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Global Warming
Leaving greenhouse gases out of the equation, would the general human industrialisation be significant enough to have any effect on global temperatures - 7 billion people, countless animals, a billion cars, houses etc all generating heat. Be a bit like heating a swimming pool with a candle but would if have any discernible impact?
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Global warming seems to be much like a hurricane.
Meteorologists can measure the force of a hurricane and chart its possible course with reasonable accuracy—much to the benefit of those in its path. But all the scientists, politicians, and business leaders in the world cannot stop a hurricane. It seems that the same may be true of global warming. This calls to mind the words found in the Bible at Jeremiah 10:23.
Meteorologists can measure the force of a hurricane and chart its possible course with reasonable accuracy—much to the benefit of those in its path. But all the scientists, politicians, and business leaders in the world cannot stop a hurricane. It seems that the same may be true of global warming. This calls to mind the words found in the Bible at Jeremiah 10:23.
"nd why has it not happened before now when all the industrial world was belching smoke out,when every household had coal fires,now the world is a far cleaner place we have "global warming"."
-Because it is a cumulative effect one whose influence spans decades and more and increases with time. Why is this so hard to understand? And if you think that the carbon output from the wests age of industrial revolution exceeded the carbon output of today, with all of the contributions from the developing worlds and the developed world itself, you are seriously mistaken.
"In the last few weeks global warming has been disproved,the arctic ice cap is bigger now than it has been for years,the antarctic ice cap is losing ice on one side but expanding twice as fast on its other side."
It absolutely has not been disproved. Sheesh!. You are offering a transient one-off increase in the artic ice cap when compared to the record low of last year as some sort of evidence of a cooling trend?!! Thats not how it works.
http://
And the suggestion about antarctic ice does not stand up to scrutiny either.
http://
"This argument can go on forever,but if you look through the ages it is a natural phenomena."
Let me ask you this, Razza. Do you think the scientists that contribute to the IPCC, the thousands of meterologists, climateologists etc from around the globe somehow overlooked the natural forcings of the climate? And despite what one might think, climate is not inherently cyclical, naturally oscillating between ice age and warmer times.
Saying "its just nature", imputing that this revelation might be some kind of global facepalm moment, that all the worlds scientists are now looking sheepishly at each other saying "gee guys, how did we miss that?" The natural cyclical variations and long term trends are already factored in to the various models of climate change.
http://
"Apparently each government have been asked to sweep under the carpet the climbdown re global warming.We are being conned out of thousands of pounds because of it."
- And your evidence for this assertion is?
"When all aircraft were grounded in America following 9/11 the mean temperature actually rose 2 degrees and didnt fall back till flights resumed."
- And again, the evidence for this is- where, exactly? And how are correlating the 2? You are aware that global warming is a long-term, decadal, GLOBAL phenomenon rather than some transient isolate event, right?
You are perfectly within your rights to question global warming and climate change. There is some uncertainty within the system, some rather large error bars, and there may well be some natural cycles within the climate we are not yet unfamiliar with. But you need evidence to support these observations, not just superficial observations about transient events extrapolated to explain a global phenomenon.
-Because it is a cumulative effect one whose influence spans decades and more and increases with time. Why is this so hard to understand? And if you think that the carbon output from the wests age of industrial revolution exceeded the carbon output of today, with all of the contributions from the developing worlds and the developed world itself, you are seriously mistaken.
"In the last few weeks global warming has been disproved,the arctic ice cap is bigger now than it has been for years,the antarctic ice cap is losing ice on one side but expanding twice as fast on its other side."
It absolutely has not been disproved. Sheesh!. You are offering a transient one-off increase in the artic ice cap when compared to the record low of last year as some sort of evidence of a cooling trend?!! Thats not how it works.
http://
And the suggestion about antarctic ice does not stand up to scrutiny either.
http://
"This argument can go on forever,but if you look through the ages it is a natural phenomena."
Let me ask you this, Razza. Do you think the scientists that contribute to the IPCC, the thousands of meterologists, climateologists etc from around the globe somehow overlooked the natural forcings of the climate? And despite what one might think, climate is not inherently cyclical, naturally oscillating between ice age and warmer times.
Saying "its just nature", imputing that this revelation might be some kind of global facepalm moment, that all the worlds scientists are now looking sheepishly at each other saying "gee guys, how did we miss that?" The natural cyclical variations and long term trends are already factored in to the various models of climate change.
http://
"Apparently each government have been asked to sweep under the carpet the climbdown re global warming.We are being conned out of thousands of pounds because of it."
- And your evidence for this assertion is?
"When all aircraft were grounded in America following 9/11 the mean temperature actually rose 2 degrees and didnt fall back till flights resumed."
- And again, the evidence for this is- where, exactly? And how are correlating the 2? You are aware that global warming is a long-term, decadal, GLOBAL phenomenon rather than some transient isolate event, right?
You are perfectly within your rights to question global warming and climate change. There is some uncertainty within the system, some rather large error bars, and there may well be some natural cycles within the climate we are not yet unfamiliar with. But you need evidence to support these observations, not just superficial observations about transient events extrapolated to explain a global phenomenon.
Possibly the salient point behind this type of research is to make us aware that we may unwittingly initiate natural processes which may lead to an irreversible short term change in the worlds climate.
Unfortunately, in the history of the planet, the human race is a short term phenomenon and this change in the environment may be enough to deliver us the coup de grace.
Unfortunately, in the history of the planet, the human race is a short term phenomenon and this change in the environment may be enough to deliver us the coup de grace.
@bluemoon
"10'000 years ago the whole of Northern Britain was covered in ice, then it started to melt.
But there were no scientists then to explain why it did.
So why did it?"
Have a read of this recent article, from the Scientific American;
http://
"10'000 years ago the whole of Northern Britain was covered in ice, then it started to melt.
But there were no scientists then to explain why it did.
So why did it?"
Have a read of this recent article, from the Scientific American;
http://
@Vulcan "Was it the same scientists who called it global warming, found it wasn't happening then decided to call it climate change?If they can't even get the name right, what else have they got wrong?"
Where is your evidence that scientists "found that it (global warming) wasn't happening? Which Scientists?
Where is your evidence that scientists "found that it (global warming) wasn't happening? Which Scientists?
It was indeed the same scientists who called it global warming, found it was happening then decided to call it climate change because foolish folk couldn't understand the consequences when they heard the name/description. They have to get something wrong first before they can get something else wrong. Ruling out the worst case predicitions doesn't count.
If we have global warming why was it cold the other day ? If we have global warming why did I need a scarf last December ? If we have global warming how come it's raining here ? If we have global warming how come I still need my cetral heating ? If we have global warming why is some parts of the world likely to be cooler/wetter ? If we have glob...... etc. etc. etc.
Of course the same folk now ask questions regarding weather rather than climate anyway. IMO should have stuck to the first description.
Of course the same folk now ask questions regarding weather rather than climate anyway. IMO should have stuck to the first description.
I'd like to enter this debate , however what i know about global warming you can write it on the opposite end to a pin head .
You have people like Nigel lawson arguing agianst it and given his profile , the voices of the sceptics appears to have been very audible recently .
Does anyone know what he bases his denial on - what are his arguements against ?
You have people like Nigel lawson arguing agianst it and given his profile , the voices of the sceptics appears to have been very audible recently .
Does anyone know what he bases his denial on - what are his arguements against ?
If global warming was happening why the name change.
These things don't get official names - for example Fred Hoyle coined the phrase 'big bang' as a sarcastic term of abuse - it stuck.
in this case Global warming came from a paper entitled:
“Climate Change: Are we on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?”
http://
Climate change is a better name because Global warming mistakenly gives the idea that every part of the globe will heat up
In the long term if things are left unaddressed that would happen but in the meantime some areas may get colder and wetter.
More heat means more water in the atmosphere means more rain
The UK could get colder and wetter from global warming
Individual effects on small areas of the globe are notoriously difficult to predict accurately
These things don't get official names - for example Fred Hoyle coined the phrase 'big bang' as a sarcastic term of abuse - it stuck.
in this case Global warming came from a paper entitled:
“Climate Change: Are we on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?”
http://
Climate change is a better name because Global warming mistakenly gives the idea that every part of the globe will heat up
In the long term if things are left unaddressed that would happen but in the meantime some areas may get colder and wetter.
More heat means more water in the atmosphere means more rain
The UK could get colder and wetter from global warming
Individual effects on small areas of the globe are notoriously difficult to predict accurately
@ Vulcan - There is no "name change", really. Read O_Gs answer. For many people, global warming as a phrase conjures up all places in the globe all getting nice and sunny all at once, which is not the likely outcome - rather that global warming will induce quite significant climate change to the patterns that people have become accustomed to.
But using one phrase to describe what is happening does not preclude or invalidate the other.
@bluemoon "So they don't know" They have a pretty good idea though. Are you only going to believe evidence and theories if they have been personally witnessed?
@Jim We have kind of cross-posted, sorry about that. I swear that when I composed my response to Razza, your post was not there :)
But using one phrase to describe what is happening does not preclude or invalidate the other.
@bluemoon "So they don't know" They have a pretty good idea though. Are you only going to believe evidence and theories if they have been personally witnessed?
@Jim We have kind of cross-posted, sorry about that. I swear that when I composed my response to Razza, your post was not there :)
I wouldn't worry about ti too much, LG -- nice to have two people agree with each other.
Re the natural cycles argument: consider the following very simple model for climate fluctuations given by something that schematically looks like T = sin(t) + a*t, where t is time, T is temperature and a is some constant that captures the influence of human activity on temperature. The sin(t) then reflects a natural cycle of temperature changes over time, while a*t, the human bit, is an increasing and cumulative effect making temperature warmer over time. However, add the two together and you something that oscillates slowly, but whose maximum and minimum temperature rises as time passes. However there are also periods where the temperature falls rapidly. Those periods in no way disprove, though, the fact that a human effect has led to the natural cycle being disrupted, or lifted over time. What you instead get is that the extremes of temperature have changed. To measure the human impact and its scale you have to compare the temperature at its peak from what the temperature was at the last peak, and see if they are different. Ideally you need to do this over several cycles, to ensure that there is more than just some sort of fluctuation going on.
The model above (that is, T = sin(t) + a*t ) is far too simplistic to describe Climate change, of course, but captures many of the important features: in particular that it is possible for humans to be still contributing to "global warming" even as the temperature is going down. It shouldn't be too surprising that Scientists have developed far more sophisticated models to describe what is going on, and while they inevitably will carry error bars the overall message is clear: the underlying natural cycles that govern the World's temperature have been heavily disrupted, and on a scale that is only explicable as a result of increased human activity.
Again, why should this be so unreasonable? Consider the various sources of control of natural temperature and greenhouse gas emissions: trees and plant life, that capture and use CO2 for photosynthesis and so act as a sink for that gas -- but we are cutting trees down at an incredible rate, and so reducing the size of that sink. Fossil fuels, that locked up massive amounts of CO2 and Methane and other greenhouse gases, and stored them safely out of the way -- but we are burning them and releasing those stores back into the atmosphere. Almost every environmental regulator of the carbon Cycle you could care to name has been disrupted to some extent by human activity. And that's before we even take into account pumping the gas in.
To say that "global warming has been disproved" is, frankly, a ridiculous assertion, that flies in the face of all the evidence. Even most sceptics accept that the world is heating up, after all -- their gripe is who or what is causing it, not that it is happening. And as the UN report released today shows, the consensus that Humans are responsible is becoming ever harder to argue against.
Re the natural cycles argument: consider the following very simple model for climate fluctuations given by something that schematically looks like T = sin(t) + a*t, where t is time, T is temperature and a is some constant that captures the influence of human activity on temperature. The sin(t) then reflects a natural cycle of temperature changes over time, while a*t, the human bit, is an increasing and cumulative effect making temperature warmer over time. However, add the two together and you something that oscillates slowly, but whose maximum and minimum temperature rises as time passes. However there are also periods where the temperature falls rapidly. Those periods in no way disprove, though, the fact that a human effect has led to the natural cycle being disrupted, or lifted over time. What you instead get is that the extremes of temperature have changed. To measure the human impact and its scale you have to compare the temperature at its peak from what the temperature was at the last peak, and see if they are different. Ideally you need to do this over several cycles, to ensure that there is more than just some sort of fluctuation going on.
The model above (that is, T = sin(t) + a*t ) is far too simplistic to describe Climate change, of course, but captures many of the important features: in particular that it is possible for humans to be still contributing to "global warming" even as the temperature is going down. It shouldn't be too surprising that Scientists have developed far more sophisticated models to describe what is going on, and while they inevitably will carry error bars the overall message is clear: the underlying natural cycles that govern the World's temperature have been heavily disrupted, and on a scale that is only explicable as a result of increased human activity.
Again, why should this be so unreasonable? Consider the various sources of control of natural temperature and greenhouse gas emissions: trees and plant life, that capture and use CO2 for photosynthesis and so act as a sink for that gas -- but we are cutting trees down at an incredible rate, and so reducing the size of that sink. Fossil fuels, that locked up massive amounts of CO2 and Methane and other greenhouse gases, and stored them safely out of the way -- but we are burning them and releasing those stores back into the atmosphere. Almost every environmental regulator of the carbon Cycle you could care to name has been disrupted to some extent by human activity. And that's before we even take into account pumping the gas in.
To say that "global warming has been disproved" is, frankly, a ridiculous assertion, that flies in the face of all the evidence. Even most sceptics accept that the world is heating up, after all -- their gripe is who or what is causing it, not that it is happening. And as the UN report released today shows, the consensus that Humans are responsible is becoming ever harder to argue against.
Plain and simple this is.....Global warming and cooling has always gone on.
Ice Ages, warming, Ice Ages, warming, mini-ice ages, warming, arrest from a medium-large volcano that cooled the world.....so on. Read Danziger 1215 and Britain was 3C warmer than now, red wine grown as far north as Bedford, Britain a wine and mead based drink society, then by Henry VIII, the mini-iceage and Britain grain-based drink society. Impacts, major (and I mean major volcanoes, angles of the earth to the sun, sun activity, etc, a combination of factors, sea contraction, expansion relating to ice formation/detrition.....so on.
This I fundamentally believe in and nowt has changed - it's ongoing.
Then one adds on human activity, not only 17th to 21st C activities but as far back as Roman times, after all they destroyed the forests of the Libyan Atlas mountains and allowed the sand into the coastal plains, the Roman bread basket as it was known..... The issue is just how much our impact has been on top of the activities of continuing Global Climate Change I refer to above - and that dividing line is what scientists find hard to define.
What does this mean for me as an ex glaciologist and someone who leans towards Humboldtian Determinism from a geological/geographical philospohical perspective, simple - I do not condone the belching of gases into the environment, the destruction of our seas and forests, the chewing up of our land resources (see the HS2 argument yesterday), but I do want to see the arguments put into perspective as to what is man-made and what is 'natural' - and that ain't easy to do - for any scientist. The pronunciation that the sea will be 82cm higher by 2100 is, frankly, speculation and complete poppycock, the forecast on temperature, balderdash - there are just as equal and meritous arguments that there will be very little increase as we are on a slippery underlying slope (wit the last decade), again the issue being how much is change tied down to man's activities.
More science is needed on this one, more action on understanding and conservation is needed, sure, but let's get the full perspective out - on both sides and then maybe consensus can rule. Then, we may have it all wrong - for example, the impact of a polar reversal........
Ice Ages, warming, Ice Ages, warming, mini-ice ages, warming, arrest from a medium-large volcano that cooled the world.....so on. Read Danziger 1215 and Britain was 3C warmer than now, red wine grown as far north as Bedford, Britain a wine and mead based drink society, then by Henry VIII, the mini-iceage and Britain grain-based drink society. Impacts, major (and I mean major volcanoes, angles of the earth to the sun, sun activity, etc, a combination of factors, sea contraction, expansion relating to ice formation/detrition.....so on.
This I fundamentally believe in and nowt has changed - it's ongoing.
Then one adds on human activity, not only 17th to 21st C activities but as far back as Roman times, after all they destroyed the forests of the Libyan Atlas mountains and allowed the sand into the coastal plains, the Roman bread basket as it was known..... The issue is just how much our impact has been on top of the activities of continuing Global Climate Change I refer to above - and that dividing line is what scientists find hard to define.
What does this mean for me as an ex glaciologist and someone who leans towards Humboldtian Determinism from a geological/geographical philospohical perspective, simple - I do not condone the belching of gases into the environment, the destruction of our seas and forests, the chewing up of our land resources (see the HS2 argument yesterday), but I do want to see the arguments put into perspective as to what is man-made and what is 'natural' - and that ain't easy to do - for any scientist. The pronunciation that the sea will be 82cm higher by 2100 is, frankly, speculation and complete poppycock, the forecast on temperature, balderdash - there are just as equal and meritous arguments that there will be very little increase as we are on a slippery underlying slope (wit the last decade), again the issue being how much is change tied down to man's activities.
More science is needed on this one, more action on understanding and conservation is needed, sure, but let's get the full perspective out - on both sides and then maybe consensus can rule. Then, we may have it all wrong - for example, the impact of a polar reversal........
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