Global Warming: Medieval Era Hotter than Today

The London Telegraph ^ | 06/04/2003) | Robert Matthews

[KarlInOhio]

I mean, tree-rings and all are very nice, but how many 500 year old trees are there, in Europe, especially. And you have to cut the tree down to study its rings, no?

You can examine the grain of wood in old buildings and ships. I saw a TV show where the matched up the average ring size in various wood samples in a region. For example, they would have one piece of wood which covered 1640-1670, which they matched with wood from a different tree which grew from 1660-1700, etc., to get a multi-century string of samples.

[chaosagent]

"He added that there were also doubts about the reliability of temperature proxies such as tree rings: "They are not able to capture the recent warming of the last 50 years," he said."

Could it possibly be that the reason they don't is that there really hasn't been any warming in the last fifty years?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

LOL!

[PA_hayseed]

Back in 1966 my 9th grade Science teacher talked about the interstellar dust clouds, and one (of many) "moving" through our solar system would reduce the sunlight hitting the Earth would cause a "little ice age". Has there been any work on that theory since then?

[aruanan]

Claims that man-made pollution is causing "unprecedented" global warming have been seriously undermined by new research which shows that the Earth was warmer during the Middle Ages.

See Thomas Gale Moore's Global Warming: a Boon for Humans and Other Animals and other papers on the site at the Hoover Institution for more on this. The Medieval Climate Optimum didn't occur simultaneously throughout the world. As it occurred, civilization flourished from Europe to China.

[Kenny Bunk]

I must warn you guys: such jocularity over such a serious topic, which will seriously impact such minorities as women, children and others, could have each and every one of you thrown bodily from the Green Party and/or a Greenpeace Meeting.

As you know, according to Blix (sounds like one of Santa's Lesser-Known reindeer,) Global Warming is a far greater threat to us and Sweden than Saddam Hussein. O, the Humanity!

Global Warming must be real. Why else would our all-knowing government settle so many Somalis in Maine? After all, Somalia averages 110 in the shade. Maine must be warming up quicker than I thought.

[rwfromkansas]

I have known this for a long time.

This is hardly a new revelation, though this article tries to make it sound like it.

[KayEyeDoubleDee]

Claims that man-made pollution is causing "unprecedented" global warming have been seriously undermined by new research which shows that the Earth was warmer during the Middle Ages.

This is not new research!!! After about a helf dozen paragraphs on the global warming crap, the reader is finally told that this new research is ...

[a] review of more than 240 scientific studies has shown that today's temperatures are neither the warmest over the past millennium, nor are they producing the most extreme weather - in stark contrast to the claims of the environmentalists.

[Francohio]

Hey, itwasnewtame!

[blam]

Middle Ages Were Warmer Than Today, say Scientists

[Bob J]

Your reference to eskimo attack implies that the Vikings were entitled to displace the local population (if any) and, reflects a strictly Viking/European view. A more balanced view would be "eskimos repelling an invader".

The word attack implies no such thing, although it may suggest who was the aggressor. In addition, your assertion that the attack was an attempt at "repelling an invader" assumes facts you have not presented, and quite frankly, facts you could not have in your possession. Therefore, you're statement is not a "balanced view", but rather a one sided interpretation based on non existent facts and invalid assumptions.

[PeaceBeWithYou]

Global Warming is the biggest crock prepetuated on the World! And we can thank dear old Maggie Thatcher for it!

No. Dr. Wallace Broecker started it with his paper:"Climate Change: Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?" published in Science Magazine in 1975. Also known as Broecker's Warning.

[weikel]

Claims that man-made pollution is causing "unprecedented" global warming have been seriously undermined by new research which shows that the Earth was warmer during the Middle Ages.

Its f***ing April and there is snow on the ground here. We really need to increase greenhouse gas production in this country.

[TheJollyRoger]

There you go...
Screwing up the pinko-commie-green-socialist massive-government-expansion agenda...by quoting
facts.

The inuendo, ignorance and outright lies of the
howling left-wing mob have been good enough for
them so far.

Why confuse the morally-bankrupt weak-minded
loonies with facts?

[Darksheare]

Yeah, all that work put into a perfectly good excuse for controlling everyone, let alone concocting a specious theory is now down the tubes!
The greenies are going to attempt to discredit this immediately.
Never mind that they've relied on the same data themselves and say it's accurate...

[mvpel]

Dr Simon Brown, the climate extremes research manager at the Meteorological Office at Bracknell, said that the present consensus among scientists on the IPCC was that the Medieval Warm Period could not be used to judge the significance of existing warming.

Dr Brown said: "The conclusion that 20th century warming is not unusual relies on the assertion that the Medieval Warm Period was a global phenomenon. This is not the conclusion of IPCC."

He added that there were also doubts about the reliability of temperature proxies such as tree rings: "They are not able to capture the recent warming of the last 50 years," he said.

He concluded his comments by remarking, "besides, if these people turn out to be right, I'm out of a job. Uhh, that tape recorder isn't still running, is it?"

[marron]

Your reference to eskimo attack implies that the Vikings were entitled to displace the local population (if any) and, reflects a strictly Viking/European view. A more balanced view would be "eskimos repelling an invader".

Whatever.

Actually, I did not pass judgement on the merits of an Eskimo attack, since I was not there, and there are no records to describe any conflict between them. But if memory serves, the Eskimos were not present when the Vikings arrived, but migrated in from the north later. If I am mistaken, I invite correction. (Thats what I love about this website; mess up and someone is bound to set you straight).

Studies of Eskimo linguistics suggest that they spread from Siberia, across the Americas, to Greenland, and then later began a reverse migration westward, back across the Americas, and ultimately back to Siberia. The Siberian eskimos of today are direct descendents of Alaskan eskimos that migrated there in the twenties. Again, if memory serves.

Eskimo culture fascinates me.

[WhoisAlanGreenspan?]

Okay, I don't want to get into the horrible war between the eskimos and the vikings, but on the subject of global warming...
Does anyone remember this oldie but goodie? Sea level rise You know the story, as the earth warms the ice caps...bla bla bla.
More evidence as far as I'm concerned that the debate about the existance of global warming is political and not scientific. And that no scientific evidence to the contrary, (tree rings, sea level) is allowed.

[Cacique]

None of this matters one iota. The environmentalist movement is not a "scientific" movement but a political one. They have been manufacturing or skewing studies to promote their agenda which is the destruction of capitalism and it's associated democracy. Their entire objective is the promotion of socialism on a global scale. They failed in their promotion of "scientific" socialism. Now they are promoting another "scientific" approach towards the same end.

Never mind that socialism is a failed system. Socialists and communists aren't interested in progress, they are interested in control.

[technochick99]

I didn't know there were Republicans to blame for this back then!