Somebody please try to sell me on Global "Warming"

Great Debates
21

Precisely the type of people who I mean - persuing an unscientific approach outside the world of peer-review…

…which is a systematic process within the scientific community, where articles and theories are scrutinised before publication, to maintain a consistent and reliable standard.

Once again, the word ‘theory’ is misused. There is no such thing as a ‘proven scientific theory’. They can be confirmed by observation, or they can be disproved. If they are consistently disproven, then we have to modify the theory. That’s how science works.

22

sinical brit, do you accept that CO[sub]2[/sub] levels are way off the equilibrium they existed at until the start of the industrial revolution?

23

  1. I’d love to see a cite on that.

  2. Americans were polluting the environment in 1754? How? :eek:

  3. We led by example by telling the signers of Kyoto that we (the US) couldn’t be responsible for all the world’s ills.

24

That’s carbon dioxide, man. The lifeblood of vegetation, and therefor the saving grace of the rain forest. Are you against saving the forests? Plant a tree! Almost every American company that forests plants at least 2 for every tree “killed”. It’s simply a formula for continued harvesting. For every tree forested, 2 are planted to keep the furniture coming!

25

Sentient - um , what “equilibrium” ? This graph ( http://www.niwa.cri.nz/pubs/wa/09-1/ice-graph.htm) shows your equilibrium to be just silly. But how 'bout this ( its in the last para, http://www.john-daly.com/bull-122.htm ):

"1. Holocene carbon-cycle dynamics based on CO2 trapped in ice at Taylor Dome, Antarctica. by A. Indermühle, T.F. Stocker. F. Joos, H. Fischer, H.J. Smith, M. Wahlen, B. Deck, D. Mastrolanni, J. Tachumi. T. Blunier & B. Stauffer. 1999 Nature , 398, 121-126.

  1. Restless carbon Pools. By Phillippe Ciais 1999. Nature , 398 111-112.

These two papers have had much publicity from Fred Singer and others, but, essentially they merely reiterate and amplify what has already been published by Etheridge et al., 1996 J. Geophys Res 103 15,979-15,993, and already reported in Greenhouse Bulletin No 120 in February 1999. These conclusions are:

That the concentration of carbon dioxide in the pre-industrial atmosphere was never in equilibrium, but fluctuated significantly. · That changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide in this period were probably caused by changes in the various carbon pools, brought on by changes in global temperature. It is unlikely that the temperature changes were a result of the changes in carbon dioxide concentration. · That current carbon cycle models do not explain several features of the past record, notably a very slow growth, or even decline, in carbon dioxide concentration between 1935 and 1945."

So yes i agree that co2 levels are changing. You seem to put an emphasis and a covert causal link to the point. I dont.

Mr Gorilla - i maybe misunderstanding something, but how do your peers scrutinise your work before it is published? Does one send it to ones mates first? Did the chappie who wrote the above paper not have it peer reviewed? How can one tell?

sin

26

I really hope you’re joking. Otherwise there’s a lot of ignorance to be faught.

Generally, it will be submitted to an established journal, who will pass it to various selected scientists with appropriate knowledge to judge it worthy of publication. They don’t judge it on whether they agree with it or not, but on whether it’s been rigorous enough in its approach. Only then will the paper be published.

27

Oh, and yes, there are unexplained aspects of the natural CO2 processes. But these are quite separate from the unnatural increase in CO2 being caused by modern industrial processes.

28

Very well, I will restate my question: Do you accept that anthropgenic forcing far outweighs natural forcing since 1750?

I accept that levels fluctuate. The question is whether the currently fluctuations would simply not happen in nature, ever, since there is no natural mechanism whereby such forcing would remain unchecked, and whether this is cause for concern.

After all, if one is dealing with an unknown and vastly complex chemical reaction which might become unstable, would it really be prudent to force one ingredient further and further off equilibrium just to see what happened?

29

If not faught, it’s for nought, right? I’m *almost * willing to consider your argument that CO2 is bad, though it’s been around since the first non-sea animal climbed up the shore and breathed air. Still waiting for the 250 year span of Industrial Revolution. In my little little world, it occured around the turn of the 20th century. Give or take 20 years. Not 130 years.

So what constituted an industrial revolution in the mid-1700’s? Or were you mistaken in your timeline? (Go ahead, even I’ve conceded being wrong in threads)

30

A good starting point for the industrial revolution is James Watt’s steam engine, invented in 1763 - very quickly, steam- (and hence fossil fuel-) powered manufacture spread across Britain. By 1800 a majority of the population no longer worked in agriculture, a sure sign of an industrialised economy.

And yes, naturally-occuring CO2 is part of our world. The problem is fossil fuels - what we’re doing is taking carbon which has built up in these underground deposits over millions of years, and releasing it all into the athmosphere as CO2 in one go. The greenhouse effect is also naturally-occuring, and its stability was the reason life could develop on earth. But adding to it, by an increase in CO2, is what is damaging this balance.

31

A little shy on history as well as science, duffer? The history I can help with: “The term INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION originally referred to the developments that transformed Great Britain, between 1750 and 1830, from a largely rural population making a living almost entirely from agriculture to a town-centered society engaged increasingly in factory manufacture.” And if you’ll take a look at GorillaMan’s location, you’ll note which “we” he was talking about.

32

Indicators during the Industrial Era.

33

Look, I’ll concede that CO2 will kill us all when I see factual evidence that it will. I, for one, refute the notion that man can kill off the planet. We can’t. At worst, we’ll fuck it up enough that man can’t survive. At some point. Many, many, many centuries from now. What the concern, today is “saving the earth”.

To that I say bullshit. The earth will survive until the sun expands to engulf the planet. It’s going to happen no matter what we do. Nobody gives a shit about “saving Earth”. The impetus is “saving man”.

Therein lies another reason Global Warming rubs me wrong. The chorus is to save “Mother Earth”, while the truth is to save mankind.

A huge reason I hate this “movement” is the euphamism of protecting people and the children, when we know damn well future generations will adapt. Or is that whole evolution thing just hokum?

If we fuck it up, nature will simply slough us off and start over. Any atheists would have to get behind this. I mean, there’s nothing to look forward to, right?

34

Yup, got me there. I didn’t notice the location gorrilaman. I was going by the US definition of coal-based power for the Ind Rev.

35

Not necessarily. We do not, for example, know how sensitive the Gulf Stream is to fluctuations. Were that to radically shift or even turn off, Europe and the Eastern US might become more like Siberia within mere years.

As for a possible impending worst case scenario, a temperature rise of a few degrees might release enormous quantities of methane from the ocean floor: Read Permian Mass Extinction

36

Agreed. Why are we changing the subject?

37

…and worse still. Like the monsoons across Asia disappearing. Forever.

38

You’re more than welcome

39

What I see in those diagrams is that emissions start to increase since 1900, not earlier. Since the warming has started long before 1900, it is not safe to assume that warming is caused by increased emissions.

40

No it hasn’t.