Global Warming

[hrothgar]

Another GW story.

As DrTodd points, scientists rarely walk in lock step. Its certainly possible to dredge up a bunch of different studies spouting a variety of opinions. For example, DrTodd posted one article from the BBC claiming that current temperature spikes are due to our being in the midst of a peak in the Sunspot cycle. Now he is posting another that claims that we aren't seeing a temperature spike. In general, its often bests to go and look for broad consensus rather than mining the fringes for countervailing opinions. Case in point: I can find scientists who believe in Intelligent Design and economists who argue that decreasing taxes increases government revenue. However, you really don't want to base your policy decisions based on the opinions of ideologues.

 

From my perspective, the evidence surrounding global warming that I find most convincing is related to ecosystem destruction. As I noted earlier, we're seeing worldwide destruction of coral reefs due to coral "bleaching". Rising temperatures are killing off coral reefs in the Indian Ocean, the Carribean, and numerous other parts of the world. These coral formations evolved over thousands of years. They are clearly quite sensitive to temperature extremes. This alone suggests that we're experiencing unusually warm temperatures. I readily agree: we could be seeing some kind of bizarre cosmic coincidence. Perhaps all this CO2 has nothing to do with the coral die off. Me, I've always had faith in Occam's razor. I tend to go with relatively simple solutions.

 

In a similar fashion, there is a very real chance that Canada is going to lose its pines forests due to warming trends. (There are some rather nasty beetles whose range is shifting quite a bit further to the North. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...6022801772.html )Here once again, the potential collapse of a previously stable ecosystem suggests very significant systemic changes.

[Al_U_Card]

Another GW story.

It is good to have both sides of an issue presented. It remains to decide if we fear one or the other more (warming or cooling) and if there is anything that we can do that will benefit our continued existance.......

[mike777]

"scientists rarely walk in lock step. Its certainly possible to dredge up a bunch of different studies spouting a variety of opinions."

 

 

Sigh...do not scientists do studies that spout facts and leave out opinions anymore?

 

We got 4 pages of posts but no one has told me the definition of global warming that scientists are debating. Great debate over undefined thesis with undefined terms.

[Gerben42]

There have been extreme views on both sides of the medal. The article Todd posts is an example. People go through many lengths to disprove the obvious if it does not suit them.

 

On the other hand all the "end of the world" scenario's are also self-serving.

 

Let's keep it to:

 

* Man is increasing the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere

* Greenhouse gases increase the global temperature

* Climate changes are not well understood but cause global temperature changes as well

* The global temperature has increased by a lot the last 50 years

* A further rise in temperature would be A Bad Thing

 

Conclusion: If we decrease the man-made part of the temperature increase, we are better off. And that's what it's all about.

[DrTodd13]

* Man is increasing the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere

* Greenhouse gases increase the global temperature

* Climate changes are not well understood but cause global temperature changes as well

* The global temperature has increased by a lot the last 50 years

* A further rise in temperature would be A Bad Thing

 

Conclusion: If we decrease the man-made part of the temperature increase, we are better off. And that's what it's all about.

1. There is no doubt burning fossil fuels puts greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

2. There must be some system of checks and balances that within some tolerance prevents either run-away cooling or run-away heating. If the Earth did not have such a system then previous cool or warm periods would have resulted in run-away cooling or heating. Once you go past the point-of-no-return you may get run-away heating like on Venus but the Earth must have some system where temperature can vary within some range without creating a run-away effect.

3. Sure, all the people on the coasts think global warming is bad because a lot of their property will be flooded. Nevertheless, species will adapt to new climates. Things will thrive where it was too cold to thrive before. I see no reason to believe that the average temperate of 100 years ago is the ideal temperature for earth. I think the concept of an ideal temperate is an extremely difficult one and think that people who want to believe that we just happen to live at a time where the temperature is "ideal" are not very good at probabilities.

4. A recent study I saw said that we just passed the point in December where we have extracted half of the oil that we are ever going to extract from the earth. How long will it take us to use the remaining half of the oil at current rates? Probably a lot less time than it took to use the first 1/2 when consumption was lower. So, what do we have left? 30 years? 40 years? We are already making progress with fusion reactors which can generate power to be used for electrolysis and then have everything based on fuel cells. Given my view that the transition to hydrogen-based fuel and energy sources are inevitable and not that far off, I see less of a need to worry about temp. increases over the next 40 years.

[hrothgar]

Nevertheless, species will adapt to new climates.

Things will thrive where it was too cold to thrive before.

Evolution is a wonderful thing...

Some species will definitely adapt.

 

However lots of other ones will simply die off. Simply put, trees aren't migratory...

 

There are a wide number of examples of mass extinctions throughout earth's history in which 70-95% of all species died off. Said extinctions had a variety of different causes (Strangely enough several are believed to have been caused by temperature changes)

 

Personally, i think that bio-diversity is a good thing in and of itself. I'd consider a world where 90% of the existent species died out a much less interesting place. As I've noted in the past during actual bridge related discussion, monocultures suffer from a number of flaws.

 

In much the same way, I am going to miss the snow cap atop Kilimanjaro. I suspect that the farmers who rely on this snow cap to smooth out irragation over the course of the year will miss it even more...

[Impact]

It is all but unarguable that "we should take care of our environment".

 

It is very arguable about the form that should be adopted - or indeed the precise nature of the danger.

 

Self-flagellation and self-denial per se may make some people feel good (have you ever tried using some of that recycled toilet paper?), but the economics and damage coefficients of many suggested programmes make little or no sense.

 

Kyoto falls into that category in that the failure to place limits on the fast-developing nations negates the point, while causing disruption to those economies. I note with that European sanctimony on the point is reached because no sacrifice whatsoever is required as the replacement of obsolete Eastern European (read formerly communist/Iron curtain) plant, produced the requisite level of improvement.

 

However Kyoto did raise consciousness of some of the potential problems - and that is not a bad thing in itself.

 

The problem is that the feelgood nature of protest and the money thrown at "being green" does not equateto real progress (imagine the same amount being spent on famine relief and agricultural improvements!!). The fact is that notwithstanding the stagnant or declining populations of some Western nations the global population is on the rise.

 

Short of exponential application of Chinese law as to population control, that situation is not going to change.

 

Further the very source of European relief (improved technology) is the likely answer both in the long and short terms: exporting improved technology to developing countries so as to avoid a repeat of the worst of the excesses already encountered in the OECD but on a far larger scale given the (rising) populations of India and China is the short term answer. Improving technology and changing it is the longer term answer.

 

Surely it is also time to seriously consider the efficacy of efficient use of nuclear technology with modern (3-layer redundancy) safeguards. The disposal of nuclear waste should be a serious research project on an international basis, but there are fairly safe storage mechanisms now if we can overcome the NIMBY (not in my backyard) attitudes.

 

The strange thing is that the very middleclass people who promote much "green" refuse to make sacrifices tehmselves but expect everybodyelse so to do - with the exception of the idological apologists who always feel that whatever the consequences if only we (read "the West") had tried a bit harder teh terrible consequences of (name your poison: war, suicide bombers, disease, pandemic, global warming....) could be averted ;) :blink:

 

 

I don't know the answers, and unlike some here, I am no scientist, but the vast majority of the "solutions" proposed by the various lobbies are clearly windowdressing and do NOT address the main issues of rising populations and developing countries (often intertwined) with economic and ecological sustainability.

 

regards

[cherdano]

I will stay out of this discussion but note that anybody who wishes to have an informed opinion on the matter cannot ignore the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Control and its reports. The IPCC is a mostly UN-funded organization with the intent to distill existing scientific consensus and present it to the public and "policy makers".

 

Arend

[DrTodd13]

Yet another GW article.

 

I'm not going out and looking for these. They just seem to be appearing on drudgereport and slashdot a lot recently. There was some discussion of cloud cover and this is what the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT has to say.

 

"When I, with some colleagues at NASA, attempted to determine how clouds behave under varying temperatures, we discovered what we called an "Iris Effect," wherein upper-level cirrus clouds contracted with increased temperature, providing a very strong negative climate feedback sufficient to greatly reduce the response to increasing CO2."

 

This is the sort of non-intuitive result that you wouldn't know unless you had done the research. This seems to be part of the atmosphere's checks and balances that prevents either run-away heating or cooling.

[Al_U_Card]

Checks and balances being what they are, on the macro scale (last 500,000 years or so (Petit and Jouzel, Nature, 1999) The graphs of CO2 variation over time when compared with Temperature variation (around those of the present) over time , say that we are on the brink, and how....

[cherdano]

DrTodd, the article you cite doesn't disagree with global warming happening, and that CO2 increase is helping it. He is just claiming we don't know whether it is caused by human activity, and that it should not contribute to increase in storms etc. The first is a well-respected scientific minority position (the latest IPCC report said human activities are a likely cause of global warming), and the second is a straw-man as far as I am concerned (I have never heard the claim he is disputing except as a casual remark, clearly not marked as scientific consensus).

[Al_U_Card]

So who saw Nova and the report on "global dimming". The reverse effect of atmospheric particulate pollution that has reduced the expected CO2 driven warming by almost half. (Sunlight being blocked has more serious effects on photosynthesis but perhaps will produce fewer skin cancers....who knows?)

[mike777]

So who saw Nova and the report on "global dimming". The reverse effect of atmospheric particulate pollution that has reduced the expected CO2 driven warming by almost half. (Sunlight being blocked has more serious effects on photosynthesis but perhaps will produce fewer skin cancers....who knows?)

Watching TV, Nova uses Electricity and creates Greenhouse gases, please stop using Electricity so much.

[joshs]

Really? I always thought that public television is powered by flower power.

[Gerben42]

IMHO, anyone saying that they accept that higher CO2 levels increase the temperature of the Earth but do not think we should decrease the human activity enhanced global warming is just claiming that 1 + 1 is not 2 because he would like it to be something else for political reasons. Get real!

[pbleighton]

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/04/25...reut/index.html

[luke warm]

from the article:

 

"While many of the conference's 500 scientists seem to agree that a warming trend in the tropics is causing more and stronger hurricanes than usual, not all agree that global warming is to blame.

 

Some, like William Gray, a veteran hurricane researcher at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado, attributed the warming to natural cycles.

 

Gray said he believes salinity buildups and movements with ocean currents cause warming and cooling cycles. He predicted the Caribbean water will continue to warm for another five to 10 years, then start cooling."

 

so "many" agree, though not all

[david_c]

I don't have an informed opinion on global warming. In fact I find it kind of scary that so many people think they do.

 

If you want to know about global warming, you will have to go and read the reasearch, and decide whether you agree with the scientists' methodology and (if so) their conclusions.

 

The information we think we're getting is really the result of a massive screening process: first of all by the individual scientist who wants to illustrate his own theory in the best possible way; then by the wider scientific community which decides which scientists are fashionable; then by the media who pick out whatever they think will appeal to their readers; and now by posters on BBF who pick out the media reports which suit whatever reason they have for posting. I'll bet that the end result of this process bears little relation to the reality.

[pbleighton]

"If you want to know about global warming, you will have to go and read the reasearch, and decide whether you agree with the scientists' methodology and (if so) their conclusions.

 

The information we think we're getting is really the result of a massive screening process: first of all by the individual scientist who wants to illustrate his own theory in the best possible way; then by the wider scientific community which decides which scientists are fashionable; then by the media who pick out whatever they think will appeal to their readers; and now by posters on BBF who pick out the media reports which suit whatever reason they have for posting. I'll bet that the end result of this process bears little relation to the reality. "

 

Do you feel this way about nuclear physics, or molecular biology, or...

 

Peter

[david_c]

Do you feel this way about nuclear physics, or molecular biology, or...

Absolutely yes. If there was an important question about nuclear physics which had scientists divided, I would not take sides without having read the research myself. And then if my lack of background in nuclear physics meant that I couldn't resolve the issue, then I would have to give up and accept that I did not know the answer.

[pbleighton]

"Absolutely yes. If there was an important question about nuclear physics which had scientists divided, I would not take sides without having read the research myself."

 

What is the level of your scientific training? It must be very advanced. I had college-level physics and math, and I would never presume to second-guess a strong consensus (which is the case, "divided" is accurate but incomplete) in a highly technical field such as climatology or nuclear physics.

 

One of my best friends is a molecular biologist, and after many conversations with him, I wouldn't do it in that field either.

 

Peter

[mr1303]

David graduated from the University of Cambridge in mathematics, and is now studying a PhD in Manchester (no doubt he can tell you this from himself).

 

I must admit I agree with him. David is not trying to overrule the consensus in the scientific community. He he saying that one should not be unduly influenced by information that we hear in the media (and from other sources) due to a screening process, and that the only correct and accurate way to make a view on a topic is to go back and read the research carried out by the scientists themselves.

 

Case in point:

 

Deaths on British roads where speed was an factor per annum (I made these up, but I think are in the ballpark):

 

4000, 3985, 3952, 4025, 4037, 3936, 3742, 3817, 3546, 3275

 

Speed cameras were introduced in year 3 of these figures (lets say).

 

At the end of the 10 year study, the scientist produces a report. The tabloid press has a headline:

 

Speed Cameras Work!! 25% decrease in road traffic deaths due to speeding since speed cameras introduced.

 

Of course, the real truth is that several years deaths have increased. And there may be many other factors involved such as the driver falling asleep at the wheel, the driver being drunk, or under the influence of drugs etc.

 

Therefore, we don't get the complete picture.

[pbleighton]

"Therefore, we don't get the complete picture. "

 

The picture that I get is that there is a strong consensus among the experts in a scientific field on an issue which has enormous public policy implications. This consensus is not yet universal, but it has gone from being a new weird theory to the consensus view in less than 15 years. My points are:

 

1. Perhaps David is qualified to critique a consensus in climatology - I doubt it, in spite of his impressive mathematical training - climatology is not the same field as mathematics. I don't think many climatologists would be able to effectively peer-review a paper submitted to a mathematical journal. In any case, very few of the rest of us are able to do so. I know I couldn't, and my background in math and science is a lot better than most people, including most of the politicians who are charged with setting and executing environmental policy.

2. This is a public policy issue, not an abstract metaphysical discussion. As a society, we should use the best information available to us, even if it is not perfect, or certain (as is the case - I don't think that the issue is totally settled yet). We should let the scientific consensus guide us.

3. We should also consider the downsides of taking one course of action (assuming global warming is caused to a substantial degree by human behavior, and changing our behavior accordingly), versus the other (doing nothing). If the odds of global warming being caused to a substantial degree by human behavior were only 50%, or 20%, we should still act as if we knew it was absolutely true. The reason is that the downside of inaction is terrible, and the downside of action is that we merely accelerate our weaning away from our dependence on fossil fuels. Since we are burning oil twice as fast as we are discovering it, and looking at the dramatically increasing use of energy in the third world, the actions we should take to combat global warming are mostly things we are going to have to do fairly soon anyway.

 

Peter

[david_c]

The picture that I get is that there is a strong consensus among the experts in a scientific field on an issue which has enormous public policy implications.  This consensus is not yet universal, but it has gone from being a new weird theory to the consensus view in less than 15 years.

But how do you know there is a consensus? I see some reports in the media which say this, but there are others which say the opposite. This is precisely the sort of thing which I would like to investigate for myself if I was asked to come up with an answer. And maybe I would find that it's true, that there is a genuine consensus, in which case I would go along with it. Though I would still not be entirely happy unless I could understand what was supposed to be wrong with the minority opinion.

 

And while I certainly don't claim to know anything about climatology, a lot of the controversy seems to be about the interpretation of statistics, which is something that any scientist would be familiar with.

[han]

Although I agree with all that Peter said in his last post, David has a very good point. Many of the people who have written here about this topic at least give the impression that they think they know what they are talking about.. and they probably don't. Of course, if there is an honest climatology expert hidden here, please accept my apology.

 

But Peter is right that we can't expect to read all the scientific evidence ourselves before it comes to making a decision (whether the decision making is active or by voting or discussing). And we can't just accept what "the scientists" say because they don't agree. What else can we do then rely upon the vast majority of scientists instead?

 

However:

 

I don't think many climatologists would be able to effectively peer-review a paper submitted to a mathematical journal.

 

While this is true, it may not be the same the other way around. While most climatologists would need years and years of training to just get an idea of what some recent mathematics papers are about, I expect that most of us would be able to understand fairly well what some climatologist paper is about, especially when we get help from an expert.

 

I'm not claiming that mathematics is "better", or even "harder" than climatology. Not at all, but it isn't the same either.