Manmade Climate Change Discussion

[Methuselah]

No, I don't.

 

But they don't help in the slightest, either.

Oh I don't know loafer? If it makes a few ignoramuses think twice, before pontificating, isn't that a good thing?

[Gray-Wolf]

It's the wilful neglect of the senators that bugs me Pete. They have a fuller , more joined up view of all the cutting edge science ( via their researchers) but choose, instead, to hunt out the 'whacky Fringe' of the science and by then emptying those contents into the electorate create confusion and maintain the Myth that the science isn't settled?

 

By 'The science is settled' I mean we are as sure as we will ever be that the changes ,wrought by mankind across the oceans,landmasses and atmosphere of our planet will bring consequences for our world.

 

The pedant will grab at areas that are still under scrutiny with no 'definate' answer as 'proof' that we don't know what will occur but within the uncertainty of the exact outcomes it is plain that they will fall in a direction harmful to our current 'style' of living?

 

Recognising the dangers is surely not a 'political' thing? The solutions may become political but then that is why we have politicians to sort out a nations response? Why deny and fiddle with the outline of the problem? Are the solutions a thing that would not favour the political right ( massive Govt. spending and tax hikes) so they deny any issue exists?

 

All a bit Chaimberlin if you ask me? When a country is threatened by another nation the Govt. spends instantly to deal with the issue. When the whole planet is threatened we all sit on our hands and deny any threat?

[loafer]

Oh I don't know loafer? If it makes a few ignoramuses think twice, before pontificating, isn't that a good thing?

 

No, because it entrenches and polarises opinion. It is pointless pointscoring.

[Methuselah]

It's the wilful neglect of the senators that bugs me Pete. They have a fuller , more joined up view of all the cutting edge science ( via their researchers) but choose, instead, to hunt out the 'whacky Fringe' of the science and by then emptying those contents into the electorate create confusion and maintain the Myth that the science isn't settled?

 

By 'The science is settled' I mean we are as sure as we will ever be that the changes ,wrought by mankind across the oceans,landmasses and atmosphere of our planet will bring consequences for our world.

 

The pedant will grab at areas that are still under scrutiny with no 'definate' answer as 'proof' that we don't know what will occur but within the uncertainty of the exact outcomes it is plain that they will fall in a direction harmful to our current 'style' of living?

 

Recognising the dangers is surely not a 'political' thing? The solutions may become political but then that is why we have politicians to sort out a nations response? Why deny and fiddle with the outline of the problem? Are the solutions a thing that would not favour the political right ( massive Govt. spending and tax hikes) so they deny any issue exists?

 

All a bit Chaimberlin if you ask me? When a country is threatened by another nation the Govt. spends instantly to deal with the issue. When the whole planet is threatened we all sit on our hands and deny any threat?

I must admit to just having had a thought: 

 

If one was staying in a hotel and the fire alarm went off, would one prat around investigating the cause, start-point, and likely progression of the fire, or would one simply run like hell, and ask questions later?

[Methuselah]

No, because it entrenches and polarises opinion. It is pointless pointscoring.

I really don't see how unequivocally demonstrating someone's mistakes can be 'pointless pointscoring' [sic]...If I'd had that attitude to education, I'd still be struggling with long division!

Edited August 16, 2013 by A Boy Named Sue

[BornFromTheVoid]

No, because it entrenches and polarises opinion. It is pointless pointscoring.

 

I'd say that being put in a position of power and responsibility, only to repeatedly shout whatever conspiracies and falsehoods your funders tell you to, is the biggest player in entrenching and polarising opinion.

[BornFromTheVoid]

 

[knocker]

In the first of RTCC’s ‘Climate Leaders’ series, former UN climate science chief Bob Watson discusses the UN’s forthcoming AR5 climate science report -

 

http://www.rtcc.org/2013/08/12/bob-watson-ipcc-must-address-slowdown-in-global-warming/

Edited August 16, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

Climate policy's twin challenges

 

We need to slow incremental damage while taking out an insurance policy against the growing risk of catastrophic damage.

 

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/la-oe-zaelke-climate-tipping-points-20130816,0,631359.story

Edited August 17, 2013 by knocker

[VillagePlank]

 

Alas, more faulty reasoning: the presenter's trying to present a false dilemma. The reality is that it isn't a boolean choice; we can also go somewhere inbetween and mitigate our activities to restrict future consequences. Shame really, nearly had me sold. Much better to simply go along the lines of the Precautionary Principle ie that we act, now, even within any degree of scientific uncertainty, to restrict activities that have a significant risk of future harm.

Edited August 17, 2013 by Sparkicle

[VillagePlank]

[snip]

Edited August 17, 2013 by Sparkicle

[knocker]

Global warming has not stopped

The apparent lack of warming in Earth’s surface temperature measurements since 1998 is not yet significant from climatic perspective. Surface temperature also seems to be changing according to IPCC projections. Climate model simulations show similar warming breaks, and have done so even before current break started, even if they include the effect of carbon dioxide. Models also can re-create the current break and the cause for the break seems to be known: warming has gone to the oceans instead of warming the surface. The ocean warming has been observed. Also the continuing warming effect of greenhouse gases has been observed. Global warming as a whole seems to continue despite the apparent break in surface measurements.

 

 

http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/2013/08/19/global-warming-has-not-stopped/

[Gray-Wolf]

I justwonderhow the climate misleaders will deal with the IPCC's 95% sureity that man is behind the changes we measure?

 

They must already be twitched about the resumption in warming that we must expect, now their 'cooldown/slowdown' meme has been fully explored and the 'proofs'  revealed undeniable. How will they be able to switch from 'Knowing' that global temps are falling into accepting temps are rising more rapidly than ever?

 

The last IPCC report brought only 90% surity of our culpability, this has now skipped up a further 5% to 95% surity. How small a margin must we reach before they accept how 'extreme' their views are?

 

You watch, overnight the biggest deniers will become 'accepters' of AGW but will focus on 'the low end' of predictions as being the 'correct'  range of expected change.

 

How will the masses that follow them react to such a massive change? Will they ditch their own leaders in favour of refuting AGW ( as is ) and save the Climate Misleaders the trouble of ditching their unpalletable extreme followers in an attempt to 'appear' reasonable???

 

Post report I'd be interested to see just how many of our contributors have changed their tune?

[UV-RAY]

I justwonderhow the climate misleaders will deal with the IPCC's 95% sureity that man is behind the changes we measure?

 

They must already be twitched about the resumption in warming that we must expect, now their 'cooldown/slowdown' meme has been fully explored and the 'proofs'  revealed undeniable. How will they be able to switch from 'Knowing' that global temps are falling into accepting temps are rising more rapidly than ever?

 

The last IPCC report brought only 90% surity of our culpability, this has now skipped up a further 5% to 95% surity. How small a margin must we reach before they accept how 'extreme' their views are?

 

You watch, overnight the biggest deniers will become 'accepters' of AGW but will focus on 'the low end' of predictions as being the 'correct'  range of expected change.

 

How will the masses that follow them react to such a massive change? Will they ditch their own leaders in favour of refuting AGW ( as is ) and save the Climate Misleaders the trouble of ditching their unpalletable extreme followers in an attempt to 'appear' reasonable???

 

Post report I'd be interested to see just how many of our contributors have changed their tune?

Another derogatory post aimed at anyone who doesn't agree with your point of view.

You know GW you are better than this, you can get your point over without the needless point scoring.

 

Edited August 19, 2013 by Sceptical Inquirer

[Devonian]

 

Another derogatory post aimed at anyone who doesn't agree with your point of view.

You know GW you are better than this, you can get your point over without the needless point scoring.

 

 

This is the 'man made' thread. There is plenty in the 'sceptic' thread I could choose to find derogatory but, since the two threads are not meant for such ding dongs, I have to put up with it and not reply. It works both ways - or should...

[knocker]

However, the problem with predictions is that they involve looking into the future, which is a bit harder, as we have seen and, as with stocks and shares, past performance is no indication of future performance.

 

But I've read a number of peer reviewed papers that state the more we understand past climate changes may well give us a greater understanding of the current situation. But still as the great Niels Bohr said, "Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future".

[knocker]

With the forthcoming IPCC report, the contrarians finally agree we are changing the climate

 

Climate contrarians may concede more than they bargained for when the next IPCC report is published

 

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2013/aug/19/global-waring-ipcc-ar5-report

Edited August 20, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

Climate Panel Cites Near Certainty on Warming

 

An international panel of scientists has found with near certainty that human activity is the cause of most of the temperature increases of recent decades, and warns that sea levels could conceivably rise by more than three feet by the end of the century if emissions continue at a runaway pace.

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/20/science/earth/extremely-likely-that-human-activity-is-driving-climate-change-panel-finds.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Edited August 20, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

Nice overview of the current state of water+drought in the west. That image of Lake Powell (1999 vs 2013) is stunning

 

Causes of the great Western U.S. drought
It is well-known that natural variations in sea surface temperature patterns, such as seen from the El Niño/La Niña oscillation, can influence storm tracks and can cause prolonged periods of drought. These natural variations likely had a hand in causing the great 2000 - 2013 Western U.S. drought. However, changes in the amount of sea ice covering the Arctic can also have a major impact on Northern Hemisphere atmospheric circulation patterns. We must consider if global warming, which has led to a 50% decline in summer Arctic sea ice extent since 1979, may be altering storm tracks and contributing to drought. In 2004, Lisa Sloan, professor of Earth sciences at UC Santa Cruz, and her graduate student Jacob Sewall published an article in Geophysical Research Letters, Disappearing Arctic sea ice reduces available water in the American west. An accompanying news release explained that their climate models found "a significant reduction in rain and snowfall in the American West†as a result of Arctic sea ice loss:

What they found was a change in atmospheric circulation patterns that caused a small northward shift in the paths of winter storms over western North America. This shift in winter storm tracks resulted in significantly reduced winter precipitation from southern British Columbia to the Gulf of California. In some areas, average annual precipitation dropped by as much as 30 percent. The reductions were greatest along the West Coast, with lesser changes further inland. But even as far inland as the Rocky Mountains, winter precipitation fell by 17 percent.

The sea ice acts like a lid over the ocean surface during the winter, blocking the transfer of heat from the ocean to the atmosphere, Sewall explained. Where the sea ice is reduced, heat transfer from the ocean warms the atmosphere, resulting in a rising column of relatively warm air. The shift in storm tracks over North America was linked to the formation of these columns of warmer air over areas of reduced sea ice in the Greenland Sea and a few other locations.

A follow-up paper by Dr. Sewall in 2005, "Precipitation Shifts over Western North America as a Result of Declining Arctic Sea Ice Cover: The Coupled System Response", used a more sophisticated modeling technique but confirmed the results of the 2004 paper. In a June 2013 interview with climateprogress.org, Dr. Sewall commented:

"I think the hypothesis from 2004 and 2005 is being borne out by current changes. The only real difference is that reality is moving faster than we thought/hoped it would almost a decade ago."

 

 

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=2495

[knocker]

Can cities adjust to to reality of no new normal coastline? I'm not sure to whom I should dedicate the song but one or two come to mind..

 

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/

Edited August 22, 2013 by knocker

[4wd]

What's a 'normal' coastline, coastlines have always changed unless heavy engineering is used to delay it slightly.

[BornFromTheVoid]

Prominent MIT researcher Kerry Emanuel has been receiving an unprecedented "frenzy of hate" after a video featuring an interview with him was published last week by Climate Desk.

 

Emails contained "veiled threats against my wife," and other "tangible threats," Emanuel, a highly regarded atmospheric scientist and director of MIT's Atmospheres, Oceans and Climate program, said in an interview. "They were vile, these emails. They were the kind of emails nobody would like to receive."

 

"What was a little bit new about it was dragging family members into it and feeling that my family might be under threat, so naturally I didn't feel very good about that at all," Emanuel said. "I thought it was low to drag somebody's spouse into arguments like this."

Climate Desk has seen a sample of the emails and can confirm they are laced with menacing language, expletives, and personal threats of violence.

 

Emanuel began receiving emails "almost immediately" after the video was posted on January 5, and the volume peaked at four or five emails a day. The threats have now petered off.

 

Threats are nothing new in the world of climate science. But Emanuel was surprised by the viciousness of the emails. "I think most of my colleagues and I have received a fair bit of email here and there that you might classify as hate mail, but nothing like what I've got in the last few days."

 

"This was a little more orchestrated this time," he said...

 

...In June 2011, top Australian climate scientists said they had been targeted by death threats and menacing phone calls, including threats of sexual attacks on family members. Australian National University in Canberra reacted by tightening security, and the police began investigating. US researchers received a torrent of hate mail in the wake of "Climategate," in which a trove of emails were stolen and released at the University of East Anglia in the UK.

 

More here http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2012/01/mit-climate-scientists-wife-threatened-frenzy-hate

 

Ridiculous when you hear "sceptics" claim that they are the ones attacked by the church of AGW and other such nonsense.

[knocker]

Near-term regional climate: the range of possibilities | New images added to interactive applet!

 

Near-term regional climate: the range of possibilities

 

http://www.climate-lab-book.ac.uk/2013/famous-ensembles/

Edited August 23, 2013 by knocker

[knocker]

Al Jazeera's Best-In-Class Coverage Of IPCC Climate Change Report

http://theenergycollective.com/josephromm/263521/al-jazeera-provides-best-class-tv-coverage-ipcc-climate-report?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A%20TheEnergyCollective-TwitterHandleFeed%20%28The%20Energy%20Collective%20-%20Twitter%20Handle%20Feed%29

[knocker]

Rising Seas

 

As the planet warms, the sea rises. Coastlines flood. What will we protect? What will we abandon? How will we face the danger of rising seas?

 

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/rising-seas/folger-text

Edited August 24, 2013 by knocker