Pickens writes "The BBC reports that researchers are digitizing the captains' logs from the voyages of Charles Darwin on HMS Beagle, Captain Cook from HMS Discovery, Captain Bligh from The Bounty, and 300 other 18th and 19th century ships' logbooks to provide historical climate records for modern-day climate researchers who will use the meteorological data to build up a picture of weather patterns in the world at the beginning of the industrial era. The researchers are cross-referencing the data with historical records for crop failures, droughts and storms and will compare it with data for the modern era in order to predict similar events in the future. 'The observations from the logbooks on wind force and weather are astonishingly good and often better than modern logbooks,' says Climatologist Dr. Dennis Wheeler from the University of Sunderland. 'Of course the sailors had to be conscientious. The thought that you could hit a reef was a great incentive to get your observations absolutely right!' The logbooks will be online next year at the UK's National Archives."
And would you ever admit that you're wrong if the logbooks do support it? We already see from the tone of your statement that you've already decided that there is no climate change.
You can't keep calling it skepticism when faced with a continual stream of evidence, that's called denial.
For the last decade there has been no global warming, at all, while producing more CO2 than ever.
1. 10 years of noisy data is not significant enough to reverse the significance of the warming trend over the entire instrumental record. 2. The last decade as shown a warming trend of 0.11C/decade [realclimate.org].
Scientifically, this _necessarily_ throws global warming into serious doubt.
So long as science relies on whacky stuff like statistics, no it doesn't.
What source is putting 2005 at a higher temperature than 1998?
When you read the article linked to you will see that the issue here is not whether two selected years are hotter and colder than each other (eg. 1850 vs 2005), it's whether the decadal trend is rising, steady or falling. Do you already understand why even if the trend over the last decade were falling (it wasn't) that would not necessarily be significant when viewed against all of the data from the instrumental, a fortiori the extra-instrumental, record?
There was plenty of skepticism about evolution (or at least, Darwinian evolution) when the theory first appeared. But it's been vetted for 150 years now, and with modern forensics, DNA sequencing, and even the observation of speciation events, there's really no credible evidence disproving the central tenets of Darwinian evolution. Though there have been some huge advancements in our understanding of it. For instance, while IANAEB, it is my understanding that evolutionary biologists no longer view evolution
Most of the cogent skeptics out there seem to be skeptical of either AGW, not GW itself, or are merely skeptical that we should do anything to stop it, arguing that it's a net boon to mankind for the climate to be a bit warmer. But yeah, anyone who argues that the climate isn't warming on average at this point can be safely ignored.
by Anonymous Coward
on Tuesday October 06, @08:08PM (#29665207)
I'm sure that this is going to devolve (pun intended) into a discussion about global warming (an argument often put against global warming is that we just don't have enough data to prove it exists). Regardless to how people feel about said subject, I hope you guys focus on how cool it is that we're preserving old information from paper-rot.
Agreed. This is science taking from it's environment and making something more (Primer quote). It's shows that if you look at what information you have from a different perspective you can find lost of intriguing patterns and learn lots of new things. It is amazing what you can learn by throwing data into a spreadsheet and then looking for order.
I agree completely, it's really cool regardless of the outcome. Some of this type of historical data has already been used: Records of bird migration in particular are useful because the date is known precisely and the record doesn't rely on a measurement, i.e., all you have to do is answer the questions does the bird in question migrate earlier or later than previously, and how much so? Some examples are the snow goose [springerlink.com] (pay link, sorry) from the Hudson Bay Company and other [usgs.gov] records. Here's a full article [pnas.org] that shows that birds are migrating to and from the UK an average of 8 days earlier than 30 years ago.
Also, some evidence of hurricane patterns [wikipedia.org] is from Spanish records of ships in the Caribbean from 1500 to 1600.
The thing is, those logs have already survived decades on a medium that requires no special equipment to read. How many records have we lost over the past 40 years simply because of changing hardware and file formats? In that time we've gone from delay line/ferrite core memory to 2TB hard drives. To say nothing of thousands of different file formats.
Call it a digital dark age. Will someone be able to read this post in 50 years?
How many have been changed to fit an agenda? On paper those are difficult to modify but how long after they are in digital form will they be massaged to promote someones religious beliefs?
All of what you state is true for the Northern U.S., but could be explained by ice melting as a result of global warming. Climate change is on a massive scale, and it will affect different parts of the world differently. Even if humans aren't causing global climate change, cleaning up the air is a GOOD THING for our own health. The work in climate engineering (or whatever it's called) is good too. We shouldn't assume that the Earth will always be habitable by humans without us needing to fight for it. None o
The climate on shore is, well, far from dreary. Safe to say all hands finding no restrictions to exploration of terrain. Clear, smooth and moist in all the right places.
There's little hope that the log books had accurate temperature readings, but the climate change could be inferred from things like snow depths on fiji. In fact I'm pretty sure the average snowfall on fiji has remained pretty constant in the last couple centuries, potentially refuting this whole global warming thing.
Entitled "Is the U.S. Surface Temperature Record Reliable?" it reviews the accuracy of the current US surface temperature measurement network and finds it woefully lacking for the sort of analysis that results in things like 0.7 degree changes over decades.
As a quick summary, there are the following issues with the temperature measurement methodology:
1. The measuring statements are often either surrounded by asphalt or in the air path of air conditioning exhaust or other hot air. 2. Data points are often not collected, and the missing points are created by interpolation. 3. Exterior finish specification changed from whitewash to latex paint, and that change has a significant impact on measurement results.
Those white boxes which make up the old style weather stations that Anthony Watts (the guy who did the video you linked to) is investigating are called "Stevenson screens".
They form the oldest weather network in the US. They have been replaced with much newer units. The stevenson screen setups don't even have anemometers.
But the data from those stations are only a very small fraction of all of the weather measurements taking place on earth. Satellites have been used extensively:
> In order to test the validity of Mr. Watts' accusations, > the NOAA scientists made a comparison of > temperature trends, using Mr. Watts' data. Two graphs > were plotted using the same technique. One analysis > was for the full data set of 1221 US weather stations. > The other used only the 70 stations that Mr. Watts and > his volunteers classified as "good" or "best". If climate > denier theories are correct, the temperatures at the > optimally sited stations should be markedly different > from the data as a whole. In fact, the curves show > virtually no difference. That's right. Even using the > cherry-picked stations listed in Watts' publication, the > data -- according to leading scientists at NOAA -- > shows no evidence of distortion.
Hmmm, my analysis of The Odyssy (written in the 9th century BC), suggests that the climate in the Mediteranean was pretty much the same as today while sea levels have gone down dramatically in some areas and up in others.
The mutineers were really the scum of the earth. They ended up knifing each other to death on the island where they settled. Bligh on the other hand made the most spectacular sailing feat of all time in order to get to Fiji, in a small boat with hardly any provisions. (The accusations against him btw are largely based on legend, not fact.)
He was probably not much worse than the average captain of the time and nowhere near the league of George Vancouver when it comes to being a heavy-handed hardass. But genius or not, he was no saint, never really learned to balance power and personality - witness his time as Governor of New South Wales - and obviously didn't learn enough from Captain Cook about leading men.
All rational research points out that he was no worse than the average captain. There are multiple reasons we remember him as being evil, but all stem from the fact that Fletcher Christian's family was reasonably well off, and was able to pull off one heckuva PR campaign against him. Bring that through to modern times when people used that telling to create movies, and the idea of Bligh as a despot is cemented.
In addition to all (save one) of the mutineers being killed violently by their brethren, let us also remember the 250 years of child rape perpetrated on Pitcairn Island.
Actually all the evidence points to Bligh being the very opposite of a despot. Check out the number of floggings on the voyage. (pretty much none, in an era where weekly floggings were the norm.) He was not in fact a harsh disciplinarian, and neither was Cook, who was his mentor. Of course the type of voyage they were doing was not routine, and so the crews were not the usual scum of the earth. I think the problems was that Cook had the strength of character and leadership to cope with any problems, while B
... but all stem from the fact that Fletcher Christian's family was reasonably well off...
I agree that the Christian Family were reasonably well off and more than that, Bligh managed not only to inspire his men to munity against his command of the Bounty, he also caused the colony he was sent to govern to rise up in armed rebellion [wikipedia.org]. The real question is not whether Bligh was despotic or not, it's why the British authorities saw fit to appoint a man, who had proven himself a singuarly ungifted commander
(Slightly under half of) the sailors were inspired to mutiny by Tahitian pussy, or lack there of after five months of it. Bligh was too nice in letting them live ashore with the Tahitians, having relations with them, and not flogging them enough.
The Rum Rebellion happened because he tried to remove the advantageous position some people in the Sydney colony had. This position would be called a monopoly nowadays.
So, maybe not a genius, but he tried to do the right thing(tm).
"Captain" Bligh of the Bounty was a lieutenant. Young and still a bit green as a commander.
Bligh and _2/3rds_ of the crew were placed into a small dingy and set adrift. Having only a compass and sextant he went 6700km and nailed the nearest British outpost Timor. Only one man died on route.
Further wikipedia concisely notes: "The Bounty's log shows that Bligh resorted to punishments relatively sparingly. He scolded when other captains would have whipped and whipped when other captains would have hanged. He was an educated man, deeply interested in science, convinced that good diet and sanitation were necessary for the welfare of his crew. He took a great interest in his crew's exercise, was very careful about the quality of their food, and insisted upon the Bounty being kept very clean."
<quote>Global climate change is true. Even if it's not true causing pollution is not good. Hopefully these logs will provide support for global climate change but if not it could be argued that reporting techniques of the time were crude.</quote>
I like this train of thought. You can't lose. "Hey, if this supports our theory, then it can be hailed as definitive proof. If it conflicts with our theory, well, they were wrong, and it'll be easy to discredit."
It common knowledge that nothing on this planet ever changes. Most certainly not the temperature or weather!
Of course, three thousand years ago, the Sahara was a savannah and not the desert it is today. But we all know that's just the product of oil companies' propaganda.
"Non-anthropomorphic causes of warming do not satisfactoryly explain the current warming tend."? You do know that this isn't the warmest the Earth's ever been, right?
I like how a less than one degree of change over the past 200 years is clearly not normal. What's even more interesting is that pro-global warming charts only go back 200 years or so (some go back 500 years). And not say...back past 10,000 years ago. Which was the end of the last ice age. Of which there have been many.
They do acknowledge that; have extremely elaborate physical and statistical models for it; and do the best they can with data from a huge number of sources. That you believe otherwise about these things, almost invalidates anything you have to say. I mean, you're not even saying that they're wrong; you seem really to be saying that they haven't even thought of fitting a model like f(x)=c*sin(a*x)+b*x.
I think you got the wrong end of the stick there; they weren't claiming such data doesn't exist. They were pointing out that "pro-climate change people" tend to use graphs that only show the last few hundred years, because when you look at graphs that go back a significant period of time the current warming trend suddenly stops looking abnormal and alarming.
how do you know the CO2 rise is man made in the first place, and not oh say from the oceans which are the largest stores of CO2?
By isotope analysis of atmospheric CO2. The isotope ratios for carbon from fossil fuels are distinct from those of carbon in CO2 outgassed from the oceans. By looking at the (changing) isotope ratios of atmospheric CO2 it is possible to track the relative origins of the increasing amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere. It turns out the increase is due to humans burning fossil fuels.
This is a classic anti-fact. What you say is completely factually correct, but a naive reading of it would lead one to conclude a total falsehood, namely that grapes were only grown in England long ago by the Romans because the climate was hot at that time. This is demonstrably false. In fact, wine has been grown in england since the time of the Romans [english-wine.com]. In fact, from that every same link
"The period from the end of the First World War to shortly after the end of t
Nope there has been a warming trend. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7e/Satellite_Temperatures.png [wikimedia.org] But don't let satellite imaging fool you I'm sure the devil is playing tricks on our billion dollar incredibly accurate satellites. And I hardly see any correlation between those three lines.
Even if that were true, anthropomorphic greenhouse gas emissions would exacerbate any non-anthropomorphic warming effect. It would be like claiming that the thermostat in your house is slowly increasing the temperature in your room so therefore there's no harm in raising the thermostat further.
It would be like claiming that the thermostat in your house is slowly increasing the temperature in your room so therefore there's no harm in raising the thermostat further.
But I don't see any harm in that. I may actually like a 1 degree annual average increase. Possibly improve my comfort, and possibly save me some money if spaced correctly (when considering the air conditioning). Thanks for the idea.
Have any of these climatologists considered climate change is a natural cycle of the planet?
Why... no! No they haven't! Thank you for bringing that to their attention.
How astute of you to see what none of the several thousand PhDs working the subject for the last few decades have noticed. I'm sure they'll get to work on your brilliant insight right away.
Have any of these climatologists considered climate change is a natural cycle of the planet?
Do you seriously think that hasn't been considered? Seriously? Do you seriously think that climatologists all over the world are so mind-numbingly stupid that that hasn't occurred to anyone? Yes, that has been addressed, time and again. We are *worsening* and *accelerating* the warming. No one has said that climate never ever changed until humans screwed stuff up. The only way you can ask that question is
No, they're all thick as posts. So dumb, several types of rocks have more intelligence. They are so woefully short of understanding their instruments, they regularly burn down their labs. They have so little knowledge of the animals they study, they leave out saucers of milk for the lions. Heck, most of the vulcanologists think the red oozy stuff is badly made jello!
And they thank you for pointing out that you, a mere Slashdot reader, have managed to understand more about global climate change in five minutes of careful study (six, if you include the fox news commercials) then they've learned in ten years of careful data collection and vigorous debate. Wow! What a champ you are!
We'll only read about it if they support AGW (Score:2, Insightful)
If the logbooks don't support human-induced climate change, the media will ignore them.
Don't you DARE call it "science" when skepticism is met with derision.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
I am sure Fox news would gladly pick up on it.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You can't keep calling it skepticism when faced with a continual stream of evidence, that's called denial.
Re:We'll only read about it if they support AGW (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't keep calling it skepticism when faced with a continual stream of evidence, that's called denial.
You can't keep calling it skepticism when faced with a continual stream of carefully selected evidence, that's called denial.
There, fixed that for ya!
Parent
Re:We'll only read about it if they support AGW (Score:5, Informative)
For the last decade there has been no global warming, at all, while producing more CO2 than ever.
1. 10 years of noisy data is not significant enough to reverse the significance of the warming trend over the entire instrumental record. 2. The last decade as shown a warming trend of 0.11C/decade [realclimate.org].
Scientifically, this _necessarily_ throws global warming into serious doubt.
So long as science relies on whacky stuff like statistics, no it doesn't.
Parent
Re:We'll only read about it if they support AGW (Score:4, Insightful)
What source is putting 2005 at a higher temperature than 1998?
When you read the article linked to you will see that the issue here is not whether two selected years are hotter and colder than each other (eg. 1850 vs 2005), it's whether the decadal trend is rising, steady or falling. Do you already understand why even if the trend over the last decade were falling (it wasn't) that would not necessarily be significant when viewed against all of the data from the instrumental, a fortiori the extra-instrumental, record?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
There was plenty of skepticism about evolution (or at least, Darwinian evolution) when the theory first appeared. But it's been vetted for 150 years now, and with modern forensics, DNA sequencing, and even the observation of speciation events, there's really no credible evidence disproving the central tenets of Darwinian evolution. Though there have been some huge advancements in our understanding of it. For instance, while IANAEB, it is my understanding that evolutionary biologists no longer view evolution
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
All branches are dead ends eventually.
Re: (Score:2)
Most of the cogent skeptics out there seem to be skeptical of either AGW, not GW itself, or are merely skeptical that we should do anything to stop it, arguing that it's a net boon to mankind for the climate to be a bit warmer. But yeah, anyone who argues that the climate isn't warming on average at this point can be safely ignored.
In before the global warming discussion (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure that this is going to devolve (pun intended) into a discussion about global warming (an argument often put against global warming is that we just don't have enough data to prove it exists). Regardless to how people feel about said subject, I hope you guys focus on how cool it is that we're preserving old information from paper-rot.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:In before the global warming discussion (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, some evidence of hurricane patterns [wikipedia.org] is from Spanish records of ships in the Caribbean from 1500 to 1600.
Parent
Re:In before the global warming discussion (Score:4, Insightful)
The thing is, those logs have already survived decades on a medium that requires no special equipment to read. How many records have we lost over the past 40 years simply because of changing hardware and file formats? In that time we've gone from delay line/ferrite core memory to 2TB hard drives. To say nothing of thousands of different file formats.
Call it a digital dark age. Will someone be able to read this post in 50 years?
Parent
Re:In before the global warming discussion (Score:4, Insightful)
How many have been changed to fit an agenda? On paper those are difficult to modify but how long after they are in digital form will they be massaged to promote someones religious beliefs?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The work in climate engineering (or whatever it's called) is good too. We shouldn't assume that the Earth will always be habitable by humans without us needing to fight for it. None o
Not old enough (Score:3, Funny)
We need transcripts of the logbooks of 16th century pirates and merchants, to accurately measure the temperature when pirates abounded.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, and it would be really helpful if those pirates kept detailed records of atmospheric CO2 concentrations as well.
Re:Not old enough (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
CO2 is 400ppm (Score:2)
(I know, you want me at your next party...)
Day 322 - Shore leave. (Score:3, Funny)
"Bounty" (Score:2)
it's all about the snowfall (Score:5, Funny)
There's little hope that the log books had accurate temperature readings, but the climate change could be inferred from things like snow depths on fiji. In fact I'm pretty sure the average snowfall on fiji has remained pretty constant in the last couple centuries, potentially refuting this whole global warming thing.
Sheldon
A small glitch in the weather readings (Score:2)
Captain Bligh's log for April 28, 1789 contains only this scrawled entry:
"I'll see them all hanging from the highest yardarm in the British Fleet!"
Even modern data isn't accurate (Score:5, Insightful)
I hit a reference to this in the Analog magazine I'm currently reading:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/surfacestationsreport_spring09.pdf [wordpress.com]
Entitled "Is the U.S. Surface Temperature Record Reliable?" it reviews the accuracy of the current US surface temperature measurement network and finds it woefully lacking for the sort of analysis that results in things like 0.7 degree changes over decades.
As a quick summary, there are the following issues with the temperature measurement methodology:
1. The measuring statements are often either surrounded by asphalt or in the air path of air conditioning exhaust or other hot air.
2. Data points are often not collected, and the missing points are created by interpolation.
3. Exterior finish specification changed from whitewash to latex paint, and that change has a significant impact on measurement results.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
answers here:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/07/no-man-is-an-urban-heat-island/ [realclimate.org]
Re:Even modern data isn't accurate (Score:5, Informative)
Modern data IS accurate. The report you linked to is not. You are going to LOVE this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_0-gX7aUKk [youtube.com]
That weather station location study discussed in the video you linked to attracted the attention of NOAA who wrote a reply:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/about/response-v2.pdf [noaa.gov]
Those white boxes which make up the old style weather stations that Anthony Watts (the guy who did the video you linked to) is investigating are called "Stevenson screens".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stevenson_screen [wikipedia.org]
They form the oldest weather network in the US. They have been replaced with much newer units. The stevenson screen setups don't even have anemometers.
But the data from those stations are only a very small fraction of all of the weather measurements taking place on earth. Satellites have been used extensively:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite_temperature_measurements [wikipedia.org]
As have radiosondes attached to weather balloons:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiosonde [wikipedia.org]
as well as many other natural indications.
Quoted from the above linked video:
> In order to test the validity of Mr. Watts' accusations,
> the NOAA scientists made a comparison of
> temperature trends, using Mr. Watts' data. Two graphs
> were plotted using the same technique. One analysis
> was for the full data set of 1221 US weather stations.
> The other used only the 70 stations that Mr. Watts and
> his volunteers classified as "good" or "best". If climate
> denier theories are correct, the temperatures at the
> optimally sited stations should be markedly different
> from the data as a whole. In fact, the curves show
> virtually no difference. That's right. Even using the
> cherry-picked stations listed in Watts' publication, the
> data -- according to leading scientists at NOAA --
> shows no evidence of distortion.
Parent
filtered for quality too (Score:5, Funny)
The thought that you could hit a reef was a great incentive to get your observations absolutely right
And filters out the data of the people who got it wrong!
Limited use (Score:4, Funny)
Day 176: No breadfruit.
Day 177: Breadfruit.
Day 178: No breadfruit.
The Odyssy of Odysseus (Score:3, Interesting)
Bligh was a genius (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Bligh was a genius (Score:5, Insightful)
He was probably not much worse than the average captain of the time and nowhere near the league of George Vancouver when it
comes to being a heavy-handed hardass. But genius or not, he was no saint, never really learned to balance power and personality - witness his
time as Governor of New South Wales - and obviously didn't learn enough from Captain Cook about leading men.
Parent
Re:Bligh was a genius (Score:5, Interesting)
All rational research points out that he was no worse than the average captain. There are multiple reasons we remember him as being evil, but all stem from the fact that Fletcher Christian's family was reasonably well off, and was able to pull off one heckuva PR campaign against him. Bring that through to modern times when people used that telling to create movies, and the idea of Bligh as a despot is cemented.
In addition to all (save one) of the mutineers being killed violently by their brethren, let us also remember the 250 years of child rape perpetrated on Pitcairn Island.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Actually all the evidence points to Bligh being the very opposite of a despot. Check out the number of floggings on the voyage. (pretty much none, in an era where weekly floggings were the norm.) He was not in fact a harsh disciplinarian, and neither was Cook, who was his mentor. Of course the type of voyage they were doing was not routine, and so the crews were not the usual scum of the earth. I think the problems was that Cook had the strength of character and leadership to cope with any problems, while B
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree that the Christian Family were reasonably well off and more than that, Bligh managed not only to inspire his men to munity against his command of the Bounty, he also caused the colony he was sent to govern to rise up in armed rebellion [wikipedia.org]. The real question is not whether Bligh was despotic or not, it's why the British authorities saw fit to appoint a man, who had proven himself a singuarly ungifted commander
Re:Bligh was a genius (Score:5, Insightful)
(Slightly under half of) the sailors were inspired to mutiny by Tahitian pussy, or lack there of after five months of it. Bligh was too nice in letting them live ashore with the Tahitians, having relations with them, and not flogging them enough.
The Rum Rebellion happened because he tried to remove the advantageous position some people in the Sydney colony had. This position would be called a monopoly nowadays.
So, maybe not a genius, but he tried to do the right thing(tm).
Parent
Re:Bligh was a genius (Score:5, Informative)
"Captain" Bligh of the Bounty was a lieutenant. Young and still a bit green as a commander.
Bligh and _2/3rds_ of the crew were placed into a small dingy and set adrift. Having only a compass and sextant he went 6700km and nailed the nearest British outpost Timor. Only one man died on route.
Further wikipedia concisely notes:
"The Bounty's log shows that Bligh resorted to punishments relatively sparingly. He scolded when other captains would have whipped and whipped when other captains would have hanged. He was an educated man, deeply interested in science, convinced that good diet and sanitation were necessary for the welfare of his crew. He took a great interest in his crew's exercise, was very careful about the quality of their food, and insisted upon the Bounty being kept very clean."
Parent
Re:Global climate change is true! (Score:5, Insightful)
Hopefully these logs will provide support for global climate change but if not it could be argued that reporting techniques of the time were crude.</quote>
I like this train of thought. You can't lose. "Hey, if this supports our theory, then it can be hailed as definitive proof. If it conflicts with our theory, well, they were wrong, and it'll be easy to discredit."
Parent
Shhh! (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course, three thousand years ago, the Sahara was a savannah and not the desert it is today. But we all know that's just the product of oil companies' propaganda.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I like how a less than one degree of change over the past 200 years is clearly not normal. What's even more interesting is that pro-global warming charts only go back 200 years or so (some go back 500 years). And not say...back past 10,000 years ago. Which was the end of the last ice age. Of which there have been many.
I'm not going to
Re: (Score:2)
They do acknowledge that; have extremely elaborate physical and statistical models for it; and do the best they can with data from a huge number of sources. That you believe otherwise about these things, almost invalidates anything you have to say. I mean, you're not even saying that they're wrong; you seem really to be saying that they haven't even thought of fitting a model like f(x)=c*sin(a*x)+b*x.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I think you got the wrong end of the stick there; they weren't claiming such data doesn't exist. They were pointing out that "pro-climate change people" tend to use graphs that only show the last few hundred years, because when you look at graphs that go back a significant period of time the current warming trend suddenly stops looking abnormal and alarming.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
how do you know the CO2 rise is man made in the first place, and not oh say from the oceans which are the largest stores of CO2?
By isotope analysis of atmospheric CO2. The isotope ratios for carbon from fossil fuels are distinct from those of carbon in CO2 outgassed from the oceans. By looking at the (changing) isotope ratios of atmospheric CO2 it is possible to track the relative origins of the increasing amounts of CO2 in the atmosphere. It turns out the increase is due to humans burning fossil fuels.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Yawn:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/11/english-vineyards-again/ [realclimate.org]
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This is a classic anti-fact. What you say is completely factually correct, but a naive reading of it would lead one to conclude a total falsehood, namely that grapes were only grown in England long ago by the Romans because the climate was hot at that time. This is demonstrably false. In fact, wine has been grown in england since the time of the Romans [english-wine.com]. In fact, from that every same link
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Even if that were true, anthropomorphic greenhouse gas emissions would exacerbate any non-anthropomorphic warming effect. It would be like claiming that the thermostat in your house is slowly increasing the temperature in your room so therefore there's no harm in raising the thermostat further.
Re: (Score:2)
It would be like claiming that the thermostat in your house is slowly increasing the temperature in your room so therefore there's no harm in raising the thermostat further.
But I don't see any harm in that. I may actually like a 1 degree annual average increase. Possibly improve my comfort, and possibly save me some money if spaced correctly (when considering the air conditioning). Thanks for the idea.
Re: (Score:2)
Have any of these climatologists considered climate change is a natural cycle of the planet?
Why... no! No they haven't! Thank you for bringing that to their attention.
How astute of you to see what none of the several thousand PhDs working the subject for the last few decades have noticed. I'm sure they'll get to work on your brilliant insight right away.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you seriously think that hasn't been considered? Seriously? Do you seriously think that climatologists all over the world are so mind-numbingly stupid that that hasn't occurred to anyone? Yes, that has been addressed, time and again. We are *worsening* and *accelerating* the warming. No one has said that climate never ever changed until humans screwed stuff up. The only way you can ask that question is
Re:Shock Horror - the climate changes! (Score:4, Insightful)
No, they're all thick as posts. So dumb, several types of rocks have more intelligence. They are so woefully short of understanding their instruments, they regularly burn down their labs. They have so little knowledge of the animals they study, they leave out saucers of milk for the lions. Heck, most of the vulcanologists think the red oozy stuff is badly made jello!
And they thank you for pointing out that you, a mere Slashdot reader, have managed to understand more about global climate change in five minutes of careful study (six, if you include the fox news commercials) then they've learned in ten years of careful data collection and vigorous debate. Wow! What a champ you are!
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