Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get.
I never claimed or implied that humanity cannot cause gw. Merely that there exists reasonable doubt that humanity is the primary cause of gw.
That’s right. Hotter summers and colder winters (not necessarily every year, but on average). Storms more frequent, more violent, and less predictable. It’s a fun package.
Showing a warming trend and proving its causation are two different things. It’s worth caring about in any case. Even a non-anthropogenic warming could wreak havoc on global food production, for example.
Climate is the predicted/expected yearly trend of weather for an area. Weather is what you get when you stick your head out a window right now.
Except, that the global average temperature is rising. But that doesn’t mean it can’t get very cold in winter, or in some spots. If people can’t understand that, I doubt they understand it’s currently summer in Australia.
I only recently learned the difference between “climate” and “weather” because I got confused by the considerable crossover where those terms are used.
And this is where I learned it: Armstrong and Miller.
Or, to put it another way: climate = long term. weather = short term.
Global warming is the idea that the average temperature over a significant period of time (measured in years or decades) is increasing. While it has stayed the same for a couple years, it has not gotten cooler.
The weather report you get for today, even if it includes an extended forecast for a week or two, is not really relevant. It would be like saying you can’t be passing a class because you got an F on an assignment.
To put it another way, you can’t argue that because you have an experience in your city or it’s something that’s occurring across the United States that it somehow translates into a worldwide phenomenon.
Which is really true about so many things.
What a very mild, well informed thread in the BBQ Pit. Well we can’t have that now, can we! I want to punch those syphilitic flaccid asshole fuckers who say “Hurrr it’s so cold! Where’s all the global warming?” in the face every time they make that stupid joke. It wasn’t funny in 1998, it’s not funny now.
To muddy the waters further, we’re in a La Nina year right now which is affecting how things play out - there are cycles within the weather patterns beyond current weather and long-term climate.
It’s not strawman. You are trying to compare apples to oranges. Sam was talking about folks on par with Hilarity N. Suze, and trust me, there are PLENTY of pro-AGW/GW folks out there that are just as ignorant. The fact that they are on the side that has the science behind them doesn’t magically make they 100% correct in their mouthings. Hell, watch History Channel or TLC/Discovery sometime when they have something about weather on…I’ve heard many times they tie in some large hurricane or more active weather pattern into GW/AGW…the same way Hilarity N. Suze is tying in a snowy winter to discount the theory.
Now…perhaps what YOU mean is that the ‘expert’ anti-GW types who should know what they are talking about (in theory) are saying incorrect things about a link between the snows this year and a case for disproving AGW/GW. If you have a cite from one of the anti-GW experts linking the snowfall or supposed cold winter to proof that AGW is wrong then it would be interesting if you linked to it. You might have a point then (i.e that the experts on both side aren’t equivalent, and that the anti-GW/AGW ‘experts’ say stupid shit that isn’t on par with what the GW/AGW experts do)…but it would be a different point that the one Sam seemed to be making.
-XT
Define “reasonable”. The problem has been that the “reasonable” definition being used by many right wingers is poisoned from the start.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/books/reviews/2010-06-01-deathmerchants01_ST_N.htm
And xtisme, lets not forget what the OP is referring to, most of the conservatives and current republican leadership are fond of this BS.
- Say it with me Hilarity N. Suze : Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, from 1995 and there are many other references even from the 1930’s.
Yeah, but they aren’t experts and, are in fact idiots. Hell, I doubt they know as much as I do on this subject, and I is ignorant. And lets not forget that a lot of liberals and democrat leadership are just as fond of BS on this subject, and are probably only marginally better informed from the perspective of someone like you…they just happen to be on the side with the real science behind them. But that doesn’t make everything they say correct, and there are many who are just as eager to claim that ever freak weather event is direct proof that GW is happening…just as there are those idiots on the other side who thing that a big snow storm proves that GW is a bunch of BS.
-XT
Think of it as the difference between a rock and geology. Is it cold and wet out? That’s weather. Is it cold and wet out because you live in Seattle? That’s climate.
Unfortunately the best example is Al Gore, and when even a right wing scientist says something like:
One can go “tut, tut, tut” with politicians that are proponents of AGW when getting it wrong; however, they are more often correct than the contrarians that not only do they get it wrong, but that are misleading in the extreme.
Actually, there is visible evidence of climate change that the average person can see - sometimes quite startling proof - if you live in a place like Ontario, and are middle-aged.
It is this - that the boundaries of species which can survive wintering here or have their summer ranges here are creeping north, within one person’s lifetime.
One species can of course be a simple variation - but there are several. For example, I was very surprised to learn that Opossums can now live in Toronto - as a kid, they most certainly did not.
And turkey vultures are now commonly seen in Temsikaming, near where we have a cottage - when I was a kid, they never were.
In both cases, it used to be too cold for them.
This overwinter survival has less happy effects - exotic species aren’t killed off and are becoming an ever-increasing nuisance.
It just seems, to my uneducated eye, as if everything is moving north over the past few decades. Of course it could just be a fluctuation, one lifetime is too short to know.
The question is, “Do they CARE whether it’s true or false?”
Certainly, but right now, in the Northern Hemisphere, it’s the righties who need throat-punched. At the end of January there’s usually a thaw, and we can go after the lefties then.
FACT 1: Humanity is putting large amounts of green house gasses such as CO2 into the atmosphere
FACT 2: Greenhouse gasses act to trap infrared radiation which would otherwise be lost into space.
FACT 3: The average world temperature has been increasing.
In order for FACT 1 not to be the cause of FACT 3, you need to provided 2 things, 1) a non human caused reason for the planet to heat up, and 2) A reason why despite FACT 2, the increase in greenhouse gasses is not warming the planet.
The idea of global warming is not a new one. I remember doing a school project on it back in 1984, this was before the evidence came out that it was actually happening.
If Becky swithces jobs from being an exercise coach, to working at Baskin Robbins, and notices her weight increase, you can bet it’s not due to a thyroid condition.
Yeah, I was just going to bring that hurricane stat up. I specifically remember the prediction that 2010 was going to be a monster year for hurricanes. Oh well, maybe 2011 will be.
I’m not a denier, I believe that pumping millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year probably isn’t a good idea. The incessant bleating about the inevitable doom of this planet does tend to make me tune out though, especially when it comes to predictions further than about 1 week into the future.
It also gets tiresome hearing from the news drones about how every single slightly abnormal weather event points to yet another sign of global warming.
Is there anything that can happen weather wise on this planet that does not point to global warming?
Unfortunately most of the media got it wrong, particularly FOX, most scientific papers reported that it was more likely that less hurricanes would appear, but when they do they would be stronger.
Yes, actually all the weather, the point that you are missing is that AGW is affecting the current balance and making natural disasters worse.