Climate Change in Svalbard

[Barquentine]

I once knew someone who had been a few times to Svalbard wih the BSES. I thought she told me it was snow all year round but on the news they showed a BSES fire camped on rubble with no snow in sight. Does anyone happen to know if it's always been like that this time of year or has global warming really removed that much snow for part of the year?

[factor-fiction]

Greenpeace have used Svalbard as an example of the effects of global warming.
http://www.svalbard-i.../global-warming-e.php

I am sceptical I'm afraid about 'global warming' but I realise that the 'global warming' bandwagon seems to be showing no signs of slowing down so maybe I'm in the minority now.

[New Judge]

No you’re not, factor.

There is a growing movement of heresy beginning to rear its head suggesting that, whatever may or may not be happening to the climate, it is not due to man’s activities. R1Geezer and I are founder members:

http://www.theanswerb.../Question1034853.html

http://www.theanswerb.../Question1037095.html

You’re very welcome to join us.

[heathfield]

Heresy? Shurely you mean realism, m'lud?

[emmie]

whatever is causing it, surely will impact on the wildlife, as we have seen recently with the polar bear that killed a young boy. One of the reasons given by presenters such as David Attenborough is that the ice is melting to such an extent, which means they are having to go further to look for food, where once they may have been scared off from encroaching on man, now it would seem with their own food sources being threatened, they are looking for other sources. Perhaps watch Bruce Parry's programmes, they have been very informative, he doesn't have an axe to grind, and doesn't belong to any eco group, but even he said man's deforestation of the Amazon is having a major impact on wildlife, and the balance in nature as a whole.

[beso]

Both the links provided by New Judge contain a plethora of untruths and profound misunderstandings of the the factors involved in climate change.

Unfortunately the "debate" is now driven largely by "armchair scientists" like many on this site who really have no clue about the subject.

People in general have little concept of the extent of enormous fire now burning continuously on this planet and comparisons with other sources of CO2.

Have a look at some of the denialist arguments debunked on this site.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/

[beso]

A common denialist myth is a comparison between volcanic sources of CO2 and human activity. We often hear that a single eruption of one volcano in Iceland has released more CO2 than humans have in 50 years. It is repeated without regard for its source or veracity.

In fact the claim is complete rubbish and the fact that so many are sucked in by it reflects the ignorance of the vast dimensions of the orgy of combustion indulged in by humanity.

The total average release of CO2 by volcanos is estimated as being one percent of human activity.

[jezter]

Armchair climate scientists...definitely a lot of them around, particularly since it suits this type of amateur to feel they don’t have to feel guilty for not make a change to their lazy, sedentary gas guzzling live style. And as a bonus they get to feel like that they are somehow unearthing a conspiracy, like they are Galileo of the 21st century. Well I got news for you boys, what ever untruth you use to base your fantasy on, what ever twisted evidence you purport as fact, what ever that is, it’s a lie. Now listen to some actual science, deduced by several independent actual scientists and endorsed by the IPCC – CO2 used to follow temp change. Now it leads it. This is unprecedented. And get this, the quantity of CO2 is associated to human activity…volcanic activity has in the past effected change, but not evident today. Solar cycles do not provide presently sufficient energy to create the temperature change either. Act on the weight of information, and if you still in disbelief (like a flat earther) act on the side of precaution. If the mass of proof is wrong then hey, we just made the human race more efficient and less reliant on fossil fuels. But if it’s right then you are dead, your kids are dead, everyone is dead Dave. Now if you want to argue with me please base your verse on fact and not hearsay, I will give you more respect for it. Thanks.

[askyourgran]

That is an interesting theory em10. I have no idea of how global warming became evident I'm not scientifically minded, however the idea of the vast areas of deforestation has made me wonder about the balance of nature. I had the idea that forests or large areas of woodland were somehow linked to clearing the air of Carbon Dixoide and other gases of some description. Whether this has anything to do with the scientific evidence of it.

[beso]

Jezter: You will notice how denialists rarely post back after the thread is contributed to by someone who actually knows the science. They prefer to go elsewhere and post the lies because it get them more mileage.

In my experience, even if a denialist engages in the debate they do not waver from their irrational assertions even when the error in their logic is explicitly pointed out to them.

Unfortunately the denialists have also clouded the debate by pretending the science isn't settled in favour of AGW being a fact which leads genuinely open minded people to the wrong conclusion especially when the fossil fuel lobby chimes in with their myths about alternative sources of energy not having the potential to be viable technologies.

In my experience they exhibit many of the traits associated with young earth creationists such as accusing those who support the science of subscribing to a religion and collusion between scientist to falsify data.

[mike11111]

If everything we bought was delivered by horse and cart we'd be knee-deep in sh!t by now. Mind you, the rhubarb would be out of this world.