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To: chrisg2001
Interestingly, it is thought that it was once much cooler, but that the positive feedback produced by increased temperatures from atmospheric CO2 caused more CO2 to be released from surface minerals, accelerating the process.

I appreciate you bringing some actual science discussion to this thread.

I initiated it as a light-hearted jab at the author's choice of politically charged terminology.

However, its good to see someone actually provide the type of valuable information that is usually missing in these MSM articles.

Are there any realistic connection or lessons that can be derived about Earth from studying Venus' environment?

38 posted on 10/18/2005 11:04:45 AM PDT by Dr._Joseph_Warren
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To: Dr._Joseph_Warren

> Are there any realistic connection or lessons that can be derived about Earth from studying Venus' environment?


I guess I'd say that the real worry about any climate changes are the positive feedback loops. There are positive feedback loops present on earth and venus's climates that can act to tip things in a catastrophic direction, either way, cold or hot. There are also negative feedback loops that can drive stuff more towards stability.
Some scientists belive that such events may have happened in earth's early history as the atmosphere's basic composition was undergoing large scale changes (meaning really large scale).

The presence of these feedback terms makes prediction of global termperature a lot more difficult than otherwise - if it were just a straight matter of the magnitude of the greenhouse effect being linearly dependent upon how much Co2 is present in the atmosphere, we could just extrapolate current emissions forward and know how much to worry or not worry. But instead, estimates might be wildly pessimistic or optimistic because not enough is known about the parameters of the feedback terms.


Some of those can probably be observed on other planets, though some are biological in nature and so only happed here as far as we know. Hopefully the triggers for these positive loops getting out of control are far away from current conditions, and chances are they are, but it would certainly be nice to know more.


44 posted on 10/18/2005 11:17:17 AM PDT by chrisg2001
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