Posted on 12/31/2014 5:49:38 PM PST by RBStealth
The seas have stored most of the excess heat generated by greenhouse gases since 2000, but they are due to send it back skyward December 30, 2014 |By John Upton and Climate Central
A Weddell seal with a conductivity-temperature-depth tag on its head. Credit: Dan Costa, University of California at Santa Cruz
Probing a blue abyss can be an abysmal recipe for the blues.
For every 10 joules of energy that our greenhouse gas pollution traps here on Earth, about 9 of them end up in an ocean. There, the effects of global warming bite into fisheries, ecosystems and ice. But those effects are largely imperceptible to humans—as invisible to a landlubber as an albatross chomping on a baited hook at the end of a long line.
What scientists discovered in 2014 is that since the turn of the century, oceans have been absorbing more of global warming’s heat and energy than would normally be expected, helping to slow rates of warming on land. What they will be talking about in 2015, and beyond, is when that trend might come to an end—likely following a routine shift in Pacific Ocean trade winds. Much of that extra sunken heat will eventually be belched back into the atmosphere by the overheating seas. The effects of ocean warming might be imperceptible to most of us, but they are far-reaching. They are driving fishing fleets further out to sea, ushering tropical fish into polar waters, and worsening flood hazards for coastal communities.
(Excerpt) Read more at scientificamerican.com ...
>>Record level of sea ice anyone?
It’s interesting that this hasn’t been updated in a while:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shutdown_of_thermohaline_circulation
Perhaps the witch doctors are having trouble figuring out how to occultly milk the seasonal cow.
Must be enormously disconcerting knowing the NSA reads every lie they email to each other.
Death rate (in the USA): 1918 Flu Epidemic: 2.5%
Ebola: 25%
Ebola is ten times as deadly.
So, statistically, Ebola is a threat ten times greater than the Spanish Flu.
You can have lots of fun with statistics.
I think what you mean is that it hasn't killed as many people as all those more widespread risks we encounter and have encountered for a much longer time.
However, the thing about Ebola is that it has not been 'on the loose' in the USA before last year, partly because people are being monitored (still are) who are at risk of having the disease. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
There will always be people who listen to part of what is being said and go off half-cocked. Just look at the 1938 broadcast by the Mercury Theater of the War of the Worlds. There were people who thought we were being invaded by Martians. I guess they missed the occasional station ID and mention of the show.
Did the media start that panic? Or was it people who did not pay attention and jumped to conclusions.
Yes, with Ebola, the media saturated the aether with stories of people being monitored, of the problems in Africa (without which the outbreak would probably be considerably worse, even the gloves the people were wearing there were being re-used, and the focus brought in supplies which were desperately needed.
Did the media use that as a smokescreen to fill air time to hide what the administration was doing? To hide the release of Fast and Furious Documents? The discovery of a slew of IRS e-mails? Sure they did. They used Fergusson the same way, and somehow failed to report (for the most part) the criminal nature and behaviour of the deceased, creating more story lines by helping foment the rioting and looting and cop-hate, even used as an excuse halfway across the country to murder two police who had nothing whatsoever to do with Missouri.
I never said the media wasn't evil, I just said Ebola is real, it kills, and we don't want it here.
If you weren't paying any attention to what else was going on, well, your bad. Always look at what the other hand is doing, when one is busy trying to distract. That's 101.
But the distraction won't work without any element of truth, and there is a large nugget in the Ebola reporting. Short of Marburg, Ebola has one of the lowest survival rates of any disease on the planet.
It is still going on, still deadly, just not here--as far as we know. Why you won't even admit that a disease that kills between 25% (with the very best and most innovative medical care) and 90% without it is a matter for concern is beyond me. The relatively few facilities (in the US) which can handle a level 4 pathogen would be overloaded with a mere thirty cases.
Beyond that, even our medical system would degrade toward survival rates more on the order of the third world.
Hopefully, our medical system got enough of a peek at what that could mean (after all, they are the tip of the spear) and has taken at least some steps to be better prepared, because there is at least one other disease brought into this country by this administration which has wrought havoc on a small scale and resulted in even more deaths than Ebola.
Accidents are avoidable, through personal action, education, changing one's circumstances, proper equipment well maintained and properly used, and proper mindset. I have seen the huge reduction in accidents in the oil drilling industry firsthand over the past few decades, and it is the result of all those things. Most people don't think it can happen to them. Those are the ones who get killed or maimed.
That the media create a matrix to take away our freedom is the issue. I have no effect on policy. the news media does as they give people false information . And how can people make the right decision on who to vote for and what to support if they have false information about reality? They can't so the media rules this world.
On this, we agree. Perception of reality is what people act upon. The media controls that perception, for those who will allow it. The reason I disagree on Ebola (hyped? Yes. "Fake"? no.) is that I have done the research, have become more knowledgeable about the disease, its transmission, its effects, mortality, and continued spread in the nations where the outbreak has been going on for nearly a year and others where it has spread.
The possibility of someone trying to weaponize the disease exists, and cases in Mosul Iraq raise questions along those lines. Not cause for panic, maybe not even cause for concern, but another dot in the matrix for anyone who is keeping their own score.
As far as voting goes, more people will vote based on 'rock star' qualities, appearance, smile, packaging, media sales than substance, and that is a measure of the superficiality run rampant in American Culture, as much as the media exploiting that. The roots of that run far deeper than the media, and can be found in an education industry that tells its students what to think instead of the tackling the more inconvenient task of teaching them how to think and how to ferret out the information they need to do so.
Oh, that's because the science is settled. Researchers agree that the debate is over. The only thing left to do is report to the folks too lazy to think.
You’re welcome!
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