Meltdown! The world is feeling the heat of global warming. (Please help me!)

Time for Kids ^ | January 12, 2007 | None listed

[drellberg]

"In 15 years, scientists say, the snows of Kilimanjaro will simply melt away. ... Kilimanjaro is not the only place that is threatened. Glaciers and polar ice are melting. Coral reefs are dying as the seas get too warm. Lakes and rivers in colder climates are freezing later and thawing earlier each year, disrupting the life cycles of native plants and animals. What is causing this breakdown in nature?

[drellberg]

Please help me. I live in a liberal midwestern college town, and next to Iraq this is the subject on everyone's lips. My kids get stuff like this in handouts from school and come home saying that the world is doomed.

I need to get up to speed. Can anyone recommend a good open-minded, even analysis of the underlying basic science? I'm not inclined to think that global warming is a non-issue. I just want an evenhanded and credible account. Ideally, I would have citations to seminal articles so I could go dig them up in the library.

[kinoxi]

There is one source of global warming. The Sun. If you can get someone to take that mental leap into reality you're halfway there.

[coloradan]

Bjorn Lomborg's The Skeptical Environmentalist. 3500 references. As an added bonus, he began the work to prove the environmentalist's case, just like John Lott wanted to show how bad guns were. But what both of their researches showed, was that the opposite of their deeply held beliefs were true, and both had the intellectual integrity to change their minds.

[Right Wing Assault]

Meanwhile, hard freeze and record cold hits California. New Zealand temps lowest in 78 years. India and Pakistan temp go below freezing.

When it's warm in one place, it tends to be colder somewhere else.

The earth has been gradually warming on its own for many years.

[goldstategop]

California is in the grip of a record cold wave and liberals are worried about global warming?? Hahahahaha!

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Right Wing Assault]

California is in the grip of a record cold wave

We should give the liberal disclaimer that "all above normal, normal, and below normal temperatures are caused by global warming".

[Thermalseeker]

The earth has been gradually warming on its own for many years.

While that is true, one fact often ignored by the Global Warming wackos is that during the 20th century the overall temperature of the earth cooled.....

[SomeoneNeedsToSayIt]

Exactly.

It might have something to do with that big bright light in the sky.

Hmmmmmmmmm!

[Big Horn]

If Mother Nature is to be controled then Mother Nature needs to be obeyed. We have to take it as it comes we are not God.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

"Bjorn Lomborg's 'The Skeptical Environmentalist.' 3500 references."

I second that reference. And excellent resource, though you'll have to adjust how you explain it to your kids to an age-appropriate level.

[Ken522]

All this talk of global warming is getting old - the folks in Denver CO (temp -2degrees F) don't see any "global warming" around them!

[mtbopfuyn]

Can't wait until the snows on Mount Ararat melt and we know once and for all if there's an ark up there or not.

[mt tom]

sure wish we had a little global warming here 4 degrees at 6:00 a.m. bottom of the sierras has to be several degrees below 0 at higher elevation to cold to golf and way to cold to ski

[FrankR]

I have found that the best way to deal with the "global warming" crowd is to just laugh it off, make fun of them...that pisses them off more than reams of "scientific data".

After we had our first frost, I told a lib at work that I had to "scrape some of that global warming off my windshield this morning". Well, that got a laugh out of everyone there, and frustrated him so bad he went back to his office and sulked for half a day.

Later, I asked him why all of these recent "global warming conferences" were cancelled on account of snow". That ticked him off too.

To top off his day, I told him that "if it weren't for global warming, we'd still be in the great ice age". For four days he didn't even say 'good morning' after that.

Treat them like an adult trying to convince another adult that there is - in fact - a tooth fairy. Global warming is the old "the world will end tomorrow" of the 21st century.

The bottom line - if by some slim chance there is something to it, what are we to do about it? Are they telling me if every internal combustion engine and every farting cow on the plant were eradicated tomorrow that we wouldn't have global warming?

IF there is such a thing as global warming, what is the short-term cure? The long-term cure?

What it comes down to is these people are desciples of algore, with a 'chicken little' mentality, gracing us all with a warning of impending doom and gloom. They're the first on your block to know more than you about your future, and you should listen to them because they are enlightened liberals, and they know more than you.

(sarcasm machine off)

[Reaganesque]

ACRIMSAT

Variations in Total Solar Irradiance
The ACRIM I instrument was the first to clearly demonstrate that the total radiant energy emanating from the sun was not a constant, and varied in proportion to solar magnetic activity. However, the sun’s output changes so slowly and solar variability is so slight (less than 0.00425% of the total energy per year on time scales of days), that continuous monitoring by state-of-the-art instrumentation is necessary to detect changes with climate significance. Scientists theorize that as much as 25% of the 20th century anticipated global warming of the Earth may be due to changes in the sun’s energy output. Systematic changes in irradiance as little as 0.25% per century can cause the complete range of climate variations that have occurred in the past, ranging from ice ages to global tropical conditions. For example, scientists believe the "Little Ice Age" that occured in Europe in the late 17th century could have been related to the minimum in sunspot activity (and a correlated minimum in total solar irradiance) that occured during the same period.

Link to article on NASA's site.

[drellberg]

Thanks to those who offered up Lomborg. I promise to read it cover to cover. Also, is there a shorter piece, or a scientist who I should follow who my professor friends would find credible (i.e., tenured at a leading American university)?

Again, thanks.

[PhiKapMom]

I am in Norman OK and don't see any warming around me right now too! I knew it was going to get cold when the Dims took over and Boxer started talking about global warming as the Chairman of the committee. We are freezing here this weekend and in between winter storms.

[sono]

I'd blame it all on this guy!

[w1andsodidwe]

Well this is a pleasant thought, given that it is 21 degrees in Lodi, Ca this morning. This is a place that rarely drops below freezing. Oh yes, the wind chill brings it to 13 degrees so I am digging out my warmest clothing.

Seriously, earlier this year I read that Canada had the warmest winter on record last year. Later on in the article it said that Canada had been keeping weather records since 1948. That means I am older than the record that they are basing their facts on. The samples that they are using are simply too small to figure anything out.

Statistic are just that. Meaningless when taken out of context. Here is an example. This is an absolutely true statement. "50% of the girls in my 1st grade class have been diagnosed with breast cancer". Sounds pretty awful doesn't it. However, when I tell you that there were 2 girls in my class, it changes your perception doesn't it.

[BwanaNdege]

I just Googled "Kilimanjaro current temperature" and got this link:

http://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/tanzania/synopsis.html

..."Clearly, the mechanism of accumulation well known from glaciers elsewhere (i.e., densification of snow to firn to ice) does not apply on Kilimanjaro. This misunderstanding may be the cause of abundant confusion appearing in recent news reports, such as: “In 15 years, scientists say, the snows of Kilimanjaro will simply melt away” (Time for Kids, p. 4 on 4-24-2001)."

..."The date was 3 October 1889, three days before Meyer and Ludwig Purtscheller became the first to ascend the mountain. In his book Across East African Glaciers: an account of the first ascent of Kilimanjaro (1891), Meyer goes on to write:


"In the great snowfields, which in July partially covered the slopes of Kibo from the ice-cap to the saddle plateau, the snow near the base was soft and flaky, whilst higher up it was dry and granular. In October, when all the snowfields had disappeared, there was likewise comparatively little snow to be met with on the ice-cap. Over large areas the surface of the ice was covered with granular morsels, half-way between ice and snow, the surface of which was slushy during the day and afforded excellent footing."

Check here to get the weather report from (Mt Kibo)Kilimanjaro:

http://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/tanzania/current.html

"Air Temperature (mean) -6.4 °C
Relative Humidity (mean) 80 %
[most humid month in 4 years]
Wind Speed (mean) 22.9 km/hr
Solar Radiation (mean daily max) 872 W/m2
Surface Height (net change) +25.8 cm
Yeah - 2006 short rains bring snow! "

Kilimanjaro's problem is lack of snow, hot high temperatures. Daytime free air temperature at 10,000' in East Africa averages about 6 degrees Celcius. We once had a snowball fight with our children in Kenya, about 3 miles north of the Equator. We were at about 9,100' elevation at the time, standing in 4" of SNOW!