the REAL issue with regard to climate change today

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(McShemp @ Mar 19 2007, 01:19 PM) [snapback]408413[/snapback]</div>

there are four spikes of co2 levels prior to now - 100, 200, 300, 400 thousand years ago - which looks somewhat cyclical to me but that is not my point. please explain to me what caused all those co2 spikes - ALL of them - since humans could not have been the cause of them - and then explain to me why whatever was responsible for the co2 spikes then, could not be responsible for them now - and if you have time, please tell me why we need to worry since planet earth has obviously survived these co2 spikes four times already and we are here today?

thanks in advance for your cooperation.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Mar 19 2007, 01:14 PM) [snapback]408448[/snapback]</div>

Look at the increase in the last 25,000 years-- does not that look a lot like the other spikes as a part of the cycle?? It went from 200 ppm to about 280 ppm. That spike can be seen by a reasonable person as a part of a cycle the earth has experienced before. Now look at present levels, 380 ppm. Where in all of the history is there CO2 levels anywhere close to that level?? Perhaps nowhere??

Okay, as far as the CO2 spikes, there are a lot of reasons that could have happened - Volcanic activity, lower productivity due to suncycles, etc. Some of those reasons can be reasonably seen as responsible for a small part of our CO2 levels over the last 25,000 years up to 280 ppm, but how the hell could you suggest that they can be responsible for the increase to 380 ppm never seen before in the course of history.

Global warming is not rocket science. Humans burn fossil fuels, humans produce CO2, CO2 levels increase because there is not enough sinks to make up for the new sources in CO2 production, CO2 warms the earth.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Mar 19 2007, 06:14 PM) [snapback]408448[/snapback]</div>

Here's the situation as I understand it...

Point 1. Mankind hasn't been around for that long. Human civilisation started about 10,000 years ago, around the time of the last big spike up on your graph (the end of the ice age). We didn't survive all those changes. We weren't around, except as nomadic hunter-gatherers. And certainly not 6 billion of us reliant on massive industrialised farming.

Point 2. We are already at the top of one of those natural cycles. We've now just injected so much CO2 into the atmosphere so fast that the atmosphere is in a state it has not been in for hundreds of thousands of years. Nowhere on that graph is CO2 as high as it is now. Our spike is so steep and so fast you can't even see it, apart from the red arrow at the top. So what on that graph gives you such confidence that having 30% more CO2 than the highest peak in the entire history of homo sapiens (around 130,000 years) is nothing to be worried about?

Point 3. Before mankind came along and injected CO2, other factors initiated climate cycles. CO2 was released from the oceans as the earth warmed. But CO2 also warms the earth. It's a feedback loop. Once a warming cycle started, due to orbital variation, or whatever, the CO2 released then sustained and boosted the initial forcing.

There was no way CO2 could be the initiator of a climate change back then, because there was no mechanism to spontaneously add major amounts CO2 to the atmosphere, apart from an initial temperature changes. But we've just discovered gigatonnes of extra carbon safely buried away and decided to chuck it into the atmosphere ourselves, at a rate far, far, far greater than any natural cycle. That is certainly likely to have interesting effects.

Point 4. It's the rate of change that's going to be the biggest problem, not the change itself. All those movements on the graph are relatively slow. Even the steepest rises on there take place over something like 5000 years. We've managed to replicate such a spike in about 100-150, and temperature is following similarly fast. The ecosystem has never suffered such an apocalyptic shock before, save prehistoric events like the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs.

Point 5. This is basic physics and chemistry. We're not relying on past observations here. We are responsible for the rise in the CO2. If you're going to try to deny that, you need both an alternate explanation for where this CO2 has come from, and you need to explain what happened to all the CO2 we know we emitted (which you can calculate fairly easily from oil production figures). Oh, and you need to explain the changes in C13 and C14 ratios of the atmosphere, which indicate that the CO2 we're seeing is "new" (or tens of millions of years old, depending which way you look at it).

Next, CO2 causes a greenhouse effect. If you're going to deny that you need to figure some reason why the earth's atmosphere doesn't behave as laboratory experiments suggest (and at the same time explain why we're not tens of degrees colder than we are - conventional physics relies on the laboratory-measured and theoretically understood CO2 greenhouse effect to explain our current climate).

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(dbermanmd @ Mar 19 2007, 01:14 PM) [snapback]408448[/snapback]</div>

I think you have not seen the "little" red arrow at the top of the graph that shows the present unprecedented high level.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(MarkMN @ Mar 19 2007, 01:30 PM) [snapback]408457[/snapback]</div>

You are missing the little red arrow as well.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(adam1991 @ Mar 19 2007, 04:30 AM) [snapback]408273[/snapback]</div>

I don't think you understand how the scientific research community works. They run experiments, gather results and come to conclusions and publish their reports. These experiments can then be duplicated and the results compared. If a scientist falsifies results or comes to erroneous conclusions there are a host of other scientists that would like nothing better than to prove him wrong. And in doing so can ruin the career of the incorrect scientist (especially if he knowingly falsified results). That being fact, why would a scientist skew reults, knowing that in doing so can ruin his career and stop any future money from comming to him.

So your suggestion that scientists are skewing results in favor of GW is simply wrong. Unless there is vast conspiracy in which nearly every climatologist (in the highly competitive scientific arena) is involved.



<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(adam1991 @ Mar 19 2007, 04:30 AM) [snapback]408273[/snapback]</div>

I don't think you understand how the scientific research community works. They run experiments, gather results and come to conclusions and publish their reports. These experiments can then be duplicated and the results compared. If a scientist falsifies results or comes to erroneous conclusions there are a host of other scientists that would like nothing better than to prove him wrong. And in doing so can ruin the career of the incorrect scientist (especially if he knowingly falsified results). That being fact, why would a scientist skew reults, knowing that in doing so can ruin his career and stop any future money from comming to him.

So your suggestion that scientists are skewing results in favor of GW is simply wrong. Unless there is vast conspiracy in which nearly every climatologist (in the highly competitive scientific arena) is involved.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(adam1991 @ Mar 19 2007, 02:50 PM) [snapback]408575[/snapback]</div>

I agree that some Universities have done just that but it does not mean all the scientists within the University are "bought". UC Berkeley is a case in point with their infighting on agricultural issues.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(KMO @ Mar 19 2007, 03:14 PM) [snapback]408485[/snapback]</div>

still no answers here boys. obfuscating.

this bad rock has been around for a long time and will be for another long time - based on the majority of people here i think i would rather have climate change (which i doubt is human based - maybe cow based) than change based on sharia law - hey your from England - how's that Mosque doing in London - and are you not worried about Islamofascism killing more brits than gw? in fact i think it has killed more people than gw to date? but then again, islamofascism is a way of combating gw - just turn the clocks of mankind back 1,000 to the stoneage :lol: is it true you have areas in GB that allow sharia law to rule? its a shame what you guys are going to be battling in the next 10-20 years (and the french) - good luck nothing will be safe - your school buses, your subways, your pizzarias - you have opened the door to the devil - and the devil is amongst you - in masses - it has a belief in religion that you do not, it believes in a cause (while most of you dont) - it believes dying for that cause is noble. it could get very ugly there. and continue to disarm - down to less than 200 nukes by next year - your navy is nothing, your airforce - ditto - your army - down to bone.... how are you going to defend yourselves without help? did the falklands teach you anything? obviously not.

anyhow, focus on GW , it will keep you from worrying about your immediate future.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(adam1991 @ Mar 19 2007, 05:50 PM) [snapback]408575[/snapback]</div>

You're seriously delusional if you think university research scientists earn more than their corporate counterparts, or that they somehow got into it "for the money."

By your definition, all scientific research is a conspiracy, with a predetermined outcome. That was how much science was conducted under the former Soviet Union, led by T.D. Lysenko. Needless to say, their scientific results that resulted from politicized science, including ridiculous practices such as cooling grain before planting it, were never adopted by the interenational community because just a little peer-review revealed it for the political hackery it was.

Fake science doesn't stand up. The falsified stem-cell data Hwang Woo-suk had published in Science was thoroughly demolished within two years.

And you don't appear to know anything about how Scientific Grants are done. First, they lay out the background for their research. Then they summarize published and unpublished preliminary results from their research. This is generally followed by the Research Plan, wherein the steps to realize the Specific Aims of the grant are described. This often includes discussion of what will be studied if the original hypothesis proves incorrect. Because a negative result in science can still point toward the truth or greater understanding of the process you're studying.

There is no global conspiracy among scientists in regard to global warming. By this time, half the scientists in the world would have made their names disproving it.

The only proven conspiracy on this topic has been the efforts of the oil lobby to cloud the issue by the using the "we need more study" strategies that worked so well for big tobacco. http://www.ucsusa.org/news/press_release/E...ng-tobacco.html

As for the "grant" money, well, in addition trying to censor what government scientists can write, the current administration is also trying to dry up the funds that let us know how the earth works. Great.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2037619,00.html
Dr Hansen will criticise the White House for successive cuts to Nasa's earth science research and analysis budget to what he calls "almost a going-out-of-business" level. He claims that this has meant that most planned launches of satellites that would collect valuable climate data have been cancelled or postponed, and that support for contractors, young scientists and students has disappeared. This will have "dire implications for future capabilities", he will argue.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(adam1991 @ Mar 19 2007, 06:58 PM) [snapback]408620[/snapback]</div>

Oh yawn, that's all you've got? There's about 30 years of peer-reviewed research that has slowly built to the current consensus regarding AGW.

But if you want a conspiracy, here's where you can follow the money:

Scientists' Report Documents ExxonMobil’s Tobacco-like Disinformation Campaign on Global Warming Science
Oil Company Spent Nearly $16 Million to Fund Skeptic Groups, Create Confusion
http://www.ucsusa.org/news/press_release/E...ng-tobacco.html

Exxon's quarterly revenue equals $45 million an hour
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/busi...oilearns28.html

 

I'd be greatly relieved. We could turn attention to some of the less serious stuff, like pollution, overfishing, etc. All of which are much easier to solve, thank god.

Although there would still be problems from CO2 emission, like ocean acidification, and in a couple of generations, it actually getting harder to breath due to the high CO2 concentration.

Here's one paper on the subject. Quotes:

See, this isn't all about global warming. CO2 is a pollutant for other reasons too, and is worth addressing.

But hey, maybe breathing is overrated.

 

It is obvious that we are producing more CO2 than ever. Earth was not built to withstand human superfluity. Although we may not be racing towards a terrible, apocalypic doom, why can't we just try to live cleaner? Do you want to breathe in smog? Who really cares if the polar bears go [which it's evident that the ice caps are melting, our fault or not]? Oil spills? Meh, what's a few dolphins and sea turtles?

It's clear humans can be part of the problem, but for once, can we just try to be part of the solution? Can we try to do our best to help and not hurt the Earth, if not for our immediate gratification [i.e. reducing litter, pollution of waterways, air quality], but perhaps for the betterment of all future life on the planet?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(KMO @ Mar 19 2007, 07:41 PM) [snapback]408647[/snapback]</div>

Breathing has a well-known liberal bias! :lol:

 

Going back to that Robertson paper on CO2 poisoning, I feel duty-bound to add that I don't know whether his figures are widely accepted; I've really not heard much discussion of the health effects of CO2. It was something that occured to me a couple of months ago - how long would it be before we wouldn't be able to breathe. But I'm not aware what the consensus is.

But clearly there must be some point at which we will have problems, and we should try to stop before we get there. It may well be that the oil/coal runs out first though. I'd imagine the problem is less critical than the weather effects, or we'd have heard more about it.

 

Question everything? Wouldn't it be more productive to start by questioning the stuff where there's reasonable doubt, so as not to waste time and effort?

How can you doubt we're producing more CO2 than ever? That follows directly from the fact we're burning more oil and coal than ever. Feel free to do the sums and estimate how much CO2 we're producing

So, I question your assertion that we're not producing more CO2 than ever.

Or are you not really claiming that, and just saying "question everything" in some sort of nihilistic attempt to deny any such thing as objective truth?

Here's a suggestion I read somewhere:

As opposed to just saying "question everything" repeatedly.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(KMO @ Mar 19 2007, 06:20 PM) [snapback]408661[/snapback]</div>

Six billion plus people are producing more CO2 than ever ... with all that exhaling and bodily functions. Add their livestock (they gotta eat) and their pets and ... well that's a lot of CO2. How much CO2 does China's 1.3 billion people generate? I'm certain that has been estimated, hasn't it?