Global Warming...New Report...and it ain't happy news

Of course, Bernard doesn't use a computer because as recently as 1980, scientists were predicting there the demand for computers would never exceed a few for major corporations.

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I'm well aware of the natural cycle in global mean temperature, and have taken it into consideration. I'm not one who is easily alarmed, and this trend isn't something keeping up at nights. There is nothing to be gained by hiding our heads in the sand, nor by rushing around warning the sky is about to fall. For me at least, the evidence for the human-activity variable as a probable cause for the rise in temperature is persuasive.

From that we can begin to think about what time-lines, outcomes and to assess the likely effects on us, human-kind. As I've mentioned above, flood and famine are obvious outcomes, and their probability seems high over the next 20 years, at least on first examination. Those species that occupy a narrow niche, or that are unable to adapt can become endangered within a generation or so. Even so, human population is already stretching the carrying capacity of large regions. China, India, Africa and portions of South America all have populations that are near the agricultural carrying capacity of their lands. The American Mid-west and other agricultural areas famous for the bounty and surpluses, may be negatively impacted by shifting climate. That is a prescription for a disastrous famine that might reach epic proportions in some parts of the world.

Has Human-kind lost its ability to adapt? I don't think so. We will continue our efforts to control our immediate environment, and look for innovative ways to reduce the impact of environmental change on ourselves. This brings us back to the production of energy and it seems reasonable to me that in the future our demand for energy from non-polluting sources is likely to be many times greater than it is today.

Some one above said this is an engineering problem trying to be solved by politicians. Quite right. Technology got us into the modern world, and it is the only way that climate consequences of our technology will be resolved ... and the result may be further unwelcome "unintended consequences". For most people and most governments the best thing to do is tend to their present business, and let the engineers and scientists do their thing. They will either resolve the problem(s), or they won't. In a hundred years or so folks may look back and thank their lucky stars that climate change became a concern at the beginning of the 21st century. The worst case is that our species will go extinct. Regretable from our point of view I suppose, but of little consequence to the Universe at large.

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global warming destroys newts, amphibians and mountains

http://travel.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1815404,00.html?gusrc=rss

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What a great post, Asherman, I especially like this part

Quote:

Quite right. Technology got us into the modern world, and it is the only way that climate consequences of our technology will be resolved ... and the result may be further unwelcome "unintended consequences".

Too true. I firmly believe that the solution to Global Warming/climate change issues is to grow our way out of them through advances in technology specifically designed to do so. Naturally, a societal focus on this issue could help provide economic incentive for the development of said technologies...

Of course, education and personal responsibility never hurt anything either...

Cycloptichorn

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Good discussion. Thanks Asherman.

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Again. Asherman, I think we are on the same page. My post gave EVIDENCE that the most outrageous claims of the "Global Warming" enthusiasts did not stand up under scrutiny and laid out, in Dr. Lomberg's writings, what could be done, in a long time line, and with much thought as to what hurried and massive changes in our economy would do to the countries of the earth, to improve Technology to meet what is probably a minor threat given the evidence available.

I must state that I am amused that not even one worthy poster has even tried to rebut most of my posts on Global Warming and has not attempted to rebut the Scientific Articles I have referenced. I can only conclude that they are unable to do so.

Instead I am faced with comments such as the ones made by Parados with regard to computers. I am very much afraid that Parados did not understand the evidence I gave. I will repeat it in a scaled down form but can, if needed, give a full and complete explanation FROM REPUTABLE SCIENTIFIC SOURCES WHICH INCLUDE THE IPCC.

The only way to PREDICT( which is exactly what the scientists involved in Global Warming studies are doing) the rise in Temperature in the future is to use computer simulations. These simulations are, of course, dependent on assumptions made when data is fed into them. There are many problems involving the assumptions. The IPCC ITSELF ADMITS THESE PROBLEMS.

Another note- Asherman--I have studied the problem of Overpopulation and it is indeed a serious problem. You are.I am sure, aware of the idiotic and hysterical predictions made by Paul Ehrlich in the seventies that the world would have mass starvation by now since we could not possibly produce enough food for all of the people that would be on earth in 2000.

He was, of course, egregiously incorrect.

Now, with regard to overpopulation. There are some forecasters who estimate that the world's population wil stabilize just short of 11 Billion in the year 2200. This may be a difficult problem but it is, it appears, a problem that can be solved.

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It would appear that the learned and erudite Mr. Blatham is not as conversant with the principles of Science as one might hope. In his post, he references an article in the Chicago Tribune( not a scientific journal) which claims that the depletion of amphibian life is due to

habitat loss

Climate change

Pollution

radiation

and fungal disease--among other things.

The precise distribution of blame is not given in the article. It could very well be radiation-67% and Pollution-3%.

There are no studies referenced in the article.

The article concludes with the comment that:

"Global Climate and pollution are some of the factors that MAY contribute to the fungal disease"

I am glad that the word MAY is used since I can find no source which definitively gives PROOF that MAY should be changed to DOES.

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All is one.

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BernardR wrote:

It would appear that the learned and erudite Mr. Blatham is not as conversant with the principles of Science as one might hope. In his post, he references an article in the Chicago Tribune( not a scientific journal) which claims that the depletion of amphibian life is due to

habitat loss

Climate change

Pollution

radiation

and fungal disease--among other things.

The precise distribution of blame is not given in the article. It could very well be radiation-67% and Pollution-3%.

There are no studies referenced in the article.

The article concludes with the comment that:

"Global Climate and pollution are some of the factors that MAY contribute to the fungal disease"

I am glad that the word MAY is used since I can find no source which definitively gives PROOF that MAY should be changed to DOES.

Bernard, here is an article pointing out how junk science becomes accepted as fact.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,202447,00.html

I remember the reports about DDT, the thinning of egg shells, etc. Interesting story because some of these myths are still reported as facts.

How many times have we heard coffee will kill you, or eggs will kill you, supported by very sound scientific studies of course, only to find out a few months or years later it was all nothing but hogwash, and in fact coffee and eggs are not only not bad, but they may prevent various health problems. I mention coffee and eggs, but the list would be endless.

It would be interesting to make a list of all the theories that become trendy, all purportedly very solid and founded in sound science, but which have all turned out to be false and unfounded. Yet, some of these theories persist because they have been repeated through the media.

I hope I live long enough to see the global warmers proven wrong. The only way for it to be proven wrong is for the temperature trends to become colder again, and then we will have to fight another theory of the sky is falling scenario. If temperatures indeed do warm slightly over the next decade or two, even if it is never proven to be man caused, it will be reported to be proven as man caused, and so that is what everyone will believe.

It is a known fact that an experiment can be made to prove a conclusion if the conclusion has been drawn before the experiment begins. This has been demonstrated numerous times in the health care industry. And it is demonstrated in the article I posted above. In the article, this quote:

In the few studies claiming to implicate DDT as the cause of thinning, the birds were fed diets that were either low in calcium, included other known egg shell-thinning substances, or that contained levels of DDT far in excess of levels that would be found in the environment - and even then, the massive doses produced much less thinning than what had been found in egg shells in the wild.

Any nitwit would know that feeding inadequate calcium to birds will cause their eggs to be thin. We learned that on the farm, thats why we gave oyster shells to the chickens. Apparently, these sharp scientists reporting on the effects of DDT could not figure such a simple concept out. They wanted the study to show the problem was due to DDT, so they fixed the experiment to make it come out that way.

The obvious parallel with global warming science is plain as day. All of the evidence and questions posed by Bernard are not being answered or addressed. Just perhaps the answers are not what the scientists wish to address now because it does not result in the answers they want.

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And to think...

...these bozos actually use to make a big deal of liberals being "knee jerk" liberals.

What a huge laugh!

The knee-jerk conservatives can out knee-jerk the knee-jerk liberals every day and in every way.

This is so hilarious!

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Asherman wrote:

I'm well aware of the natural cycle in global mean temperature, and have taken it into consideration. I'm not one who is easily alarmed, and this trend isn't something keeping up at nights. There is nothing to be gained by hiding our heads in the sand, nor by rushing around warning the sky is about to fall. For me at least, the evidence for the human-activity variable as a probable cause for the rise in temperature is persuasive.

Asherman, you seem like a very intelligent man and your posts show it. I agree with you probably 90%, and I've quoted your first paragraph. My only disagreement is I do not believe you are employing quite enough skepticism of the so-called science being reported these days concerning the greenhouse effect. Once an issue becomes political, there are numerous reasons to be very skeptical of the science surrounding it, and history has proven this over and over. And that is what we have now in this global warming issue. It is no longer sound science, but politics.

My skepticism is born out of the fact that what greenhouse gas we produce is pretty miniscule compared to the total picture of greenhouse gases. Also, if you consider all of the other factors in play here that we know affect the climates around the world, that we have no control over, and we hardly can quantify or understand, I think the scientists professing to understand this situation are revealing their naivity more than their intelligence and scientific acumen. We already know climates are cyclical without man, so when we think we are measuring a cycle, how can a reasonable person first assume it is man-caused, and then hatch the theories to match the result? Global warming science is currently bass-ackward. Not logical in my opinion.

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Frank Apisa wrote:

And to think...

...these bozos actually use to make a big deal of liberals being "knee jerk" liberals.

What a huge laugh!

The knee-jerk conservatives can out knee-jerk the knee-jerk liberals every day and in every way.

This is so hilarious!

Frank, do you ever have any reasoned argument or post to make? All I ever see is some mindless sarcasm based on your own biased mindset. Can you at least give a fact or a reason for what you believe? The worst that can happen to you will be somebody can disprove your fact or reason with opposing evidence. Or your fact or evidence will stand, and the debate goes on, but as it is, you contribute nothing to this debate.

In contrast, Asherman is excellent. Parados presents evidence. Bernard provides facts and evidence by the bucketfull, and he is frustrated that they aren't all answered. Foxfyre is good. Even Cyclops and cicerone come up with something once in a while. (Don't worry posters, if I haven't mentioned your name, I just mentioned the ones that came to mind first) Frank, if you want to contribute something besides sarcasm, it would be nice.

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Yes, Okie. I have long been skeptical of hysterical people prophesying doom from either a new ice-age, or a world more like Venus than Earth. I'm still skeptical about predictions that we're doomed.

However, credible scientific evidence for the proposition has been mounting for some time. Much of the evidence is inferential and circumstantial. I've seen men convicted of capital crimes on less evidence. This isn't something that requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt, yet it is reasonable to believe that there have been abnormal climate changes over the last hundred years or so. This could be due to a number of variables, but the most likely is human pressures on the environment. For me, the evidence has reached that point where I believe we have to very seriously consider what the affects of the changes will be at various points over the next several hundred years.

I think we need to acknowledge the trend-line, and understand what it means to us, to mankind. It isn't really too important whether the Industrial Revolution and modern technology was the cause, or whether the observed changes have nothing whatever to do with humans. The fact is we do produce a lot of gasses and emissions that didn't exist in the 18th century. We aren't going to go back to late 18th century technology, so we really do need to find cleaner sources of abundant energy. Even if this weren't strongly suggested by the evidence of climate change, we need to come to grips with the fact that you can't stretch a finite supply of petrochemicals infinitely, and humans aren't going to settle for anythng less.

This supersedes political posturing, but it isn't something that you or I can do anything about. This is a problem for the specialists to resolve. They're on the job, and doing the best they can. Roll up your sleeves, have a nice glass of cold lemonade, and Let them work

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I look at global warming as a metaphor...

We are all in a car speeding across the landscape. Ahead of us is a drop off that we can't tell how deep it is.
One person says, it is 100 feet deep, we need to stop.
Another person says, "we don't have any evidence of how deep it is, we should just keep going."

The prudent response is to at least slow down. Even if our brakes are out we can at least take our foot off the gas.

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"...foot off the gas..." is the wisest words spoken on this topic.

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I can agree on one thing, that is that oil is likely finite and non-renewable, at least in our short span of history. Whether there is global warming or not, it is prudent to look for alternative energy resources. I've never argued with that. So whether we develop alternative energy because of global warming or because of economic necessity, it makes no difference to me. However, I do not believe we should scrap the most efficient forms of energy that we have available until we have proven something else that is practical and competitive economically.

To use your metaphor, Parados, I don't think it makes sense to turn the car down a muddy primitive road, off the highway, just because somebody has reported the remote possibility of a drop off in the highway up ahead, especially given the fact that even if the drop off proves to exist which is highly questionable, still it can likely be negotiated safely, probably more safely than turning onto the primitive road.

The highway is the free market with sound science injected into it. Government mandates unrelated to the market tend to take us off on tangents that eventually lead to economic and environmental disasters. The market keeps us fairly close to reality, or the best efficiency, the highway so to speak.

One of the amusing things popping up now is that nuclear seems to be looked upon with increasing favor, as an alternative that does not emit "greenhouse gases." I would like to remind everybody that nuclear fell into ill repute and was basically run out of the business of building more plants by the "sky is falling" crowd of the late 60's, 70's, and 80's. Energy experts told us then exactly what would happen in terms of the energy crunch, how nuclear, coal, and oil fit into the picture, and that we should continue developing nuclear power plants. Who should we have believed then, the environmentalists or the professionals? So who do we believe now? So Asherman, I agree, let the specialists (or professionals) keep working.

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One of the biggest problem for the US has been "cheap" gas when most people in developed countries were already paying upwards of $4/gallon for many years when oil costs were less than half what it cost today. Some of the pundits on tv are saying oil could hit $80/barrel.

It makes me laugh/cry when I see car companies offering $1.99/gallon gasoline for one year if they "buy" their gas guzzlers.

Taking our foot off the gas peddle would be a good start: this is a rhetorical statement, and I agree with parados.

okie's point is well taken; the market place will take care of human energy needs in the future.

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Vast chunks of rock threatens to fall from Eiger as global warming opens up crack:

Quote:

Crowds gather to see chunk fall off Eiger

John Hooper
Friday July 7, 2006
The Guardian

A vast chunk of Europe's most ill-famed mountain threatens to break loose and crash down in the next few days, a geologist monitoring the situation told the Guardian on Friday.

Hans-Rudolf Keusen said 2m cubic metres of the Eiger in the Bernese Alps, Switzerland - twice the volume of the Empire State Building - was rapidly working its way loose. He said the mountain appeared to have cracked open as an indirect result of global warming.

There was no danger to human beings. "There aren't any houses underneath, so no one is going to end up getting a rock on the head," Mr Keusen said.

But he added that the debris could settle on glaciers in the area, blocking the outflow and affecting water supplies to neighbouring towns. It was not yet clear whether the part of the Eiger at risk would fall in a single event or by stages.

Mr Keusen began monitoring the mountain at the end of last month after spotting a long crack on the east face. Measurements taken by instruments located on Bäregg, on the other side of a valley from the Eiger, initially showed the fissure was opening up at a rate of five centimetres a day.

But on Friday, he told the Guardian: "The crack is now widening at 75 centimetres a day.

"That is very fast compared with fissures we have seen developing on other mountains. I think it is possible the rockfall could take place in the next few days."

It is natural for the Alps to erode. But there has been mounting evidence in recent years that they are crumbling at a faster rate than normal. In 2004, three lumps of the Dolomites in northern Italy came loose. The biggest chunk - 75 metres high - fell more than a quarter of mile to block a hikers' trail.

Since the alarm was sounded for the Eiger tourists have been gathering around the town of Grindelwald in the hope of seeing what promises to be the biggest rockfall in living memory.

Mr Keusen said the Eiger had become more fragile over the last century. "As a result of global warming the glaciers around it have gradually retreated," he said.

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It is fairly evident from the photograp posted by Walter and the visible accumulation of loose debris at the foot of the peak that many chunks have previously fallen from the Eiger. Were they due to global warming as well? The smooth well rounded 3,000 foot peaks of the Appalachian mountians were once rocky jagged peaks that rose 15,000 or more feet above the surrounding terrain. (A similar comment couuld be made about the Urals in Russia or the somewhat higher Carpathian mountains in Eastern Europe.) Was it global warming that wore them down?

Reading is easy. Thinking is more difficult.

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GeorgeOb1- As you may be aware, it has become fashionable to blame almost any catasthrope on the alleged "Global Warming". As Charles Krauthammer commented-in his --Article--"Environmentalists testing the limits of our credulity"

quote--"Harvard Astrophysicist Sallie Baliunas points out that in Northern Europe during the last thousand years, the increased devastation and occurence of storms is closely linked to cooler rather than warmer temperatures. Sublime conditions prevailed during the 10th-12th centuries(roughly one degree warmer than now) In the 13th century when a cooling began that lasted centuries, storms and sea flooding in the area around the North Sea increased dramatically in severity and frequency."

Krauthammer goes on:

"I believe that when 6 Billion humans pump tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, it MAY affect Climate. There are countervailing theories that say NOT: One study points out that greenhouse theory takes VERY POOR ACCOUNT OF CLOUD FORMATION AND WATER VAPOR DISTRIBUTION AND NOTES THAT INCREASES IN CLOUD COVER FROM CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS COULD WIPE OUT ANY TEMPERATURE RIES.

Why wont the global warming people strongly support climatically benign nuclear power? They don't, of course, BECAUSE IT OFFENDS ANOTHER PART OF THEIR ENVIRONMENTAL THEOLOGY>"

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Global Warming...New Report...and it ain't happy news

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