Comments on: Denialism Heats Up

By: BritinSeattle

BritinSeattle — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 06:33:58 +0000

The Daily Mail is only good for celebrity gossip and sports coverage. Your broader point has been depressing me all summer...

By: shortchain

shortchain — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 02:04:06 +0000

Calling the phenomenon "Global Warming" is part of the problem. What's happening is that the energy balance, between radiation received and radiation emitted back into space, has been shifted by changing the composition of the Earth's atmosphere. Yes, this manifests itself in temperature anomalies -- but we can't measure the temperature of every cubic centimeter of the volume occupied by the planet and its atmosphere. Also, the imbalance hasn't changed very much -- yet. So focusing on the temperatures reported by the measuring stations is only one relatively small aspect of the panoply of phenomena that mark what has come to be called "AGW". What's actually happening is that we're going to be seeing a whole host of things, and quite a few of them are going to cost a lot of money, those of you who think we "can't afford to place more burdens on energy production".

By: DrFunguy

DrFunguy — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 23:35:46 +0000

Pierce hit the topic today as well. "Wildfires. Superstorms. Drought. The fact that there actually is a Northwest Passage through the Arctic from the Atlantic to the Pacific now. The warnings get more and more dire. Yet we have had three debates and the simple question of how we keep from killing the planet never comes up? "

Read more: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/climate-change-2012-election-13818160#ixzz29bQH1IVf

By: mclever

mclever — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 17:29:37 +0000

It'll make DC happy that Obama just told Iowans that "Climate Change isn't a hoax" and got huge applause at his campaign stop in Mount Vernon.

By: dcpetterson

dcpetterson — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 15:47:40 +0000

By the way, the years chosen by the Daily Mail as beginning and end points to "prove" global warming stopped -- 1997 was coming off a particularly strong El Nino (which tends to increase temperatures in the northern hemisphere), and 2011 was the period of an impressive La Nina (which decreases temps).

They cherry-picked their "plateau" period well.

By: Mainer

Mainer — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 15:37:45 +0000

Good read DC. I need to mull some of this but will have a more detailed reply later today. Now my reply will not be that of a scientist but of an outdoors man that would like to think he is and has been observant but beyond that I have been connected to the sea for a good part of my life. I think you be interested in some of what I have to say.

By: dawolf

dawolf — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 15:25:14 +0000

This is a minor specialist subject of mine (MSc in Renewable Energy Systems Technology, so you can guess its of interest).

Anyway, just like to say this was a very good explanation. Hit all the main points, including the ozone greenhouse gas/antarctica point. Only thing I'd add there is that the ozone hole has shown signs of stabilising and will hopefully recover, so that particular item will become less in time (it's a complex number, there is a huge amount of variance annually). Estimates vary.

By: DrFunguy

DrFunguy — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 15:11:38 +0000

The current trend is clearly warmer.

If you would just listen to the fungi, they would tell you.That said, it is possible that a short-term (climatically-speaking) warming could lead to feedbacks that reverse it, e.g. the reversal of the north atlantic current may have led to a rapid onset of glaciers in Europe during the pleistocene... chaotic and unstable systems are inherently difficult to predict. Then there is that whole reversal of magnetic poles phenomenon, which also can happen very rapidly. That is why we need to find nearby, earth-sized planets. Oh wait, we have! This one is only 4.3 light years, but unfortunately a bit hot for human tastes.

By: dcpetterson

dcpetterson — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 15:03:37 +0000

Here is another interesting graphic, from Britain's Met Office, for data going up to 2011. The fifteen years in the span 1997-2011 all fall within the hottest sixteen years on record. The one year in the top sixteen that's not within this fifteen-year span is 1995, which came in fourteenth. Another way to say it is that the sixteen hottest years on record all fell within the last seventeen years.

By: PNE

PNE — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 14:50:44 +0000

Wow. This is very impressive.

Thank you very much for this, dcpetterson. This article is very informative.