Global Warming Opens Up Antarctic Waterways

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by SV THIRD DAY

You responded

It was that knee-jerk Canadian politeness thing. It slipped out. Sorry.

(oops, dropped another one)


page 113 !!! Yessss.

[SailOar]

I’d like to take a crack at commenting on these questions. However, I have no expertise in either Climate Change research or Climate Change policy making, so maybe you’ll want to consider my responses as those of the Village Idiot.

Originally Posted by Reefmagnet

Thank you for coming out of the closet.

Here's some questions for you.

Why has the terms "climate change" and "anthropogenic global warming" been melded in recent times to mean the same thing. Wouldn't a scientist oppose this misrepresentation of the "climate change" phrase?

In addition to Leki’s response I would add that according to the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change’s (IPCC) website it was established in 1988 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Since the “CC” in IPCC stands for Climate Change I think it safe to assume that at least for the past 30 years (which is long before AGW became a public hot potato) the phrases “Climate Change” and “Anthropogenic Global Warming” have often been used synonymously. It’s only recently that some right-wing commentators have tried to make a tempest in a teapot – and apparently have succeeded among the less discerning members of the populace.

What's your opinion on the push to implement far reaching world wide economic policies based on the fact that "There are still many "needs work" signs taped up all over"?

The urgency is driven by the time-sensitive nature of the problem and by the potential for serious consequences if we maintain business as usual. Climate is a like a huge ship, in that it takes a very long time to get moving in a particular direction, and a very long time to slow down. Since, by most accounts, the ill effects of Climate Change are accelerating, the longer we wait to alter human actions, the more costly it will be when we actually get started.

Both business leaders, military leaders, and political leaders regularly have to make consequential decisions with less than complete knowledge. That means that, necessarily, decisions made will never be optimal. Most honest commentators feel that we have enough knowledge to at least start making good, though probably not optimal, decisions. The upcoming international climate change meetings in Paris, this December, have the possibility for developing significant international agreements. We’ll see…

Would all of your colleagues still have a job if anthropogenic global warming was deemed not to be a problem of the severity as currently promoted?

Until the last year or so public support for the idea of AGW was well below 50%. Still is in the Republican-controlled Congress. A number of funding bills for various governmental departments contain language expressly forbidding use of monies for climate change research. Fortunately, both the current administration and the folks who make decisions regarding science research funding have felt that Climate Change research was important, in spite of public and Congressional resistance.

But, yes, I agree with you that there would likely be less funding for AGW research if those in charge of funding were not persuaded that AGW wasn’t a real and present concern. If Congress ever becomes convinced that AGW is a serious concern I would imagine that funding levels will increase substantially from current levels.

Why do you think the AGW theory issue is such a derisive issue whereas, for example, the theory of relativity is not?

I assume you meant “divisive” not “derisive”, though that may have just been a Freudian slip on your part

I see three groups of people who have opposed the idea of AGW. These three groups have some overlap.

1) People who may lose their incomes if we reduce our use of fossil fuels. (Coal miners, oil drillers, etc)

2) Those who are afraid that their standard of living will decrease if we reduce our use of fossil fuels. (That could be any of us, but poorer people will generally have more reason for concern than wealthier people. However, poorer people generally will suffer more because of climate change than wealthier people will.)

3) Those who for philosophical/religious reasons believe either that mankind is too puny to adversely affect the world, or else believe that God is in direct control of nature such that nothing happens unless He okay’s it, and when He okay’s it nothing we humans can do can stop it from happening. In the US this group is heavily represented by Conservative-Fundamentalist Christians, many of whom believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, that species have not changed over time, and who believe that the scientific enterprise is, perhaps unwittingly, a tool of the Devil.

What is your opinion of the possibility that many of the "bad" outcomes of AGW would be negated by "good" outcomes? Has there been any published analysis of this?

A quick Internet search shows that many sites which discuss outcomes of AGW also list a FEW potentially beneficial effects of a warming climate. But I’ve not seen anywhere that concludes that the good outweighs the bad.

Intuitively, I can think of two reasons for that. First, “change” is almost always disruptive, even if it is generally a “good” change. People (and other organisms) often like what they are familiar with, and often prefer not to venture into the unknown unless there is a very compelling reason.

Second, human civilization has developed over the past 10,000 years. During that time temperatures (and CO2 levels) have remained relatively uniform – as demonstrated in various charts already posted in this thread. We are now seeing both temperature records and CO2-level records being broken, levels that were last seen hundreds of thousands, and even millions, of years ago. This does not seem like a roadmap to Utopia.

National Climate Assessment

NASA - The current and future consequences of global change

[EPA: Climate Impacts on Agriculture and Food Supply

Your favorite, Skeptical Science

Wikipedia: Climate Change and Agriculture, effects of elevated CO2 on crops


NOAA Fisheries: New Report Summarizes Climate Change Impacts on U.S. Oceans, Marine Resources

Has warming slowed since 1998 or hasn't it? What was actual average global temperature in 1998 vs 2014? How about 1934 vs 2014 and 1934 vs 1998, using both raw and homogenised data?

I think that Leki answered your question by implying that more heat is being received by Earth than is being radiated out.

Here: http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1811736

And here: http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1779411

Some of the heat goes into raising air temperatures, which is what we humans most easily notice. Other heat goes into creating more water vapor, or greater wind speeds. And yet other heat goes into raising ocean temps, which we know even less about.

It wasn’t until the early 2000s that the international Argo project deployed many thousands of floats world-wide, to measure temperature, density and salinity not only at the ocean surface, but also at 1,000 meter and 2,000 meter depths. This is starting to give oceanographers a better understanding of ocean currents, and also where heat is going.

My perception is that temperature charts made during the early 2000’s show a much flatter temperature “hiatus” than those made more recently. I’m guessing that is because the Argo project has been able to demonstrate that much of the heat that was thought to be going into heating the atmosphere was instead heating the deep ocean due to natural cyclical events such as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). I’d be curious of Leki could corroborate this idea.

What is the present rate of average global annual sea level rise?

Current sea level rise | Wikipedia

Current sea level rise is about 3 mm/year worldwide. According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), "this is a significantly larger rate than the sea-level rise averaged over the last several thousand years", and the rate may be increasing.[2] Sea level rises can considerably influence human populations in coastal and island regions[3] and natural environments like marine ecosystems.[4]

Between 1870 and 2004, global average sea levels rose a total of 195 mm (7.7 in), and 1.46 mm (0.057 in) per year.[5] From 1950 to 2009, measurements show an average annual rise in sea level of 1.7 ± 0.3 mm per year, with satellite data showing a rise of 3.3 ± 0.4 mm per year from 1993 to 2009,[6] The reason for recent increase is unclear, perhaps owing to decadal variation.[7] It is unclear whether the increased rate reflects an increase in the underlying long-term trend

And finally as a scientist, what quantified effects on "climate change" do you think there would be if every country immediately implemented proposed carbon reduction policies?

A good question. In a previous post I posted links to various organizations that have made estimates of how much it might cost to deal with AGW.

And totally non related, but a very interesting experiment on human behavior are the Asch Conformity Experiments whereby it was demonstrated that people in a group's opinions could be changed as a result of group consensus, even if that consensus was wrong.

Asch conformity experiments - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This "flaw" in human behaviour is probably the mechanism that is exploited to advantage in marketing and propaganda campaigns. For example the "97% Concensus" (http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/); the consensus project) which is easily proved to be faulty, even by non-scientific types.

It is interesting that you should bring up this topic, since by many measures AGW-deniers tend to be the “conformists” with “distorted judgment”, while the scientific community tends to be the “independents” who report with “confidence” the correct answer in spite of peer pressure to the contrary.

At least until recently it has been the scientists who have had their good name and reputation drug through the mud both in the court of public opinion and in the halls of Congress, while fundamental Christians smugly repeat the pap they hear from false prophets in their pulpits or from smack-down talk show hosts on Fox News.

[Canibul]

The world is full of gullible idiots. hey, lets raise taxes so we can fund more studies of why the earth gets warm and why it has ice ages!! yeah right. Maybe it's time to get back to studying why the sky gets light in the morning and dark every night. What a puzzling thing to have happening all these millions of years...lkinda like ice ages and warming periods. Duh. Anyone who can't think their own way thorough that one deserves to pay for the study. I don't think the rest of us should have to pay to fund the idiots. No matter what the negative-name-calling-du-jour might be.

[LakeSuperior]

Originally Posted by SailOar

.

It is interesting that you should bring up this topic, since by many measures AGW-deniers tend to be the “conformists” with “distorted judgment”, while the scientific community tends to be the “independents” who report with “confidence” the correct answer in spite of peer pressure to the contrary.

At least until recently it has been the scientists who have had their good name and reputation drug through the mud both in the court of public opinion and in the halls of Congress, while fundamental Christians smugly repeat the pap they hear from false prophets in their pulpits or from smack-down talk show hosts on Fox News.

Do some research on the cold fusion debacle that I mentioned a month or so ago on this thread. See how GTRI, Stanford Research Institute, and others all gave big press releases reporting cold fusion results. Clearly this was all retracted later with some embarrassment. Tell us about reputations of scientists? They are people too with biases and emotions. It's all about the money and prestige for some especially if you have a big lab to support.

The difference with AGW is the measurement and causes and effects are subtle and are confounded by many other complicated processes. Proof is difficult. Trying to sort natural variations from human contributions. Think of Vikings living and farming on Greenland for 500 years.

However, the burden of proof is on the science and they are not cutting the mustard to date IMHO. Ignore the AGW prophets and cultists as they are hysterical.

[SailOar]

Originally Posted by LakeSuperior

Do some research on the cold fusion debacle that I mentioned a month or so ago on this thread. See how GTRI, Stanford Research Institute, and others all gave big press releases reporting cold fusion results. Clearly this was all retracted later with some embarrassment. Tell us about reputations of scientists? They are people too with biases and emotions. It's all about the money and prestige for some especially if you have a big lab to support.

The difference with AGW is the measurement and causes and effects are subtle and are confounded by many other complicated processes. Proof is difficult. Trying to sort natural variations from human contributions. Think of Vikings living and farming on Greenland for 500 years.

However, the burden of proof is on the science and they are not cutting the mustard to date IMHO. Ignore the AGW prophets and cultists as they are hysterical.

Of course you are correct that scientists are humans, and as such are subject to all the foibles of the human race. And you are also correct that the scientific community has at times made some notable blunders.

A big difference, IMO, between the scientific community and society at large is that:

a) The scientific process is designed to check and counter-check for the biases that individual scientists inevitably have. Leki alluded to that in his post. As a result, when science does make a mistake it typically self-corrects fairly fast, as it did with the cold-fusion example you gave. The scientific process is by far the most robust and reliable system of information-gathering that we humans have managed to come up with. And if you adhere to the scientific process it doesn't matter if you are male or female, black or white, or speak English or Swahili, your research is just as good as the next persons (usually...ideally...mostly).

b) On the other hand, society at large, and religion in particular, seems not to have a very robust self-correcting process at all. As an example consider all the thousands of Christian denominations there are throughout the world (to say nothing of all the other religious faiths and sub-faiths). They all claim to be reading the same book and worshiping the same God, yet they have widely differing beliefs, many of which are mutually incompatible. So even though they've had 2,000 years to reach mutual agreement, they have totally failed. Yet, as a broad group, Christian Fundamentalists seem to know more about climate science than do climate scientists themselves.

[SV THIRD DAY]

Originally Posted by SailOar

I have no expertise in either Climate Change research or Climate Change policy making, so maybe you’ll want to consider my responses as those of the Village Idiot..

Done at your request.

[Eder]

Lets leave our tar sands out of this debate...more bs has been written about them by people that have never been up here than about global warming!

[SV THIRD DAY]

Originally Posted by Eder

Lets leave our tar sands out of this debate...more bs has been written about them by people that have never been up here than about global warming!

We can't leave that dirty nasty source of CO2 out because it's killing the baby fur seals. How do you guys up in Canada even sleep at night knowing the environmental carnage your evil nasty tar sands are causing this Planet? It's a War Crime I say...a War Crime. Good thing our King Obama turned your Blood Oil Down...ha ha ah

[LakeSuperior]

Originally Posted by SailOar

a) The scientific process is designed to check and counter-check for the biases that individual scientists inevitably have. Leki alluded to that in his post. As a result, when science does make a mistake it typically self-corrects fairly fast, as it did with the cold-fusion example you gave. The scientific process is by far the most robust and reliable system of information-gathering that we humans have managed to come up with. And if you adhere to the scientific process it doesn't matter if you are male or female, black or white, or speak English or Swahili, your research is just as good as the next persons (usually...ideally...mostly).

Agree completely with the above. In fact, the cold fusion self correction was rapid...on the order of months. With AGW it will be at least decades and perhaps up to a century before scientist will really know if they are correct.

[capngeo]

I sure can't wait for it to warm up enough up North that you guys can go sailing instead of debating this BS!

[SailOar]

Originally Posted by SailOar
I have no expertise in either Climate Change research or Climate Change policy making, so maybe you’ll want to consider my responses as those of the Village Idiot..

Originally Posted by SV THIRD DAY

Done at your request.

apocryphally attributed to Poe

[Reefmagnet]

Originally Posted by SailOar

I’d like to take a crack at commenting on these questions. However, I have no expertise in either Climate Change research or Climate Change policy making, so maybe you’ll want to consider my responses as those of the Village Idiot.


In addition to Leki’s response I would add that according to the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change’s (IPCC) website it was established in 1988 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Since the “CC” in IPCC stands for Climate Change I think it safe to assume that at least for the past 30 years (which is long before AGW became a public hot potato) the phrases “Climate Change” and “Anthropogenic Global Warming” have often been used synonymously. It’s only recently that some right-wing commentators have tried to make a tempest in a teapot – and apparently have succeeded among the less discerning members of the populace.

The urgency is driven by the time-sensitive nature of the problem and by the potential for serious consequences if we maintain business as usual. Climate is a like a huge ship, in that it takes a very long time to get moving in a particular direction, and a very long time to slow down. Since, by most accounts, the ill effects of Climate Change are accelerating, the longer we wait to alter human actions, the more costly it will be when we actually get started.

Both business leaders, military leaders, and political leaders regularly have to make consequential decisions with less than complete knowledge. That means that, necessarily, decisions made will never be optimal. Most honest commentators feel that we have enough knowledge to at least start making good, though probably not optimal, decisions. The upcoming international climate change meetings in Paris, this December, have the possibility for developing significant international agreements. We’ll see…

Until the last year or so public support for the idea of AGW was well below 50%. Still is in the Republican-controlled Congress. A number of funding bills for various governmental departments contain language expressly forbidding use of monies for climate change research. Fortunately, both the current administration and the folks who make decisions regarding science research funding have felt that Climate Change research was important, in spite of public and Congressional resistance.

But, yes, I agree with you that there would likely be less funding for AGW research if those in charge of funding were not persuaded that AGW wasn’t a real and present concern. If Congress ever becomes convinced that AGW is a serious concern I would imagine that funding levels will increase substantially from current levels.

I assume you meant “divisive” not “derisive”, though that may have just been a Freudian slip on your part

I see three groups of people who have opposed the idea of AGW. These three groups have some overlap.

1) People who may lose their incomes if we reduce our use of fossil fuels. (Coal miners, oil drillers, etc)

2) Those who are afraid that their standard of living will decrease if we reduce our use of fossil fuels. (That could be any of us, but poorer people will generally have more reason for concern than wealthier people. However, poorer people generally will suffer more because of climate change than wealthier people will.)

3) Those who for philosophical/religious reasons believe either that mankind is too puny to adversely affect the world, or else believe that God is in direct control of nature such that nothing happens unless He okay’s it, and when He okay’s it nothing we humans can do can stop it from happening. In the US this group is heavily represented by Conservative-Fundamentalist Christians, many of whom believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, that species have not changed over time, and who believe that the scientific enterprise is, perhaps unwittingly, a tool of the Devil.


A quick Internet search shows that many sites which discuss outcomes of AGW also list a FEW potentially beneficial effects of a warming climate. But I’ve not seen anywhere that concludes that the good outweighs the bad.

Intuitively, I can think of two reasons for that. First, “change” is almost always disruptive, even if it is generally a “good” change. People (and other organisms) often like what they are familiar with, and often prefer not to venture into the unknown unless there is a very compelling reason.

Second, human civilization has developed over the past 10,000 years. During that time temperatures (and CO2 levels) have remained relatively uniform – as demonstrated in various charts already posted in this thread. We are now seeing both temperature records and CO2-level records being broken, levels that were last seen hundreds of thousands, and even millions, of years ago. This does not seem like a roadmap to Utopia.

National Climate Assessment

NASA - The current and future consequences of global change

[EPA: Climate Impacts on Agriculture and Food Supply

Your favorite, Skeptical Science

Wikipedia: Climate Change and Agriculture, effects of elevated CO2 on crops


NOAA Fisheries: New Report Summarizes Climate Change Impacts on U.S. Oceans, Marine Resources


I think that Leki answered your question by implying that more heat is being received by Earth than is being radiated out.

Here: http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1811736

And here: http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1779411

Some of the heat goes into raising air temperatures, which is what we humans most easily notice. Other heat goes into creating more water vapor, or greater wind speeds. And yet other heat goes into raising ocean temps, which we know even less about.

It wasn’t until the early 2000s that the international Argo project deployed many thousands of floats world-wide, to measure temperature, density and salinity not only at the ocean surface, but also at 1,000 meter and 2,000 meter depths. This is starting to give oceanographers a better understanding of ocean currents, and also where heat is going.

My perception is that temperature charts made during the early 2000’s show a much flatter temperature “hiatus” than those made more recently. I’m guessing that is because the Argo project has been able to demonstrate that much of the heat that was thought to be going into heating the atmosphere was instead heating the deep ocean due to natural cyclical events such as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). I’d be curious of Leki could corroborate this idea.
Current sea level rise | Wikipedia

Current sea level rise is about 3 mm/year worldwide. According to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), "this is a significantly larger rate than the sea-level rise averaged over the last several thousand years", and the rate may be increasing.[2] Sea level rises can considerably influence human populations in coastal and island regions[3] and natural environments like marine ecosystems.[4]

Between 1870 and 2004, global average sea levels rose a total of 195 mm (7.7 in), and 1.46 mm (0.057 in) per year.[5] From 1950 to 2009, measurements show an average annual rise in sea level of 1.7 ± 0.3 mm per year, with satellite data showing a rise of 3.3 ± 0.4 mm per year from 1993 to 2009,[6] The reason for recent increase is unclear, perhaps owing to decadal variation.[7] It is unclear whether the increased rate reflects an increase in the underlying long-term trend

A good question. In a previous post I posted links to various organizations that have made estimates of how much it might cost to deal with AGW.

It is interesting that you should bring up this topic, since by many measures AGW-deniers tend to be the “conformists” with “distorted judgment”, while the scientific community tends to be the “independents” who report with “confidence” the correct answer in spite of peer pressure to the contrary.

At least until recently it has been the scientists who have had their good name and reputation drug through the mud both in the court of public opinion and in the halls of Congress, while fundamental Christians smugly repeat the pap they hear from false prophets in their pulpits or from smack-down talk show hosts on Fox News.

Thanks for your opinion. You might be surprised to know I actually agree on quite a bit of what you have said.

The one issue I would have liked Leik to address was sea level rise. I know the figure is currently 3.3 mm per year (or 2.2 mm, depending on who you read) BUT, for the life of me I can see no reason for this increase (nor can the boffins, as your quote implies) EXCEPT for the fact that it correlates with the introduction of satellite readings. Further investigation of the accuracy of these satellites reveals that their accuracy isn't actually that good. Something in the order or 30 to 40 mm if I recall correctly. I was hoping Liek could comment on this.

On the Asch Conformity thing. Perhaps one of the most extreme demonstrations of Asch Conformity was at Jonestown in 1978. The same event also lead to the oft used "drinking the Kool-aid" reference. Even I've made this inference to the alarmists at times!

Anyway, just to reinforce my point that Newtons Third Law applies equally to AGW theory, here's an interesting totally random comparison I dug up today. On Mountain Pine Beetles, of all things!

The alarmist perspective:
Global Warming and Oddball Winter Weather - National Wildlife Federation

Many nasty pests are expanding further north or are no longer being kept in check by frosts or sufficiently cold temperatures.
The ticks responsible for carrying Lyme disease are one example of projected range expansion as winters become milder

Millions of acres of pine forests across the Western United States, Alaska, and Canada have been decimated by pine bark beetle infestations in recent years. Higher temperatures have enhanced winter survival of the beetle larvae.

The how it really is perpsective:
Mountain Pine Beetle

Control
Natural controls of mountain pine beetle include woodpeckers and insects such as clerid beetles that feed on adults and larvae under the bark. However, during outbreaks these natural controls often fail to prevent additional attacks.

Extreme cold temperatures also can reduce MPB populations. For winter mortality to be a significant factor, a severe freeze is necessary while the insect is in its most vulnerable stage; i.e., in the fall before the larvae have metabolized glycerols, or in late spring when the insect is molting into the pupal stage. For freezing temperatures to affect a large number of larvae during the middle of winter, temperatures of at least 30 degrees below zero (Fahrenheit) must be sustained for at least five days.

[Lake-Effect]

Originally Posted by LakeSuperior

Do some research on the cold fusion debacle that I mentioned a month or so ago on this thread. See how GTRI, Stanford Research Institute, and others all gave big press releases reporting cold fusion results. Clearly this was all retracted later with some embarrassment. Tell us about reputations of scientists? They are people too with biases and emotions. It's all about the money and prestige for some especially if you have a big lab to support.

Your recollection of that discussion is different from mine. We already know there were some breathless news stories, some good scientific followup and the cold fusion hype was quickly ... 'cooled'. The scientific process worked.

The difference with AGW is the measurement and causes and effects are subtle and are confounded by many other complicated processes. Proof is difficult. Trying to sort natural variations from human contributions. Think of Vikings living and farming on Greenland for 500 years.

However, the burden of proof is on the science and they are not cutting the mustard to date IMHO.

The only answer... is to keep studying, not sh!tting on those doing the studying.

Ignore the AGW prophets and cultists as they are hysterical.

And that of course was both useful and instructive.

[jtsailjt]

Originally Posted by Lake-Effect

And California is rolling into a record drought. I wonder how they feel about it.

I'm sure that Californians, along with many others living in places that are already quite warm don't want to see any warming, but many others, such as myself living in the north, would love to see some warming. Maybe then, some of those Californians who don't like living without much fresh water would pack up and move to Maine, where clean, fresh water is everywhere. The point is that AGW alarmists tend to only focus on people who might be hurt by it and never even bring up the advantages of warming to other people in other places. The climate is changing, just as it always has, and the best thing any of us can do is to adapt to it, just as successful species always have.

[sailorchic34]

Originally Posted by jtsailjt

I'm sure that Californians, along with many others living in places that are already quite warm don't want to see any warming, but many others, such as myself living in the north, would love to see some warming.

Interestingly enough the rainfall, at least in northern Cali this year was not bad at about 70%-84% of a wet year. lake water levels are much better this year then the last few years. Oh not at capacity, but higher then last year at this time. Even for Oreville.

The drought really was from 3 years ago where it did not rain all that much as in almost nothing for a year. Last year and this year were close to normal rainfall, least for the coastal ranges in the north bay. That is 75-85% of normal. so not quite as bad as the news would make it. Snow was way down, but that goes to the southern folks anyway as they live in in very dry country.

Myself I would not mind a few more degrees of warmth in northern California as it can be chilly too. Gee I have heat on now, though ok I'm in shorts too.