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#1 2017-03-03 10:03:27

Oldfart1939
Member
Registered: 2016-11-26
Posts: 2,429

When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

There have been comments on several other threads as to whether NASA should maintain a role in Earth Science observations, based on the premise that they need to keep monitoring "Global Warming," which has subsequently been morphed into "Climate Change." Over the past 8 years, we've heard a drumbeat of steady propaganda emanating from the White House, the EPA, NOAA, and yes, NASA about the "danger to mankind" from Human Induced Climate Change.

Before I launch into my statements and observations, let me toss out a few qualifiers about my background. In addition to being a retired Ph.D. Physical Chemist and Biochemist, I've had a lifelong hobby and deep interest in Astronomy; in fact it was my first choice for a career, but I wasn't able to pursue that dream. I also am something of a amateur archaeologist and have attended several programs involving working on various "digs' in the American Desert Southwest.

As my astronomy background calls out for me to point out a MAJOR flaw in all the hysterical climate change and Global Warming fantasies: The Sun is a LONG TERM VARIABLE STAR. The solar output isn't constant as embedded in the computer models that the climate change promoters point to. The cycle is approximately 900-950 years maximum to maximum. This is generally reflected in sunspot numbers which have now been recorded for ~ 400 years. Beginning in the early 1600's the sunspots have been observed telescopically and accurate data is available. The absolute sunspot low was recorded in the 1670's, a period which is called the Maunder Minimum. The rivers in Europe remained frozen even into the Summers, and this was commented upon by no less than Sir Isaac Newton. Fast forward to the 1990's. Sunspots were at a record high in numbers, but since 2000, have been declining rapidly, along with the un-doctored Global Temperature readings. However, due to a Political Agenda, scientists have been pressured to make the data fit with this agenda. Scientists at NOAA have been "caught faking data," recently. The University of East Anglia was caught and admonished for faking climate data. How can scientists be pressured to do things like this? Grant funding. Data the "powers that be" don't like? No grant renewals. At NASA, there are also scientists whose jobs depend on satellite observation of icepack, etc. and they sure do like remaining employed; ergo, "melting polar caps." "Melting Glaciers."

Archaeological evidence: Back in 2005, my late wife and I went to a place called "Crow Canyon Archaeological Center," and participated in an excavation of Goodman Point Pueblo near Mesa Verde, and as part of the program went through substantial laboratory training.
What jumped out at me immediately when learning about the science of dendrochronology (tree ring interpretation) was the fact that it gives an unbroken record of climate data extending back to ~ 850 AD, since the national Park has structures that old and there's a complete record of overlapping sample covering the period. The solar sunspot maximum in ~ 1100-1150 AD is mirrored by extremely small growth of trees and low rainfall in that period, reflecting near drought conditions. The Maunder minimum was also reflected by good tree ring data.   

So--my "take" on the hypothesis of "Global Warming," or "Climate Change," is yes, there are these observables, but aren't "brought about by human activity." They are natural phenomena independent of humans.

QED.

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#2 2017-03-03 10:43:44

Tom Kalbfus
Banned
Registered: 2006-08-16
Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Yes, I agree, Global Climate Change produced by humans is a political "Chicken Little" designed to produce immediate action from a panicked populace in order to get them to agree to give up certain freedoms that in turn benefit certain political actors, such as those wishing to sell solar panels to home owners, the manufacturers of wind turbines, electric car makers and the like, this produces opportunities for them to make money that they might not otherwise have. Solar power has some benefits, but I see no reason to panic whole populations into buying solar panels when they are not yet ready for prime time. I note that 100% gasoline cars are still cheaper than hybrids or all electric models. Pollution is a problem, but I think we should concentrate on other "pollutants" than carbon-dioxide. Climate change does occur, but it does not typically occur in the way it was portrayed in the movie The Day After Tomorrow, which is a sort of "Chicken Little" movie. You have a sort of scientist that makes dire predictions that nobody listens to, and then a disaster occurs and the scientist says, "I told you do, but you didn't listen to me!" Then Society tries to adapt to he sudden changes in climate as best as it can, a typical Hollywood disaster movie. I'm afraid that if we go through strenuous exertions to cut down our carbon emissions, they may either go to naught, or may in fact unintentionally contribute to the next ice age or make it even worse, where carbon emissions might otherwise mitigate it. I also think terraforming Mars is not as easy as some people may think. Mars is the way it is for a physical reason, because it is a certain size and at a certain place in out Solar System, changing it may not be as easy as some proponents think. Venus is also not just a product of global warming, but of its position in our Solar System. I don't think our planet will end up like Venus due to our failure to cut carbon emissions. Venus is like Venus because its too close to the Sun for it to be like Earth.

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#3 2017-03-03 18:22:41

louis
Member
From: UK
Registered: 2008-03-24
Posts: 7,208

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

I tend to agree with your conclusion but I expect it is quite complicated. I am amazed how little attention is paid to irrigation schemes. But their nature they put more water vapour into the atmosphere. Whether that lead to global warming or cooling (since clouds basically do both) is open to discussion but the huge increase in irrigation scheme over the last 60 years surely must be playing a part.

Oldfart1939 wrote:

There have been comments on several other threads as to whether NASA should maintain a role in Earth Science observations, based on the premise that they need to keep monitoring "Global Warming," which has subsequently been morphed into "Climate Change." Over the past 8 years, we've heard a drumbeat of steady propaganda emanating from the White House, the EPA, NOAA, and yes, NASA about the "danger to mankind" from Human Induced Climate Change.

Before I launch into my statements and observations, let me toss out a few qualifiers about my background. In addition to being a retired Ph.D. Physical Chemist and Biochemist, I've had a lifelong hobby and deep interest in Astronomy; in fact it was my first choice for a career, but I wasn't able to pursue that dream. I also am something of a amateur archaeologist and have attended several programs involving working on various "digs' in the American Desert Southwest.

As my astronomy background calls out for me to point out a MAJOR flaw in all the hysterical climate change and Global Warming fantasies: The Sun is a LONG TERM VARIABLE STAR. The solar output isn't constant as embedded in the computer models that the climate change promoters point to. The cycle is approximately 900-950 years maximum to maximum. This is generally reflected in sunspot numbers which have now been recorded for ~ 400 years. Beginning in the early 1600's the sunspots have been observed telescopically and accurate data is available. The absolute sunspot low was recorded in the 1670's, a period which is called the Maunder Minimum. The rivers in Europe remained frozen even into the Summers, and this was commented upon by no less than Sir Isaac Newton. Fast forward to the 1990's. Sunspots were at a record high in numbers, but since 2000, have been declining rapidly, along with the un-doctored Global Temperature readings. However, due to a Political Agenda, scientists have been pressured to make the data fit with this agenda. Scientists at NOAA have been "caught faking data," recently. The University of East Anglia was caught and admonished for faking climate data. How can scientists be pressured to do things like this? Grant funding. Data the "powers that be" don't like? No grant renewals. At NASA, there are also scientists whose jobs depend on satellite observation of icepack, etc. and they sure do like remaining employed; ergo, "melting polar caps." "Melting Glaciers."

Archaeological evidence: Back in 2005, my late wife and I went to a place called "Crow Canyon Archaeological Center," and participated in an excavation of Goodman Point Pueblo near Mesa Verde, and as part of the program went through substantial laboratory training.
What jumped out at me immediately when learning about the science of dendrochronology (tree ring interpretation) was the fact that it gives an unbroken record of climate data extending back to ~ 850 AD, since the national Park has structures that old and there's a complete record of overlapping sample covering the period. The solar sunspot maximum in ~ 1100-1150 AD is mirrored by extremely small growth of trees and low rainfall in that period, reflecting near drought conditions. The Maunder minimum was also reflected by good tree ring data.   

So--my "take" on the hypothesis of "Global Warming," or "Climate Change," is yes, there are these observables, but aren't "brought about by human activity." They are natural phenomena independent of humans.

QED.


Let's Go to Mars...Google on: Fast Track to Mars blogspot.com

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#4 2017-03-03 19:33:06

Oldfart1939
Member
Registered: 2016-11-26
Posts: 2,429

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

I'll bet no one here has ever heard of Dr. Art Robinson, Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine? He has assembled a petition of scientists, veterinarians, and physicians who oppose the concept of Global Warming, and submitted this to the U.S. Congress. Naturally it was suppressed, even though it contained over 54,000 signatures including many Nobel Laureates. The most impressive name he had on the petition was Dr. Edward Teller, father of the Hydrogen Bomb. Dr. Robinson was formerly the director of the Linus Pauling Institute in Palo Alto, CA. He personally directed almost all the research done on Vitamin C, but had a falling out with Linus over research which indicated Vitamin C accelerated the growth of malignant cells; he would NOT modify the data or conclusions, was terminated, and using funds he received from Pauling in a defamation of character lawsuit to found his own research organization. This story is NOT widely known, since secrecy was one of the requirements of receiving the settlement. Pauling is now long dead, and the story is circulating through the scientific community in which I formerly circulated. I know Dr. Robinson, and also knew Dr. R.B. Merrifield, 1984 Nobel in Chemistry (RIP), who was affiliated with Dr. Robinson. I use this example not only to dump on the Global Warming story, but to also indicate the duplicity of motives of even the most famous scientists.

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#5 2017-03-03 22:26:24

kbd512
Administrator
Registered: 2015-01-02
Posts: 7,764

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Oldfart1939,

My commentary on global warming / climate change is a diatribe against ignoring what the data indicates.  It is not meant to impugn the integrity of the scientists who study our climate or to question their motives for conducting their research.  I believe some of the conclusions reached are likely errors of the mathematical and/or methodological variety.

If the data doesn't agree with the theories or models, then at the very least a comprehensive review is warranted to determine why the theory, models, and data don't correlate.  In fact, I seem to recall that at least one of the scientists who was asked to testify before Congress on the issue of climate change made the same argument.  The scientists positing that humans have caused catastrophic warming of our planet when their own data doesn't agree with their own models, with respect to the temperature increases our planet should be experiencing right now, is not a very strong case for why we should radically alter modern life for a good number of people on this planet.

I think that some of our politicians have taken up this issue as a way to extort even more money from the tax payers by preying on the fears of an ignorant electorate that they've helped create with state-run non-educational systems that promote unquestioning submission to authority, group think over learning to think for yourself, and carefully weighing data with claims to determine how closely the two coincide.

Lastly, politics and religion have no place in science.  If your belief system or ego is so fragile that it won't survive encounters with experimental results that don't comport with those beliefs, then science is not the profession for you.  If scientists really did discover that we've been busily driving nails into our own coffins by irreversibly increasing the temperature of this planet, I would take no issue with changing how I live my life.  However, the disagreement between the data and the models and theory are big enough to sail a supertanker through.

I am not the least bit opposed to development of more efficient energy production and utilization technologies.  I think it is or should be common sense that pollution or destruction of the natural environment is not desirable.  However, the eco crusaders need to accept that to advance humanity there will be some frack'd hydrocarbon eggs littering the path to the clean and renewably tasty omelet they lust after.

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#6 2017-03-04 08:47:41

Tom Kalbfus
Banned
Registered: 2006-08-16
Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

I've seen science subservient to bothQ You have scientists working for the Mullahs of Iran for instance, trying to build atomic bombs.

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#7 2017-03-04 08:47:52

Oldfart1939
Member
Registered: 2016-11-26
Posts: 2,429

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

kbd512-

I cannot really disagree with most of your diatribe, and in fact your positions on most of the issues mirror mine. But maybe I'm even a bit more cynical than you about some of the scientists involved; politics has interjected itself into the scientific community  in a way that's destructive to science and the integrity of the researchers. Politicians know the workings of the pay to play game well, and have in many cases foisted it onto workers in the area of climate science. "Give us the results we want, or well find another player." Politics has destroyed the integrity of many involved.

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#8 2017-03-04 08:51:35

Tom Kalbfus
Banned
Registered: 2006-08-16
Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Scientists have worked for that madman Stalin, and other scientists worked for Hitler, some are working now for the bearded wonders of Iran. Seems most of the time scientists are subservient to irrational people. Lunatics and nutcases often rise to the pinnacles of their societies, while the scientists end up working for them, building weapons of mass destruction.

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#9 2017-03-11 23:33:30

GW Johnson
Member
From: McGregor, Texas USA
Registered: 2011-12-04
Posts: 5,728
Website

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

I think you’re all missing the boat by focusing upon the inherently-controversial temperature data.  No one will ever agree how to process it,  and as long as it is to be used,  it requires complicated processing,  because of all the uncertainties and inherent noise in the data.  Plus,  the various proxies require far too many assumptions to convert them to something understandable.

Therefore,  I do not understand why it is temperature data that all the whoopla is based upon,  except that uncertain data is most subject to manipulation for nefarious ends.  Other than that,  those temperature trends are complete bullshit.  You can tell,  because different folks doing it differently get completely different answers.  Pretty much the definition of bullshit in science. 

There’s other data to look at,  data not clouded by all those uncertainties.  I do not understand why more folks do not use it instead.  That lack makes no sense at all to me. 

These shortfalls in the use of reliable data point toward political agendas and belief systems being more important than actual facts to too many folks.  That is a very dangerous situation.  In my own personal world view,  valuing political belief systems over fact,  is verging on treason.  Because it is no different than the fake-fact-based religious belief system that motivates the terrorists we fight.

Look instead at ice.  It is melting,  and has been,  as documented by cameras for as long as there has been photography.  Over just the last 50 years,  we see meltwater lakes on the Greenland ice sheet that we never saw before.  There are variations plus and minus,  but the sense of the data is that the ice is melting,  for well over a century now.  To deny THAT means you deny basic observations.  If you deny them,  there is no point in talking further.  Such ignorance is its own death sentence. 

Now here’s the question:  where is that heat that is melting the ice coming from?  Is it something natural,  or is it something we do,  or is it both?  Very good question,  actually.  A second good question is whether it actually matters if anything we are doing is causing this. 

There is the variability of the sun.  Some indications are that the sun varies sunspot activity levels and associated solar constant output on roughly an 800-900-year cycle.  The last cold point was around 450 years ago:  the “little ice age”.  Around half a millennium earlier was the medieval warm period.  So,  this does seem to be a real and natural variability.  Its magnitude ranges from frozen rivers and lakes in winter to not-frozen rivers and lakes in winter,  with effects upon agriculture,  but NOT general glaciation.  If the timing of the cycle is right,  we should now be cooling toward another cold period,  but the available data say no,  we are not.  A good question to ask would be “why”?

A far stronger effect is the glaciation vs deglaciation of the ice ages.  This shows very significant sea level effects,  according to the geologists.  They have identified fossil beaches as high as 350 feet above current sea levels,  and as low as 480 feet below current sea levels.  The only model we have that actually fits the geologic record for this is Milankovitch orbital cycles.  This is observational only,  not a cause-and-effect model,  except in the sense that northern hemisphere insolation is lower at the low point of the cycle,  and higher at the high point.  That’s where most of the land is:  northern hemisphere. 

There are 3 such Milankovitch cycle periods known:  100,000 year,  41,000 year,  and 26,000 year.  The observational Milankovitch model cannot explain which is dominant,  or why there was a shift between the 41 kiloyear and 100 kiloyear cycles this last glaciation.  Yet,  better than any other model,  even with that shift,  it “explains” the last 3-4 million years of climate better than any other theory we have.   Not perfect,  but quite good.  It also says we should be heading toward glaciated times,  but we are not.  A good question would again be “why”? 

OK,  why not?   The difference appears to be human technological civilization,  which did not exist until agriculture started around 10,000 years ago at the end of the last ice age.  It got “serious” only a couple of centuries ago,  when global population first approached a billion.  Coincidental?  Maybe,  maybe not. 

Does it really matter whether we humans caused this apparent warming in defiance of both the solar variability and Milankovitch models?  NO.  It ONLY matters how we respond.  Basic common sense says that we should reduce those things we are doing,  that we already know make the problem worse. 

How bad can it get?  That is nothing but simple math:  the volume of ice above sea level,  multiplied by 90%,  is the volume of water added to the sea,  if it all melts.  That’s a very catastrophic potential sea level rise. 

Estimates vary,  but the land glaciers correspond to 1 meter rise,  Greenland corresponds to 6 meters rise,  West Antarctica to 7 meters rise,  and East Antarctica to at least 20 meters sea level rise.   Will it all melt?  Probably not.  Will some of it melt?  Probably yes, because at least some melting is already underway.  How much will melt?  Who knows?  But it looks to be measured in multiple meters,  and within under 100 years. 

When you look at how many folks live close to sea level,  you get a sense for the magnitude of the disaster posed by these potential sea level changes,  even if only a small fraction of the ice melts.  About a billion or more live within 1 meter of sea level,  perhaps 3 billion within 3 meters of sea level.  Should sea levels rise,  these folks will be on the march looking for new homes,  across international borders. 

We in the US could not adequately handle <100,000 refugees from New Orleans after hurricane Katrina,  all within our borders.  The close-to-a-million international refugee crises from Syria and Africa have proven even more intractable.  Clearly,  NO ONE knows how to handle migrations like that! 

Think war over resources and living space,  and the resulting famines.  So,  how many need to die?  If mass agriculture should fail,  about 90% of us must die,  because there won’t be but about 10% of current food production capability.  Check with the ag experts to confirm what would happen without big power equipment and modern fertilizers and pesticides.  You WILL NOT like the answers! 

What are we doing that seems likely to be aggravating the ice-melting problem?  Emitting greenhouse gases.  The physics of the greenhouse effect are long-known and long-verified.  Plain enough. 

The major greenhouse gases are known to us from basic physics:   methane (short life before it oxidizes to carbon dioxide),  carbon dioxide (with a multiple-centuries-long lifetime),  and water vapor.  Anyone can run the classic bell jar experiment to confirm this,  and the physics of it are very well known:  these gases simply have measurably reduced IR transmissibilities relative to dry air.  The surface of the Earth and the air near it must simply run hotter in their presence,  in order to re-radiate adequately to space to achieve an energy balance between incoming radiation from the sun,  and re-radiation of IR back to space.  Basic physics. 

Water vapor is the odd one,  because of phase change at ordinary Earthly conditions.  We all know how warmer air holds more water vapor,  while cold air does not.   Consult any psychrometric chart for that.  But the phase change of water,  and the reflectivity of its solid phase,  do explain why once the snow falls that doesn’t melt,  then temperatures crash for the duration of the winter.  It also explains why the spring meltdown is so sudden.   Sort of an on-off switch,  water vapor is.  The other two gases are not,   because with them,  phase change (and reflectivity of the solid phase) is NOT involved.  Basic physics again. 

Methane is emitted both by fossil fuel extraction and by agriculture.  Carbon dioxide is overwhelmingly emitted by the burning of fossil fuels.   Volcanic carbon dioxide emission has always been with us,  we have not changed that.  These facts CANNOT be denied by anyone in the least cognizant of how energy and agriculture actually work,  excepting those who would deny facts in favor of a political belief system. 

We have measured the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere in two ways,  neither of which is clouded in any way to infer anything,  unlike the proxy temperature data.  These are simple direct measurements.  One is the Keeling curve,  as measured in Hawaii since 1958,  the other is gas composition of air bubbles trapped in glacial ice,  from recent times all the way back into the ice ages,  almost a million years. 

Pre-industrial carbon dioxide was about 280 ppm,  at world population under a billion.  When I was a boy,  it was 300 ppm,  at world population about 3 billion.  It has recently reached 400 ppm,  and there are 7 billion of us and rising fast.  People demand energy and food,  and they burn fuels and do agriculture to get them.  Simple as that.  Should surprise no one. 

Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide,  melting ice,  the bell jar experiment and measurements of IR transmissibility.  When you add in all the basic physics,  the case is pretty tight.  Maybe not airtight,  but pretty tight.  And the risk of sharply-rising seas as the ice melts certainly looks to be catastrophic. 

I personally think we actually passed the ice-melt “tipping point” about 50 years ago,  which means I think we cannot head this disaster off.  But we CAN buy some extra time to cope,  if we reduce the offending emissions. 

What pisses me off is a political argument over whether or not to try to head this off,  with NO ONE trying to figure out how to cope with the disaster it represents.   

I’m sorry,  that asshole now running EPA who says carbon dioxide does not warm the air is just plain wrong!  He denies science for the profit of his corporate friends who pay him to do exactly that.  Too many ignorant folk believe him,  and vote for garbage like that.  So sad.  And lethal to progeny. 

That’s not to say that Al Gore is not just as bad on the other side of the climate-change fence,  because he is!  But I really do know where the science really points on this issue,  and I just told you where it points.   It all gets down to profit versus survival.  How much is the non-extinction of the human race worth to you?  And on what time scale?

GW


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#10 2017-03-12 08:27:49

SpaceNut
Administrator
From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 29,418

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

The atmospheric content of gasses does change as we contribute towards the warming but what was the amount we did versus what came naturally from the earth its self.

Whats the sunspot level, is earths position changing in its orbit by minutes of orbital distance from the sun, is there an external force coming from planet x as it come closer or falls back relative to earth.....with out collecting data we can not even begin to analyze for the cause of ice melts or cooling....

Whats the % of change for either in terms of coverage to the earths effected....that we can use to calculate the change of wattage in or out that is what we are seeing.

Global warming was always just a one way direction of change but science has now told us that it is bidirectional and we are calling in climate change or anyone acronym that means to cycle with a cause. The cause it would seem has multiple inputs. Are we at a weather triple point for earth?

I have heard of sea fossils in the White Mountain national forest mountian range but have not gone to venture there to see them.

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#11 2017-03-14 13:58:06

GW Johnson
Member
From: McGregor, Texas USA
Registered: 2011-12-04
Posts: 5,728
Website

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Hi Spacenut:

I ran across a video on Netflix that is worth looking at,  which concerns this topic.  Its name is "Chasing Ice",  and it is a documentary about a photographer who set up and runs something called "extreme ice survey" or EIS.  He describes himself as initially a bit of a climate skeptic.  The film is about an hour and a half long,  mostly documenting how dangerous and difficult was the emplacement of time lapse cameras at glaciers in Alaska,  Canada, Iceland,  and Greenland. 

The time lapse results in the last half hour are quite informative:  retreat-by-miles and depth deflation-by-half-or-more of the observed glaciers.  A park service employee points out that while 4 glaciers in Glacier Nat'l Park grew,  more than 300 disappeared entirely,  and that the remaining thousand-ish shrunk.   

It does also visually document the ice core atmospheric gas composition science that stretches back near a million years.  And the Keeling curve CO2 measurement that exploded from 300 ppm in 1958 to 400+ ppm today.  In comparison,  CO2 varied between ~mid-200 ppm during the glaciations to ~280 ppm during the deglaciations.  This does demonstrate a relationship between CO2 and ice cover,  as well as how far and how fast things have changed in the last 6 decades,  completely out of line with the previous million years.

Notice that neither I nor the film point at temperature or temperature-proxy data!  Nothing that can be rigged or faked. 

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2017-03-14 14:00:30)


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#12 2017-03-14 14:18:05

Tom Kalbfus
Banned
Registered: 2006-08-16
Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

GW Johnson wrote:

Hi Spacenut:

I ran across a video on Netflix that is worth looking at,  which concerns this topic.  Its name is "Chasing Ice",  and it is a documentary about a photographer who set up and runs something called "extreme ice survey" or EIS.  He describes himself as initially a bit of a climate skeptic.  The film is about an hour and a half long,  mostly documenting how dangerous and difficult was the emplacement of time lapse cameras at glaciers in Alaska,  Canada, Iceland,  and Greenland. 

The time lapse results in the last half hour are quite informative:  retreat-by-miles and depth deflation-by-half-or-more of the observed glaciers.  A park service employee points out that while 4 glaciers in Glacier Nat'l Park grew,  more than 300 disappeared entirely,  and that the remaining thousand-ish shrunk.   

It does also visually document the ice core atmospheric gas composition science that stretches back near a million years.  And the Keeling curve CO2 measurement that exploded from 300 ppm in 1958 to 400+ ppm today.  In comparison,  CO2 varied between ~mid-200 ppm during the glaciations to ~280 ppm during the deglaciations.  This does demonstrate a relationship between CO2 and ice cover,  as well as how far and how fast things have changed in the last 6 decades,  completely out of line with the previous million years.

Notice that neither I nor the film point at temperature or temperature-proxy data!  Nothing that can be rigged or faked. 

GW

How do you know it wouldn't have happened anyway, absent Man? We know that 18,000 years ago, Ice sheets covered all of Canada, right down to the future site of the Great Lakes, The Hudson Valley was formed by glaciers, as was Long Island and Manhattan. There has already been quite a bit of Global warming already, most of that global warming occurred before there was a steam engine, before the first civilization arose on the fertile crescent between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Before Egypt built its first pyramids, most of that global warming had already occurred, it probably still is occurring today, the Ice Age is not completely over! If the Ice Age is going to end anyway, of what use would cutting our carbon emissions serve? Even if we cut it, the ice sheets might still retreat, as they were already retreating for thousands of years before the first civilization, before the internal combustion engine. You think we can actually stop the ice sheets from retreating when they've been retreating for 18,000 years? In due course those ice sheets may expand again and we'll have another Ice Age. Do you maintain that would be a good thing?

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#13 2017-03-14 20:09:04

GW Johnson
Member
From: McGregor, Texas USA
Registered: 2011-12-04
Posts: 5,728
Website

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Tom:

Your ignorance of hard science and actual human technology is sometimes quite astounding!  So also is your evident hard-over persuasion to believe in a political belief system that includes as an article of faith denying hard science just because it is politically inconvenient.  It is that second fault that is the most appalling of the two. 

Do not fail for a moment to understand that your diatribe against my post refutes absolutely nothing I said.  Nothing at all.  Anyone bothering to read the two cannot fail to notice that fact. 

Your entire “argument” (such as it is) in that diatribe reduces to essentially “GW,  how do you know?”,  almost exactly the words you used in your very first sentence. 

I know,  because I read peer-reviewed journals (instead getting my information from cable TV news,  which is largely “fake” because the goal is ratings,  not the dissemination of fact).  Also,  I know because I understand hard science,  and I understand how to use properly data and observations as evidence,  and to recognize when they are being misused.  I know these things,   because I was trained to know how to do it “right”.  And I took that training very seriously. 

So,  here is exactly how I know that CO2 increase melts glacial ice:

Oxygen Isotope Ratio

The tendency is for glacial ice to be depleted in O18,  relative to O16.  This is enhanced during glacial periods (considered to be 10-15 C colder water than today),  and reversed during warm interglacials (considered to be 5 C warmer water than today).  Away from the glacial regions,  the O18 is enhanced over O16 in sea water (and foraminifera) during glacial conditions,  and not so much during interglacials.  That’s the opposite effect for opposed conditions.  It is a molecular weight-controlled diffusion thing,  well-verified in the laboratory to be a function of liquid temperature.   

This is a pretty robust proxy for general ancient climates,  and has been recognized as such for multiple decades.  The technique is not (and has not been claimed to be) a precise temperature history prediction,  but its indication of glaciated versus non-glaciated conditions is simply beyond question.  This is precisely because it matches the geological indications of glaciated versus non-glaciated conditions,  when the “indicated” temperatures are chosen in this way. 

CO2 Content of Air

Measured by IR transmission.  Transmissibilities of the various gases are well known and simply beyond question.  Currently in use generating the “Keeling Curve” of atmospheric CO2 content at Hawaii since 1958.  Also used for measuring air bubble composition in ice cores. 

Correlation of Glaciated vs Non-Glaciated Conditions from Ice Cores

Measured the O18/O16 ratio as a function of the annual layer count.  Annual layers visible in ice is an observation technique established for several decades.  This is science that is simply beyond question. 

Correlating Glaciatedness with Atmospheric CO2 Content

Done with ice cores.  Measure the CO2 in the trapped air bubbles.  Measure the oxygen isotope ratio in the ice surrounding the trapped air bubbles.  Date the measurements with the annual layering.  Cross-check this dating against geological evidence of glaciatedness or not. 

Results show very clearly and very unambiguously that glaciated conditions are associated with reduced O18 in ice cores and lower CO2 in the associated trapped air bubbles.  Non-glaciated conditions are associated with higher O18 in the ice core and higher CO2 in the trapped air bubbles.  As all three components of the analysis are science beyond question,  this association is beyond question,  as well.
 
Statistical association says nothing about causality,  no matter how strong the association!  That is mathematics known for a couple of centuries,  and is pretty much beyond question,  as well,  although it is too often overlooked in scientific circles by too many practitioners.  Causality information comes from elsewhere than your statistical data set.  Period.

Establishing Likely Causality

In this case,  that comes from the reduced IR transmissibility measured for CO2 relative to oxygen and nitrogen (air).  This shows up in the classic bell jar experiment,  explaining very nicely why it always works the same way,  as a “greenhouse”.  A thermometer sitting on a black ash tray under a bell jar filled with CO2 gets very much hotter than the same rig filled with dry air,  when both are sitting in the same place exposed to the same sunshine.  Methane and water vapor can be identified as “greenhouse gases” in the very same way,  with the same equipment,  and for exactly the same reason defined by IR transmissibility and radiative heat balance.  That basic cause and effect is therefore understood,  repeatable,  and pretty much beyond question.   

Situation

We have an observed correlation between glaciatedness,  CO2 content,  and oxygen isotope ratio,  the quality of which is beyond question.  We have causality established beyond question by well-established radiation heat transfer physics and a very well established and repeatable simple experiment that anyone can perform. 

We can always argue about how fast and how complete the melting is or will be.  But NOT that CO2-induced melting will occur,  that is simply beyond question!  This melting effect is something verified by the time lapse photography in the cited film (“Chasing Ice”). 

During the years in the film CO2 rose from ~350 ppm to just about 400 ppm,  according to the peer-reviewed journals.  Pre-industrial levels were ~280 ppm,  same as the interglacials during the ice ages.  Glacials were lower. 

Avoiding Fudged Data

Nothing about the above has anything to do with constructing past temperature “histories” from proxy data!  Nothing about the above has anything to do with how such temperature proxies might be manipulated or massaged for good or for evil,  in any way,  shape,  or form!   THAT is why I say look at the ice and the chemistry and the geology,  not the models of past temperatures. 

Conclusion

The real truth lies in the ice,  and in physics long-established beyond any question.  It says that whether we caused this recent rapid warming is actually irrelevant to how we respond to the sea level rise threat posed by melting ice located above current sea level.  Prudence says to simply reduce those things that you already know to act in a way that makes the problem worse (meaning reduce our CO2 emissions). 

If we had something to do with the problem,  this policy may actually work to buy us more time.  If not,  then it probably won’t work.  No one will know before it is tried.  Common sense says we better start looking for ways to cope with rather sudden (single-lifetime) rapid sea level rise on the order of 6+ meters,  because it looks very much like this will happen,  sooner or later.  The geology very clearly shows fast changes like this have happened before.  The CO2 levels are already almost twice what was in the ice core record for past glaciations and deglaciations,  with most of that in the last 50 years. 

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2017-03-14 20:17:30)


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#14 2017-03-15 09:25:36

Tom Kalbfus
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

You know you don't have to live on the coast. Early Man did not remain on the coast when the ocean levels rose with the retreating ice caps, and they did not try to stop the last Ice Age from ending. It is hubris to think we can actually preserve the Ice Caps as they are, it would require a greater technology than we now have available, I don't think that simply reducing our CO2 emissions will suffice, I also wonder if the goal of preserving the ice caps is a worthy one. What level of glaciation do you want?

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#15 2017-03-15 10:58:44

SpaceNut
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Ice age man did not care about the lowering or rising of the oceans he just moved as there was no fancey ocean shore homes. We are the only level of inteligence that cares to hold onto what we own. But with all of this is the fact that intensity of storms of distruction have increased not only in power level but with frequency as well as locations which have never had them.
Loss of the ice cap does more than just lower the sea as it creates an eco enviroment for the life that is there and does keep earth from being a runaway venus even if it does correct itself by cyclic events of global ice sheets which have covered continents.
WE all I think agree that there is a cyclic pattern to the past climate but that is not the case for what we are seeing today as we are making the cycle fluctuate within that old pattern. That said that CO2 is not the only piece of this puzzle called into that pattern and its science that will identify all the others which can contribute to what we are seeing now.

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#16 2017-03-15 12:21:48

GW Johnson
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

"You know you don't have to live on the coast."  -  tell that to about 100 million Bangladeshis who cannot afford to live anywhere but a river delta about the size of Wyoming within a foot to a yard of sea level.   That comment reflects a profound ignorance about the lives of much of Earth's population,  and a profoundly callous attitude about their sorry lot in life.  That attitude is totally un-Christian,  no matter what sect or denomination you consider. 

Tens to hundreds of thousands of those Bangladeshis drown with every storm coming ashore during monsoon season at that location.  It is not the only such place.  Over a billion people live within one meter of sea level,  and 90+% of them live in poverty.  More than 3 billion live within 6+ meters of sea level,  and most of them around the planet are much poorer than a lower middle class American,  the very mistreated and ignored people who elected the current president precisely to throw a monkey wrench into the DC political establishment (and certainly succeeded). 

The records reconstructed so far from ice cores only go back about a million years.  On a billion-year timescale,  the climate was certainly much more variable than that experienced with glaciation/deglaciation events over the few last million years or so.  These were the major extinction events that separate the Paleozoic from the Mesozoic,  and that from the Cenozoic.  There were also significant but not major extinctions between every one of the geologic periods in all three of those eras.  All of that makes the ices ages look like a Sunday picnic. 

Yep,  it's variable all right.  We've had a fairly stable climate run over the last million years,  and a really nice one over the last 11,000 years. So,  why screw that up any worse than we already have?  To do so makes no sense at all.

By the way,  the majority of Earth's largest cities and financial entities are all within a meter or three of sea level.  Wanna kiss those goodbye,  too? 

Yeah,  just keep melting the ice. 

You think the cost of weaning ourselves from fossil fuels is too high? 

Wait till you have the pay the bill for moving 3+ billion people out of danger,  rebuild your entire interlinked economies and civilization,  and do all of that while maintaining food production in spite of drastic rainfall pattern shifts that are fundamentally unpredictable,  climate and weather models notwithstanding.  If you can.  Doubtful. 

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2017-03-15 12:24:52)


GW Johnson
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"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#17 2017-03-16 18:11:21

SpaceNut
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Posts: 29,418

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Extreme coastal flooding will become the new normal in Europe, study says

Scientists say the growing risk of coastal flooding is a result of climate change, and a prime example of the interconnectedness of environmental trends across the planet. Rapidly melting ice sheets in Greenland and Antartica, fueled by warming oceans, are among the factors accelerating sea level rise around the world.

725px-Phase_diagram_of_water.svg.png

Not all ice is the same so what amount contains salts, dust or dirt and what amount is fresh....that leads to what amount of energy is needed to melt it all over time.

Now that we have an energy level we need to trace to what is the source of this energy.

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#18 2017-03-18 18:47:09

GW Johnson
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From: McGregor, Texas USA
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Posts: 5,728
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

The heat to melt the ice comes from somewhere.  Whether warm air,  warmer rainfall,  or warmer ocean water,  doesn't matter.  Actually,  it is likely that all 3 are involved. 

Why are they warmer? Greenhouse effect artificially enhanced by excessive CO2 emissions.  Maybe CH4 too,  but that's less clear,  as its lifetime before being oxidized to CO2 is relatively short.  Years instead of centuries lifetime in the atmosphere. 

GW


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#19 2017-03-18 20:17:22

Tom Kalbfus
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Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

SpaceNut wrote:

Ice age man did not care about the lowering or rising of the oceans he just moved as there was no fancey ocean shore homes. We are the only level of inteligence that cares to hold onto what we own. But with all of this is the fact that intensity of storms of distruction have increased not only in power level but with frequency as well as locations which have never had them.
Loss of the ice cap does more than just lower the sea as it creates an eco enviroment for the life that is there and does keep earth from being a runaway venus even if it does correct itself by cyclic events of global ice sheets which have covered continents.
WE all I think agree that there is a cyclic pattern to the past climate but that is not the case for what we are seeing today as we are making the cycle fluctuate within that old pattern. That said that CO2 is not the only piece of this puzzle called into that pattern and its science that will identify all the others which can contribute to what we are seeing now.

Poor people don't live in fancy ocean shore homes, they can't afford them, the people who live in them can afford to move!
We are a long way from a runaway Venus.
dinopit-fb-cover.jpg
You know when this scene occurred, this could have been Canada with palm trees! The Earth was warmer in this scene when these dinosaurs had this battle, Does it look barren to you and incapable of supporting human life? If it could support these dinosaurs why couldn't it support us? We still have ice caps, at the time of the dinosaurs there were no permanent ice caps at the poles. Dinosaurs frolicked in Antarctica of all places!

Last edited by Tom Kalbfus (2017-03-18 20:19:46)

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#20 2017-03-18 20:46:26

SpaceNut
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From: New Hampshire
Registered: 2004-07-22
Posts: 29,418

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

wrote:

Poor people don't live in fancy ocean shore homes, they can't afford them, the people who live in them can afford to move!

Yet they do not as there homes are swallowed by the oceans, destroyed by tornado, blown flat by Huricanes and shaken in piles of rubble while they still occupy them....

We may never see a runaway venus condition by why do you want to destroy the cradle of life?

wrote:

Dinosaurs frolicked in Antarctica of all places!

Have you forgotten that it was only 200-300 million years ago when the continental drift had been a super continent..
http://bernardharrisonandfriends.com/pd … nental.pdf
http://www.livescience.com/37529-continental-drift.html
http://geology.com/pangea.htm
http://www.livescience.com/18387-future … masia.html

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#21 2017-03-19 06:49:14

Tom Kalbfus
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Your assuming that what were doing is what is causing global warming, but global warming has been happening for 18,000 years which was the height of the last ice age, there has been global warming for far longer than there has been carbon dioxide emissions from industrial processes and transportation.
interesting-world-maps-34.jpg?w=920&h=422
This is the map of the World during the last ice age.
PathfinderMap.jpg
This is a map of the World today. See the extent of Global Warming?
lgf01a201307141900.jpg
This is a map of the Earth if Global Warming were to continue. What makes you think we can stop it? As you can see the globe has been warming before we actual were adding to the carbon dioxide levels, this is kind of like saying the crowing rooster caused the Sun to rise. We are in the middle picture. In the middle picture we suddenly get people saying we are causing global warming and we should stop. If we actually wanted to stop this global warming, we would probably have to shade the Earth with structures in space, because our cutting our carbon-dioxide emissions probably would not be sufficient to do the job, because our carbon-dioxide emissions weren't responsible for most of the global warming that has occurred on Earth in the first place. We would have to actively engineer this planet if we wanted to stop global warming, we'd need some of the terraforming techniques we would use on Venus to cool the planet, we would have to put something between the Earth and the Sun to do this, and I'm not sure it would be a good idea to mess with Earth's climate! The Earth was doing fine without us, having those ice ages and warming periods, we don't need to act as a thermostat for Earth and hold climate change in check!

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#22 2017-03-19 12:26:40

GW Johnson
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Tom:

Your arch-conservative political belief system prevents you from seeing the science as it really is,  so you misuse things with erroneous interpretations to suit your own political positions,  rather than fact or truth.  It’s a chronic pattern I’ve noticed about you.  This is because your political belief system requires you to deny science anytime corporate profit might be reduced by it. 

I don't rely on the proxy temperature data that some few have fudged,  and many others have mishandled.  That's inherent with noisy data,  and offers too many opportunities to game the system,  and too many vulnerabilities to political ideologues like yourself. 

Instead,  I look at the ice,  which ebbed and flowed during the 3-4 million years of the ice ages in lockstep with carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.  Glaciated in the lower-200 ppm,  deglaciated in the upper-200 ppm.  There's no proxies here,  there are only hard data.  Measured CO2 in gas bubbles trapped in ice cores,  dated by annual "ring" count and correlated to geological evidence of glaciatedness. The statistical correlation among these data is very,  very strong.  Thus to deny any of it defies all common sense.   

Causality lies not in that statistical correlation,  any more than any statistical correlation establishes causality.  Causality comes from the simple bell jar experiment that anyone can run,  and which has been in physics and chemistry laboratory teaching settings for over a century now.  How it works is fully understood with no ambiguities at all,  in terms of radiative energy conservation,  and IR transmissibilities that vary from gas to gas,  and which can be reliably measured. 

What it says is that higher CO2 content inevitably warms the atmosphere close to the surface,  thus also warming surface features.  Warmth melts ice,  coming from basic phase change physics.  That means it is rising CO2 that melts glaciers,  not glacier-melting releasing CO2 from somewhere,  that is recorded in the ice core records.  There's your causality.  This is all hard science.  To deny that part is so egregiously stupid I have no words for it.   

Now comes the part where your political belief system persistently keeps you from seeing what is,  only just what you want to believe.  Over the last couple of centuries,  atmospheric CO2 as measured in the ice cores has departed from the near-constant 280 ppm since the last deglaciation.  This is confirmed by the Keeling curve measurements made since 1958 in Hawaii.  In 1958 the annual average number was 300 ppm,  it is now 400 ppm,  and the trend says over 500 ppm in less than 30 years. 

These are major departures from the low-200's to high-200's over the entire ice age,  which in turn indicates that a difference of only 50 ppm makes a huge difference in ice cover,  once equilibrium is attained after the flip-flop.  The change in CO2 over the last 2 centuries,  most of it in the last 50 years,  is over 150 ppm!  And the ice sheets that seem to have been stable since 11,000 years ago do indeed seem to be very seriously destabilizing in the last 50 years,  based field observations and photography.  The only known difference between 11,000 years ago and now,  is us and our fossil fuel use combined with our exploding population.  That's an inference,  but it's an awfully strong one,  almost a "smoking gun".

As an aside,  the estimated atmospheric CO2 during the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum was over 500 ppm,  which is where we'll be in less than 30 years if business-as-usual continues.   It does require multiple lifetimes for things to equilibriate after the change is made.  That world was fully deglaciated and somewhere between temperate-to-tropical at the poles,  with sea levels over 100 m higher than today,  according to the geological records. 

Doesn't really matter whether we humans are causing this with our CO2 emissions,  although it certainly looks like we are,  to anyone not blinded by a political belief system.  What really matters is (1) recognizing the problem implied by rising CO2,  destabilizing glaciers,  and the science that ties this together,  and (2) acting to reduce that which we already know aggravates the melting of the ice:  our CO2 emissions.  We might not succeed in arresting this,  but we will be overwhelmed even sooner if we do not try. 

As for the pictures of the world in your posting,  you selectively misinterpret them to match yor politics which demands denial-of-science and do-nothing-about-it from you.  As the ice ages ebbed and flowed,  the world looked like your first photo at low-200’s ppm CO2 during the glaciations,  and more-or-less like today’s world in your second photo during the deglaciations at high-200’s ppm CO2,  or even your third photo.  Change was rapid moving from one state to the other,  and rather static for thousands of years in each state.  It flip-flops,  it doesn’t gradually change,  according to the geological record. 

Your third picture is of a world with ~5 m sea level rise,  with the mountain glaciers gone,  part of Greenland deglaciated,  and maybe just a little of west Antarctica melted.  It can be a lot worse than that,  and it has been in the geological past.  Fully deglaciated pole to pole,  seas rise from current levels by something like 34 meters.  If the waters warm further,  as they did in the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum,  that’s over a 100 m due to simple thermal expansion. 

The disaster comes about from the unprecedented rapidity with which this change is happening:  1 or at most 2 lifetimes,  versus dozens of them.  There is not time to adapt smoothly.  So,  resource wars are coming,  along with widespread famine as agriculture fails due to rainfall pattern shifts.  Fast enough,  and it is a near-extinction event for humanity.

Now to quote you:  “This is a map of the Earth if Global Warming were to continue. What makes you think we can stop it? “   

My answer:  Our world has looked like your second picture pretty much statically for the last 11,000 years.  It wasn’t continually changing since then.  It jumped from glaciated 18,000 years ago to current conditions by 11,000 years ago.  Now in the last 50 years it is starting to change again,  in the direction of your third photo. 

With the disaster portended by massive sea level rise and unpredictable changes to rainfall,  why should we not try to arrest this?  At least it might buy us some extra time to adapt.  At best we might stop it,  although I really doubt that.  In any event,  the cost to us all if this disaster strikes is far higher than any corporation’s profit loss if we switch energy supplies. 

So,  how do you value lost human lives versus corporate economics?

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2017-03-19 12:29:37)


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#23 2017-03-20 05:40:29

elderflower
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Registered: 2016-06-19
Posts: 1,262

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Equilibrium would take thousands of years to be established, because of the slowness of isostatic adjustment of the crust. This process is still going on in and around the formerly glaciated areas.
On the other hand, ice melting is, and has been, very rapid. The effect of these two processes is that initially the sea level will rise very quickly as warming proceeds and then will slowly retreat, over thousands of years, in areas that previously had big masses of ice, whilst shorelines advance further in the peripheral regions as mantle material slowly flows from one region to the other.

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#24 2017-03-20 09:28:31

GW Johnson
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From: McGregor, Texas USA
Registered: 2011-12-04
Posts: 5,728
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Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

Hi Elderflower. 

The equilibrium I was thinking of was more a thermal/climatic equilibrium,  which only requires some centuries after the gas composition change.  The time constant for that is crudely the lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere. 

There is an ocean temperature effect that takes longer,  I think.  Not sure how much longer.  That is thermal expansion of warming sea water after all the ice is melted. It's a considerable sea level rise effect. 

Isostatic (geologic) equilibrium requires multiple millennia.  Scandinavia and Canada are still rising after deglaciation by 11,000 years ago.

All these different time scales make it difficult to draw specific conclusions. 

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2017-03-20 10:36:57)


GW Johnson
McGregor,  Texas

"There is nothing as expensive as a dead crew,  especially one dead from a bad management decision"

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#25 2017-03-20 20:09:52

Tom Kalbfus
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Registered: 2006-08-16
Posts: 4,401

Re: When Science climate change becomes perverted by Politics.

GW Johnson wrote:

Tom:

Your arch-conservative political belief system prevents you from seeing the science as it really is,  so you misuse things with erroneous interpretations to suit your own political positions,  rather than fact or truth.  It’s a chronic pattern I’ve noticed about you.  This is because your political belief system requires you to deny science anytime corporate profit might be reduced by it. 

I don't rely on the proxy temperature data that some few have fudged,  and many others have mishandled.  That's inherent with noisy data,  and offers too many opportunities to game the system,  and too many vulnerabilities to political ideologues like yourself. 

Instead,  I look at the ice,  which ebbed and flowed during the 3-4 million years of the ice ages in lockstep with carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.  Glaciated in the lower-200 ppm,  deglaciated in the upper-200 ppm.  There's no proxies here,  there are only hard data.  Measured CO2 in gas bubbles trapped in ice cores,  dated by annual "ring" count and correlated to geological evidence of glaciatedness. The statistical correlation among these data is very,  very strong.  Thus to deny any of it defies all common sense.   

Causality lies not in that statistical correlation,  any more than any statistical correlation establishes causality.  Causality comes from the simple bell jar experiment that anyone can run,  and which has been in physics and chemistry laboratory teaching settings for over a century now.  How it works is fully understood with no ambiguities at all,  in terms of radiative energy conservation,  and IR transmissibilities that vary from gas to gas,  and which can be reliably measured. 

What it says is that higher CO2 content inevitably warms the atmosphere close to the surface,  thus also warming surface features.  Warmth melts ice,  coming from basic phase change physics.  That means it is rising CO2 that melts glaciers,  not glacier-melting releasing CO2 from somewhere,  that is recorded in the ice core records.  There's your causality.  This is all hard science.  To deny that part is so egregiously stupid I have no words for it.   

Now comes the part where your political belief system persistently keeps you from seeing what is,  only just what you want to believe.  Over the last couple of centuries,  atmospheric CO2 as measured in the ice cores has departed from the near-constant 280 ppm since the last deglaciation.  This is confirmed by the Keeling curve measurements made since 1958 in Hawaii.  In 1958 the annual average number was 300 ppm,  it is now 400 ppm,  and the trend says over 500 ppm in less than 30 years. 

These are major departures from the low-200's to high-200's over the entire ice age,  which in turn indicates that a difference of only 50 ppm makes a huge difference in ice cover,  once equilibrium is attained after the flip-flop.  The change in CO2 over the last 2 centuries,  most of it in the last 50 years,  is over 150 ppm!  And the ice sheets that seem to have been stable since 11,000 years ago do indeed seem to be very seriously destabilizing in the last 50 years,  based field observations and photography.  The only known difference between 11,000 years ago and now,  is us and our fossil fuel use combined with our exploding population.  That's an inference,  but it's an awfully strong one,  almost a "smoking gun".

As an aside,  the estimated atmospheric CO2 during the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum was over 500 ppm,  which is where we'll be in less than 30 years if business-as-usual continues.   It does require multiple lifetimes for things to equilibriate after the change is made.  That world was fully deglaciated and somewhere between temperate-to-tropical at the poles,  with sea levels over 100 m higher than today,  according to the geological records. 

Doesn't really matter whether we humans are causing this with our CO2 emissions,  although it certainly looks like we are,  to anyone not blinded by a political belief system.  What really matters is (1) recognizing the problem implied by rising CO2,  destabilizing glaciers,  and the science that ties this together,  and (2) acting to reduce that which we already know aggravates the melting of the ice:  our CO2 emissions.  We might not succeed in arresting this,  but we will be overwhelmed even sooner if we do not try. 

As for the pictures of the world in your posting,  you selectively misinterpret them to match yor politics which demands denial-of-science and do-nothing-about-it from you.  As the ice ages ebbed and flowed,  the world looked like your first photo at low-200’s ppm CO2 during the glaciations,  and more-or-less like today’s world in your second photo during the deglaciations at high-200’s ppm CO2,  or even your third photo.  Change was rapid moving from one state to the other,  and rather static for thousands of years in each state.  It flip-flops,  it doesn’t gradually change,  according to the geological record. 

Your third picture is of a world with ~5 m sea level rise,  with the mountain glaciers gone,  part of Greenland deglaciated,  and maybe just a little of west Antarctica melted.  It can be a lot worse than that,  and it has been in the geological past.  Fully deglaciated pole to pole,  seas rise from current levels by something like 34 meters.  If the waters warm further,  as they did in the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum,  that’s over a 100 m due to simple thermal expansion. 

The disaster comes about from the unprecedented rapidity with which this change is happening:  1 or at most 2 lifetimes,  versus dozens of them.  There is not time to adapt smoothly.  So,  resource wars are coming,  along with widespread famine as agriculture fails due to rainfall pattern shifts.  Fast enough,  and it is a near-extinction event for humanity.

Now to quote you:  “This is a map of the Earth if Global Warming were to continue. What makes you think we can stop it? “   

My answer:  Our world has looked like your second picture pretty much statically for the last 11,000 years.  It wasn’t continually changing since then.  It jumped from glaciated 18,000 years ago to current conditions by 11,000 years ago.  Now in the last 50 years it is starting to change again,  in the direction of your third photo. 

With the disaster portended by massive sea level rise and unpredictable changes to rainfall,  why should we not try to arrest this?  At least it might buy us some extra time to adapt.  At best we might stop it,  although I really doubt that.  In any event,  the cost to us all if this disaster strikes is far higher than any corporation’s profit loss if we switch energy supplies. 

So,  how do you value lost human lives versus corporate economics?

GW

The Earth was recorded to have been wetter and cooler during recorded history, the fertile crescent was a wetter more vegetated place than it is now, The Sahara desert was smaller. Anyway if we really want to stop global warming we will have to block some of the sunlight from reaching Earth and that means we have to become wealthy enough to go into space in a major way, we shouldn't undertake policies that curb economic growth if we want to stop global warming. Obama's environmental policies has kept our economy on a low growth trajectory at an annual rate of 1.6% over the past 8 years. I think crippling industry through overregulation of carbon emissions is a bad idea! We need to get wealthy as quickly as possible if we are to stop global warming! Also the Sun's out put varies, we need to regulate the amount of light reaching Earth if we are to act as a thermostat!

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