2008 Is the Coldest Year of the 21st Century 1039
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."
gore (Score:5, Funny)
Re:gore (Score:5, Funny)
Burn them for warmth.
Re:Burn Gore's Nobel Prize to keep warm (Score:4, Funny)
Actually, the "carbon credit" is soon to be renamed to an "indulgence".
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:gore (Score:4, Funny)
seeing as how you and corsec67 posted the same response at the same time, I for one welcome our comedic slashdot posting robotic overlords
Ignoring the real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
Queue in 10 million "global warming is a scam", "don't look at me, people didna doit" and "Al Gore is a weenie" comments.
But all of these comments on the legitimacy of global warming/cooling/climate change all ignore one very simple, inescapable fact: Most "carbon-neutral" energy forms can be generated locally. Windmills use the wind in your area. Solar panels use the sunlight from your roof. This is also true for geothermal, ocean-wave, and bio-fueled energy. All can be generated locally, with local resources.
Only oil and nuclear have limited supply.
So if, for example, you were a wealthy, North-American country with a severe foreign-debt problem, you might consider the actual costs of oil in lost lives, civil liberties, currency devaluation, and raw wealth shipped oversees to fund a petroleum addiction. This cost is so huge and multi-faceted it baffles the mind. Average people just cannot even begin to understand wealth drain and cost of this magnitude.
But if we were to generate our energy locally, with renewable resources, not only would we leave a nicer place for our kids, grandkids, and their offspring, we'd also improve our national sovereignty. Rather than fund deadly radicals [iags.org], we'd fund the nice guy down the street. Rather than ship our cash to entities who threaten us at every turn [washingtonpost.com], we'd fund your next-door neighbors. No matter where you live, no matter who you are, no matter how wealthy you happen to be, this is a good idea.
Ignore the matter of global warming, because there's a much more immediate reason to "go green". And it has nothing to do with carbon footprint, it has to do with the green bits of paper in your back pocket. It will be expensive in the short term. It will pay and pay and pay for generations thereafter.
Which would you rather be remembered as: the generation that ignored the problem until it was too late, or the generation that set your state/country/civilization on a long-term course of prosperity?
I choose the latter, thank you.
All but one point (Score:4, Interesting)
I pretty much agree with you, except for one point:
Nuclear doesn't have a limited supply in any realistic sense. This is just part of the massive anti-nuclear FUD brought to us by big oil & friends. In fact, it was one of the first, since nuclear was the first serious alternative to fossil fuels. The only reason nuclear seems limited is because we've let ourselves get boxed in to thinking in terms of one of the most wasteful and dangerous fuel cycles imaginable, which relies on comparatively rare feedstock and produces much more waste than it needs to*.
In a rational world, what we now call "nuclear waste" would be known as "fuel reserves" and we'd be set for the foreseeable future.
--MarkusQ
* But still nothing compared to what fossil fuels produce. There isn't a coal plant on the planet that could get an operating license as a nuclear plant, given the amount of radioactive carbon they dump into the air.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
People invented this thing called the "battery" about 100 years ago, look into it. Along the same lines, even on still days where you live, there's probably a south-facing hill nearby that's always windy about, oh, 80 feet above the ground.
Good thing it wasn't cloudy. Still, those few square feet wouldn't even run the blower for my A/C, never mind the compressor. Guess I'm sticking with the nuke.
Cloudy days still let current solar cells work at about 25% efficiency, and the thousands of square feet of roof your home or apartment building has can generate a surprising amount of energy, provided you're not wasting anything.
Because if it was that easy, it would be done already.
That's what people said right before the airplane was invented, and in fact before solar cells were invented. If it's so easy, the reason it hasn't been done before is because there's something more convenient already in place. People (especially you, apparently) don't want to change if it means expending a little bit of effort on their part.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:5, Insightful)
A battery that will hold a couple of days' worth of charge with minimal loss? Please give an example.
See this map [energy.gov]? See all the white areas? In most of that area, 80 feet up ain't gonna help you too much. Maybe 8,000.
That's 25% of what they normally give, which is ~15% of 1kW per square meter. Aside from the fact that I live in a 700 square foot (not meter!) space, that's not all that much power. Combined with much of the roof sloping away from the sun at any given time and a great deal of tree cover (you're not suggesting I cut down a bunch of old redwoods, are you?), 25% of next to nothing is worth next to nothing.
Don't get me wrong, I actually think we should put more energy (no pun intended) into alternative forms of electricity generation. However, misguided "expending a little bit of effort" rants such as yours tend to make me resent the fact that we're ostensibly on the same team.
Do the math for how many solar cells would be needed to provide enough energy for a single electric car that seats four people to run for 100km. The results are disheartening.
Too many people is the problem. The solution will therefore be extremely messy no matter what we do. And unless you're ready to step up to the plate and declare that you will never have any children, don't be so quick to chastise others for their lack of commitment.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:4, Informative)
In 1908? More like 1800 :-)
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:4, Informative)
People invented this thing called the "battery" about 100 years ago, look into it
The oldest known battery was found on a dig site in Iraq a few years back, and is around 2,300 years old. Technology has improved a little bit since then, fortunately.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Or, we'd shiver in the dark and/or swelter in the heat. Because if it was that easy, it would be done already.
Did you hear me say "easy"? I seem to recall saying something like:
Yep. My words for "won't be easy", but nonetheless important.
Still, those few square feet wouldn't even run the blower for my A/C, never mind the compressor.
If your house was designed properly, it wouldn't even need a huge-assed A/C. At the very least, it wouldn't need to be anything as big as it is now. When I recently doubled the size of my house, I demanded the best insulating EVERYTHING. 6" thick walls instead of 4", stuffed to the gills with insulation. Attic crammed high with almost 3' of insulation. Highest-efficiency central air available. The end result is that despite DOUBLING the size of my house, and despite RISING energy costs, my average utility bill went DOWN. Before the rise of energy costs, I calculated my ROI at about 5 years. But they've gone up, so I'll break even on this extra expense in more like 3 years!
Since doing this, I've done some research to find that, while I was on the right track, I didn't travel down it nearly far enough. I could have all-but eliminated my A/C altogether by using the ground UNDERNEATH MY HOUSE as a heat-sink.
Damn. (Where was that nuke, again?)
Ain't seen any geysers around here. And there's a whole state between me and the ocean. Bio-fuels... well, most of the stuff people grow around here, they grow for food. I don't think the little bit of miracle-fuel-plant-of-the-week I could plant on my front lawn would power my heat for the season it takes to grow it, either.
Do you live in a different country than that ocean?
Didn't think so. Power generated within the same country could be considered "local" compared to foreign imports. And with a properly designed power grid, including ubiquitous electric vehicles, (and its distributed power storage capability) the occasional non-windy day provides almost no hassle. Think it's far off? Think again [wired.com] - the best minds in the world are at work.
And let's talk about those fields growing food. They are excellent locations to keep windmills in, since they have few obstructions to wind, keeping turbulence to a minimum while causing almost no reduction in the amount of usable farmland.
(sigh) But I guess you're the "half-empty" kind of guy. Go back to your mother's basement, why don't ye? I'll try to stay off your precious lawn.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Setting aside the fact that basically all oceans are outside national borders -- why they're called international waters -- have you heard of Enron and power "deregulation" in California a few years back. Yeah, that was fun.
In addition, are you aware of how large the US is? Do you know of any power lines that stretch over 1,000 miles between a power station and a home? Being a state away is by no means local. The prices may be regulated, but electrical loss and electrical resistance do not give a rat's ass about in-state vs. out-of-state vs. international.
And this is perhaps my biggest gripe: relying on others to solve our problems. Far more problems would be solved if some of those lazy social science majors would get off their collective asses and take some "hard" science and/or engineering courses. At least then it would dawn on people that hydrogen is not an energy source.
Since we're throwing around Wired links, try this one about thorium reactors [wired.com]. Not all "nukes" are trying to replicate Chernobyl contrary to popular belief, and I don't see us running out of thorium anytime soon. If we can't figure out fusion before then, maybe we as a species deserve to die. Who knows?
Bottom line: too many people. Conserve all you want, and I applaud you for doing so; however, unless we can reduce our population substantially, even the most efficient home times a few billion is more than wind and solar -- and maybe even nuclear -- can bear. I don't see a huge number of people in the US putting up quite the same effort in staying childless, but I guess that's just a little too much to ask.
Depleting nuclear reserves predates civilization (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't see us running out of thorium anytime soon
This raises another good point, regarding the 'scarcity' of nuclear fuels alluded to a few level up in this thread. All the radioactive material we could be using to turn water into steam to power electrical generators is already sitting there burning at the same rate underground right now, it's just heating the surrounding rocks in a more diffuse spread than if it was all stuck into a reactor together.
We will run out of nuclear fuels at the same point in time whether we're using them or not, cause by their very natures, radioactive materials are always sitting there radiating. It's just a question of whether we take advantage of that energy while it's there, or just let it warm a lot of rocks a little bit until it all burns out.
Re:Depleting nuclear reserves predates civilizatio (Score:5, Informative)
already sitting there burning at the same rate underground right now
You clearly don't understand nuclear physics.
Thorium natural isotope has a half-life 13 billion years (yes, 13 billion).
Uranium's natural isotope has a half-life of 4.4 billion years.
Neither are "burning up underground".
Most fuel is created by modifying it to create less stable isotopes. Then, when you put a big pile of it together (and/or bombard it with particles, as in the previous article), it creates a chain-reaction that triggers rapid fission. This is VERY different than half-life decay.
You do, indeed, "burn" it up. I'm not arguing against nuclear power, but just pointing out that your post is pretty much 100% entirely made up gibberish .
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:5, Informative)
Setting aside the fact that basically all oceans are outside national borders -- why they're called international waters
Yes, setting that aside.... uhm... because "international waters" begin 200 nautical miles offshore.....
have you heard of Enron and power "deregulation" in California a few years back.
Yeah, you can sell power to other states at market rates... neato.
In addition, are you aware of how large the US is? Do you know of any power lines that stretch over 1,000 miles between a power station and a home? The prices may be regulated, but electrical loss and electrical resistance do not give a rat's ass about in-state vs. out-of-state vs. international.
It is impossible to be more than about 1500 miles from a coast anywhere in the United States.
HVDC transmission lines remain economical, in terms of electrical losses, to a distance of about 4,000-6,000 miles. The longest currently operating singe transmission lines in the world are around 1,200 miles. Losses are not zero, but for the most part are relatively negligible.
I find this particularly ironic, seeing how you just blatantly misused any number of diciplines from electrical engineering to physics to geography AND probably economics and politics. America!! Fuck Yeah!!
Not all "nukes" are trying to replicate Chernobyl contrary to popular belief, and I don't see us running out of thorium anytime soon.
While thorium has slightly less transuranic byproducts, it still produces a number of radioactive wastes. I'll also point out this quote from the article you cited:
"This is a market economy so the economics will have to be in favor for thorium to move that way," said Kazimi. "It could take another 50 years for us to reach the level where uranium prices are so high that thorium looks attractive."
Bottom line: too many people. Conserve all you want, and I applaud you for doing so; however, unless we can reduce our population substantially, even the most efficient home times a few billion is more than wind and solar -- and maybe even nuclear -- can bear.
While I agree about overpopulation, electricity is NOT the reason for this problem, food is. The amount of solar energy reaching the surface of the planet is so vast that in one year it is about twice as much as will EVER be obtained from the all of earth's non-renewable resources of coal, oil, natural gas and fissionable elements combined.
Simply put, roofing houses with high efficiency solar cells would solve most of our issues. Areas of low sunlight coverage (which are ironically, mostly coastal) can rely on a lot of other things, such as hydro, geothermal or tidal resources.
Non-renewable fuels (Thorium included) are awfully nice short-term solutions, but are... by definition, non-renewable. They also have byproducts (even if they are slightly less noxious than what we currently use).
I don't see a huge number of people in the US putting up quite the same effort in staying childless, but I guess that's just a little too much to ask.
You DO REALIZE that in the United States, Canada, Europe, and much of Asia, the birth rate is below the replacement rate [wikipedia.org] ? You knew that, right??? Or is that one of those "lazy social science" things?
Being smug and condescending is fun.
But you really sound like an idiot when almost every smug and condescending statement you make is factually incorrect.
Re:Ignoring the real problem (Score:4, Interesting)
If your house was designed properly, it wouldn't even need a huge-assed A/C.
Architects have known about these techniques for decades, and there is one problem: in the UK, for example, the housing stock is replaced at about 1% per year. So we will be stuck with housing that can't use this tech for many decades to come. I wish it wasn't so, and that's the state of things. All the homes I have lived in in the UK would have to have been demolished and rebuilt from the ground up, including the local neighborhood, to really become an autonomous, off the grid, facility. The avoidance of doing the numbers has created a generation of eco-conscious people just switching off chargers, but they don't hesitate to take a job where they will have to travel more, or go forth and have more kids. Environmentalism needs to be more than feeling, it has to be a bottom line, and that means looking at the cold hard numbers. People who promote solutions that will take 50 or 100 or 150 years to implement are not going to win any credibility.
Re:Coldest year my ass.... (Score:5, Funny)
Quit paying the ACs, that only makes them post more.
Re:Coldest year my ass.... (Score:4, Funny)
So you're saying that 'AC' button in my car doesn't activate an anonymity cloak for when I want to drive quickly through speed check areas or flip off cop cars? Uh oh.
Re:Coldest year my ass.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I gotta say, I was completely shocked, when about 10 years ago or so, I visited a friend that lived in the far NE of the US. I was amazed to find out, there were houses...LOTS of them that didn't actually have air conditioning?!?!
Growing up in the south, I'd always known everyone to have AC. The oddball ones were the ones that didn't have central heat and air...although after I moved to the NOLA area, in so many old houses, there are a lot of places with window units, but, I'd just never thought there were places in the US that didn't have AC at all. Then again...I'd never been exposed to people that actually used heating oil before as a means of heat. I'd always grown up with gas heating, or possibly electric...
Definitely some strange things and ways of life up there in 'yankee land'.
Re:Coldest year my ass.... (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, who would have thought that it was possible to make it through childhood to being an adult and still have all their teeth!
Just kidding.... :-)
Re:gore (Score:5, Funny)
Re:gore (Score:4, Funny)
Re:gore (Score:4, Insightful)
Wow...modded insightful.
I think a good rule of thumb is to just use less energy than algore. If he truly believes the planet is in perial, he must be a good barometer to measure one's self against.
Re:gore (Score:4, Insightful)
But what will I do with all my "Gore 2012" buttons?
Ha.
Still, remember that the Gore stance is roughly (yeah, it's exaggerated, but roughly) in line with the science.
The global warming platform from the Republican party is to shoot into the air and yell "yeeehaww!" a bunch.
Maybe so, but gas prices aren't $4.00 a gallon because rednecks shot their guns. What you are paying at the pump is the direct result of environmentalist's policies fed by the FUD spread by AlGore.
And before anyone tells me that increased production won't bring down price, please review your Jr High school textbooks where it explains supply and demand and tell me what it says happens when supply is limited.
(BTW, insinuating that Republicans are rednecks is no different than insinuating that Democrats are communist hippies. Since race is not involved, I can't call it racism, but I can certainly call it bigotry.)
Re:gore (Score:5, Interesting)
But what will I do with all my "Gore 2012" buttons?
Ha.
Still, remember that the Gore stance is roughly (yeah, it's exaggerated, but roughly) in line with the science.
The global warming platform from the Republican party is to shoot into the air and yell "yeeehaww!" a bunch.
Maybe so, but gas prices aren't $4.00 a gallon because rednecks shot their guns. What you are paying at the pump is the direct result of environmentalist's policies fed by the FUD spread by AlGore.
Meh. Not entirely accurate, really. If Al Gore's "recommendations" had really been followed by a large proportion of Americans (ignoring for now his own failure to follow them), demand for energy should have decreased significantly. With everybody switching to more efficient lighting and appliances, driving less and buying more fuel efficient cars, etc., chances are that energy prices probably would not have spiked the way they did.
The NIMBYs and the environmental lobby that slowed US drilling and new power plant construction to a crawl and completely stopped any increased capacity for oil refineries and other infrastructure were the real culprits in keeping energy supplies too far below the demand curve. Not that Gore had any solutions for helping improve energy supplies.
Of course, the big jump in oil prices has more to do with the declining value of the US dollar than anything, but that's another issue altogether.
Re:gore (Score:5, Informative)
A 5 to 10 percent decrease in energy use will be offset by population growth in as little as 3-6 years. That the problem with thinking we can inflate our tires out of this as some people think. In case your wondering how an average of a 3% population increase can offset and savings, it is becuse population growth is exponential and not linear. This means that instead of having 9,030,000 more people next year and every year after, we will have to add the 9 million people and take 3% of that. So instead of having 310,030,000+ 9,030,000 in year two, you have 310,030,00+9,300,900, almost 300,000 more.
Your spot on about the third world countries too. There are generally two reasons for this. The first is that a third world citizen uses on average one sixth the energy as a fist world citizen. That means when they improve to first world status, even with a 10% more efficient world, they will increase their energy consumption 5 fold. The second reason for this is actually the Kyoto accords. Out of 150 some or more signatories, only 37 or 38 are capped and have to reduce emissions. This promoted development into those third world countries so the emissions don't count against you when the product is imported. Europe is doing this with China and India where they are increasingly relying on imports instead of opening or using their existing facilities. As a matter of fact, you can look at the percentage of increase in Chinese imports in say england and the increase is about 5 times as much as the US or any other country not signed onto Kyoto.
Anyways, this off shoring their way into compliance is actually raising the living standards of third world countries faster then their own sets of circumstances would allow. This thereby increases the amounts of energy they use in a greater portion then the population growth. So yes, we are being taken to task on all sides of the demand issue.
I personally don't know why our leaders can't get their thumbs out of their asses and do both, get more fuels as well as make things more efficient and less energy intensive. It's pretty horrid that that congress went on vacation when people wanted to discuss this issue and get something done about it. I understand that the republicans were showboating their commitment by staying in Washington and giving speeches to anyone who entered congress over the needs to do something sooner then later. But the gas prices weren't this high when they were in control and they were the ones wanting to do something about it when the dems decided a vacation was more important at the same time people where spending their mortgage payments on gas to get to work.
I say damn it all, take both sides positions and put them into effect all at once. It is like the big plan Kerry had for winning in Iraq that he refused to tell anyone about after he lost the election. If it is so damn good, then why waste it when your side doesn't win. Use it and for once, be about the country and the people in it instead of you and your parties success. Most races bring up good ideas and suggestions on both sides. It is time to stop using them for political advantage and just do what's good for America.
Re:gore (Score:5, Insightful)
The liberal (not necessarily Dem) stance is more nuanced than the conservative idea of "More demand so just drill for more oil."
Liberals recognize that fossil fuels are quickly running out and "drilling for more" won't be possible sometime in the future, and that using the fuel as we have been IS environmentally harmful. Conservatives don't care if we run out later, that will be someone else's problem. When you are about to run out of an important and critical resource about the worst thing you can do is ramp up production and burn through your last remaining drops.
Even if we drilled in ANWR and off the coast we would STILL be importing a vast majority of our oil. My objections to those ideas are not based on environmentalism but simple reason. If we could become energy independent by drilling in ANWR I would be the first to say to hell with the wild life, but there just isn't that much oil there when you compare it to how much we use every day. If anything, doing that would simply delay the inevitable and slow our development and adoption of cleaner, sustainable fuel sources.
Re:gore (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, the conservative stance is a lot more comprehensive than the liberal one of "don't drill no matter what" since conservatives support BOTH the development of alternatives AND attempting to make sure we have the steadiest supply possible until alternatives are viable.
Re:gore (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:gore (Score:4, Interesting)
You're confusing republicans with conservatives, I blame the republicans as much as you do... in 1996 the republican congress passed legislation to allow drilling in ANWR, which I support. Clinton vetoed it. That's fine, but from Jan 2001 to Jan 2007 the republicans had both executive AND legislative and did nothing, and now they're whining that a democrat led congress isn't doing the job they could have done for years.
It IS a very hypocritical stance, and republicans have squandered 6 years of opportunity for a conservative agenda.
Re:gore (Score:4, Informative)
Re:gore (Score:5, Informative)
Do keep in mind, that ordering a city evacuation late is normal...you don't usually know till that far out where the storm will hit. And you get so many scares along the coast, that you can just flinch everytime a storm is out in the Gulf 48-72 hours away from landfall anywhere.
But that being said...my experience with Katrina was (and let me preface this by saying "I" historically have split town 48+ hours early when any storm got close)...sitting in a bar on Friday afternoon-evening watching Katrina as a small possibly Cat 1 storm tops hugging the west coast of FL. I was awakened Sat. morning about 9am with people asking what I was going to do...I asked "do about what?". Then turned on the news, and saw that overnight, the storm somehow had moved VERY rapidly across the Gulf to threaten us at Cat. 5 strength.
I heard on tv while packing and trying to get ready to leave...the Mayor and most all officials saying to leave town, and leave now. To me, that is more than official enough.
I left town to Slidell, met up with friends and hit the road east about 5am Sunday morning.
That's how much notice we had...
But anyway, please don't think that "Oh, they knew 3-4 days in advance that the hurricane was coming". It wasn't that way, and it is never that way.
Re:gore (Score:5, Funny)
Still touting the insane idea that the media is not a right-wing mouthpiece? How cute.
Yeah, I hate the way the media have manufactured this McCainmania, portraying him as almost the Messiah and so on whilst giving no coverage to Obama.
Re:gore (Score:4, Insightful)
Obviously, you're not watching the same news as I am in the US.
You've got Fox as the only one with a right slant...CNN and the majors...all left leaning. I mean, look at the Obama world tour...seriously, it was newsworthy enough for the anchor of every one of the 3 major networks to travel with him? If McCain goes on world tour, think they'll all 3 travel with him?
I mean c'mon...no matter who you are voting for, it is pretty obvious who most of the networks seem to be favoring in coverage...
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."
The name game - one of my favorites... (Score:3, Funny)
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.
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.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
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.
I've been telling people this for a while.
The you've been misleading them. You may see some variability on a local level, but fluctuating extremes on a mean global level are not something that the IPCC predicts as result of global warming. There will be fluctuations because, aside from the anthropogenic effects causing warming, there are plenty of other factors that make the climate variable; some years are colder than others, and that's still going to be true even with global warming. In this case there are a number of natural factors that have aligned to make 2008 colder than previous years. According to the IPCC global warming is simply dampening how cold this year is, not causing it to be cold through some instability. Compared to the 20th century 2008 will still be rather warm, and that can potentially be attributed to global warming.
Can we lay this tired meme about increased variability due to global warming to rest though. A cold spell is merely not necessarily strong evidence against global warming*, it is not evidence for global warming.
* At this point, given the historical temperature record, a significant (mid 20th century temperatures) sustained (5 or more years) cold spell would be required to count as strong evidence against global warming.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
As it becomes unstable, you will start seeing more records: cold, hot, rain, drought, record single day temperature differentials, etc.
Even if climate is unchanging records will still increase. Citing increasing records as evidence of global warming is an example of a classic fallacy [numberwatch.co.uk].
Re:Oh goody... (Score:4, Interesting)
It's funny the weatherman can't predict whether it will rain in a week yet the GW movement knows the exact temperature 100 years from now.
I was going to expend a lot of space explaining the basics of chaos theory mathematics but then I decided to let someone else do it.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=204 [realclimate.org]
Now you either accept that a chaotic system can be characterized statistically, or you have to admit that you don't believe in computers--because this is the *same math* that described the quantum physics that makes most of the modern world work. If you're going to accept that it works in one realm you have to accept that it works in the other.
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?)
Re:Oh goody... (Score:4, Insightful)
You even quoted that part of his statement.
But hey, maybe you're right maybe it's for convenience of political argument that the earth's climate works that way.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Interesting)
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?)
Which is exactly what is happening anyway. Every big storm or unusual meteorological event these days is automatically assumed to be yet another affect of global climate change. According to some, it's even causing forest fires and earthquakes.
NPR has a whole series where they go to some part of the world each week, and talk about how climate change is affecting the people there in some way or another, and how the people are coping (or are doomed).
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Informative)
Both of you are assuming that the Earth's climate has ever been stable, but even if it is stable, who's to say that it's becoming unstable now? We've seen evidence of relatively severe fluctuations in the climate, the ice age for example, which suggest that it's normal for the climate to change. To us it seems significant but when taken in the proper scope it's likely to be business as usual.
Getting people worked up about things nobody can change is simply an ace-in-the-hole for politicians.
The 1830 Problem (Score:5, Interesting)
It's not going to just get warmer over short time periods.. It always amazes me that folks don't realize that.
What surprises me even more is how few people know that we've been experiencing global warming since 1830 [mcgonigle.us]. AFAIK, we don't currently have a good model that can explain this.
Re:The 1830 Problem (Score:5, Informative)
Yes we do. We've been warming since 1830 as sunspots have increased after the Little Ice Age. For details, see the Svensmark book.
If his solar-driven model is correct, and if Solar Cycle 24 continues its petulant refusal to actually exist, then the entire-20th-C.-warming plunge over the last year and a bit is just a little foretaste and things are about to get very cold indeed.
Science changed from skepticism to consensus? (Score:5, Insightful)
Thank you for this post. I am no scientist, but I am an undergrad in a dual major in Engineering/Science (mathematics), there are certain things that really trouble me about contemporary climate science. For one, there appears to be an over reliance on climate models based on broad sweeping assumptions, and an extreme exaggeration of the capacity of any given model to produce accurate results. Increasingly, the GW science seems to be violating Poppers fundamental philosophy of scientific hypothesis: The only theory worth considering is that which can be disproven. Or rather, science is not about proving as such, it is about disproving. I want to see the falsifiability of climate change theory thoroughly discussed, but it never is, nobody can challenge the models, nobody is allowed to question the methods, nobody is allowed to offer alternative to the mainstream narrative. Its a dangerous place for science to be. More and more I see GW predictions failing the falsifiability test: hot year? Earth is warming, cold year? Earth is unstable due to warming, flood: GW, everything, everything under the sun is being attributed to GW.
The 'consensus' worries me also, moreso in fact. There is rarely consensus in science, especially when dealing with fundamentally complex, non-linear dynamical systems which are proven to be inherently chaotic. Even when a theory is sound and mature, the most important consideration is that you are making predictions by using a model, an inherently and unavoidably flawed model. It is always, always important to cite assumptions and errors when making predictions with any model. But if you question the validity of current climate modelling, you are branded a heretic, a denier, and the worst of all: a skeptic. As if being a skeptic in science is suddenly the wrong thing to do? What happened?
All scientists are skeptics, a scientist without skepticism is no scientist, he is a fool. Worse still believing that computer models are completely trustworthy is like believing your lego starship enterprise will fly you to the moon.
I am not a denier, but I am certainly skeptical. I am certainly open to hypotheses, theories, models and all manner of explanations for given data sets, observations etc. But I am deeply troubled by the way discussion and debate about something as highly chaotic and poorly understood as the climate is shut down so vigorously these days. Worse still, the politicians and economists are on board. I can't help but be just a tad aware that politicians will leap on any populist position and economists are always hungry for new derivatives markets.
Re:Science changed from skepticism to consensus? (Score:5, Insightful)
What I find scary is that GW/Climate Change seems to have actually become a religion replacement for so many people. Look at how they treat anybody that doubts or looks at other interpretations of the data? They are looked down on, called names, and generally treated as heretics.
The reason is simple. Their truth is so important that any doubt could cause endless harm. Sound familiar?
Funny thing is I am religious. I go to church every Sunday. The thing is that I know that my faith is strictly faith. I can not prove it true by scientific means and I don't try. Science on the other hand can not have faith as a corner stone. You must be willing at any point to say, "Nope everything I though was wrong!"
That is what Science is all about.
People need to stop worshiping at the alter of Science. It is just silly.
And the only place that Religion has a place in Science is the one narrow place the have common ground, ethics. And even ethics must be looked at in a broad scope.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Funny)
Global warming is a misnomer anyway - it should be called, "global climate instability."
How about 'Intelligent Heating?'
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
Awe, and here I was going to propose we officially call it "Earth Does Stuff". Too vague?
Noooo!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Doing stuff is overrated. Hitler did stuff! And look where that led! Wouldn't we all have been better off if he had just stayed home and gotten high?
What were we talking about again?
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.
Re:The straw man is dead (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The straw man is dead (Score:5, Insightful)
The religious issue is getting stronger and the facts seem to become less important over time or are just discarded outright. We here CFL are up to 80% more efficient yet I haven't seen one yet that is more than 50% and I have a large box full of them. We hear disposable grocery bags are evil so we should use other bags which take hundreds of times the resources to make but don't last 100 times longer. The carbon trading schemes seem to be another way for governments to print a different type of money and set up trading tariffs while pretending to encourage free trade. We hear about planting trees to sequester CO2 yet the current plan means the land will hold less carbon that it did 100 years ago yet this is somehow a carbon credit. Start looking at many of the scams using a double entry accounting system and you start to see they don't pan out. Of course pointing out wrong numbers in any of this gets one labelled a denier real quick.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:4, Informative)
Nobody says that climate change isn't happening. The temperature data is fact. It can't be denied any more than it can denied that the sky is blue.
Any serious debate is over whether humans are causing the change, whether it's a problem, and whether we should try doing something about it.
The "problem" is that there are periods in history where it was warmer than it is now, without all of the man-made air pollution.
Global Warming Science Moves On (Score:5, Informative)
All that temperature data tells us is that temperatures have risen At Thermometers. GLOBAL WARMING SCIENCE HAS MOVED ON [nzcpr.com].
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.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not that simple, I'm affraid (Score:4, Interesting)
It's not that simple, I'm affraid.
1. At the very least the cost, or "danger", in acting rashly upon a fairy tale to please some cultists is to not do something that would actually work. At worst it's doing something outright unproductive, that compounds the problem in the long run or creates a bigger problem.
As the stereotypical example, take Easter Island. Instead of doing what would have worked (start replanting trees) they did what the priests told them (cut more trees to build and haul more statues to the gods, 'cause the gods would surely take care of all problems.) Eventually the problem got so bad that they couldn't even make enough fishing vessels any more. Maybe stopping and thinking before acting couldn't have been worse.
I find that to be, ironically, a decent metaphor for _both_ extremes of the climate debate. Both have their a priori "truth" set in stone, both don't actually do real science (in real science, no truth is set in stone, and everything is falsifiable), and both would rather act now, goddammit, instead of at least trying to understand the big model. I can almost imagine a bunch of Easter Island tribesmen doing the same, waving fists and shouting slogans to act now to please the gods, and calling anyone names if he even tries debating the already decided orthodoxy.
2. To also answer the question what is the danger: the economy is already in a precarious position in most western countries, having worked on, essentially, over-spending ever since the Great Depression. We don't really have a better model to replace it with.
The old laissez-faire model essentially died in the Great Depression. Not that it was that great a model to start with. It produced increasingly erratic swings between boom and crash, with each boom setting the stage for the following crash. Increasingly more money and resources were going not into satisfying people's needs (which, may I remind, was how the Wealth Of Nations was supposed to be measured), but into rebuilding the industry after the last crash. The actual standard of living for workers decline through the 19'th and early 20'th century, with the general theme being demanding more hours work for less pay.
(And it's funny to see Libertarians pining for _that_ model. But I digress.)
Even if some claim (rather unproven, but ok) that it was the corrective measures that finally caused the big crash, it still just wasn't a that great model anyway. The swings were getting bigger and bigger, and the whole situation shittier and shittier. Even _if_ it would have bombed a bit later without the corrective actions, bomb it would have. And it wasn't much fun to be an employee in that model even before it bombing.
Some also tried other stunts in the meantime, like supply-side economics, but even those failed to work better than the current model.
Or, of course, we could actually be Keynesian as Keynes actually intended it to work: overspend in times of crisis, yes, but cut back and pay the debts in times of boom. No government yet managed to do that, and it could be argued that it would make for a very unpopular government to cut back, say, welfare, _because_ the economy is doing great. Plus other problems.
But, of course, adding yet another permanent burden to it, really doesn't help there.
Basically most first world economies are in a bigger trouble than they seem. We all _seem_ to do great, but we're steadily heading towards the end of the model that makes it work. At some point, the debt gets so big that you can't go on like that any more. And all we've been doing is postpone the next crash. Quite successfully and for a remarkably long time, duly noted, but that's what we've been doing. And each averted crisis added even more debt. Not just in the USA, but everywhere.
Fear what will happen when we all no longer have the reserves to avert the next one, because it won't be pretty. Unless you're at least, say, 90 years old, you have only seen minor crises, held small by having the money to throw at them. To
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
You are correct that there is a debate about anthropogenic climate change. From the most recent reports, there's about a 90% chance the warming we've seen is mostly due to increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels and forests.
But the climate does not appear to be cooling. The climate is getting warmer. Just because 2008 is cooler than the past seven years doesn't mean that global warming has stopped. There will always be variability in climate. You can't expect every year to be strictly warmer than the years before. It would be like expecting the stock market to reach new highs every year. It doesn't work like that -- you need to look at the long-term trend, not just the most recent years.
Now when you confuse weather with climate, you're going way off track. We can't predict the weather in a given region for a given month. Again, it would be like predicting the price of a given stock in a given month. It can't be done. Would you pass up a buddy's stock tips if he's correct 90% of the time when he says a stock will go up, even if he can't tell you what the price will be six months out? Whether it goes up 20% in three months or 30% in eight months, you'd be passing up easy money!
Scientists keep saying that with increased carbon dioxide emissions temperature will increase. In addition, we can expect rising sea levels, more intense tropical storms, and increased droughts. Sounds bad enough to me to think about cutting back on emissions. The chief scientist of a major oil company agrees [youtube.com] (you can fast-forward to 13:00 in the video if you want to see only the part on global warming).
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?
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 ...
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???
Re:Oh goody... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not less than 1%. And if it is that does not bode well for the field.
Actually, there was an article in Science that there was not a single peer-reviewed paper that claimed global warming isn't happening. The author reviewed all the papers in the appropriate journals and while many made no claims about why it was happening, they all agreed it is happening. So it is less than 1%. I'm curious why this doesn't that bode well for the field?
Because if we're warming up, why is 1938 was the hotest year on record? Why is it after WW2 we entered the coldest non-ice age period, ever recorded?
This isn't true. You might be thinking 1934, which was the 2nd or 3rd, depending on how you interpret the data. However, more telling, is that the last 9 years are all in the top 25 warmest years.
I don't think CO2 production is bad. I know it is. But for the right reasons. It causes acidic water. But that's where it ends. It does not warm. It probably does not cool.
I would like an autographed copy of your book - the one where you rewrite physics and chemistry. The visible light from the sun can travel through CO2 quite well, the infrared radiation from the Earth cooling at night can't. As CO2 increases, less energy can radiate off the planet into space, resulting in more energy in the system. More energy = higher temperature. It's the same idea as an x-ray, visible light can't go through your body, but a higher frequency wave can.
Face it, you started off like idiots, you're going to end like idiots. Stupid blunts like the hockey stick projection by a UN official cannot be forgiven.
But march right out if you think we'll keep buying your peddled crap when you change the meaning a bit to keep in line with what's happening.
Actually, forgiveness has no place in science. That's why we have peer review and independent confirmation of results. You can have wrong theories and wrong projections as much as you want. The only "unforgiveable" is false data and isn't forgiven. However, being wrong is OK because that's how science is supposed to work. You create a theory, test it, and try to prove/disprove your theory. Based on your results, you come up with a new theory, or modify your old one, and try again. We have more climate data, so we alter our models to reflect this new information.
Re:Oh goody... (Score:4, Informative)
No, while this did circulate in the news for quite sometime, it turns out to have been an artifact of coding mistakes. Four of the top 10 are now from the 1930s: 1934, 1931, 1938 and 1939, while only 3 of the top 10 are from the last 10 years (1998, 2006, 1999). Several years (2000, 2002, 2003, 2004) are well below the entire 20th century.
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 ...
Yarr! (Score:4, Funny)
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?
Re:Stupid sunspots...( or lack thereof ) (Score:4, Interesting)
No, you can't. The only thing that we can really know for sure, is if, the lack of sunspots continues for say a year, maybe two years, AND, the climate temperatures deviate from what the climate models would otherwise predict. While I'm not 100% sold on the climate models that we have, and am sort of skeptical of them, I'm not jumping into bed with those skeptics who would dismiss AGW as bunk. It would seem to me that those skeptics should have their own climate models that have something we can test. As it is, all we have is this notion that there might be some link between sunspots and climate, but not much of a physical link that we can really go out and measure and correlate to climate, and we won't have that until those climate models we do have fail spectacularly. So, right now, the La Nina is taking the rap for the present global cooling, but, La Nina has been over for a few months now, and the earth's temperatures are either slightly declining or flat, according to the latest satellite temperatures. If we have falling temperatures for at least year we can worry, and if we start falling faster, than we can really worry, but for today, all we can really do is note that if it snows unusually, toss out a link on Slashdot to sunspots and make some snarky comments about how Hansen's FORTRAN really blows.
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?
Re: Global Warming (Score:4, Insightful)
Basically, the logic is that every weather event or phenomenon is somehow either proof of global warming, or happened despite it and in no way can be used to refute it. Haven't you figured that out yet?
Or low sunspots cause another "little ice age" (Score:4, Interesting)
... 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.
TFA missed one: ... or the current sunspot shortage continues, as it did in the "little ice age", causing another one.
Given that, by at least one model, we only have maybe 8 or so centuries until the fossil carbon runs out and we plunge back onto the orbital-mechanics driven end of the current interglacial and dive into a BIG ice age (whose steepening slope we may have been holding off with greenhouse gases since about the dawn of agriculture) we might not see any significant "global warming" at all.
All of this is assuming that we don't establish enough space industrialization to let us tune the insolation and just FIX the issue. (Which seems likely. The current government prescriptions for patching "global warming" would destroy the wealth and technology bases needed to drive a space program.)
And also assuming that polywell, POPS (Periodically Oscillating Plasma Sphere), and other fusion power approaches ALL don't work out. (Cheap aneutronic hydrogen fusion power would drive fossil-carbon based fuels out of the market for most uses and provide the energy needed to drive several technologies that could tune the Earth's temperature.)
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."
Re:Let's have some context, please (Score:4, Informative)
The last ice age was before the start of the Holocene, over 11,000 years ago. Not, as you claim the "late 19th centure[sic]."
And all the other years in the 21st century have been record breakers. At some point, some year has to be the "coldest since year X," and with a sample size of eight there's nothing amazing about it being this one. What's more important is it's still far warmer than most of the preceeding hundred years.
--MarkusQ
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?
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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
Meaningless statistics (Score:4, Insightful)
Did you know that , at the time of 9/11 , 2001 was the coldest year of the 21st century.
It was also the hottest year of the 21st century (at that time).
The term 'century' is often used to refer to a period of 100 years. However we have had less than 8 years of the 21st century so far. Wake me up when you have the results from the whole 100 years (ie in 2101)
Do we affect the climate? Or does it affect us? (Score:4, Insightful)
Regardless of what the truth actually is... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a practical matter, it's going to be difficult to keep up political momentum in the face of cooler trends. The movement could be essentially dead in a couple years. In ten, we could be looking at films like An Inconvenient Truth, The Day After Tomorrow and Waterworld in the same way we now look at Population Explosion, ZPG and Soylent Green from the sixties and seventies.
Hysteria tends to go in cycles. Buried amongst discredited doomsday theories might be the one that actually does kill us. When that happens, I wonder if we'll all be surprised that it's nothing like the articles running in Time, or if scientists will actually see the prediction-of-the-decade come true, whether by brilliant insight or sheer coincidence.
What worries me is that with the best of intentions we do something profoundly stupid and damaging like, I dunno, dumping old tires in the sea in the insane (in hindsight) belief that they would serve as artificial reefs. In the seventies there were plans to coat the ice caps with soot to combat the global cooling that never came about. Now we're talking about dumping iron oxide in the sea as a solution to global warming, something that would be called "polluting our environment" if it didn't have the Climate Change seal of approval. Confidentially, it's unintended consequences from plans like this that scares me more than the fear that the seas will rise and drown us all.
Three Alaskian Volcanos (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Three Alaskian Volcanos (Score:4, Funny)
You are fired. You are not allowed to be part of the climate debate every again.
Please do not come into our discussion with obvious reasons for short term events. We have spent many years working many late nights to come up with theories that aren't likely to be proven during our life time and are based on theoretical data. It took as many years of research to find data based on other theories and concepts that have yet to be proven.
We do not welcome your kind in our group. We are respectable scientists with families and lives. Your ideas could seriously undermine our ability to obtain grant money for research in far away lands, and, as a direct result may also result in starving Ethiopians losing out on the slave wages we pay them to move all of our 'equipment' around for our research. Think of the sled dog teams that will no longer get a whole $10 bill for carrying us 200 miles north of any human with an ounce of self preservation in the northern hemisphere.
Please, before making such statements again, consider how the children will be effected by your statements.
Thank you
Or... (Score:4, Insightful)
...perhaps the fact that 2008 virtually wiped out any direct evidence for global warming should give us pause to reflect that we really don't understand how global climate works and that a multi-trillion dollar plan to combat it might help, hurt, or, most likely, do nothing but eat up so much tax money that if and when we finally do know what to do we will no longer be able to afford it.
And that is a very inconvenient truth.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Short answer, yes.
Long answer, even a warmer climate has stretches of cold years. Sounds like thing are pretty much consistent with the currently accepted climate models, at least for the time being.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
> Sounds like thing are pretty much consistent with the currently accepted climate models,
> at least for the time being.
To borrow a phrase I have grown to hate.... citation needed.
Show me one warmer's scare charts that predicted we would COOL DOWN for a decade. Every chart I have ever seen showed ever increasing temps until we all DIE.
And even when the MSM report stories like this one, about a cooling trend, they have to get the "but we are still gonna f**king DIE!" into the second paragraph.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The short answer: We probably are, but we don't know what is causing it, and it may just be a temporary trend.
Basically there has been a general warming trend that roughly correlates with the Industrial Revolution(IR) in the US and Europe. Year-to-year, it fluxuates, but overal there is an increase. Now the Greenies among us will instantly attribute this to emissions, but remember...correlation is not causation.
The IR brought advances to many aspects of our lives, which include meteorological mesurement a
Re:Global Warming (Score:5, Informative)
CO2 levels were [b]11x higher[/b] 500 million years ago. 3x as high just 100 million years ago. This is all through proxy measurement, but if it's even remotely accurate then atmospheric CO2 levels today are some of the lowest in the last 500 million years. There's a nice article [wikipedia.org] all about it that you might want to read.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
When record breaking cold temperatures are touted as evidence of "global warming", what do you think?
And I thought the flat earthers were persistent in their beliefs!
Re:Mid life crisis (Score:4, Funny)
Uranus is the one that is into that freaky European sex, right?
Re:Get the spelling right! (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
heat being absorbed by the earth is decreasing due to changes in the earth's albedo."
Anyone else read this as libido?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I thought it was the Areola Borealis?...
Re:Get the spelling right! (Score:4, Informative)
Actually it's El Niño.
As in, "the little boy".
This is a reference to the birth of Christ, since El Niño usually occurs around Christmas time.
La Niña actually means "the little girl"