Study: Earth Is At Its Warmest In 120,000 Years (washingtonpost.com) 221
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Washington Post: As part of her doctoral dissertation at Stanford University, Carolyn Snyder, now a climate policy official at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, created a continuous 2 million year temperature record, much longer than a previous 22,000 year record. Snyder's temperature reconstruction, published Monday in the journal Nature, doesn't estimate temperature for a single year, but averages 5,000-year time periods going back a couple million years. Snyder based her reconstruction on 61 different sea surface temperature proxies from across the globe, such as ratios between magnesium and calcium, species makeup and acidity. But the further the study goes back in time, especially after half a million years, the fewer of those proxies are available, making the estimates less certain, she said. These are rough estimates with large margins of errors, she said. But she also found that the temperature changes correlated well to carbon dioxide levels. Temperatures averaged out over the most recent 5,000 years -- which includes the last 125 years or so of industrial emissions of heat-trapping gases -- are generally warmer than they have been since about 120,000 years ago or so, Snyder found. And two interglacial time periods, the one 120,000 years ago and another just about 2 million years ago, were the warmest Snyder tracked. They were about 3.6 degrees (2 degrees Celsius) warmer than the current 5,000-year average. Snyder said if climate factors are the same as in the past -- and that's a big if -- Earth is already committed to another 7 degrees or so (about 4 degrees Celsius) of warming over the next few thousand years. "This is based on what happened in the past, Snyder noted. "In the past it wasn't humans messing with the atmosphere."
120,000 years ago (Score:2, Funny)
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Hipsters were doing scientific studies before it was cool.
Re: 120,000 years ago (Score:2)
Why bother? (Score:3)
Both sides already "know" they're right, and no argument whatsoever could change that. Why bother continuing?
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solutions? (Score:2)
As long as (Score:2)
As long as this destroys humans - I'm all for it.
120,001 years (Score:2)
Middle ages warmer (Score:3)
There were vineyards in Scotland and diaries of vikings in Iceland tell of a land as warm as Europe. Orange trees were grown in parts of temperate China and northern Italy.
When it came to an end it started the little ice age which called all of the above to this day never recovered.
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The Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age were highly localized around the Atlantic. Europe may be at high risk for turning into Canada, but it's likely the rest of us will see far more subtle changes.
I find the Medieval Warm Period instructive. Today there's lots of fear-mongering that Global Warming will ruin all arable land, when in fact the Warm Period was a huge boon.
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Where do you get fear-mongering about ruining all arable land? It isn't from the scientists.
There will be good things caused by global warming. There will be bad things. Overall, even if the increased temperature will be advantageous, the process of getting there is going to suck big-time.
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It depends where?
I had quite a life living in both Southern California and Alaska :-)
So, so Cal it is bad for global warming as the mediterian climate turns desert for both agriculture and water for citizens and Citris farmers. However, in Alaska WAHOO! Farmers who left Oklahoma in the dust bowl in the 1930's have moved north of Anchorage to Palmer. In the old days the frost free season was only barely 90 days north of Fairbanks central Alaska. Talk about TOUHGH!
Today it is more +120 days as 90 degree days
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If the thermohaline cycle stops, Europe turns into Canada, and Sweden and Russia will be in serious danger of turning into Greenland. Not a "win".
Similarly, if the California Current slows or stops, Alaska and B.C. Canada will get far colder, while Washington, Oregon and Northern California warms up.
It's an open question [latimes.com] whether California will get less or more rainfall from warming.
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All over the place...
"severe crop failures and livestock shortages worldwide."
- http://www.livescience.com/370... [livescience.com]
"average yields are predicted to decrease by 30â"46% before the end of the century under the slowest (B1) warming scenario and decrease by 63â"82% under the most rapid warming scenario"
- http://www.pnas.org/content/10... [pnas.org]
"most of the Western Hemisphere (along with large parts of Eurasia, Africa, and Australia) may be at threat
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I repeat: where do you get fear-mongering about ruining all arable land? Your quotes say that there will be lots of serious agricultural problems worldwide, with significant shortfalls in production, but nothing close to "ruining all arable land". Hint: If you cite stuff, you may want to make sure it supports your position.
As far as my reference to scientists go, they tend to stick to what they know, and they know a lot, so they're more reliable than any sort of journalist. I can find idiots who say
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If you were expecting the foodpocalypse because you far too literally read one throwaway line, you're a complete idiot. That uncontrolled Aspergers is probably why you're on my lovely foes list. Yields down as low as 18% of their current levels would be incredibly devastating, and yes, a perfect and infallible scientist said that, so it's time to drop your hero worship.
Well, it sure is a good
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You cite one example of a scientific article in which under certain extreme conditions a certain model includes an extreme of 82% loss in food production. I missed that in the typical Slashdot non-Unicode character soup. In that case, only 80% of your cites fail to support your claim, and 20% says that in extreme conditions your claim might be close to reality. I'm still not impressed.
I don't know all scientists, I've met a few, and I've read stuff, including numerous scientific papers. They are def
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I provided a citation that explicitly proves my statement and disproves yours, but that isn't good enough because I linked other stuff, too (and because you misread it on the first go-around)? Okay, I guess that makes sense... to someone... probably.
Don't worry. I can assure I don't have the slightest concern about your opinion on this or any other subject.
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Re:She's right (Score:5, Informative)
Re:She's right (Score:4, Informative)
Re:She's right (Score:5, Informative)
Re:She's right (Score:5, Informative)
The data [nasa.gov] it's based on is also not global. It's from a single ice core in Greenland - the very definition of cherry-picked data, and hardly comparable to global temperature reconstructions.
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The period from 5,000 years back to 120,000 years has also been chosen to start with the last Ice Age and includes the Older Dryas and Late Glacial Maximum periods, while the most recent 5,000-year block includes the Boreal warm period, the Roman Warm Period, and the Medieval Warm Period, at least the latter two of which were warmer than today. The Vostok Petit ice-core data show that the Earth has spent the majority of its history significantly colder than today, with the last 5,000 years representing an u
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Oh deniers love that lie. Claiming that warm periods which were so regional they didn't even *change* the global average were somehow spikes hotter than the climate change now so we don't have to worry. It's a peculiar form of eurocentrism to pretend that somethign which only happened in Europe happened to the world.
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I love how graphs made by deniers even have a hockey stick.
But they drew a little lip at the end, from which they can project centuries of flat temperature, or perhaps even a decrease!
They should make up their minds. If the warming trend is natural and not at all bad for us, why not draw the graph realistically? What compels them to sugar-coat their own sad "me too" rebuttal?
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They should make up their minds. If the warming trend is natural and not at all bad for us, why not draw the graph realistically? What compels them to sugar-coat their own sad "me too" rebuttal?
Why does this remind me of GMO labeling? Deniers decry the "hockey stick" because they claim it is "alarmist". And the processed food industry is against GMO labeling for the same reason... it will scare people!
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Well there you go. Former television presenter, Anthony "My high school diploma is as valid as your PhD" Watts, just shot down those pesky scientists and their damn "facts" once again!
Next up, why evolution isn't real with "Actual scientist with bible degree" Gish!
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This isn't a popularity contest. OK... it is. but it shouldn't be. It should be a matter of reality, not the land of dreams and make believe.
Surprisingly XKCD is wrong ! (Score:2)
I love XKCD, but surprisingly Randal got it rather wrong when he did the comic - in the sense that the XKCD graph is based on old and debunked views that have been replaced by better data. For the actual data in a format similar to XKCD please see:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/20... [wattsupwiththat.com]
For those that want to 'shoot the messenger', why don't you like the modern observational data that replaces the old and incorrect meme ? some folks are just so conservative they love eco 'doom n gloom' and don't want to accep
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Oh look, it's this guy again - cite him a study and watch him yell "NO IT ISN'T!" and start frothing at the mouth :-)
Pro tip, dude - look a few posts up. Someone already tried posting your version, only to find it's not "better data" at all. I'm guessing you took all of Watts' claims as gospel and never realised it's based [nasa.gov] on only a single ice core (and thus says nothing at all about global temperatures). Or are you just still pushing your whole "nuh uh, you're all wrong because Greenland" schtick?
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I'm guessing you took all of Watts' claims as gospel and never realised it's based on only a single ice core (and thus says nothing at all about global temperatures).
What causes you to imagine that a single ice core tells us nothing at all about global temperatures?
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We had this exact same discussion last time. You ignored every study I cited then, you refused flatly to substantiate your own claims, and you're still repeating those same claims today. I see no point in repeating myself as well.
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Do some googling. The whatsupwiththat version is a complete and utter frabrication and has been roundly debunked for such basic errors as confusing greenland for the entire planet !
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>Greenland was much warmer in the past than it is today. I am only telling you the truth about the archeology.
Greenland is not the world. The medieval warm period was such a regional phenomenon that the global average didn't even change.
>The 'Greenland only' talking point you have doesn't match the observed evidence.
As per the scientists who debunked that one - Greenland is the only place for which a piece of data exists that remotely matches what he drew for that time period, the rest of the world wa
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We are still unable to farm in Greenland as the Vikings did (it is so much colder today than then that the graves of the Viking farmers there are now under 'permafrost' - because it was warm enough 1000 years ago that Greenland was green and fertile and not white like today).
Did you tell anyone in Greenland that they can't farm there? Because they seem to think they can grow potatoes, turnips, beets, carrots, parsnips, cauliflower and cabbage. [atasteofgreenland.com] Mind you, I don't know much more about Greenland than you do, but it kind of seems like you don't actually know anything about the country, the people who live there, or their history.
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Why do you feel the need to insult a stranger when they are telling you the truth?
First I didn't insult you, I commented on your lack of knowledge about Greenland because you made multiple statements that are so obviously incorrect that the only possible way a person could actually believe they were true was if that person knew nothing at all about the country. Second, many of the things you have written are pants-on-fire false, and now when presented with direct evidence that contradicts your statements, you chose to ignore the evidence, and double down on your fact-free views. So, if
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So? In a few years your air condition bills will be.
Re:So we're already committed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:So we're already committed (Score:4, Informative)
Re: So we're already committed (Score:3)
I'm finding a correlation between warm weather in California and these articles. That's better statistics than is in this journal.
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Re:So we're already committed (Score:4, Informative)
I think you have that backwards. Snyder is saying that the historical record shows that the sensitivity of temperature to carbon dioxide is much HIGHER than the GISS estimates.
Gavin Schmidt's comment is, basically, that her data shows correlation, not causation.
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There are also the small matter that due to glaciation there would have been much less plant life, and animal life to either consume or exhale CO into the atmosphere. In addition those same ice sheets also increase the albedo of the planet, reflecting more sunlight than it would have otherwise, which would also have impact not only on temperature but potentially the interaction of greenhouse effect in the atmosphere.
That said I think it is a no brainer that there is obvious correlation of CO and temperature
It's a technical problem (Score:2)
There are also the small matter that due to glaciation there would have been much less plant life, and animal life to either consume or exhale CO into the atmosphere. In addition those same ice sheets also increase the albedo of the planet, reflecting more sunlight than it would have otherwise, which would also have impact not only on temperature but potentially the interaction of greenhouse effect in the atmosphere.
This is a good part of the criticism of interpreting her correlation. Much of the correlation comes during the retreat of glaciers from the northern hemisphere. But the glaciers have mostly already retreated from the northern hemisphere-- this effect isn't likely to operate.
That said I think it is a no brainer that there is obvious correlation of CO and temperature. Only that it isn't that simple in all but probably the models being built.
The modelers have a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't dilemma. When the models are simple, people snipe "but the models are too simple; they can't be right." And then when the models are more complicated, people snipe "but the mode
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Seeing as how industrialization in it's entirety has failed to have been shown to appreciably affect global temperature changes...
I don't see the failure. CO2 levels are directly connected to temperature changes. So if we find the cause for the changing CO2 levels, we have the cause for the temperature changes. And CO2 levels have changed in the last 100 years. Just go to a library and take a 100 year old book about the atmosphere, and you will find that there are measurements of about 270 ppm CO2. Then take a measurement yourself, and you will get about 400 ppm CO2 today. So we have a 130 ppm increase of CO2 levels within 120 years.
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Your maths are a bit off. You forgot that the O2 in CO2 came from the atmosphere in the first place. It's not exactly accurate since oxygen atoms don't have the same mass as carbon atoms but we can for a quick near-enough guess say that 2/3rds of the CO2 mass was there before the CO2 was there, only it used to be O2. Only the 1/3rd that is C was added by industrialization - having previously been sequestered since the carboniferous age.
So while your maths is cool - you need to adjust how you're doing the m
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Re: So we're already committed (Score:2)
Mmm. I misread that. You are correct sir.
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Actually your one-fourth conclusion at the end could be partially explained by the fact that you factored in the mass from oxygen when calculating CO2 from carbon mass but not when calculating the carbon added to the atmosphere.
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We're committed - but not to the extent she says (Score:3)
I took away from her study that, as far as she could extrapolate from the available data on climate/temperature cycles going back 2 million years, that we were pretty much smack at the point of the two curves one would expect during this point in time
Not quite. We reached the peak of the current interglacial about 8000 years ago. That peak is the result of Milankovitch cycles and the carbon, albedo, and other feedbacks - just as the peaks that came before. Temperatures have been falling slowly since then until the last 150 years when we increased atmospheric CO2 by about 70% by burning fossil fuels. Temperatures have risen along with the recent CO2 increase, just as you'd expect. The question she's trying to answer is, if we stopped releasing CO2 t
Million year time scale (Score:3)
I think you have that backwards. Snyder is saying that the historical record shows that the sensitivity of temperature to carbon dioxide is much HIGHER than the GISS estimates. Gavin Schmidt's comment is, basically, that her data shows correlation, not causation.
I took away from her study that, as far as she could extrapolate from the available data on climate/temperature cycles going back 2 million years, that we were pretty much smack at the point of the two curves one would expect during this point in time, so to speak, on both CO2 and temperature and from that lack of deviation from expected norms then suggesting that humans have had little if any significant effect on global temperature averages
In that case, you are misled by a misinterpretation of her results.
She looked at temperature and carbon dioxide with five thousand year averaging. Five thousand year averaging says absolutely nothing about the effects of industrialization-- we don't even show up in her data. With averaging on five-thousand year bins, you only see effects on time scales that are long compared to five thousand years.
, and that the warming that is occurring and will continue for a long time at pretty much the same average rate is pretty well inevitable given past history with or without human industrialization.
A more accurate statement of that : "The activities of humans over the last 100 years have not had an effect
How to solve the problem (Score:3)
...then massive, costly, and punitive CO2 mitigation schemes become pointless and wasteful.
It is a political talking point that doing anything to address the production of CO2 will be "massive, costly, and punitive". Since the response of the fossil fuel industry has been "do everything possible to cast doubt on the fact that a problem even exists, and divert all attention away from realistic thinking about possible ways to address the problem", though, this has never been thought through.
The problem being that a non-existent 'climate crisis' allows governments, politicians, and their bureaucracies unprecedented powers and control that they will never willingly give up.
It is a right wing talking point that if climate change is real, then the only possible way to address it is
Re:we were just heading back into an ice age. (Score:5, Informative)
Re:we were just heading back into an ice age. (Score:4)
I have another XKCD for you: https://xkcd.com/605/ [xkcd.com]
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There have been several glacial/interglacial periods over the last 120,000 years.
No. Since the last interglacial 120000 years ago (the Eemian, warmer than the current) and the one we're living in (the Holocene) there has only been a glacial period (cold ... ).
It seems the paper thus says that our current interglacial is the warmest interglacial since the last interglacial. That seems very uncontroversial.
Regarding the XKCD graph it's contradicted by its own source. The graph claims to use Marcott et. al 2013 as a source (see top right). Now, study the graph carefully. Then read the foll
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No. Since the last interglacial 120000 years ago (the Eemian, warmer than the current) and the one we're living in (the Holocene) there has only been a glacial period (cold ... ).
My mistake. Thanks for correcting.
"Current global temperatures of the past decade have not yet exceeded peak interglacial values but are warmer than during ~75% of the Holocene temperature history."
XKCD would have done well to include the error bars. They do illustrate this additional variability towards the right side between 16,000 and 15,500. If you include the error bars you can see that there is no contradiction. Even still, Marcotte was published in 2013. We're about 0.3C hotter now than the hottest observed temperature at that time: http://woodfortrees.org/plot/g... [woodfortrees.org] . That may very well exceed even the error bars and cover that last 25%.
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There have been quite a few ice ages in the last 120,000 years- and there will probably be another one next time Ray Romano's bank account gets low.
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There have been several glacial/interglacial periods over the last 120,000 years. The peak of the current interglacial occurred about 8000 years ago. Since then temperatures have been slowly falling... up until about 150 years ago when something happened and temperatures dramatically reversed course.. Here's just the last 20,000 years by XKCD: http://xkcd.com/1732/ [xkcd.com]
One reason for climate change, from my thinking, is that the earth's spin is slowing down. At one second per year or decade or century, that slow down has a side effect. The sun is able to do one second more melting of ice.
And of course, birmomg fossil fuels also causes a side effect. Altogether, I can, in my mind, rationalize what we are experiencing as "global warming"
Re: we were just heading back into an ice age. (Score:4, Informative)
Re: we were just heading back into an ice age. (Score:5, Insightful)
The site's tagline is: "The national daily championing freedom, smaller government and human dignity."
Now while I'm sure there are genuine good people who just happen to believe government should be small - unfortunately their voices are drowned out by the insane bastards who want government to be powerless so there isn't anybody to stop them from throwing poison in your drinking water and making your air unbreathable. Climate change denial is a forte of theirs and claiming models aren't accurate (mostly by either lying about what models predicted or lying about what the actual temperature is right now) is a key part of how they deny things. The whole "we don't know and we can't know" schpiel from people claiming to be champions of science (which is the thing we use to know things with) is ridiculous. But that tagline says it all. That's not an article about maths, statistics, science or probability though it claims to be all of the above. It's an article about politics - which is being disguised because they don't want you to know it's about politics. It's an attempt to achieve a political goal - regardless of scientific fact.
When you get to the point where you will deny science and reality for the sake of your poiltical beliefs - no matter how nobel those beliefs may otherwise be - they've become evil. At the point where you want government to be too small to keep the water drinkable, the air breathable and the CO2 levels survivable - small government libertarians are no longer just people with whom I have a difference of opinion - they become an actual and legitimate threat to my personal security and the national security of all nations. Killing them becomes justified on the basis of self defence. *
You generally want to stop following the line of any ideology before the point where it becomes justifiable for other people to kill you in self defence over what you do in the name of that ideology.
*Note that I am speaking of what would be justified - not what I would actually do. I'm a pacifist and consider force the very last resort. I don't think we are *quite* at the last resort level in general yet. In a few specific cases yes, but not in general. If you live in a town where somebody is dumping poison in your drinking water though - and you kill the CEO of the company who did it and every idiot who tried to stop the government from preventing it, you are not a murderer though, that's self defence and even the most devoted pacifist will not begrudge you that.
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What happens when government itself is poisoning your water?
That's a sign of insufficient citizen involvement, not a sign of too-large government. Larger governments than Flint's have managed not to pollute their water.
Re: How about Government poisoning your water? (Score:3)
I can vote government out and you bet your ass the republicans will be losing Michigan over Flint. I cannot vote out PG&E.
Thats the difference. History has almost no examples at all of elected governments killing many citizens.
In the case of Flint the fuckup was enforced by the state government against the demands of the local government who actually wanted to stop it. Interestingly the state government was the party of small government. See when you make government too small to stop corporations from k
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And yet we see that temperatures were much higher in the past. And then lower. And then higher. And then lower. And then higher
We also see that there were 26 ice ages in the
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>the amount of industrialization 150 years ago was trivial compared to today comparable to volcanic activity
And you were doing so well. You almost sounded like what you were saying wasn't complete bullshit... and then you come up with this such and complete and utter fabrication that it's impossible to believe somebody could actually still seriously claim this.
The good news is - we don't have to guess, we have actual numbers. See the American Geophysical Union - who are pretty much the premier experts on
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A quick search shows the graphs linked to below. Coal use is grows exponentially but only becomes significant around 1850. Coal production in the 18th C was minimal in comparison to that extracted and used in 1850, and close to insignificant to today.
https://ourfiniteworld.com/201... [ourfiniteworld.com]
http://www.rmi.org/RFGraph-Fos... [rmi.org]
The comparison to volcanos was not coal production in the year 2000 but coal production in the year 18
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Okay, so what you are saying is that over the past 150 years we've stepped up CO2 production so much that what is considered one of the largest drivers of natural climate change (the largest after orbital shifts and solar changes) is now nothing but noise... and somehow this is an argument for the denier side ?
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Are you stupid or just lying ?
That's not what the word 'starting' means.
Re: we were just heading back into an ice age. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, and all this is academic. Lets assume your insanity is true and climate change to this degree is normal and the historical record actually supports that claim. It's bullshit but lets pretend it was real.
See we have other records - archeological, anthropological etc. etc and the thing is - they show that every major climate shift humanity has experienced was a major calamity and we very nearly didn't survive any of them as a species. Every single one came close to an extinction level event for us. Every single one caused massive displacement, starvation and wars.
And we are MORE vulnerable now than we were when those happened. They happened when displacement was a much smaller problem. If you went somewhere else, there was a good chance you could find somewhere that somebody else wasn't already living and prepared to fight to keep you out off... there are no such places anymore. There is nowhere for the displaced to flee but to your country. America can't figure out how to deal with a few hundred thousand refugees from wars they caused - how the fuck are you going to deal when there's a few hundred million or more fleeing starvation and hunger and drought ? Sure it may make some places green which aren't now. Those places won't be producing much food anytime soon though - most of them are areas where the soil is not conducive to farming. No matter how much warmer and wetter you make it - Siberia will not have productive farmland for centuries. The soil is just to dead. And meantime - the places that were good farmland won't be anymore.
Oh and the plagues... you are having a political crisis trying to deal with Zika right now. Malaria kills more people every year than any other cause. Even a small increase in the global average *massive* increases the areas where these diseases can spread. Many economists have calculated that Africa's economic woes can be *entirely* attributed to Malaria. Sure we have wars and corruption but so does everywhere else. We alone have malaria to deal with. With all those productive people dying young. All those kids missing school because mommy is sick, husbands and family missing work to take care of her and all that money wasted on funerals in a classic broken window fallacy.
Imagine America with Africa's economy - all your wealth destroyed, all your resources spent just trying to avoid complete collapse - and for the same reason.
That's the thing you think is not a major problem. Just because nature can be a bitch doesn't mean it's not idiotic to horrible things to ourselves. The lesson to learn from natural climate shifts is not that climate shifts is just something that happens and so what... the lesson is that it has come pretty close to eradicating our species several times, and never failed to cause enormous hardship and uncountable deaths and it will be *worse* next time.
And, much like the zombie appocalypse, in a major climate change scenario - the single greatest threat is not the weather, it's the other humans. Who will happilly kill you for the water you have.
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My point wasn't about efficacy - frankly I don't believe it would be very effective, mass murder rarely is. Such a process would also require enormous resources, which creates a breeding ground for corruption. In practical terms - it would not be an effective way to achieve the goal and would open the door to many genuine atrocities.
My point was to put into perspective the point where libertarians ought to stop being libertarians - because of what becomes justified (justified != a good idea) when they do. P
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https://stream.org/xkcds-global-warming-time-series-mistakes/
I didn't see any mistakes pointed out in that. All it said is that there are uncertaincies in relying upon proxy data. We know that. Nothing of value was added to any conversation by that article.
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The last ice age ended about 10 thousand years ago... you do know that ten-thousand is quite a bit less than 120-thousand right ?
Like 110 millennia more. The last time it was this warm the only people around hadn't discovered fire yet.
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denier? anti-science?
Do you realize those are weasel words? Science is not a religion, except when it is. Also, Science is not a verb. That's just a pet peve.
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Science is not a religion, except when it is.
Yeah it's a religion when it doesn't come out with the result you want. I've seen this one on slashdot. Climate deniers are literally no better than 9/11 truthers or creationists. They're just more numerous than the former and less numerous than the latter.
Krakatoa (Score:5, Insightful)
it would only take one Krakatoa to push us back into an ice age.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1883_eruption_of_Krakatoa
Krakatoa's eruption did not, in fact, push us into a glaciation, so your assertion is experimentally falsified.
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It would be better he created another Earth pronto, I can do without his blessing but another planet would be useful.
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Push comes to shove there are tens of millions indirectly responsible for the warming effect but then again.. it would only take one Krakatoa to push us back into an ice age.
God bless us all.
Or a nuclear winter. Ever get the fear that this global warming is just the superpowers prepping themselves for survival of a nuclear war?
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Why does it matter?
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The truth is, nobody gives a shit. Those that could change it won't, and those that know how to cannot. So why bother trying?
I have no kids. I am old enough that it won't hit me anymore. I don't give a shit anymore. Why bother fighting for moron who don't want to survive?
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Give us a few hundred years and we will have the technology to warm or cool the earth at will. There will not be an ice age in the next few hundred years. The only reason we will have another ice age is if human society completely collapses.
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And if not, the you of 10 years from now will be dead from lung cancer and cease to contribute to global warming. It's so win-win.
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The cessation aid in this case being "death". Which, I will grant you, has a 100% success rate at getting people to stop smoking.
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When it doesn't matter, then why is it the "real" question?
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The Earth's climate has LAWAYS been changing and will continue to do so no matter what. So the important question is not the blame, which is after the fat... It is what we can do.
It's not after the fact because it is still happening. We have to identify the culprits and stop them. Are you a time traveler, come back from an era when we no longer know how to spell, to tell us Fuck You, I'm Eating?
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Maybe we can ask China and India. They have a lot of people. Certainly one of them must know!
China knows that it ships most of its cheap shit made with no pollution controls to the USA.
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In that vein, how much will the climate change in the future and how does that impact the long-term survival of humans? The Earth has been considerably hotter at times in the past, even without anthropocentric intervention (that we know of.) Additionally, the Earth has been considerably cooler at times in the past. If the past is the best indicator of the future, and you extrapolate forward into the future on a long enough timeline, it becomes self evident that we are ill prepared for what inevitably wil
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Expectations are irrelevant.
The question is "Can we survive globally with temperature rising by X degrees" and since we did just fine 120000 years ago with higher temperatures compared to today, the answer seems to be: Yes.
I do not deny that warming will have some negative effects in the short term (as well as positive effects such as increased vegetation due to more CO2), but long term survivial is not in danger, contrary to what the doomsday prophets like to claim.
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some negative effects in the short term
The Earth is going to be just fine with it being hotter. I don't think anyone is worried about that.
However, your life, and that of your children, and your children's children may be one of increasing water shortages, mass population movement, famine and wars over resources. All due to warming and drought. All in all, a pretty shitty next 100 years coming up for everyone.
But good for you for looking at the bigger picture and not worrying about the minor personal details.
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All in all, a pretty shitty next 100 years coming up for everyone.
Wayyy more than a HUNDRED years!!!! [skepticalscience.com]
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Hey, all you "man made" global warming people...you think it is mans fault? Do the world a favor and exit the planet and leave the rest of us the hell alone!
The quick fix for the "global warming people" isn't to leave the planet. It's to kill the people who are destroying the ecosphere upon which we depend for survival. If you want to see an eco-war, keep running your suck instead of changing your habits.
The ice core from greenland is a perfectly good meter stick. If localized activity affects the weather there will be signs in the ice. For example, if there's a volcano reducing insolation, then there's going to be volcanic particulates in the ice. Thus, you'll
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You do realise that in most cases this would require them to kill themselves. Most warmists talk a good fight, but if you asked them to give up their cars, air travel or air conditioning, they'd refuse.
That describes many of them, sure. But we don't actually have to give up any of those things, just improve them all. Well, maybe cars. Cars are just stupid. Also, you don't get to complain when people do the things they need to do to be a member of our dysfunctional society as long as they're at least asking for change, and perhaps voting for it as well. Our society is built around the car. I want that to change, but I'm still going to drive places I can't reasonably get to any other way.
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You don't get that much agreement among scientists (always a quarrelsome lot) from a specific political agenda. If a solid majority of US climate scientists claimed we were going to have problems from AGW, that's localized enough that it could be a political agenda. Almost complete agreement among climate scientists all over the world means that there is very strong evidence that it's happening.
If we warmed up like this over a period of ten thousand years, it'd be fine. It's the extremely rapid change