New Climate Change Warning

sebFlyte writes "A new grid computing climate research project, climateprediction.net, has come up with its first major results, and they're really not good news for the planet according to the BBC. The simulations suggest that over the next hundred years we could see average rises of average temperatures of up to 11K, more than twice what was previously thought."

It's because....

[gardyloo]

This thing was run on so many PCs. They obviously took the simulation itself into account -- good job!

Re:It's because....

[demachina]

Here is a good resource on global warming from EPA and National Science Foundation [epa.gov] though there estimates are little lower, 6 celsius is there upper end over the next century. The most impressive thing about this web site is that its created by people in the U.S. government, the Bush White House hasn't shut it down and they haven't fired the people who created it, so shhhhh don't tell them about it because they must know its there because they really hate anyone who says stuff like this.

One of the more interesting sections. Those of you who've been through the big rains on the West Coast and the big snows on the East Coast should note that intense rainstorms and presumably snow storms are a potential indicator of global warming as the oceans evaporate off more water as they warm.

"Global mean surface temperatures have increased 0.5-1.0F since the late 19th century. The 20th century's 10 warmest years all occurred in the last 15 years of the century. Of these, 1998 was the warmest year on record. The snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere and floating ice in the Arctic Ocean have decreased. Globally, sea level has risen 4-8 inches over the past century. Worldwide precipitation over land has increased by about one percent. The frequency of extreme rainfall events has increased throughout much of the United States."

"Increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases are likely to accelerate the rate of climate change. Scientists expect that the average global surface temperature could rise 1-4.5F (0.6-2.5C) in the next fifty years, and 2.2-10F (1.4-5.8C) in the next century, with significant regional variation. Evaporation will increase as the climate warms, which will increase average global precipitation. Soil moisture is likely to decline in many regions, and intense rainstorms are likely to become more frequent. Sea level is likely to rise two feet along most of the U.S. coast."

Re:It's because....

[calidoscope]

Global mean surface temperatures have increased 0.5-1.0F since the late 19th century.

A complicating factor is that 1850 marked the end of a several century global cooling event. The years 800 to 1200 AD were considerably warmer than from AD 1400 to 1800.

Re:It's because....

[ajs]

Nope, I recall measurements in Australia showing the same thing, and Antartica has been in a warming trend for the last 10,000 years (since the last ice age). You are correct, though that, as we understand it, the North Atlantic and Mediteranian suffered a far stronger period of warming 500-100 years ago (Egypt, as I recall, was significantly impacted).

The grand (or is that grand, grand) parent was concerned that the Bush administration didn't realize that the EPA was saying that the temperatures were rising AND were predicting further rises.

The problem here is a misunderstanding of what the point of disagreement is (and it's really not a right-left issue at all: I'm a liberal democrat myself, but agree with the White House on this). The difference is based, not on the question, "is it getting warmer?" That was a real and significant question in the 80s when there were doubts about the measurements being used. However, at this point we are fairly certain that temperatures have been rising for the last 100 years and have been rising more sharply for the last 50.

The question is: is this a natural warming trend, as observed 500-1000 years ago, is this human-induced or is it a combination of the two.

The most likely answer is that it's a combination, so the disagreement boils down to where you place the division of responsibility. If man is responsible for 0.00001% of the current warming trend then there's no point in worrying about it any more than we worry about tracking hurricanes. Do the math, warn the people, carry on.

If we're responsible for 50% of the current warming trend, then we should seriously re-think out interaction with the environment... and soon!

My personal belief is that, in the current climate of mud-slinging and political pressure, there is no reasonable way to determine the real answer, and so I am left with one overriding fact: for every form of influence man can exert on our world, nature routinely exerts far, far more influence. All of our factories, planes and cars pale in comparison to volcanoes, forest fires and various bilogical processes. The Sun's influence is still poorly understood. For example, what is the exact relationship between increases in solar output and evaporation? Since water vapor is the most potent greenhouse gas, knowing if evaporation is a linear, logarithmic or step function with respect to solar radiation is KEY to understanding global warming, and yet the process of evaporation is so complex that we have yet to understand it even enough to describe simple weather phenomenon, much less climactic change.

So, do we change the way we live? We should, but we didn't need a global warming debate to tell us that. We desperately need to police the most obviously damaging influences that man has on the environment. Chemical dumping kills millions every year, around the world. Why is that less of a problem than the THEORY that global warming might have a human influence?! We're over-fishing our oceans. Why is that less of a danger to human quality of life? We've been preventing forest fires the wrong way for 100 years, leading to fires that burn orders of magnitude hotter and more dangerously.

The problem I have with environmentalism is that it is mostly focused on a FEELING that humans are doing the wrong thing, and research is used as a sort of background music to the movement rather than the driving force. I want to be an environmentalist, but as long as environmentalism is defined by owl-squeezers and doom predictors I guess I'll have to just be a concerned inhabitant of planet Earth.

Re:It's because....

[EvilTwinSkippy]

Flooding out most habital areas near sea shores, massive flooding in river basins, combined with widespread drought in most other places seems like a fairly corrective measure on nature's part to me.

Re:It's because....

[Cally]

My personal belief is that, in the current climate of mud-slinging and political pressure, there is no reasonable way to determine the real answer,..

Well, no, I can't agree with that. We're (mostly) intelligent and rational people here. Generally speaking we accept that the scientific method is the best means we have for understanding the world about us. Genuine, respected climatologists do acknowledge that there are areas of genuine debate in the field; however, the basic question you're asking (the ex

Re:It's because....

[ajs]

Reduce/eliminate emissions and maybe scrub greenhouse gasses from the air. If man is responsible for global warming then temperatures will stop rising or decrease.

THIS... this right here, is what I was talking about above. No one with a shred of scientific credentials that I've read anywhere has suggested that man has the unbridled power to reverse or even halt global warming. It's unthinkable that we would have that kind of power. All that has been suggested is that the existing warming trend, that current models take as a given could be returned to the track that our current understanding of solar and geothermal forces predict. In plain english: the best we could do is go back to slower warming, not prevent what appears to be a natural period of global warming that began in the late 1800s.

But that's not a valid statement for an environmentalist to make. It *feels* better to say that we could "stop [...] or decrease" global warming, and so science be damned!

Like I said, in this climate, we are almost certain to be unable to extract real meaning from the data at our disposal. Instead, I suggest that we focus on the threats to the environment that are real, provable, and KILLING MILLIONS OF PEOPLE EVERY YEAR. Do that, and you are a real environmentalist. Do that as an environmentalist organization, and I will back you financially.

Re:It's because....

[mrogers]

But largely natural temp variations are ok, it's when man creates the changes that we have to worry.

Why? If the sea level rises due to 'natural' temperature variations you'll still drown.

Re:It's because....

[Cally]

There's a lot of debate whether the current temperature increase is actually due to humans. Although most people believe it's due to humans, there is evidence on both sides.

Sorry, you're mistaken. All models that are capable of reproducing the last 1000 years or so of climate fail to reproduce the recent global temperature increase (the 'hockey stick') unless they include the effects of human CO2 emissions. That the recent uptick is due to human CO2 is no longer an area of dispute (amongst those researchers with some grasp on reality, who actually know something about the subject, and are capable getting published in respectable peer-reviewed juornals, anyway. Supermarket tabloids and AM radio shows may not agree...)

Re:It's because....

[Syberghost]

The most impressive thing about this web site is that its created by people in the U.S. government, the Bush White House hasn't shut it down and they haven't fired the people who created it, so shhhhh don't tell them about it because they must know its there because they really hate anyone who says stuff like this.

A lesser man would have interpreted that as evidence that the "conventional wisdom" that the Bush administration covers this stuff up might be in error. I salute your unshakeable faith.

Re:It's because....

[demachina]

Here [washingtonpost.com] is a Washington Post piece on the Bush administration's efforts to suppress this kind of report, at the EPA no less, though I wager unless its coming from Fox news you will probably consider it left wing propaganda since I imagine you are a card carrying member of the American Gestapo(a.k.a the New Repulican Party). You probably shouldn't refer to yourself as incompetent, its not a sign of the strength you need in your line of work :)

Re:It's because....

[Acts of Attrition]

This is no laughing matter.
The avg temp is going to go up 11000 degrees!
We're doomed!

Someday...

[davew2040]

Someday people are going to feel awfully silly that they were worrying about terrorism instead of the warning signs of ecological degeneration.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:You have to prioritize

[Anonymous Coward]

You also have to prioritise based upon possible casualties and cost of the threat.

Terrorism in the USA: A few billion dollars, a few thousand lives, maybe once every 10 years.

Warming: Sea defences, mass migration from low-land, and everything else: Hundreds of billions of dollars, millions? of lives, over the next 100 years.

Re:You have to prioritize

[mboverload]

More people die in cars than in terrorist attacks every year.

Terrorism is overhyped. Planes are STILL the safest way to travel, yet we have this screening program hiring McDonalds rejects.

Re:You have to prioritize

[Eric Damron]

"You have to prioritize based on immediate threat."

And what threat did Iraq pose?? No WMD. They Saddam was contained.

Let's face it. This was a blood for votes war started by Bush.

It's costing us billions of dollars and over 1000 American lives. And I don't give a shit if we did capture Saddam. His capture wasn't worth a single American life!

I only hope that history will paint Bush as the evil little mental midget that he really is.

Re:You have to prioritize

[That's Unpossible!]

And what threat did Iraq pose?? No WMD.

Actually, they did have WMD. Sarin gas for starters. What else went over the border to Syria and Iran, we'll probably never know. Absence of proof is not proof of absence. Even the report that the media trotted out a few months ago highlighting the "NO WMDs" claim made it very clear that Saddam was going to keep his eyes on the WMD prize.

And this is completely setting aside the question of the oppression of Iraqis.

Let's face it. This was a blood for votes war started by Bush.

Wait, first it was a blood for oil war. But then everyone pointed out we weren't making out on Iraqi oil. (Just the UN made out on that, right?)

Now it's a ... blood for votes war? The war divided the fucking USA. How exactly did that win him votes? He won by a larger majority than 2000, but you act as if the war sealed the deal. I mean, the war was the single most hated thing about Bush by the left.

It's costing us billions of dollars and over 1000 American lives. And I don't give a shit if we did capture Saddam. His capture wasn't worth a single American life!

Is he worth hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives? Because that's how many his men have killed since he was in power. And they didn't just die from bombings, we're talking rape and torture. And no, not the kind of torture where people have sex in front of you and make you undress, but the kind where things are shoved up your ass that don't belong in your ass, where you are slowly killed, you know, real torture.

And that's not even counting the Iraqis that were just made to suffer under his rule.

I only hope that history will paint Bush as the evil little mental midget that he really is.

Sad to tell you this, but if Iraq gets a taste of democracy and it catches on in the middle east, Bush is going to be the Reagan of the 21st century.

Re:You have to prioritize

[Coryoth]

Sad to tell you this, but if Iraq gets a taste of democracy and it catches on in the middle east

Yes, that's one possible outcome for Iraq. Another possible outcome is that out of all the chaos Iraq manages to form itself into an Islamic state - what Zawahiri and bin Laden have been trying (and repeatedly failing) to do for the last 15 years or so. Who knows, Zawahiri and bin Laden believe that, sould that actually happen it will cause the muslim masses to rise up, overthrow their leaders and create a slew of Islamic states throughout the middle east. That was, is, and will be their goal. For the most part the state "jihad against America" is a way to try and rally support - a lesson they learned when their attempted efforts in, for instance, Algeria failed to attract the support of the masses (oddly the general population was rather repelled, rather than attracted by, their violence).

So, we have 2 competing theories:

(1) Install a democracy in the Iraq and watch democracy then sweep the middle east.

(2) Rally support by encouraging people to rise up against the Americans that interfere in middle east politics and institute an Islamic state in Iraq. The Islamic Jihad movement can then sweep the middle east.

To be honest, no matter what happens in Iraq, I don't really expect anything to "sweep the middle east". In the meantime though the two theories seem to be fairly well in balance. Iraq is in chaos, there's ill will by the common people toward the US, and Islamic clerics (like al Sadr) are polling very well leading up the elections. In the meantime Iraq is actually having free and open elections so democracy will arrive. It looks to me if things could go either way - which means I'm not so sure this whole "introduce democracy and watch it spread through the middle east" idea was quite all it was cracked up to be.

Jedidiah.

Re:You have to prioritize

[metamatic]

Is he worth hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives? Because that's how many his men have killed since he was in power.

And guess what? We killed ten of thousands ourselves "liberating" them [washingtonpost.com], and now the civilian death rate is worse than it was under Saddam [jhsph.edu].

And they didn't just die from bombings, we're talking rape and torture. And no, not the kind of torture where people have sex in front of you and make you undress, but the kind where things are shoved up your ass that don't belong in your ass, where you are slowly killed, you know, real torture.

You mean like the Iraqi teenager who was seen in Abu Ghraib, lying on the floor with his anus bleeding [xciv.org] while US troops discussed sodomizing him with metal objects? I guess that story didn't get reported on FOX News, huh?

Re:You have to prioritize

[That's Unpossible!]

And guess what? We killed ten of thousands ourselves "liberating" them

That is what happens in a war. However, we did not intentionally kill civilians, unlike Saddam. And our goal is to free everyone there, unlike Saddam's goals.

Do you know how many millions died fighting the good fight in WW2? How many innocent civilians? Does this mean we shouldn't have fought that war? There's more to war than just black and white.

now the civilian death rate is worse than it was under Saddam.

Ummm, nope, sorry, it's

Re:You have to prioritize

[Wyatt Earp]

"Keep your military in your own damn country; no-one likes a nosy neighbour."

OK. So when the EU can take care of, say, problems a days drive from Berlin, like Kosovo or Bosnia, the United States should leave Europe, of course when the entire Red Army and Warsaw Pact was sitting on the other side of the Fulda Gap, it was alright to be nosy.

What about Korea? Ready for the DPRK to burn Seoul? Or Japan? Ready for the PRC to get back at Japan for WW2? Or Taiwan? Ready for the PRC to get back at them for having the gaul to resist the PRC?

Or how about things no one hears about, like the Green Berets demining all over the world? Or American SAR saving lives in the deep ocean? Or how about the 82nd Airborne keeping the DMZ in the Sinai since 1977?

Or what about the US military being there to assist in the Indian Ocean after the Tsuamni? Australia is the only other one in the region with any sealift or airlift and it's a fraction of what the US has.

As soon as the rest of the World shows the slightest ability to not burn itself down the moment we pull back to the US, we'll be happy to, until you all man up, you are stuck with us.

Re:You have to prioritize

[Darken_Everseek]

I apologise, my intentions were mistaken here. I'm all for peacekeeping and humanitarian operations. Aiding after the Tsunami is a good thing, as is helping to enforce the DMZ. Iraq isn't. Afghanistan wasn't.

Your de-mining bit though; rather ironic considering that when last I heard, the U.S. still hadn't signed the international treaty banning anti-personnel mines.

Re:You have to prioritize

[thej1nx]

You don't really get it do you ?

Afghanistan was fine. Noticed how the world was with you and cheering you on when you went there ? But let us cut the crap. You didn't really go there to "extend freedom and democrocy". You went there to catch terrorists who had attacked you and to topple a regime which harboured these terrorists, and world agreed that you had the right. Freedom and democracy ? Well that was incidental. You *are* supposed to clean up after the mess you cause. If you create a power vaccum you would definitely be expected to protect the innocent civilians there from anarchial looting and rioting, by helping set up a democratic government.

As for Iraq ... for the umpteenth time, how was it a problem for you ? There are hundreds of tyrannical regime. Last I checked one of them actually became an ally despite having WMDs and caught profilerating the nuke technology *and* being a dictatorial regime, which had actually toppled the previous democratic government via a military coup.

You seem to be the only one buying into your fairytales about "extending freedom and democracy", when in reality you just support dictators usually.

Re:You have to prioritize

[Taladar]

We have always been at war with Eurasia...

Re:You have to prioritize

[RichardX]

Afghanistan was a total sucess.
I have to agree with you there - it was pretty impressive how Bin Laden was captured so quickly. Uh.. oh.. wait...

Re:You have to prioritize

[ErikZ]

Yeah, sorry about that. We'll pull our aircraft carrier and troops out of Malaisa and those other countries hit by the Tsunami. Damn Americans. Providing fresh water, mobile airfields, command structure, delivering food, medicine and other supplies.

To primarily Moslem areas. Americans, keep your military in your own damn country. No one likes a nosy neighbor.

Re:You have to prioritize

[Darken_Everseek]

Invading a country and shooting people is -not- a good way to reduce terrorism. If your school system taught world history, you'd be able to see that example in Ireland and England. They're -still- fighting for independance. What in God's name makes you thing Iraq will be -any- different?

You know the prayer "God grand me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference"? You -really- need to trade in some of that courage for the other

Re:Tried looking forward?

[Coryoth]

bin Laden does have a stated intent to kill Americans yes. The fundamental goal they are striving for, however, is the for muslim states of the middle east to become Islamic states. As to killing Americans... yes, he will try, and is limited only by his capability. I am not questioning intent, I am questioning capability.

Aum Shinrikyo was a japanese cult that had billions at their disposal, and were interested in making chemical and nuclear weapons. With all that money, and recruiting intelligent young

Re:And when there is no significant immediate thre

[Gob Blesh It]

According to Google, the natural death rate in the U.S. is 0.121879864 hertz [google.com]. What this means for humanity at large, I couldn't say.

Re:And when there is no significant immediate thre

[CmdrGravy]

Not true WMD definitely exist, I think we are all beginning to realise now that not only did Saddam obviously ship all his WMD's to Iran but that Iran is also a much greater support of terrorism and evil than we previously suspected, after all what else would it buy the WMD's for if it didn't plan on using them it's self or selling them on to Al Quaeda.

Probably as silly as...

[glrotate]

the scientists who 30 years ago said we were starting experience global cooling. Or the intellectuals who said that the world couldn't support more than 2 billion people. Or, dare we mention, the people who claimed Y2K would matter.

Re:Probably as silly as...

[arminw]

...Global Warming supporting scientific community have mountains of evidence...

But they have NO evidence that this warming is caused by human activity. Climate, like much in nature goes in cycles, some of very long periodicity compared to the short human life time. There were times in recorded history when it was much warmer and also times when it was much colder, all long before mankind started using fossil fuels. So right now we may be in a warming cycle, the duration and extent of which NONE of the smar

Re:Probably as silly as...

[LarsWestergren]

...Global Warming supporting scientific community have mountains of evidence...
But they have NO evidence that this warming is caused by human activity.

There is quite a lot of evidence, or at least indicators. A simple one:
As a child, did you ever make a small ecosystem [k12.ut.us]? Basically a plant sealed in a bottle. If you did not, I can tell you that increasing carbon dioxide increases temperature. And as a comparison, burning fossile fuels releases a lot of stored carbon dioxide. Now, the earth is not a closed

Re:Someday...

[Waffle Iron]

Krakatoa put out more greenhouse gases than ALL HUMANITY in history. Why don't we hear about that?

Because it's patently false [sciam.com]:

There is no doubt that volcanic eruptions add CO2 to the atmosphere, but compared to the quantity produced by human activities, their impact is virtually trivial: volcanic eruptions produce about 110 million tons of CO2 each year, whereas human activities contribute almost 10,000 times that quantity.

Again False

[Ironsides]

There is no doubt that volcanic eruptions add CO2 to the atmosphere, but compared to the quantity produced by human activities, their impact is virtually trivial: volcanic eruptions produce about 110 million tons of CO2 each year, whereas human activities contribute almost 10,000 times that quantity.

If the above were completely true, humans would produce about 1 TRILLION tons of C02 each year. according to http://www2.biotech.wisc.edu/jeffries/faq/carbon% 2 0dioxide/CO2.html [wisc.edu] and http://www.mindfully.org/ [mindfully.org]

...not good news for the planet...

[hwestiii]

I suspect that the planet will be fine in either case. Now perhaps not good news for it inhabitants...

Re:...not good news for the planet...

[EvilAlien]

mod parent up insightful

The planet couldn't care less about change, the organisms on it are another matter. The organisms that evolve thanks to wonderous change may very well thank us for our SUV-driving efforts.

I, for one, welcome the coming of our new -40 degree Celcius winter defeating climate masters.

Re:...not good news for the planet...

[savagedome]

Planet will be fine. This is just the planet's way to get rid of us. We were here to create plastic and that need is over.

In the words of George Carlin:

If plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn't share our prejudice towards plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn't know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, 'Why are we here?' Plastic...asshole.

Re:...not good news for the planet...

[The Snowman]

I suspect that the planet will be fine in either case. Now perhaps not good news for it inhabitants...

I am willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, since both the U.S. government administration and I are both inhabitants of Earth. Much like fucking the fat chick at the bar while your friends get the hot chicks that are her friends, this is called "taking one for the team." Ah, short end of the stick. We meet again...

Re:100 years 100 years 100 years ....

[nounderscores]

No, the big scary predictions are there to scare us back onto the straight and narrow.

It's like when you tell a friend "You're drunk. If you drive home you'll kill somebody," when you know that he only has a 1 in 10 chance of actually killing somebody on that night, you still might be able to stop him and drive him home yourself, preventing a potential accident.

Plan for the worst. Hope for the best.

Having a let it ride attitude is a good way to meet with the day you really needed that gun, and didn't hav

HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[Space cowboy]

Disclaimer: I actually do think there's something in the global warming argument. I think putting loads more energy into a chaotic system gives that system the freedom to explore states in its phase space that could cause us some real grief. I actually don't care if "the planet will survive, it's seen worse". I'd prefer to survive personally, and I'd like to keep a few other humans around as well...

However I think the results are pretty conclusive in their own right and right-minded politicians ought to be doing something on that basis alone (they're finally beginning to, as well :-). I don't think that alarmist, over-the-top "reports" are doing any real good - in fact I think they harm the argument they try to represent.

So, by varying the parameters in a simulation, they've found a range of temperature increases which we should engender reactions from "concerned" (2 degrees) through "terrified" (11 degrees). Hey, I admitted my bias in the first paragraph! The press reports the "terrified" figure and it's big news. Until someone points out that it's a Normal distribution, and the massively-more-likely figure is in the "worried" temperature range of (guessing here) 5-6 degrees.

The problem is not that the scientists are lying (they're not), and not that the press are lying either (they're not). The problem is a lack of understanding of the end-result in announcing a catastrophe and then saying "No, we'll be ok". There's a fable about this, and it involves a boy crying "wolf" too many times...

I'm not sure who's to blame. Should the scientists state more forcefully what their expectation is rather than the extremes of their results? Would they ever get published in that case ? Should journalists be held accountable for doing the equivalent of shouting "Fire" in a theatre ? Well, a journalist's job is not to report the news, it's to sell papers, and catastrophes sell better. Perhaps there's a need for a neutral ground, some sort of arbiter that can interpret the results in a way the public can understand (since no-one seems to take science these days), but *that*'s open to *easy* abuse as well.

Perhaps science was better off in its ivory tower after all. That's a depressing thought. Perhaps the best solution would be to comprehensively educate people about science (better, about statistics) and beat the snake-oil salesmen at their own game.

Simon.

Re:HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[Vellmont]

The problem isn't that everyone is going to die, the problem is that an 11 degree temperature rise will cause massive disruption in society. If the global temperature rose 11 degrees (remember this is a global average over the whole year, not what you'll experience) that would melt much of the Antarctic glacier. Sea levels would rise substantially and coastal cities would be underwater. The climate would change dramatically and the key areas for food production would likely change. We'd probbably get more frequent and powerfull Hurricanes and tornados.

The point is that we humans have a lot invested in how the climate is right now. A drastic change of 11 degrees over a relatively short period of time would be a global catastrophe that could cause an economic depression that's make the great depression look like an "economic downturn".

Re:HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[ahodgson]

If all the ice on Antarctica and Greenland melted, global sea level would rise about 80 metres. There is 30 million km3 of water in Antarctic ice.

The ice is miles deep on Antarctica.

It would have to get pretty damned hot to melt all that though.

Re:HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[rokzy]

>Melting the entire Arctic ice mass will have no effect whatsoever because its weight is already supported by the water it floats in, so it can be ignored - people do seem to forget that.

you seem to forget there's a difference between ice water and sea water (hint: salt). that's what scientists are worried about - disruption to currents when the two mix.

Re:HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[thogard]

Its not the humans getting too hot thats going to be the problem.

Many fish in the Pacific ocean hatch out of eggs on the great barrier reef. That reef's eco system is tired into specific temperature bands and certain fish breed in specific parts of it. There is a very delicate balance in the food chain that does go away with slight changes. The last 10 years has seen a major drop in the number of young fish that hatch and that means there are fewer fish in the ocean to feed humans.

Also don't forget water. If you increase a forest's temperature by about 5 degrees, you double its risk of forest fire. If the risk is high enough you end up with a former forest that can't recover after fires. Forest hold a massive amount of water and are a major part of the local water cycle.

The areas you mentioned can only support that many people because of good transportation and the fact there is a huge river to pump water from. The great salt lake is getting much smaller very quickly and its local evaporation and local rain is a source of a great deal of the ground water. That local water cycle provides a buffer that helps keep the climate bearable.

Re:HOWTO: give science a bad name.

[strider44]

Firstly, it meant 40 degrees farenheit per second, and it stopped at -200 degrees celcius or lower apparently. As far as I know that scenario has been disproved anyway.

But saying average temperatures rise 11 degrees does not mean "oh it's 30 degrees now it'll be 41 degrees in a hundred years". Lets move away from the fact that I live where it gets to 40 degrees, and I most definitely don't want to live in a place where it's 50 degrees. But other things happen that are just unpredictable. Global weath

11K?

[t3hl33t]

11K? Is that 11 000 *unknown units* or 11 degrees kelvin? If 11 degrees kelvin, why not just say 11 degrees celsius...

Re:11K?

[yabos]

There is no degrees Kelvin. It's just 11 Kelvin. And it sounds more sciencey. Even though 11K = 11 degrees C.

Re:11K?

[Teclis]

11K = 11 degrees C

wrong.. 11K is not 11 degrees C. 11K is -262 degrees C. What I think you meant to say is that a difference of 11K is equal to a difference of 11 degrees C.

Hmm..

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh well. As long as it's the The Century After The Next, and not the day after tomorrow... not my problem.

If I have any kids, I'll be sure to painfully torture them myself long before climate becomes an issue.

The cause

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a graphic [alexrosen.net] that shows the cause of all this, in a particularly vivid way.
Almost fell off my chair when I first saw this info...

It's about time!

[sdo1]

All this snow in the northeast is really starting to piss me off.

-S

Crichton novel- State of Fear

[bach37]

Anyone else read Michael Crichton's latest novel State of Fear [nytimes.com]?

He has an interesting take on the subject, backed with documentation to his sources.

Re:Crichton novel- State of Fear

[Staplerh]

Hmm, an interesting review was posted on Slate: http://slate.msn.com/id/2110815 [msn.com]

Not so good. I've had some issues with Chrichton and his reactionary, conservative stance before. This could help you take some of it with a grain of salt.

Or not, I don't propose to be an expert. Just thought it might interest you.

Re:Crichton novel- State of Fear

[IvyMike]

Anyone else read Michael Crichton's latest novel State of Fear? The scientists at RealClimate [realclimate.org] read it; they're not impressed. [realclimate.org] For the lazy, here's the conclusion:

In summary, I am a little disappointed, not least because while researching this book, Crichton actually visited our lab and discussed some of these issues with me and a few of my colleagues. I guess we didn't do a very good job. Judging from his reading list, the rather dry prose of the IPCC reports did not match up to the some of the racier contrarian texts. Had RealClimate been up and running a few years back, maybe it would've all worked out differently...

It rained yesterday

[Dancin_Santa]

It was sunny today.

The news was unable to predict either of these to any accuracy only 24 hours prior to the weather event.

You want to believe that they can predict the weather 100 years from now?

Re:It rained yesterday

[metlin]

First off -- I'm quite doubtful about the credibility of the eco-folks who cry Global Warming out loud every other week.

That said, long term generic predictions are easier than short-term precision predictions simply due to the fact that you have more information and flexibility.

However, we do not really have all that much information from our past to begin with and the system is too chaotic for folks to even begin formulating "predictions".

But that does not seem to stop our "climatologists" though.

Re:It rained yesterday

[Capt'n Hector]

Flamebait, but... I'm gunna hafta bite. Chaotic systems are predictable. A pot of boiling water is chaotic. But I can make several predictions. If I turn up the heat, the water will boil faster. If I leave the pot there for a long time, all the water will be gone from the pot. The atmosphere is chaotic in that it's a bitch to predict whether it will be sunny or raining two weeks from now. But, it's become nothing but painfully obvious to those in the field, people you degrade by putting quotes around their title, that over the long term a very orderly process is occuring. It's called global warming. This latest study is just another nail in ALL our coffins.

Re:It rained yesterday

[metlin]

The weather system is so chaotic that we do not yet even know of all the factors involved. More importantly, we hardly have sufficient data showing the complete interaction of all the factors and parameters involved to make any kind of effective future prediction.

And yet, we make tall claims. Your water boiling analogy is too simplistic - a better one would be you boiling water using minimal firewood in the middle of a forest on a mountain with wild life and equatorial weather. Can you still predict with c

Re:It rained yesterday

[petra13]

You want to believe that they can predict the weather 100 years from now?

Well, actually, I think you're a little confused on the issue of weather vs. climate. First, predicting weather is different from predicting overall trends in the climate system. So no, obviously, they're not going to know exactly what's going to happen on a particular day a week from now to say nothing of a century from now. However, it is reasonable to predict an increase in the planet's temperature over the next several decade

Specifics about the model used???

[glrotate]

Out of sample results? Anything?

it shows there's no such thing as a safe level of carbon dioxide.

Uh. Ok.

BS, FP

[Anonymous Coward]

Both.

Again, why do I have to keep posting the same thing: where are the scientists?

SHOW me a graph of solar infrared output versus Earth temperatures, over a period of at least 50 years.

THEN we'll see how much B.S. this global warming crap is. ... if you think ol' Sol has a constant output, I have a bridge to sell you.

Mankind doesn't have the ability to alter the planet in this way. We're off by dozens of orders of magnitude.

Get real, folks. It's all about the sun.

Re:BS, FP

[Capt'n Hector]

There's really two arguments to global warming. One is that it's even happening. The other is that we're causing it. My personal belief? I couldn't give a shit who's at fault. Be it flatulent cows, smog-belching cars, the sun, or... aliens from outer space - it still doesn't do anything for the first argument, that is, it's still happening regardless of who's at fault. We're still left with one of the great problems of humanity: how do we stop it?

Reducing our emissions can only help, and can indeed go a long way, but over the last 50 years its become painfully clear how impossibly difficult it is for such drastic measures to take place. It's unpopular among corporations, politicians and the general population. Not a good way to get things done. Now - if alternative power sources become more profitable and cheaper than fossil fuels, the world will jump on the bandwagon and reduce emissions in an instant.

But should we really hope that an unsure economic turnaround takes place in the next 100 years, before average global temperature rises 11K? And even then, can zero emissions stop anything? As per my previous comment in this story, a pot of boiling water will continue to boil even if its removed from the stove. There IS an alternative solution, though. It involves increasing the earth's albedo - the reflectiveness of the atmosphere and surface. Now, the earth already has a mechanism to do this: storms. Clouds have a high reflectiveness, and storms also kick up the ocean, producing whitecaps. If the temperature rises, storm activity might simply increase, in which case we might just be OK. But just as an additional safeguard (after all, we're talking about the whole planet/life/7 billion people) we might just want to come up with our own method of raising the albedo.

Lalalalalala I can't hear you lalalalalala

[revscat]

Let's get this over with:

1. It's all a liberal apocalyptic myth
2. The planet will be fine. It's been here for billions of years.
3. It's part of a natural change
4. Rush Limbaugh/Sean Hannity/Fox News told me different, and they're experts on the climate whose opinion I have every reason to trust.
5. I think it's funny when liberals scream about the environment.

Do conservatives just not think there are consequences, or does it just appear that way? "Pollute the environment? Don't worry about it. Dump motor oil on your lawn, screw it. Make a liberal cry. Hahaha. Torture innocents? Eh. Has to be done. Drive up the national debt? C'est l'vie. Declare war for no good reason? They love us for it, the liberal media lies if they say any different."

I thought America was founded by *scientists*, non? The prevailing scientific opinion is that global warming is real and dangerous. Where'd these religious zealots come from, and when do we start shooting?

Re:Lalalalalala I can't hear you lalalalalala

[Anonymous Coward]

The people who go into environmental sciences, like the people who go into journalism, are a self-selected group who have generally progressive ideas. Not so much with non-environmental Physics or Chemistry.

This leads to an abundance of progressive thinkers in these fields which gives them the general left-leaning slant. It's nothing like a conspiracy, just the general direction that these things take. You'll find left-leaning lawyers making up the bulk of environmental law, you'll find right-leaning la

Re:Lalalalalala I can't hear you lalalalalala

[ErikZ]

Good luck with that. Notice that gun control is one of the big lefty policies. Now go look at the states that voted for Kerry. Illinois (Chicago), California, New Jersey, New York...all of them make it very hard, if not impossible to own a gun.

So, when the shooting starts, you'll have a bunch of people who think guns are evil and probably have never touched a gun, versus people who have been using guns for most of their adult lives.

What's your scientific prediction of the outcome?

Re:Lalalalalala I can't hear you lalalalalala

[LarsWestergren]

I thought America was founded by *scientists*, non?

What, the people on the Mayflower where scientists?? ;)

new hotness

[trs9000]

average rises of average temperatures of up to 11K
whoa whoa whoa... 11,000 degrees! Damn! I'm not even sure if you mean Fahrenheit or Celcius, but I know that's hot!

We don't know so, everyone stop doing anything!

[pavera]

"Stephen Byers claims to know that 400 ppm is the maximum 'safe' level; what we show is that it may be impossible to pin down a safe level, and therefore we should not focus exclusively on stabilisation."

Ok, so its impossible to pin down a "safe level" of greenhouse gas, so we already might be over the "safe level" or it might not be "safe" if there are only 200ppm, so what we need to do is build this huge CO2 sink that will draw down CO2 to nearly 0ppm, that will be safe right? It has to be!

This is the same logic that causes Superfund in the US to clean up toxins to lower than naturally occuring levels wasting billions of dollars digging tons of dirt and replacing it with new dirt just because arsenic is found in higher than 3ppb naturally in some area.

We don't know what's safe, but we know that at some level it becomes bad, so that means at any level it's bad right?

Obligatory Futurama reference

[Dachannien]

Lrrr: We will raise your planet's temperature by one million degrees a day... for five days.

CO2 IS a greenhouse gas

[caffeine_monkey]

I honestly do not understand how anyone can doubt that humans cause climate change. First of all, it is a fact that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. Nobody can dispute this: you can prove it with a very simple experiment [espere.net], and of course the planet Venus is a very vivid example. Therefore, all other things being equal, increasing the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will cause the planet to heat up. It seems obvious that it's better to err on the side of caution than to say the future is too difficult to predict, and therefore we shouldn't do anything.

Re:CO2 IS a greenhouse gas

[dustmite]

I honestly do not understand how anyone can doubt that humans cause climate change.

(1) Because people (including many here on /. apparently) don't think for themselves and easily believe the (politically and economically based) propaganda claiming otherwise.

(2) People simply don't like being told that their current lifestyles are unsustainable and that they'll have to make changes if we are to survive (i.e. they just don't like hearing that there is something "wrong" with the way they are living, so they

Help climateprediction.net!

[miope]

The climates models are computed using the BOINC platform (distributed computing in your PC, similar to SETI, etc.).

Please, help the project donating your idle CPU cycles, go to: the homesite of the project [climateprediction.net] and download [ox.ac.uk] the client.

The client (BOINC) supports Linux, Windows, MAC OS, etc.

Its a good thing...

[nwbvt]

...that we don't live in a computer simulation. Otherwise we would have destroyed our planet a dozen times already.

Peak Oil vs Global Warmining

[TheNarrator]

I am far more convinced that Peak Oil [wikipedia.org] is going to be the next big catastrophe to hit humanity. Peak oil has far more evidence going for it in that oil supply's have followed the Hubbert's peak model in many different areas where oil has been discovered. Of course if world oil consumption falls this means that Global Warming is going to be a non-issue 100 years from now and we are either going to be somewhere in between the scenarios where we'll all be living in a nuclear powered hydrogen economy utopia where fossil fueled powered engines are as common as horse and buggy or living in poverty with 1/5 or less of the world's population due to mass starvation.

Re:Peak Oil vs Global Warmining

[Paradox_001]

Peak Oil will is coming to a theatre near you. People who don't know about it better learn soon, the peak will probably come in 2007 sometime from what it looks like, but surely before the end of the decade. Buckle your seat belts people. For more information on Peak Oil and a concise list of the resources out there check my research website http://ospmm.sourceforge.net/research.html [sourceforge.net]

Please, no more climate change articles.

[rokzy]

no offense, but no one on this site has enough knowledge or understanding to talk about this subject.

it seems like there'd be less bullshit being posted if the topic were creationsm or some bollocks like that.

The real deal

[null etc.]

I think it's important to remember that what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. I think the planet abides by the same philosophy. So after a few centuries of global warming, it should be indestructible.

If we should need to solve the issue of global warming, it should be fairly easy:

1. Set up solar reflection panels to direct concentrated rays of sun towards the ice caps, so that not only will the ice melt, it will evaporate as well.
2. Set up a huge thermal vent so that evaporated water can waft up to space and out of our orbit.
3. The planet will naturally start to spin faster as a result of reduced mass.
4. A planet that spins faster will expose any given portion of the planet to the sun for shorter increments, allowing the sun less time to "heat up" the atmosphere.
5. Furthermore, the evaporated water will freeze once it reaches space, making a nice little shiny reflector shield to block out some of the sun's radiation.

I honestly don't understand why no one consults me about this problem. Thank gosh I can share my productive fruits with the slashdot population.

Virginia scientist shows long-term human infulence

[SuperKendall]

This [virginia.edu] study is interesting as it posits that in fact the rise of CO2 levels really began 8000 years ago when people began clearing large tracts of land for farming.

That accounts for half of the CO2 changes from the norm; the last 150 years accounts for the other half.

He also notes that from climate models it seems the rise in CO2 has served to shield us from a large scale glaciation phase that was scheduled to hit long before now, and kept the climate more stable!

The study is rather interesting (full link to study in article, check end) as he really ties together a wide variety of data from different sources.

11 Thousand Degrees!

[MadMorf]

The simulations suggest that over the next hundred years we could see average rises of average temperatures of up to 11K, more than twice what was previously thought.

Ok, who else besides me read that as 11 Thousand Degrees, instead of the intended 11 Degrees Kelvin?

Come on, admit it!

'Worst case' context

[Cally]

Here's some relevant bits of info I dug up whilst researching my own rejected submission on this story....

These results were collated from approx. 60,000 separate climate model runs [climateprediction.net]. Here's a link to the actual paper published in Nature [climateprediction.net] (PDF). ClimatePrediction.net passed the 50,000 run mark only a month ago, so it looks like participation is on the up. Kudos to everyone running it! Personally I've switched from SETI@Home to this project. (Of course, you may feel that cancer research into protein folding is more important. One of the nice things about the BOINC [berkeley.edu] framework is that you can contribute to multiple projects at the same time.)

The 'eleven degrees rise over the next century' is of course the worst-case scenario. Of course, climate disruptions of that magnitude really would be catastrophic to human civilisation - for one thing, massive loss of agricultural production, the loss of large areas of expensive real-estate (many of the world's great cities would certainly be under water. I don't know precisely what magnitude of sea level rise 11 degrees would produce but consider that the Greenland ice sheet, which is already showing signs of increased melting, would produce approx. 7m rise - that's goodbye to London and New York and Amsterdam for starters.) Here's a chart from the IPCC's 2001 report [grida.no] showing the various scenarios they based their predictions on. As you can see, the worst-case they foresaw was about 5 or 6 degrees C. The significant thing about these results is that the upper bound of the range of possible temperature rises is shown to be about twice as severe as previously thought. Not only is more and more solid evidence being produced to back the fundamental prediction that human CO2 emissions are causing significant changes in our climate, but the magnitude of those predicted changes is getting greater and greater as time goes on. Note as well that the charts don't suddenly flatline at the year 2100...

Finally I'm looking forward to a discussion on RealClimate.org [realclimate.org] on this. I've found it to be utterly addictive to see discussions amongst actual researchers in the field, not only showing the areas of legitimate disagreement, debate and uncertainty, but also the solidity of the scientific consensus, as well as busting various common myths - the Crichton garbage, the hockey-stick stuff etc etc. Strongly recommended.

Re:11K???

[Lead Butthead]

Of course, measurement unit of kelvin does not carry the word DEGREE; it is 11 k, not 11 degrees kelvin...

Re:Once Again Totally Irrelevant

[Snad]

None of this is going to be relevant a hundred years from now.

There are some theories that we don't have even 20 years, let alone 100. [nzherald.co.nz]

Re:Uh, what?

[tonyr60]

Fairly obvious, they mean an 11 degree Kelvin rise, which is the same as 11 deg Centigrade or 19.8 F.

Re:Uh, what?

[ari_j]

Actually, based on this:

The simulations suggest that over the next hundred years we could see average rises of average temperatures of up to 11K

I can only conclude that the average annual rise in the average global temperature* will be up to 11 degrees Kelvin for the next 100 years. In other words, the average temperature will be up to 1100 degrees warmer in 2105 than it is now.

I'm no global warming expert or pundit, but that's certainly my interpretation of the story blurb that made the front pag

Absolutely not. Key word "over". Stil important

[Nomihn0]

if there is more than one average rise in temperature from the globe, it denotes a change of temperature in a single location (i.e. from a single sensing station).

Had the article said "for the next hundred years", I'd have questioned its science rather than its grammar. Yes, it is confusing, but 11 Degress Celsius (as it is properly referred to) is still an outrageous increase, especially taking into account the fact that it is an average temperature. This means that the both the mean and extremes increase. Expect some very cold weather in parts due to "global warming". Also, expect scorchers. Of course, the significance is not so much the extremes as it is this mean temperature. Bird migration and plant budding schedules are already off-kilter. This isn't only an inconvenience for Dodo birds, its a serious hazard to the Earth's convenient biological balance. Watch for increased pollution in cities, species die-offs, catastrophic farming years, fisheries collapse, and increased natural disasters. It's in front of us right now. Those places least harmed by the full force of the tsunami had wave-breaking coral reefs and mangrove swamps in front of them. Without these, and many more, of nature's natural defenses, we're in major trouble.

It's not just "The Day After Tomorrow", people.

Re:Uh, what?

[Darken_Everseek]

Just to clarify for all you US Customary unit folks; a temperature change of 1K is equal to a temperature change of 1C. The only difference between the two scales is the zero point. Celsius uses the freezing point of water, Kelvin uses absolute zero. The original submitter was absolutely correct.

Re:Uh, what?

[mwood]

While you're informing us US Customary unit folks, you might go ahead and remind us that 1 degree C or K is about 1.8 degrees F. So, we're looking at average temperatures up to twenty Fahrenheit degrees warmer, about the difference between "I might need a jacket" and "man, it's hot today."

Re:Uh, what? --- We in the US use FAHRENHEIT

[basingwerk]

The british often use Fahrenheit as well, and always use it when talking about the weather, except for the forecasters, who mix everybody up by using Centigrade. Some pedants in Britain also correct you use the term Centigrade, because they reckon it should be Celcius, but Centigrade was taught for years in schools, and nobody uses Celcius except for a few boffins. Also, only boffins use Kelvin, which is odd because it is named after a British scientist, (Lord Kelvin). The British generally use imperial m

Re:Uh, what? --- We in the US use FAHRENHEIT

[EvilNTUser]

"The original poster was fine, though why they converted TFA's Celcius into Kelvin, I'm not sure."

It's better to use K, because you can't perform calculations on the Celsius scale. For example, 20 C + 30 C != 50 C. It is in fact well over 300 C.

20 C + 30 K = 50 C, however.

Re:HOW I KNOW GLOBAL WARMING IS A LIE

[fireboy1919]

Of course, you're forgetting the counterintuitive yet also highly likely result of global warming - an ice age. [commondreams.org]

Possibly just another one of those problems that we can deal with, but maybe not. At any rate, it debunks your argument that global warming is almost definitely a good thing.

Mod Parent Up

[thelizman]

It's about the only thing the "global warming is our fault and it's going to kill us all" morons can agree with the "if the earth is warming why do we have record snowfall for the second straight year" idiots on.

Re:First test of this distributed model

[chickanmonkey]

From climateprediction.net Introduction to climate modelling

The equations are tweaked, within reasonable boundaries, so that the model does as well as possible at producing past and current climates (compared to archived observations).

I really can't beleave you give them so little credit as to think they would overlook something so bleading obvious as to test the model before using it. Do you discount everyone you disagree with this easily.

Re:First test of this distributed model

[Jim Logajan]

It seems neither you nor the person(s) who modded you up didn't know that the researchers actually used the method you proposed to select the best models. The AFP story on Yahoo, http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=15 12&e=6&u=/afp/scienceenvironment/ [yahoo.com], states that "Once the first batch of results was obtained, the researchers selected those models that had simulated the past climate accurately. These best-performing models were then asked to predict how much the Earth would warm after CO2 concentrations had doubled from the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million (ppm)."

Re:First test of this distributed model

[nels_tomlinson]

Put in the conditions for 50 years ago. Run the model forward 50 years. If the model correctly predicts the conditions today, report that. Then tell us what it predicts about the future.

Sorry, that won't help.

The conditions for 50 years ago are nothing like the conditions that the Chicken Littles are claiming we'll see in another 50 years. A model which accurately predicts 2005 from 1955 could fail utterly to predict 2055 from 2005.

The problem is called ``out of sample prediction''. The model can be

Re:Since when did computer models become gospel?

[IdntUnknwn]

The model involved in this research was tweaked to reproduce the climate data for the last 50 years. I do make the presumption that if the model can do so with reasonable accuracy that it can predict the future with reasonable accuracy.

Re:Since when did computer models become gospel?

[nels_tomlinson]

The model involved in this research was tweaked to reproduce the climate data for the last 50 years. I do make the presumption that if the model can do so with reasonable accuracy that it can predict the future with reasonable accuracy.

Bad presumption, I'm afraid. I've explained that a bit in an earlier reply, see here [slashdot.org].

What it boils down to is the model is only assured to be good for the range of data that you fitted it to. Plug in data that is outside that range (which you must do, if you believe tha

Re:Since when did computer models become gospel?

[Coryoth]

Does anybody remember how Chaos Theory was first postulated?

Yes, I seem to recall reading about Henri Poincare finding a "homoclinic tangle" while trying to solve the problem of the stability of the Solar System (to win a prize put up by the King of Sweden). It amounted to a strange attractor, and a chaotic system. That probably wasn't "the first" being only around 1890, but it was one of the earlier points. Why what did you have in mind?

The crux of Chaos Theory is that some systems will NEVER be pre

First-Worlders pollute less?

[CreateWindowEx]

That doesn't make any sense. Developing nations tend to use energy in dirtier and less fuel-efficient ways, yes, but they also use vastly less per capita then we do. Oh, and by the way, they spend a lot of that energy producing crap that we buy. Imagine everyone in India and China owning a car. The cars in the US are pretty clean from an emissions standpoint, but likely generate more CO2 per vehicle than your typical 3rd world vehicle. Leaving the SUVs aside, a high tech 200 hp V6 hauling a 3500 lb sed