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2008 Is the Coldest Year of the 21st Century
Posted by
timothy
on Thu Aug 21, 2008 08:20 PM
from the problem-with-complexity-is-all-the-complexity dept.
from the problem-with-complexity-is-all-the-complexity dept.
dtjohnson writes "Data from the United Kingdom Meteorological Office suggests that 2008 will
be an unusually cold year due to the La Nina effect in the western
Pacific ocean. Not to worry, though, as the La Nina effect has
faded recently so its effect on next year's temperatures will be
reduced. However, another natural cycle, the Atlantic
Multidecadal Oscillation, is predicted to hold global temperatures
steady for the next decade before global warming takes our planet into
new warmth. If these predictions are correct, there must be
a lot of planetary heat being stored away somewhere ... unless the heat
output from the sun
is decreasing
rather than increasing
or the heat being absorbed by the earth is decreasing due to changes in
the earth's albedo."
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gore (Score:5, Funny)
Re:gore (Score:5, Funny)
Burn them for warmth.
Parent
Re:gore (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Oh goody... (Score:5, Funny)
Hopefully for this one we'll get some cashiers, makeup artists and puppeteers to weigh in with their expert environmental opinion, just to mix things up.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Global warming is a misnomer anyway - it should be called, "global climate instability."
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod parent up.. The earth's climate is a control system. As it becomes unstable, you will start seeing more records: cold, hot, rain, drought, record single day temperature differentials, etc.
It's not going to just get warmer over short time periods.. It always amazes me that folks don't realize that.
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not going to just get warmer over short time periods.. It always amazes me that folks don't realize that.
I've been telling people this for a while. I liken it to a spinning top. When it begins to slow down it starts wobbling and becoming very erratic. The difference is that unlike a top, the climate will eventually begin to restabilize. It just might not stabilize in a way that humans are particularly comfortable with.
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Mod parent up.. The earth's climate is a control system. As it becomes unstable, you will start seeing more records: cold, hot, rain, drought, record single day temperature differentials, etc.
Which, conveniently, lets just about any type of weather be attributed to global warming (or is that climate change?)
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Funny)
Global warming is a misnomer anyway - it should be called, "global climate instability."
How about 'Intelligent Heating?'
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Awe, and here I was going to propose we officially call it "Earth Does Stuff". Too vague?
Parent
The straw man is dead (Score:5, Insightful)
No one is denying climate change. No one even denies that human activity (or the sun or various natural cycles) influences the change. The argument is over how big a role each factor plays. (Along with accusations of exaggerating selected factors for political or commercial gain.) As with many scientific questions, teasing apart correlation and cause is exceedingly difficult - especially with multi-factor causes.
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
You're confusing "denial" over climate change (of course it changes! the Sahara was green thousands of years ago, we used to be in an ice age, etc) with being very wary about the political motivations of many of the more shrill people on the stage. Those who claim that the only reason we're looking at any climate change is because of human activity, and that ceasing human activity would magically restore the dynamic climate back to some idyllic state (um... maybe with a green Sahara, but without the continent-covering glaciers, etc?
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Funny)
Wow, believe it or not, most people aren't going to care about a theory that A) Doesn't affect them B) has many people that reject it C) Has no short or medium-term impact and D) has no effects right now.
Awesome troll. But I think you're being too harsh on intelligent design, personally ...
Parent
Silly to reject climate change (Score:5, Interesting)
The climate does nothing but change. The debate is always about which direction it is going. Long-term ice records indicate it should be cooling. CO2 theorists say it should be warming. ! Could we be heading into a period of climate stability as trends cancel???
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Really? The danger as I see it is a moderate amount of self-regulation to reduce emissions. If you think that if the economy taking a slight hit is just so unbearably bad that it's worth any risk to avoid it, then you are a miserable human being.
Parent
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Funny)
I'm still busy with the emacs vs vi debate.
But climate change and your choice of editor are intimately related. It's all the extra processor cycles needed to run emacs that's causing global warming ...
Parent
In New Zealand.... (Score:5, Informative)
Stupid sunspots...( or lack thereof ) (Score:5, Informative)
Those of us who are paranoid about the sun have got some justification for our beliefs. First off, the new solar cycle is somewhat late, depending on who you believe. Secondly, there have been very few sunspots this year. In fact, right now, we have gone 30 days without a single sunspot.
http://www.solarcycle24.com/ [solarcycle24.com]
Fire up those SUVs and coal plants, little ice age, here we come.
Re:Stupid sunspots...( or lack thereof ) (Score:5, Funny)
OK, who knocked Sol up?
Parent
SIgh (Score:5, Insightful)
No, the heat output from the sun is not changing to reflect the temperature changes.
Global warming doesn't stop or create the normal cycles. It makes them more active.
The particulate matters in the air reflects light.
Not enough to completly offset the global warming.
Look up global dimming.
The melting of the ice sheets is having a cooling effect on Europe.
OMG coldest of the LAST 8 YEARS?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hype the headline a little more, will ya?
Let's have some context, please (Score:5, Informative)
Even so, 2008 is set to be about the 10th warmest year since 1850, and Met Office scientists say temperatures will rise again as La Nina conditions ease.
I hate to point out the obvious, but global warming models do not predict a year over year increase in temperature. Again, from the article:
"The principal thing is to look at the long-term trend," said Dr Kennedy. "2008 will still be significantly above the long-term average. There's been a strong upward trend in the last few decades, and that's the thing to focus on."
The law of small numbers (Score:5, Insightful)
It would be a lot more interesting if 2008 was the coldest year in the last 100 years instead of the coldest year "this century."
2001, or 2000 for those who short-change the first century, set a record as both the coldest and hottest year of the century. The following year broke one of those records.
Global warming or cooling? (Score:5, Funny)
This picture [beewulf.com] says it all - is it global warming or global cooling?
Storing heat? (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh give me a break. The ice caps are melting, or haven't you heard?
That's why we use ice in our cooler chests: when they melt they absorb a lot of heat, and the ice cold runoff keeps the things around them cooler than they would otherwise be. But just because the ice is melting but your beer is cold you can't conclude that the sun has cooled off.
What you should conclude is that you'd better drink your beer before the ice melts, 'cause it's going to warm up real fast as soon as the ice is gone.
--MarkusQ