eerilly warm weather

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

this is starting to weird me out a little. i live in wheeling wv, just outside pittsburgh:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Wheeling,+WV (you can zoom out a bit to get an idea of where that sits if needed)

it will be january in a few days and we still havent had more than handful of days below 50. i dont mean like its been warm often ... it still feels like its september. the nights get fairly cold, but nothing like what would be normal for this time of year.

right now its 52: http://www.ohiovalleynow.com/
50s for the rest of the week. its been 50s or 60s all since september, minus a few cold days in october and a week where it dropped into the 40s while raining.

i know we had a year or two like this back in the 80s, but this seems more and more like its becoming the norm vs. the exception. when i was a kid wed get snow around thanksgiving and it seemed like it stayed on the ground until spring. im only 26 ... friends of mine in their 40s and 50s tell me i havent seen real winters. they have pictures of the snow the received which was normal for the time.

i ****ing detest fear mongering paranoia theories, but this is really begining to creep me out. i remember just 4 years ago thinking this kind of weather was out of place for october. now were getting even warmer weather in late december.

so does everyone think that this is just part of some earth cycle that we haven't been around long enough to take into full scope, or do you think we are actually baking the planet?

[Liokault]

And with China building a coal fired power station every five days, get used to warm!

[Oso]

so does everyone think that this is just part of some earth cycle that we haven't been around long enough to take into full scope, or do you think we are actually baking the planet?

the answer is both. And, hopefully, it seems as if maybe the greenies are starting to realize that part of what's happening is completely natural.

the worst thing is that if we weren't doing our part to exacerbate the natural warming trend; by the time it happened naturally we might have had the technology to deal with it better.

oh well...if the dinosaurs all had to die out due to a perfectly natural impact from a meteor...why do we have the right to persist as a species?

[wall]

Europe this year has had the warmest autumn in history (as in since any records were kept!). The alpine glaciers (the few remaining anyway, given the huge % decrease in the past 30 years) kept on melting until November (normally they should be incrementing from October) and currently it's still spookily warm (5-8 C above average for the period!) and dry too (absolutely no snow anywhere ... just 15-20 years ago there would have been over 2 meters in the mountains).
Truly bizzarre and worrying.

Wall

[rogue]

The good news as I learned this week is girls still in shorts and belly shirts after Christmas!

[Royal Dragon]

Global warming could be one cause of the break of the Ayles Ice Shelf at Ellesmere Island, which occurred in the summer of 2005 but was only detected recently by satellite photos, said Luke Copland, assistant professor at the University of Ottawa's geography department.

http://news.search.yahoo.com/news/search?p=25+mile+ice+shelf&c=

[Radhnoti]

The global warming scare tactics have wrung $18 billion out of recent federal budgets for climate change research. The "conspiracy" could well be researchers hoping to pay their mortgage and send their kids to college. Who here is willing to announce that their job is not needed? That's what the world is asking of these researchers.

Want to see some titles to some magazine articles? All about global COOLING?
-Science, "Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide and Aerosols: Effects of Large Increases on Global Climate," July 9, 1971
--Fortune, "Ominous Changes in the World's Weather," February 1974
--Time, "Another Ice Age?" June 24, 1974
--Newsweek, "The Cooling World," April 28, 1975
--Business Week, "The world's climate is getting worse" August 2, 1976
--National Geographic, "What's Happening to Our Climate?" November 1976
--Time, "The Ice Age Cometh?" January 31, 1994
Alarmism sells papers or boosts ratings. Global warming is just the latest Chicken Little scenario the media has latched onto.

Here's a site talking about how Mars is going through "global warming" right now. Do the cars on mars cause warming in the stars?

http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=17977


And by the way, Greenland was never green. Those vikings, with their great farming genius...

I think the world may be getting warmer, but I doubt humans have a whole lot to do with it. Warm cycles, cool cycles and humans haven't been watching these things on NEARLY the kind of time scale we'd need to give a real educated guess at what's going on.
That's my take.

[Fuzzly]

Rad, while it's true that the Earth goes through cyclic temperature changes due to the seasons, the general trend in the Earth's temperature goes up. While we haven't been around very long, scientists can study air bubbles from ice core samples that are millions of years old. We can see that in these samples that the CO2 levels are much much lower than they are now.

You can't say that humans don't have an impact on the atmosphere either. We've proven this with the hole in the ozone layer. We made it, and through our efforts (almost global-wide banning on chemicals that caused the hole), the hole has stopped growing, and it's actually shrinking at this point.

You should really watch "An Inconvenient Truth." Yes, the Earth has natural cycles in temperature, but to say that humans are not having a huge impact is insane.


Also, I can't believe you are comparing Earth to Mars. I mean, really.

[Royal Dragon]

How many cars are on the road in the us alone? Now what about world wide?

How can you put that much *daily* emmissions in the air, and not change the balance of the atmosphere?

[Li Kao]

Tom Waits once voiced this universal truism in a song "And all over the world, strangers talk only about the weather. All over the world it's the same."

I am a science student myself (though in the medical sector) and so I'm all for the scientific method. I don't think there's anything wrong with caring about the world we live in, I just think we overestimate our influence sometimes and we have to be careful about the conclusions we derive from the data that is available. Also, I don't think we know enough to get alarmed yet -- the time span that global climate changes are vast, so I think that trying to subjectively measure changes from memory in one's own lifetime are meaningless. My basic opinion is the same as George Carlin as seen in this clip -- *language warning* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kOCv-yfhTc -- I realize this is just a comedy bit, meant for entertainment, but I relate to his outlook on the subject (and have a healthy sense of humor).

I have seen An Inconvenient Truth -- it presents a compelling argument, but like many issues, there are contrary or divergent data and arguments -- see http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.html?id=d0235a70-33f1-45b3-803b-829b1b3542ef&p=1 and http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/. It would seem that with a topic like this, you could rely on cold hard facts, but it's an issue that is steeped in politics and business as well, which makes it that more cloudy and biased, depending on who is making the argument.

Everyone has to come to their own conclusions on matters like these, and decide how it will affect their life.

[5Animals1Path]

Everyone's worried? I just figured this was "normal" Jersey weather, aka, around the end of January to the beginning of April, I'm gonna get covered in more white stuff then John Belushi at Scarface's house.

But if it's happenin everywhere, maybe I'm wrong.

[Fuzzly]

Li Kao, the first article has nothing to do with science and all about semantics. The second one dosn't make much sense at all, and has almost nothing to do with science as welll. The second article claims that C02 can't possibly cause the Earth to heat because it is such a tiny percentage of the total atmosphere. It does admit, however, that humans have increased the percentage by quite a bit. The fact that CO2 currently makes up a small portion of the atmosphere seems to be the second article's biggest argument. Even though CO2 makes up less than %1 of the atmosphere, there are 2.97 × 10 to the 12th metric tons of it in our atmosphere. That is 2.97 X 10,000,000,000,000 metric tonnes. A metric ton is equal to a thousand Kg.

The second website gives us a conservative estimate saying that we have increased the total CO2 in an atmosphere by .01 of a percent since the industrial revolution. %.038 from %.028. The amount sure looks small when we look at percentages, but when you are dealing with that much gas, an increase of %.01 is a lot.



I'm a science student as well, in Ecology, and I say that we humans can not possibly underestimate our influence on the Earth. I go back to my example of the hole in the Ozone layer. We caused it. And, we are actually in the process of healing it.


It's not about politics, it's about taking responsibility for where we live and not messing it up.

[Royal Dragon]

You want to see how much we have effected our planet? Anyone can do it.

Get on a plane, and fly from NY to LA. As you fly, look out the window. You are only allowed ro stop looking when you are flying over undamaged natural terrain.

You will notice that except for a few minutes over mountians, every inch of this country is carved up for farms, towns, cities,or paved over for roads.

150 years ago it was all natural praries, forests with nothing but green as far as can be seen, except for small pockets of civilisation.

Now, except for small pockets of wilderness, that is all gone, and civilisation is over the *Entire* continent.

Don't belive me? Go buy a plane ticket and see for yourself....

[Ray Pina]

I get the opposite impression flying across the country. You fly out from Las Vegas at night and by the time you hit 15,000 feet there are no lights to be seen anywhere. Maybe a little rinky-dinky city here and there but really nothing until you hit North New Jersey, right outside of NYC. The Rockies, the badlans, Montana, Wyoming, forget Alaska... even New Jersey has a lot of Pine Barren land. Up state New York.

There's still lots of land out there.

As for China. When we went industrial we built. Now we're going to tell everyone else they can't?

As for cold, it's freaking freezing today. 29 days and I'm in Puerto Rico! Can't wait.

[mantiskilla]

70 year old women are having babies, FDA approves genetically modified meat for human consumption, large chunks of the North Pole are breaking off and floating away, increased frequency and intensity of hurricanes?and perhaps most importantly the coral reefs and oceans are dying. On the up-side Miss Universe got to keep her crown after re-hab.
________
Coach handbags (http://icoachhandbags.com/)

[MasterKiller]

The global warming scare tactics have wrung $18 billion out of recent federal budgets for climate change research.

We spend that every month in Iraq. A drop in the bucket to ensure my children, and their children, don't have to fight mutant zombies for table scraps.

[Ford Prefect]

lol @ Global Warming "scare tactics".

Also lol @ trying to discredit climate research with the fallacious argument of poisoning the well with the "they do it to make a living" line. You do realize that would discredit all science, yes?

[Radhnoti]

MK, I'm just saying it's foolish to give you a job fighting the zombie menace, then ask YOU if it's possible the zombie threat is ended forever. Why would you say yes and have to go find another job and learn a new skill set that doesn't include a shotgun and chainsaw?
Especially when you look back at the track record I showed a bit of the documentation for articles about global cooling...even in 1994. Multiple articles through the 70s and just as much hype then about cooling as we have now about warming.

The global warming POLITICAL/ecological movement completely ignores the fact that the world was warm enough for Vikings to grow crops in Greenland until around 1400. That's serious temperature fluctuation that has nothing to do with my mini-van.

[MasterKiller]

MK, I'm just saying it's foolish to give you a job fighting the zombie menace, then ask YOU if it's possible the zombie threat is ended forever. Why would you say yes and have to go find another job and learn a new skill set that doesn't include a shotgun and chainsaw?
Especially when you look back at the track record I showed a bit of the documentation for articles about global cooling...even in 1994. Multiple articles through the 70s and just as much hype then about cooling as we have now about warming.

The global warming POLITICAL/ecological movement completely ignores the fact that the world was warm enough for Vikings to grow crops in Greenland until around 1400. That's serious temperature fluctuation that has nothing to do with my mini-van.


Climate Change is a more accurate term than Global Warming. Colder, dryer temperatures can occur in some regions if the oceans get too warm (didn't you see The Day After Tomorrow? :p ) Evidence points toward ACCELERATED change caused by human-derived emissions. And since the consequences can be dire (no planet to sustain our societies), it makes sense to dump as much money as possible into research to try and curb ANY acceleration of the natural process, and possibly circumvent the worst side-effects of that process.

At the minimum, preventing future "Katrina-esque" catastrophes could SAVE us billions in reconstruction and loss of life.

Next thing you'll be trying to tell me is cancer can be cured but the medical industry will not do it because they make too much money.

[golden arhat]

we have had the warmest winter on record here in the uk this year
and mt kilimanjiro is melting
anyone who says global warming aint real is retarded

[IronFist]

GDA is correct. When I was a kid, it would start to snow around Thanksgiving and it would keep snowing through February.

This year is weird. I'm in the Chicago suburbs.

It snowed ONCE on October 16th (or sometime around there), and there were a few flurries.

Then, toward the end of November or beginning of December, we had a hardcore overnight blizzard where it snowed 12" overnight (and my work closed the next day, w00t). They predicted that so I was able to go buy frozen pizzas the night before since I couldn't go anywhere the next day.

But since then, there's been nothing. The weather cycles are f'ed up and it's not right.

I hope global warming doesn't mean the summers are going to get warmer, too, because I hate hot weather. My body does not do well in the heat, and honestly, 90 degrees is hot enough in the summer. When I can't even walk from my parking space to the mall without completely soaking my shirt in sweat, it's too hot. That's why I like fall/winter, and hate this global warming ish.

[TenTigers]

I think this is GREAT! I hate the freakin cold. I'm gonna spray aerosal cans everywhere. I stopped buying regular cheese. Now I only use the spray cheese-for everything-sandwiches, omlettes,you name it. No more hair gel for me, from now on, it's Aqua-Net all the way. My school smells like Glade potpouri. Feel free to use the bathroom. (well, after all that cheese....) Hey, I heard that methane also contributes to global warming.
MORE CHEESE! CHEESE FOR EVERYONE!!!
WELCOME TO TEN TIGERS KUNG-FU ACADEMY AND CHEESE EMPORIUM!!!!

now if anybody needs me, I'll be lying out in the parking lot, working on my beautiful tan.

[Royal Dragon]

Next thing you'll be trying to tell me is cancer can be cured but the medical industry will not do it because they make too much money.

Reply]
Well, there are plenty of things like that...

As for winter, yeah when I was Kid, winter (cold needing coats) used to start around late october, with snow in early, to mid November, and it would last from then, often into early March.

We haven't seen that in 10 years at least.

[golden arhat]

I think this is GREAT! I hate the freakin cold. I'm gonna spray aerosal cans everywhere. I stopped buying regular cheese. Now I only use the spray cheese-for everything-sandwiches, omlettes,you name it. No more hair gel for me, from now on, it's Aqua-Net all the way. My school smells like Glade potpouri. Feel free to use the bathroom. (well, after all that cheese....) Hey, I heard that methane also contributes to global warming.
MORE CHEESE! CHEESE FOR EVERYONE!!!
WELCOME TO TEN TIGERS KUNG-FU ACADEMY AND CHEESE EMPORIUM!!!!

now if anybody needs me, I'll be lying out in the parking lot, working on my beautiful tan.

so california turning into a desert and the netherlands dissappearing
and northern europe becoming one solid lump of ice is ok as long as you get your tan ?

[Ford Prefect]

MK, I'm just saying it's foolish to give you a job fighting the zombie menace, then ask YOU if it's possible the zombie threat is ended forever. Why would you say yes and have to go find another job and learn a new skill set that doesn't include a shotgun and chainsaw?
Especially when you look back at the track record I showed a bit of the documentation for articles about global cooling...even in 1994. Multiple articles through the 70s and just as much hype then about cooling as we have now about warming.

The global warming POLITICAL/ecological movement completely ignores the fact that the world was warm enough for Vikings to grow crops in Greenland until around 1400. That's serious temperature fluctuation that has nothing to do with my mini-van.

Again, all science is discreditted if you try to play the "it's in there best interest" angle. It is fallacious for a reason in its utter absurdity for the likelyhood of a global conspiracy involving nearly all scientists in the field who all reach similar conclusions.

Re: Articles - Those are merely reporting a lot fringe scientists claim. You saw how that company claimed to have cloned a human right? They were properly discredditted, and in the future when ALL MAJOR SCIENTIFIC BODIES show that humans have been cloned, does that mean they are lieing because of some past claims by a fringe group? How about Einstein? He modified Newton's law of gravity. Should science be discredditted because they were wrong about gravity for so long?

Science is transitory and provisional. It will without a doubt be 100% wrong on occasion in areas in which it was thought to be right. This is the very nature of science. Science is the best conclusion based on available data. Some scientists in the 70's looked at temperature records that go back to 1880 and realize that average global temperature had cooled from the mid 50's. Now looking at the same data to 2006, looking at ice core records, trending climate models and evaluating current evidence with supercomputers not available in the early 70's, the consensus of the global scientific community is not only that global warming is happenning (which at this point is indisputable), but also that man's activity is greatly effecting the current warming trend.

Re: Greenland. This proves NOTHING. The earth was a lot warmer when dinosaurs roamed, but that doesn't mean it'll be fine if it gets that warm again. You see the earth goes through climate changes based on natural occuring greenhouse gasses, sun activity cyles, etc. Man is now effecting a naturally occuring cycle by speeding warming up faster than it ever has. Since we don't know the trigger for devastating climate change, this can be a huge problem.

Now let's look at the fact that 1000 years ago when the vikings were farming greenland, there was no infrastructure really in place in coastal cities like London, New York, Boston, LA, etc. If the earth was to warm to where Greenland's glaciers largely melted, then you'd have some serious flooding of coastal regions. We are talking about companies going out of business and laying off people, people losing homes to water and/or unemployment, airports and cargo ports inoperable... That would cause a huge economic crash. Now let's also count for the fact that rain patterns would shift. Now the current airable land isn't good for farming. Where the patterns shift to, farms and the infrastructure needed to support them will be rushing to catch up. This will cause shortages of food to go along with economic crashes...

So it's either err on the side of caution or throw caution to the wind. There is a simple fact that remains that no valid scientific argument can be against global warming or the fact man is impacting it. Because of this skeptics resort to the fallacy of poisoning the wells in an attempt to discredit every major scientific body out there.

[TenTigers]

"so california turning into a desert and the netherlands dissappearing
and northern europe becoming one solid lump of ice is ok as long as you get your tan ?"
no, you didn't read what I was saying. I specifically said beautiful tan.
sheesh! you need to get yer priorities straight. With this global warming, I can get a tan in helf the time. This would put a serious crimp in tanning salons' business. HOWEVER, it also is an incentive to find cures for skin cancer.
That oughta get those pharmacuticle company supported AMA and FDA azoles in gear. Maybe the might get with the program and support drugs such as leatrile, like the rest of the world. nah, who are we kiddin?

[Ray Pina]

Things will not be as they were nor as they are now.... that is guaranteed no matter what man does.


Molten rock... global sea... ice age. Change will always happen

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

its weird to hear so many people reporting oddly warm winters from so many different places.

[GunnedDownAtrocity]

Things will not be as they were nor as they are now.... that is guaranteed no matter what man does.


Molten rock... global sea... ice age. Change will always happen

were all gonna die too, but using that logic to justify smoking and snorting all of cuba's coke isn't exactly the wisest approach.

im not saying that's where you were goin with that, but i thought it was worth mentioning.

[Chief Fox]

I live on the front range of Colorado and we just had 3 freakin' blizzards in a 2 week time span! :eek:

Funny but true: http://frankandernest.com/cgi/view/display.pl?104-08-08

[lunghushan]

When humans are long gone, there will still be 80% nitrogen in the atmosphere and around 20% oxygen and around 1% other gases.

Bottomline is by messing up the planet humans are only hurting themselves and other species. Something else will come back, **** roaches, giant sponges or something, and repopulate the planet, unless somehow we manage to wipe out all life on earth.

Anyways, it's not really anything to worry about. Unless humans decide to start some real reform in population control and fixing the environment, global warming is kindof a non-issue compared to everything else.

[David Jamieson]

meh. It's still green where I am, a little rain at night, but above freezing consistently.

I live in Canada! :p and tere's no snow where I am...but we have a couple of places like that here, the main one being in southern british columbia and it's not unheard of for Toronto, where I am, to go quite a while before there's snow.

warming, cooling ...who knows. I personally think it's mostly a big guessing game, the science of climate is not solid at all it's a hit and miss kinda thing.

besides, the actual ability to make accurate measurement has only been around for a comparably short period of time. so we "know" what the weathre patterns have been for less than a hundred years on a global scale and at best we can hazard a guess of what was going on begfore that for the previous 4 billion years :p

frankly, I don't think it's unnatural at all. I mean, we are of nature aren't we? What if things are going exactly how they are supposed to be going? Last I checked I wasn't an alien species or a robot, so whatever we're doing en masse is probably natural on a lot of levels. just a thought.

[lunghushan]

m
frankly, I don't think it's unnatural at all. I mean, we are of nature aren't we? What if things are going exactly how they are supposed to be going? Last I checked I wasn't an alien species or a robot, so whatever we're doing en masse is probably natural on a lot of levels. just a thought.

Somebody at work joked that humanity was just Gaia's means of staving off the killer asteroid ... who knows.

[Li Kao]

How's this for a funny twist? Some reports are now saying that "cattle emissions" aka cow ****s are more responsible for changes in the greenhouse gasses than humans or their cars. There has even been rumblings about imposing a "methane tax" on farmers ...
http://www.canadafreepress.com/2006/cover121106.htm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,12374,905360,00.html
http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a4_176.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/3005740.stm

Has anyone ever seen the Penn & Teller show B.S.? They did an episode on "Environmental Hysteria". While these guys definitely have their own agenda, I thought this was a pretty entertaining watch, even though they focus on the fringe element. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4480559399263937213&q=penn+teller Some might find this episode offensive or smug, but I get a laugh out of some of their gags, like the people signing the petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide (aka water!).

I live in Arizona right now where there are 2 seasons -- hot and warm -- so it's hard for me to judge the weather. Right now, it's warm like it always has been. My parents in Michigan tell me that the winter has been unusually warm, but my brother in Denver is singing a different tune.

Fuzzly, I just put up those links as an example that there are different opinions and ideas about global warming than the views presented in Al Gore's movie. I'm not saying I buy into them or what they present is the ultimate truth. I guess the point I was trying to make is that you have lots and lots of data out there, but depending on who is making the theory and what they are trying to prove can affect how that data is interpreted.

Then again, maybe Maynard is right and we are headed for doomsday -- in that case, I'll be sitting in my patio chair in Arizona with a bag of popcorn watching it all unfold -- make sure all of you California folks swim over and wave (after the entire state becomes one with the Pacific :D )

Some selected lines from Ænema, one of my all-time favorite songs:

Some say the end is near
Some say we'll see armageddon soon
I certainly hope we will
I sure could use a vacation from this
Bullsh it three ring circus sideshow...
I've a suggestion to keep you all occupied
Learn to swim
Mom's gonna fix it all soon
Mom's comin' round to put it back the way it ought to be
Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona bay ;)

[David Jamieson]

Well, the end is nigh. people die every second of everyday of every week of every month of every year.

It's a never ending cycle of "the end".

all this stuff about this or that real, fabricated, actual or fantastical is a mere distraction from the inevitable that we all face.

that is to say, death. The great equalizer. Even this whole planet will die eventually, whether we were ever on it or not. That's how things are.

Isn't it funny how easy we are to stir up with some little "fact" or some other latest outrage.

as long as I can get a hot meal, a cold beer and the occasional blowjob, i really, truly and honestly don't really mind that much about all the strife in teh world.

when it get's to my house, then I'll do what I need to. until then, meh! cheers!

Living in canada I really really really don't care about global warming. Heartless ain't I? Well, if you're a cow eyed idiot who will believe the hype du jour then yes I am. :)

[lunghushan]

Living in canada I really really really don't care about global warming. Heartless ain't I? Well, if you're a cow eyed idiot who will believe the hype du jour then yes I am. :)

Well, what's the worse thing that can happen to a person? They suffer terribly and die.

Well, you'll die whatever happens, so the only question then is will you suffer terribly?

Compare a lifetime of the suffering of an average person to the suffering done by someone dying relatively quickly, say, of starvation, or hunger, and the average person probably has more suffering in a long life, if they are ill, or just various aches and pains of growing old.

So bottom line is global warming, environmental catastrophe -- you're screwed no matter how you look at it anyway, so why worry about it?

[David Jamieson]

exactly.

so Al can go fillibuster himself in a small room. :p

[lunghushan]

exactly.

so Al can go fillibuster himself in a small room. :p

IMHO that's where Al belongs ... can't stand the guy. We need to get some more photogenic politicians. All these crusty old women and stupid old guys are annoying.

We need to get some younger folks in there. I vote for Jessica Simpson. :)

[Radhnoti]

Wow, I agree with DJ.

Re:Re: The articles. Those weren't fringe claims, it was the then prevailing scientific opinion. In some cases the SAME scientists had simply switched the word cooling with warming. There were scientists THEN saying, "That's pretty weak, you're not accounting for all the facts." and there are scientists NOW saying, "That's pretty weak, you're not accounting for all the facts." So...science has been wrong before, and will certainly be wrong again...but we need to take global warming (uh, sorry "climate change") as an absolute certainty. And wallow in the guilt of what we've done to the planet, even though almost everyone agrees that nothing can or will be done about it. Oh, yeah. We also need to spend lots of taxpayers dollars analyzing every little way we MAY be responsible so we can be sure to wring our hands hard enough.
Global warming, in my opinion, is political fearmongering on a global scale. It's, "Do it for the children!" to the nth degree, minus the necessity of those pesky bothersome "results" evil people who want the planet to die ask for just to be mean.
If it WAS humanities fault could we shut down all the U.S. factories? How about India and China? Everyone going to start riding bikes? It's just mental, spiritual and monetary self flagellation.

[golden arhat]

Al would have made a far better president than bush
in fact he should have been president
but the supreme court saw to him
may be info on global warming is varied and unreliable
but id rather have him ruling america than the current fundamentalist nutjobs

[unkokusai]

may be info on global warming is varied and unreliable
but id rather have him ruling america than the current fundamentalist nutjobs



Too bad you've got not one **** thing to say about it! hahahaha

[lunghushan]

Al would have made a far better president than bush
in fact he should have been president
but the supreme court saw to him
may be info on global warming is varied and unreliable
but id rather have him ruling america than the current fundamentalist nutjobs

Presidents don't run the country. The executive branch is supposed to enforce the laws (execute) like a CEO. Congress makes the laws, Supreme Court decides constitutionality -- it's called checks and balances.

The fact that Bush has as much so-called 'power' as he has (and he doesn't really, he's still a figurehead put into power by the people who support him), is just because a lot of people decided to get rid of much of those checks and balances (or basically ignore them).

The people really running the country are committees like the New America foundation and special interests (corporations). They manipulate the public so well through media that the actual public has no say at all.

SO ... Back to my original point, which is who would you rather look at? A bunch of old men and old women? Or get somebody younger in there and more photogenic?

I think we should get some younger and better looking figureheads in there, like Jessica Simpson.

[Fuzzly]

Li Kao, once again those articles don't make much sense. One article says that cows cause more damage than humans, then another says that the main reason cows are harmful (methane) is second to C02.

Some of the claims are really disturbing, one article claims that the amount of methane has been increasing at one percent a year. That doesn't make any sense, because humans have been throwing a lot more (a lot) into the atmosphere for a long period of time and we've raised the % of C02 by a tenth of a percent.


Then another article says that methane levels have been rising, and cow population have "thought" to been rising, and then makes a half-arsed attempt to correlate them.


And like I mentioned above, one of the articles says methane comes second to CO2.


Just because there are other arguments does not mean that all arguments are created equal. I can say that Newton's laws of physics don't apply to anything, and you can say that they do. It's not just about saying something, it's about being able to lend proof to your argument.

[lunghushan]

Li Kao, once again those articles don't make much sense. One article says that cows cause more damage than humans, then another says that the main reason cows are harmful (methane) is second to C02.

Some of the claims are really disturbing, one article claims that the amount of methane has been increasing at one percent a year. That doesn't make any sense, because humans have been throwing a lot more (a lot) into the atmosphere for a long period of time and we've raised the % of C02 by a tenth of a percent.


Then another article says that methane levels have been rising, and cow population have "thought" to been rising, and then makes a half-arsed attempt to correlate them.



It's also interesting when you consider that bison, for example, which would be assumed to have the same digestive tract as cows, roamed the Great Plains in huge numbers. Are there more cows now than there used to be bison?

But seriously, cows produce a LOT of methane. Somebody said upwards of 150 liters a day. If we could only tap cows butts we could probably solve our fuel crisis.

[Li Kao]

Fuzzly, the links I gave were admittedly summary articles of a study done by the Food and Agricultural Organization (http://www.fao.org/UNFAO/about/index_en.html), a branch of the United Nations. There is a summary of their report here http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0612sp1.htm but I would suggest reading the 408pg report to get a baseline idea regarding the potential problems that the worlds nearly 1.5 billion cattle industry could/is potentially causing. The report, titled Livestock's Long Shadow, can be downloaded in its entirely at this link: http://www.virtualcentre.org/en/library/key_pub/longshad/A0701E00.pdf It's a pretty comprehensive write-up, with hundreds of referenced studies and reports done world-wide. The meat of the material regarding climate change is from Section 3, pgs. 102-148, though is addressed in other parts as well. If you're interested in the science behind these studies, look to that report as well as the references given.

Not sure why I'm still posting on this thread -- it's honestly not something I really concern myself with -- I suppose I just like a good discussion and healthy exchange of ideas. I'm certainly not an authority on this subject in the least -- I do have a minor in chemistry and so I understand a bit of the science, but my major and profession is in the medical sector and so I have an entirely different focus. Studying health, wellness, and the human body is my passion. I too want to make the world a better place, but I do it one patient at a time. ;)

[Li Kao]

But seriously, cows produce a LOT of methane. Somebody said upwards of 150 liters a day. If we could only tap cows butts we could probably solve our fuel crisis.

LOL that's a great idea -- I nominate you for that job my friend! :D

[Ford Prefect]

Wow, I agree with DJ.

Re:Re: The articles. Those weren't fringe claims, it was the then prevailing scientific opinion. In some cases the SAME scientists had simply switched the word cooling with warming. There were scientists THEN saying, "That's pretty weak, you're not accounting for all the facts." and there are scientists NOW saying, "That's pretty weak, you're not accounting for all the facts." So...science has been wrong before, and will certainly be wrong again...but we need to take global warming (uh, sorry "climate change") as an absolute certainty. And wallow in the guilt of what we've done to the planet, even though almost everyone agrees that nothing can or will be done about it. Oh, yeah. We also need to spend lots of taxpayers dollars analyzing every little way we MAY be responsible so we can be sure to wring our hands hard enough.
Global warming, in my opinion, is political fearmongering on a global scale. It's, "Do it for the children!" to the nth degree, minus the necessity of those pesky bothersome "results" evil people who want the planet to die ask for just to be mean.
If it WAS humanities fault could we shut down all the U.S. factories? How about India and China? Everyone going to start riding bikes? It's just mental, spiritual and monetary self flagellation.

Sorry. You couldn't be more wrong. The global scientific consensus was "Gee. Looking at temperature records for the last 10 years, it looks like the earth is cooling." It was only a fringe element screaming about a new ice age, which the alarmist media bites on to get circulation. Scarey sells in the media. Truth sells in science. This is similar to the article you cited from 1994 about a new Ice Age. This was because following the 2 hottest years on record up to that point (1990 & 91) the temperature dropped about 0.3 C for the 1992 & 93. Now, non-fringe elements looked and saw similar behavior after other peaks. '80&81 then a 0.3C drop in '82 and back up in '83 only to drop again until '87... They looked at this along with other factors (green house gasses) and said, well the earth is still warming, this drop off is temporary until another spike in a couple years. However, fringe elements looked at 92 & 93 and declared the earth was cooling and headed toward an ice age. The media grabbed onto this fringe element which held a minuscule sway in prevailing scientific thought and then published a story about it.

Again, you offer little in the way of proof. Actually nothing in the way of proof... You only offer conjecture and conclusions based on what the media has published in the past as opposed to what science was saying at that time. The way science works is that data is gathered and then analyzed. Science then draws a conclusion that all the data is pointing to. When more and more data supports that conclusion, then the theory is adopted. That is until a peice of evidence comes along that doesn't fit into that theory. Then it is either modified or thrown out completely depending on exactly what that evidence is. As of now, ALL evidence is pointing to the earth being in a natural warming cycle but man accelerating that warming and pushing that warmer further than would occur naturally. All new evidence coming in FOR YEARS supports this.

But hey, let's just ignore it and hope we don't cause massive global problems. :/ Let's just ignore science all together since it's obviously tainted. The theories that supported the creation of the internal combustion engine, irrigation systems, rail ways, bridges, jets, computers, etc... Those were all "just theories" and could change. Why did anybody pay any attention to them? Silly scientists are so corrupt...

[Ray Pina]

were all gonna die too, but using that logic to justify smoking and snorting all of cuba's coke isn't exactly the wisest approach.

im not saying that's where you were goin with that, but i thought it was worth mentioning.


We're all going to die:

You can spend 40 years going to work and paying off a morgage

You can snort coke and live fast and die from OD or an accident

You can take the middle road, live simply, party here and there

You can do a lot of things.

Personally, I feel climate change is inevidable with all this industry. We did it. Now we're going to tell China they can't? While we still do it?

Money rules the world now and how many americans are going to get rid of their cars and take the bus to work? How many are willing to give up their TVs and easy access to food. We are a spoiled lot and there's no going back now. Industry produces and creates a need.

How many people NEED these HUGE TVS? They made them. Only the rich could afford them but that made others want them. More people made HUGE TVs, supply went up, prices came down. Now many people own something they didn't need. This goes for cell phones, iPOds, etc., etc., etc.

I don't blame people. They were born into this and are constantly bombarded with images telling them they need more things otherwise they are lacking.

I don't blame producers for producing and promoting.

What I don't like is when people don't take responsibility for their choices.

[Radhnoti]

Ford - "The way science works is that data is gathered and then analyzed. Science then draws a conclusion that all the data is pointing to. When more and more data supports that conclusion, then the theory is adopted. That is until a peice of evidence comes along that doesn't fit into that theory. Then it is either modified or thrown out completely depending on exactly what that evidence is."


Ok. My evidence is a Viking civilization in Greenland (not just farms, there were churches, etc.) until around 1400. That means it WAS warmer, then got colder and it had nothing to do with modern civilization. My hypothesis to fit this ignored (in certain circles) set of facts is that the Earth's temperature has fluctuated in the past and will continue to do so in the present and future. This may be (as in the case of Mars, which is why I posted that article) primarily due to the amount of energy currently being released by our Sun.

[Ford Prefect]

Ford - "The way science works is that data is gathered and then analyzed. Science then draws a conclusion that all the data is pointing to. When more and more data supports that conclusion, then the theory is adopted. That is until a peice of evidence comes along that doesn't fit into that theory. Then it is either modified or thrown out completely depending on exactly what that evidence is."


Ok. My evidence is a Viking civilization in Greenland (not just farms, there were churches, etc.) until around 1400. That means it WAS warmer, then got colder and it had nothing to do with modern civilization. My hypothesis to fit this ignored (in certain circles) set of facts is that the Earth's temperature has fluctuated in the past and will continue to do so in the present and future. This may be (as in the case of Mars, which is why I posted that article) primarily due to the amount of energy currently being released by our Sun.

If that is your evidence, then it is blatantly obvious you haven't the slightest clue about what science is saying about global warming and the risks man is posing toward his environement by adding to it.

1) ALL SCIENTISTS CONCUR that we are in a NATURAL warming trend. Wow! So like Oh my god. It like has nothing to do with civilization. That is like so weird. I'm sure that the hypothesis of "the earth's temperature has fluctuated in the past and will continue to do so in the present and future" is ignored in some circles. (ie people who have no clue about climatology and paleo-climate models) I think it is suffice to say that is blatantly obvious that temperatures do fluctuate naturally. It is also a bit obvious that the earth may warm naturally coming out of a period dubbed "The Little Ice Age".

2) The warming of Greenland was definately a naturally occuring event. 2 things to consider are: (a) Even it being naturally, such a warming would play disaster with current civilizations due to obvious reasons (b) that period is referred to as the "Medieval Warm Period" and has recently been called into question as to whether the global mean temperature actually rose very much during that period. It is now believed that it (and even the Little Ice Age) were more local changes (Northern Hemisphere) than global.

3) Solar variation and even orbittal variation are being accounted for Global Warming models. Even such solar variation enthusiasts and EXPERTS like Sami Solanki (the director of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany) believe that in the past 60 years solar variance is at an all time high and its effect cannot be disentangled from man-caused greenhouse gasses. Even he admits in peer-reviewed study on solar radiation's effect on Earth's climate that, "Just how large this role [of solar variation] is, must still be investigated, since, according to our latest knowledge on the variations of the solar magnetic field, the significant increase in the Earth’s temperature since 1980 is indeed to be ascribed to the greenhouse effect caused by carbon dioxide." (ie the past 20 years --more on them later--- are obviously due to man's activity) Here is the headline of the press release from his institute (2004): Studies at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research reveal: solar activity affects the climate but plays only a minor role in the current global warming

Basically, other than the fringe groups who claim that solar variances account for a large part of the current climate change and whose arguments are summarily torn to shreds when under peer-review, the most radical view that any kind of scientific backing is that solar variance played a bigger role for the first half of last century, but man-made greenhouse gasses are what caused the bulk of warming in the second half.

3) About those 20 years... They have seen the fastest temperature rise ever seen (even from ice core records). This is no coincidence that greenhouse gasses are now also at 10,000 year highs and approaching the high for the last 1,000,000 years...

Seriously guy. At least educate yourself before taking such an adamant stance on an issue. Not accounting for local variations during the Little Ice Age, Medieval Warming Period, and the fact that all climate scientists in the world believe the climate shifts naturally is a pretty ignorant argument.

[Radhnoti]

OK. Let's assume I'm undereducated. Looking at your post, you seem to be agreeing with most my points? I'll try to summarize:

1. We are in a natural warming trend, and historically temperatures have wildly fluctuated.

OK, but you're unwilling to acknowledge the possibility that man might have very little to do with the currect trend? Even while admitting that similar trends have happened?

2. Greenland happened.

But you explain it away as a localized event.

3. Solar variation happens.

But you indicate that it has little to do with Earth's warming...yet while quoting your expert he says, "Just how large this role [of solar variation] is, must still be investigated..."? Doesn't the title of the article fly in the face of this quotation? He admits it's an unknown, unless I'm mis-reading?

Your final point is the one of greatest interest to me. But you point to A. Greenhouse gas, then B. Rising temps and draw an equal sign. The actual formula is unknown, primarily because it is so complex. Solar variation, the Earth's position in our galaxy, the carbonate-silicate cycle... and there are LOTS of respected scientists (and politicians) who feel the issue is being overdone:
http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=264777

In fact, here's quotes reported in Free Republic that I think reinforces my position:

"What we've got to do in energy conservation is try to ride the global warming issue. Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, to have approached global warming as if it is real means energy conservation, so we will be doing the right thing anyway in terms of economic policy and environmental policy."
-- Timothy Wirth, former U.S. Senator (D-Colorado)

"On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but - which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we'd like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change. To do that we need to get some broadbased support, to capture the public's imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This 'double ethical bind' we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both." (Steven Schneider, Quoted in Discover, pp. 45-48, Oct. 1989; see also (Dixy Lee Ray in 'Trashing the Planet', 1990) and (American Physical Society, APS News August/September 1996).

"Scientists who want to attract attention to themselves, who want to attract great funding to themselves, have to (find a) way to scare the public . . . and this you can achieve only by making things bigger and more dangerous than they really are." (Petr Chylek, Professor of Physics and Atmospheric Science, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, commenting on reports that Greenland's glaciers are melting. Halifax Chronicle-Herald, August 22, 2001)

"A global climate treaty must be implemented even if there is no scientific evidence to back the [enhanced] greenhouse effect"
(Richard Benedict, US Conservation Foundation)

"We have wished, we ecofreaks, for a disaster or for a social change to come and bomb us into Stone Age, where we might live like Indians in our valley, with our localism, our appropriate technology, our gardens, our homemade religion -- guilt-free at last!"
-- Stewart Brand (writing in the Whole Earth Catalogue)"


OK, that last one was probably even "fringe" to Al Gore. But, hopefully, you see my point. There's a REASON to distrust this movement.

[lunghushan]

Ok. My evidence is a Viking civilization in Greenland (not just farms, there were churches, etc.) until around 1400. That means it WAS warmer, then got colder and it had nothing to do with modern civilization.

Yep, Greenland used to be Green. Finland actually means Vineland or something like that, and they grew grapes there and in England, until it got too COLD for that.

[Radhnoti]

Right, lunghushan. It got hot and cold without factories, cars, etc. I'm not saying those things may not be adding to the process, just that we have no idea to what extent and that nothing would change even if it turned out to be the major factor.

[Ford Prefect]

OK. Let's assume I'm undereducated. Looking at your post, you seem to be agreeing with most my points? I'll try to summarize:

1. We are in a natural warming trend, and historically temperatures have wildly fluctuated.

OK, but you're unwilling to acknowledge the possibility that man might have very little to do with the currect trend? Even while admitting that similar trends have happened?

The earth is in a natural warming trend. Based on scientific data concerning green house gas levels and their effects on climate, man is significantly impacting this current trend by making it both hotter as well as the speed in which the warming is taking effect.

This is all explained ad naseum by global warming reports released by various scientific bodies the world around. You may want to actually learn a little about it before dismissing it.


2. Greenland happened.

But you explain it away as a localized event.

I don't explain it away as anything. It was likely a localized event, but even so it is a moot point. The earth has been warmer in the past... The effects of which wouldn't bode well for current human society. If I have to explain this I will, but it will speak volumes about your understanding of the issue.


3. Solar variation happens.

But you indicate that it has little to do with Earth's warming...yet while quoting your expert he says, "Just how large this role [of solar variation] is, must still be investigated..."? Doesn't the title of the article fly in the face of this quotation? He admits it's an unknown, unless I'm mis-reading?

You are reading it poorly. The exact extent of solar variation effect is still unknown, however it is known the extent of greenhouse gas warming which is proven to be the impetus for the bulk of the warming in the past 20 years.


Your final point is the one of greatest interest to me. But you point to A. Greenhouse gas, then B. Rising temps and draw an equal sign. The actual formula is unknown, primarily because it is so complex. Solar variation, the Earth's position in our galaxy, the carbonate-silicate cycle... and there are LOTS of respected scientists (and politicians) who feel the issue is being overdone:
http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=264777

The fact remains that the vastly overwhelming majority of climate scientists believe there is a major issue here. Einstein is considered a prominent scientist, yes? Yet he fought tooth and nail against Quantum physics... The vast majority of the scientific community saw it as folly on his part and he was roundly beaten in debates as global warming skeptics are. Appeals to authority are falacious for a reason...

As for your silly point, greenhouse gasses have been shown to cause warming. They have largely been the impetus for climate change in the past, but of course they were naturally occuring then.

[golden arhat]

right simple as this
CO2 - green house gas eg make world warmer
trees take this and produce oxygen which is then balanced by animals
cars produce CO2
less trees and more animals and cars means more CO2 therefore world gets warmer
FACT!!
now weither or not this is occuring now is un questionable
it is
how much its happening is questionable
and the fact remains that even if global warming happens next year or 100 years from now

we still need to do something about it

the earth might be in a warming trend hell it might not

but eventually global warming will occur and we need to deal with that

[Yao Sing]

Why is it that RF emmissions doesn't figure in to the warming trend?

Not enough energy put out by radio, tv, cell phones, etc?