New paleo reconstruction shows warmer periods in Alaska over the past 3000 years

For those worried about tundra melt and methane outgassing, this study might dampen those worries a bit. A new peer-reviewed study by Clegg et al. demonstrates that modern global warming is significantly less than the global warming experienced in the higher latitudes, specifically Alaska, during the summers of the last 3,000 years. It demonstrate that the Current Warm Period (CWP) is not unprecedented, at least for Alaska. The authors suggest a tie in to solar variability.

What was done
The authors conducted a high-resolution analysis of midge assemblages found in the sediments of Moose Lake (61°22.45′N, 143°35.93′W) in the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve of south-central Alaska (USA), based on data obtained from cores removed from the lake bottom in the summer of AD 2000 and a midge-to-temperature transfer function that yielded mean July temperatures (TJuly) for the past six thousand years.

What was learned
The results of the study are portrayed in the accompanying figure, where it can be seen, in the words of Clegg et al., that “a piecewise linear regression analysis identifies a significant change point at ca 4000 years before present (cal BP),” with “a decreasing trend after this point.” And from 2500 cal BP to the present, there is a clear multi-centennial oscillation about the declining trend line, with its peaks and valleys defining the temporal locations of the Roman Warm Period, the Dark Ages Cold Period, the Medieval Warm Period, the Little Ice Age — during which the coldest temperatures of the entire interglacial or Holocene were reached — and, finally, the start of the Current Warm Period, which is still not expressed to any significant degree compared to the Medieval and Roman Warm Periods.

Six millennia of summer temperature variation based on midge analysis of lake sediments from Alaska

Abstract

Despite their importance for evaluating anthropogenic climatic change, quantitative temperature reconstructions of the Holocene remain scarce from northern high-latitude regions. We conducted high-resolution midge analysis on the sediments of the past 6000 years from a lake in south-central Alaska. Results were used to estimate mean July air temperature (T_July) variations on the basis of a midge temperature transfer function. The T_July estimates from the near-surface samples are broadly consistent with instrumental and treering-based temperature data. Together with previous studies, these results suggest that midge assemblages are more sensitive to small shifts in summer temperature ( not, vert, similar 0.5 °C) than indicated by the typical error range of midge temperature transfer functions (1.5 °C). A piecewise linear regression analysis identifies a significant change point at ca 4000 years before present (cal BP) in our T_July record, with a decreasing trend after this point. Episodic T_July peaks ( not, vert, similar 14.5 °C) between 5500 and 4200 cal BP and the subsequent climatic cooling may have resulted from decreasing summer insolation associated with the precessional cycle. Centennial-scale climatic cooling of up to 1 °C occurred around 4000, 3300, 1800–1300, 600, and 250 cal BP. These cooling events were more pronounced and lasted longer during the last two millennia than between 2000 and 4000 cal BP. Some of these events have counterparts in climatic records from elsewhere in Alaska and other regions of the Northern Hemisphere, including several roughly synchronous with known grand minima in solar irradiance. Over the past 2000 years, our T_July record displays patterns similar to those inferred from a wide variety of temperature proxy indicators at other sites in Alaska, including fluctuations coeval with the Little Ice Age, the Medieval Climate Anomaly, and the First Millennial Cooling (centered around 1400 cal BP). To our knowledge, this study offers the first high-resolution, quantitative record of summer temperature variation that spans longer than the past 2000 years from the high-latitude regions around the North Pacific.

Here’s an excerpt from the conclusion:

Within the limit of chronological uncertainties, some (but not all) of these cooling events at Moose Lake coincide with periods of reduced solar irradiance, such as the solar minima centered on the middle and late LIA (250 and 100 cal BP), 1400 cal BP, and 3400 cal BP (Steinhilber et al., 2009).

Although the co-occurrence of solar minima with cooling during the LIA is well appreciated, the role of solar output in modulating surface temperature remains controversial, partially because the effect of solar activity changes on the surface energy budget is orders of magnitude lower than those of the drivers operating over shorter timescales (e.g., clouds or volcanism) (Damon and Peristykh, 2005). Nonetheless, a number of recent paleoclimate
studies have attributed decadal- to millennial-scale variation to fluctuating solar irradiance in Alaska (Hu et al., 2003; Wiles et al., 2004; Tinner et al., 2008) and elsewhere (Hegerl et al., 2003; Damon and Peristykh, 2005; Eichler et al., 2009). Thus the potential role of solar irradiance in high-latitude climate change remains an issue that warrants further research (MacDonald, 2010). Analysis of midge assemblages in lake-sediment cores
from other sites is necessary to verify our results from Moose Lake and assess the potential linkages of summer temperature variation to fluctuating solar output.

The full paper is available at the Willie Soon’s website at Harvard here (PDF)

We who believe the Scriptures know that the earth was warm before the Noahidic flood worldwide and how the Lord God of Israel changed the post flood world into the four seasons we have now. Note verse 22 “While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease”

Genesis 8:

1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was with him in the ark: and God made a wind to pass over the earth, and the waters asswaged ; 2 The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stopped , and the rain from heaven was restrained ; 3 And the waters returned from off the earth continually : and after the end of the hundred and fifty days the waters were abated . 4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat. 5 And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month: in the tenth month, on the first day of the month, were the tops of the mountains seen . 6 And it came to pass at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made : 7 And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro , until the waters were dried up from off the earth. 8 Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground; 9 But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth: then he put forth his hand, and took her , and pulled her in unto him into the ark. 10 And he stayed yet other seven days; and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark; 11 And the dove came in to him in the evening ; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf pluckt off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth. 12 And he stayed yet other seven days; and sent forth the dove; which returned not again unto him any more. 13 And it came to pass in the six hundredth and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried up from off the earth: and Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked , and, behold, the face of the ground was dry . 14 And in the second month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, was the earth dried . 15 And God spake unto Noah, saying , 16 Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and thy sons, and thy sons’ wives with thee. 17 Bring forth with thee every living thing that is with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and be fruitful , and multiply upon the earth. 18 And Noah went forth , and his sons, and his wife, and his sons’ wives with him: 19 Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and whatsoever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went forth out of the ark. 20 And Noah builded an altar unto the LORD; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. 21 And the LORD smelled a sweet savour; and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake; for the imagination of man’s heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done . 22 While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease

And we have a government taking action:

Malawi poised to outlaw farting

***************************EXCERPT****************************************

Malawi is determined to “mould responsible and disciplined citizens” with a law banning the breaking of wind.

The Local Courts Bill of 2010 is set to be presented before a forthcoming parliamentary session by Justice Minister George Chaponda.

The legislation also targets ne'er-do-wells "disturbing religious assemblies", "trespassing on burial places", "insulting the modesty of a woman" or "challenging to fight a duel", as well as those who pass the time by pretending to be a fortune teller...

This study illustrates what often appears in scientific journals. It is a serious study of limited scope that presents data and findings in a unbiased fashion. The study shows that during the recent Quaternary period, temperatures at Moose Lake have risen and fallen in general correlation with recognized climate changes.

Once the popular science press (read: global warming cultists) gets their hands on this paper, they will report it to represent clear and undeniable evidence of anthropogenic global warming. Evil mankind is causing the temperatures at Moose Lake to skyrocket. All nonsense, of course, but these people are on a political crusade to destroy free market based capitalism and replace it with big government socialism. Deception and hyperbole in support of their one world vision is not only permitted, but encouraged.

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