Forget global warming: Welcome to the new Ice Age

Good thing the weather forecasters are never wrong, I guess.

 

I think you may be the one jumping to conclusions. If we understand how CO2 effects longwave radiation and we understand that humans are putting a lot of it into the atmosphere how do you consider that jumping to conclusions? If we have a wealth of knowledge on past climates including data on earths tilt, wobble, and variable distance from the sun and all of this fits well with the current theory of global warming how can you assume this is jumping to conclusions? No, there is enough scientific data to back up the current conclusions on global warming. Of course they could all be wrong but with so much data pointing in the same direction it would be simply wrong to assume they have not done the research to back up their opinions. Have you ever talked to any of these people yourself? They seem quite educated and sane to me.

Knuckledraggers may be very useful for fixing my drywall or mowing my lawn but when I need medical attention or advice on how to send a satellite into orbit I'm not going to ask a non-scientist. One common misconception is that scientists look down on the uneducated, that's not true except in cases where the uneducated toss out opinions on a scientific subject of which they seem to know very little yet do it with a fierce conviction that can only be driven by politics, religion, or their underlying embarassment of not being educated. I was one of the later for quite some time.

 

They are predicting overall climate shifts. Not specific weather on specific dates and times.

Could it be wrong? Of course, if ocean currents are disrupted or hadley cells shift then we would likely see much different weather patterns. Id rather they tell us something may happen and be better prepared for some kind of climate shift rather than assume it's all a big conspiracy theory and do nothing and not be prepared. Regardless of climate change predictions based on global warming, many areas will see their local climate change as it has done so VERY often in the past every 50yrs, 100yrs, 200yrs, etc.. As a nation we are not prepared for any of it. We continue to overuse water, build on flood plains, drain aquifers, dam up rivers, etc. Collectively we act so irresponsibly that I'm amazed we have survived this long.

 

That same graph states that far and away the strongest forcing is warming caused by greenhouse gases, and that it is understood with high confidence. Even if all the other forcings proved to be cooling at the extremes of their respective uncertainties they would barely overcome the greenhouse gasses; and the odds that all those uncertainties do go that way and that far are virtually nil.

 

Ok - we get that you look down on those that don't drink the kool-aid, but my point is that GW is bieng used as a tool to drive social change by those with a specific agenda, such as


"When you have a society that tolerates very rich people having "a lot" and a substantial number of people who are forced to do and live and consume in poverty, there is something wrong. I'm not a socialist, but I do think that a healthy society cares for the least among us. I don't consider us very healthy.", as written in another post.

 

I go from the premise that if we do not COMPLETELY understand the effects of CO2 emissions etc on the ecosystem then it's better to limit the emission of such gases. Just to be safe....

 

You're problem is that you are turning this into a partisan issue and it is not. Sure anyone can take an issue and turn it into an "agenda" but when you fail to examine the data and imediately make up your mind on an issue because it does not fit your mental frame then you are the one who appears to be "drinking the kool-aid". Remember, this is not a U.S. based issue and plenty of educted people around the world are in agreement.

Do you have any great evidence to back up dismissal of global warming or would you like to continue arguing ideologies?

 

It's called the Precautionary Principle or as one Native American speaker put it, "the DUH principle". lol

Nice to see someone from South Africa posting here. I was just playing Mandoza and Brenda Fassie a few minutes ago. lol

 

Since you chose to quote me with out attribution AND out of context, I will respond.

The question that I responded to raised the question of Jobs Vs the Environment. I was pointing out that it didn't have to be an either/or situation, and if we lived in a different society, perhaps we could expect different outcomes. My basic premise is that people act first out of self interest, and usually for short term self interest at that. If,,, as I stated in my first opinion in this thread, if, we were to pay the full cost of our actions, (environmental, social, etc) up front, we would be able to act in our short term self interest as is our nature, AND act in a way that has benefit to the many. To restate my point: If burning coal for grid power cost the consumer it full cost, (acid rain, habitat destruction, mine accidents, land reclamation etc.) then we might choose to use Pv solar, or better conservation or some un-invented magic system that can't get mainstream because it is not "cost effective"

So, in the future, feel free to quote me, but please attribute the quote so others can read the entire thought, AND, try not to quote out of context.

Thank you,

Icarus

 

How have I turned this into a partisan issue? I don't favor a political point of view, because there are members of both parties in America that think "we have to do something" sbout GW. I don't even really doubt that GW is real to some degree (no pun intended ) , however the cause is very much in dispute, and the "solutions" even more so. If we are going to spend valuable resources on attempting to lessen our impact on GW, I want those solutions to be effective at actually reducing our impact, not a shot in the dark driven by a political agenda designed to set up a permanent funding source for enviromental groups to do whatever. That is why I think we should do the small things we know will have an effect, such as regulating lower emissions on vehicles (the biggest man made source), promoting and investing in alternative sources of energy, and developing technologies that can actually clean up the effect we have already had. There's three things that we can do right now that will reduce our CO2 emissions and , unbelievably, no need to spend money on wishful thinking solutions or "lowering our expectations" or dramatically harming our economy by signing on to dumb international treaties that won't do any good. Imagine that.

 

How can we know the uncertainty bars are accurate when the scientific level of understanding is "very low".

Regardless, as Schwartz shows here "The resultant equilibrium climate sensitivity, 0.30 ± 0.14 K/(W m-2), corresponds to an equilibrium temperature increase for doubled CO2 of 1.1 ± 0.5 K."

This is far below the catastrophic levels promoted in the media.

 

F8L I have not yet gotten a chance to look at your links you provided but i will tonight sometime. I was just thinking, How does flatulence contribute to the issue?

 

I was having breakfast one morning with a NASA scientist and friend of mine for 40 years. I asked him what about his “take” on global warming. He paused for a minute (probably thinking of all the technical info he knew and could relate) and then to my surprise, simply said “I think nature is extremely robust, but we should still be good stewards”. He seemed to be saying that there is much we don’t know about nature. He actually only said what we do know—“robust” “be good stewards”.

 

Being that I am 27 years old, The weather has never changed. Some winters have been moderate and some have been downright cold. I can remember a summer a few years ago we struggled to see 80 degree weather. The whole summer was cold. I remember a summer where it was hotter than an oven. It's still a theory and until these 7 billion dollar fed global warming scientists come up with a true reason and proof that it does exsist then I'll believe it. Until then It's still a theory and unproven.

It's like this, I ask for funding to do research on Squirrels and how they migrate I won't see any funding. Now If i say I need funding for effects on Squirrels in Global Warming conditions I bet I'll have all kinds of money flowing in.

I'm not trying to be negative about this but I know for a fact that some individuals are making BIG money off of this.

 

That is interesting Tim. I wonder how helpful that would be considering we still have to deal with methane release and ocean acidification issues. CO2 has many effects when the concentration is raised above or below mean levels. I guess we are going to find out. lol

 

No worries mate. When you have time they are worth the read or watch.

As for the theory thing. Theories are not proven. There is no real "fact" in science. Theories can only fail to be proven false, yet to say "it's just a theory" is to miss the finer point in that a well studied theory covers a lot of subject material and generally has gone through a lot of peer review and rigorous testing.

One of the major problems with humankind is it's inability to think in terms of "geologic time" naturally. We live at a human pace and to us 27yrs is a long time and even 100yrs is long time to us. 1000yrs is nothing on the geologic timescale. So while you may not agree with anthropogenic climate change, the data on a geologic timescale provides distinctive clues to historic climates and when all the various methods of determining paleoclimate (pollen, ice cores, sediment, rocks, tree rings, etc.) point in the same direction I feel it is much more prudent to "listen" to the data as opposed to some radio talk show host or politician with an agenda (Al Gore included).

As for the funding issue. People maybe making a living on grants for this work but I highly doubt they are getting rich off it like many of the CEOs of the big corporations that fund anti-climate change hyperbole are. I know a lot of scientists and very few (none that I know personally) are rich. In fact one of the first things they caution me on is making sure the field I'm going into is a passion of mine because I will never get rich from it. So if you really want to use money as an argument look at who has the most and you'll find it is the very companies with a history of screwing us (Exxon Mobil, Coke, Wal-Mart, General Electric, Union Carbide Chemical )over in terms of environment, social justice, environmental justice, or just plain screwing us out of money (Think Enron here).

 

Afraid on a per capita basis which is the only fair way to measure emissions there are 10 countries in the world with higher per capita emissions than the USA and they have a total combined population of less than 10 million. Most of those countries are producing oil for the USA and other nations. Unfortunately Australia and Canada aren't far behind the USA.

 

To prove the theory about splitting atoms and atom bombs some bombs had to be destroyed so lets bumble along and do nothing about climate change and when the atmosphere is destroyed the theory is proven then maybe we will change our ways. Great plan.
Or we can atleast do a few simple things to reduce consumption of carbon based energy and if all the highly paid climatologists are proven wrong how will that be such a bad thing? Of course someone makes a killing from you turning off lights in unused rooms, or recycling waste, or using a municipal bus rather than driving a car or buying a more efficient car.

I see your point.

 

Canada has the highest per-capita energy consumption

 

Not entirely true. Canada may have higher per capita consumption than the US but their "capita" is quite low. It doesn't make it into the 20 countries with highest population:



We are also one of the countries with the lowest efficiency. Along with Canada.