'An Upper Layer Of Earth's Atmosphere Has Collapsed'

[Ghostrider]

I do believe gravity is a theory. In part from the fact that I've seen a ball roll uphill from a dead stop. Also I have seen water flow up hill.... and not because of the force of it flowing downhill either. All the while this was happening, everyone observing was leaning in the same direction so as not to fall down.

These are optical illusions, or tricks. We've all been to the funhouses where these things are done. I've seen a river in the mountains you'd swear was running uphill. Only because of the relative slope of the road you're standing on, and that of the river. It's a whole lot more likely that your mind or your eyes have been tricked than the physical laws of the universe being suddenly suspended in one small area - think about it.

 

[Ken Stallings]

Actually, is not gravity officially considered a scientific law now?

In science, a law is the highest order of knowledge in terms of acceptance.

Cheers,

Ken

 

[EasyEd]

Hey All,

Been ignoring this thread but must comment. With respect to climate change I suggest that folks consider this site from the American Institute of Physics for an outstanding discussion of climate change history. The parts on history and Impacts are especially worth reading.

http://www.aip.org/history/climate/index.htm

The implications about "cooked data" and such are simply wrong as none of the "climategate" accusations have any merit as shown by investigations in Britain, Penn State who conducted two investigations and the National Academy of Sciences. For example the substitution of real world data for proxy data (supposedly to cover up the trend) were completely scientifically justified - all anyone ever has to do is read the original research and the followup research on the Bristlecone pine data set on which it was based.

The bigger problem is the politicizing the process of science especially when you may not like the implications of what it is telling you.

As we move forward in time I think humanity will have to operate on more and more "partial evidence" to deal with especially knotty problems. We simply will not have the time to wait for the final dotted i and crossed t proof and then argue about what to do - especially when the whole earth is the "experiment". I think scientists have a duty to report their findings and interpretations and that is what these scientists are doing. I commend them as well as those qualified scientists who question them.

-Ed-

 

[luckydog]

The arrogance of mankind is truly astounding !!

To think that the miniscule amounts of CO2 that humans are injecting into a chaotic atmosphere
contibutes to "global warming" is ignorance beyond belief....

 

[PRB]

The arrogance of mankind is truly astounding !!

To think that the miniscule amounts of CO2 that humans are injecting into a chaotic atmosphere
contibutes to "global warming" is ignorance beyond belief....

A perfect example of an emotional and political reaction to a scientific question. I think that's what EasyEd meant... Whether or not humans are contributing to global warming is inconclusive, not “beyond belief”.

 

[CybrSlydr]

As we move forward in time I think humanity will have to operate on more and more "partial evidence" to deal with especially knotty problems. We simply will not have the time to wait for the final dotted i and crossed t proof and then argue about what to do - especially when the whole earth is the "experiment". I think scientists have a duty to report their findings and interpretations and that is what these scientists are doing. I commend them as well as those qualified scientists who question them.

Yes, going about things half-cocked and without truly understanding the implications of our actions to fix a problem is exactly what we need to do.

No way that'll make the problem worse. Nope, none at all.

 

[jhefner]

The implications about "cooked data" and such are simply wrong as none of the "climategate" accusations have any merit as shown by investigations in Britain, Penn State who conducted two investigations and the National Academy of Sciences. For example the substitution of real world data for proxy data (supposedly to cover up the trend) were completely scientifically justified - all anyone ever has to do is read the original research and the followup research on the Bristlecone pine data set on which it was based.

If nothing else, the following proves that

A. The global warming science has become too politicized, with universities chasing after multimillion dollar grants, and politicians forwarded their agendas based on it.

B. Going forward "half cocked", as proposed above does not help your cause when it turns out you were wrong.

C. And there is still more we cannot quantify and explain than we can. Most computer models treat the Earth as a "black box" in space. But that is flawed, because it leaves out the biggest heat source of all - the sun. And we know that the sun goes through periods of sunspot activity, which in turn affects the amount of heat and energy in the form or radiation we recieve. Looking at space as being a "black box" conveniently takes the sun out of the picture.

So, right away, any sort of global modeling (whether the simple "ball in a blanket" model or more complex computer models) leave out both the major sources of heat, and the major greenhouse gas - water vapor.

Before imposing any sort of legislation on greenhouse gases; you need to determine if man is or will have an effect on the temperature of the atmosphere of the earth. But, how can you determine that with any certainty if you are ignoring the sun and water vapor in the atmosphere? And if you don't know or can't prove it, why bother?

There is also another heat sink to consider -- the world's oceans. Even if we managed to raise the temperature of the atmosphere, some of that added heat will find it's way into the world's oceans, both through convection and water cycle. Surely even you can see that the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of both the atmosphere and oceans is more than man can ever hope to generate.

We know that there are greater sources of both heat and greenhouse gases than us -- volcanoes. We also know that the earth has been more active in regards to volcanic activity in the past. Why did they not turn the earth into Venus back then?

Finally, in terms of modeling and predicting current and future temperature patterns, we need to have an accurate measurement of the world's temperatures. But, we don't even have that; as the below article shows (and has been mentioned elsewhere)

<!-- m -->http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/03/ ... latestnews<!-- m -->

Couple this with the fact that it was admitted by one of the chief scienctists that it was warmer in medival times than it is now; and the evidence is not there. I have no problem with further research; but so far, every legislation that has been proposed has been more of a wealth transfer than an attempt to solve the problem; the participants in the last conference in Copenhagen basically admitted to that. It is ridiculous to propose such economically crippling laws based on such flimsy data. And with China and India refusing the participate, it was a recipe for turning us into a third world country after these two growing superpowers.

When we had droughts in the past few years; that was blamed on global warming. Last winter, when we were being buried under snowfall, that is also being blamed on global warming. Some scienctists are saying that it never should have been called global warming in the first place, but "global climate change." (Some of us still remember that they were predicting global cooling based on the amount of particulates in the atmosphere as late as the 1960s-1970s.) As best as we can tell, the earth's average air temperature has been flat for the past decade or so.

If You Can’t Explain It, You Can’t Model It

Revenge of the Computer Nerds

By Larrey Anderson
It is fascinating to watch the mainstream media in America duck (and/or make excuses for) the greatest scam in modern history: the "science" behind man-made global warming. Even more entertaining, and far more enlightening, is to follow the analyses by the experts in computer programming of the recently disclosed methods used by the Climate Research Unit (CRU) from the University of East Anglia.

Most commentators in the media have been talking about the "REM" statements in the purloined e-mails and computer codes from the CRU . True believers in anthropogenic global warming (AGW), especially those in the mainstream and "scientific" media, are pooh-poohing such words as "tricks" or "hide the decline" as interoffice slang that had no real impact on how the science was conducted.

But the real action (and the evidence for chicanery) is in the computer code obtained from the CRU. Our own computer guru Marc Sheppard, writing for American Thinker here and here, was one of the first to offer an accurate diagnosis of this fraudulent method of computer programming. Analyzing the code, as Marc has indicated in his work, is a complex business. As he pleads in one article, "please bear with me while I get a tad techie on you."

For the layman readers of American Thinker, I want to explain in a simple manner what went on in the construction of one piece of the controversial programming.

A bit of background: The cornerstone of the evidence for global warming presented by Al Gore and the AGW crowd was a notorious graph that became known as "the hockey stick graph." The graph is based on computer models that supposedly prove our planet has heated exponentially in the last half-century due to increasing amounts of man-made CO2 released into the atmosphere. Proponents further claim (and the computer models purport to show) that temperatures will continue to increase exponentially. The implication is that unless we drastically curtail human output of CO2, the "escalation" in temperature is going to get even worse even faster.

Turns out that these claims are absolutely false, and the computer models have been rigged.

Here is one version of the famous "hockey stick" graph:

Now that is scary [ii]! According to the now-debunked myth, global temperatures started going through the roof about sixty years ago. They will to continue to rise and bring unimaginable disaster. Except they haven't, and they probably won't.

Now to the CRU code that maintains these fictional monstrosities. Pay particular attention to the black line at the far right of the "hockey stick" in Graph 1. The black line starts at about 1900. (This is the same period of time addressed by the code we will examine.) The black line looks something like this very simplified version:

The x-axis (horizontal) shows time. The y-axis (vertical) shows temperature. In the last few decades, the temperature, according to AGW enthusiasts, has been climbing off the charts.

Marc Sheppard discovered and showed us this bit of programming taken from the CRU documents:

yrloc=[1400,findgen(19)*5.+1904]

valadj=[0.,0.,0.,0.,0.,-0.1,-0.25,-0.3,0.,-0.1,0.3,0.8,1.2,1.7,2.5,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6,2.6]*0.75 ; fudge factor

The long string of bold numbers in the second set of brackets is the "fudge factor" applied (supposedly) to the raw data [iii]. This string of numbers "adjusts" the raw data from 1904 to 1994 in five-year increments. Here is what these nineteen numbers roughly look like on a simple graph (each bar below represents a number in bold above):

I have left a space between the bars that represent each number so the reader can compare the temperature line to the numbers from the program. Time is once again indicated by the x-axis (horizontal). Temperature is portrayed on the y-axis (vertical).

The numbers in the code indicate a degree of cheating that is actually much larger than I was able to show with the bars in Graph 3 [iv].

We can now prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the hockey stick is an absolute ruse. The hockey stick graph cannot possibly be based on the actual data. (...Wherever and whatever that data might have been, that is. The CRU has admitted destroying the raw data.)

Even if the numbers in the program were not added to the aggregate temperatures (of each preceding period [v]), the numbers in the code plot like this:

Graph 4 this still looks an awful lot like the "hockey stick." In short, no matter how you read the code, it was designed to create a phony outcome.

But don't take my word for it. Computer experts everywhere are all over this particular con game, and many other deceptions, that came out of the CRU files.

Many years ago, I was an instructor in logic at the university level. Some of my best students were young people who planned on entering the new, exciting, rapidly expanding, and lucrative fields of computer science and computer programming.

A solid grasp of logic was, and still is, a great way to start an education in the computer sciences -- since computer programs are grounded in the basic rules and the syntax (sometimes slightly adjusted) of Boolean logic.

Computer programmers are often referred to as "nerds." In fact, they are meticulous; they have to be. Their programs don't work if they're lazy, or skips a step, or ignores the rules of logic and syntax that make computers do the job they are supposed to do. This is why competent computer programmers can spot a phony and a cheater from a mile away.

Writing the beautiful and logical structure of a computer code is almost like writing music. It is very easy for a skilled computer programmer to detect code that is "out of tune." Computer nerds are literally shouting about the audacity of the obviously contrived bit of code we have just examined. They are screaming in Germany, in America, and in lots of other places. Read the comments to these postings -- there are some good ones. (There are also efforts by true believers to justify the code. Try following the logic of the post in that last link.)

The bottom line is that if this kind of code were to be used by, say, an insurance actuary -- or by someone writing banking software or for tracking the stock market -- the programmer would immediately be fired...and probably face criminal prosecution.

The truth about the hockey stick hoax is slowly leaking out. New Zealand climate scientists released a similar doctored graph (for temperatures in New Zealand) that looked like this:

The scientists in New Zealand didn't destroy the raw data. (Oops.) The raw temperature data from New Zealand, when fed into a computer without a "fudge factor," looks like this:

In short, New Zealand has not heated up in the last 150 years. Not a bit. Zealous scientists promoting AGW (not the actual weather) caused the "warming" in New Zealand. (Notice how closely the doctored Graph 5 from New Zealand resembles doctored Graph 1 and the code from the CRU we have examined.)

Any computer programmer worth his or her salt will tell you, "Garbage in, garbage out." The garbage in the AGW debate turns out to be the scientists who are writing fraudulent computer codes. Time to take out the trash.

Larrey Anderson is a writer, a philosopher, and submissions editor for American Thinker. He is the author of The Order of the Beloved, and the memoir Underground: Life and Survival in the Russian Black Market.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
REM statements are little notes made "in the margins" of the actual code.

[ii] Notice the title "Reconstructed Temperature." As we will see, "reconstructed temperature" turns out to be quite the litotes for AGW proponents.

[iii] The CRU has admitted to destroying most of the raw data. Those digging into the CRU documents are still trying to figure out which data was used for what programs. Sometimes this is clear in the files and sometimes it is not.

[iv] The +2.6 "fudge factor" in the 1980s is a magnitude 26 times greater than the -0.1 decrease in the 1920s -- but I do not have enough room to show the actual proportions of bars to the numbers in the space allotted.

[v] For example, I cannot tell if the second +2.6 is added to the previously adjusted +2.6 or if each is an individual adjustment to the "raw data" and not cumulative. Since the temperature of the hockey stick increases exponentially, I assume that the effect of the program is cumulative -- i.e., Graph 3, not Graph 4, more closely represents the effect of the program on the raw data. Even if I am wrong, the code still creates a nonexistent (or grossly inaccurate) increase in actual and predicted temperatures. I would welcome clarification on this point from someone more familiar with the code than I am. See Lord Monckton's discussion of the code here.

Physics Group Splinters Over Global Warming Review

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504383_162-5964504-504383.html

December 10, 2009 7:15 PM

Posted by Declan McCullagh
As the science scandal known as ClimateGate grows, the largest U.S. physicists' association is finding itself roiled by internal dissent and allegations of conflict of interest over a forthcoming review of its position statement on man-made global warming.
The scientist who will head the American Physical Society's review of its 2007 statement calling for immediate reductions of carbon dioxide is Princeton's Robert Socolow, a prominent supporter of the link between CO2 and global warming who has warned of possible "catastrophic consequences" of climate change.
Socolow's research institute at Princeton has received well over $20 million in grants dealing with climate change and carbon reduction, plus an additional $2 million a year from BP and still more from the federal government. In an interview published by Princeton's public relations office, Socolow called CO2 a "climate problem" that governments need to address.
"It is Socolow whose entire research funding stream, well over a million dollars a year, depends on continued alarm over global warming," says William Happer, a fellow Princeton University professor and head of the Happer physics lab who has raised the question of a conflict of interest. The reason: the ostensibly neutral person charged with evaluating a statement endorsing man-made global warming is a leading proponent of precisely that theory whose funding is tied to that theory.
As previously reported by CBSNews.com, Happer and other members of the APS have been urging the society to take a second look at the 2007 statement, which claims the evidence for the CO2-global warming link is "incontrovertible" and "we must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now." Their letter circulated last month says: "By now everyone has heard of what has come to be known as ClimateGate, which was and is an international scientific fraud, the worst any of us have seen... We have asked the APS management to put the 2007 statement on ice until the extent to which it is tainted can be determined, but that has not been done."
Neither the current APS president, Harvard's Cherry Murray, nor its incoming president, Princeton's Curtis Callan, replied to questions on Thursday, and Socolow could not be reached for comment. The APS leadership has chosen not to withdraw its statement but has authorized a limited review of the language's "clarity and tone" -- although that was announced before the embarrassing leak from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit occurred.
Hal Lewis, a professor emeritus of physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara who has been an APS member for 65 years, says that he asked both the current and incoming APS presidents to require that Socolow recuse himself from a review of this subject, and both refused.
That means the review will be "chaired by a guy who is hip deep in conflicts of interest, running a million-dollar program that is utterly dependent on global warming funding," Lewis says. In addition, he points out that the group charged with taking a second look at the 2007 statement, the Panel on Public Affairs, is the same body that drafted it in the first place. That, "too has a smell of people investigating themselves," Lewis says.
The APS ethics policy that appears to apply to Socolow's panel says "it is particularly desirable that members" be "free from real or perceived conflicts." An APS ethics policy used when awarding prizes says that conflicts of interest can be resolved, depending on the circumstance, by "resignation of one or more members of the committee, withdrawal of a member from parts of the committee's deliberations and voting." And when involving the chairman: "Potential conflict of interest involving the chair of the selection committee is ipso facto a serious matter, and at the least another committee member should take over as chair."
An APS spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday about how the group's ethics policies apply and whether Socolow would be the chairman.
As the full import of the ClimateGate leak became evident, Happer, Lewis, and others redoubled their efforts to ask APS members to support a review of what they considered to be bad science. They now say 77 supporters are fellows of major scientific societies, 14 are members of the National Academies, and one is a Nobel laureate; Happer adds that "some have accepted a career risk by signing the petition."
APS President Cherry Murray replied to that effort with a stiff letter to all members saying the message was sent without "APS knowledge or approval" and the group is "continuing to investigate how the senders obtained APS member e-mail addresses."
Murray also said the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is "in the process of investigating the affair," and APS will wait until the results of that investigation are public. But that doesn't seem to be accurate: IPCC chairman R.K. Pachauri said in Copenhagen this week that there is "not an investigation." And there's no mention of an investigation in either IPCC statement, both of which defend the East Anglia research that has been called into question.
What irks the APS members circulating the petition are not claims that CO2 has been increasing for a century and that the Earth is warming; Lewis says the planet has been warming for thousands of years without our help, especially since the Little Ice Age a few hundred years ago. Instead, the physicists are concerned about the APS's claim that the science is settled on the question of the causal link between the two -- a claim that underpins the Copenhagen conference, the Democratic cap and trade proposals, and the EPA's announcement this week that CO2 is dangerous to human health.
Socolow leads the Princeton Environmental Group's Energy Group, one of the university's research units. According to a list of its reports and publications, the group is now focused on topics including fuels with "near-zero" greenhouse gas emissions and "carbon dioxide capture" technologies, both of which become of economic interest if a causal link between CO2 and global warming can be shown to exist.
The current chair of the APA Panel on Public Affairs, or POPA, is Duncan Moore of the University of Rochester, and Socolow will take over in three weeks, on January 1. A subcommittee will be tasked with looking at the 2007 statement for "clarity and tone," and is expected to report its recommendations to the full POPA committee by early February.
Moore told CBSNews.com on Wednesday that "we will only look at tone and clarity and will not rewrite the 2007 statement," and a discussion about "whether APS should form a committee to look at the role of APS in climate change" will take place at the February POPA meeting.
Meanwhile, the ClimateGate scandal is broadening, with more mainstream scientists being concerned about what the leaked e-mails and apparently buggy computer code say about their chosen profession, and how they could influence public perceptions of science. The two leading science publications, Scientific American and Nature chose to downplay the scandal's impact, with Nature saying the leak was a "propaganda windfall" to the "climate-change-denialist fringe" -- an especially unflattering term that seems to sweep in the APS physicists asking for the re-review.
Petr Chylek, a fellow at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and an adjunct professor at New Mexico State University, said in an open letter that climate scientists "have substituted the search for truth with an attempt at proving one point of view." And 141 scientists have signed a statement at CopenhagenClimateChallenge.org that says actual evidence of human-caused global warming is lacking and "unproven computer models of climate are not acceptable substitutes for real world data obtained through unbiased and rigorous scientific investigation."
Happer, the Princeton University physicist who jointly circulated the letter to APS, says: "APS has simply circled the wagons, while trying to figure out how to quieten the growing unrest in the membership."

U.N. Panel's Glacier-Disaster Claims Melting Away

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010...eed%3A+foxnews%2Fscitech+%28Text+-+SciTech%29

The world's most famous climate change expert is at the center of a massive controversy as the leading environmental science institute he heads scrambled to explain its assertion that the Himalayan glaciers will melt completely in 25 years.

Rajendra Pachauri, head of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and director general of the Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) in New Dehli, India, said this week that the U.N. body was studying how its 2007 report to the United Nations derived information that led to its famous conclusion: that the glaciers will melt by 2035.
Today, the IPCC issued a statement offering regret for the poorly vetted statements. "The Chair, Vice-Chairs, and Co-chairs of the IPCC regret the poor application of well-established IPCC procedures," the statement says, though it goes short of issuing a full retraction or reprinting the report.
Pachauri told Reuters on Monday that the group was looking into the issue, and planned to "take a position on it in the next two or three days."
The IPCC's 2007 report, simply titled AR4, claimed that "glaciers in the Himalayas are receding faster than in any other part of the world, and if the present rate continues, the likelihood of them disappearing by the year 2035 and perhaps sooner is very high if the Earth keeps warming at the current rate."
Contacted by FoxNews.com at TERI, officials would not respond to a request for additional comment. IPCC is expected to withdraw the report's claim eventually.
Hundreds of millions of people in India, Pakistan and China would be severely affected if the glaciers were actually to melt. There are some 9,500 Himalayan glaciers.
Indian Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh questioned the findings of the 2007 report during a news conference.
"They are indeed receding and the rate is cause for great concern," Ramesh said of the glaciers. But, he said, the IPCC's 2035 forecast was "not based on an iota of scientific evidence."
One of the key elements in the growing scandal is the revelation that IPCC based some of its public proclamations on non-peer reviewed reports.
"The data, all the data, needs to come to light," says Dr. Jane M. Orient, president of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness and an outspoken skeptic on climate change.
"Thousands of scientists are capable of assessing it. The only reason to keep it hidden, locked in the clutches of the elite few, is that it decisively disproves their computer models and shows that their draconian emission controls are based on nothing except a lust for power, control and profit."
The IPCC "made a clear and obvious error when it stated that Himalayan glaciers would be gone by 2035," added Patrick J. Michaels, a senior fellow in environmental policy at the libertarian Cato Institute, in an interview.
"The absurdity was obvious to anyone who had studied the scientific literature. This was not an honest mistake. IPCC had been warned about it for a year by many scientists."
A letter just released to the Science Web site underscores the mistake. Written by J. Graham Cogley of the department of geography at Canada's Trent University, it points out that "the claim that Himalayan glaciers may disappear by 2035 ... conflicts with knowledge of glacier-climate relationships, and is wrong."
The dustup is the latest scandal in global warming science, coming after the disclosure of attempts to shade climate-science research findings at the U.K.'s East Anglia University and the failed talks in Copenhagen by environmental policymakers last month.
The IPCC report had indicated that the total area of Himalayan glaciers would shrink from 500,000 square kilometers to 100,000 square kilometers within 25 years. The study cited a 2005 report by the World Wildlife Fund, an environmental advocacy group. The WWF study cited a 1999 article in New Scientist magazine that quoted another expert, who speculated that Himalayan glaciers could disappear within forty years.
The speculative comments were not peer reviewed, and other reports have indicated that the glaciers are not retreating abnormally.
"Most Himalayan glaciers are hundreds of feet thick and could not melt fast enough to vanish by 2035. The maximum rate of decline in thickness seen in glaciers at the moment is two to three feet per year, and most are far lower," Don Easterbrook, a professor emeritus of the department of geology at Western Washington University, told FoxNews.com.
Pachauri, the IPCC chief, is under attack on another front, as well, as newspaper reports in India have commented repeatedly on his reportedly lavish lifestyle. TERI receives funding from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy, both of which did not respond to requests for comment from FoxNews.com. Reports indicate that there also are concerns in the United Kingdom surrounding 10 million British pounds in funding for TERI, and questions about TERI's objectivity.
"It's about time that somebody started following the money trail to the big interests that want to prosper from the green regime, while the rest of the economy is crushed," Orient told FoxNews.com. "It's not as though the amount were a trickle."

 

[KOM.Nausicaa]

jhefner, it's not the place to discuss stuff like this (I fear this will be locked sooner or later), so I won't go into much detail, but just so much: your post is basically a summary of well known denialist crocks, most of them have been debunked over and over again, the famous "ice age" prediction on the 70's (false), the New Zealand graph, water vapor, and so on. I see you have lot's of info from Fox News -- probably the worst place in American media to get information about climate change from. Just so much from me here on SOH. If you are interested, we discuss this stuff lot's of times in the Quarter Moon Saloon.

 

[Wing_Z]

Wow that's a mouthful...most people have already lost interest.
There is one little niggling thought that persists though:
Ecosystems are resilient, and can absorb much punishment.
But when they tip over, it's quite sudden.
Generally reversible, luckily, but there's a timescale attached to that.
A case in point wiped out the dinosaurs, and didn't recover fast enough for them to survive.
We do have to take care that we don't push our biosphere beyond what it can absorb to sustain all the bits that make our life form comfortable here.

I'd say taking a long hard look at pumping (every year) 29 thousand million - is that billion? - tonnes of Co2 into the (very) thin layer of atmosphere surrounding the planet would be a seriously good place to start.

You think we can't mess up this planet?
We can...just give us time.

 

[jhefner]

I'd say taking a long hard look at pumping (every year) 29 thousand million - is that trillion? - tonnes of Co2 into the (very) thin layer of atmosphere surrounding the planet would be a seriously good place to start.

OK; let's engage in another intellectual exercise.

Let's just say that one day, someone woke up, and calcuated how much electricity is being produced by mankind in a year. (Trust me, it is a big number, though I don't know what it is off the top of head.) Then, they made the determination that electricity (or even EMF) is harming the environment.

OK, that is all well and good. But, when you compare how electricity we produce when compared to a single thunderstorm, that amount will look tiny by comparision.

Then, you would have to demonstrate to me that the amount of electricity being produced in the environment, both in thunderstorms and the ionsphere is staying the same or decreasing. If you can't accurately calculate what that total is, and forecast what direction it is heading; then it is a bit premature to start taxing all generators, and having some of them shut down in the interest of decreasing the total.

The same is true for CO2. First, it is the #2 greenhouse in the atmosphere; behind water vapor. Second, we are not the only contributors CO2, volcanoes and other living organisms are too.

So, to determine if that 29 thousand million tons of CO2 is a big deal, you would have to calculate how water vapor there is out there, and how much CO2 (and wate r vapor) is spewing from volcanoes and living organisms. Next, you will have to show me that you can accurately forecast how much of both are being contributed by nature going into the future; before you can convince me to worry about my CO2 emissions; much less tax me for them.

I have yet to see man make a major dent in the earth's weather for an extended period of time. But, we know that nature can do it; the "year without a summer" proved that.

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

(EDIT: so did two ice ages; and a warm period in medival days.)

So, that figure alone for CO2 emissions is meaningless. Compare it to how much nature cranks out, and maybe then we can have a discussion. (Nevermind the fact that plants thriving off the CO2 will probably change the balance on their own; goes back to nature self-adjusting itself.)

-James

 

[jhefner]

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth's_atmosphere

Over 95% of total CO<SUB>2</SUB> emissions are natural. For example, the natural decay of organic material in forests and grasslands, such as dead trees, results in the release of about 220 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide every year. In 1997, Indonesian peat fires were estimated to have released between 13% and 40% of the average carbon emissions caused by the burning of fossil fuels around the world in a single year.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-8>[9]</SUP><SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-9>[10]</SUP><SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-10>[11]</SUP> Although the initial carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the young Earth was produced by volcanic activity, modern volcanic activity releases only 130 to 230 megatonnes of carbon dioxide each year,<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-11>[12]</SUP> which is less than 1% of the amount released by human activities.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-12>[13]</SUP>
<SUP></SUP>
These natural sources are nearly balanced by natural sinks, physical and biological processes which remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. For example, some carbon dioxide dissolves in sea water, and some is removed by plants via photosynthesis.

There is a large natural flux of CO<SUB>2</SUB> into and out of the biosphere and oceans. In the pre-industrial era these fluxes were largely in balance. Currently about 57% of human-emitted CO<SUB>2</SUB> is removed by the biosphere and oceans.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-13>[14]</SUP> The ratio of the increase in atmospheric CO<SUB>2</SUB> to emitted CO<SUB>2</SUB> is known as the airborne fraction (Keeling et al., 1995); this varies for short-term averages but is typically about 45% over longer (5 year) periods.
Burning fossil fuels such as coal and petroleum is the leading cause of increased anthropogenic CO<SUB>2</SUB>; deforestation is the second major cause. In 2008, 8.67 gigatonnes of carbon (31.8 gigatonnes of CO<SUB>2</SUB>) were released from fossil fuels worldwide, compared to 6.14 gigatonnes in 1990.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-Le_Quere_14-0>[15]</SUP> In addition, land use change contributed 1.20 gigatonnes in 2008, compared to 1.64 gigatonnes in 1990.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-Le_Quere_14-1>[15]</SUP>
<SUP></SUP>
This addition, about 3% of annual natural emissions as of 1997<SUP class="plainlinks noprint asof-tag update" style="DISPLAY: none">[update]</SUP>, is sufficient to exceed the balancing effect of sinks.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-15>[16]</SUP> As a result, carbon dioxide has gradually accumulated in the atmosphere, and as of 2008<SUP class="plainlinks noprint asof-tag update" style="DISPLAY: none">[update]</SUP>, its concentration is 38% above pre-industrial levels.<SUP class=reference id=cite_ref-carbon_budget_1-1>[2]</SUP>
<SUP></SUP>
Various techniques have been proposed for removing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere in carbon dioxide sinks.

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_gas, water vapor contributes 36 – 72 % to greenhouse gases, compared to 9 – 26 % for CO2. So, a 38% increase in CO2 in the atmosphere means additional 3.42% - 10 % contribution to greenhouse gases by man in the form of CO2.

It would only take a 3.6% - 7.2% decrease in water vapor to counterbalance our contribution to greenhouse gases; providing all the above numbers are even accurate. If that number is in fact rising, then so is the total amount of greenhouse gases.

But finally, you would have to prove that increase in greenhouse gases is causing a rise in global temperatures. And that is where the house of cards falls down. Average global tempertures have in fact dropped in the past decade. There are other things taking place in nature that are swinging global temperatures more than we can; the amount of entergy we recieve from the Sun is probably one of them.

-James

 

[EasyEd]

Hey All,

I said the world will have to act on partial evidence. This is a good example. To expect that models must correctly predict every aspect of past temperature to thus create confidence in the predictions of the future and then use that as a basis for discussing action is a completely foolish perspective to take. We will probably never be able to correctly predict the weather because it is a chaotic system - if we can correctly predict trends that will or should be good enough. Yes there are regional effects, sun effects, volcanic effects etc but the basic physics and chemistry never changes.

Right now for example we cannot account for the fate of half of the heat entering the earth system - we know it doesn't leave but where does it go? See this youtube of Kevin Trenberths. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=868nr1Pgxw0 This illustrates some of our lack of knowledge but is it a valid reason to say everything is bogus and so business as usual? Uh in my opinion no we may not have the luxury of waiting till all the results are in as the consequences are too great.

The real basis for climate change lies in simple basic elementary chemistry and physics. CO2 and other GHGs heat the earth no ifs and or buts - if you doubt it go to the AIP site in my first post and read the history and check the original science references. Because we know there is net heating - even if it is a relatively minor background item - it represents tremendous energy which will be expressed through other natural process - for example extreme weather which we are seeing more of. It is completely possible that the direct effect of CO2 may not be huge but it's indirect effects may far outshadow direct effects and we may regret it mightily. Add to this the effects we are already seeing. To expect correct modeling of all this is I think unrealistic. There would be very little life on earth as we know it without the GHG effect.

Follow that up with the consequences of global warming (see the AIP site and the book Climate Wars) and then evaluate if the risk is worth taking. There is no question that Mother Earth may throw humanity a curveball that does the same thing as global warming but that is not an acceptable excuse for doing it to ourselves.

I am not an alarmist but given the consequences this should be taken very seriously.

Then yes there are all the possible ramifications - wealth transfer, paying for the pollution of dead ancestors who polluted CO2 since CO2 is in residence in the atmosphere for hundreds of years, increased socialism, increased world "closeness"/cooperation even perhaps one day one world government. Yes I have no doubt that various parts of these is the future of mankind if for no reason other than population density (current near 7 billion to 9+ billion in 20 years - a separate issue) but will especially be so if we do not begin to act today to prevent this future for American and other children not yet born by taking care of the planet upon which we live and depend. What an amazing legacy we would leave if by fighting responsible behaviour around climate change and GHGs we condemn our descendants to exactly what we are fighting against - not a legacy I want.

-Ed-

PS Hottest June ever recorded on earth. http://www.physorg.com/news198434180.html

 

[luckydog]

A perfect example of an emotional and political reaction to a scientific question. I think that's what EasyEd meant... Whether or not humans are contributing to global warming is inconclusive, not “beyond belief”.

Ah......PRB trying to start trouble AGAIN !!

There is absolutely nothing "political" or emotional about my post whatsoever!!

Here's some numbers:

C02 makes up about .03% of the atmosphere

95% of that is natural..........leaving .0015% of C02 in the atmosphere man-made.

Nothing political or emotional about that. Jeez !!

 

[Cratermaker]

I don't understand the argument that we must do something even if we are not sure, the consequences are potentially too horrible to not take extreme measures, etc.

Why aren't the people making this argument screaming more loudly about asteroid defense? They've hit the earth before and they'll do it again. It's not a question of if, but when. Instant extinction (or pretty darn close). Why no outcry for that? I suspect that it is because it is not politically convenient for certain parties.

The really big problem I have with AGW theory is that as far as I can tell, ANY observed behavior of the climate is "obvously" due to AGW. Incrase of polar ice? Global warming. Cooling temps? Global warming. Drought? Global warming. Flooding? Global warming. Melting ice? Global warming. etc. There is no set of conditions to disprove it (as far as I can tell, if anyone has seen it mentioned anywhere, I'd like to know) and that makes it invalid as a scientific theory.

 

[Eoraptor1]

I'd thought after Germany got knocked out of the World Cup that my Muad'Dib powers had deserted me, but I guess they're coming back. Featured article on the Wikipedia Home Page: Confirmation Bias.

A general note about Wikipedia, strictly MHO: What's good about it - anyone can contribute. What's bad about it - anyone can contribute.

I can say no more while obeying forum rules.

JAMES

 

[jhefner]

I said the world will have to act on partial evidence. This is a good example. To expect that models must correctly predict every aspect of past temperature to thus create confidence in the predictions of the future and then use that as a basis for discussing action is a completely foolish perspective to take. We will probably never be able to correctly predict the weather because it is a chaotic system - if we can correctly predict trends that will or should be good enough. Yes there are regional effects, sun effects, volcanic effects etc but the basic physics and chemistry never changes.

If you want to accept "squishy" science, that's OK. At least you are willing to admit that if you could wave a wand and make all man-made CO2 emissions go away, that still doesn't guarantee that CO2 levels will go down, and temperatures with them. And I will agree that a long term goal of reducing our dependence on foreign oil is a good thing; for geopolitical reasons as much as environmental.

But, when folks try to impose crushing environmental regulations on the basis of such "squishy" science, or impose what is basically a global transfer of wealth and guilt in the form of a carbon tax; that is a whole different kettle of fish. And that is what was tried in Copenhagen; a good thing it fell apart.

PS Hottest June ever recorded on earth. http://www.physorg.com/news198434180.html

Yes, how quickly we forget that just seven months ago, the UK and Europe was entirely covered with a blanket of snow; a rare event. Several records were broken then.

And "ever recorded on earth" means nothing when you realize that global temperature data goes back to less then 200 years. And we don't have enough secondary temperature data in the form of tree rings, ice cores, pine cones or what ever to cover the earth for its entire lifetime. Just the sort of exaggeration that makes us loss faith in AGW avocates.

jhefner, it's not the place to discuss stuff like this (I fear this will be locked sooner or later), so I won't go into much detail, but just so much: your post is basically a summary of well known denialist crocks, most of them have been debunked over and over again, the famous "ice age" prediction on the 70's (false), the New Zealand graph, water vapor, and so on. I see you have lot's of info from Fox News -- probably the worst place in American media to get information about climate change from.

All I will say is that if you in return believe Al Gore, the U.N. Climate Council, and those that cried that the polar bears are drowning...I'll let the facts stand as they are.

-James

 

[luckydog]

"...........for the last seven hundred thousand years, our planet has been in a geological ice age, characterized by advancing and retreating glacial ice. No one is sure why, but ice now covers the planet every hundred thousand years, with smaller advances every twenty thousand or so. The last advance was twenty thousand years ago, so we're due for the next one.

Even today, after five billion years, our planet remains amazingly active. We have five hundred volcanoes, and an eruption every two weeks. Earthquakes are continuous : a million and a half a year, a moderate Richter 5 quake every six hours. Tsunamis race across the Pacific every three months.

Our atmosphere is just as violent. At any moment there are one thousand five hundred electrical storms across the planet. Eleven lightning bolts strike the ground each second. A tornado tears across the surface every six hours. And every four days, a giant cyclonic storm, hundreds of miles in diameter, spins over the ocean and wreaks havoc on the land.

The little apes that call themselves human beings can do nothing except run and hide. For these same little apes to imagine they can stabilize this atmosphere is ludicrous........"

Michael Crichton............."State of Fear"

Hey PRB..........is Mother Nature political ????

 

[Wing_Z]

Every bit of Real Science (as opposed to Quasi-science that came gushing on about Hockey Sticks and Coloured Underwear and so forth) that I have seen says that GHG emissions are a matter of concern to this planet.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was appointed to evaluate the risk of climate change caused by human activity, as a result of long scientific study, not on some showman's whim.
It is not a political body nor one which is driven by vested interest.
Alas every time it reports something which is not sweet music to various vested interests, we hear the Chorus of Rubbish, Rubbish!

I am reminded of R J Reynolds Tobacco, who to the last, stood by their product.
Like this:

There's so much smoke from all those smokestacks, how could a few cigarettes possibly hurt you?

I do like this thought, as a fallback position it is ironclad:

...There is no question that Mother Earth may throw humanity a curveball that does the same thing as global warming but that is not an acceptable excuse for doing it to ourselves...

 

[luckydog]

Every bit of Real Science (as opposed to Quasi-science that came gushing on about Hockey Sticks and Coloured Underwear and so forth) that I have seen says that GHG emissions are a matter of concern to this planet.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was appointed to evaluate the risk of climate change caused by human activity, as a result of long scientific study, not on some showman's whim.
It is not a political body nor one which is driven by vested interest.
Alas every time it reports something which is not sweet music to various vested interests, we hear the Chorus of Rubbish, Rubbish!

I am reminded of R J Reynolds Tobacco, who to the last, stood by their product.
Like this:

There's so much smoke from all those smokestacks, how could a few cigarettes possibly hurt you?

I do like this thought, as a fallback position it is ironclad:

Sorry Wing........

but the IPCC IS political and does have a vested interest................have you not been following the news ???
They've embarrassed themselves several times over the past few years with totally ridiculous "evaluations".

 

[Wing_Z]

Sorry Wing........
but the IPCC IS political and does have a vested interest................have you not been following the news ???
They've embarrassed themselves several times over the past few years with totally ridiculous "evaluations".

It was not constituted as a political body.
That it is at the center of very strong vested interests is apparent - it must react in some way, and that is perceived as politically vested interest.
It has a job to do, and we have to hope it does it well.

If it doesn't ... we'll all still be smokin' Luckies, "so our throats don't get irritated."