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Author Topic:   Global Warming... fact, fiction, or a little of both?
gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 31 of 113 (243346)
09-14-2005 1:57 PM
Reply to: Message 29 by Silent H
09-14-2005 10:04 AM


quote:
The idea that ice = ice age is patently absurd. Ice will almost always exist someplace. Does that mean we are always in an ice age? Or are you saying that Ice Ages are always relative concepts specific to each location on earth?
I wouldn't say that it's "absurd". Pretty much the only time you have a polar continent that's covered in an icecap is during an Ice Age, or in our case, an interglacial.
Because you need a conveniently positioned continent as well as a favorable climate to accomplish this, ice ages are fairly rare in Earth's history, and by definition this is when you have a have a continental ice cap. In fact, I wouldn't say that we aren't in an Ice Age now, just not in a glaciation.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 29 by Silent H, posted 09-14-2005 10:04 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 37 by Silent H, posted 09-15-2005 8:18 AM gene90 has replied

  
gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 32 of 113 (243353)
09-14-2005 2:32 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by Silent H
09-14-2005 9:19 AM


Re: Regrouping...
quote:
Perhaps to stir the pot, let me be so bold as to suggest this has so far looked much like a creationist position. I have seen many exhortations that it must be and that people do bad things which will destroy us if we don't trust in that paradigm and so alter our behavior
The part about our changing our behavior is an inherently political question. The science itself is independant of whether or not we can, will, or should sign treaties to reduce emissions. That kind of question is primarily for diplomats, economists, and partisan politicians to calculate.
quote:
but the actual facts are not quite so forthcoming... and I did lay out some specific points.
Well, we know that we're releasing CO2 and a half dozen or so other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
We know that the ground reradiates heat as thermal infrared, and we know that GHGs absorb and reradiate that. Some component of that reradiated energy must be directed back at the ground unless there are some very bizarre physics going on up there that nobody has yet to discover.
Not suprisingly, we know that the average global temperature is rising (BTW, Crichton apparently misunderstood the meaning of 'average global temperature' in his book, since his characters apparently travel to a station that shows a local trend of cooling.)
So we can arrive at a hypothesis that our GHGs are causing a warming, and we can construct models that generate testable results.
For a long time, it was pretty easy to doubt global warming because soundings and satellite temperature measurements contradicted the ground data. But in the last year or so, it was discovered that the satellite data was being cluttered by gradual orbit decay and that some of the diurnal signal they were getting was actually from nightime surfaces. For example, see Vinnikov and Grody, Global Warming Trend of Mean Tropospheric Temperature Observed by Satellites, Science, Vol 302, Issue 5643, 269-272, 10 October 2003 and a few similar papers in the same journal in recent years.
Here's a good article posted on the 'net by one of the scientists involved:
RealClimate: Et Tu LT?
Further, there's a warming trend in the global ocean from 1948-1998 as measured at a depth of 3000 meters. Since the ocean has a lot of thermal inertia, this is pretty clear evidence that this is a true, global trend and not noise in the data. (Levitus et. al., Warming of the World Ocean, Science, Vol 287, Issue 5461, 2225-2229 , 24 March 2000)
And the discrepancy in balloon-borne measurements just bit the dust as well:
Sherwood, Lanzante, Meyer. Radiosonde Daytime Biases and Late-20th Century Warming, Science, Vol 309, Issue 5740, 1556-1559, 2 September 2005.
From the abstract:
quote:
Several characteristics of this trend indicate that it is an artifact of systematic reductions over time in the uncorrected error due to daytime solar heating of the instrument and should be absent from accurate climate records. Although other problems may exist, this effect alone is of sufficient magnitude to reconcile radiosonde tropospheric temperature trends and surface trends during the late 20th century.
Now we have arrived at a point where the surface observations, ocean temperatures, radiosonde data, and satellite measurements are consistent with model predictions.
That doesn't "prove" global warming and further testing and refinement of these models will continue as understanding of the climate and additional measurements accumulate. However, as of now the theory of anthropogenic global warming is perfectly good science.
I know that bald links are discouraged, but I think these can add additional information for this debate to anyone interested. I think they are tangential to the debate but they cover topics that have been raised.
This shows how closely models can approximate climate:
RealClimate: Planetary energy imbalance?
Here's an article on the myth that was already mentioned in this thread that scientists once believed humans would cause an ice age and that it somehow has a bearing on GW today:
RealClimate: The global cooling myth
An article entitled "Michael Crichton's 'State of Confusion'"
RealClimate: Michael Crichton’s State of Confusion
Another installment from RealClimate, "Michael Crichton’s State of Confusion II: Return of the Science"
RealClimate: Michael Crichton’s State of Confusion II: Return of the Science

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by Silent H, posted 09-14-2005 9:19 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 47 by Silent H, posted 09-15-2005 11:43 AM gene90 has replied

  
Itachi Uchiha
Member (Idle past 5614 days)
Posts: 272
From: mayaguez, Puerto RIco
Joined: 06-21-2003


Message 33 of 113 (243442)
09-14-2005 5:51 PM


Im no expert but......
I dont know if global warming is real or fake but to my opinion something is definitely going on with the atmosphere. Hurricanes seem to be greater in number and strength every year. Between last year and this year more hurricanes have hit the US than any time before. These changes are also affecting my country. This week big pieces of hail have been falling (yes its true hail in a tropical island) and we just got approximately two hours ago our first tornado in the history of Puerto Rico (not sure of this) and it was like 3 miles from my house. It only lasted for like 30 seconds but people here are panicing because we never had to deal with that before. We are prepared to handle hurricanes and have been warned about a possible earthquake anytime soon but what happened here today was unbelieveable. A friend of mine saw it and called me while it was happenning. He said the traffic stoped and everybody was looking and taking pictures of the tornado. If I get my hands on any of those pics Ill post them here.

Viva Puerto Rico Libre. Colonialism is an international crime

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gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 34 of 113 (243448)
09-14-2005 6:04 PM
Reply to: Message 33 by Itachi Uchiha
09-14-2005 5:51 PM


Re: Im no expert but......
quote:
Hurricanes seem to be greater in number and strength every year. Between last year and this year more hurricanes have hit the US than any time before.
Statistical analyses have shown that hurricane frequency is definately up in recent years. But there are multidecadal cycles in frequency that can also account for this. I'm not ready to pin on it global warming yet, but some papers have come out recently that now say that a warming could cause more, and more intense, hurricanes. They've also found a more convenient way to measure hurricane incidence and intensity by calculating the average heat dissipated by hurricanes instead of merely intensity or numbers. (If this trend of linking GW to hurricanes continues, it is a new development. Dr. Christopher Landsea resigned from the IPCC not too long ago because he thought that his superior was playing up last year's season as a result of global warming when the consensus at the time was that GW would not significantly increase hurricane incidence or intensity through 2070).
quote:
These changes are also affecting my country. This week big pieces of hail have been falling (yes its true hail in a tropical island)
That is exceedingly unusual, but I don't know that a direct warming of the atmosphere would cause it. I understand that the reason the tropics don't get hail is because the freezing line is so high up that it's hard to make hail in the first place and most of it melts or sublimates on the way down. If you are getting hail now, my first guess would be that the freezing line might have come down a bit, which would mean it was a little cooler aloft. Of course, climate is complex and predicting the consequences of warming for a particular place is very difficult to do. And it's also hard to try to construct a global trend from anomalous weather in a single locality.
quote:
A friend of mine saw it and called me while it was happenning. He said the traffic stoped and everybody was looking and taking pictures of the tornado. If I get my hands on any of those pics Ill post them here.
Please do that if you can. That would be a thing to see...
While we're talking about weather oddities, Brazil got hit by its first recorded hurricane this season.
This message has been edited by gene90, 09-14-2005 06:05 PM

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crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1466 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 35 of 113 (243458)
09-14-2005 6:35 PM
Reply to: Message 25 by Silent H
09-14-2005 9:06 AM


This is simply false. You have already seen at least two others here, one involved with paleoclimatologists who said there is no sense of any trend beyond the usual temp variation.
And yet, from the Wiki article alone I'm looking at composites of some 10-20 different climatological models that make it pretty clear that the warming trend is already way beyond the recent annual variation.
So I'd say your paleoclimatologists are wrong.
Unless I see a mechanism I am loathe to suggest that greenhouse gases are to blame for anything.
Mechanism? Greenhouse gases are the mechanism; their inherent chemical properties. I guess I don't understand your question. You're asking for the mechanism whereby greenhouse gases cause atmosphereic warming?
Why discuss it at all as a real thing?
Discuss what? The prospect of Earth becoming Venus? I'm not familiar with any climatologist who advances that as a realistic possibility.
I agree, that is why GW is not the correct term or model is it?
I agree that "global warming" is a potentially misleading term. I prefer to use "climate change" to refer to anomolous changes in the heat level and other factors of the atmosphere, and "anthropogenic climate change" to refer to those changes that are caused by human activity.
There are changes which we should and should not expect to see.
And I believe that I successfully made the case that the onset of a cooling trend is one eventual change that we might reasonably expect to see, given one model of the forces that affect the atmosphere and climate.
I'm sorry that the term "global warming" doesn't seem consistent to you with the idea of an eventual ice age. That's why I prefer the term "climate change" as there is no reason to believe that the result of human activities will always be warming temperatures. For a brief period between 1940 and 1970, for instance, human industrialization actually caused a reduction in atmospheric temperatures due to the chemical properties of different industrial products. That's still anthropogenic climate change.
I'd be interested in knowing where to find some of that.
I started with the Wiki article on his novel, which led me to a blog written by atmospheric scientists, for instance. It was from that article that I originally quoted.
Anyone who states he only supplied within the nonfiction section, refs for antiGW is simply making things up.
As I said I haven't read the book so naturally, I haven't read his footnotes either.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 25 by Silent H, posted 09-14-2005 9:06 AM Silent H has replied

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crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1466 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 36 of 113 (243462)
09-14-2005 6:43 PM
Reply to: Message 27 by Silent H
09-14-2005 9:19 AM


Re: Regrouping...
If I came on asking for evidence that evolution was a good scientific model my guess is I'd have gotten a lot more than one post with unencouraging statements from one science org, and one link to Wiki.
On a board dedicated to the discussion of that very subject? Yes, this is probably true.
Might the reason that you're so underwhelmed by the response so far is that you're posing questions in atmospheric science to a group of biologists and biology enthusiasts?
Perhaps to stir the pot, let me be so bold as to suggest this has so far looked much like a creationist position.
Funny, but that's how I've always felt about the climate change deniers. Here's the arguments that I've recieved upon presenting climate data:
1) Those are just models (theories.) If GW was real it would be called a "fact."
2) GW proponents, regardless of their scientific credentials, are people motivated by an irrational hatred of SUV's and oil companies.
and my personal favorite -
3) Climate scienists can't even predict tomorrow's weather - how can we take them seriously about global warming?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 27 by Silent H, posted 09-14-2005 9:19 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 44 by Silent H, posted 09-15-2005 11:03 AM crashfrog has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 37 of 113 (243731)
09-15-2005 8:18 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by gene90
09-14-2005 1:57 PM


I wouldn't say that it's "absurd". Pretty much the only time you have a polar continent that's covered in an icecap is during an Ice Age, or in our case, an interglacial.
That's not what Jar said, so I'm not sure why you are saying my comment is incorrect. He said that simply if you have ice where you are it is an Ice Age. That to me is absurd terminology.
I provided a link to a discussion on the term Ice Age. It discussed three different uses, including a common generalized one, and Jar's was not compatible with it. And in keeping with why it was brought up in the first place, essentially contrary to GW.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by gene90, posted 09-14-2005 1:57 PM gene90 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 39 by gene90, posted 09-15-2005 10:05 AM Silent H has replied

  
gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 38 of 113 (243768)
09-15-2005 10:00 AM
Reply to: Message 23 by crashfrog
09-14-2005 7:43 AM


Re: My view of global warming
quote:
I disagree. I find it highly consistent, or at least not inconsistent. Anthropogenic climate change doesn't mean that the warming trend persist forever. The warming trend itself has consequences, which may include stimulating a period of global cooling. For instance the rise in the temperature of the atmosphere allows it to contain more moisture; more moisture means more cloud albedo and thus less solar energy at the Earth's surface.
That would be a self-regulating system, not the onset of a cooling trend. It would stay around an equilibrium.
quote:
The question is then, is the new cooling trend limited by the same feedback effect? If it cools too fast, probably not. An expansion of glaciers and record snowfalls increase surface albedo, which prevents warming. Because of its reflectivity, a snowball Earth doesn't heat very quickly.
Here's an interesting summary of a Perspectives column written in Science:
quote:
OCEAN SCIENCE:
Global Warming and the Next Ice Age
Andrew J. Weaver and Claude Hillaire-Marcel
There is a popular notion in the media that human-induced global warming will result in the onset of a new ice age. In their Perspective, Weaver and Hillaire-Marcel refute this view, explaining that global warming is unlikely to dramatically alter the North Atlantic ocean circulation. They also emphasize that elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide lead to summer temperatures that do not allow glacier formation and growth.
Science, Vol 304, Issue 5669, 400-402 , 16 April 2004
This message has been edited by gene90, 09-15-2005 10:00 AM

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gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 39 of 113 (243773)
09-15-2005 10:05 AM
Reply to: Message 37 by Silent H
09-15-2005 8:18 AM


quote:
That's not what Jar said, so I'm not sure why you are saying my comment is incorrect. He said that simply if you have ice where you are it is an Ice Age. That to me is absurd terminology.
Well, as I understand it ice has been historically rare on Earth outside of Ice Ages. Even now when we have midlatitude glaciers (for the moment) climate is still a bit colder than normal. There *might* have been some glacioeustacy in the Cretaceous, a paper like that was presented at GSA, I think last year. And that was definately a greenhouse climate. But as more of a general rule of thumb than an absolute statement of fact, and assuming we are talking about ice that persists yearlong, I would agree with jar.
This message has been edited by gene90, 09-15-2005 10:05 AM

This message is a reply to:
 Message 37 by Silent H, posted 09-15-2005 8:18 AM Silent H has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 42 by Silent H, posted 09-15-2005 10:25 AM gene90 has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 40 of 113 (243776)
09-15-2005 10:09 AM
Reply to: Message 35 by crashfrog
09-14-2005 6:35 PM


And yet, from the Wiki article alone I'm looking at composites of some 10-20 different climatological models that make it pretty clear that the warming trend is already way beyond the recent annual variation.
Its hard to say way beyond, but it is increasing higher that in some recent estimates. This is where understanding the data means something to put it all into context. Here are a list of graphs on climate that they presented: 1k temp, and Here is their graph on 2K temp comparisons , and 12k temps, 450k temps, 5mil temps, and 65mil temps.
As you broaden the range some important points regarding GW should start coming up. The first is that while temps are going up, and perhaps they are going up quickly, they do not necessarily seem as out of place in a geologic context. If we start from a neutral position of not knowing what is going on and where we are headed, that context becomes important. Second is that its relative normalcy in a historical context raises the question of why it is of concern.
As I mentioned before, in the seventies there was a worry that we were entering a new Ice Age and that was due to to a recent downward trend of temps. Here's the Wiki link to that fad. You will note that throughout their discussion they point to the fact that it was what they generally did not know about the environment and its mechanisms which made them jump to conclusions.
Going through the GW data, you should start looking for spots where it is admitted that data is scarce. The NOAA link on global warming (their present position) which cplmini provided is laced with the same sort of caveats.
While it is true that we now have a better understanding than before, it does not suggest that we have moved to that much better a position.
So I'd say your paleoclimatologists are wrong
I said mine were from years ago and I could be behind the times at this point (well catching up rapidly now). The Wiki article itself keeps mentioning the small amount of climatologists who are not in agreement with GW as it is commonly portrayed, but that 1) does not make it true (I was unaware of any statistical analysis for how many did or did not agree with GW), and 2) does not lend credibility to GW nor discredit those raising questions.
Right now there ARE valid questions out there which have not been answered. I set out the main ones. Cpl supplied NOAAs response to those very questions (kudos for them understanding those are the questions that need verification), but their answers were not definitive. That should suggest something.
I might note that they even provide contrary assessments to global changes in environment, like what Jazz suggested based on what he had seen regionally.
I guess I don't understand your question. You're asking for the mechanism whereby greenhouse gases cause atmosphereic warming?
Inherent chemical properties don't mean a lot once you start talking about atmospheres. Our atmosphere is rather large and multilayered. It is definitely true that increased CO2 in general can result in warmer temps, but this is not a general thing. It enters the atmosphere and goes where? Where is the heat trapped and how does it get distributed within that area? What mechanisms exist that could ounteract and reverse accumulation (or conversely to increase its accumulation)?
You will note that from recent temp graphs that they actually dipped for a few decades when they should (according to GW theory) have been climbing drastically. The idea now is that aerosols provided a mechanism which reversed CO2 effects. In the far past there are sudden surges of CO2 (perhaps even faster than today) from oceanic "burps", which are a bit similar to what GW theorists surmise may happen as Siberia warms up. Yet these great releases diminished and so did the temps of the past... through purely natural mechanisms.
I prefer to use "climate change" to refer to anomolous changes in the heat level and other factors of the atmosphere, and "anthropogenic climate change" to refer to those changes that are caused by human activity.
Agreed that this is a start in the right direction. But this then shifts back to my original questions regarding global climate change and manmade effects. I would also raise the question if Climate Change must be viewed with a sense of fear or more of a pragmatic view of what that means. Is it a neutral term, or one for environmentalist groups to use as a flag?
And I believe that I successfully made the case that the onset of a cooling trend is one eventual change that we might reasonably expect to see, given one model of the forces that affect the atmosphere and climate.
Small regional cooling is completely different than the possible onset of an Ice Age. I already supplied a link on ice ages to Jar. I might also note that I saw nothing (particularly on the NOAA site) which suggested that GW should create enough cooling to create an Ice Age.
I started with the Wiki article on his novel, which led me to a blog written by atmospheric scientists, for instance. It was from that article that I originally quoted.
I'll check that out.
As I said I haven't read the book so naturally, I haven't read his footnotes either.
I wasn't blaming you for that. I was raising a point. If these critics said he did not provide contrary evidence, when in fact he certainly did, doesn't that call into question their honesty, and their criticisms?

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

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gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 41 of 113 (243780)
09-15-2005 10:17 AM
Reply to: Message 40 by Silent H
09-15-2005 10:09 AM


quote:
As you broaden the range some important points regarding GW should start coming up. The first is that while temps are going up, and perhaps they are going up quickly, they do not necessarily seem as out of place in a geologic context.
I tend to agree with that.

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Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 42 of 113 (243786)
09-15-2005 10:25 AM
Reply to: Message 39 by gene90
09-15-2005 10:05 AM


But as more of a general rule of thumb than an absolute statement of fact, and assuming we are talking about ice that persists yearlong, I would agree with jar.
1) He didn't say anything about persisting. He said if you have ice. I assume he meant where you didn't have it before, but that's giving him the benefit of the doubt.
2) We are not discussing rarity of ice outside of Ice Ages. Ice has existed throughout human civilization (even if not all have experienced it). Thus we are discussing the term Ice Age as humans use it. I provided a reference for that usage. It suggests that it is based on quantity of Ice, not existence of ice. Thus it seems you are using a more technical idea not actually used in common nomenclature. While I did learn that ice was scarce outside of Ice Ages, I certainly did not learn that thus when there was any ice around (even for over a year) it was an Ice Age.
3) If any ice is indicative of an Ice Age, and thus we are in an ice age now (technically), then Jar's entire point collapses anyway as GW cannot be said to be the instrument of a NEW Ice Age.
You seem knowledgeable, and I'll be getting to your posts in a bit. But this seems like hairsplitting in order to defend Jar's def, which ends up countering the larger argument being made.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 39 by gene90, posted 09-15-2005 10:05 AM gene90 has replied

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 Message 43 by gene90, posted 09-15-2005 10:54 AM Silent H has replied

  
gene90
Member (Idle past 3822 days)
Posts: 1610
Joined: 12-25-2000


Message 43 of 113 (243803)
09-15-2005 10:54 AM
Reply to: Message 42 by Silent H
09-15-2005 10:25 AM


quote:
I certainly did not learn that thus when there was any ice around (even for over a year) it was an Ice Age.
Then maybe you will find this statement better: as a general rule of thumb across Earth history, the odds are against you finding permanent land ice unless you are in an Ice Age.
That is because:
(a) Today's climate is unusually cool.
(b) It is unusual for there to be land masses near the poles.
I do not mean that if I open my freezer and find ice there, I am in an Ice Age, although it could be argued that in that case it would technically be true.
You might be find be able to find permanent land ice on Earth during non-Ice Ages if you scoured the planet. However, because the key definition seems to be "wherever jar happens to be at the time", and if jar has a random geographical occurence, then yes, the rule of thumb will usually hold true.
quote:
2) We are not discussing rarity of ice outside of Ice Ages. Ice has existed throughout human civilization (even if not all have experienced it).
Hence the need to divide the rather colloquial term "Ice Age" into glacials and interglacials. Human civilization is an artifact of our current interglacial. Alpine glaciers have occasionally devoured European villages but there aren't continental glaciers on North America or Europe like there were during previous glacials.
quote:
Thus we are discussing the term Ice Age as humans use it. I provided a reference for that usage. It suggests that it is based on quantity of Ice, not existence of ice.
Obviously the quantity definition is superior.
About the only reason I have sought to defend the existance of ice definition is because I think it has some validity, in that land ice (notice I'm further qualifying it) is usually rare. Of course, this is now a non-issue because you have acknowledged this already.
quote:
I certainly did not learn that thus when there was any ice around (even for over a year) it was an Ice Age.
No, I'm thinking of it as a 'rule of thumb'. As a definition, in the context you seek to use it, it is clearly inferior.
quote:
3) If any ice is indicative of an Ice Age, and thus we are in an ice age now (technically), then Jar's entire point collapses anyway as GW cannot be said to be the instrument of a NEW Ice Age.
Technically that's true, but we're arguing semantics. There is a significant practical distinction to be made between the interglacial we live in and when glaciers eat Manhattan.
This message has been edited by gene90, 09-15-2005 11:02 AM

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Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 44 of 113 (243807)
09-15-2005 11:03 AM
Reply to: Message 36 by crashfrog
09-14-2005 6:43 PM


Re: Regrouping...
Might the reason that you're so underwhelmed by the response so far is that you're posing questions in atmospheric science to a group of biologists and biology enthusiasts?
Heheheh... point taken. Though I did think there were geologists and climatologists around to debunk (or prove!) the Flood and other YE theories.
I should also add that this ought to be important to bio people. Whether we are in an abnormal climatic condition which could harm organisms or entire ecosystem requires knowledge about paleoclimates and efficient modeling.
I've always felt about the climate change deniers.
I find both sides of this debate to be inhabited by true believers. This is unfortunate. I am truly an agnostic on this subject, but am firmly a skeptic in scientific practice. I am waiting for good solid data and models. Gene may have provided this. I have yet to get to his data link packed post.
1) Those are just models (theories.) If GW was real it would be called a "fact."
2) GW proponents, regardless of their scientific credentials, are people motivated by an irrational hatred of SUV's and oil companies.
Those are obviously fallacies... the first betraying a knowledge of science anyway. The second one however does hold some truth. There are true believers, including within the science world. And there are environmental activists that place their ideology above science. Thankfully one cannot see that in an article. They have good data or they don't, and they have a good argument off the data, or they don't.
Of course good data itself raises an issue...
I've been on the verge of discussing some personal things that I would rather not. But it is highly pertinent to this whole subject. Let me be vague enough, yet remain candid. I've told you I worked for the gov't (internally and as a contractor). It was in one of the USs major science/enviro departments. In fact it was within an int'l section (hi importance) of this major department. It dealt with what was supposed to be real data on important sci/enviro issues.
I was part of a section within that section which was newly formed to review the data. I was told on entering the job, by those departing, that I would never trust a sci/enviro statement made by a gov't based org (particularly that one) ever again. They were right.
You don't have to take my word for it. But keep your eyes open if you move into science/enviro and especially if you go to work for the gov't. Science data being generated under the wing of politicians and that means important orgs, may have little to do with reality.
I left for several different reasons, but one of the biggest shocks before I left came when our oversight of the data was pulled and when we questioned this, were given the statement "Who cares about science? People need to be concerned about this." I forget now, maybe it was even "scared" instead of "concerned".
Either way it was definitive. They wanted data presented as if real, that may have no legitimate basis, just to get people concerned on that topic of the year. This happened to be an enviro issue which I was VERY concerned about as it had a real potential impact, and the data was crucial. It did not make me happy to see someone potentially fluffing the data, even if we shared the same basic concern.
It was not uncommon to find that those in upper reaches of certain sci/enviro offices, had degrees in art and history and biz and nothing close to science. Some were people just like you described and they were IN CHARGE of combing... I mean cherry picking and then protecting from internal review... the data everyone uses.
When the raw data itself can be corrupted, anything is possible.
That is why I am a bit cynical, on top of being skeptical. The number of agencies and scientists which say anything, is not half as important as the data (how they got it) and clear explanation of how that relates to a model. That goes double when an agency with political overtones says something.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 36 by crashfrog, posted 09-14-2005 6:43 PM crashfrog has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 54 by crashfrog, posted 09-16-2005 7:30 AM Silent H has replied

  
Silent H
Member (Idle past 5819 days)
Posts: 7405
From: satellite of love
Joined: 12-11-2002


Message 45 of 113 (243810)
09-15-2005 11:10 AM
Reply to: Message 43 by gene90
09-15-2005 10:54 AM


There is a significant practical distinction to be made between the interglacial we live in and when glaciers eat Manhattan.
Heheheh... I agree. And thus the question becomes is GW consistent with a scenario where glaciers eat Manhattan? And I don't mean beyond 100+ years.

holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This message is a reply to:
 Message 43 by gene90, posted 09-15-2005 10:54 AM gene90 has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 46 by gene90, posted 09-15-2005 11:30 AM Silent H has not replied

  
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