NASA Study Finds World Warmth Edging Ancient Levels

NASA GISS ^ | September 26, 2006 | NASA GISS

[cogitator]

Because there are already 213 articles on Google News about this, I thought it would be prudent to read the press release FIRST, unfiltered by the media.

The linked press release includes images with captions. I did not include them in this posting.

[cogitator]

** ping **

[BenLurkin]

Exactly.

Thousands of years ago there were no SUVs to blame.

[rhombus]

Scientists concluded that these data showed the Earth has been warming at the remarkably rapid rate of approximately 0.36° Fahrenheit (0.2° Celsius) per decade for the past 30 years.

Oh my God, that's a little over 1 degree in 30 years. I thought it was hot in here. Hey is that a triceratops? Forget about the Muzzies who want to kill us. What are we going to do when the dinosaurs return? Panic now, before it's too late!!!

[ClearCase_guy]

now reaching and passing through the warmest levels in the current interglacial period, which has lasted nearly 12,000 years.

Or, there is this story:

Earth Headed for Warmest Temps in a Million Yearsl

Drive-by climatologists. They just want their name in the paper.

[theBuckwheat]

NASA isn't saying what humans did anciently to mitigate "global warming".

There are plenty of leftists, and supporters of big and Bigger government, and doogooders who are willing to tell us how to mitigate it today. Oddly, nor maybe not so oddly, all their plans have a common thread: reduced liberty, increased costs and increased central control over the lives of the average person.

[DBrow]

"at any prior time in the Holocene"

So things have been getting warmer since the end of the last Ice Age.

Will they get warmer yet as the Milankovitch cycle continues?

[Lucky Dog]

If we do not slow down the rate of global warming, many species are likely to become extinct. In effect we are pushing them off the planet.

Author’s implied logic chain:

Premise: The earth’s climate is becoming warmer than it should from natural processes.
Premise: This warming is the result of human activity.
Conclusion: Changing human activity will stop global warming.

This syllogism is invalid as well as unsound from a number of perspectives. First, the major premise contains an unproven assumption that the current postulated warming is not part of a natural statistical variation. Second, the minor premise is unproven and, hence, the conclusion is potentially false. Third, the conclusion is not inevitable as, even if the second premise were true, it may be too late to reverse any trend or, perhaps, a natural mechanism will mitigate the situation such as a increase in plant life (like algae) to absorb and convert CO2 or other green house gases.

Author’s implied logic chain:

Premise: Global warming is bad.
Premise: Changing human activity will stop global warming.
Conclusion: Prudence demands implementing this change immediately.

This syllogism is also invalid and unsound from a number of perspectives. First, as noted above, there is no concrete indication that global warming will lead to catastrophic or deleterious effects. In fact, ice core drillings have indicated that the earth has been warmer as well as cooler than it is now a number of times in the past without catastrophe. Second, the minor premise is faulty as noted above. Finally, the conclusion ignores the deleterious impacts on humanity of the proposed changes that are speculated to mitigate the problem without the proof that the proposed changes would do anything to lessen global warming.

[NaughtiusMaximus]

The weather is more the way it is today than it has ever been before.

[cynicalman]

Can Someone link me to one or two articles that take the point of view there is no global warming or at least not caused by us humans or SUVs. My daughter is in college and is reading Al Gore's book. I want to send her other points of view. It won't help but a least I will give it a try.

[ClearCase_guy]

These two books are good. If you want articles (more digestible) you could search the net for articles that discuss these books:

"State of Fear" by Michael Crichton
"Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World" by Bjorn Lomborg, Bjern Lomberg

[wbill]

A study that appeared in Nature Magazine in 2003 found that 1700 plant, animal and insect species moved poleward at an average rate of 6 kilometers (about 4 miles) per decade in the last half of the 20th century.

So many points to discuss....I'll just pick one.

A specices (as a whole) moved poleward by a total of 20 miles in the past 50 years? How would you go about measuring something like that? And, how would it be relevant?

More Global Warming nonsense. James Hansen, irregardless of his credentials, is one of the larger Chicken Littles out there.

[Parley Baer]

So? We have been comming out of an Ice Age for what 10-12,000 years. It would only be natural for warming to be the highest in thousands of years. If you look at the big picture as I have seen on some graph's this is nothing.

[snowman_returns]

Will they get warmer yet as the Milankovitch cycle continues?

I wonder sometimes whether scientists or eco-warriors have ever heard of The Milankovitch Cycles.

According to the three cycles the northern Hemisphere currently should be due to return to glacial levels, ice core sediments also show that a warming spike was reached just before previous glacial epochs took hold.

[RightWhale]

Heard that NASA guy again this morning pushing his retired-guy agenda. Kind of reminds one of retired guys who appear on the Art Bell Show with their tales of captured UFOs in the mountains.

[palmer]

The most important result found by these researchers is that the warming in recent decades has brought global temperature to a level within about one degree Celsius (1.8°F) of the maximum temperature of the past million years

Also the most misleading result. They are comparing precise measurements from the present with very imprecise and smoothed measurements from the past. All the spikes like the one of the last 30 years disappear when the temperature proxy only takes measurements every century or 1000 years and averages decades or centuries worth of variation into that measurement.

[PissAndVinegar]

yea, but which Bush family member was in office?
And what was Haliburton doing @ the time!?!?

[palmer]

Lots of global warming skeptic links : http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/

[palmer]

Hansen is supposed to be taken seriously because he converted to global warming alarmist after looking at the data as a skeptical scientist. It's easily seen to be BS when looking at his statements about climate zones moving and stress. He obviously knows nothing about the science, just wants to sound an alarm.