Antarctica Is Melting Three Times As Fast As a Decade Ago (nytimes.com) 289
An anonymous reader writes: Between 60 and 90 percent of the world's fresh water is frozen in the ice sheets of Antarctica, a continent roughly the size of the United States and Mexico combined. If all that ice melted, it would be enough to raise the world's sea levels by roughly 200 feet. While that won't happen overnight, Antarctica is indeed melting, and a study published Wednesday in the journal Nature shows that the melting is speeding up. The rate at which Antarctica is losing ice has tripled since 2007, according to the latest available data. The continent is now melting so fast, scientists say, that it will contribute six inches (15 centimeters) to sea-level rise by 2100. That is at the upper end of what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has estimated Antarctica alone could contribute to sea level rise this century.
"Around Brooklyn you get flooding once a year or so, but if you raise sea level by 15 centimeters then that's going to happen 20 times a year," said Andrew Shepherd, a professor of earth observation at the University of Leeds and the lead author of the study. Even under ordinary conditions, Antarctica's landscape is perpetually changing as icebergs calve, snow falls and ice melts on the surface, forming glacial sinkholes known as moulins. But what concerns scientists is the balance of how much snow and ice accumulates in a given year versus the amount that is lost.
"Around Brooklyn you get flooding once a year or so, but if you raise sea level by 15 centimeters then that's going to happen 20 times a year," said Andrew Shepherd, a professor of earth observation at the University of Leeds and the lead author of the study. Even under ordinary conditions, Antarctica's landscape is perpetually changing as icebergs calve, snow falls and ice melts on the surface, forming glacial sinkholes known as moulins. But what concerns scientists is the balance of how much snow and ice accumulates in a given year versus the amount that is lost.
More water, less plastic in the ocean? (Score:2, Funny)
More water, less plastic in the ocean?
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Yes, thats the joke.
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Say hello to Ms Merkel for me.
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"Russia's frozen farm land would become productive"
A lot of it has vast stores of methane beneath which means huge swaths will collapse long before they "become productive"
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Unavoidable change,
no Globalist World Government Tax & Spend scheme will slow the changes of Solar energy output.
Of course if you go by solar energy output then we should be slightly cooling since the 1970s.
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Obviously we just need to build a bunch of 6" stilts to raise all buildings along the coast. Done.
Now I'm off to disprove this globe earth thing with my lawn chair and 45 helium balloons.
Don't forget the BB gun.
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Obviously we just need to build a bunch of 6" stilts to raise all buildings along the coast. Done.
Now I'm off to disprove this globe earth thing with my lawn chair and 45 helium balloons.
Don't forget the BB gun.
He didn't, but dropped it after the first shot..
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Obviously we just need to build a bunch of 6" stilts to raise all buildings along the coast. Done.
Now I'm off to disprove this globe earth thing with my lawn chair and 45 helium balloons.
Don't forget the BB gun.
He didn't, but dropped it after the first shot..
Just use a shotgun, will get you back to earth in one cartridge even if you drop it.
show some damn respect, son! (Score:2)
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how terrible. (Score:3, Insightful)
People who believe that God created the world and expects us to act as care takers of His gift for the next generation of humanity should be shocked and appalled and take every responsible action to ensure the gift we have been given by God is preserved and passed down to the next generation.
However I can't think of any reason that would inspire action for those who have no faith because the results of any action on this matter for or against are unlikely to have any effect beyond our lifetime.
That brings the next real question, how can we motivate people to action , how can we ensure that action does not unjustly disenfranchise the poor.
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Errr...because people have sons, daughters, grand-children, great-grand children, humanity, non-human critters, etc.?
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
Which is relevant in what way after you are dead unless you are somehow conscious of it? So do you think most people would be highly motivated or not much by a remote possible future threat to there grand or great grandchildren. Also would such a response be reasonable or simply irrational emotionalism? The latter probably isn't a good foundation for discussion just global economic systems.
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Stop trying to imagine how atheists feel or think. You're just fucking wrong.
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
I'm not imagining how anyone feels who doesn't talk about feelings. I'm talking about what is rational, logical, and concrete and the natural conclusion of specific premises.
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You are mistaken logically, from athiestic world view, the only things that can matter to you are things that affect you.
Do you really think it's a good idea to publicly admit to everyone that you've never heard of philosophy [wikipedia.org]? Because the only way your ridiculous claims can make any sense what so ever, is if you are completely ignorant of the existence of philosophy.
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
You seem to disagree with obvios logic. So provery me wrong.
Can you name a single thing that has no effect on you and explain why it _must_ matter to you? Remember having knowledgeable about a thing is an effect.
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
Yes many of them. Used to know more of them when I lived in the north east. Most atheist I have met have never really thought out the logic of what they believe and live life driven more by emotion then rational thought. Not that there aren't just as many detest in that boat. Although many of them like to imagine or claim they live rationally. Most become quite uncomfortable when you point out the basic consequences of the atheistic hypothesis and it logical realactions to ethics. That is not to say al
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Possibly the same reason why anyone does the right thing, our own sense of morality? Weather the source of that morality is attributed to our religion, our sense of society, family or simply a personal decision to do what we feel is the right thing, all humans have a moral compass that may or may nor work correctly relative to the societal norms.
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
I've alway found your correct and astute observation interesting. All humans have a moral compass, which may or may not be in agreement with others. The thing is where does that compass come from and how do we decide if we should follow it or ignore it because it is faulty. Should we apply logic? Science? Or just do whatever we feel so long as we accept the outcome? Logically it makes a great deal of difference if our compass exist because there is some greater reality it evolved or was creatededited
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Honestly I typically go by logic and try to calibrate my compass based on what benefits the majority of first people, second animals and third the earth, regardless of how it makes me feel. I've found other people's opinion (elders, educators but also anyone in general) helps to form ideas but I also often have to account for the possibility that their opinions are based a lot on self interest, which is not necessarily a bad thing. For a long time, humanity survived in a condition of scarcity so the selfi
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To make any difference requires a drastic change in modern lifestyles. I mean massive and complete change in how modern man lives. Given that you can't convince a majority of people to give up their cars, air conditioning, beef and hundreds of other things that would have to go plus do something about population growth I don't see any real solution. A global thermonuclear war might solve it but that brings it's own problems. Without a world government exercising dictatorial and draconian laws we're on a cou
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We could fix this by totally backing away from the modern lifestyle and living the Amish life, spending our days doing backbreaking manual farm work and living by candlelight. We could even go to a vegan lifestyle, though that would mean no candles either.
OR... we could replace our fossil fuel baseload with nuclear, electrify transportation and go on living normal 21st-century lives. The choice is ours.
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It would help to move away from fossil fuels true, but it will NOT solve global warming. And we are at best 3-5 decades from being fossil fuel free worldwide. At best we might only end up with 100 feet of sea level rise in the next century or so instead of 200 feet. Personally, if I had any high dollar oceanfront property I'd sell it now.
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To make any difference requires a drastic change in modern lifestyles. I mean massive and complete change in how modern man lives.
Not really, much of people's impact on greenhouse gas emissions come from transportation and electricity generation. We do not need to eliminate all emissions, we just need to reach a point where we are not rapidly increasing the levels. It's entirely possible to reduce that without dramatic or draconian changes.
Given that you can't convince a majority of people to give up their cars, air conditioning, beef and hundreds of other things that would have to go plus do something about population growth I don't see any real solution.
You don't need to do that. Electric cars can be powered by solar and wind energy. Air conditioning is most necessary on sunny days, which means there's solar power to power the air conditioners.
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No.
Also, no.
This is a horrid straw man argument that is getting rather tiresome. Yes, there will have to be large-scale changes, but in the end, everybody can still have a nice, comfortable modern lifestyle. There will be changes, of course, but they are hardly "drastic" lifestyle changes.
You may not be able to eat beef 7 days a week for a pittance, but there will st
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I look at the levels of carbon being released yearly into the atmosphere and I see no slow down globally. Many western nations are cleaning up their act but globally the numbers are rising, not dropping. Solar and WInd power are starting to be implemented but we are nowhere near replacing fossil fuels. Globally somewhere around 25% of greenhouse gas emissions are from electricity and heat production. Industry is responsible for 21%. Agriculture, Forestry and other land use another 24%. Transportation is 14
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You can't comprehend what you read. Man you're stupid.
Re: how terrible. (Score:2)
Agreed.
Re: how terrible. (Score:3)
Anyone who believe that the 'end times' somehow releaves them of there moral obligation should read there bible. As 'no one knows the time and hour' Mathew 24
Certainly caring for God's creation is one of the prime obligation placed on those who are supposed to be doing all good until his return.
http://w2.vatican.va/content/f... [vatican.va]
This some it up well.
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people pick and choose bits of the old and new testaments as they see fit to match their preconceptions. Whether or not he was real few people seem to give a rate arse about what Jesus said.
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Actually poor people may be better able to survive in a war ravaged world. They've already figured out how to survive on a bare minimum anyway. Most wealthy people have so much stuff done for them that they don't have a good handle on how to survive if things go south. All the wealth in the world won't do you a bit of good if there's no underlying society to provide the goods you need to survive.
Awesome (Score:3)
10 degrees more and I am not afraid (Score:2)
too late already. (Score:2)
As opposed to stopping the CO2 growth, it is now time to focus on what will happen as the CO2 grows? IOW, how are we going to deal with the ocean increases, the lack of precipitation in BOTH America AND CHina.
Total Ice Mass Gain/Loss NASA 2015 (Score:2)
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/g... [nasa.gov]
I doubt it (Score:2)
If you think Millennials (Score:2)
bad mouthing the BabyBoomers is bad, wait till the generation that is growing up in 2100 ( assuming we survive that long ) starts throwing blame around :D
" Those GD Neanderthals back in 2018 F*CKED UP THE ENTIRE PLANET FOR US ALL "
*stomps foot for dramatic effect*
Re:Yes, The World Is Returning To Normal (Score:5, Insightful)
I hate how many otherwise intelligent people completely misunderstand global warming. Although people are contributing a fair amount to the rate at which we are warming up, this planets default temperature is much MUCH higher than what our species is comfortable with. Guess what? If you are reading this, you were born during an ice age: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
So what? From a human perspective (arguably the thing that matters most to you and me), normal is what we have now, and any deviations from that are going to cause us pain and suffering. It might be inevitable, but it's absolutely in our best interest to have it happen as slowly as possible. Cities, industries, and crops are where they are; moving them or hardening them is gonna be hella expensive and would be better done over long periods of time. Not to mention that really fast rates of change could destabilize the very fabric of our societies. That's nice that we're in an "ice age", but it means diddly squat to whether or not we should be trying to reduce our contribution to climate change.
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In this context, "normal" means the difference between "We need to do everything we can to stop climate change" and "Climate change is inevitable, so let's get busy moving our infrastructure away from the coasts." Opportunity cost is measured against the possible alternatives, not against what you used to have in the past.
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While I think this is an interesting perspective, you ignore the impact of new technology. Having to move in 100 years versus 2000 years is a big deal in terms of technology. In 2000 years we've gone from no steel or concrete to skyscrapers and space stations. Who knows what the next 2000 years will bring.
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Actually, 2000 years ago, the Romans had some pretty good concrete, some of which is still around. Then there was close to 2000 years of no good concrete.
Perhaps in the same way, we'll regress for a millennia or more. Technological advance has always been in fits and jerks and often with steps backwards.
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The classic /. poster: never reproduced! No kids to worry about.
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The best thing a person can do to resist climate change is not have any children.
Excellent. I can assume the moral high ground due to a failure of my loins!
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Or run an abortion clinic. Then you're killing the problem at its roots.
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He'll die happy, you'll die full of hate. Ya, you're the intelligent one.
Yea, ignorance is bliss ...
until the shit hits the fan.
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IOKIYAR
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I'm also haunted by the thought that after I'm gone my grandchildren or great-grandchildren will be cursing me for being such a selfish prick.
Ah but will they? For example lets say I don't forgo all kinds of economic opportunities in the name of reducing my carbon foot print - Might my grandchildren be glad I did not squander the family wealth on feel good BS that was likely to have little impact and was able to leave them something as a result?
The idea for 'us' at least the climate change is really a problem assumes we are going to go down the path of other self destructive policy like allow immigration in unlimited numbers and continue to play
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Oh, they'll already get a nice piece of change. They're much more likely to wonder why I wasn't more concerned about the fact that the coastal property they inherit is underwater and why they have to run
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f you're so stupid that you think protecting the environment will sacrifice the well-being of your children, then your children would be better off if you slit your own throat.
No see the difference between you me and you apparently is that I actually understand ecology, economics, and don't make purely emotional decisions. Protecting the environment really comes down to a function of people per area. There really isn't any bigger driver of environmental impact. Yes I want a country where there are large wildreness areas where my kids can enjoy. Where we maintain a little bio-diversity. Where we they can go hiking and fishing etc. Guess what carbon foot print has very littl
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Just barely. I'm on the cusp with Gen X, so I'm not only selfish, but I'm a giant pain in the ass too.
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Climate change this decade, global warming last decade. Make up your minds. What a bunch of hogwash fake science.
One of the causes of climate change is global warming. Either one is useful in the correct context.
Re:Yes, The World Is Returning To Normal (Score:5, Insightful)
The Rate of global warming is the biggest issue. Just like falling it is your rate of speed that you hit the ground is what will kill you.
The world isn't ever "Normal" it is always in flux, but if we change it too much a lot of things can die.
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Just like falling it is your rate of speed that you hit the ground is what will kill you.
It's actually the abrupt stop at the bottom that kills you. :-)
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But the sudden deceleration at a low speed will hurt you less.
The delta of Speed start to speed end is what hurts.
If you have a slow deceleration you may feel the effect but cause no harm.
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Wow so stupid.
1. I understand the difference between Climate Change and weather change. Also knowing we have cold spells and warm spells. However navigating the data shows the average climate is getting warmer.
2. The data is comparing average of orchards output of Apple from 1920 - 1980 then trending them with the rate of change of the number of orchards. Using both sets of data we can see if apple consumption is rising or falling.
3. One of the ways this is measures is with core samples that spans many t
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You can have increasing temperatures and melting ice caps or you can have decreasing temperatures leading to the next ice age. You can't, historically speaking, have a steady climate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
https://upload.wikimedia.org/w... [wikimedia.org]
Re:Yes, The World Is Returning To Normal (Score:5, Funny)
If you are reading this, you were born during an ice age
Come on, not everybody here is my age.
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Ice age is defined as times when the polar regions have a permanent ice cover. The Earth has been in an ice age for the last 2.5 million odd years.
Re: Yes, The World Is Returning To Normal (Score:2)
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Yes, I seemed to have mis-remembered. Also Wiki disagrees with my memory and says ice caps at both poles. Better link, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] which includes this,
I guess it is semantics which is hot
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I hate how many otherwise intelligent people completely misunderstand global warming.
Same here. In particular I'm shocked at how little obviously intelligent people understand the nature of the impact of anthropogenic global warming in particular.
Humans are the most adaptable animal species that the planet has ever produced. There's no question we could be happy and prosperous in a world that's eight or ten degrees warmer. The difficulty is all in how quickly we get there: the rate at which we are forced to adapt.
Four degrees over ten thousand years is easy. Four degrees over a hundred
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Humans are the most adaptable animal species that the planet has ever produced.
Considering how long some animal species have survived, it is going to be a few hundred million years before that can be stated accurately.
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I hate how many otherwise intelligent people completely misunderstand global warming. Although people are contributing a fair amount to the rate at which we are warming up, this planets default temperature is much MUCH higher than what our species is comfortable with. Guess what? If you are reading this, you were born during an ice age: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Guess what, humans, in fact the whole history of the genus Homo [wikipedia.org] has happened during the current ice age. So maybe that's what we're adapted to.
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attacking the messenger instead of the message , Anonymous coward ? You Don't have an answer do you ?
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I hate how many otherwise intelligent people completely misunderstand global warming.
Including the supposedly intelligent people that insist on calling it Global Warming.
(Hint: Anthropomorphic Climate Change is what the intelligent people call it. Or just Climate Change.
You're welcome.
Hmm... does climate change look like a human?
anthropomorphic
anTHrpmôrfik/
adjective
adjective: anthropomorphic
relating to or characterized by anthropomorphism.
having human characteristics.
"anthropomorphic bears and monkeys"
The word you're seeking is anthropogenic.
But anthropogenic global warming is still happening and it is the major cause of anthropogenic climate change.
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Re:Alarmist much? (Score:5, Informative)
So which is it?
The NASA article is dated Oct 2015, and it claims that the gains in West Antarctica outweigh the losses in East Antarctica. The Nature article is dated 2018, it specifically addresses the NASA data, and claims that they have even better analysis of the satellite information. This is what peer review is for. Hopefully NASA was consulted in this paper.
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The Nature article claims losses every year over that 1992 to 2008 period, and NASA says "nope". So for the 1992 to 2008 period, who do you believe? If you believe NASA, then automatically you need to take the Nature article's conclusions for time periods outside that range with a huge grain of salt. If you believe the Nature article, then why do they disagree so extremely with NASA?
As Mark Knopfler so eloquently wrote "Two men say they're Jesus one of them must be wrong". Well - we have two groups sayi
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I know for me, tolerance ranges of 110% of nominal value lead me to cast a VERY skeptical eye on the Nature article
What is the tolerance range of the NASA article? The one you linked to doesn't say. Right now, you are comparing a paper with little more than a press release, then looking at one number and discarding the paper.
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There have been a large number of studies that show Antarctica has been losing ice mass overall - Cazenave et al., 2009; Chen et al., 2009; E et al., 2009; Horwath and Dietrich, 2009; Velicogna, 2009; Wu et al., 2010; Rignot et al., 2011c; Shi et al., 2011; King et al., 2012; Tanget al., 2012, Shepherd et al., 2012, Martin-Español et al., 2017 etc, and now Shepherd et al, 2018.
Yet you chose to second-guess the conclusions of a single one of those (despite lack of expertise in the field) that combines r
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I believe the correct value is 50, with a tolerance range from 0 to 100" I'd send them back to the bench after a good chewing out or they'd be sent out to the street...
You shouldn't, because you may not need more accuracy than that. If you had an army of 5000 soldiers, and your spies reported that the advancing army had 50,000 +/- 30,000 soldiers, would you send them back out for a more accurate count? No, you would pack up and run. Yes, the confidence interval is greater than the raw number. But it clearly isn't worth going back and getting an accurate count.
In science, the idea isn't to only publish when you have certainty. The idea is to publish when you have vali
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wrong, article is equivalent of saying 50 +/- 50 soldiers are coming. in other words, it is useless bullshit.
credible studies show antarctic ice *growing*, I'll believe NASA over *nature* alarmist hippies any day of the week
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wrong, article is equivalent of saying 50 +/- 50 soldiers are coming.
The article says 1330 to 4110.
Why make up numbers when they're right there?
You should be able to tell that since 2720 is larger than 1390 that zero can not fall into the range of 2720 +/- 1390.
Since this is basic addition and subtraction, it's practically inconceivable that you screwed it up instead of simply choosing to lie to people. Of course, if you did screw it up, then you are so incompetent that you should think long and hard about whether you should post anything anywhere ever again. It might be f
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Classic. An AC claiming that 2720 -1390 = 0. And then calling someone else out for "third grade arithmetic skills." Run along, little second-grader.
Re:Alarmist much? (Score:5, Insightful)
Okay, I'll bite.
The two studies do indeed contradict each other. They use different methodologies. The Journal of Glaciology "Antarctica has been gaining mass" presser linked there (here's the paper, I believe [cambridge.org]) appears to use altimeter measurements alone, while the Nature paper [nature.com] uses a combination of altimeter data, gravimetry, and the "input-output" method which appears to estimate glacier melt and snow accumulation more directly. (You may have paywalls, I'm at a university.) Which paper to trust? I'm not a glaciologist, I can't answer that.
And yeah, the confidence intervals in the Nature paper are kind of wide. Measuring the mass of ice on a sparsely-populated continent is actually pretty hard, I suspect. But an estimate at either end of the CI still means you're losing a bunch of ice. With your engineer... I'd hope your response would depend on what question you were asking. Are 0 and 100 both numbers you can deal with? Is your acceptable range 40 – 60, or -1000 – 1000? Raw numbers are meaningless without context.
The main takeaway from the two papers are kind of similar, though. There's a LOT of ice in Antarctica. Sea levels are, right now, measurably rising — I mean, "FLOODING" is happening in coastal communities now. Dealing with it is really expensive. If Antarctica's ice melts faster, we'll see more flooding, sooner. If your argument is "increased global temperatures will increase Antarctic snowfall enough to more than offset faster melting," sure, make that argument, but the scientist in the NASA press release you linked to says the exact opposite:
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The NY Times article has this big graph showing an accelerating downward trend starting in 1994. Yet NASA says [nasa.gov] that Antarctica has been gaining ice from 1979 to 2015. So which is it?
Boy, you're just in love with that Zwally paper, aren't you? Even to the point of ignoring the caveats that Zwally himself put on it.
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Even with a accelerating melt, there will be most all of the ice in 250 years,
That's not what the article is about. They aren't saying Antarctica will run out of ice.
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You are comparing the tolerance range of one number to a conclusion about something irrelevant. If my oven temperature is 450F +/- 250F, and the cook time is 20 hours +/- 10, I guarantee you the chicken will be hot. You can't just dismiss the entire thing because of one tolerance range on one number.
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No, they aren't. The sea level rise has nothing to do with the amount of ice remaining in Antarctica. And the article doesn't say 200 feet of sea level change. Stop making up stuff.
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Well, at least they'll bring in some tax revenue so that you can keep your schools open a full 5 days a week.
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It's a bell curve (Score:2)
The numbers fall on a bell curve. So while 82 and 24 are just as likely as each other, 53 is actually 3x as likely as either of those extremes.
Your further extrapolation is wrong on face (you can mathmatically carry through error margins) . Even if you were correct mathematically, according to your logic, it would be just as likely to have increased 5.5x (24->185) as 1.5x (82->133) as 3x (53->159) as... All of which average to... 3x
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So we should endanger the planet because of your sense of incredulity? Because of your obviously wrong notions of how much CO2 we've produced? Because you've overestimated the amount of variation in the power provided by the sun, which varies so little it is called the Solar Constant?
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According to Wikipedia the Antarctic ice sheet contains 26,500,000 km^3 of ice. According to Wikipedia the area of the world's oceans is 360,000,000 km^2. Dividing 26,500,000 by 360,000,000 gives you 0.0736111 kilometers which is about 241.5 feet. Since the oceans will spread out as they rise they end up rising around 200 feet.