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Normal climate fluctuations can take place in short time periods, like 10 to 30 years. The climate is a beasty animal and we are poking it with sticks. Don't be surprised if it bites you on your ass in the next 30 years.Originally Posted by randerizer
Look, randerizer, the reason that we are having this argument has nothing to do with science and everything to do with the fact that you just don't like the political or economic implications of the science. If you didn't like the political implications of quantum field theory, you would be challenging it too. However, if you are like most people, you are willing to accept scientific authority to a large extent as long as it doesn't conflict with strongly-held religious or political beliefs or economic self-interest. If it does, you adopt a new higher standard of having to have the scientists convince you that they are right even without any real attempt to obtain the background to understand their evidence and arguments.
OK, Mr. Clueless, ignore what the world's leading climate scientists are telling you. Listen to the crack-pots and scientists turned hacks. In 30 years you will be singing a different tune.
Gonzo, check out this site. You might like it.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/forcing.html
People that believe in AGW make me laugh. By the way, I have some property that you and AltaDawg might be interested in. It is in the Arizona desert, but with the rising sea levels caused by AGW it will be beach-front property in the very near future. It is yours for a very reasonable 100k per acre. I also have a few bottles of Kabbalah water that will heal all your ailments. I will sell it to you for a very reasonable 100 bucks a bottle.
I know that. But that doesn't mean he has been "following" it. Altadawg's comment seemed out of place considering what we had been discussing for the previous 20 posts or so.
No doubt, very interesting. I just thought it might be interesting as well to add to the debate that not all effects of global warming are bad. I know that some will say we are headed to destruction, but during this period and in that region a least the effects did have some positives.
I agree. Unfortunately, the continued rise of CO2, while not objectionable now, is getting out of our control. in short, when that beasty creature called climate changes from sleeping to growling, there won't be much we can do.:bigcry:
I have previoulsy used numbers like 7.5 gigatons of CO2 dumped into the atmosphere on a yearly basis. That's an old number from 1997. Today. the number is probably closer to 9 or 10 gigatons. By 2020, it could well be 14 or 15 gigatons a year. Not only that, but there is a big risk that the portion of the CO2 released by burning fossil fuels that is current going into the biota might stop or slow down, thereby increasing the amount going into the atmosphere.
We are moving into uncharted coastal waters. WE know that the average global temperature is going to rise for the rest of this century and the next, but how the climate is going to handle that increased temperature is unknown.
If we knew our current climate would remain the same but only warmer, that wouldn't be so bad but we don't know that. There could be major shifts in rainfall amounts and temperatures on a regional basis.
I'm late to reply in this, but I'll say one more post and then hopefully not come back to this thread.
First, as I mentioned before, I was not a skeptic, but only indifferent at the start of this discussion. I had not really taken the time to look at the evidence presented in support of the global warming theories that have gained so much "consensus" support in the past 10 years. I have always understood the politics of science, particularly the values of "threat construction" for the gaining and maintenance of funding/job security. But I have also known that there is this "consensus" of "experts" who state that global warming is occuring, that this global warming is the result of human activities, and that this global warming threatens our society.
But to rely on "consensus" alone is the worst scientific reasoning I've ever been heard. I believe that Newton, Galileo, etc. had to fight against a "scientific consensus" as well. Who was right in the end? More recently, I have also been challenged in my own research endeavors by experts (Nobel Laureates, etc.) who state absolutely that X result will happen if Y stimulus is applied. But no matter how many times I do the experiment X does not happen. Why? Because the "experts" jumped to a conclusion without considering Z. I know you are not interested in polymer physics, which is the field in which the particular case has come up, but anyone with any experience in experimental work should be able to relate similar stories. Anyway, my point is that "experts" are certainly not infallible, even if they are being faithful to their scientific pursuits. And the fact that many "experts" are all wrong is certainly not unheard of in our world. I like to exercise my own rationality to assess the validity of scientific theories.
I understand the concepts involved in the greenhouse effect, and I believe that science is fairly valid. I have yet to see solid evidence that a relatively small change in the total atmospheric concentration of a relatively small contributor to the overall greenhouse effect is enough to push our temperatures to the point that X,Y, and Z happen. I'm not going to say that it WON'T happen, but I'm not convinced, and my natural inclination is to say it is unlikely. But you see, I am not the kind of scientist that relies on "models" or "predictions". Very few Ph.D. level scientists are both experimentalists and theoretical modelers. I'd say with 99% certainty that NO scientist is at the top of his or her field in BOTH areas. If I see experiments on a small scale that reasonably approximate our natural system, I'd be much more convinced. Of course, if you've been reading ANY of my posts, you'd understand that this is not where I am arguing the global warming science. Others are, but for the most part, I'm generally silent on this issue.
But I do have a strong background in the concept of mass balances (which relates to the carbon cycle), thermodynamics of vapor-liquid, solid-liquid, etc., mass transfer, etc.. So I try to apply my areas of "expertise" to a limited but very important piece of global warming data. I do not see ANY answers in the scientific communities to the questions posed in this area. I see a plethora of EXPERIMENTS run by others demonstrating that (1) water flows even in deep ice sheets, and that (2) these water flows contribute to transport of various metals, organics, and gases OUT of the ice sheets. Despite these FACTS, global warming theorists continue to treat the concentrations of CO2 determined from ice core samples as ABSOLUTE rather than RELATIVE concentrations. RELATIVE concentrations would enable scientists to better understand the carbon cycle (which Salty obviously makes no effort to do). ABSOLUTE concentrations would enable one to compare previous times with our current CO2 levels. Why has this knowledge, which is very much supported by THEORY and EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS, not been considered by the global warming theory? I believe the 2 reasons why it hasn't are that (1) most of the "experts" in the field are modellers, not experimentalists, so they don't catch the significance of the questions posed and (2) politically and socially, the "experts" already have so much at stake in their pursuits that they are not willing to abandon something so critical to the rest of their case.
For what it's worth, I think all politicians are silly. But I do not think that the democrats that push global warming theory are any worse than the republicans push on the war. I have no plan to work in big oil and do not feel that my long-term economic self-interest is any more damaged by the politics of global warming than the economic self-interest of all of us.
Last edited by randerizer; 02-19-2007 at 09:45 AM.
Thanks for that long post. Just 2 brief comments. First, ice core readings are not necessary for concluding that rising atmospheric co2 levels will lead to increase average global temperatures. Second, the amount of CO2 we are dumping in the atmosphere is not a "relatively small change in the total atmospheric concentration of a relatively small contributor to the overall greenhouse effect." It's a big increase and its getting bigger. CO2 does not degrade in the environment by chemical or physical processes.
Keep an open mind and keep reading the latest science on the subject.
you mean like the chemical process by which co2 is converted to o2 and plant mass? i can't believe all this time i have been falling for the myth of photosynthesis!
or by dissolution into water and forming carbonic acid?
good point. i was just thinking about the CO2 that doesn't go into photosynthesis.
But isn't it true that even in photosynthesis the CO2 is fixed into the wood and then later when the wood burns or decomposes the CO2 is released back into the atmosphere?
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