Global Warming - How Valid and Serious?

[2020hindsight]

1. Hey guys... some points to stir the pot a little.

2. ...look at these issues on a geological time scale then it appears quite different.

3. .... The media loves to sensationalize things and although sea levels have been predicted to rise by up to 10 meters, if we look a little further back in history at the Cretaceous period (144 – 65 million years ago) sea levels were 170 meters higher than today.

4. ......I think that even if humans do have some impact on the earths climate it has run its course in cycles for many millions of years before this and to try and sustain ourselves in a temperature range or sea level of what we “perceive” to be habitable is crazy. That is like trying to stop earthquakes and volcanoes from happening.

5. Thought I might add this for a balanced wholistic approach. Just a little food for thought.

dj
Summary ;
1. stir indeed m8 lol

2. 145 million years ago to 65 million years ago - pretty difficult to compare Cretaceous and now ,
True there was (slightly) higher temp (5 deg) and (much) higher sea levels – but this needs qualification. (average ocean depth was damn all)

3. sensationalise ?
lol - you saying we might go back to the Cretaceous ? - lol - any comparison is pretty "strange" mate. eg Antarctica Australia and Africa were still joined lol. :eek3:

Also there was a massive amount of luxuriant flora – and no parking lots, nor roads
Only a few peaks of (now) Scotland were then land. Average depth of the ocean was much less. - absolutely no relevance to todays ocean floor or ocean shape.

4. The temperature then was only (about) 5 degrees hotter – about the same as IPCC scenario A1F1

5. balanced? - lol - no way we're going back to the dinosaurs ! - eg Johnny Howard

http://www.bbm.me.uk/portsdown/PH_130_Envmnt.htm

The world during the Cretaceous looked very different. Its continental arrangement was different, as was the 'flora and fauna' that survived in a very different climate.
The following discussion covers:
• The Appearance of the World
• The High Sea Level
• Climate and the High Temperature
The Appearance of the World
From space, the Cretaceous Earth looked markedly different. Although the continental arrangement was beginning to resemble that of today, an equatorial-seaway existed around the globe, dividing the land mass into Northern, and Southern, continents. Within this arrangement of continental separation by an oft-narrow seaway, Africa was still welded to South America, Antarctica and Australia were still attached to Africa, and North America and Eurasia was one.

Both the Atlantic and Indian Oceans were young and small, the Pacific = the "super-ocean"
Furthermore; there was little emergent land, little (or no) ice at the poles, and equatorial land was arid - unlike today's equatorial rainforests.

The biota was a mixture of the exotic and familiar - luxuriant green forests of now-extinct trees flourished within the Arctic Circle and dinosaurs roamed. However; flowering plants (angiosperms) were making their mark, and many marine animals, such as the crustaceans and crocodiles of the time, closely resemble those that thrive today.

The High Sea Level
Perhaps the most significant factor of the Cretaceous world was the very high sea levels. The global sea level was at its highest ever during the Cretaceous (though was very high in the preceding Jurassic, too), peaking during the Late Cretaceous around [86]Ma ago. Various estimates have suggested height increases (above today's level) of many 100's metres, and although it is now believed that many of these estimates are excessive, it is certain that the eustatic (global) sea level was well over 200m higher during the Cretaceous than it is today.
During the peak of the high sea levels, only isolated areas of the Highlands of Scotland, and possibly Wales, in the United Kingdom, were land. The rest of our island was under the warm, shallow, tropical sea that flooded much of the Eurasian continent.

…However; current estimates suggest that if all land ice were to melt (following our attempts to create another Greenhouse world), the sea levels would rise by 'only' about [80m]; so clearly other factors that affected the sea level were also at play in the Cretaceous.
The higher temperatures thus led to both more water in the oceans (dam all polar ice) , and a given mass of water occupying a greater volume; but even these could not account for the very high levels of water, for which a third explanation is required.

The third factor is the most important, and relates to tectonic processes, rather than atmospheric conditions.
During the Cretaceous, the great landmass of Pangea was breaking up,
… These new oceans were all shallow (as they resulted from land splitting apart), …

Thus, due to
• Tectonic activity and the geography of the Earth at the time reducing the capacity of the numerous but shallow ocean basins,
• The lack of polar ice because of a warmer climate, and
• thermal expansion of water in that warmer climate,
much oceanic water spilled out of the ocean basins to flood the adjacent shallow continental land.

Climate and the High Temperature
The higher temperature of the Cretaceous has already been referred to. Estimates suggest that at the beginning of the Cretaceous, the Global Mean Surface Temperature (GMST) was around 20 °C (about 5 ° hotter than today's value of 15 °C), and was about the same at the period's end - but peaked to a high of 25 °C in the Upper Cretaceous.

These high temperatures were due to the much higher level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere at the time - which has been suggested as being 4 times as much as is in our air today.
The Cretaceous was thus an intense "Greenhouse world", and we have a long way to go before reaching those conditions.

 

[2020hindsight]

PS The end of the Cretaceous spelt the chance for early man to evolve -

PS at least early man was intelligent enough not to stuff up the climate

https://www.aussiestockforums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=201409&highlight=dinosaur#post201409

PS how lucky is man that there was an asteroid hit 65 million years ago

this heavenly asteroid hit
then the dinosaur decline occurred
left the ones up the front in the ****
then the back of the pack were in-terred
but the plus in that "dino-goodbye"
was that non-dinosaurs could emerge
heck we'd just be a glint in god’s eye !!!
if the dinosaur’s hadn’t been purged

from "the handful" rose serious mammals
and from serious mammals rose man…..
would the wise men who rode on those camels
agree - that’s a "bumpy old plan"
from there black men and white men and tamels
sprang from adam and eve and suzanne
by the skin of our teethy enamels -
hey that’s random – that’s luck and that’s Man

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geologic_timescale

 

[Pat]

I understand the complete stupidity brought about by this GW debate.
For example: http://www.news.com.au/business/money/story/0,25479,24033075-5017313,00.htmlIt's an excuse for politians to give more of there crap.

 

[dj_420]

Hahaha

All I am saying is that we maybe witnessing some small fluctuations in cycles on earth rather than an impending catastrophe the pollies would have us believe. And everytime they do a "study" on climate change they will compare statistics from the last 50 000 years, the cycles last a lot longer than that.

A good article against global warming here, might be warned though, gets pretty technical in the climate modelling and lingo.

http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/200807/monckton.cfm

For those who cant be bothered reading or trying to dechipher the article it states that the IPCC have some fundamental flaws in the climate models they have presented, which leads to an exagerated statistics on future climate change. The IPCC presentations have overstatedthe ffects of feedback systems in the earths climate, feedback systems can be negative and positive.

A positive feedback system is one which effects amplify the original impact, like the ice albedo effect, more ice means higher reflectivity (albedo) which means lower regional temperatures which means move ice and so on.

A negative feedback system is one which effects reduce the original impact, a good example here is a thermostat in a house, increase in temperature cause the thermostat to switch the heater off and lets it cool down again.

So anyway, the article states that the IPCC have overstated or over estimated the feedback effects that global warming could cause.

 

[2020hindsight]

All I am saying is that we maybe witnessing some small fluctuations in cycles on earth rather than an impending catastrophe the pollies would have us believe. And everytime they do a "study" on climate change they will compare statistics from the last 50 000 years, the cycles last a lot longer than that.

small fluctuations ???
I beg to differ mate.

 

[jtb]

Hey guys

I have not posted on this thread yet, but would like to add some points to stir the pot a little.

All this attention has been brought about by apparent global warming. But if we begin to look at these issues on a geological time scale then it appears quite different. In the past the earth used to be a lot hotter, and it is only in recent times (in a geological sense) that the earth has begun to cool down.

We are technically still in an ice age, this is because there is still substantial ice on the poles. Currently we are in an interglacial period which by definition is a warmer period within an ice age.

If you look at the nuts and bolts of it, it is identified that glacial periods (colder periods of an ice age) are characterized by colder drier climates, and interglacial are characterized by warmer wetter climates. Could it not be simple fluctuations in the earth’s climate that is continuing today as it has for the past 4.5 billion years? We would probably see just as much media hype if the earth was coming out of an interglacial and heading for a glacial period, whereby sea levels fall and the continents dry up as more and more freshwater is locked away in ice sheets.

The media loves to sensationalize things and although sea levels have been predicted to rise by up to 10 meters, if we look a little further back in history at the Cretaceous period (144 – 65 million years ago) sea levels were 170 meters higher than today.

My point is that the time on earth that humans have been around (300 thousand years) is merely a blip on the geologic time scale. During the time of humans we have seen three glacial periods and two interglacial, of which the temperature was warmer than it is today. I think that even if humans do have some impact on the earths climate it has run its course in cycles for many millions of years before this and to try and sustain ourselves in a temperature range or sea level of what we “perceive” to be habitable is crazy. That is like trying to stop earthquakes and volcanoes from happening.

Thought I might add this for a balanced wholistic approach. Just a little food for thought.

Well said DJ,

If we slow our small animal minds to geological timelines than I find facts that Lake Titicaca (4000m or so above present sea level) was once a salt water sea (now mostly leached away by ice melt).

One wonders as how salt managed to find its way to that great height yet evidence exists that it may be the result of precipitation (of the oceans) after the impact that prompted mans early memory of the great deluge (40 days and 40 nights-big wooden ark etc).

Thats something to ponder.

I find it amusing (and I'm certainly no skeptic) that receding glaciers and snowlines regularly expose evidence of grasses, human remains, civilisation etc etc that clearly exhibit a more temperate time in even our (homo-sapien) short time on earth. Ho Hum
Yet the media shows a clip of a glacier calving and we all ponder immediate and extended self flagellation (sorry had to slip in a catholic reference)

As you mentioned we are overdue for another ice age, so realistically we need to put as much CO2 into the atmosphere as we can (to delay it). However the planets feedback loops will eventually take us back to equilibrium regardless so best start practicing humility and Zen imo

2020,

DJ's not talking about how hot it was last week bro, before the impact that blasted the moon out of the mass of the earth and gave us our astounding angle of rotation and pleasant level of rpm. The planet was an oxygen free boiling mass of not very niceness.
Mankind is hung up on recent memory- Adam and Eve weren't remembered for wearing thermal undies and full kapok were they?

 

[wayneL]

small fluctuations ???
I beg to differ mate.

You will have to beg, because that graph is totally ludicrous... pulled straight out of someones @rse - laughable.

 

[Sean K]

You will have to beg, because that graph is totally ludicrous... pulled straight out of someones @rse - laughable.

There was an Ice Age in the 1600s? Gee didn't know that.

 

[wayneL]

Hahaha

All I am saying is that we maybe witnessing some small fluctuations in cycles on earth rather than an impending catastrophe the pollies would have us believe. And everytime they do a "study" on climate change they will compare statistics from the last 50 000 years, the cycles last a lot longer than that.

A good article against global warming here, might be warned though, gets pretty technical in the climate modelling and lingo.

http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/200807/monckton.cfm

For those who cant be bothered reading or trying to dechipher the article it states that the IPCC have some fundamental flaws in the climate models they have presented, which leads to an exagerated statistics on future climate change. The IPCC presentations have overstatedthe ffects of feedback systems in the earths climate, feedback systems can be negative and positive.

A positive feedback system is one which effects amplify the original impact, like the ice albedo effect, more ice means higher reflectivity (albedo) which means lower regional temperatures which means move ice and so on.

A negative feedback system is one which effects reduce the original impact, a good example here is a thermostat in a house, increase in temperature cause the thermostat to switch the heater off and lets it cool down again.

So anyway, the article states that the IPCC have overstated or over estimated the feedback effects that global warming could cause.

What this article has done:

At best - Consigned AGW to the rubbish bin.

At worst - Has completely destroyed AGW as a theory and placed it firmly back into the realms of hypothesis, where it always belonged anyway.

One of the tenets of theory is that results must be able to be predicted, based on the theory. This document shows that the IPCC and the AGW hypothesis are completely incapable of predicting anything at all.

The absolutely scandal of the whole deal is that AGW is regarded as fact.

Real dumb!!

Some reasons why the IPCC’s estimates may be excessive and unsafe are explained. More importantly, the conclusion is that, perhaps, there is no “climate crisis”, and that currently-fashionable efforts by governments to reduce anthropogenic CO2 emissions are pointless, may be ill-conceived, and could even be harmful.

True science shines through the dross in the end.

 

[2020hindsight]

You will have to beg, because that graph is totally ludicrous... pulled straight out of someones @rse - laughable.

Actually it was the collective work of a lot of scientists working their buts off ..

Hey - if that graph is news to you , then you didn't even watch that Channel 4 TV doco you posted - started a thread rather - called the Great Global Warming Swindle.. let alone the ABC review of it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:2000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png

PS The alarming line - the black graph - was "pulled out of the UK Met bureau's ass" (using the terminology you so pleasantly use to argue your case).

black 1856-2004): Instrumental data was jointly compiled by the w:Climatic Research Unit and the UK Meteorological Office Hadley Centre. Global Annual Average data set TaveGL2v [2] was used.

 

[wayneL]

Actually it was the collective work of a lot of scientists working their buts off ..

Hey - if that graph is news to you , then you didn't even watch that Channel 4 TV doco you posted - started a thread rather - called the Great Global Warming Swindle.. let alone the ABC review of it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MWP_and_LIA_in_IPCC_reports

Read my next post and the rectal origin of that extrapolation you posted will be obvious.

 

[2020hindsight]

Read my next post and the rectal origin of that extrapolation you posted will be obvious.

Read this then - the extrapoltaion was hypothetical
called a "what if"

 

[Pat]

Yet the media shows a clip of a glacier calving and we all ponder immediate and extended self flagellation (sorry had to slip in a catholic reference)

What do you ponder jtb, when you see the ice melting? Any sense of loss? Or is it all ridiculous because you read it in the paper and the media put a negative GW spin on it?

FWIW it's kinda sad to see peeps writing off CC (possibly because they are self righteous lounge room asswholes) with no regard to what we may be losing. Ignorant?

Perhaps it’s futile to think we have a chance of changing things. But heaven forbid we think positive and make change for the better.
There are more important reasons to change our ways, CC and GW just add to the argument.... "Why not change for the better???"

Or do some here think the human race is efficient enough?

 

[--B--]

FWIW it's kinda sad to see peeps writing off CC (possibly because they are self righteous lounge room asswholes) with no regard to what we may be losing. Ignorant?

scare tactics like this are what much of the AGW debate is based on. lets stick to facts.

heres an interesting article from someone who has experience in climate science:

David Evans | July 18, 2008


I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia's compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.

FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I've been following the global warming debate closely for years.
When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.

The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.

But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, "When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?"

There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:

1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.

Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.

If there is no hot spot then an increased greenhouse effect is not the cause of global warming. So we know for sure that carbon emissions are not a significant cause of the global warming. If we had found the greenhouse signature then I would be an alarmist again.

When the signature was found to be missing in 2007 (after the latest IPCC report), alarmists objected that maybe the readings of the radiosonde thermometers might not be accurate and maybe the hot spot was there but had gone undetected. Yet hundreds of radiosondes have given the same answer, so statistically it is not possible that they missed the hot spot.

Recently the alarmists have suggested we ignore the radiosonde thermometers, but instead take the radiosonde wind measurements, apply a theory about wind shear, and run the results through their computers to estimate the temperatures. They then say that the results show that we cannot rule out the presence of a hot spot. If you believe that you'd believe anything.

2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.

3. The satellites that measure the world's temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980). Land-based temperature readings are corrupted by the "urban heat island" effect: urban areas encroaching on thermometer stations warm the micro-climate around the thermometer, due to vegetation changes, concrete, cars, houses. Satellite data is the only temperature data we can trust, but it only goes back to 1979. NASA reports only land-based data, and reports a modest warming trend and recent cooling. The other three global temperature records use a mix of satellite and land measurements, or satellite only, and they all show no warming since 2001 and a recent cooling.

4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect.

None of these points are controversial. The alarmist scientists agree with them, though they would dispute their relevance.

The last point was known and past dispute by 2003, yet Al Gore made his movie in 2005 and presented the ice cores as the sole reason for believing that carbon emissions cause global warming. In any other political context our cynical and experienced press corps would surely have called this dishonest and widely questioned the politician's assertion.

Until now the global warming debate has merely been an academic matter of little interest. Now that it matters, we should debate the causes of global warming.

So far that debate has just consisted of a simple sleight of hand: show evidence of global warming, and while the audience is stunned at the implications, simply assert that it is due to carbon emissions.

In the minds of the audience, the evidence that global warming has occurred becomes conflated with the alleged cause, and the audience hasn't noticed that the cause was merely asserted, not proved.

If there really was any evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming, don't you think we would have heard all about it ad nauseam by now?

The world has spent $50 billion on global warming since 1990, and we have not found any actual evidence that carbon emissions cause global warming. Evidence consists of observations made by someone at some time that supports the idea that carbon emissions cause global warming. Computer models and theoretical calculations are not evidence, they are just theory.

What is going to happen over the next decade as global temperatures continue not to rise? The Labor Government is about to deliberately wreck the economy in order to reduce carbon emissions. If the reasons later turn out to be bogus, the electorate is not going to re-elect a Labor government for a long time. When it comes to light that the carbon scare was known to be bogus in 2008, the ALP is going to be regarded as criminally negligent or ideologically stupid for not having seen through it.
And if the Liberals support the general thrust of their actions, they will be seen likewise.

The onus should be on those who want to change things to provide evidence for why the changes are necessary. The Australian public is eventually going to have to be told the evidence anyway, so it might as well be told before wrecking the economy.

Dr David Evans was a consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005.

 

[2020hindsight]

What do you ponder jtb, when you see the ice melting? Any sense of loss? Or is it all ridiculous because you read it in the paper and the media put a negative GW spin on it?

FWIW it's kinda sad to see peeps writing off CC (possibly because they are self righteous lounge room asswholes) with no regard to what we may be losing. Ignorant?

Pat , lol

dj says that we should put things into perspective by going back to the days when Antartica Australia and Africa were joined ...

jtb wants (I think) to compare when the moon was flung off 4 billion years ago..

Actually I'm damned if I see the relevance in either/any of those comparisons.

Nothing to worry about folks - we've all been here before Ignore the fact that the earth climate is changing at never before dreamed of rates ( short of asteroids and other catastrophies)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicxulub_Crater = dinosaur extinction

http://www.sunysb.edu/research/milestones1/page15/page15.html

the first dating of the age of the Moon - at about 4 billion years - based on the rock samples brought back by the Apollo 11 astronauts, the first humans to walk on the Moon, in July, 1969

 

[Pat]

scare tactics like this are what much of the AGW debate is based on. lets stick to facts.

heres an interesting article from someone who has experience in climate science:

There just aren't enough facts B, only 200yrs worth. My point is, if we can change for the better, and live in a sustainable equlibrium with the environment. Then we should wrok 'harder' towards this.

I certainly agree that the sky is not falling, but the FACT is ice is melting. The world is changing... Facinating

 

[--B--]

Nothing to worry about folks - we've all been here before Ignore the fact that the earth climate is changing at never before dreamed of rates ( short of asteroids and other catastrophies)

really?? source? thats not one of those 'say it and everyone will believe it' type things many agw hypists rely on is it?

in any case, the fact that the climate changes is nothing new. thats what the climate does. its the "A" of the agw that is highly debatable. (although the GW part is quite shakey too)

 

[Pat]

Nothing to worry about folks - we've all been here before Ignore the fact that the earth climate is changing at never before dreamed of rates ( short of asteroids and other catastrophies)

At least nature will survive, thanks Cousteau. These debates reinforce the fact society needs look at things from the future. A hard concept to grasp for most.

really?? source? thats not one of those 'say it and everyone will believe it' type things many agw hypists rely on is it?

in any case, the fact that the climate changes is nothing new. thats what the climate does. its the "A" of the agw that is highly debatable. (although the GW part is quite shakey too)

So you don't think we contribute? We can make acid fall from the sky! And fly to the moon! But we can't possibly effect the earth's climate. FFS!

 

[--B--]

So you don't think we contribute? We can make acid fall from the sky! And fly to the moon! But we can't possibly effect the earth's climate. FFS!

did you read my article above pat?

heres a snippet for you:

There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.

 

[2020hindsight]

really?? source? thats not one of those 'say it and everyone will believe it' type things many agw hypists rely on is it?

-B-
look at the graph in post #1050
see that sharp incline in the graph
that's put out by the UK Met Bureau.
happy now?