the day after tomorrow

wkwillis

Some people have problems...

Torqumada said:
wkwillis, you're saying that all of the temperature rise is caused by humans? According to you "It is possible that some part of global warming is nonanthropogenic" Did you look at the discussion that Jesse and I are having in this thread? He posted data that showed that every 125,000 to 140,000 years there is an increase in temperature, atmospheric CO2 and atmospheric Methane. While the overall CO2 level is 26% or so over the high listed, the spike is occuring at roughly the same time as the previous ones in the past. Are you telling me that all of those temeprature changes are the fault of humans? Please show me the archaelogical data that shows that humans or anyone had the same industiral capacity as we do now 140 to 420 thousand years ago. I think both Jesse and I agree that there has been an increase in atmospheric CO2 and temps, but humans are only responsible for a fraction of it and that it has happened before humans had the capacity for industry.

Torqumada
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It is possible that some part of global warming is nonanthropogenic. We haven't had a decent volcanic eruption in 1400 years. A decent volcano eruption is one that kills a significant part of the earth's population. Tambura doesn't count as a decent eruption.
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What part of 'It is possible that some part of global warming is nonanthropogenic' don't you understand?

'It is possible that some part of global warming is nonanthropogenic.' means that some part of global warming might not be caused by people. It could be caused by changes in solar output, by changes in atmospheric greenhousing not caused by people, like, some large natural gas deposit in the ocean sprung a leak after an earthquake, or some new species of temite is more efficiently recycling cellulose into methane, or god knows what.
No offense, but I believe that most global warming is caused by coal mining (CO2 and CH4), by oil burning (CO2 and CH4), by forest clearing, by hydroelectric power plant reservoirs degrading biological carbon in covered soils, by farting cattle (though, weren't the deer eating the same vegation before?), or god knows what else. There are undoubtedly more stuff going on that I don't know about, and stuff going on that nobody knows about yet.
 

Torqumada

"No offense, but I believe that most global warming is caused by coal mining (CO2 and CH4), by oil burning (CO2 and CH4), by forest clearing, by hydroelectric power plant reservoirs degrading biological carbon in covered soils"

None of those events existed 420,000 years ago, and yet CO2 and methane levels rose and the temperature went up. If industrialization is,as you argue, the primary reason for Global warming how did it happen without any industry? The data so far suggests that global warming is a normal part of the Earth's biosphere and that so far humans can only account for 26% of the total CO2 increase in this current cycle. I agree that there are other unknown factors going on, but I don't believe that Global warming is soley caused by human activity as you have stated above. It it were, then there wouldn't be this cycle as already presented in this discussion. It would be a relatively flat graph on CO2, methane and temp levels until after 1850 or so. Its not. Its a cycle. I think its the ultimate in human hubris to say that its all our fault that a natural process is taking place. We might as well say we command the tides, cause the sun to rise and set and the seasons to change. After all we are here to see those events take place, so we must be causing them. We should take responsibility for the pollution that we put into our environment and take steps to clean it up and prevent excess.

Torqumada
 

Mark

I haven't read the most up-to-date literature, but from the stuff a few years ago (few, not many and post grad school), the vast majority of the increase in global temperatures was/is from natural or unexplained causes. The discussion then was what percentage was caused by humans (which most climate folks accepted was/is occurring). The number I remember was approximately 5% of the global warming could be caused by human activities. The concern is that this amount may be enough to kick the natural climate changes to a higher state.

I also remember a speaker in grad school (late '80s) who mentioned the 1940s to 1970s were abnormally calm in terms of weather and the 1980s were returning to historic variations. Which would explain why so many weather records are fairly old.
 

wkwillis

Uptodate

We learn new stuff every day. We unlearn old stuff a little slower. That's why the 'get your lie in first' tactic succeeds. People operate their whole lives on what they learned in high school because that's the last time they study science.
 

Mark

One of the things we've learned that hasn't changed is that Earth's climate is constantly changing due to natural causes. And some of the changes can be fast and large. So to blame the great majority/most of the recent change on human activities, you had better have a great deal of evidence. (Computer models in and of themselves are not evidence. Even the best ones have problems recreating past climates at fine enough scales for what people want for predictions. I wish they were accurate enough, because I am much more interested in past climates.)

Also, change in and of itself is not bad. Michigan, where I live, is habitable because of climatic changes that caused the ice sheet to melt, freeing the land between 14,000 and 12,000 years ago. Those or other changes also caused Earth to be warmer than now approxiamtely 13,000 to 11,000 years ago (I can't remember the dates off the top of my head). The question is who will benefit and who will lose as Earth's climate changes.
 

Torqumada

Chris Oakley said:
If a new ice age starts,we'll all lose.
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Well, you live in MA. Of course you'll lose. :p Those of us in more temperate climes might have a little colder winter to deal with. :eek:

torqumada
 

Faeelin

Banned
Mark said:
Also, change in and of itself is not bad. Michigan, where I live, is habitable because of climatic changes that caused the ice sheet to melt, freeing the land between 14,000 and 12,000 years ago. Those or other changes also caused Earth to be warmer than now approxiamtely 13,000 to 11,000 years ago (I can't remember the dates off the top of my head). The question is who will benefit and who will lose as Earth's climate changes.
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The midwest, in a decade long drought, appears to be a loser.

Seriously, I don't get this. We have a side that says global warming is happening, and a side that says we might not be responsible.

Isn't this like buckling a seatbelt? We might not crash, but why take that chance?
 

Torqumada

Faeelin said:
The midwest, in a decade long drought, appears to be a loser.

Seriously, I don't get this. We have a side that says global warming is happening, and a side that says we might not be responsible.

Isn't this like buckling a seatbelt? We might not crash, but why take that chance?
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Yes, but if those who push Man as the primary cause of Global Warming have their way, we won't be able to find the true cause of it. They will have us looking in the wrong places for the right answers. We are spending all our time looking at emissions of this or that chemical, we are missing the simple answer in front of us. It has become politics and not science.

Torqumada
 

Mark

[Torqumada]"Yes, but if those who push Man as the primary cause of Global Warming have their way, we won't be able to find the true cause of it. They will have us looking in the wrong places for the right answers. We are spending all our time looking at emissions of this or that chemical, we are missing the simple answer in front of us. It has become politics and not science."

Thank you, Torqumada.

My points are that climate changes happen naturally and that the reference point for most people was a period with a benign climate. I am not arguing that humans are influencing the changes or the amount of change. Nor am I arguing that even if we are adding a small percentage to the change, it isn't important. An analogy - if I am standing in knee-deep water, who cares if the water level increase 6 inches (15 cm). However, if I am standing in chin-deep water, then a 6 inch increase becomes much more important. The problem with climate studies is that we are still working out how deep the water is and how much it will increase.

If I am overly skeptical about the politics of climate change, it is partly due to hearing all about the coming Ice Age due to global cooling in the 1970s.

Today I found a reference to a paper in press in Surveys in Geophysics (I think, based on the abreviation) that discussing our impact on the climate. I checked and the paper doesn't appear to have been published yet. If this or a similar thread is going when it gets published, I'll let ya'll know.
 

Dave Howery

Back online.. for the moment, anyway

I go along with the "climate changes are happening due to things beyond our control, but human activities have a small impact on it" crowd. All in all though, even if it gets proven beyond a doubt that humans aren't responsible for climate changes, we still should make all efforts to clean up industry, harvest forests responsibly, etc.... living cleaner is always better....
 

Mark

As one who makes his living cleaning the mess left by industry, I agree with Dave. It's also much nicer to breathe clean air, swim in clean water, eat crops from clean soil, etc. I don't know what that has to do with the movie, but it is nicer.
 

Dave Howery

Dr. What> thanks... missed this site a lot. I've been spending this day off catching up... as I look at the clock, I see I've been online for... 3 hours?! Dang, I better get in the shower while there's still daylight left.... :)
 

Dave Howery

Grooooaaaaannnnn...... do you know how often I heard that joke when I was a kid (of course, when I was a kid that joke was new....).... you know how it is, kids have to tease everyone in some way about their name, and my last name doesn't lend itself much to teasing, so they had to pick on my first name :)
 

Doctor What

:D

I hear you man--got more than my fair share of teasing when I was a kid too--at least all they did to you was make fun of your name--try being a short, dark-skinned, nerdy kid with coke bottle glasses in a school filled with tall, white jocks :rolleyes:

So--why the long absence--I seem to recall something about you moving to a new job/city, right?
 

Dave Howery

yeah, quit my old job in OR (the company I worked for is slowly going out of business, so I got out while the getting was good), moved to Cheyenne WY (I have family here), found a new job. Staying with family here until I get a place of my own... in which case, I will have to set up my account on this board yet one more time after I get my own IP account :)
 
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