Posted on 03/27/2006 8:23:53 PM PST by quantim
Yep. The increase in greenhouse gasses has caused increased glacier measurement. You might be on to something...
Agree. I have read it as well. Felix makes a compelling case that we are actually headed into an ice age as part of a natural cycle. Man has very little to do with it. Felix believes it is ocean warming (vice global warming) , which is brought on by underwater volcanic activity. This has the effect of releasing more CO2 from the oceans and thereby increasing the moisture in the air. Increased percipitation will lead to increased snowfalls, thereby starting the ice age. Felix provides good data and references.
So Continental drift can repeat itself, and we can all take a free trip. LOL
Ops4 God Bless America!
Michael Crichton may not be a climatologist, but he does have a scientific background. He understands the scientific method and the apropriate way to conduct scientific studies.
CRICHTON, (John) Michael. American. Born in Chicago, Illinois, October 23, 1942. Educated at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, A.B. (summa cum laude) 1964 (Phi Beta Kappa). Henry Russell Shaw Travelling Fellow, 1964-65. Visiting Lecturer in Anthropology at Cambridge University, England, 1965. Graduated Harvard Medical School, M.D. 1969; post-doctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences, La Jolla, California 1969-1970. Visiting Writer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1988.
Why? Too much snow?
Thousands Trapped by Record Snowfall in Europe - 6 Mar 06
Heavy blizzards swept through Western Europe over the weekend, killing at least seventeen. Some regions in Germany , France , Switzerland and Italy saw the heaviest March snowfalls in nearly three decades. Several thousand travelers returning from ski holidays in southern Germany and France were trapped on the roads as record snowfalls slowly buried their cars.
The Red Cross provided emergency shelters in Germany and France, where some 2,600 tourists were housed in the town hall in Bourg-Saint-Maurice in the French Alps after snow made travel impossible. Even so, many had to spend the night in their vehicles.
Train traffic in southern Germany was virtually shut down, and Frankfurt International Airport experienced one of its worst weekends in decades.
What's the big deal? The glacier on Mt. Hood would melt in about 5 seconds in an eruption - think Mt. St. Helens and THEN some!!!!!!
If you think weather is climate than there is no point in having a debate.
Climate change causes greater extremes.
So are you saying you would think buying land in the Netherlands or investing in a ski resort in the Alps is a good idea?
By the way, the season is Austria is 2.5 weeks shorter than 15 years ago.
Loved it, we drove up to Portland from San Fran. Best vacation i've ever had, and maybe the last before kids (unless my wife and I can get away this summer).
To be true, those are not my pics but I have a few dozen of each. I have a few of vista house which are better than the one I posted, they are just not online. I should really get a flickr account.
I agree with you. It is the global warming alarmists who point to hurricanes, floods, etc. as a reflection of what amounts to their theology. It doesn't matter what happens weather-wise, it is caused by global warming.
No one doubts that the climate is getting warmer over the past 100 years. We have some real data on which to base that conclusion. However, there is no conclusive proof that man is responsible in any significant way for these changes.
It is pure hubris to believe that man can control the earth's climate. Man's presence on this 4 1/2 billion year old ball of rock and iron hurtling through the cosmos has been a mere blink of an eye similar to a fruit fly's life span compared to man's. The earth has gone through enormous climate changes long before man emerged from the sea. It will survive long after man has gone.
Unfortunately, global warming has become politicized and its adherents will not truck any difference of opinion or accept any data that conflict with their preconceived assumptions. This is not good science and certainly not the basis of good public policy. We (the developed, affluent countries) are being steamrollered by global warming fanatics to spend trillions of dollars, which can cripple our economies, on the mere hope that cutting down on various emissions and meeting other pollution goals can actually influence the climate of this planet. Moreover, there may be unintended consequences of our actions, which could actually make things worse.
In the meantime, the most populous countries on the planet, India and China, are exempt from these formulaic pollution goals. As both of these countries become more affluent, they will be become the major polluters. For example, the Chinese government has made plans to increase automobile production by an annual average of 10.9% over five years. China is the world's third largest producer of automobiles now. Their imports of automobiles are also increasing exponentially.
Tony Blair has seen the light and so are many other European countries as they realize that they cannot reach these self-imposed targets without suffering significant economic pain. I find it amazing that anyone signed on to Kyoto, which was based less on science than on the herd mentality of the environmentalists. We would be better served trying to adapt and adjust to the ever changing effects of the earth's climate than laboring under the delusional premise that we can control it. The earth's climate has been colder and warmer than it is today. The idea that we can stablize and negate these natural cycles and covert the earth into some sort of artificial, climate controlled biosphere is sophistry.
So are you saying you would think buying land in the Netherlands or investing in a ski resort in the Alps is a good idea?
Sure. It is an individual decision, but any such decision would not be based on some unproven theory that the climate will be altered significantly in the next 100 to 1000 years. Thirty years ago Time magazine had a cover story that we were heading into a new ice age, which was the conventional wisdom at the time. Now, they have a story that we have global warming and are near the tipping point for abrupt change in the world's climate resulting in floods and melting ice caps.
By the way, the season is Austria is 2.5 weeks shorter than 15 years ago.
That is weather, not climate change. LOL.
We barely have enough water left to make ice, so there may be an element of truth there. :)
I’ve lived in the Pacific Northwest most of my life and have to say that you most of the people posting on this thread are way off base.
First of all, glaciers are important to us here and to glibly say that it doesn’t matter if they melt strikes us as being either dumb or mean. Glaciers feed streams that produce our electricity, our clean water sources, and cold water for our salmon, among other things. They’ve been here for a long time and we don’t want them to melt.
Second, when exactly did Conservatives decide that they are going to ignore science, and how far do you guys plan to go with this? Talk to 99% of climate scientists, people that study these issues for a living, and they will tell you that global warming is happening, we are contributing to it by increasing greenhouse gases, and it’s not wise to experiment with our climate in this way. When you have that kind of scientific consensus on an issue, why wouldn’t you want to pay attention, and why is this a political issue? Even if you own a lot of stock in Exxon, you still get your food from the oceans and the land that will be affected by this.
And regarding some of the other hogwash on here:
Glaciers increase if incoming snow exceeds melting snow. You can have glaciers increase if enough snow falls (and this can compensate in some places for losses due to increasing temperatures), but globally we should expect a loss of glaciers with increasing temperatures, and this is what is happening around the world. The glacier on Mt. St. Helens is forming because it is starting from scratch (it erupted in 1980). The top of that mountain is at over 8,000 feet and that is still cold and still gets a lot of snow, so a glacier starts to form. Drop to 6,000 feet, though, and it’s warmer than it used to be and we’re probably not going to see glaciers form there again.
Floating ice isn’t what scientists are worried about raising sea levels. It is the mammoth ice sheets that sit on land in Greenland and Antarctica.
Conventional wisdom about climate change 30 years ago was that we could be affecting our climate negatively by releasing greenhouse gases at the same time and that we could be nearing the beginning of another ice age cycle. There was a national geographic article on this in the mid-1970s that talked about the state of the research and this seemingly incompatible notion. There has been considerably more research since then, but largely this confirms these early warnings. Climate does fluctuate in natural cycles and could have been leading to an eventual resumption of an ice age, but we’re tweaking everything by pumping millions of tons of carbon and methane into the atmosphere on a very short time scale. The earth has gone through enormous climate changes in the past and no climate scientist would disagree with this. The last poster would have us believe, however, that we are unable to affect climate, regardless of how much ancient carbon we pump out of the ground and release into the atmosphere. It seems that if you take this viewpoint, then you are asserting that either (a) we are not releasing carbon into the atomosphere, or (b) carbon (and other gases) don’t really trap heat.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.