may be right, the problem with CO2 quotas is that they are based on each country emissions up to now, or 1990 or so. That means that USA and Europe have large quotas per capita while poor countries have smaller, Is that fair. Russia and the former Soviet republics have lower emissions now because of lower production ("smaller" economy?) after the communist break down, think,. That's why they can sell quotas to us. It's a very strange system!

Toot

09-15-2006, 08:22 PM

... the problem with CO2 quotas is that they are based on each country emissions up to now, or 1990 or so. That means that USA and Europe have large quotas per capita while poor countries have smaller, Is that fair?

In the short term, it's perfectly fair. In the long term, it may not be fair to smaller up-and-coming countries. However, if the quotas are kept low enough and continually reduced in order to keep the price artificially high, then it could indeed serve its purpose of reducing emissions with a minimal effect on the free-market economy.

As I see it...up-and-coming countries, or old countries, will invest in new technology to avoid using high-priced quotas... which will then improve the environment and drive down the cost of the quotas.... at which time some of the quotas ought to be taken away in order to inflate the price again, thereby driving more R&D into the reduction of CO2... until eventually everything is clean.

The "prize", the lowest cost provider of widgets, will be the people who are the first to reduce the cost of reducing their CO2 output.

I can't say that's a fair system as America has a LOT of scientists and stuff while smaller countries have relatively few... but at least the system encourages innovation and creativity as the path to making money. That's at least a free market approach... and far better than raping the environment, IMO.

Raggi_Thor

09-15-2006, 08:40 PM

You could just buy smaller cars :-)

ron17571

09-15-2006, 09:16 PM

I can remember people worrying about the coming ice age.ive seen programs on tv about the earth going thru cycles of ice ages and warm periods.so a big part of it seems natural,but to be a good steward towards the earth,well i see many people around me feeding their need for some kind of macho power thing,driving big fwd pickups,i also think the mpg of many vehicles is way to low.better fuel milage means less crap pumped into the air.By the way i see no change weather wise here in Phoenix AZ.its nice in the winter and hot as hell in the summer.

SamSam

09-15-2006, 09:27 PM

There is nothing wrong with caution, common sense and moderation, but in this discussion we have to keep in mind what parts of the world should moderate itself. For example, it's a common misunderstanding that Africa is overpopulated while the fact is that Europe is much denser populated. Another example; If you are worried about the number of humans on earth, shouldn't you look at what they consume?

As far as moderation, I don't know the figures and I'm not going to google them right now, but don't America and other developed countries with x population use XXXX amount of the earths resources compared to x amount used by developing countries with a population of XXXX? Don't you think the earths systems are not overloaded allready, and will only become XXXX overloaded when the rest of the humans try and claim their share of profit through global free trade and the political (or maybe for some, it's a God Given Right) system of capitolism? Can't the first world moderate itself and modify the environmental effects of the third world grabbing their own piece of the pie?

Maybe Europe has a much denser population than Africa, but I don't remember seeing many Europeans with distended bellies, skeletal arms, flies crawling in and out of their mouths and across their 1000 yard stare eyeballs. I AM worried about what all the excess humans consume. When the climate changes and shifts, when Midwest and European breadbaskets become ...something else, what happens then? Do you think making a bigger grocery store might work? When billions of people are displaced by rising oceans, which also wipes out cropland, are you going to share the stuff you're growing in your backyard (Norwegian Wood?) to the hordes?

Actually, though, "consume" applies to more than food. It applies to oil. It applies to water. It applies to every resource on the planet and I am definitely worried about what "they" consume. And the opposite of consume would be something like "discard" and I am also worried about what and where and how "they" discard "their" stuff. Their **** is my **** on this planet now. Sam

Toot

09-15-2006, 09:28 PM

SamSam

09-15-2006, 09:46 PM

It's the tragedy of the commons.

You got that right , but it's about the only thing. "The best argument against Democracy is a 5 minute conversation with the average voter." Winston Churchill

Toot

09-15-2006, 09:48 PM

As far as moderation, I don't know the figures and I'm not going to google them right now, but don't America and other developed countries with x population use XXXX amount of the earths resources compared to x amount used by developing countries with a population of XXXX? Don't you think the earths systems are not overloaded allready, and will only become XXXX overloaded when the rest of the humans try and claim their share of profit through global free trade and the political (or maybe for some, it's a God Given Right) system of capitolism? Can't the first world moderate itself and modify the environmental effects of the third world grabbing their own piece of the pie? Sure. The first world could pollute less so that poorer nations won't be hurting the environment when they start having the ability to pollute more. It's the tragedy of the commons problem again though. It's like having a hot chick in your bed and you deciding to wait till she's married. It may never happen, her marriage might not be to you... but sure, you can wait if you want. I won't say it's the wrong choice...

But now, exactly how many dollars a year should each American contribute to reducing pollution? I think a catalytic converter and emissions-compliant engine add about $1,500 to the price of a car (actually, it's probably a bit more than that). That right there is quite a big chunk of change, wouldn't you say? What else do you want? Name a percentage of income, and make sure it doesn't change our standard of living relative to other nations, otherwise that will cause riots... Like the 80% tax rate.

Maybe Europe has a much denser population than Africa, but I don't remember seeing many Europeans with distended bellies, skeletal arms, flies crawling in and out of their mouths and across their 1000 yard stare eyeballs. I AM worried about what all the excess humans consume. When the climate changes and shifts, when Midwest and European breadbaskets become ...something else, what happens then? Do you think making a bigger grocery store might work? When billions of people are displaced by rising oceans, which also wipes out cropland, are you going to share the stuff you're growing in your backyard (Norwegian Wood?) to the hordes?That's truly a noble concern. I suppose we should take the precautions as we take in the case of alien invasion as well though- both have the ability to wipe out the planet and both are possible events. I resent you as much for not supporting a nuclear space shield as you resent me for not supporting CO2 reduction. Don't forget, the odds of another earthquake and tsunami in San Francisco is HUGE, and the Midwest is overdue for a 9.0 earthquake- anytime now in the next 20,000 years or so. And every place has some major boogeyman that's just ripe to happen. NO PLACE IS SAFE!!!! And that's not even mentioning asteroids. You might think I'm an idiot, or laugh, thinking I'm kidding around. And a few years ago, you would have laughed if I told you about a hurricane destroying New Orleans or a Tsunami in Tailand. It's always funny and not worth a thought... until it happens. You want to change Global Warming? Well I don't think there's enough willpower in the universe to change every natural disaster that's waiting to happen.

Life is uncertain. THOUSANDS of ENORMOUS natural disasters are waiting in the wings. And I personally don't think global warming is #1 on that list. So should we sink a lot of money into global warming, or should we keep our money in a bank account where it can be quickly deployed to combat any one of a number of potential disasters which may befall us?

People are going to die tomorrow. and the day after. And they will be for causes that could have been prevented. You create a doomsday scenario about Global Warming, I'll talk about a Japanese Tsunami. You have your boogeyman, I'll have mine.

It's much like the babies floating down a river... the first day there is one. Then another. Then another. Then another. You realize it's an ongoing problem and doesn't appear to be stopping. So do you travel up the river in order to stop this from happening and thereby let a baby die the next day when you aren't there? Or do you stay where you are and catch more babies?

Do you solve the problems you know you can solve? Or do you solve the problems that you are unsure of? It's a moral question. And it's not an easy one.

Actually, though, "consume" applies to more than food. It applies to oil. It applies to water. It applies to every resource on the planet and I am definitely worried about what "they" consume. And the opposite of consume would be something like "discard" and I am also worried about what and where and how "they" discard "their" stuff. Their **** is my **** on this planet now. Sam

Tragedy of the commons, again. If you know how to solve that dilemma in a way that doesn't involve private ownership and capitalism, I'm all ears.... As far as I know, capitalism is the best way to achieve that. But, again, I'm all ears...

Toot

09-15-2006, 09:51 PM

You got that right , but it's about the only thing. "The best argument against Democracy is a 5 minute conversation with the average voter." Winston Churchill

Alright. Don't like democracy? Then let's start a revolution. Everybody chant with me...

TOOT FOR EMPEROR!!!!! TOOT FOR EMPEROR!!!!!!!

And to assure my post, if elected emperor for life, I hereby do promise to do something about global warming. :)

Frosty

09-15-2006, 11:05 PM

It might help if America cleaned up there diesel a bit ( wich they have been told to do) America makes diesel fuel with sulphur 500part per million, they have been told to cleen up the diesel to 50 parts per million. Then you can import clean burning European deisel engines that at the moment will choke on American fuel. Back to Bush again with no back bone.

Arnold for president he will sort out the bad guys. I saw him in 'Terminator" he wont stand for any monkey business.

ron17571

09-16-2006, 12:40 AM

Jack theres low sulphur diesel now and its being fazed in now,its going to be 500 ppm and going down to 15 ppm,yep folks are wanting them small diesel powered cars and the good mpg them europeans have,funny how i didnt like the grey looking buildings,courtesy of many diesels in holland.

Frosty

09-16-2006, 01:36 AM

Thers nowt wrong with deisels Ron. I have been told the new Jag diesel pulls like a train. Toyotas can easily make 300 Hp from 4.2 liter (1 Hd engine)

The days of the humengous Cadilacs are over thank god. Those huge space ship like fuel guzzling monsters have been as much amusement to us in Europe as out little Fiats and minis have been to you. The Amercan motor car industry has a long way to go with its push rod engines of 500ci or more. Oh I believe today that Fords are laying off many workers as we speak.

When you make a decent motor I guess some one will buy it? Sticking the Stars N stripes on it and saying its your duty to buy it cant last forever.

I didnt say anything about Harleys!! But I like watching that walruss looking bloke with the wimpy sons on Orange county choppers on National Geographic.

Raggi_Thor

09-16-2006, 03:46 AM

Maybe Europe has a much denser population than Africa, but I don't remember seeing many Europeans with distended bellies, skeletal arms, flies crawling in and out of their mouths and across their 1000 yard stare eyeballs. ..

Maybe we are bit off topic, but I think it's important to remember that the problem for (most of) Africa is poverty, not too much people. People starve because they don't have money to buy food, not because there is no food.

westlawn5554X

09-16-2006, 04:54 AM

New World Saver LIfestyle:

1. Use slide ruler for calculator, batteries create chemical waste.
2. Grow you own wheat and strange vegetable, use your own waste, good cycle.
3. Use bicycle, save fuel and less pollution.
4. Listen to radio with hand handle charger, no TV... full of pollution news anyway.
5. Use insect net, no pest spray use.
6. Cut your hair bald, save money and chemical pollution from soap and shmpoo.
7. Dont use condom, dangerous suggestion but save the world, less population due to infection and no rubber condom turn into chewing gums:D

Third world countries used to be effecient until the world teach them new advance pollution tricks.

Anymore guys?

There is always a trade off somewhere:D:D:D

Cheers

Figgy

09-16-2006, 05:17 AM

Now this thread is getting good! Are humans to blame? I dont think it matters much now. Like I said in the other thread, its a moot point. Instead of trying to figure out whos fault it is, we should figure out how to fix the problem, at least delay it. We have a moral obligation to future generations to really get that ball rolling.

ron17571

09-16-2006, 12:01 PM

Jack im a truck driver and like diesels.I kinda liked them big Cadilacs,but theyve been replaced by big SUV,s and other gas guzzlers,i see them everyday,youd think people had money to burn.Pickup trucks are very popular here,but most people have no real use for them.Some kinda macho crap,mabe alota men trying to compansate for a lack of size downstairs.

ron17571

09-16-2006, 12:07 PM

Figgy for me its a matter of what is really needed,i see people driving big gas guzzling pickup trucks with knothing in the bed,i hear in canada pickup trucks are registered as commercial vehicles.Housing is silly also,they build what i call McMansions,big houses with two ac units,big energy hogs.Vehicles and housing should be smaller and more efficient.

stonebreaker

09-16-2006, 03:50 PM

In the short term, it's perfectly fair. In the long term, it may not be fair to smaller up-and-coming countries. However, if the quotas are kept low enough and continually reduced in order to keep the price artificially high, then it could indeed serve its purpose of reducing emissions with a minimal effect on the free-market economy.

As I see it...up-and-coming countries, or old countries, will invest in new technology to avoid using high-priced quotas... which will then improve the environment and drive down the cost of the quotas.... at which time some of the quotas ought to be taken away in order to inflate the price again, thereby driving more R&D into the reduction of CO2... until eventually everything is clean.

The "prize", the lowest cost provider of widgets, will be the people who are the first to reduce the cost of reducing their CO2 output.

I can't say that's a fair system as America has a LOT of scientists and stuff while smaller countries have relatively few... but at least the system encourages innovation and creativity as the path to making money. That's at least a free market approach... and far better than raping the environment, IMO.Actually, I see the CO2 quotas as an economic control, similar to the prime interest rate. For those of you not familiar with it, in the USA the Federal Reserve sets the prime interest rate. It's the primary tool the government has for economic control. When the economy is too slow, the Fed lowers the interest rate, making it cheaper to borrow money; when it's growing too fast, the Fed raises interest rates. It's not a perfect system because there is some lag, but it does eliminate the peaks and valleys - we've never had another Great Depression, and it's primarily because of the Fed controlling the interest rate.

The kyoto protocol is a similar economic control tool. By manipulating quotas, the UN will be able to apply control pressures to the various world economies. From an American viewpoint, that is unacceptible. We would be placing our economic health in the hands of foreigners. I don't like a lot of things Bush does, but keeping us out of that charlie foxtrot was the best thing he could have done.

Frosty

09-16-2006, 10:26 PM

Co2 emission is not like interest rates!!!!!,-- you always need an interest rate, we do not need to manufacture Co2.
I cant wait for Co2 emissions to be brought to zero I hav'nt a clue how we can do it and I am sure it wont be in my life time.You would think that it would'nt be such a big problem. After all the big picture is get rid of the internal combustion engine!. Im not sure just how much the thousands of planes in the sky contribute to it.

Oh what a sweet day that will be--Sorry Mr Arab we dont use oil any more,----

stonebreaker

09-16-2006, 10:57 PM

Sorry Mr Arab we dont use oil any more,----
I'm looking forward to that one myself.

Raggi_Thor

09-17-2006, 03:11 AM

I don't remember the name but one US professor and adviser(?) said that you need a new "Manhattan project" to develop new sources of energy and stop importing oil. He was reasoning politically, not environmentally.

safewalrus

09-17-2006, 09:56 AM

Hey Figgy you got one important thing right there - who cares whose fault it is/was! the thing is how (if at all possible, which I doubt) are we going to fix it?

SamSam

09-17-2006, 01:10 PM

Maybe we are bit off topic, but I think it's important to remember that the problem for (most of) Africa is poverty, not too much people. People starve because they don't have money to buy food, not because there is no food.

Yes, there is enough food in the world to feed everyone, for the moment. It sort of seems though, like the way the U.S. gov. is being run, with massive debts piling up, with seemingly insurmountable problems down the road to add to it (Soc. Security, baby boomers retiring, etc.). The earth's resources are being borrowed now to pay for feeding and supporting the hordes, but there is no way to repay that debt. Food is being grown in dirt that took millions of years to establish, but is being washed down to the sea in decades. There is a 'theory' afloat that the oceans have been abused so badly that they (it) are not just polluted, but might actually be sick, much like animals become. It only takes decades for what used to be trash fish, such as orange roughy, to become the main fish to catch, as other species become extinct or thinned out.
The poll is too limiting, I don't believe it is just one or the other, it is both. But to have the power to do something about it and do nothing but keep contributing to the problem seems pretty lame for a supposed 'advanced' species. To think there won't be a problem with too many people supported by a shifting, changing, possibly collapsing natural system, is wrong.

Alright. Don't like democracy? Then let's start a revolution. Everybody chant with me...
TOOT FOR EMPEROR!!!!! TOOT FOR EMPEROR!!!!!!!
And to assure my post, if elected emperor for life, I hereby do promise to do something about global warming. :)

It does have it's limitations. One person, one vote seems to be distilling the US into mediocracy. Dumbing down perpetuates itself. Narrow mindedness about things coupled with excess religion, greed, nationalism, patriotism make for dubious government and an unsafe situation. Sam

Figgy

09-17-2006, 01:20 PM

Excess greed and nationalism, fine. But please tell me how this God fearing, red-blooded American is helping make for a "dubious government"?

safewalrus

09-17-2006, 04:28 PM

BillyDoc

09-17-2006, 04:52 PM

Hey Figgy,

"And they shall be judged by the fruits of their labors."

You can see what our "God Fearing" "Faith Based" government has brought to the world in just a few years:

Torture.
Wars of aggression (clearly war crimes)
Mass murder of civilians and children
Massive theft via conquest
Detention without the benefit of a court review
Listening to your phone without a court order
Habeaus Corpus out the window
Massive election fraud
The death of almost 3000 AMERICAN servicemen and women in pursuit of a criminal war . . .

Do ya catch my drift?

And Safe,

I am a long term "Librul" who actually thinks that fair play for all is a good idea . . . and I agree with you completely about earning the right to vote. When I become Emperor I plan to make having a child an earned right as well. Too many ignorant God-Fearing-rather-than-thinking individuals are breeding us into a disaster.

Let the flames begin.

BillyDoc

bntii

09-17-2006, 06:38 PM

Figgy

09-17-2006, 06:40 PM

BillyDoc-
Hey, I'm not pro-Bush, I hate the guy. And yes, more wars in the name religion bla bla bla. My question was how does a patriotic person make for a "dubious government"?
I support the troops, not the war. I love my country, but fear my govt.
I also believe in God, but for me, the two (govt. & religion) dont go hand in hand, and shouldnt either. But I'm dreaming.
But whats killing me now is your "I plan to make having a child an earned right as well" comment. Your kidding, right? I mean, to take away basic human rights is sick. Thats communist. I think what your trying to say is ****** should quit breeding, Thats cool. So we should work on our education system, not tell people how many, if any, children they can have.

Frosty

09-17-2006, 09:35 PM

Lets really make this political - one person, one vote - never heard such a load of cr**! To have a vote you should earn it! Only those who have SERVED their country should be allowed to vote in it! Ex soldiers, sailors and airmen, (both military and civil) police, medics,etc you get my drift! But the great unwashed who've never done a thing except for themselves, no chance, if you want to freeload off the state thats your problem (and the states) but to tell others who can run it? you've got to be joking! Unfortunately the liberal do-gooders of the world think they have this right! There's only one answer to them and it ain't polite - but until we get to that state we'll always be in the brown stuff
I am choked I am gasping for words -all I can think of to reply is what a load of crap. Ex sevice men? you mean soldiers and navy, you mean people that could'nt get a real job or was unemplyed and accidentaly walked past the recruitment office one saturday afternoon.

Police----- now you really got me. The most corupt power hungry I am better than you types, the people that know when they leave school at 16 that they can retire at 40 with a pension. wow what a career. Why do you want to be a poice man "Oh so that I can be above my mates and put people in prison, i will never need to tax the car and can park where i want".
You want these people to vote but people like Richard Branson wont be able ---

I suppose that also includes YOU?? You think you know better than the doctors ,stock brokers, bank managers, most of the members of parliment.
Oh well thats Cornwall for you ( thats the bottom bit with a traffic light and some sheep in it).

I got to stop Im finished!

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 01:00 AM

Co2 emission is not like interest rates!!!!!,-- you always need an interest rate, we do not need to manufacture Co2. Maybe one of these days we won't, but not so far. Until we are completely able to eliminate CO2 emissions, the quotas can be used as a limit on economic activity.

A good example of this is how the CAFE fuel regs could be used. Currently, all car companies in the USA have to meet the same fuel economy standards. However, what if Congress decided that all cars built in the USA got a 5 mpg break over imports? This would, in the short term, kill foreign auto imports because the domestic cars would be both cheaper and more powerful than the imports, and in the long run would force manufacturers to buld plants in the USA in order to compete.

The UN could easily use the CO2 quotas to artificially curb the world's most powerful economies and give a sort of affirmative action leg up to third world countries. It's bad enough that 75% of the jobs in my field are being offshored as it is; I don't need any more help going broke, thank you very much.

Toot

09-18-2006, 02:15 AM

I am choked I am gasping for words -all I can think of to reply is what a load of crap. Ex sevice men? you mean soldiers and navy, you mean people that could'nt get a real job or was unemplyed and accidentaly walked past the recruitment office one saturday afternoon.

Police----- now you really got me. The most corupt power hungry I am better than you types, the people that know when they leave school at 16 that they can retire at 40 with a pension. wow what a career. Why do you want to be a poice man "Oh so that I can be above my mates and put people in prison, i will never need to tax the car and can park where i want".
You want these people to vote but people like Richard Branson wont be able ---

I suppose that also includes YOU?? You think you know better than the doctors ,stock brokers, bank managers, most of the members of parliment.
Oh well thats Cornwall for you ( thats the bottom bit with a traffic light and some sheep in it).

I got to stop Im finished!

For what it's worth, I agree with you... I will say, however, that I wouldn't be completely against mandatory government service. I won't say it has to be military service, but if everybody did just one year of work before turning, say, forty, dedicated to whatever they do and whatever they know, the country would be in a much better place. Pick up litter at the side of the road one day a week for 5 years, pitch in to get some freeway projects done faster, join the service, whatever... If we did, people would feel that they have a lot more at stake in the government and the elections. Though I can't imagine it ever happening.

westlawn5554X

09-18-2006, 07:00 AM

Ahemm... This must be a global warming effect:) I feel warm already. Come guys back to the topic? Just choose your favourite emperor and go on with forum life:D:D:D

Frosty

09-18-2006, 07:51 AM

Toot,- I am a great believer in thinking that kids who just wont learn and go back and forth out of borstal or prison should be sent to the army. Some of the football hooligans we have in Uk are not human --but they just could be with a bit of service in them Im sure.

The magistrate courts just dont understand what they are up against. Even pshiciatrists cant handle them. Saying they need love and attention because they had trouble wth thier potty when they were 3.

Peeling potatos and washing tanks will help them

bntii

09-18-2006, 07:55 AM

Remember acid rain.

Our fearless leader at the time said that it just could not be true. It was just considered a pipedream of the liberal scientists. Any action to curb acid byproducts from our plants was felt to put us at economic disadvantage.

Mercury anyone?
Bush actually pouted on national TV when he said "its not fair, those Chinese don't need to lower emissions why should I?"

Sometimes one needs to stand up and do what is necessary.

Frosty

09-18-2006, 09:26 AM

Sometimes one needs to stand up and do what is necessary.

And whats that then bntii?

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 11:00 AM

For what it's worth, I agree with you... I will say, however, that I wouldn't be completely against mandatory government service. I won't say it has to be military service, but if everybody did just one year of work before turning, say, forty, dedicated to whatever they do and whatever they know, the country would be in a much better place. Pick up litter at the side of the road one day a week for 5 years, pitch in to get some freeway projects done faster, join the service, whatever... If we did, people would feel that they have a lot more at stake in the government and the elections. Though I can't imagine it ever happening.
This idea was put forth in a book by Robert Heinlein called "Starship Troopers". Don't judge the book by the movie, btw. Anyway, in order to make earning a vote via govt. service work, he had to make it so that anyone who wanted to, could do their service. Nice concept, but totally unworkable in practice. If for no other reason, it would just cost too much money.

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 11:44 AM

Why "unworkable in practice?" I have served in both the Navy (when the ships were wood, and the men steel . . . not like today) and also as a Peace Corps volunteer. In both cases I provided a social service for my country, and in both cases I wasn't paid very much at all! $75 per month in the Peace Corps, for example! Such service is a bargain for the society that sponsors it, and a great experience for the person doing it as well. A win-win situation for sure!

As another example, I remember reading somewhere that the WWII GI Bill which allowed so many returning veterans the chance to get an education, also allowed them to earn enough more than they otherwise would over their lifetimes to increase their taxes sufficiently to pay back the tax investment made in their education several fold. For a society to invest in it's members is very similar in practice to a manufacturer investing in better tools. Both usually pay back the investment with a profit.

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 12:26 PM

Why "unworkable in practice?"
Partly because of the cost - you'd need huge numbers of employees to monitor all these new voters, for one thing. There are 4 million people turning 18 every year in the United states, which, if all they did was pick up trash along the highway one day a week in groups of 20 for a year, means you'd need 40,000 govt employees just to supervise them. I don't know what the total cost would be, but looking at the government's budget for the coming year, even the Small Business Administration cost over 18 billion to run. I figure you would need something similar to the Department of Education, which required 25 billion to run. Even to the United States, that ain't chicken feed.

Then there's the fact that you'd never, ever get it written into the Constitution. Good luck figuring out how you'd ever get that one passed in Congress.

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 12:34 PM

So Stonebreaker,

You're saying that even the trivial pay we give our servicemen and women is not worth the cost of the service they provide?

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 12:37 PM

So Stonebreaker,

You're saying that even the trivial pay we give our servicemen and women is not worth the cost of the service they provide?
OK, you lost me there...:confused:

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 01:29 PM

Toot

09-18-2006, 02:23 PM

So it boils down to a very simple question: DO YOU THINK THAT THE TAX MONEY YOU PAY TO OUR SERVICEMEN AND WOMEN IS NOT WORTH THE MONEY SPENT FOR THE SERVICE RENDERED? This is what it certainly seems to me that you are saying, but I could be wrong. Please clarify, if you would.

I'll clarify for him. That's a loaded question.

How many people are in, say, the Navy? Let's say 10,000 just to keep the numbers simple. The value of the service, naturally, should be more than the cost of the service. This is true in any job. McDonald's employees make what they make because they make more money for their employer than they are paid. Associate lawyers, intern doctors, cops, etc., all must be worth more than they are paid, otherwise the job wouldn't exist.

Anyway, the value, per "employee" in a 10,000-man Navy is MUCH greater than the value per "conscriptee" in a 250,000 man Navy.

There is certainly something to be said for the efficiency of smaller numbers.

But on the other hand, some services will never seem to be worth their investment. We could have had class 5 levees around New Orleans years ago. And, had we done so, but for Katrina, it would NOT have been worth the investment. It's insurance, really. And insurance is NEVER worth the investment....

Uhhh... That is.... until something really bad happens. ;)

Similarly, the Navy is a complete and utter waste of money. (until something bad happens). Putting a dollar figure on "something bad happening" is right nigh close to impossible until the situation presents itself.

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 02:38 PM

OK Toot, you and I seem to agree that the value received from our servicemen and women is greater than the cost. But who said anything about conscription? I know I volunteered, and I thought that everyone in our current service did as well.

And exactly how is my question "loaded?" Stonebreaker has been pretty plain in saying that the cost of sponsoring public service is too much for him. He would rather keep those taxes in his pocket, I suppose. Isn't my question simple enough for a direct answer? Or is it a case of "well, except for this" or "except for that" and other misdirection?

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 02:38 PM

I'm so sorry Stonebreaker! It's such a difficult concept, I know. So let me try again.

Safewalrus made the suggestion above that it might be a good idea if members of a society earned the right to vote in their society by making an actual contribution to it first. Right, got that part.

He suggested military service as a way to do this. There could be many other ways as well, obviously. YOU seem to be saying that this is a bad idea because it is too expensive. I was merely asking you to affirm or deny the idea as applied to servicemen and women . . . which is where we started with this bit of off-topic-ness.

So it boils down to a very simple question: DO YOU THINK THAT THE TAX MONEY YOU PAY TO OUR SERVICEMEN AND WOMEN IS NOT WORTH THE MONEY SPENT FOR THE SERVICE RENDERED? This is what it certainly seems to me that you are saying, but I could be wrong. Please clarify, if you would.

BillyDoc

Ah, now I see where you're coming from. No, you're idea is unworkable. You cannot deny anyone in America the right to vote, if they so choose to earn that right. The Department of Defense would thus be forced to accept any citizen who wished to earn their right to vote. That's impossible to accomplish for several reasons:

1) Financial. Even assuming only half of the graduating seniors each year chose to enter the military in order to earn the right to vote, that's still 2,000,000 enlistees a year the military would have to deal with - and they couldn't reject ANY of them, for ANY reason. The DOD only recruited about 240,000 enlisted people last year, and that includes the reserves. That means you'd be increasing the size of the military in this country by 7 or 8 times. We'd need to put wheelchair ramps on all the tanks, too. Remind me again how much it costs to train one soldier?

2) Political. It stands to reason that the half of the population that would choose to not earn their voting rights would be moderates - those people who do not feel strongly one way or the other. Hard rights and hard lefts, on the other hand, would ALL do their service. The country is too radicalized as it is - it would only get worse.

3) Social. You would effectively be creating a class system. If only veterans could vote, it stands to reason then that only veterans could hold public office. You now have a class of citizens with full rights and another class with only partial rights. You'd have to put a tachometer on Martin Luther King's grave.

4) And I haven't even gone into what the rest of the world would think about us enlarging our military by 7 or 8 times...

Toot

09-18-2006, 02:57 PM

stonebreaker- BillyDoc isn't saying that military service would be the only way. I think that, like me, he is thinking more along the lines of "public service" rather than military service. At least, I think that's what he's thinking.

For example, when I was in High School, I was required to do some community Service. I volunteered one day a week at a shelter for battered women (I always thought they'd be tastier deep-fried, than simply battered, but that's another debate for another time...). So, conceivably, this volunteer work would be applied to my "service requirement" of, say, 2000 hours. I could simply do that for 5 years and fulfill my 1 years service requirement. Or do a stint in the Peace Corps, or military or whatever. Heck, it wouldn't even have to cut into your life too much. Think about this- it's only four summers. You could do it during high school and be eligible to vote before your eighteenth birthday. Or during college. Or whatever.

I also spent some time at a raptor rehabilitation clinic. Presumeably their internship program (minimally paid) would also count toward the service requirement.

Things along those lines would all count, at least how I envision it. But I agree with you that the administration costs and various "constitutional issues" would be insurmountable here in the real world.

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 03:07 PM

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 03:08 PM

Exactly right Toot, if Stonebreaker will read my post carefully he will also find the statement:

There could be many other ways as well, obviously.

But since the "military service" example is a very common one, and indeed the one originally posed, why not simply answer the question:

DO YOU THINK THAT THE TAX MONEY YOU PAY TO OUR SERVICEMEN AND WOMEN IS NOT WORTH THE MONEY SPENT FOR THE SERVICE RENDERED?

A simple "yes" or "no" will do, Stonebreaker, why not give it a try?

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 03:14 PM

Exactly right Toot, if Stonebreaker will read my post carefully he will also find the statement:

But since the "military service" example is a very common one, and indeed the one originally posed, why not simply answer the question:

A simple "yes" or "no" will do, Stonebreaker, why not give it a try?

BillyDocLet me put it this way: My son is 17. He will be enlisting in the Air Force when he graduates next year. He's my only son. Don't question my, or my family's, patriotism again.

Toot

09-18-2006, 03:19 PM

OK Toot, you and I seem to agree that the value received from our servicemen and women is greater than the cost. But who said anything about conscription? I know I volunteered, and I thought that everyone in our current service did as well.

I put "conscription" in quotes. If there were a mandatory service requirement that could be completed through the Navy, then it would be borderline conscription. Not exactly the same as conscription, mind you, but it would be similar. That's why I put it in quotes.

And exactly how is my question "loaded?" Stonebreaker has been pretty plain in saying that the cost of sponsoring public service is too much for him. He would rather keep those taxes in his pocket, I suppose. Isn't my question simple enough for a direct answer? Or is it a case of "well, except for this" or "except for that" and other misdirection?

It's really not a simple question. It's like insurance. Is insurance worth the cost? No. It never is worth the cost. Unless you need it.

As I alluded to before, sometimes value isn't the proper measure of worth.

Toot

09-18-2006, 03:22 PM

Stonebreaker isn't saying that the cost of sponsoring public service is too much for him. He's saying that the cost of keeping tabs on 4,000,000 "NEW ENLISTEES" each year is too much. And I tend to agree with him, although, like anything, it's mostly a matter of how such a program would be conceived and whatnot. If you interfaced it with existing programs, it might be easier than starting from scratch, for example, requiring "public service" to be performed for verified 501(c)(3) charities, rather than inventing a new classification and maybe running the requirement through high schools (who would be given added funding), rather than creating a whole new branch of government.

But you think people cheat a lot on their taxes? I would imagine that the "public service" requirement could be much much worse....

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 03:26 PM

Let me put it this way: My son is 17. He will be enlisting in the Air Force when he graduates next year. He's my only son. Don't question my, or my family's, patriotism again.

The question concerned the value of public service, not patriotism. Calling upon patriotism is merely another misdirection. Why won't you answer this simple question?

DO YOU THINK THAT THE TAX MONEY YOU PAY TO OUR SERVICEMEN AND WOMEN IS NOT WORTH THE MONEY SPENT FOR THE SERVICE RENDERED?

Toot

09-18-2006, 03:30 PM

Well hell, if you're so hung up on it, then I'll answer.

The money paid to our service(wo)men is well spent. However, the money spent on new technology, the ability to project power, the money paid to civilian contractors, and the money paid to the bureaucracy may, indeed, be outrageous... depending on your political point of view.

I have never heard anyone say that servicemen are overpaid. Some people would say, however, that our military is grossly overpowered and meddles too much in the affairs of other countries. But, sadly, that's a political issue more than a social one.

BillyDoc

09-18-2006, 04:10 PM

I appreciate your input, Toot, and I agree with everything you said. Our servicemen are regularly called upon to put their very lives in harms way, for damn little in return! Our current administration, has even cut back on what little there was . . . but that is off the subject.

Stonebreaker seems to think that paying for such service is too expensive, and by using the "servicemen and women" example I think perhaps he has realized that he may have been dead wrong. He apparently doesn't want to admit it, though. In my mind our servicemen and women are a bargain beyond compare, and no doubt about it.

And I think that most of us who have been over that ground would also say that the bargain goes both ways. I wasn't paid enough to matter when in the service, in dollars, but was extremely well paid in experience, camaraderie, a feeling of accomplishment, and even that irrational concept: patriotism. I had a similar experience in the Peace Corps; where a superficial person might think I was “giving,” in actual fact I received far more . . . just not in dollars.

And those of you who paid taxes to support my Navy and Peace Corps experiences got a good deal too. First, I devoted years of my life to making our homeland safe from those who would do us harm, and second by acting as your ambassador to the world. I served as your representative in Africa for almost three years. I like to think that there are quite a few people there with fond memories of my stay, which reflects well upon you too. You really got a bargain on that one. And so did I!

I think that there is in most of us a tendency to want to help others, to be a member of a society. We find it very difficult to just walk by someone in need because helping would be “inconvenient.” And because we help, we gain ourselves. You can ask almost any question on this Board, and someone, usually someone quite knowledgeable, will try to answer it. This is why I think that making public service positions available in one way or another (and I would love it if they didn't have to be military) is an extremely good investment in our society. It is cheap by any measure, when you consider the benefits accrued against the costs. And one reward that would promote such a system is the privilege of voting. After all, do you think that society as a whole benefits by allowing some of it's decision makers to only take, but not contribute? Perhaps I am unduly optimistic, but I think that by far the greater number of our members are “givers” rather than “takers.” Making public service positions available is a way that we as a society give to those individuals, and will thus facilitate their ability to give right back. A good deal all around.

BillyDoc

stonebreaker

09-18-2006, 09:35 PM

Vega

09-19-2006, 06:15 AM

Hah. You wish. Considering our current defense budget is a third of our annual budget, ...

Jesus...Is this true?:rolleyes:

Figgy

09-19-2006, 06:31 AM

Does that shock you, Vega? Of all the stuff you hear about the U.S., this cant come as a suprise.

Vega

09-19-2006, 07:49 AM

Does that shock you, Vega? Of all the stuff you hear about the U.S., this cant come as a suprise.

I knew that was big, by European standards, but that big? I really didn't imagine it possible.

I am not an USA citizen and it is not my business, but its hard to understand how American citizens approve that...and that's all I am going to say. I really don't want to talk about Politics here.

BillyDoc

09-19-2006, 09:10 AM

Most of us DON'T approve of it Vega, but our Fascist Leaders insist on it so their Corporate Owners will keep paying them their meager stipend out of their war profits. Our system is now completely out of control here. I hope you do better than we have there in Europe.

stonebreaker

09-19-2006, 11:07 AM

BillyDoc

09-19-2006, 03:53 PM

The denial industry

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1875762,00.html

Excerpts:

"For years, a network of fake citizens' groups and bogus scientific bodies has been claiming that science of global warming is inconclusive. They set back action on climate change by a decade. But who funded them?"

"ExxonMobil is the world's most profitable corporation. Its sales now amount to more than $1bn a day. It makes most of this money from oil, and has more to lose than any other company from efforts to tackle climate change. To safeguard its profits, ExxonMobil needs to sow doubt about whether serious action needs to be taken on climate change. But there are difficulties: it must confront a scientific consensus as strong as that which maintains that smoking causes lung cancer or that HIV causes Aids."

"The website Exxonsecrets.org, using data found in the company's official documents, lists 124 organisations that have taken money from the company or work closely with those that have. These organisations take a consistent line on climate change: that the science is contradictory, the scientists are split, environmentalists are charlatans, liars or lunatics, and if governments took action to prevent global warming, they would be endangering the global economy for no good reason. The findings these organisations dislike are labelled 'junk science'. The findings they welcome are labelled 'sound science'."

"By funding a large number of organisations, Exxon helps to create the impression that doubt about climate change is widespread. "

"While they have been most effective in the United States, the impacts of the climate-change deniers sponsored by Exxon and Philip Morris have been felt all over the world. I have seen their arguments endlessly repeated in Australia, Canada, India, Russia and the UK. By dominating the media debate on climate change during seven or eight critical years in which urgent international talks should have been taking place, by constantly seeding doubt about the science just as it should have been most persuasive, they have justified the money their sponsors have spent on them many times over. It is fair to say that the professional denial industry has delayed effective global action on climate change by years, just as it helped to delay action against the tobacco companies."

BillyDoc

Figgy

09-19-2006, 04:01 PM

I saw a bumper sticker yesterday;
Love your environment, uproot a Bush.

Vega

09-19-2006, 04:32 PM

"We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth."

We are living in an increasingly lush environment of plants and animals as a result of the carbon dioxide increase. Our children will enjoy an Earth with far more plant and animal life than that with which we now are blessed. This is a wonderful and unexpected gift from the Industrial Revolution."

:rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

http://environment.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,,1875762,00.html#article_continue

yotphix

09-19-2006, 06:01 PM

About the only evidence I have ever encountered that says there is a true consensus of unbiased experts that Global Warming is in fact real is the continued insistance of a few organizations through press releases that there is consensus! Are these the same folks who earlier this year claimed an el Nina here on the west coast which has now transformed into an el nino? Or the same folks who by consensus warned us that the 2005 hurricane season was a result of global warming and that we could expect the trend to continue? Sorry folks but long term climate prediction is like political science, economics and yachting! Just fun ways to waste time and spend money!

Toot

09-19-2006, 06:19 PM

I knew that was big, by European standards, but that big? I really didn't imagine it possible.

I am not an USA citizen and it is not my business, but its hard to understand how American citizens approve that...and that's all I am going to say. I really don't want to talk about Politics here.

Simple Economics. During the Depression, when people were the poorest, we instituted a number of Public Works Projects through organizations such as the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). These groups were given bold projects to complete and a large bankroll to get them done. For workers, they hired young unemployed and healthy men who gave a year (or a few years, I'm not sure exactly how it worked) of service in exchange for a steady paycheck in a time of great uncertainty.

The result of the projects were multifold- The U.S. got great things accomplished that would not otherwise have been done; tens of thousands of jobs were created; Those jobs put money into peoples' pockets and that money was then spent, which spurred economic growth.

When you listen to economists talk, you realize that one of the best things for an economy (if not for personal financial stability) is to spend spend spend. When an economy spends money, it's value is increased over and again. If I earn ten dollars and give ten dollars to a shop keeper for some meat and the shopkeeper gives $8 to a distributer who gives $6 to a farmer, then the ten dollars of pay has created $24 of income and the U.S. economy has grown by $24. But if I pocket that $10, then the economy hasn't grown at all.

So, spending is good (economically speaking). And spending is exactly what will happen when people are poor and need goods to support a given comfort level, and the poorer they are, the MORE of their paycheck they will spend in order to be more comfortable (Maslow's Hierarchy of needs). What does this have to do with national defense?

Well, Military Spending is one of the few areas where nearly ALL of the money is spent within the United States. We don't buy foreign aircraft, we don't buy foreign guns, or foreign missiles. Every dollar spent in the United States is pumped into the United States' economy. In other words, the large military spending sounds extreme, but in actuality, it isn't that bad because it helps spur economic growth. In other words, our overall economic health is increased by spending the money in a way which supports American workers and American business. It's not as good as hiring unskilled laborers who need a roof over their head, but hiring extra blue-collar production workers and engineers nevertheless does have a dramatic income on GDP.

I'm not saying it's right. I'm not saying it's a wise use of resources. However, I will say that, as I see it, defense spending is a lot like "public works projects" from an economics standpoint.

yotphix

09-19-2006, 06:25 PM

All cool if you don't have to borrow all the money you're spending. Eventually that money has to get paid back.

bntii

09-19-2006, 06:25 PM

The denial industry

BillyDoc

Not the only front in the disinformation campaign.

Take a look at the nut cases who promote abiotic oil theory for a real laugh.

Toot

09-19-2006, 06:41 PM

All cool if you don't have to borrow all the money you're spending. Eventually that money has to get paid back.

Not exactly. Ever hear of a guy named Alan Greenspan? He, and most other leading economists say that when your economy is weak, you should borrow money. In order to borrow money, you lower interest rates. Fortunately, the government controls interest rates, so they can easily make borrowing quite attractive. And then, when the economy is strong, you raise interest rates in order to control inflation. Raising interest rates makes the money you borrowed at a lower interest rate "cheaper" to pay back.

So for this to make sense economically, you have to appreciate that the modern american economists are predicting a strengthening U.S. economy in years to come. Notice, interest rates recently rose in the U.S.. This is telling us that the economy is improving. When Bush started the war? Interest rates were down in the dumps. In other words, the war has had a positive effect on GDP and it is being reflected in the economy (the war is NOT the only cause, but it is one cause of many, including the absence of further terror strikes on US soil).

Remember, a few years ago, there was actually talk that the U.S. could fall into a depression. The problem is, you can only lower interest rates so much. Afterall, you can't PAY people to take money. So as the interest rate approaches 0%, you are in a depression. So what happened? Military spending (spending money within the United States) rose dramatically. The problem though, is that the work has to have an "output". We didn't need any more roads (although some in Chicago could certainly stand to be repaved). So we projected the "work" into a war.

Now, I am not so cynical as to say that Bush started this war for economic reasons, although I'm sure some liberals would take what I've said and run with it. However, I do believe that the war was a convenient application of economic principles and that, had the U.S. economy been stronger at the time, we would not have invaded Iraq. That doesn't, of itself, make the Iraq War right or wrong in my mind- it simply made it feasible. Again, liberals might say it was the justification and I suppose they are entitled to their opinion. Personally, I won't get into that debate because there are no clear answers and a hell of a lot of opinions. I'm just sticking to the economics of the issue and the cold-hearted economics say that the military spending and projection of power were very good things for the U.S. economy.

And, how's this for a thought? Should Iraq stabilize over the next ten years, the United States' economy will grow significantly stronger as a result of the stabilization. However, if we pull out, there will be a mini-depression. In order to pull out, politically, either party will have to be in a position where the U.S. economy can afford to do so. That means, we need to see HUGE interest rates (indicating high economic growth and low unemployment) before we can pull out without hurting our economy.

yotphix

09-19-2006, 06:57 PM

Toot

09-19-2006, 07:07 PM

Not sure if this now constitutes a hijacked forum but I'm curious now. How do you define a strong economy and how will it affect all of the people who have borrowed monstrous sums to purchase overvalued property at unusually low interest rates over the last couple of years.

Well, housing prices have increased faster than interest rates. So the people who have borrowed cheap money are profiting off their mortgage- the interest they are paying over the term of the loan is less than their home's appreciation. Even if the housing boom ends (and many real estate people will say the bubble has burst, or is about to), homes still appreciate. Rarely, if ever, do homes/land lose value- afterall, that's partly tied to inflation (which is a constant in even a marginally-functioning economy) and it's partly tied to the population (which, of course, is constantly expanding). So, if/when the bubble bursts, what you are going to see is home appreciation going from 10+% a year, down to maybe 2 or 3% at the worst. Most of the cheap loans were around 4%, IIRC, though some were even less. So, really, even worst-case scenario, they will lose about 1% which is really not all that significant on a purchase of $80,000 to $1,000,000 or so, given the use of the home for 30 years- it works out to an $800 (on an $80K home) to $10,000 (on a $1mil home) loss per year. And that is really the WORST case scenario. I don't think it's likely at all. So, realistically, it will have no effect on people with existing mortgages and, most likely, unless the bursting bubble is dramatic, they will still gain a net benefit from their mortgage. And, if the economy gets REALLY bad and we find ourselves in a depression, the home-owners can have reasonable confidence that their Government will lower interest rates ("Greenspan", again) in order to spur the economy. That will make refinancing a viable option for them and, again, limit the potential loss on their investment. So really, there's hardly any downside at all. Even people who buy a home when interest rates are 10% or more, can take advantage of refinancing should the economy go down the tubes... so you really don't have very much risk there at all, regardless of when you buy. I'm hazy on this detail, but I think I was told by a lender that mortgage refinancing makes sense when the interest rate you can get is 1.5% less than your present interest rate. So that's the absolute worst case scenario. There's no other investment in the known universe with so little downside risk that you can still sleep in and raise a family in.

I would say that a strong economy has the following characteristics- Low Unemployment and high GDP. High GDP, of course is variable based upon the respective economy, but can generally be characterized as low savings with a high reinvestment (or spending) of income.

SamSam

09-19-2006, 07:52 PM

Most of the cheap loans were around 4%, IIRC, though some were even less.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/285275_trahant17.html

"What stands out in this housing boom is that average U.S. housing prices grew three times faster than disposable incomes.

How could that be? It became easier to tap into loans with adjustable rate mortgages or ARMS.

"Over 30 percent of all conventional mortgages closed in 2004 and 2005 were ARMs. The ARM share moderated to 25 percent by the second quarter of 2006," Brown said.

But among poorer-credit borrowing, or subprime loans, Brown said, "the share of ARMs was far higher, closer to 80 percent."

In other words: Eighty percent of the loans of the people who can least afford a house are facing enormous risk, escalating payments and possible defaults.

On top of that, a lot of loans were interest-only or worse, fixed payment plans that increased the principal owed on a house.

Brown said it's difficult to measure how many of these loans are out there -- but they "appear to have made as much as 40 to 50 percent of all loans securitized by private issuers of mortgage-backed securities during 2004 and 2005."

The FDIC economist says there are only two possible outcomes: A period of stagnation and weak housing prices or a sharp decline in housing prices "with severe adverse consequences for homeowners, lenders and the real estate sector as a whole."

Toot

09-19-2006, 08:06 PM

Yes. The poor were often set up with ARMs that may royally screw them. However, note that the stat is "80% of poorer-credit borrowers", not "80% of loans". So that stat is very hard to quantify, but I will do so using very generous estimates.

What effect will the collapse of poor peoples' ARM-mortgages have? Well, really it depends on when the home was bought. For early loans, it's going to be just fine because, as you noted, housing prices were skyrocketing. So even if one day they turn around and can't make the payments, the appreciation ought to more than take care of them. Even if we see a few percent decline in value, the enormous previous increases will ensure that the early adopters come out of this just fine.

The later adopters- the people jumping to ARMs in the past 12 months or so- may be in some trouble. But remember. Most mortgages are 30 years. So the past 12 months of mortgages account for about 3.3% of the mortgages out there. Ok, let's say 6% of mortgages out there, since obviously we were still in a bit of a bubble/boom.

So the "at risk" group is about 6% of mortgages. But not 6% of ALL mortgages, just those people with poor credit. Let's say half of the total have poor credit (and I think that's a generous estimate since some people in the lower half ought to be classified as "average", don't you think?). So that's 3% of mortgages that are at risk of collapsing at some point in the future, but only 80% of them have ARMs, so that's 2.4% at risk. That's not 2.4% that will collapse, they are only the additional number, on top of whatever the traditional historical number is, that might collapse. So based on this, it's reasonable to assume the default rate will not increase by more an additional 2.4%. HOWEVER, there's more mitigating factors....

What group of people, traditionally, are the least likely to own homes? Young people who haven't bought one yet. So who ought to have the majority of the ARM's out there? Young People. And who is more likely to have significant increases in their earnings over the next few years? Young people. I'm not going to add this to my analysis because I don't have the figures to quantify it, but I'll leave it out there as another reason that the ARM-collapse isn't going to be as drastic as many people think.

So my ballpark estimate is that 2.4% of the market are "at risk". Even without the mitigating effects of salary increases for young people, given that increase in GDP and population increase are both above this number, I don't think the ARM problem is enough of an impetus to cause a longterm downtrend in the market.

Omno

09-20-2006, 07:34 PM

Yet when other people point out that the recent rise in global temps is part of a millenias-long rise in temps as the earth has come out of the last ice age

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png

and that there was a solar-induced Little Ice Age from the 1400's to about 1850, and from the 1000's to the 1300's the earth was actually warmer than it is now

There was a solar-induced cold spell in the middle ages called The Little Ice Age that ended about 1850. Before that, it was actually warmer than it is today

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c1/2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

For some reason, and this makes me extremely suspicious of the climatologists, their reports all fail to address the effects of water vapor in the atmosphere

http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/268.htm
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/269.htm
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/079.htm
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/266.htm#721
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/04/water-vapour-feedback-or-forcing/

yotphix

09-21-2006, 12:10 AM

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 12:28 AM

Omno,

The last graph you posted to refute me actually shows a greater deviation from 0 in the negative direction during the little ice age than the current hot trend; and the Holocene graph shows historic short term fluctuations 3 times greater than the last 150 years. So the current climate warming is still within natural variations. Because of these historic records, scientists will have to prove an actual link between CO2 emissions and the current warming trend, not just point to circumstancial evidence.

yotphix

09-21-2006, 02:41 AM

Was that meant to refute you? I looked at that and thought he was trying to show how the data simply can't conclusively show anything regarding global warming. Well ok, it does show that it has gotten warmer since the environmental movement was spurred into existance by concerns over global cooling:)

Toot

09-21-2006, 03:22 AM

Ok Toot, I follow you. Now excusing my ignorance if you would;
Are the balance of the mortgages fixed at rates for long terms?Like decades?
Or are they fixed for terms like one to five years.? I vaguely remember the real estate bubble that burst in about 1990 resulting in property values dropping as much as 25 percent almost overnight and taking years to rebound. Even more vaguely I remember interest rates in the double digits about 10 or fifteen years before that. Is that simply not possible anymore?

We have gotten gleefully of-topic now, but I feel that may be my true calling in life. :)

ARMs usually have a period during which they are fixed. That period is maybe 1-10 years. It could be shorter, could be longer, of course. After that, they will fluctuate based upon LIBOR, the London Interbank Offered Rate. Don't ask me what London has to do with it, I don't know much about it, but basically, it's the "market rate" for interbank lending. Obviously, the more your bank has to pay to borrow money, the more they are going to charge you (the consumer/borrower) to get it. So you'll typically be charged LIBOR plus some additional percentage after your fixed term has ended.

If the going rate has dropped since then, it's no big deal at all, you simply refinance at the new lower rate and move happily along with a lower premium.

There is nothing preventing interest rates from climbing to 10+% in the future (except for a war and various other "issues" that are depressing the economy). That's why an ARM may screw you if the economy gets good (and interest rates rise). However, if you have a fixed mortgage, you are locked in and that variation in interest rates will not really affect you one bit.

As for property values dropping over night, you do see that in some areas. The one that springs to my mind is Flint, Michigan. When a major provider of jobs picks up and leaves, the local market gets depressed and nobody wants to buy a house there, so the market tumbles. And yes, I do think there are some markets with quite a bit of excess fat in them right now- Much of the California coast springs immediately to mind. Could they lose value quickly? Or overnight? I suppose it is possible. HOWEVER, a mortgage term is typically 30 years. A lot of things can happen in 30 years.

But if you comparing the situation surrounding Flint, MI to that in Los Angeles, CA, you will see something very clearly. Los Angeles isn't depending on one corporation to provide jobs to the community. In fact, LA is just like any other large city. In the long term, the only real worry would be something like nuclear fallout which could make their property uninhabitable or undesirable for an extended period of time. But eventually, the market WILL have to rebound because we have population growth. People will eventually need a place to live. More crowding means more demand for homes, means an increase in prices. Again, this is the long term view. But break it down into thirds, and break it down by the type of mortgage.

You've got new buyers in ARMS who would be hurt by a real estate crash. You've got new buyers with fixed mortgages who have determined that they can make the payments and nothing should change for them because their payments are fixed and predictable for them over the next 30 years.

You've got people who've owned their homes for 5-15 years or so and, even if the real estate market is cut in half, their property may still be worth more than they are paying for it, thanks to the previous bubble. And, if they are in ARMS and if the fixed-period is ending, they are still paying their mortgage based on 50% of the home's current value, so unless they bought a house twice as big as they could afford, they should do just fine. And, if they can't afford it, they can cash out- sell it- and at LEAST break even.

Then you've got the people who've owned their homes for 16+ years. These people are paying ridiculously low mortgages. My parents paid off their mortgage about 5 years ago. Their mortgage, IIRC, on a 3 bedroom brick home in Chicago was about $300 a month. The value of the home is presently about $150,000. Now, Chicago real estate hasn't gone nearly as crazy as much of the rest of the United States, but it should be pretty obvious that you can't rent ANYTHING for $300 a month. And if they were in a "hotter" real estate market, they'd only be better off. So the long-term mortgage holders won't be affected one bit. They've gotten enough appreciation over the past 15-30 years to more than weather a 50% drop in home values.

Raggi_Thor

09-21-2006, 04:48 AM

Jesus...Is this true?:rolleyes:

Remember their budget is lower than ours, because health care and other insurencies like pensions, sick leave etc, etc are mostly private :-)
US spends more money on health care per capita than we (Norway) do, but we have it in our budget and pay for it with taxes, while they pay the insurance company, that is the 2/3 of the population that have the money...

BillyDoc

09-21-2006, 09:28 AM

Good news! We can skip those Panama Canal fees! (This has nothing to do with that Liberal Global Warming Cr*p . . . of course!)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/climatewarmingarctic

Wed Sep 20, 7:18 AM ET

PARIS (AFP) - European scientists voiced shock as they showed pictures which showed Arctic ice cover had disappeared so much last month that a ship could sail unhindered from Europe's most northerly outpost to the North Pole itself.

The satellite images were acquired from August 23 to 25 by instruments aboard Envisat and EOS Aqua, two satellites operated by the European Space Agency (ESA).

Perennial sea ice -- thick ice that is normally present year-round and is not affected by the Arctic summer -- had disappeared over an area bigger than the British Isles, ESA said.

Vast patches of ice-free sea stretched north of Svalbard, an archipelago lying midway between Norway and the North Ple, and extended deep into the Russian Arctic, all the way to the North Pole, the agency said in a press release.

"This situation is unlike anything observed in previous record low-ice seasons," said Mark Drinkwater of ESA's Oceans/Ice Unit.

"It is highly imaginable that a ship could have passed from Spitzbergen or Northern Siberia through what is normally pack ice to reach the North Pole without difficulty."

Spitzbergen is one of the Svalbard islands, which are Norwegian.

Drinkwater added: "If this anomaly continues, the Northeast Passage, or 'Northern Sea Route' between Europe and Asia will be open over longer intervals of time, and it is conceivable we might see attempts at sailing around the world directly across the summer Arctic Ocean within the next 10 to 20 years."

The images are for late summer. In the last weeks, what was open water has begun to freeze, as the autumn air temperatures over the Arctic begin to fall, ESA said.

Regular satellite monitoring over the last 25 years shows that the northern polar ice cover has shrunk and thinned as global temperatures have risen.

But this year's images are unprecedented, and fierce storms that fragmented and scattered already thin pack ice may be to blame, the scientists believe.

The images were released less than a week after a paper, published in the US journal Science, found that year-round sea ice in the Arctic shrank by one seventh between 2004 and 2005.

Loss of sea ice does not affect global sea levels. Ice that floats in the water displaces its own volume.

However ice that is on land, as an icesheet, glacier or permanent snowcap, adds to sea level when it melts and runs off.

Retreating ice cover also creates a vicious circle, adding to the warming caused by greenhouse gases -- carbon emissions, mainly from fossil fuels, that trap the Sun's heat.

Ice, being white, reflects the Sun's rays. Less ice therefore means the sea warms, which in turn accelerates the shrinkage.

The shrinkage of the Arctic icecap is viewed with alarm by scientists, as it appears to perturb important ocean currents elsewhere, notably the Gulf Stream, which gives western Europe its balmy climate.

It also threaten animals such as polar bears and seals that depend on ice.

There are geopolitical implications, too, as Canada, Russia and the United States jockey to claim rights over transpolar passages that open up within their newly ice-free waters.

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 09:28 AM

Omno

09-21-2006, 02:51 PM

Omno,

The last graph you posted to refute me actually shows a greater deviation from 0 in the negative direction during the little ice age than the current hot trend

It does refute you. You specifically claimed that "from the 1000's to the 1300's the earth was actually warmer than it is now". The placement of zero is arbitary. In this case they have used the mean of recorded records.

; and the Holocene graph shows historic short term fluctuations 3 times greater than the last 150 years. So the current climate warming is still within natural variations.

This graph refuted your implication that the recent global temperature rise is part of a millenias-long rise in temperatures. Over the past 6 millenia there has actually been a long term cooling trend if anything. So the recent warming is not part of some long term warming trend. Indeed if recent warming of ~0.8C a century was just part of a 6 millenia trend we would be 48C warmer than 6000 years ago which is absurd.

The different reconstructions to not agree closely enough to provide any knowledge about short term fluctuations. But the case for much of recent warming being anthropogenic is not based on temperature being outside the range nature could push it, but that it is not explainable given recently recorded natural variation, such as solar variation.

For example if solar variation in the past had pushed temprature up and down 2C that only makes solar variation a plausible candidate for recent warming. But if recent records show solar variation has not increased enough to explain the recent rise then solar variation can be written off or made a lower priority as an explaination.

Because of these historic records, scientists will have to prove an actual link between CO2 emissions and the current warming trend, not just point to circumstancial evidence.

There is a proven physical link - co2 being a greenhouse gas causes an increased warming effect as it's concentration in the atmosphere increases.

co2 has increased by over 35% over the past 150 years. Therefore there will be a warming effect associated with that. How much is a good question, but it's hardly "circumstancial evidence" as if the whole notion of it is ridiculous.

It's not like say number of pirates vs temperature for example in which there is no physical link between number of pirates and temperature, only a correlation.

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 03:28 PM

co2 has increased by over 35% over the past 150 years. Therefore there will be a warming effect associated with that. How much is a good question, but it's hardly "circumstancial evidence" as if the whole notion of it is ridiculous.

Depends on who you believe. Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski, in a hearing before the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, I.E. in a place he could be charged with purgery if he lied, reported that climatologists cherrypicked data points and adjusted the Siple Curve timeline vs. the Mauna Loa CO2 record in order to make the "facts" fit their pet theories. Simply by showing where the climatologists cooked the data, he effectively disproved the notion that preindustrial CO2 levels were at the claimed 290 ppm, and were in fact at 328 ppm in 1890, and as it turns out the same 328 ppm were measured at Mauna Loa as late as 1973.

Here's where he pointed out that one Dr. Callendar cherrypicked data points to make the outcome match his preconcieved theory, and was later disproved by someone OTHER than Dr. Jaworowski:

http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/call2.jpg

And here is the graph depicting the ice core CO2 concentrations timeline BEFORE the data was cooked, showing the CO2 levels rising to present levels about 1850 to 1890, which coincides with coming out of the Little Ice Age:

http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/sip1a.jpg

ANNNNND...
The same data after the facts were "adjusted" by the IPCC, among others, to fit the theory:

http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/sip1b.jpg
http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/sipcap.jpg

Here's where you can get the entire report: http://www.warwickhughes.com/icecore/

Whether or not the global temperature is rising, the fact that the eco nuts are having to LIE to support their claims that humans are responsible, makes me suspicious of the whole concept. Since I've started researching this, I've gone from having no opinion to the belief that this is simply an attempt by ecologists to bypass the legitimate democratic process in order to dictate economic policy.

Toot

09-21-2006, 03:37 PM

This graph refuted your implication that the recent global temperature rise is part of a millenias-long rise in temperatures. Over the past 6 millenia there has actually been a long term cooling trend if anything. So the recent warming is not part of some long term warming trend. Indeed if recent warming of ~0.8C a century was just part of a 6 millenia trend we would be 48C warmer than 6000 years ago which is absurd.

It sure looks like a millenia-long rise to me... occuring over about 20 millenia, it seems.

http://www.ourworldfoundation.org.uk/IceCores1.gif

What is interesting in that graph though is that usually in the warm periods, the increase in temperature outpaces the increase in CO2. For the first time ever, this appears not to be the case.

Now, since the first 7,000 years of an ice core (called the "firn") tends to be somewhat open to the atmosphere allowing gassing and degassing through the not-yet-solid core, this could simply be a result of the method used to acquire the data- surely, where gassing/degassing occurs, your results will be different than when it "settles out" and becomes a solid core.

Here's something else that just caught my eye. It appears to my eye that temperatures lag CO2 on the upswing, and lead CO2 on the downswing. Does anybody else see that? If that's the case, it appears that the Earth has a self-regulating function built in.

Anyway, you will notice that the peak temperatures of *this* "heatwave" (the last 20k years) is lower than previous peaks. But the CO2 is higher. This suggests to me that the CO2 is having a regulating effect. By not declining, it is preventing the temperatures from going down into another ice age (10,000+ years from now). Further supporting this is the fact that our current "heatwave peak" has lasted about 10,000 years whereas historically they seem to have lasted about half that long. This suggests that the CO2 is actually staving off an inevitable decline in temperatures.

Seems to me that CO2 production is having a stabilizing effect on temperature swings.

BillyDoc

09-21-2006, 05:24 PM

Good one bntii!

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 05:52 PM

Nothing like an unbiased understanding.

Good work with the research. You have found exactly what you were looking for.
If you go back through this thread, I also listed biases I found at both the EPA and NOAA, as well . All I found was what was out there to find. What makes Dr. Jaworowski so compelling is that his findings are independently verifiable - all you have to do is check the original data that was altered, and you've verified for yourself whether he was telling the truth or not. You don't have to have anything interpreted.

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 07:15 PM

Yes thank you Stonebreaker. You have in fact listed the most important bias in your argument:
C'mon, bntii, surely you can muster an actual argument instead of that rather weak innuendo?

Omno

09-21-2006, 07:36 PM

Depends on who you believe. Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski, in a hearing before the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, I.E. in a place he could be charged with purgery if he lied

http://www.someareboojums.org/blog/?p=16
The hearing schedule for the Committee does not list a hearing for March 19, 2004, but it does list climate-related hearings on Jan. 8, 2003, on Nov. 16, 2004, on Sept. 15, 2004, on May 6, 2004, and on Mar. 6, 2004.
In these hearings, no mention of Jaworowski is to be found.
The Committee’s transcripts and witness lists are searchable. “Jaworowski” appears nowhere.

So no I don't believe Jaworowski. And I definitely prefer to believe the majority of scientists on the issue rather than someone who prints errors and doesn't risk putting them up for peer review.

The rest of his article is debunked here too: http://www.someareboojums.org/blog/?p=7

Here's where he pointed out that one Dr. Callendar cherrypicked data points to make the outcome match his preconcieved theory, and was later disproved by someone OTHER than Dr. Jaworowski:

Addressed here: http://timlambert.org/2005/01/hissink3/

However, if you examine Jaworowski’s graph, it is clear that most of the CO2 measurements shown on the graph are inaccurate. The measurements for 1865, for example, vary from 290 to 550 parts per million. It just isn’t possible for the CO2 concentration to change by that much in one year—the difference corresponds to about 500 billion tons of carbon which is about the same amount of carbon in all plants in the entire world. The red line I added shows the measurements of CO2 concentration taken at Mauna Loa since 1958. Notice how there are no huge year-to-year fluctuations.

So given that many of the measurements are wrong, it makes no sense to average them as Jaworowski suggests should be done. The correct procedure is discard the inaccurate measurements. Callendar discarded (Tellus X (1958 p 244):

(a) Period mean values 10% or more different from the general average of the time and region.

(b) Air samples taken in towns, because these often give 5 to 20% more CO2 than uncontaminated air.

(c) Averages depending on only a few samples, or made within a short period, because real fluctuations may exceed 10% in such cases.

(d) Measurements intended for special purposes such as biological, soil air, atmospheric pollution, etc

Jaworowski claims that rather that selecting the most accurate values, Callendar made an arbitrary selection to produce the result (increasing CO2) that he desired. Jaworowski has not a scrap of evidence for his claim and all other data supports Callendar. The green line shows measurements of CO2 concentration from ice cores at Law Dome. Notice how it agrees with the values Callendar chose and the red line of the Mauna Loa measurements. Jaworowski has an answer to this. The ice core measurements are fraudulent, as are the Mauna Loa measurements. Multiple independent ice core measurements agree with those from the Law Dome, so presumably Jaworowski believes that these are the product of a huge conspiracy as well. It should come as no surprise that Jaworowski’s theories were not published in a scientific journal, but in 21st Century, a magazine published by Lyndon LaRouche, renowned for his belief in various conspiracy theories.

Simply by showing where the climatologists cooked the data, he effectively disproved the notion that preindustrial CO2 levels were at the claimed 290 ppm, and were in fact at 328 ppm in 1890

He did no such thing though. He distorted the processes of the scientists to make it look that way. This is a classic case of skeptics trying to muddy good science.

Whether or not the global temperature is rising, the fact that the eco nuts are having to LIE to support their claims that humans are responsible, makes me suspicious of the whole concept. Since I've started researching this, I've gone from having no opinion to the belief that this is simply an attempt by ecologists to bypass the legitimate democratic process in order to dictate economic policy.

Since when have climate scientists been eco nuts? Now you know it is the skeptics like Jaworowski who are dishonest. Articles like his are an attempt to muddy the water. They sound impressive, lots of quotes and diagrams, but they the science behind them is flawed and his point is not to reach the truth at all but to hide it.

Omno

09-21-2006, 08:05 PM

It sure looks like a millenia-long rise to me... occuring over about 20 millenia, it seems.

There was a millenia long rise, but it ended about 10,000 years ago. Since then temperatures have been dropping very slightly.

What is interesting in that graph though is that usually in the warm periods, the increase in temperature outpaces the increase in CO2. For the first time ever, this appears not to be the case.

co2 isn't believed to be the trigger of interglacial warming. There is more than just temperature and co2 at work over long periods of time - astronomical factors like tilt of the earth and orbital variation come into play and solar variation.

Here's something else that just caught my eye. It appears to my eye that temperatures lag CO2 on the upswing, and lead CO2 on the downswing. Does anybody else see that? If that's the case, it appears that the Earth has a self-regulating function built in.

co2 actually lags temperature on the upswing which is very good evidence that the initial temperature rise is not caused by co2 at all. Ie co2 is not that powerful at warming to cause those large upward spikes. So the recent co2 rises are not going to cause anything near a 10C increase. The cyclic nature of it also suggests something more clockwork like some kind of cyclical orbital change.

There is some self-regulation in that the earth has fallen into a stable state. The earth has been in many different climate states in the distant past switching from one state to the other. Only recently in earth's history have we had these 125K glacial cycles for example.

Anyway, you will notice that the peak temperatures of *this* "heatwave" (the last 20k years) is lower than previous peaks. But the CO2 is higher. This suggests to me that the CO2 is having a regulating effect. By not declining, it is preventing the temperatures from going down into another ice age (10,000+ years from now). Further supporting this is the fact that our current "heatwave peak" has lasted about 10,000 years whereas historically they seem to have lasted about half that long. This suggests that the CO2 is actually staving off an inevitable decline in temperatures.

Well co2 only got that high in the past 150 years so I suspect this longer than normal 10,000 year interglacial period is just an anomoly.

stonebreaker

09-21-2006, 08:57 PM

Omno,

The problem with your quoted refutation of Jaworowski's points is that the high numbers are simply assumed by climatologists to be wrong, and dismissed out of hand, rather than going to the effort to actually prove it. In other words, the ecologist on your website agrees with Callendar, and sees no problem with his cherry-picking.

You're right, though, after checking the senate website I see that Jaworowski never actually testified before the senate committee, so I stand corrected there. BUT, a climate hearing WAS cancelled/postponed in march of 2004, according to the senate website, and doesn't list the members so it's possible he was on the list.

However, your guy fails to address the 80 year "correction" in the siple ice core data that Jaworowski pointed out, so I'm still suspicious. However, you've convinced me to look further into it.

yotphix

09-22-2006, 02:32 AM

I haven't heard anything lately about "heat island effect". Anyone know if there is current thought on it's relevance to the supposed increase in temps?

Omno

09-22-2006, 03:45 AM

Omno,

The problem with your quoted refutation of Jaworowski's points is that the high numbers are simply assumed by climatologists to be wrong, and dismissed out of hand

Clearly they are not. They dismissed for good reason:

First: The green line shows measurements of CO2 concentration from ice cores at Law Dome. Notice how it agrees with the values Callendar chose and the red line of the Mauna Loa measurements.

Second: Multiple independent ice core measurements agree with those from the Law Dome

It just isn’t possible for the CO2 concentration to change by that much in one year

However, your guy fails to address the 80 year "correction" in the siple ice core data that Jaworowski pointed out

He does. He points out that Jaworowski's claim that scientists failed to support the time lag experimentally are false. They explain it more here: http://www.someareboojums.org/blog/?p=18

At the time this paper was written, some very good research had been done showing that there is substantial mixing of air down to the firn-ice transition layer (And quite a bit more has been done since then.) Some of the most convincing evidence for this mixing, and thus for an age difference between air and ice, is the gradient in heavier isotope concentration caused by gravitational enrichment right down to the transition layer, where it levels off dramatically. Jaworowski et al. either ignore this research, or try to turn it to their purposes. They dismiss one 1982 article by Craig and Chou, saying that a 1988 article by Craig et al. had “revoked their earlier assumption” regarding the age difference. They then turn around and cite another 1988 article by Craig and a different set of collaborators, saying that the enrichment “strongly indicates that the air in porous firn is protected from convective and other motions.” So, gravitational enrichment is unreliable as an indication of how long the air has been mixing, but it is reliable as an indication that there is not much mixing?

stonebreaker

09-22-2006, 09:08 AM

bntii,

Go away and let the big boys play. Omno's a challenging debater. You're just looking for a flame war.

Toot

09-22-2006, 10:30 AM

Omno- thanks for the reply! It fun to talk about things when your "opponent" isn't resorting to calling you an idiot for disagreeing. :)

I openly state that I'm not an expert on this, but am skeptical of ALL things that I do not understand. And Global Warming falls into this category.

So you're saying that CO2 isn't causing a warming trend. You're agreeing that it's holding off another possible "ice age".

So... uhhh... what's the "trigger" for the high temps, in your opinion? Another gas? Sun spots?

bntii

09-23-2006, 07:45 AM

Is this a nod to political/public pressure to address a real concern? Or just the clamoring of more eco nuts?:

http://www.climatetechnology.gov/stratplan/final/index.htm

From the intro:

CCTP constitutes the “technology component” of a
comprehensive U.S. approach to climate change that
includes undertaking short-term actions to reduce
greenhouse gas emissions intensity, advancing climate
change science, and promoting international
cooperation. CCTP’s purpose is to accelerate the
development, and reduce the cost of, new and
advanced technologies, as well as promote the
deployment of advanced technologies and best
practices that could avoid, reduce, or capture and
store greenhouse gas emissions. CCTP was
established by President Bush to implement his
National Climate Change Technology Initiative
(NCCTI) and coordinate existing efforts. This
initiative brings to bear America’s strengths in
innovation and technology to address climate change.

yotphix

09-24-2006, 04:24 AM

Hey great news everybody! Just read that the arctic ice pack is thicker this year and global temps are down. Keep up the good work! Man you guys can solve any problem!

BillyDoc

09-26-2006, 09:41 AM

Hottest Earth in a million years

September 26, 2006 12:00am
Article from: Agence France-Presse

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,20479015-663,00.html

THE Earth's rapid warming has pushed temperatures to their hottest level in almost 12,000 years and within a hair's breadth of a million years, NASA has reported.

Global warming, which has added 0.2C a decade over the past 30 years, has caused temperatures to reach the warmest levels in the current interglacial period, which lasted almost 12,000 years, according to a study led by James Hansen, a leading climatologist at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

The study, published in the September 26 of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, said that Earth was now within about 1C of the maximum estimated temperature of the past million years.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration researcher said that was the most important finding of the team's research.

"That means that further global warming of 1 degree Celsius defines a critical level. If warming is kept less than that, effects of global warming may be relatively manageable. During the warmest interglacial periods the Earth was reasonably similar to today," Hansen said.

"But if further global warming reaches 2 or 3 degrees Celsius, we will likely see changes that make Earth a different planet than the one we know."

Hansen pointed out that the last time it was that warm was in the middle Pliocene, about three million years ago, when the sea level is estimated to have been about 25m higher than today.

The researchers recalled that a study published in 2003 by the British science journal Nature showed that 1700 varieties of plants and animal and insect species had migrated toward the North Pole at an average 6km a decade in the second half of the 20th century.

Toot

09-26-2006, 12:57 PM

So the article says that in the geologic history of the Earth, there's a precedent for these types of temperatures, we see from the charts that the temps should be rather warm right now- after all, we HAVE emerged from an "ice age", and we see that water levels used to be a lot higher, but aren't at the present moment, for reasons that aren't specified.

I will put this article in my "propoganda" file as it provides no scientific discussion about what global warming is, or how it works. :(

BillyDoc

09-27-2006, 10:47 AM

The most important result found by these researchers is that the warming in recent decades has brought global temperature to a level within about one degree Celsius (1.8°F) of the maximum temperature of the past million years. According to Hansen, "That means that further global warming of 1 degree Celsius defines a critical level. If warming is kept less than that, effects of global warming may be relatively manageable. During the warmest interglacial periods the Earth was reasonably similar to today. But if further global warming reaches 2 or 3 degrees Celsius, we will likely see changes that make Earth a different planet than the one we know. The last time it was that warm was in the middle Pliocene, about three million years ago, when sea level was estimated to have been about 25 meters (80 feet) higher than today."

Go here for the whole article: http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20060925/?print=1&1=1&2=2&3=3

Go here for the National Academy of Sciences (detailled version) of the same: http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abstracts/2006/Hansen_etal_1.html

stonebreaker

09-27-2006, 11:13 AM

resurrected

09-27-2006, 02:38 PM

I haven't really heard what I'm looking for. When and at what elevation do I buy land to take advantage of the rising ocean levels? Just thinking about a profitable retirement plan.:D :D

BillyDoc

09-27-2006, 04:34 PM

stonebreaker

09-28-2006, 04:01 PM

bananabender

10-09-2006, 06:34 AM

Having recently had a trip to the higher northern latitudes, I must agree that the glaciers are mostly in retreat, as evidenced by their terminal moraines. The lovely U-shaped glacial valleys are mostly bereft of ice, especially in areas like Norway. The point that intrigues me is the scientifically accepted fact that as little as 10-12,000 years ago these areas were under up to three to five MILES thickness of ice, with only a few Inuits and their seal fat lamps to make it melt. So who were the "guilty" parties in those pre-fossil-fuel days? And why could these prehistoric causes not still be active? To get to where we are today requires on average about a foot depth of ice melting every year... is it any faster than that now?
Like it or not, the only constant in the Earth's history is change ... life adapts to change or dies and this underlies evolution. Unfortunately we all wish things would stay like they were when we were young.... and we can forget that the human race is only really important to us!:?:

safewalrus

10-09-2006, 10:34 AM

Totally agree bananabender - there is some sense spoken in Queensland after all! :p

SteamFreak

10-17-2006, 12:28 PM

Journal: Agency blocked hurricane report

By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer Tue Sep 26, 6:54 PM ET

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration has blocked release of a report that suggests global warming is contributing to the frequency and strength of hurricanes, the journal Nature reported Tuesday.

Read the rest here: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060926/ap_on_sc/hurricane_report;_ylt=ArKN9yT.UY.aLPEll12k.Sqs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3OTB1amhuBHNlYwNtdHM-

Yep... and this season was a real gut-buster...

Read this, not for the author's comments but for the history material one previous warm and cool periods...
http://www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/reg15n2g.html

another article, just to show that there is no such thing as consensus among scientists about the issue
http://cagle.msnbc.com/news/GlobalWarmingSteigerwald/main.asp
^Especially interesting considering the person their interviewing and plays a part in my intense desire to see some serious honesty from the scientific community about the means of data collection and sorting and statistical rejection of data outside the "norm" curve.

You know Greenland was green at some point in time... hence the name... funny how its all covered in snow and ice..

Ultimately, I draw a section of my comments elsewhere to finish this post.

"You want honest dialogue? Look at every scientists' statements, separate out the "facts" they state and compare them all together... Look at the "studies" and lets see how they were conducted, what were the raw results and what analysis was applied to these results.... This is all simple stuff we all should have learned in high school. Nobody has to be a climatologist to read and discern if the methods applied to the gathering, sorting, and analyzation of facts was sound, objective and reasonable scientific method and holds true to accepted statistics preceps..

And in the end, we may just have to accept that 20 or 30 years of serious measurement isn't enough for a climate system which has year, decade, century, and millenia cycles..."

Jimbo1490

10-17-2006, 05:20 PM

Much of this really does depend on whose data you trust. We really have been in a warming trend for several thousand years as the history of glacial ice clearly shows:

9711

9712

http://www.clearlight.com/~mhieb/WVFossils/last_glacial_max.html

http://www.clearlight.com/~mhieb/WVFossils/present_interglacial.html

Unless of course you believe that glaciation is not associated with cooler temps, in which case one wonders why you would worry about the retreat of glacial ice now :confused:

Another thing that is bothersome about the GHG theory of climate change (really the CO2 theory of climate change) is that atmospheric CO2 content tracks fairly poorly with historic surface temps using reliable proxy data. Atmospheric CO2 has been much higher than it is now, and not necessarily associated with warmer temps. This suggests that there does NOT exist a cause/effect reationship between CO2 content and global temps.

Another troublesome detail is that CO2 content has been rising for a long time also, long before the industrial age:

9713

It's actually far more scientifically honest to assume that whatever caused past warming trends is likley causing this one too. Of course that assumption carries no political implications with attendant calls for adoption of draconian 'eco-socialism'. Since socialism has proven to be pretty much unsustainable economically over the long term, it should come as no shock that true believers in that system (and you all know who you are :D) have really latched on to the CO2/global warming theory since it validates/re-energizes what amounts to their pet socio-economic system, a system that has largely been abandoned by the world.

Above charts and data all came from:

http://www.clearlight.com/~mhieb/WVFossils/ice_ages.html

a site both 'believers' and skeptics should peruse.

Jimbo

harlemriverman

10-17-2006, 05:39 PM

That article is a good example of the rampant sensationalism climatologists are spouting these days...the article doesn't mention exactly what will happen when....

Well let me tell you lads what happens, and its not a pretty sight. Not a pretty sight at all! The first thing that happens is all us fat Americans that started this mess take off all our clothes. Opra too! And if that doesn't turn you into a pillar of salt, everyone migrates to the Jersey shore to drink globally warmed, British beer!!! Horrible!!!

Raggi_Thor

10-18-2006, 05:28 AM

..Another troublesome detail is that CO2 content has been rising for a long time also, long before the industrial age..

I think it's like this:
CO2 is a "climate gas", it absorbs energy of certain wavelengths,
BUT a certain amount of CO2 is able to absorb all the energy of this wavelength, we are now above this level and adding more CO2 doesn't mean more absorption.

This is my understanding of an explanation given by a professor in physics. He also adds that most of the "climate scientists" know very little of physics, thermodynamics and other "hard" subjects.

Vega

10-18-2006, 06:39 AM

I think it's like this:
CO2 is a "climate gas", it absorbs energy of certain wavelengths,
BUT a certain amount of CO2 is able to absorb all the energy of this wavelength, we are now above this level and adding more CO2 doesn't mean more absorption.

This is my understanding of an explanation given by a professor in physics. He also adds that most of the "climate scientists" know very little of physics, thermodynamics and other "hard" subjects.

Yes, concluding, Climatologists are just dumb asses and don’t know what they are talking about.

On the post38 of this thread I have posted some quotations from an article written by James E. Hansen and published in the American Scientific.

James E. Hansen is one of the world’s leading climatologists, he is the head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, which is a division of the NASA and a unit of the Columbia University Earth Institute located on the Columbia campus in New York City. Dr. Hansen was elected to the National Academy of Sciences (USA) in 1995.

Dr Hansen primary research for the past 25 years has been on studies and
computer simulations of the Earth's climate, for the purpose of understanding the human impact on global climate.

Dr Hansen has a Ph.D. in Physics, and other formal qualifications in “HARD SUBJECTS”, like a B.A. in Mathematics and a M.S. in Astronomy.

I guess that explains why “"climate scientists" know very little of physics, thermodynamics and other "hard" subjects.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hansen

Reading the content of this thread one would assume that most of the people in this forum think that Global warming has nothing to do with the increasing levels of CO2 that result from human industrialization.

But of course, that is not true. The pool results show that the vast majority thinks that human industrialization and the resulting increase in CO2 emissions is to blame.

Then, why are there so few posts defending this point of view?

I guess that the majority have understood that this is a much more complicated subject than boatbuilding and that the knowledge and the data needed to understand the whole issue is too vast to be meaningfully discussed by amateurs.

The majority has chosen to rely on the dedicated professionals that have studied the subject for a long time, and are specialized in it, the Climatologists. Those are the ones who know what they are talking about, in what refers global warming and climate change.

They are almost unanimously in saying that human activity and CO2 production is contributing alarmingly to the “Global Warming”.

PS. If the vast majority of cardiologists say that you need an urgent heart surgery, would you rely on their opinion or in the opinion of some other no specialized doctors that say that it is useless, or on some others that say that you are going to die anyway?

Would you put your life on the line and try to find for yourself (with the rudimentary knowledge that you would have on the subject) who is right? :eek:

Cheers

Raggi_Thor

10-18-2006, 08:33 AM

SteamFreak

10-18-2006, 09:36 AM

Then, why are there so few posts defending this point of view?

I guess that the majority have understood that this is a much more complicated subject than boatbuilding and that the knowledge and the data needed to understand the whole issue is too vast to be meaningfully discussed by amateurs.

The majority has chosen to rely on the dedicated professionals that have studied the subject for a long time, and are specialized in it, the Climatologists. Those are the ones who know what they are talking about, in what refers global warming and climate change.

They are almost unanimously in saying that human activity and CO2 production is contributing alarmingly to the “Global Warming”.

Because, amazingly, there are those with the same qualifications as those who raise the banner of global warming who say the models are error ridden, the studies slanted, and so on... This is the vaunted "PEER REVIEW"... so why do you dismiss the peers? Here are just a few people among that group who disagree

These are petitions signed by various experts protesting or calling for more serious study of the supposed Global Warming, they constitute a large number of scientists from a wide variety of fields.

Oregon Petition (1998)
http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm

Statement by Atmospheric Scientists on Greenhouse Warming (1992)
http://www.sepp.org/statment.html

Heidelberg Appeal (1992)
http://www.sepp.org/heidelberg_appeal.html
numerous nobel prize winners signed this one

The Leipzig Declaration (1997)
http://www.sovereignty.net/p/clim/leipzig97.htm
http://www.sepp.org/LDsigs.html

And just so there's no confusion, yes I am an amateur engineer. Part time, I work with a yacht service repairing electrical and mechanical systems as well as installing new electrical components. I've had the engineer's Physics courses in college (the US Merchant Marine Academy) as well as chemistry and meteorology. I am not a climatologist or physicist. But I'm not stupid either... the only thing that separates me from every climatologist out there is education. There is not some mythical IQ number to understand what man currently knows about climate mechanics. It might take a high IQ to puzzle out new knowledge, but even the average college mathematician can prove E=mc^2....

So when someone spouts some facts, alittle analysis, and a conclusion at me, I don't just nod my head. Logic is logic is logic. If there's a progression of facts which prove causation, not association, then its not hard to understand. But when things don't add up or the facts only show that two events are related, but not one the result of the the other, I don't shrug my shoulders and say "hey, he's the expert." I question how they came to such a conclusion based on facts which don't seem to prove their result. Its like being a juror... I don't have to know how the DNA person went to school for 4 years to be able to put drops of blood in a test tube, I just need to know how one sample compares to the other and the logical steps in between that say "these are the same".

So, I favor the non-global warming side simply because the data which both sides say is true, namely that there's been warming and cooling periods before and that they seem to form a cycle, seems to suggest it might happen again. And since CO2 is blamed as one of the problems, I find it curious that not one global warming expert seems to deny that the rise began well before the industrial age. Certainly, I've read and seen graphs where they show an increase in the rate of CO2 rise in tune with the revolution but that data has been called into question. And when the cry of "the glaciers are melting!" rings out, I look to the other side of the debate and their reply is "so? its happened a dozen times before" and when I look back to the warming side, nobody has an answer why this time should be any different.

So instead, Vega, of going along with the crowd, who the loudest experts with the most news time say are correct, I much prefer to look and decide for myself, using the intelligence that allows me to do my part time job successfully without ever taking an electrical engineering course taught by some "expert". I simply read books and educated myself.

harlemriverman

10-18-2006, 09:37 AM

Yes, concluding, Climatologists are just dumb asses and don’t know what they are talking about.

On the post38 of this thread I have posted some quotations from an article written by James E. Hansen and published in the American Scientific.

James E. Hansen is one of the world’s leading climatologists, he is the head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, which is a division of the NASA and a unit of the Columbia University Earth Institute located on the Columbia campus in New York City. Dr. Hansen was elected to the National Academy of Sciences (USA) in 1995.

Dr Hansen primary research for the past 25 years has been on studies and
computer simulations of the Earth's climate, for the purpose of understanding the human impact on global climate.

Dr Hansen has a Ph.D. in Physics, and other formal qualifications in “HARD SUBJECTS”, like a B.A. in Mathematics and a M.S. in Astronomy.

I guess that explains why “"climate scientists" know very little of physics, thermodynamics and other "hard" subjects.”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Hansen

Reading the content of this thread one would assume that most of the people in this forum think that Global warming has nothing to do with the increasing levels of CO2 that result from human industrialization.

But of course, that is not true. The pool results show that the vast majority thinks that human industrialization and the resulting increase in CO2 emissions is to blame.

Then, why are there so few posts defending this point of view?

I guess that the majority have understood that this is a much more complicated subject than boatbuilding and that the knowledge and the data needed to understand the whole issue is too vast to be meaningfully discussed by amateurs.

The majority has chosen to rely on the dedicated professionals that have studied the subject for a long time, and are specialized in it, the Climatologists. Those are the ones who know what they are talking about, in what refers global warming and climate change.

They are almost unanimously in saying that human activity and CO2 production is contributing alarmingly to the “Global Warming”.

PS. If the vast majority of cardiologists say that you need an urgent heart surgery, would you rely on their opinion or in the opinion of some other no specialized doctors that say that it is useless, or on some others that say that you are going to die anyway?

Would you put your life on the line and try to find for yourself (with the rudimentary knowledge that you would have on the subject) who is right? :eek:

Cheers

I applaud your study of contemporary science but note for the record that it was not so long ago that your faith, or what you describe as the faith of some silent majority, would have been placed in a community that devoutly proclaimed the world to be flat while a small band of humble and, apparently in your opinion, feeble minded boat builders quietly proved them unequivocally wrong. PS they were quite drunk when they did it!

Vega

10-18-2006, 11:29 AM

I don't say that it's this way or the other.
No need to be ironic, many scientists in physics think that the climate models are questionable :-)

Who are the climate scientists?
Take a look at Cicero, the Norwegian center for Climate research,
http://www.cicero.uio.no/employees/index.asp?lang=en

The director has a phd in biology.
Then you have 5 persons in the information department,
6 persons in administration
and 13 scientific emplyees:
Dr. scient. (Ph. D) in atmospheric chemistry
Ph.D. in political science
Cand. Scient in meteorology
Ph.D. student, Cand.polit, Interest groups, lobbyism
- Cand. polit. (political science) , Dr.philos, professor in political science
Cand. Real in meteorology, Dr. Philos
Journalist? (no education mentioned)
PhD student, Cand. Scient. (MSc.) degree in Geography
Dr. Scient. in physical chemistry
Master's degree in meteorology
Dr.polit degree in political science
PhD student , Politics of CO2 capture and storage technology
Master's degree in political science

Sorry about the Ironie, I mean it (after reading your post).

About the staff composition of "Cicero, the Norwegian center for Climate research" I have to agree with you. Those Phds in political science have no business there. But that's a Norwegian problem:P

That’s about the opposite perspective of looking at climatology, comparing with Dr Hansen. He looks at the problem from a global perspective and from an interdisciplinary way were physics and astrophysics are the center.

“As a college student in Iowa, I was attracted to science and research by James Van Allen's space science program in the physics and astronomy department. Since then, it only took me a decade or so to realize that the most exciting planetary research involves trying to understand the climate change on Earth that will result from anthropogenic changes of the atmospheric composition.

One of my research interests is radiative transfer in planetary atmospheres, especially interpreting remote sounding of the Earth's atmosphere and surface from satellites. Such data, appropriately analyzed, may provide one of our most effective ways to monitor and study global change on the Earth. The hardest part is trying to influence the nature of the measurements obtained, so that the key information can be obtained.

I am also interested in the development and application of global numerical models for the purpose of understanding current climate trends and projecting humans' potential impacts on climate. The scientific excitement in comparing theory with data, and developing some understanding of global changes that are occurring, is what makes all the other stuff worth it. “

http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/

This is the leading man, not “Cicero”, and for him, Climatology obviously is centered in Physics.

Vega

10-18-2006, 12:01 PM

.... but note for the record that it was not so long ago that your faith, or what you describe as the faith of some silent majority, would have been placed in a community that devoutly proclaimed the world to be flat while a small band of humble and, apparently in your opinion, feeble minded boat builders quietly proved them unequivocally wrong.

Nah! Fact is that normal people (the ones you call "feeble minded" people) insisted that the world was flat, while scientists had said, many many time before ( + thousand years) that Earth was round.

“The first person known to have advocated a spherical shape of the Earth is Pythagoras (6th century BC).

By the time of Pliny the Elder (1st century) at the latest, however, the Earth's spherical shape was generally acknowledged among the learned in the western world.

At that time Ptolemy derived his maps from a curved globe and developed the system of latitude and longitude (see clime). His writings remained the basis of European astronomy throughout the Middle Ages, although Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (ca. 3rd to 7th centuries) saw occasional arguments in favour of a flat Earth. “

The modern misconception that people of the Middle Ages believed that the Earth was flat first entered the popular imagination in the nineteenth century”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_earth

Fact is that some of those that you have called “feeble minded people” still insist that the Earth is flat.:rolleyes:

http://www.alaska.net/~clund/e_djublonskopf/Flatearthsociety.htm

westlawn5554X

10-18-2006, 01:05 PM

actually it is flat... mmm... my map actually:P

Jimbo1490

10-18-2006, 01:06 PM

I applaud your study of contemporary science but note for the record that it was not so long ago that your faith, or what you describe as the faith of some silent majority, would have been placed in a community that devoutly proclaimed the world to be flat while a small band of humble and, apparently in your opinion, feeble minded boat builders quietly proved them unequivocally wrong. PS they were quite drunk when they did it!

One need not delve so far into the historical past to find cases where the true scientific knowledge of a thing was only understood by those holding the minority opinion. Just before the turn of the 20th century, scientists concluded that heavier-than-air flight was impossible. In the 1920's most scientists believed that the atom was the smallest constituent particle of matter and was indivisible. During the 1930's and 40's, most aerodynamicists believe it impossible for an aircraft to fly faster than the speed of sound.

Yet the majority have always stated their opinion as if it were fact and derided those holding the minority opinion.

Guys, science does not happen in a vacuum! It is part of a social fabric and as such, it is subject to all the wrinkles and tears and other faults in that fabric.

Jimbo

SteamFreak

10-18-2006, 01:10 PM

well said

safewalrus

10-20-2006, 06:05 PM

Has anyone ever thought that the average 'feeble minded person' inundated with non stop verbale garbage thinks " your story has touched my heart with its tale of gloom and despondance and the fact that we're all going to die; now go tell somebody who gives a damn!"

Or, gentlemen to put it another way, "this is too big for me and anyway will not apparantly happen for another thousand years so will not affect me or my children or their children or even their children; I have more important things to worry about - like do I have another beer or shall I spend the money on food for the wife and kids"

So all you high thinkers enjoy your ivory towers, and you can worry for us! the rest of us will just get on with living, thank you"!:P

jimisbell

10-23-2006, 10:15 PM

A preface: I cant spell worth a damn, I have a BS in Math and Physics and a Masters in Education and Astronomy. But none of those degrees contained a spelling class and spelling is neither intuitive nor logical, both qualities needed to be a scientist. If that will bother you, delete this now.

Now in to the fray.

Intresting that in a very early post someone suggested that more and worse hurricanes were caused by global warming. Are we now headed, by evidence that not one hurricane hit the US coast this year, into a new ice age?

It is well known that just 800 years ago we went thru a mini ice age with people ice skating on the Thames in London during the now defunct "Winter Fair" and that Vinland had grapes growing where there is now snow not too many years ago.

The Ozone Hole (another well known myth of the anti industrialization loby) was discovered around the turn of the last century BEFORE the industrilazation of the human race so it cant be blamed on freon.

I think anyone who thinks man is responsible for global warming is like the flea climbing the elephants leg with rape in mind, very egotistical. Man is puny compared to things like volcanoes. Pinetubo (sp?) in the Phillipines raised the global temperature by 2 degrees just a few years ago. There have been many volcanoes in the past 4000 years that have raised the global temperature by much more than that.

Not two months ago I was sailing my GS 36 from Tampa to Corpus Christi and in Pensacola Beach FL I was berthed behind an 80+ foot Mega yacht. The owner came to my boat and wanted to look around. I was flattered. While sitting in my cockpit we got into a discussion of global warming....turns out he was a big shot in Air America (Al Gores radio station) and he dissagreed with me. I observed that his riding around in a mega yacht that used 120 gallon per hour of fosil fuel (his own numbers) was somewhat hypocritical and suggested that we should swap yachts since mine only needed 0.5 gallons per hour. Needless to say, he is still riding around in his Mega Yacht and I in my GS 36.

Maybe the reason for the weak hurricane season is that after inventing the internet and now weary of the bankruptsy of Air America Al Gore is just to tired to press on with his global warming plan.

Jimbo1490

10-23-2006, 10:47 PM

Both forest fires and volcanic events are natural phenomena that 'globalwarmingists' tend to downplay in their modeling and forecasts. They try to belittle the climatological importance of these events since these do not support their case (cause?). Ditto for solar radiative energy variations, which we now know are very significant and with effects that are subtle and complex and play out over decades of years.

jimisbell:

I'm impressed! So few people know that the 'hole' in the ozone layer was actually predicted before it was ever observed-more than a half century before the first halons were synthesized in a lab. Not that the info has been kept secret. It's just that so few people bother to research anything on their own. Instead they just listen to the pundits that thay agree with and essentally TRUST them to be honest, which of course, they are not.

As a blatant example of how balderdash gets repeated as a mantra in the pop press, then 'acted on' by 'well meaning' legilators, take a look at the case against so called 'second hand' tobacco smoke. Now most people will tell you that a government study PROVED that it is harmful. Do you all realize that that very study proved NOTHING OF THE SORT! It in fact showed a 23% increase in tumors in the non-smokers but with a 25% statistical margin for error!. This means that the study showed no statistical difference between the test and control groups. But the non-smoking zealots are not out to educate you but to get laws changed. They know most people know $hit about statistics, so they tell you that this result is meaninful, which of course it is not. Now i'm not, nor ever have been a smoker myself, so I don't have a dog in that fight on the surface. It's just reall outrageous that this knd of garbage is passed around as good science when what is really is is JUNK SCIENCE.

Have you noticed that the anti-industrial types seem to display a certain glee that they have been able to raise the spectre of global warming? After all, cars don't spew TEL (or even MMT) anymore; only CO2 and water. You can't even kill yourself in the garage with a modern car :rolleyes: The air in US cities is cleaner than it has been since the turn of the LAST century. And we did not have to give up everything and go back to the stoneage to clean it up, as these people had once predicted. We drive more cars than ever, in fact. So they had to make a demon out of one of the two benign by-products of modern clean combustion, and it sure wasn't going to be water vapor :D

But it is only a spectre, based on fearmongering political motives, not objective science. I for one, do not believe in ghosts anymore.

Jimbo

harlemriverman

10-24-2006, 03:59 AM

...anyone who thinks man is responsible for global warming is like the flea climbing the elephants leg with rape in mind, very egotistical...Al Gore is just to tired to press on with his global warming plan.

Global warming is an English plot to have us all drinking warm beer. I know it for a fact. I’m here to report that I dated that girl in college and if I recall correctly it was a few too many globally warmed English pints that gave me the courage to crawl up her wrinkly, swollen thighs, not me ego.

Lads its “one if by day and two if by night!” for us cold beer loving tail gate party fans. Or is that to? Or too? There go those blasted English again, giving us a language that only they can figure out. That’s it, I’m going to go open my refrigerator and cool this place off!

bananabender

10-24-2006, 07:41 AM

The answer to the "global warming" problem of more hurricanes is simple... from reading the Sunday supplement articles on chaos theory I now understand that they are caused by butterfly wing flapping ... what should I see on Discovery channel but millions of Monarch butterflies migrating to Mexico, just where so many hurricanes start! Never mind Al Gore, do it the Bush way and nuke those Mexican butterflies before they cause any more!! Amazing how the answers are out there for anyone to see!

bntii

10-24-2006, 03:25 PM

You all should check your facts before posting.
Or at the very least back them up with at least one semi-credible reference.

Pinatubo raised global temps?

http://www.geology.sdsu.edu/how_volcanoes_work/climate_effects.html

I can smoke a cigar and raise global temps. Its very easy to change things. The real question of interest concerns the degree of change likely to occur by mans activities and whether that change will influence our environment in any significant way.

jimisbell

10-24-2006, 04:15 PM

You are right, that should have been LOWERED. But the point was not which way it went, but that it changed the temp by 2 degrees which is MORE than golbal warming theorists are screaming about. The direction is immaterial, its the fact that MEN are so puny that Volcanoes make them look like mice.

jimisbell

10-24-2006, 04:32 PM

Just in case you were refering to the "2 degrees", I looked at your reference (which by the way didnt even include the largest eruption in history, 200 times the size of Krakatau, the island of Santorini in the Mediteranian sea) so their research is suspect depending upon when you think "History" begins, but it did state that the drop for Pinatubo was 1 degree centigrade or 1.8 degrees F (we dont use Centigrade in the US)...OK, OK, I missed it by 0.2 degrees. I think that is close enough for government work. I rounded it off.

bntii

10-24-2006, 04:36 PM

Rounded it off did you?

"The direction is immaterial, its the fact that MEN are so puny that Volcanoes make them look like mice."

I assume you mean to say that volcanism contributes more co2 to the atmosphere than human activity.

Try supporting this claim by valid reference.

BTW
Don't present aurguments like this if you believe the direction is not relevent:
"Man is puny compared to things like volcanoes. Pinetubo (sp?) in the Phillipines raised the global temperature by 2 degrees just a few years ago. There have been many volcanoes in the past 4000 years that have raised the global temperature by much more than that."

jimisbell

10-24-2006, 04:47 PM

I dont call your arguments Gibberish or Nonsense so I am assuming that your resort to name calling means you have run out of reasonable arguments?

But I will honor you with one more response. Did I say volcanoes made more CO2 than man? I dont see it as I look back at my posts. I said men were puny and that volcanoes had a greater effect on global temperatures that man did. Go back and read what I said and see if that isnt what I said.

CO2 supposedly raises temperatures while SO2 lowers temperatures. Read up on your science before you attack a scientist.

bntii

10-24-2006, 05:04 PM

Fair enough.

I have retracted the bad bits.

"I think anyone who thinks man is responsible for global warming is like the flea climbing the elephants leg with rape in mind, very egotistical. Man is puny compared to things like volcanoes. Pinetubo (sp?) in the Phillipines raised the global temperature by 2 degrees just a few years ago. There have been many volcanoes in the past 4000 years that have raised the global temperature by much more than that."

This has no scientific basis

bntii

10-24-2006, 05:35 PM

A preface: I cant spell worth a damn, I have a BS in Math and Physics and a Masters in Education and Astronomy. But none of those degrees contained a spelling class and spelling is neither intuitive nor logical, both qualities needed to be a scientist. If that will bother you, delete this now.

Now in to the fray.

A lay assesment of data:
Intresting that in a very early post someone suggested that more and worse hurricanes were caused by global warming. Are we now headed, by evidence that not one hurricane hit the US coast this year, into a new ice age?

It is well known that just 800 years ago we went thru a mini ice age with people ice skating on the Thames in London during the now defunct "Winter Fair" and that Vinland had grapes growing where there is now snow not too many years ago.

Well known? To whom?
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/globalwarming/medieval.html

I would like to see the reference on this:

The Ozone Hole (another well known myth of the anti industrialization loby) was discovered around the turn of the last century BEFORE the industrilazation of the human race so it cant be blamed on freon.

You can't really defend any of this:

I think anyone who thinks man is responsible for global warming is like the flea climbing the elephants leg with rape in mind, very egotistical. Man is puny compared to things like volcanoes. Pinetubo (sp?) in the Phillipines raised the global temperature by 2 degrees just a few years ago. There have been many volcanoes in the past 4000 years that have raised the global temperature by much more than that.

Fluff which tries to implicate the liberals as the source of the energy crisis and its attendent ills:

Try researching the aurguments provided by the oil loby against mpg requirements in autos during the seventies if you want to place some blame.

Not two months ago I was sailing my GS 36 from Tampa to Corpus Christi and in Pensacola Beach FL I was berthed behind an 80+ foot Mega yacht. The owner came to my boat and wanted to look around. I was flattered. While sitting in my cockpit we got into a discussion of global warming....turns out he was a big shot in Air America (Al Gores radio station) and he dissagreed with me. I observed that his riding around in a mega yacht that used 120 gallon per hour of fosil fuel (his own numbers) was somewhat hypocritical and suggested that we should swap yachts since mine only needed 0.5 gallons per hour. Needless to say, he is still riding around in his Mega Yacht and I in my GS 36.

Tired regurgitation of the party line:
Maybe the reason for the weak hurricane season is that after inventing the internet and now weary of the bankruptsy of Air America Al Gore is just to tired to press on with his global warming plan.

When you post like this don't try to say its science.

Jimbo1490

10-24-2006, 06:14 PM

Hey bntii:

Thanks for the latest pebbles!

http://usgovinfo.about.com/b/a/156663.htm

http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/ritter/geog101/textbook/atmosphere/atmospheric_composition_p3.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particulate

I'll let you connect your own dots on this one. I'm sure that type of puzzle suits you.

Jimbo

jimisbell

10-24-2006, 06:27 PM

50 or more years ago my father told me not to argue with a fool.

Im outa here. You wouldnt be convinced under any circumstances so why waste my time on you. I will spend my time with people who really care not psuedo scientists like yourself who wouldnt know global warming if it set fire to their house.

Is this name calling, YOU BET, its all your type understand. I am surprised at your admitting to being a Liberal. Most liberals say "We dont need to apply labels" while conservatives are proud of their beliefs.

By By

gonzo

10-26-2006, 10:16 AM

It's all my fault. Every winter my mother would yell at me: "close the door, you're heating up the whole neighborhood".
I think there isn't enough data to make a good decision. Before humans, there were ice and tropical ages. The explanation for those, without political posturing, may give us better explanations.

bntii

10-26-2006, 07:08 PM

Thanks Jimbo,

Still way busy with these boats. Give me a few days and I'll have at it.

A freebie for you:

http://spacecenter.dk/xpdf/influence-of-cosmic-rays-on-the-earth.pdf

safewalrus

10-27-2006, 05:27 PM

Harlemriver man! Do you realise that the only reason you colonials freeze your beer is that you can't make a beer with taste worth a damn! It's got to be freezing cold or you can't drink that lager stuff - now quality English beer has just got to be drunk warm to experience the taste of the hops (it also gets you drunk quicker - no that's because of the strength, American beer is about as stong a flys pee) Sorry buddy, tha'ts the way it is (probably just as well you can make a decent drop of whiskey then ain't it)

Jimbo1490

10-27-2006, 07:35 PM

Good lager is quite drinkable. Buttwiper is not good lager and not drinkable. As with other food and drink, Americans are becoming much more sophisticated in their beer tastes, though this is happening more slowly than it is with other food and drink items since this shift in taste is not in the profit interests of the Giant Beer Companies. So they have redoubled their advertising efforts to keep their product first in the minds of the buying public.

Before the great experiment, US beer was like anybody elses. The current swill traces its roots to the end of that noble (stupid) experiment.

Jimbo

safewalrus

10-28-2006, 04:57 AM

ron17571

10-28-2006, 10:30 AM

Good reason to have a boat.

ron17571

10-28-2006, 10:33 AM

That had to do with the global warming talk,nice of yall to attack our beer,you keep it up and well have to talk about your women and how they dont shave their legs!

safewalrus

10-28-2006, 05:32 PM

Ron son - don't burn me! :eek: Only telling it like it is, in addition our women don't shave their legs 'cos they're to pretty to need to :P and also they keep an edge on their razors for cutting other things (normally off! if they can find cowboys with them! :D )

harlemriverman

10-30-2006, 07:08 AM

kagraham

10-31-2006, 02:05 PM

That article is a good example of the rampant sensationalism climatologists are spouting these days. A whole lot of alarmism with absolutely no data to back it up. You'll notice that the article doesn't mention exactly what will happen when the climate DOES start to warm up - they just make vague doomsday predictions and then leave it you your imagination; while failing to mention that nothing bad happened during the last several warming periods, all of which were hotter than now.

I guess you missed all the data given in the article. These deep ice cores are the most extensive medium of historical climate evidence. They are absolutely loaded with data and evidence of the earths historical climate. An ice core from the right site can contain an uninterrupted, detailed
climate record extending back hundreds of thousands of years. This record can include temperature, precipitation , chemistry and gas
composition of the lower atmosphere, volcanic eruptions, solar variability,
sea-surface productivity and a variety of other climate indicators, and its the simultanity of this information and events that allow paleoclimatists to come up with very extensive and accurate models of the earths climate.

One of the most important climate proxies contained in these ice cores is that of fractionation. Two of the three stable oxygen isotopes contained in water oxygen 18 and oxygen 16 have measurable differences in vapor pressure. That is, precipitaion, in the form of snow, will contain an enriched amount of H20(16) compared to the original proportion in the body of water it was evaporated from. This difference, or fractionation is dependant upon air temperature.

comparing the fluctuation in air temperature with that of paleo-carbon dioxide concentrations shows that they are related. A rise in CO2 levels correlates with a dramatic rise in temperature and vice-versa. unfortunately the resolution of this data is not good enought to tell which comes first, a rise in co2 or a rise in temperature.

"while failing to mention that nothing bad happened during the last several warming periods" The warming period after the last glaciation period induced severe drought in much of the current US. Vast climate change can and has occured due to these warming events, whether natural or caused by our human behaviors. The Nebraska Sand Hills are a perfect example. Radiocarbon dating has shown that about 3000 BP (before present) these sand hills, now covered by sparse vegitation and inactive, were a vast active sand sea, much like those of northern africa at present. The Nebraska Sand sea was the largest recorded, about 35,000 square km and 8 meters thick.

Study of fractionation in deep sea sediments can also yied similar fractionation, however this fractionation can be related to sea level and ice volumes. This information has shown that the earth does cycles through periods of glaciation followed by rapid deglaciation during the current ice age that we are in (an ice age being any time there is ice present on the earth). The last glacial maximum, (period of full glaciation) was about 18000 BP, and was followed by rapid deglaciation. Looking at a graph, it seems that a threshold is met at maximum and minimum temperatures, whereafter the earth rapidly cools or heats. So we know this is a natural process, and scientists are not sure what drives it. There are several theories, most notable of which is orbital theory, which deals with the constant motions of hte solar system and the relationship of our climate to that (very complicated). The point is we know the earth constantly changes, including the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, however we also readily know our human behaviors are increasing this supply of CO2 to the atmosphere beyond the natural rate. therefore we know that once this threshold in the earth's mean temperature is reached it will be followed by rapid glaciation. There are many theories of positive feedback concerning how the temperature is changes so rapidly after a threshold is met, but thats another story...

Not to argue with you, but possibly to shed some scientific light on the situation. Much is still to be learned on the subject, graduate students next door are probably counting CO2 bubble in an ice core from Vostok, Antarctica as I type this.

kagraham

10-31-2006, 02:52 PM

Must be me then ' cos I have found that ALL American beer is like Rat's pee (come to think of it Rat's water is probably stronger) with little or no taste whatsoever and it don't matter who makes it (come to think of it most other world lagers are about the same with a couple of exceptions - one from Singapore one French and a couple of German ones and one originated in the Phillapines) Stick to the rum fellas [unless your American and can't drink (there are some Americans who most Definately can drink but they are all Services trained - abroad!):D

You may be right, fortunately though, i live close enough to the largest brewery in the world to shoot a window out of their offices...Still being in college, beer tastes that much better when you get three free ones a day, even if it's made by coors, after slipping past the tour group straight to the "test lab".

Raggi_Thor

10-31-2006, 05:19 PM

I guess you missed all the data given in the article. These deep ice cores are the most extensive medium of historical climate evidence. They are absolutely loaded with data and evidence of the earths historical climate....

I think it's just like that :-)
Ice cores can tell us how the climate was, how the air was and so on, but not WHY it was like that..

kagraham

10-31-2006, 07:13 PM

I think it's just like that :-)
Ice cores can tell us how the climate was, how the air was and so on, but not WHY it was like that..

I never said they did, I was simply adding some knowledge to how the climate proxies are determined. I did however briefly mention the Orbital Theory of Climate change. Very detailed astronomical measurements have been taken over long periods of time. These measuremnts show that the earths orbit is irregular. This irregularity is related to the relative gravitational pull by the moon, sun, other planetary bodies, e.t.c. James Croll (19th Century) and Milutan Milankovitch (early 20th) proposed that these variations in the Earth’s orbit would lead to variations in the receipt of solar energy. These astronomical measurements record the earths anual change in precession ("wobble" if you will), obliquity (tilt relative to the ecliptic plane), and eccentricity. These values cycle every 23 ky, 41 ky, and 100/413 ky respectibly. These orbital variations change the earths insolation, or radiation from the sun recieved, at any given latitude. parametizing the functions of the 3 graphs gives us the function and graph of the combined radiation received, or insolation. As it turns out, this insolation curve matches very closly to the curve given by the recorded marine oxygen isotopic ratios from the same latitude, as well as sea levels and other records. The bottom line of this theory is that variation of insolation stronly affects earth's climate, at least over short (geologically) periods of time. These variations occur due to the perturbations in the earth's orbit.

These processes have been going on for hundreds of thousands of years, and we know the rates of change in CO2 levels of the past, without humans emitting additional amounts into the atmosphere. Now, these CO2 levels are increasing at rates faster than before, it seems logical assume that if nothing else, our habbits are speeding up or throwing this process of. Because CO2 levels, fractionation, and sea levels are no longer in sync with the combined insolation graph.

hansp77

11-01-2006, 01:48 AM

Thank you for your considered and experienced posts Kagraham.
You are dealing with this issue with a level of care and patience that I (and a few others) long since gave up upon (if I ever had it;) ).

I don't mean to throw around aspersions,
but I have been rather fascinated by the way the poll results have been changing this last month or so.
The ratio has been been rather quickly changing (towards the sceptical side), after what appeared to be a relatively stable growth in a ratio (around 65%-35%) from the beginning, which then lead into a sustained drop off in anyone voting. This now seems to have changed, and either a lot of people who chose not to vote for months have now voted, or maybe a influx of 'new members' are adding their votes.
Maybe (or I should say probably) I am just being suspicious or paranoid- or some may even say I am simply annoyed that things 'are not going as much in the way as I would like them to' (as no doubt I could be critiscised of). I don't believe this is the case. I was, and am, very interested in the breakdown of the numbers out there how ever they go down.

I have a few regrets about creating this thread.
Mainly that I didn't make it clear from the get-go something along the lines of what Matt had to say soon after on the matter.
In the interest of scientific accuracy, I would like to encourage anyone replying to this thread with "facts" or "data" to provide proper references for this informaton. Please keep in mind that, from a scientific perspective, peer-reviewed journals are admissable, as are university papers, while newspapers, television and public Web media are not considered scientifically valid sources.
If anyone would like to take a scientific stance on the issue, I encourage you to also let us know what your scientific credentials are. It is very hard to take a supposedly scientific argument seriously unless sources and credentials are also present.
--
Matt
B.Sc.E (ENPH) candidate, Queen's University

I think that if I had made this clear from the beggining, along with a request that anyone posting here is to avoid simplistic and steroetypical insults, name calling and and general pointless squabbling, then this could have been a much better and more productive thread.

Having already raised my 'fascination' at the turn of the tide in votes, I have also recently wondered if making this poll a silent one was the best idea.
In spite of my doubt and suspicion that it may be being abused, I still think a silent poll was the best idea.
I wanted to encourage people to vote on their personal opinions, feelings and beliefs on the matter, rather than on their desire to identify themselves with one side of the debate, and the political implications of such.

So if anyone thinks I am accusing them of something... I am sorry.
This is not my intention.
I have long since given up fighting this battle here, and I do not wish to insult or fight with anyone.
I am simply sharing a sneaking suspicion that I have had- which I freely admit is probably just that- a paranoid suspicion...

(In the spirit of Matts request, (as is visable in my personal profile) I should say that I am not a scientist, but rather my areas of ongoing study are 'Development Studies', and 'History and Philosophy of Science'- where I aim to better understand the social, economic, political and scientific interactions of such things as poverty, underdevelopment, climate change, etc, etc, and hopefully some of their possible solutions.)

Thanks
Hans.

idlerboat

11-01-2006, 02:11 AM

Try living here in Australia.
Stage 3 water restrictions. Hottest driest spring since records began. Severe ozone warnings. (These are part of our weather forecasts) Sun burn on a cloudy day is now no problem. New Zealand has got it even worse. Fire index through the roof. Its going to be a crap summer. God knows how many hectares are going to burn with houses and probably people too. Last week we had 200 fires in the state of Victoria in ONE DAY ! We are still months away from our hottest time of year. Alarmist ? No just the plain crappy facts. Just heard on the radio that they are bringing in yet another skycrane water bomber (at several million a season) If this is a "normal natural cycle" then it must have a bloody long frequency. The people in the pacific islands are going to have to come and shack up with us as their islands go under. Cant recall the last time that happened. But its happeneing now. Go to www.bom.vic.gov.au and have a look at the climate outlooks. l know its fun for some, to play mind games over the net .(Great to be just another bit of typing ,without having to have a face to it. ) Yes we here in Australia will cop it first (and already are) but catch up will happen pretty fast. Weather and long term predictions are important to serious boat lovers. Its a shame that we have done so little so late. And l am ashamed to say that my government wont even ratify kyoto.

l hope it rains soon.
Martin.

Mychael

11-01-2006, 05:21 AM

This is just a subjective observation. As a kid going to school (Closer to 50 then 40yrs old now). So quite a long time ago. I can remember that quite frequently in the winter months it would be cold enough that all the puddles in the playground would be frozen over and there would be little icicles hanging off the fencing wire where the dew had frozen overnight.
I cannot honestly recall (it's not alzheimers) the last time I saw that sort of thing. Certainly very rare occurence from what I remember 40 something years ago.
Make of it what you will. I know I seem to burn in the sun a lot easier then I did years ago.

Mychael

hansp77

11-01-2006, 06:00 AM

For anyone interested.
'The Stern review on the economics of climate change'
no doubt you have heard it on the news etc.
A fairly big read, its gonna take me a few months.

http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_change/stern_review_report.cfm

kagraham

11-01-2006, 12:53 PM

[QUOTE=idlerboat;112352 If this is a "normal natural cycle" then it must have a bloody long frequency. .[/QUOTE]

If i understand you correctly, yes, naturaly geological cycles are quite long relative to our lifetimes. Geological time covers billions of years, and most of these cycles have been happening for slightly less time than that. So yes, for these cycles to just be starting now, and lasting several thousands of years is quite insignificant in relative terms. However, in perspective of your and my lives, it is quite hard to consider insignificant! Just hang on, because its only going to keep changing, in either direction. Fortunately though, b/c this cycle is made up of trends so spread out, it may be really hot and dry one year, but moderate the next.

Hansp77, thanks for your compliments. Whether good or bad, i did not bother to read the 13 something pages of posts. I just wanted to give some informative insight so that people, who wish to know, may understand how these accusations and models are derived. I hope it helps those of you who wish to understand, and if it hasn't and you still want to know, let me know, I'd love to potentially broaden(sp) my understanding to help you out!
-karl

kagraham

11-01-2006, 03:12 PM

toot: "So, spending is good (economically speaking). And spending is exactly what will happen when people are poor and need goods to support a given comfort level, and the poorer they are, the MORE of their paycheck they will spend in order to be more comfortable (Maslow's Hierarchy of needs). What does this have to do with national defense?

Well, Military Spending is one of the few areas where nearly ALL of the money is spent within the United States. We don't buy foreign aircraft, we don't buy foreign guns, or foreign missiles. Every dollar spent in the United States is pumped into the United States' economy. In other words, the large military spending sounds extreme, but in actuality, it isn't that bad because it helps spur economic growth. In other words, our overall economic health is increased by spending the money in a way which supports American workers and American business. It's not as good as hiring unskilled laborers who need a roof over their head, but hiring extra blue-collar production workers and engineers nevertheless does have a dramatic income on GDP.

I'm not saying it's right. I'm not saying it's a wise use of resources. However, I will say that, as I see it, defense spending is a lot like "public works projects" from an economics standpoint."

After reading some more pages, i dont know how it got to this topic but I am interested in it as well. After the Great Depression, Governments around the world have been influenced by this keynesian thought, That to increase economic growth, we must spend. The basis of what Keynes tells us is that in order to reach equilebrium level in the GDP, or when GDP equals total expenditure, we must have an active government sector. The only factor of total expenditure (rather simplified) is governtment expenditure. This " somewhat comprehensive program of socializatoin of investmant" is fully explained in Keynes "General Theory" on page 378.h Investment depends largely on the market expectancy of capital (MEC), interest rates can raise this and therefore investment expenditure, but is often inadequate to close the gap in GDP equ. or to solve unemployment.
Obviously, as pointed out by some members from other countries, our countries fiscal policy makers DO NOT consider GDP when making spending decisions. Therefore, government expenditure is in no way dependant upon GDP. As you expalined, due to what is often called the multiplier process, A government expenditure may increase total GDP by say 4 times as much as the original expenditure, when the marginal propensity to save is say 75%, meaning out of every dollar we earn, we save 75 cents.

So...I agree, much of the reason for our expenditure of national defense and war is due to the fact that is all spent "in house". But, what is the difference between this expenditure, and say more expenditure in other welfare programs, research towards renewable energy, infrastructure, e.t.c. instead of research and developments towards the 747 that employs 4-6 super powered lasers that can target and burn up a rocket/missle in a matter of 10 secs that i watched a show about on the history channel, althought i realize this may actually be deamed necessary... Anyways you get my point. Is there a difference between this spending in house towards war and spending on other welfare programs?

Maybe this should be a different thread altogether, but its been brought up once.... oh well
-karl

Vega

11-01-2006, 07:09 PM

,
but I have been rather fascinated by the way the poll results have been changing this last month or so.

The ratio has been been rather quickly changing (towards the sceptical side), after what appeared to be a relatively stable growth in a ratio (around 65%-35%) from the beginning, which then lead into a sustained drop off in anyone voting.

This now seems to have changed, and either a lot of people who chose not to vote for months have now voted, or maybe a influx of 'new members' are adding their votes.

Maybe (or I should say probably) I am just being suspicious or paranoid-
Hans.

Hum... considering the absurd and ridiculous political importance that this subject has in the USA, perhaps Jeff can take a look at the ones that have voted in this pool recently, to see if we don’t have any "ghosts" among us.:D

jimisbell

11-01-2006, 07:28 PM

Interesting, maybe its just that the discussion has revealed the truth to more people so the voting has changed. ....You think?

hansp77

11-01-2006, 11:10 PM

Jimisbell,
I will say this very clearly.
I think it is more than just a possibility that the voting is changing legitimately.
I think it is a high probability.

I raised my fascination at the results, as I have simply watched enough voting trends (like when I loose on election nights) to be surprised by sudden turnarounds. What surprised me also was a pick up in the voting again after it seemed most who where interested in voting had already done so. Hence the thought about new members, or 'new' members;) .

Either way, extrapolating trends out of a pool of 45 voters by me is unwise in the extreme- (the law of small numbers).
Just had some thoughts, and shared them...

On revealing the truth from the discussion in this thread?
The majority of the arguments posed here against anthropic warming are IMHO simply of the recylced and recylced internet-type- mostly not issues that actually engage or concern the scientific community.

Check out this site, it's a bit of fun,
http://illconsidered.blogspot.com/2006/02/how-to-talk-to-global-warming-sceptic.html
Most of the arguments raised here are dealt with there, you may be familiar with a few, you may also find the reasons why some of the ones you haven't found or thought of yet are also wrong :D (check out the conversations under the topics not just the topics- its a big site).

If you find A few things ill considered too light-weight- it is linked to a much heavier site
realclimate.org/
Also interesting, but getting pretty deep into the real particular and technical scientific stuff rather than the more simplistic big picture models and ideas (that I personally find a lot easier to get my head around).

No insults intended.

Hans.

Vega

11-02-2006, 11:01 AM

Interesting, maybe its just that the discussion has revealed the truth to more people so the voting has changed. ....You think?

Well, in a pool you can not change your vote and there are 46 votes on this pool. The total number of different posters in this thread is 29. The last posters seem to have voted on “Global Warming is occuring as a direct result of Human Activity”.

I am not saying that there is a fraud here, but I would like to have it checked.

jimisbell

11-02-2006, 12:02 PM

Well, in a pool you can not change your vote and there are 46 votes on this pool. The total number of different posters in this thread is 29. The last posters seem to have voted on “Global Warming is occuring as a direct result of Human Activity”.

I am not saying that there is a fraud here, but I would like to have it checked.

First, I thought the trend was toward "humans NOT causing global warming"???

If that were the case I can see this discussion causing an up trend in that answer.

Second, can not someone vote without posting to this list, i.e. is it required to post to get access to the poll?

Frosty

11-02-2006, 08:27 PM

Opened up the computer this morning and before heading straight to the forum I usually check out the BBC World page. Well this morning was 'No more fish in 50 years'.

Probably not much to do with global warming ( or is it?) but what a headline. The point is that this is definately a human encouraged situation.

Ari

11-02-2006, 11:04 PM

Jimbo1490

11-02-2006, 11:38 PM

On revealing the truth from the discussion in this thread?
The majority of the arguments posed here against anthropic warming are IMHO simply of the recylced and recylced internet-type- mostly not issues that actually engage or concern the scientific community.

This line in your post trivializes objections to the arguments posed by some scientists that suggest humans are causing the curent bout of climate change. I know that is how you feel, but feelings do not create truth.

The truth is that the arguments against anthropogenic CO2 causing climate change are not at all trivial, and not addressed by 'believers'. Scientists can be believers, too; science does not happen in a vacuum!

The most current thinking on the matter is that the sun's cycles are the most likely cause of climate cycles. This seems rather simple, but it is not. The sun throws a wide range of radiative and energetic particle emissions at us, each with it's own interaction with our atmosphere. It's not simple at all.

Even believers have acknowledge now that the sun's impact on climate change is the dominant one, and that it is far greater than all the greenhouse gases, of which CO2 is nearly the least important anyway, comprising only <.04% of the atmosphere. Nevertheless they cling to the idea that somehow CO2 must be dreadfully bad since we (humans) make a bit of it, and can stop making some of that which we now make, if we choose, though this will be very costly. This has clearly devolved to a philosophical argument, not a scientific one.

There is good evidence that the minor greenhouse gases, of which CO2 is one, are NOT the regulators of the earth's temperature. If CO2 were a regulator, the system would have gone off equillibrium long ago, never returning. The natural variations in CO2 swamp out our tiny contribution, making the entire argument unplausible. At something around 360 PPM presently, the earth is now CO2 starved, sice it has been over 6000PPM in the geologic past. This period was NOT associated with catastrophic temperature increases using accepted reliable proxy data.

The fact that the rise in CO2 began thousands of years ago, long before the beginning of large-scale human releases of CO2, should further cause you to reconsider the plausibility of the argument. No spike in CO2 levels is noted in the geologic record coinciding with the beginning of 'signicant' anthropogenic releases.

The 'believers' are left in the position of postulating ever more complex and convoluted mechanisms by which this minor gas could somehow leverage the whole heat content of the earth's atmosphere rather than accept the demise of their pet theory.

Are you a believer, Hans?

Jimbo

hansp77

11-03-2006, 09:46 AM

Jimbo,
I wonder if you even read my posts?:confused:

I would of thought my position was pretty clear.

You want a direct answer I suppose.
Though I find your question a little loaded, I will give it to you anyway.

YES.

I believe the best explanation that science has to offer at the present time is that anthropic GHG emissions are largely responsible for for the current and rapid rise in temperatures/climate change.

Do you believe that you don't have 'feelings' on this matter, or that you don't have 'beliefs'?

You bring up the solar thing again.
Within your own thread (http://boatdesign.net/forums/showthread.php?t=14205&highlight=is+the+environment) I had this to say on the matter.

...
I will try to very briefly (and un-comprehensively) show one of the problems with one of the claims made.
This is regarding the claim that variations in the suns temperature or influence are responsible for global warming.
This is not one of the easy targets, and is actually one of the stronger areas where future advances in science could very potentially challenge the theory of anthropic climate change. (I don’t think it will)
This is why I picked it.
It is a real issue, that in this thread has been presented in a completely biased and simplistic way (with no evidence or references).

This first extract is a quick view into the scientific mumbo jumbo of investigating the relationship between solar activity and global climate changes.
Basically it goes over some of the difficulties involved in this science.
This sort of prediction is far from accurate at present.
This inevitably weakens any argument based upon solar influence for or against anthropic induced climate change.

from,
Edouard Bard and Martin Frank. 2006. Climate change and solar variability: What's new under the sun? Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Volume 248, Issues 1-2, 15 August 2006, Pages 1-14

“Overall, the role of solar activity in climate changes — such as the Quaternary glaciations or the present global warming — remains unproven and most probably represents a second-order effect. Although we still require even more and better data, the weight of evidence suggests that solar changes have contributed to small climate oscillations occurring on time scales of a few centuries, similar in type to the fluctuations classically described for the last millennium: The so-called Medieval Warm Period (900–1400 A.D.) followed on by the Little Ice Age (1500–1800 A.D.).”
(Bard and Frank, 2006: 1)

“Beyond the past four centuries of telescopic observations of the Sun, the main tool for evaluating solar activity is provided by cosmogenic nuclides. The production of these isotopes is modulated by the magnetic properties of the solar wind, which can be ultimately linked to solar activity. After their formation, cosmogenic isotopes are transported in the atmosphere and the ocean before being buried in various archives. These processes make the interpretation more complicated. Nevertheless, studies of cosmogenic isotopes generally agree in indicating numerous solar activity minima in the past, with the Sun passing a large part of its history in calm phases, conceivably with an irradiance several % weaker than the present-day value.
Several recent studies have attempted to extract solar changes over periods of ten thousands [64] to hundreds of thousand years [83]. On such time scales, cosmogenic nuclide production is largely modulated by slow variations of the Earth's magnetic field. The currently available reconstructions of geomagnetic field intensity and cosmogenic nuclide production are still not sufficiently precise to extract a meaningful solar component. To apply this approach, we await more reliable and longer records of both cosmogenic nuclide production and geomagnetic field intensity of the past.”
(Bard and Frank: 12)

So these guys draw the conclusion that the sun has passed “a large part of its history in calm phases, conceivably with an irradiance several % weaker than the present-day value.”

This is of course disputed by other research and other theories.
However some may agree with this conclusion, and then make other observations on top.

From,
Bumford, N. 2004. Does the sun influence climate change?(Quizzical). Geographical 76.12 (Dec 2004): 17(1).

“As the solar system's big source of energy, the sun has a direct effect on the global climate. And the sun's activity changes. Scientists at the Max Planck institute for Solar System Research in Germany have gone through 300 years of astronomers' records and reconstructed sunspot trends as far back as 850 AD. Their conclusion is that the sun went into a phase of unusually high activity during the past 50 years, radiating far more UV light than normal. Since 1940, there have been twice as many sunspots as the long-term average. The scientists have pieced together evidence of solar activity over more than 1,000 years and conclude that the Earth's average temperature follows that of the sun. During the Middle Ages, for example, there was a warm period between 1100 and 1250 that can be linked to high solar activity.

However, the sun has not matched the dramatic rise in the Earth's temperature over the past 30 years. Sunspots and the increased UV radiation that come with them continue on an 11-year cycle but their overall levels haven't risen much in the past 30 years.
The significant increase in the Earth's temperature since 1980 is indeed to be ascribed to the greenhouse effect caused by carbon dioxide," says the institute's Professor Sami Solanki.”
(Bumford, 2004: 17)

So this position is accepting that the sun is in a ‘hot’ phase, but are pointing out that even this does not account for the last 30 years of warming.

This is one little disagreement with one of the common objections that has been raised here (with a skimpy two references).
We could no doubt argue for months about this point alone (as the scientific community has done and does far better than I could).

Now this hardly resolves that issue.
Please note that I made the point that Solar influence "is actually one of the stronger areas where future advances in science could very potentially challenge the theory of anthropic climate change."

As a student of the 'History and Philosophy of Science', I am well aware of the social (or political if you prefer) inner workings of Science and its generation of 'facts'. The cannons of HPS literature (Khun, Latour, etc, etc), and the discourses they have generated, have for a long time been percieved as a threat to what scientists attempt to construe as 'certainty', and regarded by many scientists as 'anti-science'.

Quite simply though, it would take a great deal more sceptisism than I can muster (and on my own part- arogance as well) for me to dis-believe what is by and large scientific consensus.

There are of course scientists, like you claim, who do precisely this.
I freely admit that these individuals are more qualified and justified in making these judgments than I am.
However, if you cannot recognise that they are in a dwindling minority (who's cause itself is not helped by some rather questionable actions, funding and academic standards by some of the louder members) then you really need to investigate a little deeper, and do some serious reading within serious scientific and academic journals.
---
It is quarter to two in the morning.
I am going to be up all weekend writing papers.
In other words I have better things to do.

I will repeat this again, as I have said a few times before.

I scincerely hope that you are right and I am wrong.

Hans.

Richard Hillsid

11-03-2006, 03:59 PM

No to be anonomys i woted here a while back on this subject, YES

Jimbo1490

11-03-2006, 10:56 PM

As I said, the issue of the sun's influence is much more complex that the sun simply throwing more heat. Other energetic particles emissions come into play.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/07/020731080631.htm

The cosmic ray bombardment theory coincides much more exactly (one might say perfectly) with the geologic teperature record using accepted reliable proxy data for both CO2 content and cosmic particle bombardment. The fact that atmospheric CO2 content and temperature don't track together terribly well in the past should also give you pause. Why didn't the earth 'overheat' when CO2 was at 6000 PPM? This is where the believers must come up with ever more convoluted arguments about the influence of CO2 as an important greenhouse gas. If the warming is truly 'global', then why the great difference between surface and upper atmosphere temps? If the warming were truly 'global' and truly the result of the 'greenhouse effect', then the warming would certainly be uniform throughout the atmosphere, but it is not. And no one, including the believers, is saying that it is uniform. Instead of admitting that this collapses the theory on the grounds that this observed warming cannot be due to the greenhose effect by our accepted understanding of the mechanisms of said effect, the believers simply look for a more complex way to explain the discrepancy. But these and other discrepancies between the observed atmosphere and the predictions of greenhouse gas warming are glossed over. In effect they say, "This observation does not match the theory, but the theory is still correct, we just don't understand it enough." How scientific is that??!!:confused:

The scientist you quoted stated with actually :D laughable:D confidence that:Overall, the role of solar activity in climate changes — such as the Quaternary glaciations or the present global warming — remains unproven and most probably represents a second-order effect.

This is laughable since we know SO little about the sun's effect on our planet, believe it or not:

http://www.livescience.com/environment/050505_earth_bright.html

Jimbo

idlerboat

11-03-2006, 11:59 PM

To jimbo and all the other naysayers ,enjoying their contoversial positions...

Taura excreta non est disputandum.

bntii

11-04-2006, 07:30 AM

Jimbo,

"Why didn't the earth 'overheat' when CO2 was at 6000 PPM?"

Good talking point, but did you look into this??

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/282/5397/2199

"This period was NOT associated with catastrophic temperature increases using accepted reliable proxy data."

You have studied the current research? You are saying that the temps were not higher during the cretaceous?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/02/040229231619.htm

http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/31/7/585

Generally concidered that the sea level was 200 m higher at this time. Sure I like the beach so I wouldn't call it catastrophic, but interesting non the less.

You keep mentionioning the less than .04 composition as an example of why co2 content has neglible effect. Sound impressive, but is it suportable that quantity is determinate?

"No spike in CO2 levels is noted in the geologic record coinciding with the beginning of 'signicant' anthropogenic releases."

What do you mean by this??

"There is good evidence that the minor greenhouse gases, of which CO2 is one, are NOT the regulators of the earth's temperature. If CO2 were a regulator, the system would have gone off equillibrium long ago, never returning."

Where is the research you are quoting?

"The natural variations in CO2 swamp out our tiny contribution"

You never addressed my question:

"What is the pre-human and post human co2 net gain in the atmosphere"

What is that contribution which can be attributed to human activity??

Tiny?? Care to put a percentage on it??

Solar variation is not neglected in the science.

You state:

"Even believers have acknowledge now that the sun's impact on climate change is the dominant one, and that it is far greater than all the greenhouse gases"

Where is the research you are quoting?

SamSam

11-04-2006, 12:09 PM

To jimbo and all the other naysayers ,enjoying their contoversial positions...

Taura excreta non est disputandum.

Just a guess.. You can't argue with ********. ? Sam

SamSam

11-04-2006, 12:29 PM

What difference does it make which entity is causing it?

Since everyone seems to agree that global warming IS happening, the third post in this thread becomes relevant. Whatever the cause, can anything be done about it?
Should anything be done about it?
What interests me is what will be the consequences and how to prepare for them. Sam

ron17571

11-04-2006, 12:39 PM

I think it occurs in cycles naturally,i would be more concearned about pollution and just asking people to do their best to help out,i see all the big gas hog vehicles everyday and think of all the crap they emit into the air,i wish all large trucks were taxed hard enough to make people think hard enough about wheather its worth owning them.i once read that one of the first thing george bush did was to get rid of a mandate that coal burning powerplants had to have scrubbers.Ive traveled the usa and the amount of places with polluted water,where people cant eat the fish is very high.

jimisbell

11-04-2006, 01:38 PM

To jimbo and all the other naysayers ,enjoying their contoversial positions...

Taura excreta non est disputandum.

If this merans what I think, then yes, you are right and that is why this naysayer has made no more posts on the subject. Its not worth my time. I am outnumbered by people with loads of BS

Vega

11-04-2006, 02:28 PM

Just a guess.. You can't argue with ********. ? Sam

Taura excreta non est disputandum. I thik it means:

A sterile cow is not worth discussing.

Jimbo1490

11-04-2006, 05:58 PM

"This period was NOT associated with catastrophic temperature increases using accepted reliable proxy data."

You have studied the current research? You are saying that the temps were not higher during the cretaceous?

From the very page you cited:
http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V8/N5/EDIT.jsp

You keep mentionioning the less than .04 composition as an example of why co2 content has neglible effect. Sound impressive, but is it suportable in chemistry that quantity is determinate?

"No spike in CO2 levels is noted in the geologic record coinciding with the beginning of 'signicant' anthropogenic releases."

What do you mean by this??

"There is good evidence that the minor greenhouse gases, of which CO2 is one, are NOT the regulators of the earth's temperature. If CO2 were a regulator, the system would have gone off equillibrium long ago, never returning."

Where is the research you are quoting?

"The natural variations in CO2 swamp out our tiny contribution"

You never addressed my question.

"What is the pre-human and post human co2 net gain in the atmosphere"

What is that contribution which can be attributed to human activity??

Tiny?? Care to put a percentage on it??

Perhaps you could *actually read* this page this time since all of the above questions have already been covered:

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html

Solar variation is not neglected in the science.

Really?

http://www.aip.org/history/climate/solar.htm

Yet the global warming alarmists continue to search the garden for tiny CO2 pebbles ignoring the solar boulder upon which the whole garden rests.

You state:

"Even believers have acknowledge now that the sun's impact on climate change is the dominant one, and that it is far greater than all the greenhouse gases"

Where is the research you are quoting?

Researchers are not sure how cosmic rays contribute to cloud cover, though there are a couple of theories. Jasper Kirby and Frank Close, who work at the European particle-physics centre in Geneva, have devised an experiment to strengthen the connection. The researchers plan to use a modified cloud chamber (a box containing air super-saturated with water vapor) that can be used to replicate conditions in the atmosphere. By firing particle beams similar to cosmic rays through the box they can see whether clouds are formed. It may turn out that much of the small amount of warming that we have experienced in the last century is due to solar inconstancy (The Economist, April 11, 1998)

I answer with a graph and a counter question: If CO2 in the atmosphere is causing global climate change, and we can at least postulate mechanism(s) by which CO2 might do this, does CO2 also happen to cause the sun's activity to increase, and can you postulate a plausible mechanism to wit?

Ultimately, this question is not about the science; I keep coming back to that point. It's more about the way science gets funded and used and abused by various advocacy groups. It's about how politicians use scientists to buy a cloak of legitimacy the way kings of old did with clergymen. Politicians on the left side of the political spectrum are now and have been for some time, using scaremongering about a deteriorating environment to get people to vote for their anti-industrial agenda.

The right does this too, but not with the environmental issues. Their hobgoblin is a sort of xenophobia with national security overtones.

Our understanding of the earth's climate is an evolving science. The believers in the GHG/Global Warming thoery cast the debate as already decided when this is not the case, scientifically speaking at least.

Jimbo

bntii

11-04-2006, 06:30 PM

Good- I see you can read as well:

"This incredible warmth, in their words, "implies a total absence of polar ice at these high latitudes, and contrasts dramatically with a present-day mean annual surface air temperature of about -15°C at 80 N." Indeed, the temperature difference between that earlier time and now exceeds a whopping 35°"

So you now understand that the Cretaceous saw remarkable higher temps and your statement:

"This period was NOT associated with catastrophic temperature increases using accepted reliable proxy data."

is now placed in perspective.

Give me five and I will get to the rest

Vega

11-04-2006, 06:33 PM

I answer with a graph and a counter question: If CO2 in the atmosphere is causing global climate change, and we can at least postulate mechanism(s) by which CO2 might do this, does CO2 also happen to cause the sun's activity to increase, and can you postulate a plausible mechanism to wit?[/B]

Jimbo, I have said that in my opinion this subject is too complex to be analyzed by amateurs... but I still can read a graph;) .

Please take a look again. You can see that the solar wind reached a pick in 1977, then went down till 1979, went up again till 1982 ( but not above the 1979 max) then went rapidly down till the end of the time laps (1990).

During all this time, with ups and downs on the solar activity, the temperature is increasing as well as CO2. It is particularly significant from 1985 to 1990.

Jimbo1490

11-04-2006, 06:39 PM

The page I cited taken from the page you cited had several key scientists sharply at odds with that 35 degree figure, which was conjured, BTW by the publisher's own computer model. The gist of their objection is that if one accepts the 35 degree figure then other more solid data goes out the window and we can't have that. The final analysis is that his model "needs more work" and can't be relied on. The conclusion is that 15 degrees is more like it. His 35 degrees is a stark departure from widely accepted data of that period being only~ 15 degrees warmer, which is precisely why it was noteworthy to begin with. This is another case where a believer is trying to make the data fit a model rather than vise versa.

High Five :D

Jimbo

bntii

11-04-2006, 06:47 PM

Point taken,

Sloppy on my part- just trying to nail you on the whole issue of no higher temps associated with....... etc
Generally agreed that the Cretaceous was a hothouse. 15 degrees hotter is still a remarkable difference.

""Why didn't the earth 'overheat' when CO2 was at 6000 PPM?"

It did

-sent a pm to you-

bntii

11-04-2006, 08:06 PM

Perhaps you could *actually read* this page this time since all of the above questions have already been covered:[/B]

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html

Jimbo

Perhaps you could *actually answer* the question. As to this reference you did not provide it the last time you did not answer either:

"Most, if not all of your questions are answered in a post to another thread. To keep from re-posting it, I refer you to the post here:

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/sho...&postcount=172"

Jimbo1490

11-04-2006, 09:30 PM

That page really does answer all the questions, but I'll simply quote from it with the cited reseach refernces to prove it. I've attached some of the charts. The data is taken from the US Department of Energy Assesment the full text of which can be found here:

http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/pns/current_ghg.html

And from the US Environmental Protection agency's Asessment the full text of which can be found here:

http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/UniqueKeyLookup/SHSU5BUM9T/$File/ghg_gwp.pdf

The chart at left summarizes the % of greenhouse gas concentrations in Earth's atmosphere from Table 1. This is not a very meaningful view though because 1) the data has not been corrected for the actual Global Warming Potential (GWP) of each gas, and 2) water vapor is ignored.

But these are the numbers one would use if the goal is to exaggerate human greenhouse contributions:

Man-made and natural carbon dioxide (CO2) comprises 99.44% of all greenhouse gas concentrations (368,400 / 370,484 )--(ignoring water vapor).
99899991
Also, from Table 1 (but not shown on graph):

Anthropogenic (man-made) CO2 additions comprise (11,880 / 370,484) or 3.207% of all greenhouse gas concentrations, (ignoring water vapor).

Total combined anthropogenic greenhouse gases comprise (12,217 / 370,484) or 3.298% of all greenhouse gas concentrations, (ignoring water vapor).

The various greenhouse gases are not equal in their heat-retention properties though, so to remain statistically relevant % concentrations must be changed to % contribution relative to CO2. This is done in Table 2, below, through the use of GWP multipliers for each gas, derived by various researchers.
9990
To finish with the math, by calculating the product of the adjusted CO2 contribution to greenhouse gases (3.618%) and % of CO2 concentration from anthropogenic (man-made) sources (3.225%), we see that only (0.03618 X 0.03225) or 0.117% of the greenhouse effect is due to atmospheric CO2 from human activity. The other greenhouse gases are similarly calculated and are summarized below.
This is the statistically correct way to represent relative human contributions to the greenhouse effect.

From Table 4a, both natural and man-made greenhouse contributions are illustrated in this chart, in gray and green, respectively. For clarity, only the man-made (anthropogenic) contributions are labeled on the chart.

Water vapor, responsible for 95% of Earth's greenhouse effect, is 99.999% natural (some argue, 100%). Even if we wanted to, we can do nothing to change this.

Anthropogenic (man-made) CO2 contributions cause only about 0.117% of Earth's greenhouse effect, (factoring in water vapor). This is insignificant!

Adding up all anthropogenic greenhouse sources, the total human contribution to the greenhouse effect is around 0.28% (factoring in water vapor)
9992
The Kyoto Protocol calls for mandatory carbon dioxide reductions of 30% from developed countries like the U.S. Reducing man-made CO2 emissions this much would have an undetectable effect on climate while having a devastating effect on the U.S. economy. Can you drive your car 30% less, reduce your winter heating 30%? Pay 20-50% more for everything from automobiles to zippers? And that is just a down payment, with more sacrifices to come later.

Such drastic measures, even if imposed equally on all countries around the world, would reduce total human greenhouse contributions from CO2 by about 0.035%.

This is much less than the natural variability of Earth's climate system!

While the greenhouse reductions would exact a high human price, in terms of sacrifices to our standard of living, they would yield statistically negligible results in terms of measurable impacts to climate change. There is no expectation that any statistically significant global warming reductions would come from the Kyoto Protocol.

" There is no dispute at all about the fact that even if punctiliously observed, (the Kyoto Protocol) would have an imperceptible effect on future temperatures -- one-twentieth of a degree by 2050. "

Dr. S. Fred Singer, atmospheric physicist
Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia,
and former director of the US Weather Satellite Service;
in a Sept. 10, 2001 Letter to Editor, Wall Street Journa

CO2 in our atmosphere has been increasing steadily for the last 18,000 years-- long before humans invented smokestacks ( Figure 1). Unless you count campfires and intestinal gas, man played no role in the pre-industrial increases.

As illustrated in this chart of Ice Core data from the Soviet Station Vostok in Antarctica(http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/climate/labs/vostok/), CO2 concentrations in earth's atmosphere move with temperature. Both temperatures and CO2 have been steadily increasing for 18,000 years. Ignoring these 18,000 years of data "global warming activists" contend recent increases in atmospheric CO2 are unnatural and are the result of only 200 years or so of human pollution causing a runaway greenhouse effect.
9993
Incidentally, earth's temperature and CO2 levels today have reached levels similar to a previous interglacial cycle of 120,000 - 140,000 years ago. From beginning to end this cycle lasted about 20,000 years. This is known as the Eemian Interglacial Period and the earth returned to a full-fledged ice age immediately afterward.

Sorry for the lengthy post,
I hope you found it informative or at least entertaining :D

Jimbo

bntii

11-04-2006, 09:39 PM

In fact Dr. Singer does nothing to answer my basic question of the relative human contribution to the NET gain in atmospheric co2. He does a rather good job of pretending to address this most basic and important issue in this area of the debate.

The line of reasoning he uses is well summarized here:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/01/calculating-the-greenhouse-effect/

Please allow that I use the term 'debate' in reference to our discussion only as I feel it would be overstating the matter under any other circumstances.

marshmat

11-04-2006, 11:52 PM

marshmat

11-04-2006, 11:56 PM

Jimbo- Might I suggest you take a close look at that ice core data in your last post- that one is indeed correct. Now take that data set and add the 1950-2000 CO2 and temperature values on it. The results might surprise you.

Jimbo1490

11-04-2006, 11:59 PM

The entire quote above is not attributable to Dr Singer, just the portion commenting on the efficacy of the Kyoto Protocol, if implemented. Nobody really knows the answer to your question since CO2 was increasing before the industrial releases began, and there is a lot of uncertainty of the lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere.

The mechanisms for the uptake of CO2 (fluxes) are quite variable and hard to quantify on a global scale. If humanns never did industrialize, would CO2 have increased anyway? Given the trend was already an increase, the answer would certainly be "yes". The only debate would be "how much?". Of course the climate alarmists will state the worst scenario possible to bolster their claims, but the simple answer is, we don't know. From the change in carbon radio isotopes, it is known that some of the increase is certainly from human activity. The amount and importance is still up for debate.

Even proponents of GHG warming like Jan Schloerer have to admit:

"The vexing thing is that, in the global carbon cycle, the rising level
of atmospheric CO2 and the human origin of this rise are about the only
two things that are known with high certainty. Natural CO2 fluxes
into and out of the atmosphere exceed the human contribution by more
than an order of magnitude. The sizes of the natural carbon fluxes
are only approximately known, because they are much harder to measure
than atmospheric CO2 and than the features pointing to a human origin
of the CO2 rise."

Cliff notes version:

We don't know.
:D

Jimbo

Mychael

11-04-2006, 11:59 PM

So, is anyone able to name any or all of the truly independent scientific oranisations? I think someone posted earlier about funding for research.
Sad but probably true that there may actually be very few fully independant reasearch groups.

Mychael

Jimbo1490

11-05-2006, 12:08 AM

The US-DOE for instance, is perhaps the world's least credible source on this issue.

I'm puzzled by this remark since the DOE's figures look a lot like everyone else's. This was never a debate about the amount or quantity of this or that gas, just the relative signifcance of those quantities; the quantities are not in dispute.

Anyway the DOE's position is on the side of the global warming alarmists, so again I'm puzzled at your criticism. This just goes to show that people just look at the source first and then decide whether to bother to read the content :rolleyes: The full text was cited; if you had bothered to read page one you would already know the DOE's position. So the DOE would be credible if you thought they were supporting the side of the debate that appeals to you, but not credible if on the other side? Same data, different attitude. And you probably insist you are objective!

:D

Jimbo

bntii

11-06-2006, 06:40 AM

Two words:
Credible sources.
Lately there's been very little of that here. The US-DOE for instance, is perhaps the world's least credible source on this issue.
If anyone wants to state an opinion, go right ahead- state whatever you like.
If anyone wants to state something as scientific fact, it has to be backed up by independent, credible studies- stuff from genuine peer-reviewed journals, that is not funded by anyone with a vested interest in a particular result. If you claim to have a scientific fact, and do not back it up with valid science, no educated person can possibly believe you. This goes for everyone, guys.

If this were to be adapted I would be much more interested in this informal discussion. It is a real pain to counter all the trash generated by the countless blogs.

The real interest to me and many lay persons is the science. This has been put on the table before here. As far as I can tell this thread is populated by lay persons. I am guilty as any other but I would like to see more honest citation of source: no cutting and pasting summaries from web pages as self authored. More use of lanquage such as 'What I think is true' , 'I just looked into this question and found such', If inference- state it as such and source actual peer reviewed research as a base/source of knowlege. If one wishes to dismiss whole areas of research Please document the point with references where the SCIENCE shows that another point of view is more valid.

*Stating conclusions which are true only if the science is ignored or misrepresented is academically dishonest*

It turns this discussion into a foolish exercise where the more convincing storyteller 'appears' to win a point of debate.

Once again language is important: Sweeping generalization, conclusions without supporting citation must be prefaced with 'I could find not research to suggest....' , the research fails to prove therefore....

I need more coffee.....

And its getting cold- damn global cooling :)

hansp77

11-06-2006, 08:08 AM

bntii,
I couldn't agree more.

I started this damn thread and I am sick of what it has become (or what it became long long ago).
I like this forum over a lot of others for what I might say is a general predominence (I say general) of a higher level of 'integrity' in the way that issues are dealt with, and the general (again) way people deal with other people- as in we are all real people spending our valuable time and efforts here.
I don't want either side of this debate to drop out, as many have in exasperation and frustration already, but the way it is going on, I personally have just about had it with this thread.
This is a live issue and will no doubt stay so for a long long time yet.

There are enough places already on the net to flame each other and throw junk science around. Is this level of conversation really that far beyond us?

There are some members here who have a lot to contribute to this issue, combined with a desire to challenge their own views and pre-conceptions and learn in the process, and like it or- as in bellieve it or not -it is a real issue for all of us (even if global warming is bunk- it is still a real issue because at the moment so many people, scientists and institutions believe in it, and so much political and social shaping is evolving around it)

This is not about blame.

So,
What do you say people-
as the sorry b@st@rd who started this thread-
can I ask a favour?

How bout from now on, we try to go about things a bit differently.
Of course this is open to suggestion,
but my idea would be something liket...

Rather than trying to trash or prove the theory in one or two foul swoops from a dubious source or two making sweeping generalisations, maybe we can try to focus on more specific issues one or two at a time (as they are no doubt often interelated).
And like has been asked a heap of times already,

Credible sources MUST be used.

The members from either side of this discussion will probably have to try to self-regulate this. Sceptics, stop others sceptics from trashing junk-sciencing and flaming, and 'believers' (not that I like that word particularl) vice versa.

If there is any agreement on this, then,
As this request is coming from someone who has been labled a 'believer', I shall put it out there for those in opposition to pick any issue that we can start off with. First in best dressed.
for instance, it could be something like temperature tracking with CO2 levels, etc.
I don't want to pre-empt this, so lets say we won't start with that example.

What do you think?

agree?
want to suggest something else?
or business as usual?

If its the third option, personally I am out of this thread. It is not worth the time or effort.