BEST Study Finds Temperature Changes Explained by GHG Emissions and Volcanoes 355
riverat1 writes "The Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature studies latest release finds that land surface temperature changes since 1750 are nearly completely explained by increases in greenhouse gases and large volcanic eruptions. They also said that including solar forcing did not significantly improve the fit. Unlike the other major temperature records BEST used nearly all available temperature records instead of just a representative sample. Yet to come is an analysis that includes ocean temperatures."
Well that proves it (Score:5, Funny)
If we just plug up the volcanos, everything will be fine!
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
The article shows a correlation between volcanoes and dips in climate. Also they attribute all climate rise to mostly CO2 and say that solar/urbanization/etc has not caused noticeable climate change. They attribute CO2 increase to both humans and volcanoes.
See correlation here: http://berkeleyearth.org/volcanoes/ [berkeleyearth.org] The theory is that the recent (1956+) rise is mostly AGW.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
If we just plug up the volcanos, everything will be fine!
Humans emit 100 times more CO2 than volcanoes. The ash clouds of volcanoes typically cause a temporary cooling.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
Ok, maybe not all.. there's those large parasols women were using in the 1880's that did a little.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
And human industry also emits significantly more SO2 than volcanoes; you don't get a Pinatubo every decade, and China alone emits two Pinatubos of SO2 annually.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Insightful)
So let's have more climate treaties, more inconsistent taxation, and move more production to China !
What does China/other developing economies use for energy for that production ?
Almost exclusively coal, which is pretty much the worst method of producing energy, environmentally speaking. Also, transporting those produced goods to the west is not exactly environmentally friendly either.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:4, Insightful)
So what's your point?
Yes - the stuff China is doing is bad. And by consuming their products, we enable them. And we are bad.
As a civilization - we need to all stop figuratively flicking our cigarette butts out the window. And by "all", I mean "all". I know that that sounds pretty awful and totalitarian, and the implications are staggering. But if we don't consider that, and continue on our present course - don't kid yourselves - we're not going to "ride this out" or "cope and adapt". It's going to get pretty god damn ugly here in about 20-30 years. It's probably already too late.
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So if China is worse, that's an excuse for doing nothing?
Actually China is investing more in renewables than the USA. Like the US, they come from a fossil fuelled history. But they're doing more to change than America.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
Please cite a source on this. I would love to see if this is truly fact. My own research into the matter suggests not, but I am willing to be wrong. Where are you getting the figure "100 times more"? It is quite interesting that your number works out so exactly to 100.
P.S. @Moderators - "Informative". Really?
If you were any more obtuse, I'd be able to use you as a decent approximation for pi.
https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=human+production+co2+volcano&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&channel=suggest [google.com]
First 5 links all agree with a number on the order of 100 time greater, I stopped bothering to look after that.
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Queue the military-industrial complex lobbying for money for volcano-nuking projects.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
"Queue the military-industrial complex lobbying for money for volcano-nuking projects."
The study is funded by the Koch brothers and the Charles Koch foundation.
http://berkeleyearth.org/faq/#funding [berkeleyearth.org]
I rest my case.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Informative)
I think you missed the point. The Koch brothers are typically anti-AGW in their funding. So this study that was in part funded by people who disagree with its conclusion should in fact be biased "the other way." Yet it is not. It could be that facts are difficult to find a bias in...
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If we just plug up the volcanos, everything will be fine!
Actually, that's a brilliant idea! Because, what would we use to plug them with? Lots of concrete which would have to be manufactured - so that way we could solve the climate problems AND start the global economy again.
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A few million tons of concrete would just make a bigger bang when it goes off...
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Nuke them!
Apparently Russia nuked out of control oil and gas wells [npr.org] and suggested the same for the Deepwater Horizon spill (nuking the gulf of mexico couldn't possibly have gone wrong, could it?) and we have all these nuclear weapons that no-one really wants to use lying about...
As a bonus, the lava should mean that the radioactives are less of a problem. Or you'll now have radioactive eruptions of lava which is sure to lead to superheroes, right?
Re:Well that proves it (Score:4, Informative)
I know it is a joke, but cement manufacture has very high CO2 emissions. It is something like 5%-7% of global human carbon emissions.
Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Funny)
Does that work when you eat beans and shove the can up your ass as a plug?
No, but it's cheaper than a potato gun and just as exciting when it goes off!
Re: (Score:2)
The recoil would sure be "exciting". Just face *towards* me when you do it, okay?
Re:Well that proves it (Score:4, Funny)
This story doesn't end with a monkey desperately trying to put the can back... does it?
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This story doesn't end with a monkey desperately trying to put the can back... does it?
That's no monkey!
It's a Thetan desperately trying to avoid being in the volcano when it gets plugged...
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Re:Well that proves it (Score:5, Funny)
Replied to the wrong post?
No, I think he's blaming Climate Change on the followers of "My Little Pony." Perhaps he knows something about magical Pony farts that we should all learn???
Typical bad summary (Score:5, Informative)
The summary makes it sound like volcanoes are the explanation for greenhouse gases, which is completely false. It doesn't say that at all. Actually, it's the opposite.
RTFA and you learn (as quoted from the .PDF supplied by the article): "According to a new Berkely Earth study released today, the average temperature of Earth's land has risen by 1.5 C over the past 250 years. The good match between the new temperature record and historical carbon dioxide records suggests that the most straightforward explanation for this warming is human greenhouse gas emissions." (Emphasis mine.)
The .PDF article explains that human CO2 contribution, volcanic activity, and ocean activity (e.g. Gulf Stream and El Nino) are the biggest contributors that are needed to match the graph of temperatures over time. But volcanoes follow the drops in temperature on the graph, not the rises in temperature. Contributions from solar activity exist but were determined to be negligible. They explain that CO2 doesn't prove to be responsible for the warming, but is by far the best contender. As stated by the scientific director, "To be considered seriously, any alternative explanation must match the data at least as well as does carbon dioxide." So denialists can't simply supply "common sense" alternatives: the alternatives must match the data at least as well (or better) than CO2.
Re:Typical bad summary (Score:5, Informative)
I pretty sure no serious (by which I mean logically sound) skeptical arguments deny that CO2 contributes to warming.
The actual controversy is over how we can expect the warming to be exacerbated or alleviated by feedback loops.
"Alarmists" tend to claim runaway positive feedback loops will cause a dramatic rise in temperature in the near future, while "denialists" tend to argue that these positive feedback loops are counteracted by negative feedback loops that tend to keep the temperature within a reasonable range.
Re:Typical bad summary (Score:5, Interesting)
Measurements on the great barrier reef have shown a temperature increase of 2 degrees since the 60's, and they are expecting another 2 by 2050, which is largely regarded as the temperature needed to kill it off. Already outside a reasonable range for the fauna that live in the area, which are migrating down the coast. If this were to happen over millennia the reef would probably migrate south, but at this rate of change it can't propagate quickly enough.
See http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-18/warming-to-put-oceans-and-reefs-in-hot-water/4470104 [abc.net.au]
"Alarmists" are often climate scientists. "Denialists" seem frequently to be corporate funded loons with no expertise in the area. But even if both sides were equally populated by people of the same calibre I would still think it was worth trying to switch to alternatives ASAP to avoid the risk.
Think about it - if someone said "do this, or there is a 50% chance your house will burn down" you would do 'this', even if 'this' was quite expensive. After all, most people do exactly 'this' when they buy home insurance, and the chance is way lower than 50%.
Re:Typical bad summary (Score:4, Insightful)
Here is a guy claiming that Global Warming doesn't exist: http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3395415&cid=42645177 [slashdot.org]
Here is a guy claiming that it is real but probably a good thing, he can't wait for more of it: http://science.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3395415&cid=42645015 [slashdot.org]
Read any denialist website and you'll soon see that they hold several contradictory assertions to be simultaneously true. Why then, would we accept that any of these assertions are true?
So what is your definition of "logically sound"? It sounds like it's equivalent to "the most plausible at any given time that doesn't involve admitting that we must take action to mitigate climate change" Qualifying what is allowed to be real doesn't sound like accepting reality - reality is not negotiating with us for a mutually acceptable outcome.
Oh, and one final thing. If you want to know whether or not feedbacks are negative, neutral or positive, read just about any denialist website. They'll tell you that in the climate record, there are instances where CO2 has lagged a climate change. What does this mean? What it really means is that climate sensitivity is positive. These people are disproving themselves and they don't even realise it. Ironic, no?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's been a while now that I've been hoping for a slashdot poll on this subject. For example...
My views on AGW are:
1) It doesn't exist
2) It does exist, but it's not caused by us so why get all worked up about it?
3) It does exist, but I think that change is a good thing (or the change will be neutral)
4) It does exist, and it's going to kill off millions of plant and animal species
5) It does exist, and it's going to kill off millions of humans
I'm guessing that it's a few loudspoken people on slashdot he
Re:Typical bad summary (Score:4, Interesting)
while "denialists" tend to argue that these positive feedback loops are counteracted by negative feedback loops that tend to keep the temperature within a reasonable range.
Well, then these "denialists" should come with a sound proof for that statement, I would say. The "alarmists" have done their work.
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Maybe you're right. I should have made it more clear that volcanic eruptions were responsible for temporary dips in temperatures in their findings and they said nothing about volcanoes having anything to do with the increase in GHGs.
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And we are spot on for a 6.0C rise by end of century, but that's average, the actual rise in places like the extreme latitudes will be significantly greater, releasing profound amounts of methane from the decomposition of melting permafrost and the heating of cold bogs. The problem is that perturbed weather could actually lead to colder wetter winters in most high latitudes and massive burn off of forest from the tropics to the mid temperate zones... adding more CO2 to the atmosphere. So most of the feedbac
Predictions? (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh-huh, big whoop. We've had heaps of models that fit the historical data - that's the easy part. It's all there, you can tweak your model as you like until it fits the historicals just right. The value of a model isn't in how well it fits the historical data, but how well it predicts future data.
So crank a prediction or two out of this puppy and get back to us in a decade.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Informative)
The point of this was that it wouldn't use complex models where they tweak to fit expectations. Instead it plots atmospheric CO2 against global temperature, specifically accounting for denier favorites like urban heat islands, volcanoes, poor station condition, data selection bias, and transparency. All the data is available at the site so anyone can run the numbers themselves. According to them, and by the looks of their graphs, it's a shockingly close match.
The conclusion is that the temperature rise is from human greenhouse emissions. As always, everyone is free to try to come up with more convincing evidence to the contrary.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Informative)
Exactly. Look at global temperature for the last 250 years plotted with CO2+volcanos and a simple fit:
http://berkeleyearth.org/images/annual-with-forcing-small.png [berkeleyearth.org]
There's almost no modelling there, it's just plotting two sets of measurements together.
If you think CO2 is not the cause, you need to find two things: another warming effect that fits the data at least as well as CO2 (and it has to be a huge warming effect that no one's noticed before), plus an equally large cooling effect to cancel out all the heat that we know the CO2 will have added to the atmosphere. This is possible, of course, but not very likely.
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Why the natural logarithm? Do we have a hypothesis to explain why the overall forcing effect of CO2 follows the natural logarithm of atmospheric concentration? Why a linear combination with volcanic sulfate? [...]
In the absence of sound theoretical answers to these questions, these are interesting but not compelling plots. The IPCC4 report (for example) goes into far more detail about our theoretical understanding of climate forcing from different components, and how projections are built up from this understanding that apply correctly in retrospect, leading to a more compelling argument for climate change.
The fact that CO2 has a logarithmic relation to radiative forcing has been well understood since Svante Arrhenius in the late 19th century, and is also reported in the IPCC WG1 report [www.ipcc.ch]. The base of the logarithm is irrelevant (as long as its >1), as that only translates into a constant scaling factor.
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Models that have been in use for more than a decade were actually conservative about the level of warming we've seen so far, but got it pretty much right.
Please pull your head out of your ass and look at the facts. Or just shut the fuck up and quit interfering with adult conversations.
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BEST doesn't do a climate model or try to predict the future, they're just reporting on historical data.
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Hey, you have a model that says we are cycling towards a cliff, and are already gaining momentum. Prove to me that there is a cliff there before I think about putting on the breaks.
How did you ever make it to adulthood.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Informative)
Uh-huh, big whoop. We've had heaps of models that fit the historical data - that's the easy part. It's all there, you can tweak your model as you like until it fits the historicals just right. The value of a model isn't in how well it fits the historical data, but how well it predicts future data.
So crank a prediction or two out of this puppy and get back to us in a decade.
They don't have to wait for a decade, they can just crop out the last decade of data and ask the model minus 10 years of data to predict it. Since they already have the answer, they'll know if it fits.
The is routinely done with large timescale models like the atmosphere and the ocean.
Re:Predictions? (Score:4, Interesting)
They don't have to wait for a decade, they can just crop out the last decade of data and ask the model minus 10 years of data to predict it.
That only works if you never ever intend to run the model with different parameters, otherwise you just settle on the parameters that "fit" the existing data.. which continues to not be prediction.
Not if you remove that data (that you have cropped out) from the original model. As far as the model is concerned, that data does not exist, and it not used to create the model parameters.
This has been done with ocean temperatures and other climate models.
It's not as simple as fitting the line then hiding the last 5 data points and saying "oh look, the points are on the line".
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The parameters of a climate model - a good climate model, that is - is constrained by physics. All parameters have experimental, physical estimates - the question isn't how well the model can be fitted to the past, but how well it can remain nicely in the middle of these estimates.
So you're complaining about the science part? (Score:4, Insightful)
Global Climate Change (which I believe in) proponents should publish a model, with a margin of error, and STOP CHANGING IT and agree that they will go away and start over if they are wrong, Instead, as each new bit of data comes in, they modify the "model" to better match the new data on a regular basis. Come on -- predict, and cast in concrete, the average tropospheric temperature from 2013 to 2018, with a low margin of error, and "lock it in". Cancel most "global climate change" funding, conferences, papers etc. for the next five years. If the prediction holds five years from now, then it has creds, else it's back to starting over.
Faith is cast in concrete and chiseled in stone. Science is more of a wiki page.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Informative)
Come on -- predict, and cast in concrete, the average tropospheric temperature from 2013 to 2018, with a low margin of error, and "lock it in".
The problem with that is that climate scientists don't even try to predict temperatures on such a short time scale since natural variability can completely override any long term climate signal over less than around 20 years.
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The problem with that is that climate scientists don't even try to predict temperatures on such a short time scale since natural variability can completely override any long term climate signal over less than around 20 years.
So no falsifiable predictions from the climate scientists? Makes you wonder what sort of science they are practicing.
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Sorry kid, you are just going to have to think for yourself here instead of regurgitating bullshit from some denialist playbook written by a thinktank that put a low rent philosophy undergraduate student on as an intern. I'm sure yo
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Of course they are falsifiable, just not on the short time scale you would prefer that they be. So far the temperature predictions of climate models have been reasonably accurate. Every year there is an update of model-data comparisons [realclimate.org] that shows this. There should be a new one that includes 2012 data within a month.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Insightful)
But changing one's models to fit empirical data is the basic philosophy underpinning ... um ... that thing they're doing.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Informative)
We already do something like this: IPCC projections [thinkprogress.org]. We do investigate previous projections to see how they worked / what they got wrong. Its a large part of what we do as scientists.
And you can do it too: the early models are still available (eg I think the EdGCM model is based on the early GISS model); these days you can run what used to take a supercomputer on your PC and repeat the runs.
But as climate scientists we're not in the business of playing "I told you so" with denialists. The 64 billion dollar question is : what will happen? we need to adapt and react to climate change, and knowing exactly whats happening is important: shrinking the error bars on those model runs translates to billions of dolllars of taxpayers money that needs / doesn't need to be spent : e.g. knowing the lengths of droughts, how much water needs to be stored. the scale of sea level rise, etc. This is why the climate models are important.
Re:Predictions? (Score:5, Insightful)
Climate models are grounded in physics. The models have many parameters, but these are not free - their possible range is constrained by experimental data. A good model manages to reproduce past climate while staying as close to the best estimates of these parameters as possible (and most of them have already shown themselves good at predicting future climate, to some degree).
You are in cloud-cuckoo land. Unfortunately, this idea that climate scientists should throw away all their work and "start over" isn't rare, nor is it your own.
Not credible (Score:5, Interesting)
Yep, "peer reviewed". This is apparently volume 1, issue 1 of a new series of journals started by an Indian publisher that decided to simultaneously launch 53 new journals [scholarlyoa.com]. In order to fill them, they took pretty much anything that anyone wanted to publish.
Taking a larger set of stations would seem to mean that this study includes stations that other studies eliminated as poor-quality. For example, stations with siting issues, stations that have moved over time between rural/urban locations, stations suffering UHI in unknown amounts.
Given the need to work in corrections for all of these quality issues, and given a pre-stated conclusion, it is very easy to make the corrections in a way that supports your desired conclusion.
In short: not credible.
Re: (Score:3)
So, you have no specific critiques of their methods? I see only a vague assumption that a larger set of data in one aspect of the study "would seem to mean" the whole study is worthless. You've clearly decided to ignore their conclusions without even bothering to read the paper, let alone understanding their methods.
I find even SciTechnol's peer review to be more credible than yours.
Re:Not credible (Score:5, Informative)
The Berkeley Earth team is making these preliminary results public, together with the analysis programs and data set in order to invite additional scrutiny as part of the peer review process.
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Phew. For a moment I thought global warming was my fault.
Re:Not credible (Score:5, Insightful)
Scientists use a subset of temperature stations to exclude bad ones, denialists cry: "They ignored the other stations because it didn't fit their desired outcome".
Scientists use all available data. Denialists cry: "They didn't exclude the bad ones, so the results are unreliable".
Science cannot win against politics and that is all denial is - politics, it has no scientific basis or support, no evidence whatsoever in it's favour, all it has is a very large, well-funded and heavily-subsidized incumbent industry that is quite desperate to prevent the rise of any competition - especially competition that is far more efficient and cheaper to consumers over the medium term.
Spark notes (Score:5, Informative)
1. Temperarature rise for the last 250 years of 1.5 degree C is entirely because of increased CO2 emissions.
2. Vulcanic activity can seriously lower the earths temperature and affects the curve with downward spikes.
No other activity shows any significant colleration towards earth temperature. They have checked against solar flares and other activites and all they compared against has had no impact. CO2 rise looks to be the major cause behind it all.
Basically they are saying: Critics of AGW are wrong.
The data will be fully available on their webplacce form 30 july with abilities for visitors to test the data themselves and to toy with how the temperature rise has affected their local temperature.
Re:Spark notes (Score:4, Interesting)
This same research has been rejected by every other climate and atmospheric research journal, by the peer review process.
Key researchers are omitted from the paper - like Judith Curry, who I suspect will have something to say, since she was a key member of the BEST project.
Go figure.
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No other activity shows any significant colleration towards earth temperature.
Now that is simply incorrect!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PiratesVsTemp(en).svg [wikipedia.org]
No one does anything for nothing (Score:5, Insightful)
Every major industrial force on the planet will continue as they are so long as their quartlerly reports show 'growth.' It's a system we can't change or undo. The major industrial forces will not allow it to change. They can't see or don't believe in a future that exists beyond the next year. When was the last time you heard "5 year plan"? And they are playing chicken with the future of humanity whether they realize it or not. Whoever hesitates or turns back will 'lose' as market forces will crush anyone into insignificance who isn't pushing forward.
They don't "lead" the markets let alone control them. With such short vision, how can they? The market is still in the hands of the consumer... sheeple consumers mostly. If anyone has been paying attention to the increase in guns and ammo and especially the market effect the government's billions in ammunition purchases, then it should be pretty clear. This gun control talk and scarcity of supply isn't only causing a rise in prices, it's causing a rise in interest. People who had no interest in buying guns and ammo are now interested.
Consumers can shape the next quarter. And the quarters to follow. Keep buying green. Keep buying things that do as little harm as possible. *I* don't make a difference. *You* don't make a difference. But *we* do. Talk to people, but don't argue or preach. Short, simple statements and move on. They won't think you're a crazy person if you don't come off that way.
If you're thinking about moving, I would consider moving away from major weather areas... you know, like the coasts, or places where mountains have significant impact. That's what all this climate change is about anyway--the weather, the redistribution of water, the content of the air and what it does with the sun's energy. Take up a hobby like gardening. It could be useful. (Just don't grow things indoors too much... UV lamps attact cops.)
Deny all you want... (Score:3, Insightful)
Australia still burned down in December. We've had more fires, worse droughts, bigger storms, worse heat waves, more floods and unheard of winter storms all predicted by climate change models. At what point do you finally concede? When the planet is the twin of Venus? Physical reality first, ideology second. You can nit pick all day long, but y'all are picking nits. You're complaining about issues that impact the 5th or 6th places after the decimal point in the analysis results, while ignoring the whole numbers. That would indicate y'all are less deniers and more in denial. Sorry that climate change is messing with your "Atlas Shrugged" world view but we need to come up with smarter answers. By the way, if the Germans make solar work, then from this day forward, we all get to call bull shit on those folks who've been stone walling renewables, just because Chevron can't figure out a way to create an artificial sun shortage to jack up prices.
Re: (Score:3)
Australia burns down every December. We always have fires, droughts, storms, heatwaves and floods, and most of them caused far less damage than comparable events in the past. Sorry to disappoint your shrill alarmism, but every storm, flood, tsunami or volcanic eruption (yes, I've seen tectonic events blamed on climate change) isn't a point in favour of AGW - not unless you can show how they significantly differ in degree or quantity from previous events. Climate change science has predicted everything from
Re:Deny all you want... (Score:4, Informative)
The event in Australia broke more records than you could possible shake a stick at. Go here [climatecentral.org] for just the briefest scientific review of the incident. Here's a quote: "A relatively small change in the average temperature can easily double the frequency of extreme heat events. Australia has warmed steadily since the 1940s, and the probability of extreme heat has now increased almost five-fold compared with 50 years ago." What part of this do you not get. Globally, spring comes 3 weeks earlier than 50 years ago. The clear and unmistakable results of climate change measure in the ten of thousands of unique individual events and phenomena. Taken as a body of evidence you'd have a better chance of arguing against evolution (and the body of evidence doesn't stop ideologues from doing that either.) Why is it that I'm yelling "Hey, dummy your arse is burning!" and instead of putting it out and thanking me for saving your life, you choose instead get insulting and indignant.
I'm point at trends, when data point after data point in one direction you get a trend. The system is incredibly complex, melting in the arctic messes with the haline cycle (and recent changes in the Gulf Stream suggest global current changes may be imminent.) These changes would have profound effects on global climate particularly cutting warm currents to the extreme latitudes causing dramatically colder winters. So there are a number of possible outcomes, when you perturb a system as complex as global weather, it's like throwing dice, many possible things can happen because there are many competing feedback loops and we still can't produce predictive models with the subtlety to give us long term predictions of complex chaotic systems.
That said, we can look at more general possibilities and compare them against what has already happened, in other words if I create a model starting in 1850 and successfully predict general large scale climate features and event up until now, I have a reasonable probability of predicting some of the large scale events coming. As for pulling out a single anything, that's crap no single data point informs you of anything. Again, the only thing that matters are trends, and we have those, we have a whole bunch of trends.
And I wish for the love of Jebus you guys could have one of these conversation without blowing all kinds personal FUD, you can stick your presumptions where the sun don't shine. You haven't the foggiest idea what my political opinions are but its clear that if your as good at guessing politics as you are about noticing its getting hotter every year that it explains why you can't seem to make a cogent observation about physical reality. In the flagellating department I believe its better to give than to receive. Guilt is what nice people do to assuage their consciences for being irresponsible or committing unkind acts. I don't practice either, therefore no guilt. I never said the world was ending, not today or a week from Tuesday or in a thousand years. Humanity is extincting about a 1000 species a day now. Most are insects and various invertebrates. Still, in your and my lifetime, we'll see the last of all the big mammals in Africa, most in Asia, and nearly half of the world's rain forest will go away. The impact of the change we're perpetrating on the environment will come back to haunt us because our biology is intimately tied to the global biology... nature of ecosystems. Every human being is a river of biota, moving through us every moment are ten times as many cells without a human genome as with. Plow the ecosphere under and we're committing slow motion suicide. Life has ben here nearly 4 billion years and suffered far worse than us, it will get along fine without us. We're an apex predator, we'll be one of the first things to go. Or, we'll pull our collective heads out of our rear ends and design a global technology that supports human advance without turning the world into a toilet. Why is that
Editors, please correct the title (Score:2)
It currently reads "GHG Emissions and volcanoes".
However, the Slashdot Groupthink has clearly decided that what they meant to say was "GHG Emissions from volcanoes", because obviously anything published about climate must be assumed to be denialist propaganda from filthy big oil shills.
It's far easier simply 'correct' reality than to turn aside an ecowarrior in full battle frenzy, is what I'm saying. Why fight it?
A newly invented journal to get past peer review. (Score:3)
AH BEST. The original paper was rejected by the journal JGR Atmospheres but finally they have passed "peer review". The BRAND NEW heretofore unheard of Journal Geoinformatics and Geostatistics [scitechnol.com] will now feature the BEST paper. Yes ladies and gentlemen, issue 1 volume 1 will have this study as its centrepiece.
In other earth shattering news - NOAA has discovered that the further away from the structures you put the thermometer, the recorded night time temperatures are colder. This is known as the "theory of duh" in physics circles, but required experimental verification [wattsupwiththat.com] by climate scientists.
There is still much science to be done and much politics to extricate from climate science
So now what? (Score:4, Interesting)
You can argue all you want about whether global warming is real or not, and if so, man-made or not. But those who believe it is real (and I am cautiously one of those) deploy a long array of data, scientific studies, models, peer-reviews and global consensus.
BUT, when it comes to deciding what action is needed, if any, then the solutions are based on nothing at all. Where are the scientific studies that prove that renewables, carbon capture and storage, fossil fuel phase-out or carbon taxation, etc. leave us globally with a better standard of living? There are other alternatives, but the hysterics only promote the ones that inflict maximum misery by returning us to caves. And the unintended consequences are rarely evaluated.
As Hippocrates would have it regarding a sick patient, "First, do no harm". I believe that doing nothing is the best strategy.
Re:Human Nature and Avocados (Score:5, Funny)
The question is: what is "human nature"?
Your post, and you, just demonstrated this true answer [globalnerdy.com].
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The BEST study failed peer review at JGR Atmospheres but flew peer review at the inaugural issue of "Geoinformatics and Geostatistics" by an Indian publisher. The funding is irrelevant to the study except to people in denial of the massive fossil fuel funding of climate alarmism.
[citation needed] (Score:4, Informative)
Seriously, this study is saying exactly the opposite - the sun has no effect, it's all CO2, and that CO2 comes from human activity and volcanic activity.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This study says A, that study says B.
Seriously, there are literally hundreds of climate models littering the back issues of science journals. Coming up with data and a model that fits some historical context is one thing, but we're still no closer to knowing what 10, 50 or 100 years from now will look like. When was the last time someone showed you the famous Al Gore hockey stick graph, without hastily and profusely making excuses about it?
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One could also point out that the temperature changes predicted by the "scientific consensus" at the UN's IPCC had both predictions and 95% intervals. Guess what ?
Those predictions were wrong, we're outside of the 95% confidence intervals for both IPCC FAR and the first AR. Depending on the month we are either at the very bottom, or below, the 95% interval for the second AR. Futher studies did not stop the alarmism, but apparently the IPCC got the message and stopped including predictions in their most rece
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This study says A, that study says B.
Seriously, there are literally hundreds of climate models littering the back issues of science journals. Coming up with data and a model that fits some historical context is one thing, but we're still no closer to knowing what 10, 50 or 100 years from now will look like. When was the last time someone showed you the famous Al Gore hockey stick graph, without hastily and profusely making excuses about it?
Ah, so we've moved from "global warming doesn't exist", right through "global warming isn't caused by humans", and now we're at "who knows what will happen in the future with global warming". I guess that's progress.
Re:[citation needed] (Score:5, Informative)
the sun has no effect
Ever wonder why it's so hot in Australia right now? Not only is it summer there, but Earth's orbit is at perihelion [slashdot.org], closest to the sun on January 3. In 20,000 years or so, the northern hemisphere will be summer at perihelion [wikipedia.org]. That's why the south pole is colder than the north pole; it's farther away from the sun in winter than the north pole is in its winter.
There are other cycles, such as the wobble of the Earth's axis.
Of course, there is the 100,000 year problem and other problems. [wikipedia.org] "Various explanations for this discrepancy have been proposed, including frequency modulation[12] or various feedbacks (from carbon dioxide, cosmic rays, or from ice sheet dynamics)."
The carbon feedback is what we're seeing now; the sun's affects only change on huge, slow time scales (except the seasons and axis wobble, of course).
Everything I know about it is from wikipedia; I'm no expert. You should read the wiki articles, they're very informative.
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The reason there's record breaking temperatures there in recent years is Anthropogenic Global Warming
Yes, that's a carbon feedback, as I said. You can't pump millions of tons of previously sequestered carbon into the atmosphere and expect there to be no effects.
Re:Koch Brothers? (Score:4, Informative)
The sun's output is easy to measure.
Given that, you'd think there'd be some solid evidence to back up your claim...but noooo.
Why even bother involving this study ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Ok, and how do you talk your way out of this one. Since 1990 there have been various studies on the climate. The scientific consensus in 1990 was that the temperatures on earth would rise by 0.2 degrees per decade. The scientific consensus on climate in 2000 was that it would rise by 0.18 degrees per decade. The scientific consensus in 2005 was that it would rise 0.23 degrees per decade.
The reality ? http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=global+climate+studies+last+20+years [wolframalpha.com]
Now we can go through the motions if you like, but looking at that graph, is it so hard to believe that we're below every 95% certainty interval for temperature prediction made at least 5 years ago (5 years, because there was an IPCC assessment report in 2007).
Can you just remind me, because I seem to have trouble remembering my philosophy of science class. What does one do with theories whose predictions (which means measurements made AFTER publication) provide completely wrong ? And, given that climate theory has failed the only test that matters for science, accurate predictions, can you please explain to me why anyone believes it ? Please note that saying "others know better than you" is wrong, as made obvious by these "95% certain" predictions the "others" you speak of made.
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"Temperatures have gone from -0.25 to 0.25 since 1980."
Here is a classic case of cherry-picking your data in order to try to prove your point.
You are comparing the low temperature from one year to the high temperature of another. Also, look at the years chosen: if you choose instead 1998 to present, you end up with (roughly) 0.4 to 0.3, or a change of -0.4.
I'm not arguing with you about AGW. I'm just saying that the evidence you have used to support your point is almost laughably weak.
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Actually, there are.
Mars Ice Caps have been recorded since Newton's time by many early scientists, and of course current probes and high resolution telescopes.
Certainly longer than Earths, and better sizing data as we could see the entire extent of the planet and the icecaps, something we on Earth have only been able to do in the last half of the century with satellites.
And guess what? They are shrinking. No human input. And no volcanic activity, either.
So there is your control, and it is behaving the same
Re:Koch Brothers? (Score:5, Informative)
Isnt this the group that was funded by the Koch brothers and hand picked with denialist?
Muller was rather more of a skeptic than a denialist.
I'm not aware of David and Charle's Koch specific opinions on the BEST results, but in the denialist blogosphere, Muller and BEST went from white knights to treacherous scum overnight. Compare Anthony Watt's comments before the announcements [wattsupwiththat.com]:
I have no certainty nor expectations in the results. Like them, I have no idea whether it will show more warming, about the same, no change, or cooling in the land surface temperature record they are analyzing ... I’m prepared to accept whatever result they produce, even if it proves my premise wrong. I’m taking this bold step because the method has promise. So let’s not pay attention to the little yippers who want to tear it down before they even see the results.
and after [wattsupwiththat.com]:
And still, he hasn’t published anything and his papers have not passed peer review, but the political apparatchik wants to showcase the incomplete and rushed, non quality controlled, error riddled BEST science as if it were factual enough to kill off “denialism” worldwide. That’s political desperation in my opinion.
Re:Koch Brothers? (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with this exactly. The problem I have is the frequency that anyone who raises a question is labeled as a denier. There are a lot of good points that get glossed over because the points are being addressed to a non-existent group identity with a large helping of name calling. There are many different beliefs that dont swear by AGW, and some of which are loony tune deniers, and some are pointing out scientific questioning.
I like to read through all of these comments, replacing "denialist" or "denier" with "poo-poo head", then again with "person" . The arguments can be vastly different this way.
Re:Koch Brothers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Almost everyone of those who "raise questions" just regurgitate stuff they've sucked up on internet messageboards, frequently debunked falsehoods that are still recirculated ad nauseam just because those people (look, I called them people, not denialists!) don't really care about facts. I notice that you don't mention any one of those "good points" you pretend to refer to, glossing over them yourself while blaming your strawman of the very same.
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Oh wow, you must be a wannabe journalist to feign neutrality like that. "Both sides of the issue." Right. When one side is right and the other side is wrong, you can't expect the right side to stop mentioning facts out of fairness to those who should stop stating falsehoods. Also, your comment is still void of empirical fact. Once again, you obscure the issues you pretend to raise. You may not have declared your position on AGW, but you have proven yourself to be a dishonest prick who will accuse others of
Re:Koch Brothers? (Score:4, Interesting)
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He asked a question, a legitimate one at that.
The question "Isnt this the group that was funded by the Koch brothers and hand picked with denialist?" is not legitimate because yes, it is a group funded by the koch brothers but no, its not that other charged shit about denialists.
The fact that you think its a 'legitimate' question in the form that its in just proves that you have been greenwashed too. You really don't see the problem with it, do you?
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Maybe all the honest researchers already realized it's hopeless, quit, short sold their houses to go out in a haze of cocaine and hookers before the earth burns up.
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Of course, the answer could not be "the quality of the science is not related to the source of funding"
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Actually, it would be the first place they would go. If they belived their views were correct and the science showed it, you couldn't reject it easily.
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First Phase
The Lee and Juliet Folger Fund ($20,000)
William K. Bowes, Jr. Foundation ($100,000)
Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (created by Bill Gates) ($100,000)
Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation ($150,000)
The Ann & Gordon Getty Foundation ($50,000)
We also received funding from a number of private individuals, totaling $14,500 as of June 2011.
Second Phase
William K. Bowes, Jr. Foundation ($100,000)
The Ann & Gordon Getty Foundation ($50,000)
Anonymous Foundation ($250,000)
So the two single largest specific funders are Koch related and an unnamed group.
Your bad! LMAO [berkeleyearth.org]
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Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually I seem to recall that gas produces far less CO2 for energy produced that coal or oil. The thing is though, that we should take this as an opportunity to move to clean energy because it is better all round. No pollution, no digging dirty great holes in the ground (and I am in Australia, we are famous for the size of our holes in the ground). Sure it will be more expensive in the short term, but maybe that reflects the TRUE cost of energy, and you can bet your bottom dollar that it will plummet in price if the world made a commitment to full conversion. As a side benefit there would be huge investment into energy storage which should finally give us flying cars.
There was a recent study on how green energy could provide all of our energy needs in Green:tech http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/how-about-99.9-percent-renewables [greentechmedia.com].
Incidentally I was in Saudi Arabia in December and while I was there the king announced a US$25 billion program of investment in solar PV. He must know something we don't...
Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:5, Informative)
It does, but there's still a huge problem with natural gas. The reason it hasn't passed yet, is the expansion of what was previously called unconventional gas - natural gas extracted by fracking. While the groundwater issues related to fracking has gained much attention, and are serious enough, what's worse in the long run is that a lot of the gas from such operations escapes directly into the atmosphere. Since methane is a potent greenhouse gas, and fracking is itself energy-intensive (we spend a lot of natural gas to get at a little more natural gas), some studies have estimated it as on level with coal for the climate.
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Things are changing so fast, building hydroelectric plants in places like the bay of Fundy make huge sense (use amplified ocean tides and you can theoretically circumvent a significant amount of the problems associated with hydropower. OTECs could generate both electricity and fresh water simultaneously while bringing up mineral rich deep ocean water for aquaculture. Recent breakthroughs in hydrothermal suggest that the same technology that brought us fracking could give us abundant new geothermal. Solar ha
Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:5, Insightful)
I fail to see how a crappy Murdoch rag could be responsible for global warming.
Despite what you say, many people DO deny global warming, and just like the creationists they change their arguments when they are on a loser. Perhaps you would care to postulate as to why thousands of experts in their field are wrong, and posit an alternative theory as to why the CO2 we are pumping into the atmosphere is not following the laws of thermodynamics and heating us up like a frog on a barbie.
What I don't get is how a fair proportion of posters on this site, who must be mostly tech savvy, can leave their thinking shoes in the cupboard. Maybe it is because it is a predominately US site and you seem to be more right wing than Hitler over there. I don't think many of you get that Obama is actually right of centre compared with the free world, and your country is run as a corpocracy with your politicians doing the bidding of their sponsors rather than their electorates.
Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:5, Insightful)
What do you mean "deny climate change"? People don't general deny it; people deny the attribution.
Actually, the progression is "there is no warming", "there is some warming, but it's natural", "there is some warming, its anthropogenic, but it's good", "there is some warming, its anthropogenic, it's bad, but there is nothing we can do", "there is some warming, its anthropogenic, it's bad, but it's to expensive to do something", and then back to "there was some warming, but it has stopped". Different deniers are not always in sync - some cling to "there is no warming" when others have already reached the "its to expensive" stage.
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OK, so just stick with the "it's too expensive" rebuttal.
What do you do about global warming if it's too expensive to 'fix'? Honest question. No, I'm not saying "just ignore it", I'm saying: come up with a real goddamn solution, or at least a path which is tenable without punishing first adopters or shoving government totalitarian enforcement down peoples' throats. (No, it isn't worth living or saving the planet if we all live as eco-slaves.)
Re:Funded by Koch brothers and Getty family ... (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, so just stick with the "it's too expensive" rebuttal.
What do you do about global warming if it's too expensive to 'fix'? Honest question. No, I'm not saying "just ignore it", I'm saying: come up with a real goddamn solution, or at least a path which is tenable without punishing first adopters or shoving government totalitarian enforcement down peoples' throats. (No, it isn't worth living or saving the planet if we all live as eco-slaves.)
I don't think that it's too expensive to do anything. Significant expense is coming down anyways - in the form of direct effects of climate change, of increasing fossil fuel prices, and of social unrest. We can opt to handle the expense in a controlled, gradual manner, or we can wait until the midwestern corn belt turns into a dust bowl again, New Orleans vanishes behind a massive sea wall, and refugees from Bangladesh destabilise India. A simple way of changing to a less carbon-intensive economy is to introduce a gradually and reliably increasing tax on carbon emission - e.g. collected internally for fossil fuel at the point of production or importation, and at the border for products coming from states that do not have a similar policy. This can be done in a revenue-neutral way, by lowering existing taxes, or by distributing the income to the population similar to e.g. Alberta's so-called Prosperity Bonus [wikipedia.org]. Even if you follow the Stern Review [wikipedia.org], the suggested tax rate of US$ 30 per ton of carbon amounts to less than 10 cent per gallon - noticeable, but hardly debilitating.
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It can also be explained by aubergines and the Fairies at the Bottom of your Garden.
You have no idea what the words "can explain" mean in a scientific context. What you just said is just plain wrong.
The Sun is the most reasonable explanation.
Except that this very study, which was done with actual data by people who actually know things, clearly says it isn't.
You just believe that because you want to, not because there is any evidence for it.
Re:Sounds reasonable, but... (Score:4, Informative)
I still wonder about those graphs that show CO2 lagging temperature by 800 years during past global warming events.
You still wonder about something that has been *explained* umpteen times, I can image not being interested enough to look stuff up, but please don't involve yourself in a debate if your knowledge is 20 years out of date... (I'm sorry to come over all agressive, but I've this exact argument trotted out for over a decade.)
Long-term climate change (tens to hundreds of thousands of years) is influenced by changes in the orbit of the moon (google Milankovitch if you want).
Slight change in orbit --> causes slight warming --> causes CO2 release --> causes more warming ---> switches between ice-ages & intermediate periods.
The delta-T between the "change in orbit" and the "CO2 release" was about 800 years, which accounts for the lag.
The current change is *different* becuase the CO2 release is not caused by changes in orbit, but by man burning millions of years of stored carbon in a few centuries.
So we're skipping the first bit that ook 800 years, and going almost instantaneously to the "more warming" bit... which is why we are now seeing faster warming of the planet than was ever seen in the climatological records, going back hundreds of thousands of years (and probably much, much longer, but the farther back we go, the harder it becomes to measure how fast temperature changes actually happened).