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True - 'global cooling = global cooling'

  • #21
wait. people LISTEN to radio talkstatons?
 
  • #22
sure, alan colmes rocks. he has on the CRAZIEST people imaginable. I won't go into details... but they're pretty darn crazy.
(but that's another thread... he he he)
 
  • #23
this should be fun!
lets see if we make AlphaWolf's head explode..
A.W.
please read this:

http://www.junkscience.com/news/robinson.htm

now..im sure you will naturally dismiss the claims in that article as Right-wing propaganda..thats fine, I would naturally expect that of you..
I dont care about that..
what is more interesting to me is why you would automatically dismiss that article as right-wing propaganda, because it disagrees with your theorys,
and yet all your "facts" you believe are truth right?
and have nothing to do with left-wing political proganda at all?
of course..
so..explain to me why one set of scientific data is propaganda but another set of conflicting data is NOT propaganda..
thats what I would like to know..

the whole global warming myth has nothing to do with the environment anyway..its all political.
if you dont believe that you are very naive..
Scot
 
  • #24
oh please. That graph you showed us (twice... in the same page) had no scientific value at all. if you think that graph is not propaganda, then... well i'm sorry for you.
...
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]what is more interesting to me is why you would automatically dismiss that article as right-wing propaganda, because it disagrees with your theorys,
and yet all your "facts" you believe are truth right?
first of all, it's theories, not theorys.
secondly, I don't know in what world you live in but you did not give me that article before and i did not dismiss that article, because i didn't know it existed!
thirdly, the facts I gave you can be measured and tested and they ARE facts.

Let me read it... and i'll reply again..
 
  • #25
Well, Scotty, I'm quite a bit less naive and more cynical than you could ever hope to be but.....

Yep. All these scientists are lying. Every last darn one of them. The "global cooling" phenomenon and "global warming" phenomenon are linked. Makes quite a bit of sense, actually. But you won't read that on conservative websites.

We should just go on fouling the air and the earth like nothing's wrong with doing so, right? Industry and profit margin uber Alles, right?

Global warming and cooling ARE natural cycles..and no one I know denies that. They are NOT natural when exacerbated by the reckless activities of human beings. AprilH
 
  • #26
[b said:
Quote[/b] (TheAlphaWolf @ May 16 2005,3:32)]oh please. That graph you showed us (twice... in the same page) had no scientific value at all. if you think that graph is not propaganda, then... well i'm sorry for you.
I made those graphs..
they have my initials on them.
I thought that would be obvious..
they arent intended to literally accurate..
they are intended to make a point, which you have apparently utterly failed to get..
(or..more likely, are choosing to ignore)

tell me, what is the point of my graph?
what is it trying to say?

Scot
 
  • #27
[b said:
Quote[/b] (aprilh @ May 16 2005,3:35)]Well, Scotty, I'm quite a bit less naive and more cynical than you could ever hope to be but.....

Yep. All these scientists are lying.  Every last darn one of them.  The "global cooling" phenomenon and "global warming" phenomenon are linked.  Makes quite a bit of sense, actually.  But you won't read that on conservative websites.  

We should just go on fouling the air and the earth like nothing's wrong with doing so, right?  Industry and profit margin uber Alles, right?  

Global warming and cooling ARE natural cycles..and no one I know denies that.  They are NOT natural when exacerbated by the reckless activities of human beings.  AprilH
April,
im not a conservative,
and im a rabid environmentalist.

Scot
 
  • #28
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]the whole global warming myth has nothing to do with the environment anyway..its all political.
if you dont believe that you are very naive..
Your side just cares about the oil companies and don't want to reduce pollution and go to other energy sources. My side just cares about the environment and science even though it may be bad for the economy.
that paper sounds contradictory. first it says:
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]For there is not a shred of persuasive evidence that humans have been responsible for increasing global temperatures.
then it comes back and says:
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]It is now about 360 parts per million, vs. 290 at the beginning of the 20th century, Reasonable estimates indicate that it may eventually rise as high as 600 parts per million. This rise probably results from human burning of coal, oil and natural gas, although this is not certain......The observed rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide does correspond with the time of human release and equals about half of the amount released.
ok... so they first say there's not a shred of evidence and then they say there is... ok?
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Scientists have been able to test it carefully, and it does not hold up. During the past 50 years, as atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have risen, scientists have made precise measurements of atmospheric temperature. These measurements have definitively shown that major atmospheric greenhouse warming of the atmosphere is not occurring and is unlikely ever to occur.
it's not about the atmospheric temperature, it's about the surface temperature.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]A great deal of research has shown that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide accelerate the growth rates of plants and also permit plants to grow in drier regions. Animal life, which depends upon plants, also increases.
right... there we go into ignoring facts. it's always bad to mess with nature, and:
http://news-service.stanford.edu/news....24.html
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]they arent intended to literally accurate..
they are intended to make a point, which you have apparently utterly failed to get..
(or..more likely, are choosing to ignore)
exactly what I said. propaganda (just meant to make a point by not being accurate).

oh... I notice it says "The Wall Street Journal (December 4, 1997)"
lol.... let' see... what to believe... the newest information or things that are 7+ years old?
 
  • #29
aw man..that was dissapointing..but expected.
ignoring questions is par for the course..ah well..

I have been collecting SURFACE temperature data..out in my driveway.
since February of this year, the weekly average temperature of the surface of my driveway has been increasing dramatically!
Data for February, March and April shows an undeniable upward warming trend..
yes, I have data that goes back thousands of years..and yes, the surface temps have gone up and down a lot in that time..thats not the point..
the point is that for THREE whole months the trend has been steadily upward!
thats PROOF that human activity is causing global warming!
really! it is!
3 months of increase!

when it comes to millions of years of fluctuating global cimates..
3 months of an upward trend is JUST as statistically meaningless as 300 years of an upward trend..
using 300 years of a warming climate as "proof" of global warming is just as pointless as using 3 months of my driveway data as "proof" of global warming..
both trends are equally meaningless..
thats the point..

Scot

p.s.
when it comes to oil companies, im on your side.
I hate them..
I think we should all go 100% solar/wind/water power..
I wish the whole world would run out of oil right now.
yes, im serious.

actually, my supreme wish is for humans to go totally extinct..
it would be the greatest thing that could happen to life on Earth..
 
  • #30
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]aw man..that was dissapointing..but expected.
ignoring questions is par for the course..ah well..
I can say the same about you.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]3 months of an upward trend is JUST as statistically meaningless as 300 years of an upward trend..
using 300 years of a warming climate as "proof" of global warming is just as pointless of using 3 months of my driveway data as "proof" of global warming
again, oh please. apparently you didn't see the graph the first time. I guess you do things to others that would make you understand it better so here it goes:
C&EnglobT.gif


*cough ignore cough facts cough*

[b said:
Quote[/b] ].s.
when it comes to oil companies, im on your side.
I hate them..
I think we should all go 100% solar/wind/water power..
I wish the whole world would run out of oil right now.
yes, im serious.

actually, my supreme wish is for humans to go totally extinct..
it would be the greatest thing that could happen to life on Earth..
great, me too.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]I have been collecting SURFACE temperature data
it's the surface that matters. we're on the surface.
(ugh... I edit too much)
 
  • #31
Alpha...you're confusing the argument with facts....some aspects of our society don't like facts. They like what they hear on Fox, instead. aprilh
 
  • #32
what I meant by that is that it's ridiculous to compare three months in one place by one person or even three hundred years to a thousand years measured by hundreds of people in many places.
And I used to think fox was horrible... now I just don't like it all that much. Is it just me or are they obssesed with michael jackson? I mean... every single time i flip the channel there they're talking about the michael jackson trial!
 
  • #33
They're obsessed with things that don't matter, and with everything else, they lie. Fair and balanced my patootie.
 
  • #34
C&EnglobT.gif


your chart is meaningless..
"such as tree rings and sediments"
translated "a ton of guesswork, and vague data that is easy to reconstruct to give the readout we want, and lots of other tree ring and sediment data that doesent give us the answer we want can be easily ignored and not reported"

"mean temperature, 1902 - 1980"
meaningless..thats only 78 years, a blip, has no value whatsoever.

"linear trend" (1000-1850)
based on what?
they dont say..

your chart shows me nothing..other than some people have tweaked the numbers to show what they think the truth is..
I have "proof" that shows the opposite..big deal..

and so what if 1998 was the warmest year in 1,000 years?
that is also utterly meaningless..
it was also the warmest year since 1996,
so what?
we are talking about MILLIONS of years..
now, if you can show me that 1998 ws the warmest year in the entire history of the planet, then you may have something!
1,000 years is also a meaningless blip..
same as 300 years,
same as 3 months..

the last ice age "ended" 12,000 years ago..
well..not really "ended"..that was just when the big glaciers mostly disappered
we are still at the end of it now..
we are still coming out a cool spell in the "big picture"..
we could very well be warming..that would be natural when coming out of an ice age..
again..so what?
there is zero evidence that humans have anything to do with it..

Scot
 
  • #35
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Averaging temperatures

In a well-behaved system an estimate of a global average can be obtained by sampling. As we see in the discussion of averages, the variance of the estimate will be inversely proportional to the size of the sample, and the standard deviation proportional to the square root of this.

The global thermal system, however, is not well behaved. It is non-linear. It is highly non-stationary, as is shown by the occurrence of ice ages. In more recent history, we have had the Mediaeval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age, which are well attested by art, history, literature, archaeology, dendrology, entomology etc. Another complication is the activities of mankind. While they are insufficient to disturb the Greenhouse Effect, which provides the warmth for life to exist on Earth, man-made Urban Heat Islands interfere with the sampling process. It is an unfortunate fact, for example, that the longest continuous temperature record, Central England, is situated in one of the most populous and industrialised places on Earth.

The global average temperature exists as a theoretical concept. If we were able to place a large number of sensors around the world at regular spacings, we would be able to establish a meaningful estimate of the instantaneous average, which could then in turn be averaged over a year to produce a number that is a reasonable representation of the thermal state of the surface of the planet. Unfortunately, such a ground station network does not exist. Not only are the existing sensors poorly distributed, many are placed in thermally atypical sites such as cities and airports, others are in primitive rural areas where they are poorly maintained. Ironically though, it is over the oceans that the most discrepant surface measurements occur. Thus surface weather stations provide a very poor basis for determining average global temperature.

Fortunately there is an alternative, which is satellite surveillance. Microwave radiation from oxygen in the atmosphere is temperature dependent and therefore provides a convenient remote thermometer. Because the satellite orbit is continuously scanning the Earth’s surface like a television raster, it is equivalent to a very large number of well-distributed thermometers. As a result it produces a credible estimate of a global average temperature. The results cross calibrate well with data collected by balloons.

Less fortunately, the satellite record is relatively short, as the technology has not been around for very long. It shows a slight cooling trend, but all finite data sets show trends that are not necessarily properties of the parent distribution. All the satellite data tell us at the moment is that there are no dramatic changes of temperature occurring.

John Brignell

April 2004

stratotemp1nu.gif


tropotemp5vx.gif
 
  • #36
Gawd_oOo, can I ask originally where you got your graphs from? They're hosted by image shack. Very suspicious if you ask me.
about heat islands... who the hell do you think scientists are? kids?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_heat_island
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Because some parts of some cities may be several degrees hotter than their surroundings, a difference double or triple the warming observed over the historical temperature record, there is a risk that the effects of urban sprawl might be misinterpreted as an increase in global temperature. However, the fact that the UHI is so large is, paradoxically, evidence that it largely absent from the record, otherwise warming would be shown as much larger in the record. The 'heat island' warming does unquestionably affect cities and the people who live in them, but it is not at all clear that it biases the historical temperature record: for example, urban and rural trends are very similar.

The IPCC says:

However, over the Northern Hemisphere land areas where urban heat islands are most apparent, both the trends of lower-tropospheric temperature and surface air temperature show no significant differences. In fact, the lower-tropospheric temperatures warm at a slightly greater rate over North America (about 0.28°C/decade using satellite data) than do the surface temperatures (0.27°C/decade), although again the difference is not statistically significant. [8] (http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/052.htm#2221)
Note that not all cities show a warming relative to their rural surroundings. For example, Hansen et al. (JGR, 2001) adjusted trends in urban stations around the world to match rural stations in their regions, in an effort to homogenise the temperature record. Of these adjustments, 42% warmed the urban trends: which is to say that in 42% of cases, the cities were getting cooler relative to their surroundings rather than warmer. One reason is that urban areas are heterogeneous, and weather stations are often sited in "cool islands" - parks, for example - within urban areas.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which has issued several influential reports on climate trends, says that the effects of urban heat islands on the recorded temperature "do not exceed about 0.05°C over the period 1900 to 1990."
....A study by David Parker published in Nature in November 2004 attempts to test the urban heat island theory, by comparing tempature readings taken on calm nights with those taken on windy nights. If the urban heat island theory is correct then instruments should have recorded a bigger temperature rise for calm nights than for windy ones, because wind blows excess heat away from cities and away from the measuring instruments. There was no difference between the calm and windy nights, and the author says: we show that, globally, temperatures over land have risen as much on windy nights as on calm nights, indicating that the observed overall warming is not a consequence of urban development
...Another view, often held by skeptics of global warming, is that the heat island effect accounts for much or nearly all warming recorded by land-based thermometers. However, these views are only aired in the "popular literature" and there are no known scientific peer-reviewed papers holding this view
can you give us your source? is it a scientific pee-reviewed paper?
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]The results cross calibrate well with data collected by balloons.
exactly. it's weather baloons, boueys, satellites, ground stations, etc measuring today's temperature and tree rings, sediments, glaciers, the poles, etc. measuring past temperatures/greenhouse gases.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]It shows a slight cooling trend, but all finite data sets show trends that are not necessarily properties of the parent distribution. All the satellite data tell us at the moment is that there are no dramatic changes of temperature occurring.
not according to:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7665636/
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Researchers led by NASA’s James Hansen used the improved data to calculate the oceans’ heat content and the global “energy imbalance.” They found that for every square meter of surface area, the planet is absorbing almost one watt more of the sun’s energy than it is radiating back to space as heat — a historically large imbalance. Such absorbed energy will steadily warm the atmosphere.
 
  • #37
since heat islands aren't a problem in the records, my graph is still valid...
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]"such as tree rings and sediments"
translated "a ton of guesswork, and vague data that is easy to reconstruct to give the readout we want, and lots of other tree ring and sediment data that doesent give us the answer we want can be easily ignored and not reported"
translated wrong. It's sediment, tree rings, thickness and gases trapped in layers of ice in the poles and glaciers, etc. measured by scientists all over the world, form all nationalities, all agreeing.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]"linear trend" (1000-1850)
based on what?
they dont say..
... uhhh... based on the temperatures through which it goes through?
confused.gif
I thought it was obvious. It shows a global cooling until about the 1800's  
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]and so what if 1998 was the warmest year in 1,000 years?
that is also utterly meaningless..
it was also the warmest year since 1996,
so what?
that it is NOT just a 5-10 year span or whatever it is you said. You wanted a long period of time and then YOU narrow it down and say it was also the warmest since 1996. If it was a billion years, would you say so what it was the warmest since 1996 too?
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]we are talking about MILLIONS of years..
now, if you can show me that 1998 ws the warmest year in the entire history of the planet, then you may have something!
we're not talking about the earth becoming a sun for pete's sake! millions of years ago there were giant cockroaches and dinosaurs. that was a very different place today. WHO CARES how warm it was millions of years ago? that is totally irrelevant. The point is that the earth is warming up and that it's our fault, not that we are becoming a sun!!!
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]1,000 years is also a meaningless blip..
same as 300 years,
same as 3 months..
a billion years is also a meaningless blip...
same as 300 years,
same as 3 months..
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]we could very well be warming..that would be natural when coming out of an ice age..
again..so what?
there is zero evidence that humans have anything to do with it..
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7665636/
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]your chart shows me nothing..other than some people have tweaked the numbers to show what they think the truth is..
I have "proof" that shows the opposite..big deal..
 
  • #38
God save us from "rabid" environmentalists like Scotty.
 
  • #39
God save us from the gullible who believe whatever they are told..
sad..
well, its how the democrat party keeps it base..fear and ignorance.
nothing new there.
 
  • #40
Howdy folks.  I guess i'm a bit late to this party- seems everyone is already drunk on their own biases and brawling with broken gas bottles or something.

However, i do have a few things to add that i don't think i saw in the thread.  If they were already said, well i guess i'll repeat.

I sat in on a class on sustainable energy here at MIT this last semester, a school populated with a lot of pragmatists (engineers).  I was frankly amazed at the degree to which all the professors that lectured had accepted the reality of global warming to some degree (no pun intended).  I don't pretend to know enough about all the factors to make an educated judgement, and i really doubt any of you do here, but i do tend to trust their collective assessment.  They weren't in agreement over a lot of things, but that was one thing they (and in fact almost all scientists in the field) agree on.  There was some very noisy controversy in the past, that many, including myself, pickup up on, but most of that was from studies funded by petroleum companies and discredited due to poor methodology.

There are a few really irrefutable facts that are relevant here:
* The atmospheric CO2 concentration is much higher than it ever has been in the fossil record.  Conservative projections put it at twice the previous highs by 2050.  The rate of release is accelerating.
* CO2 in the atmosphere traps heat that would otherwise have escaped to space (the "greenhouse effect")
* Aerosols have the opposite effect.  Increasing atmospheric sulphates (anyone remember acid rain?) could counteract the greenhouse effect.
* The measured temperature trend has been up over the "last little while".  The validity of this data has been called into question, apparently (see the quoted bit on satellite radiation measurements above), but it has been pretty consistently increasing.
* Models that try to take into account all the relevant factors in global climate have predicted global warming.  These are crude models, at best, due to the size scale- making the cells in the model small enough to capture local effects is still intractable computationally.
* China and India (to a lesser degree), which currently play a minority role in energy consumption (and hence CO2 production- i would remind you that there is very little CO2-free dispatchable energy production going on these days, hydroelectic notwithstanding) are ramping up for some serious CO2 production.  China has stated a goal to increase tenfold the number of vehicles on the road in the immediate future, and is currently constructing a LOT of new coal plants... without using the latest in efficient and non-polluting designs.  Coal plants typically last 50 years, so these are 50 years of guaranteed increased emissions.
*Glaciers and ice caps are melting at a very fast rate, raising sea levels.

So i'm forgetting some important things, but this is hardly a scientific treatise.  The point is that there are some real issues here, yet every time i've seen someone bring up the topic of global warming online, the cavalier and even violently opposed reactions from general society shock me.

The point that even my Harvard physics graduate student roommates, who should know better, miss ("Well, it's too cold here for me, global warming doesn't sound so bad."-they were serious, not joking-), is that the disruptions to local weather patterns, especially precipitation, are going to be more drastic than overall averages suggest.  As mentioned, weather does not follow linear behavior.  A small perturbation can cause huge changes in the outcome.  And fresh water, as you may have noticed, is becoming a bigger and bigger deal as our population increases.

Another issue is that most of the population centers of the world are soon going to be under sea level at the current rate of melting.

Going back to the original question of the thread starter, i personally haven't heard anyone present that theory as a likely scenario, but most of the debate these days is on present and near future global warming, the degree thereof, the control thereof, etc., with little discussion about what happens after we get to "that point".

In any case, it's unfortunate that stupid movies like The Day After Tomorrow take valid concerns and real possible scenarios and turn them into laughably bad movie plots.  It tends to numb the ear and close the mind.
 
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