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

If I were to conclude Novak was wrong about the cause of ice ages, I would still have over 400 (actually, 461) comments by scientists that human releases of CO2 in the atmosphere are not causing global warming.

"Hopefully, our grandkids are going to have a lot better
weather information than we did, and they will be able to answer a lot of the questions
we're just in the process of asking,

this reduced solar activity could work in the opposite
direction to climate change caused by humans,”

“We don’t know what the future ice conditions will be, as there
is apparently considerable uncertainty in the sea ice models regarding the timing and extent
of sea ice loss.

Novak explained. "The real cause of global warming could be an increase in solar energy, as critics generally claim; but there is evidence that it is due to variations in heat from the earth's core. Ice ages are caused by oceans heating, which appears to result from increased heat from inside the earth. The primary evidence is the exact cycling of ice ages. Environmental factors would not be so precise. Also, the oceans heating more than the atmosphere points to the heat coming from inside the earth

What I take from Novak's short statement (which surely is not all he has written or said on the subject) is that he does not discount scientific opinion that the sun is the likely prime mover, but he also is looking to an alternate theory of heat from the Earth's core. Chances are that will not achieve broad based support or I think more scientists would be looking at it, but it should be part of the debate.

Compagnucci believes humans have only contributed a few tenths of a degree to
warming on Earth and that solar activity is a key driver of climate

Is Parados rewriting the text again?

To dismiss a theory as not credible simply because it hadn't yet been seriously considered in the debate, shows me a huge lack of scientific curiosity and shows me opinion drive by ideology or opportunism rather than science.

Good ole Foxy.. Just can't resist the temptation to be snide.

But we all know you are holier than anyone here Foxfyre.

To dismiss a theory as not credible simply because it hadn't yet been seriously considered in the debate, shows me a huge lack of scientific curiosity and shows me opinion drive by ideology or opportunism rather than science.

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.SenateReport#report
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Physicist George E. Smith, a former physics lecturer at University of Auckland, is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Institute of Physics. Smith expressed climate skepticism in 2007. "There is enough doubt to scuttle any idea that man is causing [global warming]," Smith wrote to EPW on May 27, 2007. "The earth is a giant swamp cooler, with increased warming (mostly in the oceans) leading to increased evaporation, which ultimately leads to more clouds forming somewhere, and hence less solar radiation reaching the ground so it cools down again. So long as we have oceans, we can't change the temperature of the earth, either up or down, even if we wanted to," Smith, who received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of Auckland, explained. "The so-called global mean temperature is reputed to be 58F versus about 57 F a century ago. So what value would you like it to be and why?" Smith added. In 2005, Smith also detailed his skepticism in a January 2005 Physics Today article. "The largest single repository of CO2 on Earth is the oceans, and that the solubility of CO2 in water drops as the water temperature increases. So clearly a mechanism exists whereby increasing ocean water temperatures (which is where most of the solar energy goes) causes increased out-gassing of CO2 into the atmosphere. Furthermore, Arctic permafrost zones revert to marshy peat bogs when the Arctic warms, and then bacterial activity takes hold and converts decaying ancient vegetation into atmospheric CO2. Both of those processes are happening right now," Smith wrote. "The Russian Vostok ice cores going back 420 000 years and the Dome-C ice cores going back 730 000 years show that the Antarctic ice sheet has not melted during that time frame, even in the warmest interglacial periods. The ice cores also show periods of rapid global warming followed by rapidly increasing atmospheric CO2," he added. (LINK)

Swiss seek Pope's blessing to stop glacier melting

Thu Aug 6, 2009

ZURICH (Reuters) - After centuries of praying for a local glacier to stop growing, Swiss villagers are now seeking an audience with Pope Benedict to get his blessing for prayers against the global warming that is causing it to recede.

In 1678, the inhabitants of the Alpine villages of Fieschertal and Fiesch made a formal vow to live virtuously and to pray against the growth of the Aletsch glacier, Europe's longest, which had caused a lake to flood into their homes.

To reinforce their prayers, they started holding an annual procession in 1862, when the glacier reached its longest during the mini-Ice Age Europe suffered in the mid-19th century.

But the villages now want to seek permission from Pope Benedict to change their vow as the glacier is melting fast due to climate change and have requested an audience with him.

"The residents of Fiesch and Fischertal hope that this will happen in September or October and are optimistic that the Holy Father will decide in their favor as he has repeatedly spoken out about climate change," they said in a statement.

Switzerland's glaciers shrank by 12 percent over the past decade, melting at their fastest rate due to rising temperatures and lighter snowfalls, a recent study showed.

Glaciers are a key source of water for hydro-electric plants in Switzerland as well as an important tourist attraction.

Researchers are predicting that the temperatures in the Swiss Alps will rise by 1.8 degrees Celsius in winter and by 2.7 degrees Celsius in the summer by 2050.

(Reporting by Emma Thomasson; Editing by Jon Boyle)

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Evolutionary Biologist and Paleozoologist Dr. Susan Crockford of University of Victoria in Canada has published papers in peer-reviewed academic journals and rejected fears that man-made global warming could devastate animal life on Earth. "It is apparent to me that animal species are much more flexible over the long term (centuries and millennia) than we assume based on short-term studies of local populations: most species have the capacity to adjust to abrupt climate or habitat change," Crockford told EPW on December 1, 2007. "While many individuals, or even entire local populations, may perish in the face of change, others do just fine (this variation in ‘survivability' among individuals within a population is characteristic of all species). The individuals who survive rebuild the population and the species perpetuates," Crockford added. "Contrary to popular belief, populations can rebound from quite low levels, as demonstrated by the fact that many population expansions (and introductions by humans) derive from a handful of individuals at best and often, a single pregnant female. Polar bears, for example, survived several episodes of much warmer climate over the last 10,000 years than exists today and if global numbers of bears dropped during these times, they must have rebounded nicely or there would not be so many bears today. Ringed seals, the primary prey of polar bears (and similarly dependant on sea ice), also survived these warm periods and are now very abundant," she added. "In other words, there is no evidence to suggest that the polar bear or its food supply is in danger of disappearing entirely with increased Arctic warming, regardless of the dire fairy-tale scenarios predicted by computer models: evidence from the past is a kind of ‘ground truth' we can trust and it tells us that sufficient sea ice will persist, even with significant increases in temperature, to ensure the survival of both polar bears and ringed seals," she concluded. (LINK)

Is the unfulfilled promise of a 'barbecue summer' getting you down? Surprised when our climate delivers the unexpected? Then let David Randall take you, in the first of two holiday specials, on a tour of the very best - and worst - of Britain's summer weather

This year's weather getting you down? Remember the long, hot summer of 1976? Or what about the great washout of 1954? In the second of our two special holiday sections, David Randall guides you through some of the best, the worst, and the weirdest British summers ever

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.SenateReport#report
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Meteorologist Herb Stevens, one of the original meteorologists at The Weather Channel and founder of Grass Roots Weather, expressed climate skepticism in 2007. "Based on my background as a scientist, you should also know that I am a firm believer that warming of out atmosphere is not caused by man. Quite simply, the evidence does not exist to prove a correlation between greenhouse gas emissions and rising atmospheric temperatures...the correlation does not pass muster with the scientific method, and until it does, thousands of other scientists and I continue to look elsewhere for the answers to questions of short and long term climate change," Stevens wrote on May 17, 2007. "The vast majority of the coverage of global warming suggests catastrophic consequences await in the not too distant future...mind you, all of those predictions for 25, 50, or even 100 years in the future come from computer models, the same technology that quite often can't get tomorrow's weather right," Stevens explained. "It is especially troubling to scientists that the vast majority of spokespersons for global warming have little if any scientific background...politicians, actors, radio and television hosts, and other members of the media, most of whom have journalism backgrounds," Stevens added. "Unfortunately, due to the one-sidedness of the information barrage, much of our society has bought in to the notion that we are on the road to ruin. Several entities within the winter sports industry have become vocal supporters of the notion of human-induced global warming, and they have scared the heck out of a lot of people in the process," he concluded.

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Meteorologist Arthur T. "Terry" Safford III, a retired Lt Col. of the U.S. Air Force has declared himself a skeptic. "My principal interest in this subject is not so much how climate change affects public policy, but more the scientific aspects. That does bother me greatly. I was always taught that as a pure scientist, you gather the facts, develop some possible explanation, and select the best-tested solution. That is clearly not the norm with (internationally) government-granted scientists or grants from agenda groups. They tend to start with the conclusion and work backwards to the facts. If the facts aren't convenient, they are adjusted, the sample size reduced, or simply ignored," Safford wrote to EPW on May 21, 2007. "This is ‘junk' science, at its worst and needs to uncovered and exposed. It's OK, under the First Amendment, if Hollywood advocates junk science, but it is not OK for the meteorological/climatological community. The science of meteorology has enough trouble with its ‘public image' without destroying its credibility altogether," Safford explained. "I am a retired synoptic meteorologist from the Air Force for 29 years. I spent the vast majority of that time directly supporting military operations at a number of locations and differing commands in both the Air Force and Army," he concluded.

"Based on my background as a scientist, you should also know that I am a firm believer that warming of out atmosphere is not caused by man. Quite simply, the evidence does not exist to prove a correlation between greenhouse gas emissions and rising atmospheric temperatures.