Gulf Stream Slowdown in Progress?

peacefinder writes "Researchers report that one process which drives the Gulf Stream is slowing down. As that current is part of the global oceanic heat conveyor which keeps parts of Europe and North America warmer than would be expected for their latitudes, such a slowdown might lead to abrupt climate change."

Demise of the Maya

[4of12]

A TV program a while back highlighted research investigating just why huge indigenous populations of Central America mysteriously disappeared around 800.

Lakebed sediment cores suggested a fairly severe multi-year drought around that time that was linked (through that Atlantic conveyor) to some severe winters in northern Europe. That drought was thought to disrupt agriculture that those cultures relied upon.

Re:Yes, climate will change...

[uncadonna]

Normally, 10 millenia is a short time in geophysics. Watch out for the next few centuries though. They'll be among the most exciting highlights of the entire multi-billion-year record.

Welcome to the anthropocene [innovations-report.de].

Darn

[aoteoroa]

Here on the Canadian West Coast global warming has been great. Winters are getting milder and milder and we've have had some great summers in the last few years.

The only downsides have been a few pesky forest fires, and annual water restrictions.

negative nancy

[witte]

As usual, this will only become an issue once the majority of people make the connection between climate change, its origins, and the resulting unpleasantness. (Starvation, war for dwindling resources, mad max, etc.)

Re:Yes, climate will change...

[arodland]

Actually, the grandparent expresses the perfect environmentalist viewpoint. The fundamental philosophy of the most vocal group of "environmentalists" is that I should treat the planet (or something) as being more important than human life. That's the single point that it all comes back to, even if not everyone who makes that argument knows that they are.

pretty predictable responses

[cahiha]

Well, the responses are pretty predictable:

Let those godless commie pinko Europeans freeze under dozens of feet of snow in their hovels, as long as we can keep driving our SUVs with oil "imported" from the middle east. It's our goddamn right--I'm a libertarian and nobody is gonna tell me what not to drive. And they hate us anyway, so what do we care?

Nothing good comes from there anyway. Those people just keep buying dollars and real estate and all that, and they are sneakily devaluing the dollar by refusing to buy our products and dumping their wine on us. Travel there hasn't been much fun either: they still speak all those funny languages, and the waiters are surly. And technologically, they live in the stone age--I mean, we invented it all anyway, the telephone and television and everything.

And what are they gonna do about it? Our army is bigger than theirs and there isn't a damned thing they can do other than complain in their funny accents.

Besides, until the gulf stream is dead in its tracks, it might just be a false alarm. And even if it does happen, who is to prove that we caused it? It might be cow farts that stopped the gulf stream, or too much hot air from politicians.

And technology can fix it. We're just gonna dump some industrial waste into the ocean and it's gonna fertilize the algae, and then they are going to eat up all the CO2, and then everything is gonna be alright. Or maybe we'll just build some spaceships and colonize space. Yeah, that's what we'll do--space elevators, interstellar travel, and Orion slave girls, and we can still keep driving our SUVs.

Life is good.

Re:Yes, climate will change...

[Fyz]

I've been thinking about this as well. But maybe it isn't going far enough to say that humanity is taking the earth into a new geological era. A better, be it more speculative, suggestion is that humanity actually has it in their power to usher in a new eon.

My reasoning for this is that eons are defined by whatever principal force that affects the earth most profoundly changes. A short list:

The Hadean(4550 mya - 3800 mya), where the earth was cooling and life was impossible.

The Archaean(3800 mya - 2500 mya), where life originates.

The Proterozoic(2500 mya - 570 mya), where single-celled life proliferates and evolves into forms that permanently changes the makeup of the atmosphere, and thus instills on the world a regulation feedback loop.

The Phanerozoic(570 mya - present day), where advanced life makes it's entry and further increases the level of control life has on its environment.

So my question is, since the passing of eons basically describe the amount of control and impact life has on its environment, isn't the speed and sophistication of humanity's effect on the environment so profound that we should be entering the Anthropean eon?

Re:A quick synopsis

[g011um]

Let me get this:

• Global warming adds more pure water to the sea in the North Atlantic
• Gulf stream slows
• Slower Gulf stream cools the temperatures

Sounds to me like a natural thermostat.

Also a lower temperature sea will increase the likelyhood of dissolving the extra CO2 into the seawater.

Most of this kind of research (models) are focused on extrapolation [thefreedictionary.com] in this case the time-frame (using a couple of years +-100 to predict too much 800 or more and using limited knowledge gained from other sources such as core samples).

And I'm not trying too discredit the sciences of core samples etc. It is just that their findings are still being refined too.

Models are a great tool to research complex behaviour. But those that use their findings blindly as fact are bound to be humiliated.