July 2016 Hottest on Record.

[Hellmanns]

Originally Posted by gorbelly

It's not as though trying to halt human contributions to greenhouse gas accumulation means opting for a freezing earth. So I don't really understand your point.

And there is plenty of harm in a warming earth. Once again, global warming does not only mean things get warmer. It also means that weather gets more severe, precipitation patterns change, and entire ecosystems undergo radical change. In many parts of the world, it can mean catastrophic winter cold, which may be counterintuitive to many people... but climate can sometimes not be simple or intuitive, as it's about complex global systems and inputs. Climate is not weather. You can't understand what the climate is doing by walking out of your house and looking around. This complexity is probably why it's so easy or so many to be in denial about climate.

Cooling or warming, changes to the earth's temperature are very problematic. And very small changes in global temperature have big consequences on the ground. But I have no doubt that if human activity were causing global cooling, there would be just as much denial.

You're going to have to explain to me how global warming can cause catastrophic cold. In an IPCC report it is claimed:

Milder winter temperatures will decrease heavy snowstorms but could cause an increase in freezing rain if average daily temperatures fluctuate about the freezing point.

http://www.grida.no/publications/oth...ar/wg2/569.htm

[Hellmanns]

As the Union of Concerned Scientists claimed,
“Winters have generally been warming faster than other seasons in the United States and recent research indicates that climate change” is causing it.
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming...l#.V7i5Ou4pDqC
When actually, winters have been cooling for 20 years!
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Scre...5.52.06_AM.png

[gorbelly]

Originally Posted by Nematode

We disagree, the record as I understand it is:
Cooling or warming, changes to the earth's temperature are entirely normal.

Normal ≠ good.

Tornadoes are "normal". But you won't see me shrugging and saying, "Meh. It's normal" and going about my business if I see one coming at me.

Normal is sometimes good or neutral. Normal is also sometimes bad. Normal is usually very bad if we're talking normal in geologic time but not normal in human historical time, as what is normal to the earth is not normal to the human species or to society as we've built it.

Originally Posted by Nematode

Conceivably they could be problematic or helpful depending on your circumstance.

The earth has been much cooler and much warmer than it is today, I don't understand the notion that the temperature of the earth today is the only good temperature and that any change is bad.

In the grand amoral scheme of the universe, it doesn't matter. Things have been different, things will be different, and any death or suffering that has occurred or will occur from these changes means nothing.

But if you care about death and suffering, then the picture changes.

Our current global society has been built around a certain set of conditions and will be massively disrupted by sweeping changes to these conditions. Any time you have massive disruptions, the potential for epic suffering and death is pretty high. It would be one thing if human beings were peaceful, cooperative, altruistic creatures that avoided conflict, did not value material things, and had no territorial tendencies or if the global human population were small compared to available resources. None of these things are true, though.

At any rate, I'm with the scientists who say it's too late to do anything to stop the climate spiral that's in motion. Even if it isn't too late, as some believe, I doubt there's any way we're going to get emerging economies on board in time to the extent that they need to be on board, especially since the issue has become massively politicized in the world's biggest per capita producer of greenhouse gas to the point where nothing can get done, as is the case with all highly politicized issues here.

We really need to be concentrating on large-scale strategies and technologies to mitigate the harms, but we're not even going to do that here in the US because climate is now politics here, and politics = paralysis.

[Mischka]

I'm all for healthy debate here, so this thread will remain open.

If you can express your viewpoint and opinion while remaining civil and respectful toward other members, there won't be any problems.

Should this turn into a personal insult slingfest, the party or parties involved will answer for it.

[gorbelly]

Originally Posted by Hellmanns

You're going to have to explain to me how global warming can cause catastrophic cold. In an IPCC report it is claimed:

http://www.grida.no/publications/oth...ar/wg2/569.htm

This is another forced either-or.

Unusually cold periods can and do happen even amidst a general trend of rising temperatures. Once again, weather is not climate.

Warming global temperatures can affect global systems in ways that make the jet stream more erratic, which can mean more frequent periods of arctic air dipping down into regions unaccustomed to it. Remember the "polar vortex"? That could happen more frequently if the jet stream becomes/remains jittery.

Note that the "polar vortex" did not "disprove" global warming, as temps in many other parts of the world were well above average at the same time. To repeat, since it seems necessary to repeat this, we're talking global climate and how rising temperatures affect its systems which in turn manifest as unusual weather (in temperature, in precipitation, in intensity of weather phenomena) locally. The argument does not begin and end with just the weather we see when we walk outside of the house.

Originally Posted by Hellmanns

As the Union of Concerned Scientists claimed,
“Winters have generally been warming faster than other seasons in the United States and recent research indicates that climate change” is causing it.
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming...l#.V7i5Ou4pDqC

I do not see that claim on that page, although even if it were there, it wouldn't necessarily be problematic or contradictory because context would be key in understanding what was being said.

Originally Posted by Hellmanns

When actually, winters have been cooling for 20 years!
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Scre...5.52.06_AM.png

Since I can't find the passage you're quoting, I have no idea whether that ICECAP ( ) chart and the supposed statement by the UCS are talking about the same time period, whether in terms of span of years, in terms of how they're defining the cutoff dates for "winter", or how they're defining the "United States" (48 contiguous? all 50 states?).

So what I've got is you essentially saying, "Compare this imaginary apple to this random fruit, which I swear is also an apple!". What's your point here?

[dmforcier]

Thank you Mischka. I'm actually surprised that the discussion has remained so civil over several pages. This topic quickly brings out the worst in some.

[dmforcier]

Originally Posted by Nematode

There are some theories that the earth is in a co2 drought geologically speaking.

I did a quick image search and didn't find it. But I have seen a graph of atmospheric CO2 taken from ancient ices. Going back several hundred thousand years, the levels are all over the place. Some periods were much higher and some much lower than present levels. One outstanding feature is that levels over the past 10,000 years or so have been relatively flat. This both accentuates the scale of the peaks and valleys, and shows that fluctuations graphed at century scale are, historically, noise.

As best I recall, present level is above the rough average of high/low, which may mean nothing important.
_______________

Now, I stated my theory above and I'm sticking to it. We're on the road to Hell. (apologies to Chris Rea)

[gorbelly]

Originally Posted by Nematode

There are some theories that the earth is in a co2 drought geologically speaking.

What does this mean? What is a "drought" when applied to atmospheric gases?

And whose theory is it?

I mean, there are some theories that germs don't cause disease. But are those theories any good? Are the people proposing those theories credible? Are the arguments they make and the evidence they base them on reasonable and worthy of consideration by serious individuals?

Originally Posted by Nematode

Tomatoes are most productive in a co2 enhanced environment, I think that is not an accident.

Invertebrates tend to evolve to be larger in higher CO2 environments. Don't you think hornworms are big enough?

And tomatoes don't do well in extreme heat and drought. Not sure CO2 can make up for that.

[Worth1]

I had big global warming advocate tell me every little bit helped no matter how small.
My reply was, really then why do you drink beer and alcohol drink cokes and eat pickles?
All of which put huge amounts of Co2 in the atmosphere.

Worth

[Gerardo]

Originally Posted by Worth1

I had big global warming advocate tell me every little bit helped no matter how small.
My reply was, really then why do you drink beer and alcohol drink cokes and eat pickles?
All of which put huge amounts of Co2 in the atmosphere.

Worth

Nothing unifies us more than Coca Cola. Only PDRK abstains from the cola, ahem, Kool-Aid.

The beautiful game comes in a distant 2nd as the next best unifier.

Living on a border and being privy to what increases in migratory pressures can do to cities, I hope the transitions occur gradually.

With an educated and interconnected populace solutions will appear.

[dmforcier]

Originally Posted by Worth1

My reply was, really then why do you drink beer and alcohol drink cokes and eat pickles?
All of which put huge amounts of Co2 in the atmosphere.

Oh, don't get me started on cow farts. You hamburger hounds are climate criminals. (I'll have a burger and a Coke, me.)




Actually, it's cow burps.

[Hellmanns]

Originally Posted by gorbelly

This is another forced either-or.

Unusually cold periods can and do happen even amidst a general trend of rising temperatures. Once again, weather is not climate.

Warming global temperatures can affect global systems in ways that make the jet stream more erratic, which can mean more frequent periods of arctic air dipping down into regions unaccustomed to it. Remember the "polar vortex"? That could happen more frequently if the jet stream becomes/remains jittery.

Note that the "polar vortex" did not "disprove" global warming, as temps in many other parts of the world were well above average at the same time. To repeat, since it seems necessary to repeat this, we're talking global climate and how rising temperatures affect its systems which in turn manifest as unusual weather (in temperature, in precipitation, in intensity of weather phenomena) locally. The argument does not begin and end with just the weather we see when we walk outside of the house.



I do not see that claim on that page, although even if it were there, it wouldn't necessarily be problematic or contradictory because context would be key in understanding what was being said.



Since I can't find the passage you're quoting, I have no idea whether that ICECAP ( ) chart and the supposed statement by the UCS are talking about the same time period, whether in terms of span of years, in terms of how they're defining the cutoff dates for "winter", or how they're defining the "United States" (48 contiguous? all 50 states?).

So what I've got is you essentially saying, "Compare this imaginary apple to this random fruit, which I swear is also an apple!". What's your point here?

That was the wrong link, sorry.I'm doing this on a tiny screen on my phone. I also know the difference in weather and climate. Some of the networks must not, though. They're the first to tout a hot week or warm month as GW!

But, at the end of the day, there has been NO global warming in over a decade, and temperatures are actually trending down. So maybe we're saved!
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/06/...arly-a-decade/

It is clear there has been no rise in U.S. surface air temperature in the past decade. In fact, a slight cooling is demonstrated, though given the short time frame for the dataset, about all we can do is note it, and watch it to see if it persists.

[clkeiper]

All I can say... is it is the FIRST WARM Summer in 10 years here. I had to heat my greenhouse last August. Oyvey. My children didnt go swimming most of their childhood. It was too stinking cold every Summer. No need for a swim pass anywhere here, you had to heat your pool to use it all Summer long. I had farmers markets that I consistently had sweatshirts, jackets or kept a blanket in my van to stay warm in.

[ilex]

People don't understand that 2 degrees in average global temperature is about a 11% increase. It's a significant change.

[Gardeneer]

Originally Posted by clkeiper

All I can say... is it is the FIRST WARM Summer in 10 years here. I had to heat my greenhouse last August. Oyvey. My children didnt go swimming most of their childhood. It was too stinking cold every Summer. No need for a swim pass anywhere here, you had to heat your pool to use it all Summer long. I had farmers markets that I consistently had sweatshirts, jackets or kept a blanket in my van to stay warm in.

GLOBAL temperatures are measured across the globe and averaged out. So you can have locations that might seem to indicate that there is no warming.
Also, as pointed out before, Climate Change is not just temperatures. There can be drought in some place and flooding somewhere else. Another thing is the frequency of these extremes that seems to be on the rise.