Warming Climate Is Changing Life On A Global Scale

A vast array of physical and biological systems across the earth are being affected by warming temperatures caused by humans, says a new analysis of information not previously assembled all in one spot.

The effects on living things include earlier leafing of trees and plants over many regions; movements of species to higher latitudes and altitudes in the northern hemisphere; changes in bird migrations in Europe, North America and Australia; and shifting of the oceans' plankton and fish from cold- to warm-adapted communities.

"Humans are influencing climate through increasing greenhouse gas emissions, and the warming world is causing impacts on physical and biological systems attributable at the global scale," said lead author Cynthia Rosenzweig, a scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the Columbia Center for Climate Systems Research. Both are affiliates of The Earth Institute at Columbia University.

Rosenzweig and researchers from 10 other institutions across the world analyzed data from published papers on 829 physical systems and some 28,800 plant and animal systems, stretching back to 1970. Their analysis of revealed a picture of changes on continental scales; previous studies had looked mainly at single phenomena, or smaller areas. In physical systems, 95% of observed changes are consistent with warming trends.

These include wastage of glaciers on all continents; melting permafrost; earlier spring river runoff; and warming of water bodies. Among living creatures inhabiting such systems, 90% of changes are consistent with warming.

The researchers say it is unlikely that any force but human-influenced climate change could be driving all this; factors like deforestation or natural climate variations could not explain it. Their work builds upon the consensus of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which in 2007 declared manmade climate warming "likely" to have discernible effects on biological and physical systems.

"It was a real challenge to separate the influence of human-caused temperature increases from natural climate variations or other confounding factors, such as land-use changes or pollution," said coauthor David Karoly, a climate scientist at the University of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia.

"This was possible only through the combined efforts of our multi-disciplinary team, which examined observed changes in many different systems around the globe, as well as global climate model simulations of temperature changes."

The data showing the patterns of change are strongest in North America, Asia and Europe--mainly because far more studies have been done there, said Rosenzweig. On the other continents, including South America, Australia and Africa, documentation of changes in physical and biological systems is sparse, even though there is good evidence there of human-influenced warming itself.

The authors say that there is an urgent need to study these environmental systems, especially in tropical and subtropical areas.

Actual abstract for this paper:

Significant changes in physical and biological systems are occurring on all continents and in most oceans, with a concentration of available data in Europe and North America. Most of these changes are in the direction expected with warming temperature. Here we show that these changes in natural systems since at least 1970 are occurring in regions of observed temperature increases, and that these temperature increases at continental scales cannot be explained by natural climate variations alone. Given the conclusions from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report that most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-twentieth century is very likely to be due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations, and furthermore that it is likely that there has been significant anthropogenic warming over the past 50 years averaged over each continent except Antarctica, we conclude that anthropogenic climate change is having a significant impact on physical and biological systems globally and in some continents.

“The data showing the patterns of change are strongest in North America, Asia and Europe—mainly because far more studies have been done there, said Rosenzweig. On the other continents, including South America, Australia and Africa, documentation of changes in physical and biological systems is sparse, even though there is good evidence there of human-influenced warming itself.”

The real reason for this is there is no indication of increased temps in the southern hemisphere. The temps in the north seemed to have been rising between 1991-2000. This just happens to correspond to the timing when 100s of measuring stations were shut down in Siberia and northern Russia with the fall of the USSR. The fact of the matter is, neither hemisphere is warming. Don’t let people fool you into accepting there is even such a thing as “global warming” at this time. Does the globe warm...? Of course it does. Does it cool? Of course it does.

Is man the cause of any of this? It has not been proven.

I think the real reason of this is that there is no such thing as “global temperature”. From a scientific standpoint, can you really get an average temperature from the earth? You run into an infinite boundary when you logically dissect this notion.

The devil is in the details. Climate is not something that can be measured by a thermometer. Think about it. The earth’s atmosphere is better understood today than it has been in our history. But the the fact remains, that we understand more about the interplay between our celestial neighbors in our own solar system than we do about deep ocean currents,the interaction of GHGs in our atmosphere, and know almost nothing about the five bazillion other data sets that make up “climate”.

We may be able to understand what will probably happen in a very precise geographic location in a very restricted time frame and very restricted set of conditions. And even then, we are wrong more than 20% of the time.

You can go on and on for days trying to dissect this absurdity talking about solar winds, recurring weather cycles, non anthropogenic contributors, occean currents and blah de blah de blah. The fact is we know very very little. To think we can draw any reasonable and reliable conclusion about long term climatic trends is just absurd and quite pompous in my own educated opinion. To make policy and restrict modern convenience is mostly suicidal.

The day when they can reverse-test their models, i will listen to them. Until then, its all nonesense being pushed by grant hungry science whores. Albeit sometimes it is dangerous nonesense.

So, Antarctica isn't affected by global change? Last I checked, it WAS part of the ecosphere!

These GW chicken-little panic mongerers are a hoot! In 1974 these same people were obsessing over global cooling. In any case, their data is faulty at best and more idiotic than "junk science" at worst.

Depending on the source, temperatures have been stable or decreasing over the last three to 9 years. Whateverthecase, the Arctic ice cap is larger this year than any other in recorded history (ice cap measurements go back approximately 200 years), snow levels in the Rocky mountains are WAY above normal, there are 35 egregious errors (or lies) in Gore's movie, current temperatures are significantly below those of the midieval times (a period of unparalleled growth and prosperity), and the litany of data showing the "concern" of the chicken-little panic mongerers is totally and uterly unfounded goes on and on (like this sentence).

Note that as temperatures were rising here on earth in the 80's and 90's, the caps on Mars were also shrinking, proving unequivocally that temperature increases are the result of activity on the sun, something on which mankind has no impact. My SUV makes no difference to temperatures on earth; neither does cow flatus!! The fact is that carbon dioxide DOES increase with temperature, but lags the temperature curve by about 300 years. Temperature causes carbon dioxide, not the opposite. Idiots!

The whole premise of GW requires the suspension of logical thought, or ANY thought, for that matter. It's the same lack of thought required to accept current, ongoing lies, for example, darwinism is more than a badly flawed theory, islamics are open to negotiation, increasing taxes makes more money for the gov't, making everyone defenseless (taking guns away from law-abiding citizens) decreases violent crime, and any number of other easily disproven hypotheses!

There, THAT ought to liven things up a bit!

Global-warming myth

By Patrick J. Michaels
May 16, 2008

On May Day, Noah Keenlyside of Germany's Leipzig Institute of Marine Science, published a paper in Nature forecasting no additional global warming "over the next decade."

Al Gore and his minions continue to chant that "the science is settled" on global warming, but the only thing settled is that there has not been any since 1998. Critics of this view (rightfully) argue that 1998 was the warmest year in modern record, due to a huge El Nino event in the Pacific Ocean, and that it is unfair to start any analysis at a high (or a low) point in a longer history. But starting in 2001 or 1998 yields the same result: no warming.

The Keenlyside team found that natural variability in the Earth's oceans will "temporarily offset" global warming from carbon dioxide. Seventy percent of the Earth's surface is oceanic; hence, what happens there greatly influences global temperature. It is now known that both Atlantic and Pacific temperatures can get "stuck," for a decade or longer, in relatively warm or cool patterns. The North Atlantic is now forecast to be in a cold stage for a decade, which will help put the damper on global warming. Another Pacific temperature pattern is forecast not to push warming, either.

Science no longer provides justification for any rush to pass drastic global warming legislation. The Climate Security Act, sponsored by Joe Lieberman and John Warner, would cut emissions of carbon dioxide — the main "global warming" gas — by 66 percent over the next 42 years. With expected population growth, this means about a 90 percent drop in emissions per capita, to 19th-century levels.

Other regulatory dictates are similarly unjustified. The Justice Department has ruled that the Interior Department has until May 15 to decide whether or not to list the polar bear as an endangered species.

Pressure to pass impossible-to-achieve legislation, like Lieberman-Warner, or grandstanding political stunts, like calling polar bears an "endangered species" even when they are at near record-high population levels, are based upon projections of rapid and persistent global warming.

Proponents of wild legislation like to point to the 2007 science compendium from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, deemed so authoritative it was awarded half of last year's Nobel Peace Prize. (The other half went to Al Gore.) In it there are dozens of computer-driven projections for 21st-century warming. Not one of them projects that the earth's natural climate variability will shut down global warming from carbon dioxide for two decades. Yet, that is just what has happened.

If you think about it, all we possess to project the future of complex systems are computer models. Therefore, if the models that serve as the basis for policy do not work — and that must be the conclusion if indeed we are at the midpoint of a two-decade hiatus in global warming — then there is no verifiable science behind the current legislative hysteria.

What does this mean for the future? If warming is "temporarily offset" for two decades, does all the "offset" warming suddenly appear with a vengeance, or is it delayed?

Computer models, like the one used by Keenlyside, et al., rely on "positive feedbacks" to generate much of their warming. First, atmospheric carbon dioxide warms things up a bit. Then the ocean follows, raising the amount of atmospheric water vapor, which is a greater source of global warming than carbon dioxide. When the ocean does not warm up, it seems that the additional warming is also delayed.

All of this may mean that we have simply overestimated the amount of warming that results from increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide.

That final point has been a subject of debate for a long time. Several recent publications in the peer-reviewed literature argue that observed changes in temperature show the "sensitivity" of temperature to increasing carbon dioxide is lower than earlier estimates.

All of this suggests a 21st-century warming trend that will be lower than the average value calculated by the climate models in the IPCC compendium.

But who really knows? Before Keenlyside dropped his bombshell, few scientists would have said publicly that global warming could stop for two decades. Anyone raising that possibility would doubtlessly have been treated to the smug reply that "the science is settled," and that only the most bumptious ignoramus could raise such a question.

One final prediction: The teeming polar bear population will be listed as "endangered," and in the next year or two, Congress will pass a bill mandating large and impossible cuts in carbon dioxide.

What is "settled" is the politics, not the science.

Patrick J. Michaels is senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute.

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