Posted on 01/24/2005 12:53:45 PM PST by missyme
Second, the CO2 level that is the supposed cause of global warming has been ramping up for 150 years. If CO2 was the primary cause of global warming, then it would follow that temps would have been going up steadily. However this is not the case.
Temps increased up till the 30's, but then they declined until 1970, leading to the panic back then that we were approaching another ice age. They have now gone back up to about where they were in the 30's.
Why the decline in the face of rising CO2? Obviously there is another factor at work that has more of an effect than CO2. Until that effect is found, then like the ice age cause, we know nothing.
You are right that we really don't know enough about global climate change or the ice ages, etc. But my understanding is that these cycles appear to occur very gradually, that is the ice cores seem to indicate a pretty steady rate of cooling followed by a continuous and fairly steady rate of warming. But what has been occurring this century (especially in the past 35 years) is completely off the scale. I agree that there is not necessarily an easy correlation between the rate of warming and CO2 levels between the 30's and 70's but there are explanations. I agree though, I'm not sure they are absolutely convincing. I am trying to remain skeptical, but at the same time I have a hard time ignoring the fact that I am very reluctant to buy any waterfront property on low-lying islands!!
CO2 levels show a constant rise for a century. But the 1940's brought world war that dumped massive amounts of particulates into the air from fires and oil burning ships. These particulates reflect light, and reduce solar heating.
The continuing industrialization after the war added particulates, and the earth cooled. That is, until 1968, and the birth of the environmental movement.
One of the first reductions in "pollutants" were coal plants, which had previously dumped massive amounts of particulates into the air. Western Europe also drasticly reduced their pollution.
Through the 80's and 90's, after pressure from regulations drove the cost of heavy industries up and they closed, and the continuing improvements in diesel particulate reduction, the temps began to rise.
I think the cause of Global Warming is the Environmental movement. It was much easier to clean up the soot, that had cooled the earth. But it was much harder, perhaps impossible to clean up the CO2, which (may) cause warming.
The refusal of greens to accept safe and non-polluting nuclear is a big factor as well.
BTTT!!!!!!
Off the scale of the warming a thousand years ago, and the cooling of the little ice age a couple of centuries ago?
I know that a great deal of data can be gleaned from ice cores and other sources. But I doubt that reading secondary evidence in them gives evidence with a response quick enough to determine how fast the warming/cooling occured.
I'm not an expert on this, but I just doubt counting gasses in ice or polen levels would show short term changes.
That is the same explanation I have read and it seems to make a lot of sense. Heavier pollutants definitely block out sunlight and the levels of some of these pollutants have definitely been decreasing. But I have also read that the decrease in things like coal burning here in the states and in europe has been offset by similar pollutants in the rapidly industrializing third world. I know that there are good studies that show that there is actually almost 30 percent less sunlight hitting the earth now than there was in 1960.
Part of the nightmare scenario that Crichton thinks is so ridiculous is that the Kyoto Treaty will reduce emissions of heavy pollutants at the same time as it reduces CO2 emissions. The heavy pollutants will fall out of the air much faster than the CO2 and we will end up with an even worse global warming nightmare.
Prey was OK, but not nearly as good as SoF due to the timeliness of the latter.
The presumption being he is biased.
And climatologists aren't??
I used to be a science oriented person. Scientists spouted gospel.
Not anymore.
It's all about $$$$$. If they can create a crisis then the grants roll in. Their livelihood.
To hear the climatologists tell it Any weather phenomenon can be placed at the foot of Global Warming.
The Earth's climate is always in flux. How many Ice Ages and warming periods are recorded? Many.
Picking out a miniscule slice of history and getting excited about it is junk science.
And while we are on the subject, why are China and India exempt from Koyoto??
Heck, most of the goods sold in the US are made in China. Their factories are busier than ours.
It's simple, transfer of wealth.
If you haven't read State of Fear ,do so.
Not just Michael's opinions, full of references and footnotes.
From what I have read about thelast great ice age, most of the scientists concur that these events were brought about by a relatively small temperature changes. During the last ice age most models show the earth cooling by only 2-3 degrees spread out, along with the subsequent glacier growt,h over a few thousand years. i don't know about the mini ice age but i'll do some research, its a good question and I am curious to know how it has been addressed.
LOL!
Point of no return, huh? Imagine that. Alcohol and drug abuse can do some amazing things.
That one is just the funniest tall tale I've ever heard. There was talk about that a few weeks ago.
The only source of heating for the earth is the sun. If we'd had a 30% reduction of heat, we'd know about it. We'd be frozen.
I feel quite certian that the "30%" reduction is some kind of serious spin. I don't know what kind of spin, but it's spin. Perhaps they're talking about one specific wavelength, or one specific location. Or they're talking about cloud cover. Whatever. But there's just no way that we could have had litteraly a 30% "less sunlight hitting the earth" and not see the effects. Big time.
Wherever the original source of this number is, I wouldn't trust another thing they ever tell me, lest they cover their obvious spin better than they did this one.
I'm waiting for definitely irreversible
To absolutely irreversible
To positively irreversible
To really really ireversible to
Double dare you irreversible...
We did!
Reality since then has been a fig-newton of your imagination.
I wasn't saying that having an axe to grind with science necessarily makes him biased but I think we would agree that it ought to cause us to be a little more skeptical than we might otherwise be.
I don't know any climatologists personally, so maybe you are right. But I do know an awful lot of research scientists and they don't do what they do just to get grant money. Most of them do it because they are passionate about the scientific method, and the truth is important to them. Otherwise they would be doing high-paid applied science.
As for the flux argument, I agree, both with you and with Heraclitus, that theory's progenitor, that the climate is always in flux. But does that mean that ALL change is natural change? No way. And the reason we pick out this little slice is because it is the only one we've got. It's kind of like the question of extinctions. Sure, species have always gone extinct, but have they always gone extinct at the rate they are disappearing now? I don't know, but I am curious to find out, because I know for a fact that we are capable of changing the environment, and not always for the better. I don't believe that believing we should be good stewards of the earth should make me a liberal or some kind of environmentalist nutjob.
As for the exemptions for China and India, they are not permanent exemptions, they simply allow that these developing nations won't have to curb their emissions at the same rates as developed nations (they've each got a billion people, many still riding around on bicycles or ox-carts, the argument is that it wouldn't be fair to lock them in to low levels of emissions when they haven't even industrialized yet.). I agree that it is problematic but I am sure we could get some compromises that wouldn't hurt us too unfairly. But I am also one of those optimists who thinks that alternative energy development could end up being a big boost to the economy in the long run.
"Environmentalists also have argued that since the United States is the largest emitter of CO2, the greenhouse gas of primary concern, it should take the lead in reducing emissions of greenhouse gases. Unfortunately for their argument, it turns out that the U.S. is in fact a leading "air filter." According to an October 16, 1998, article in Science, North America removes more carbon (about 2 billion tons) from the atmosphere than it emits (1.5 billion tons) each year. One reason is the tremendous regrowth in the eastern U.S. of forests that act as carbon sinks, removing CO2 from the atmosphere."
From this article:
http://www.ncpa.org/ba/ba299.html
Insanity is independed of party or political philosophy. Some of those voted for Kerrey, too.
What's your point?
The fig newton has morphed into the Raspberry Newton .( global warming, no cooling, no warming, aw hell.)
His mother?
I should have been more specific. The 30% (or it may be 25, I don't have a reference offhand) is not how much sunlight is hitting the earth, it is how much direct sunlight is reaching the surface. This can be pretty easily measured by a bunch of different methods. I was skeptical too of a similar study a friend of mine was doing at the university of anchorage back in the 90's on the amount of suspended particulates in the air. I really didn't beleive that there could be considerable levels of suspended particulates in AK. But when I saw a fifty year photographic sequence of visibility on days of optimum visibility I was absolutely amazed at the difference.
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