Trust Pat Robertson to even be able to screw up being right.
An MSNBC article says that he finally spoke up about global warming:
This week the heat index, the perceived temperature based on both air temperatures and humidity, reached 115 Fahrenheit in some regions of the East Coast. The 76-year-old Robertson told viewers that was "the most convincing evidence I’ve seen on global warming in a long time."
Sigh. A hot summer is not "convincing" evidence of global warming! We’ve had hot summers before. It’s difficult to predict how global warming will affect us specifically, that is, on any given day, or in any given place. Many models show winters getting more severe as global ocean currents change their paths (this was one of the most egregiously exaggerated parts of the movie "The Day After Tomorrow"), for example, so you can have global warming, but colder winters in some places.
So Robertson is finally right about something, but for the wrong reason. The evidence for global warming is everywhere, all around us. Some may still deny that, but they’re wrong. There is no controversy among climate scientists, and the only "controversy" is generated in the media.
Look: the National Academies of Science were pretty clear about this. Global warming is real, it’s happening now, and it is certainly caused or amplified by humans. The next step is clear as well: if the partisan people still denying it don’t get their heads out of their butts and wake up, we’re all screwed.
I don’t know if I should be surprised or not that someone like Robertson would finally see the light, but I am bordering on sad: people are letting their partisanship really blind their views. Some may accuse me of that as well, but there is a big difference: I looked at the reports, I’ve listened to the scientists, and I have not let media-imposed "balance" sway me– the media are not scientists, and they are too easily infiltrated by people with an axe to grind.
The science is clear. It’s about time the message was as well.
Update: Turns out PZ Myers says the same thing I do. But he’s a reasonably smart fella.
Update the second (Aug. 5, 2006): BallonJuice is saying exactly this same thing as well. C’mon, join the bandwagon. The water’s warm. And getting warmer.
August 4th, 2006 at 1:45 pm
I don’t know why people are so adamant in trying to deny that a) global warming exists, and b) humans are the cause. At least if we’re the cause, we have some small hope of being able to effect a change for the good with a concerted effort. If we’re not the cause or at the very least the major contributing factor, there’s nothing we can do about it and we’re in bigger trouble than ever! That scares me more than the idea that it’s our fault.
August 4th, 2006 at 1:58 pm
I know I’m very much in the wrong but I do have a question:
If the World is getting warmer, how come we’ve had the same summer temperatures since 1911, when it was just as hot?!
I’m just a kid, so go easy, but i’ve not seen any evidence of warming. beaches are the same, temp’s are the same and summer length is the same so how come it’s all going to go to pot in 100 years?
August 4th, 2006 at 2:33 pm
Pete, it is the average annual temperature that is increasing. In many places this could be manifest as warmer winters. Warmer winters have the disadvantage of having more (and possibly more energetic) storms.
August 4th, 2006 at 2:34 pm
The BA said:
“Update: Turns out PZ Myers says the same thing I do. But he’s a reasonably smart fella.”
What, implying that you’re not? Come on, Phil, don’t do yourself down.
August 4th, 2006 at 3:28 pm
Un-educated people are worse problem with this. One individual this past week pretty much said the same thing that Robertson did, and I didn’t bother correcting him. Probably the saddest (and funniest at the same time) thing I heard someone say this past week was when one person claimed that the weather must really be out of control because is snowed in South Africa in August. Their exact words were that is “was snowing in South Africa in the middle of the summer.” I calmly explained to them that in South Africa, as well as the rest of the Southern Hempishere, its winter, and even though it was rare for snow in South Africa, it has happened before. They looked at me as if I grew a second head. As I said, un-educated people are the cause.
August 4th, 2006 at 3:35 pm
Nigel, you read that incorrectly. He’s smart too.
August 4th, 2006 at 3:41 pm
Pete, it is the average annual temperature that is increasing. In many places this could be manifest as warmer winters.
Indeed, winters warm more rapidly than summers, and nighttime low temps warm more rapidly than daytime high temps. These trends are observed, and they agree with the theory. This happens because the increased greenhouse effect is more effective at lower temperatures and with a solar radiation deficit (i.e. nighttime and winter) than it is at higher temperatures and solar radiation surplus (daytime and summer).
Incidently, this is a good simple counterargument for people who claim that increases in incoming solar rad intensity is causing the warming trend, as a solar-induced global warming would very likely show the opposite trends, with summer and daytime highs increasing more rapidly than nighttime and winter lows. Of course, if you really dig into it, the atmosphere is very complex, so this isn’t absolutely conclusive. But hey, if people want to throw out oversimplified arguments against AGW, I don’t see anything wrong with a simple sound counterargument.
August 4th, 2006 at 3:42 pm
People resist the idea of global warming because (A) accepting it means consequences that may include taxes on gas and other things that people seem to fear irrationally.
Because of A they will (B) be reluctant to actually inform themselves on the issue and instead accept the hand waving and pseudo truths about scientists that don’t agree.
August 4th, 2006 at 5:02 pm
Phil, I generally agre with what you say, but I must disagree with your statement that we have consensus among the scientific comunity. I too have read the reports, I too have listened to the scientists, and I too have not let media-imposed “balance” sway me. And I still see and read plenty of other scientists who are willing to stake their carriers that global warming is a) not human induced or b) not a threat.
Before you or anyone posts a reply, I want you to consider this. As the battle against ID has taught us, science is not a democratic process. Theories do not become accepted beacause scientists endorse them. And neither to they become accepted because of their preponderance of evidence alone. They become accepted because of their power of prediction. Something the current global warming “hypothesis” all toghether lacks. See my final post here for elaboration.
http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2006/06/20/does-al-gore-read-ba/#comments
Finally, there are good scientists without an ax to grind or an agenda to push who still are not convinced. Please try to understrad that, We just . . . Don’t . . . Know.
And I don’t know how much clearer I can make that.
August 4th, 2006 at 5:16 pm
They become accepted because of their power of prediction. Something the current global warming “hypothesis†all toghether lacks.
Global warming makes predictions. One I listed previously, that the diurnal temperature range decreases with increased greenhouse warming (observed). Second, the poles warm more rapidly than the tropics (observed). Also, the stratosphere should cool as the troposphere warms (observed). Future predictions are, of course, that as CO2 levels continue to rise, so will global mean temperature, and the other indices I listed will continue to show the warming trend more prominently.
Again, the atmosphere is terribly complex, and coupled feedbacks and forcings (like the oceans and ecosystems) make understanding that much rougher. Local effects, poor understanding of some feedback processes (clouds), and ignorance of human civilization’s future choices all add a lot of uncertainty to the mix. This isn’t like predicting time dilation or something relatively simple and straightforward with a few orderly equations. There is still a lot of work to be done in the field. But claiming that global warming theory as it stands today has no predictive power is, quite frankly, naive at best.
August 4th, 2006 at 5:18 pm
As fun as it is for everyone to make fun of Pat Robertson, we do want to present facts, do we not?
If you not the quote expressed by Pat is not the complete quote. I heard a comment by someone who watched the show that day say he recalled Pat saying the heat was “almost enough” to make him a convert.
Has anyone seen the full quote to verify or refute this?
Also it needs to be understood that no one is denying the rise in temperatures (at least currently). What is being argued is the cause of the warming - natural versus man-made. For instance, around the end of May, I saw a weather reporter describe how this season is following the trend of a previous year, I believe it was in the 1950’s - with the hot April, cool May, and scorching hot summer (the report was to predict what summer would be like - not about global warming). But the point is there is a cycle of temperatures that occurs naturally. Remember how the vikings were able to originally establish Greenland?
Note, I am not personally attacking the theory of global warming, just explaining what I see to be an error in debating.
Personally, I believe pollution needs to be dealt with no matter what it is or is not doing to the global temps.
August 4th, 2006 at 5:58 pm
http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2004/09/22/keen-dimming/
August 4th, 2006 at 7:03 pm
This joke was sent to me today….
Conservative Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson said the wave of
scorching temperatures across the United States has converted him
into a believer in global warming. The 76-year-old says the weather
was “the most convincing evidence I’ve seen on global warming.”
Meteorologists, however, refuse to rule out the possibility
that the older Robertson gets, the closer he’s getting to hell.
Hee hhee.
August 4th, 2006 at 7:52 pm
Max says:
2. It must be able to make testable predictions about future events.
So is the Big Bang not a theory? It only makes predictions about past events, not future ones.
As for climate models, the late 80’s climate models have predicted global mean temperature for the past 15 so years (future, from their perspective) reasonably well. So it seems to me that climate change is a more robust theory than, say, the Big Bang.
August 4th, 2006 at 9:35 pm
Lab, the big bang theory does make predictions, didn’t you read the BA’s post on July 30th?
http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2006/07/30/big-bang-misconceptions/
and the asociated link:
http://angryastronomer.blogspot.com/2006/07/big-bang-common-misconceptions.html
You’ll notice that every prediction made by the current big bang theory has been found to be correct. Whenever a prediction didn’t hold up, the theory had to be modified to acomidate it, and the current theory (as the angry astronomer points out) has stood up to intense scrutiny, and hasn’t needed to be modified for a long time.
This is not the case for the global warming hypothesis. It’s predictions are as wrong as often as they are right. Despite what you said, there is no current model that has made acurate predictions for 10 years or more. I would like to know where you got the idea that there was one in the 80’s.
August 4th, 2006 at 11:38 pm
I don’t know….after the “global cooling” scare of the ’70’s, I tend to be rather sceptical of weather-guessers predicting the coming of the apocalypse. In adition to that, global mean temperatures have by all measurements increased no more than a fraction of a degree over the last century. Furthermore, we don’t have enough data on past weather patterns in order to be able to make any sort of meaningfull predictions. So there’s very little solid evidence to support the idea that global warming is even real, let alone the idea that it’s a man-made phenomenon.
And then there’s the question of what we could possibly do about it. Sure, the first world nations could learn to pollute less. However, any decrease in out emissions will be eclipsed by the increase in emissions generated by China and India as they continue to build on their existing industries. So at best we’d maybe put off the apocalypse by another 20 years. While at the same time maybe damaging our economies and slowing progress. Somehow I don’t see that as a worthwhile goal.
August 5th, 2006 at 2:28 am
Science is more complex than has been alluded to in preceding posts.
True, a theory needs to make successful predictions to be completely water-tight, but many hypotheses are accepted as our “best guess” at reality because (a) they are supported by the preponderance of evidence even if they have not made successful predictions, and (b) they are a better fit t oreality than any other hypothesis that has been proposed.
A lot of modern science, because of the subtlety and complexity of the phenomena under investigation, must accept that we don’t know for sure, but we need to make some decisions anyway.
No alternative to anthropogenic global warming (AGW) explains the observations as well as does AGW. AGW has made some predictions that have been borne out by observation. AGW and climatology in general model one of the most complex phenomena we have ever tried to understand. It’s not rocket science. It’s harder than rocket science. So, to expect precise predictions is to miss the point.
If global warming is man-made, we can do something about it. And we need to do something about it, because a large portion of the world’s population lives on areas likely to flood in the event of rising sea levels. If global warming is not man-made, maybe reducing the amounts of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere will mitigate its impact. Either way, it is worth a try.
The consequences of doing nothing will be severe. Therefore, it is not worth gambling on - we should do what we can to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
August 5th, 2006 at 2:39 am
Global warming is global, and the current effects are such that it is easy for both sides to come up with anecdotal evidence to support their view. Every big storm or hot summer will be attributed to global warming by some, while nay-sayers will point out that these storms and hot summers were also around in the fifties. The real sting is in the statistics, and I imagine there being enough data by now to say something definite about the matter. Indeed, that is what the scientists seem to do.
August 5th, 2006 at 2:44 am
Alex, to address your points in particular:
Meteorology and climatology have come a long way since the ’70s. And global warming has been consistently on the scientific agenda since the early ’90s. It is no passing fad.
The average global temperature may have increased by only a small amount during the 20th century, but the bulk of that increase seems to have been in the later part of the century (indicating anthropogenic origin), and it only takes a small increase in the average temperature to increase the volume of the oceans by several cubic kilometres.
You say:
“So there’s very little solid evidence to support the idea that global warming is even real, let alone the idea that it’s a man-made phenomenon.”
Well, there’s plenty of liquid evidence. Glaciers and ice sheets all over the world are melting. And not just a little bit. Studies have been carried out in which photographs of glaciers from the late 19th and early 20th centuries are compared with modern images of the same places. In many of these, the glacier has retreated by many hundreds of meters.
Plus, there are temperature records from the 20th century that indicate an increase in average temperature.
Global average temperature is increasing. The debate is over the cause. See my post above.
You say:
“However, any decrease in out emissions will be eclipsed by the increase in emissions generated by China and India as they continue to build on their existing industries.”
Well, once the “first-world” nations (to use your term from the mid-’80s) have learned to curb our greenhouse gas emissions, we will be able to share the technologies with developing nations. Once they have established a stable economic and technological base, it will be quite possible for them to switch over to the less polluting technologies that are being developed in Europe, Australasia and Japan.
Since China and India want a standard of living that matches ours, it is up to us to show the way.
Finally, you say:
“While at the same time maybe damaging our economies and slowing progress. Somehow I don’t see that as a worthwhile goal.”
Au contraire. It is a huge opportunity for car manufacturers and energy companies to develop a whole raftload of new technologies. The economical opportunities are there for those with the vision to sieze them.
And I cannot imagine anything “slowing progress” more than losing all of the world’s coastal plains to an encroaching sea.
August 5th, 2006 at 5:19 am
Warming is a GOOD thing!
In 1975 everybody was worried about the New Ice Age… Remember?
One degree in 100 years?!?!? Come on!
What caused the cooling from the 1940s to the 1970s? Did CO2 go on vacation?
August 5th, 2006 at 5:24 am
I am sincerely disappointed at the level of non-research exhibited here. The NAS broke the “hockey stick” in July, labeling the Mann conclusions as “unsupportable.”
If ALL anthropogenic GHG emissions were reduced to zero, how much warming would be avoided?
August 5th, 2006 at 9:59 am
Nigel, you put your last post very well. I’m willing to agree that AGW is the best hypothesis we’ve got to describe the current climate behavior.
My point is that taking the kind of action proposed to level green house gas emissions will take it’s toll on the economy. Maybe it will have the long term benefits your proposing, but maybe not. I don’t think they will. Government developed technologies are very slow to enter the private market.
And taking such drastic actions based on an often wrong hypothesis is a dangerous move. Would you feel confident staking your economy on the validity of say, String Theory/Hypothesis?
Finally, It sounds like your advocating direct government controls (research subsidies, taxes, energy credits) to help nations cut down on Greenhouse gas emissions.
This will not work.
Kyoto proposed a top-down policy like this, and despite the hype, no major ratifying nation is making its quota. I really don’t think the government has the ability to curb our greenhouse gas emissions.
What will work (And what I believe will happen) is if we allow our economies to run their courses, Adam’s invisible hand will kick in. Burning fossil fuels is not a clean way to produce power, and if there are negative environmental effects (Global Warming or otherwise) people will realize that, and make the shift to cleaner sources automatically. If the anthropogenic global warming hypothesis is promoted to a theory, that shift will occur all the quicker. The private market won’t destroy the planet if there is money to be made in saving it. And trust me, there is.
August 5th, 2006 at 10:00 am
I’m actually amazed and appalled to read the growing speculation in media giving grounds to be HAPPY about global warming! For instance, professional nautical and naval journals (ex; Naval Institute Proceedings) have run articles about the coming boom resulting from the North Polar Cap’s melting, thus freeing the Northwest Passage (the sea route around Canada’s Northern extreme) from summer icing. Other pieces have discussed where profitable investment might be made to capitalize on the changes we are observing.
This is what we can expect from Homo Idioticus, I suppose…
Redrefractor
August 5th, 2006 at 10:12 am
To address your new post Nigel and come to Alex’s defense:
I know I’ve made this point before, and I know you’ve responded to it, still I feel like I have to make it again.
There are over 160,000 glaciers on this planet. Scientists have only studied about 80 with scientific precision for longer that 5 years.
So scientists have only studied .05% of this planets glaciers with any level of scientific precision. And a great deal of these glaciers are not melting.
You pointed out last time that we didn’t need scientific precision for many of the glaciers because we have things like old photographs, explorers measurements and natives testimony that put the glacier as larger sometime in the past. I don’t think this is a legitimate way of making measurements. Who knows, maybe this glacier was in the middle of a freak surge at the time? Maybe it goes through natural 100 year cycles? Once you allow that kind of evidence onto the playing field you open yourself to all kinds of problems.
If you use only the pure data to draw your scientific picture, the trend in glacier expansion / retreat is not clear.
August 5th, 2006 at 10:39 am
Max and others:
I think debating the strength of the evidence is a little bit wrong headed in this situation. It’s academic and abstracted and doesn’t really apply to the actuality of what may be happening.
Allow me to exagerate for sake of illustration. Say there was a 90% chance of everything being just fine in the next century and a 10% risk of total disaster. And by taking action we could reduce that risk to 1%. Isn’t it worth the effort to try and do something?
So, though as far as I can tell the indicators are lining up and the odds are tipping towards some real disatserous stuff, I respect your dissent on the academic level. But I still much rather see people taking this seriously.
I’d hate for the arguments to go on until it was too late.
August 5th, 2006 at 11:35 am
Zart,
As I said in my last post, I’m all for “reducing the risk,” provided it’s done the right way.
My greatest fear is that the US government and others will use global warming as an excuse to enact such things as mandatory emission standard, heavy taxation and unfair subsidies. Have you ever heard of the political term “Watermelon?” It’s used to imply that someone is using environmentalism to promote socialist ideas (Green on the outside, Red on the inside.)
As I’ve said before, I believe that humans running their natural course will address the issue of global warming. And if it is a threat, solve it.
I’m also confident that if any government try’s to address the problem with a regulatory “Top-down” strategy, they will only make things worse. Both for us, and for the environment.
August 5th, 2006 at 12:07 pm
Max F. says “…direct government controls…to help nations cut down on Greenhouse gas emissions…will not work.”
While governments as political organizations often seem unable to work together, and a government often seems to be at odds with what is best for its own citizens, it isn’t true that we should abandon attempts at governmental support and cooperation. Governments have been successful when they have cooperated in areas like health, science generally, air and sea transportation, intellectual property rights, treatment of combatants, and many others. Where governments fail is usually where capitalism seems to intrude, or more specifically, where governments perceive that either they or their industries will lose money. In brief: the current U.S. administration has done nothing but oppose the idea of global warming, the shrinking oil reserves and the U.S. dependence on a dwindling energy supply, and has generally put in roadblocks in the way of legislation to prevent alternative solutions to these problems from being explored - largely because of the opposition from industries which depend upon the status quo (in their perception) in order to continue to earn profits. From refusing to sign the Kyoto Protocol, from being dragged reluctantly over the past six years into an acceptance that global warming might be a reality, from failing to support legislation already enacted to reduce air pollution and emissions and from failing to support proposed legislation, and from ignoring what will surely be an even larger problem, the availability of potable water, a government can, by it’s support or neglect, have a profound impact on both a national and an international scale - especially a government such as ours which has such a great influence on the rest of the world’s resources. I don’t believe that concerned individuals or altruistic private corporations can have a greater effect on a global problem without the support of their govenment in conjunction with other nation’s governments - especially for a problem with global proportions.
August 5th, 2006 at 1:46 pm
Let’s see, Socialism=social control of the economy vs. lassiaz faire. Tell me again how this is all wrong? As I recall, the major reason the Soviet Unions economy collapsed was because they were trying to compete with a country that controlled 55% of the worlds resources,,,nice try, but no carrot,,,
Global warming is the way things are, whether by human activity, cyclic variation in solar output or just one too many damn vocanoes. It doesn’t matter as long as we have the ability to affect just ONE of the determinant factors(green house gasses) we should exercise as much control as we are able.
Social control of business activity is a well established equalizer of the business playing field. Safety glass and seat belts had to be mandated by law, as they were not “cost effective” for a single manufacturer to implement. Same held true for auto polution control. Everybody had to adhere to the same standards or else those who tried to do so unilaterally would be working at an economic disadvantage with those who chose to ignore the greater good and just go for the profit.
Consumer choice is not as effective as lassaiz faire capitalists would have us believe. At current fuel prices one would think there would be a massive stampede to purchase fuel efficient cars, but people are still buying Lincoln navigators and Humvees, while they complain about the high cost of running the things. Neither will most people voluntarily drive their vehicles at 55, just to save gas. It’s easier to gripe about the “dad gum A-Rabs and oil industry greed”, rather than accept that oil is a finite resource that is RUNNING OUT.
Social control will reduce fuel consumption as it is mandated by law, but even that only works if people grumblingly comply. So too with global warming.
We’re all in this boat together. Too bad we seem to have idiots steering the damn thing,,,
Gary 7
August 5th, 2006 at 3:02 pm
Will said: “Where governments fail is usually where capitalism seems to intrude”
Remember what I said about Watermelons?
I think your wrong there, but I’m not going to confront you on that topic. Trust me, we’ll never get anywhere.
But there are some other points you made that I will confront.
You seem to think that the U.S. is to blame for Global Warming because we didn’t sign Kyoto. That’s not true. The only difference between the countries that have signed Kyoto and those that haven’t, is a scribble on a piece of paper. The sad fact is that EVERY OTHER RATIFYING COUNTRY IS DOING JUST AS POORLY AS WE ARE! Thats right, Kyoto would have failed whether or not the U.S. had signed it. Lassiz faire in action.
Even if Kyoto did work, it’s effect would be completely unnoticeable. When first put into action, it was claimed that Kyoto would prevent between .02 and .09 Degrees C of warming. Not significant in the big picture.
You also said that:
“I don’t believe that concerned individuals or altruistic private corporations can have a greater effect on a global problem without the support of their government in conjunction with other nation’s governments.”
Who said they had to be altruistic? Who said they even had to care about the environment? Did Toyota produce the Prius because they wanted to curb CO2 emissions? Of course not. They did it because they realized people didn’t want to drive gas guzzling smog belching SUV’s anymore. Despite all the governments regulations and tax’s, it was ultimately capitalism and lassiaz faire that made the first step in cleaning up car emissions.
The situation is still the same. Governments are trying to regulate people into living a less polluting lives, but obviously they are not succeeding. What will work is when people wake up on morning and decide to pollute less on their own. Once that happens their will be dozens of new products and energy sources to supply that demand.
Just like with global warming. If the environment does reach a point where AGW becomes a threat, people will change their lifestyles automatically.
August 5th, 2006 at 3:18 pm
Oh, and Gary, the soviet union collapsed because they tried to do exactly what you’re proposing. They didn’t let Lassiaz faire take its course, they thought they could manage prices and quantities on their own. Eventually the task of managing an entire economy became overwhelming.
Lassiz faire works. Auto makers would use seat belts and safety glass even if it wasn’t regulated. Americans care about safety and their willing to pay a few extra bucks to protect themselves.
As for purchasing better cars, just wait. People don’t go out and buy a new car every month. If prices stay this high, I guarantee you the 2007 car models will be fuel efficient, and cleaner. Exactly like what happened in the 1970’s during the oil shortage.
Government can use regulation to some effectiveness. But the problem is it tends to get way out of hand. Once the government learns that it can regulate something, They will ask themselves “What else can we control?” In the long run resulting in more and more regulation.
Successfully controlling all the factors of an economy by government regulation is impossible, thats a fact. But lassiz faire does it all automatically.
I warned you all. Green on the outside, red on the inside. WATERMELONS!!!!!
August 5th, 2006 at 3:56 pm
As for glaciers, ICESAT, launched early 2003, will help us monitor ice sheet activity over a much wider area than scientists have been able to thus far. So, we should be able to plug the data void holes within the next decade or so.
Sly: What caused the cooling from the 1940s to the 1970s? Did CO2 go on vacation?
The dozens of other major processes controlling Earth’s climate do not instantly shut down when excess carbon is introduced, of course. In fact, I would not be fatally shocked to see such a dip appear in the temp record within the next few decades. And for the record, the models suggest that increasing carbon content was not as influential on temperature back the as it is today. Earth’s climate has inertia, after all.
Max Fagin: And taking such drastic actions based on an often wrong hypothesis is a dangerous move.
This is LIFE. As beings with limited knowedge, we have to make decisions based incomplete information. There is a wide range of outcomes that GW could produce, and many of them are very capable of leaving very nasty marks on the economy, much deeper than mitigation would. This is even more troublesome when you include many of the other issues we will be dealing with at the same time (e.g. dwindling oil supply). Of course it is possible that GW will turn out to be harmless. But you have to also consider the risks involved in assuming this and taking a passive stance in preparation as well. Simply ignoring the problem could be as poor a decision (or worse) than taking an overly-aggressive stance. That is why rationality and caution are needed.
On the Kyoto protocol, the main benefit the protocol gives us is TIME. If we can slow the oncoming warming, we will have more time to learn about GW’s consequences, and more time to develop a cost- and environmentally-effective plan to deal with it. Yes, implementing the protocol is expensive. But it is an investment, not a permanent sacrifice. And the returns are better science and savvy economic policies.
And I still disagree that AGW is just a hypothesis. You are underappreciating the decades of observations taken to learn more about the topic, and the complexity of Earth’s climate. As noisy and as regionally-dependent as the observations are, the heart of AGW theory - that increasing carbon concentration is driving up the global mean temperature - is testable, has been tested observationally and with numerical models, and is verified with a lot of confidence. Details are certainly important, but don’t get hung up on them.
Politics are also a detail in climate science. But if you must, don’t forget that certain national governments are currently already involved in handing out large subsidies and loopholes to appease certain industries, which many people find less than ethical. Maybe I am a rarity in the environmental world, but I sincerly hope that GW and other things can be dealt with effectively without harsh government intervention. I don’t want that kind of world. But sometimes we cannot have everything we desire…
August 5th, 2006 at 6:27 pm
I wish someone could post ANY evidence that:
1- “Global” warming is happening (I’ll concede recent warming in the Northern Hemisphere)
2- The measured warming is bad (Most projections indicate milder winters, which is not a bad thing)
3- The measured warming is ‘unprecedented’ or even ‘unusual’ (Don’t confuse ‘weather’ with ‘climate’)
4- The measured warming is due to anthropogenic GHG emissions
5- Elimination of ALL Anthropogenic GHG (AGHG)emissions would make a substantial difference (By my calculations, total elimination of ALL AGHG emissions would result in a warming ’savings’ of ~0.11 degC in Greenhouse warming… Total [Natural and Anthropogenic] GreenHouse Effect warming being around 40 degC)
August 5th, 2006 at 6:56 pm
What I’ve seen here and in most news articles and other stories is that Global Warming exists. OK, let’s say it does exist. So what?
Please excuse my ignorance and I’m being serious here, I have not seen anything about the consequences. Please educate me.
August 5th, 2006 at 8:48 pm
Sly:
For basics, see the NAS report metioned above- but make sure to read the whole thing, not just the isolated paragraphs that deniers like to link to:
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11676.html
For point 5, you can do the modelling yourself- Columbia U has a GCM that will run on a PC, here:
http://edgcm.columbia.edu/
August 6th, 2006 at 12:26 am
I have to comment on this, because it drives me crazy… Twice in this thread commenters have repeated the erroneous accusation that scientists predicted global cooling or an ice age back in the 70s. This is false — the popular press ran this story, but this was never a scientific consensus. See this link:
http://www.wmconnolley.org.uk/sci/iceage/
Please, please stop using this wrong argument; I have a hard time taking anything else you say seriously when you do.
August 6th, 2006 at 2:00 am
Lab Lemming;
I have twice attempted a rather lengthy response. The first was “submitted to the spam monitor” and the second was tagged as a “duplicate comment”
At this point I am frustrated and just give up…
August 6th, 2006 at 7:09 am
Even one of the songs that make up the soundtrack to Shrek gets it: All Star by Smash Mouth: “The ice we skate, is getting pretty thin, the water’s getting warm so you might as well swim. My world’s on fire how about yours, that’s the way I like it and I never get bored.” It sounds like a comment on global warming anyway. It´s just so obvious…
August 6th, 2006 at 10:37 am
Despite the fact that “State Of Fear” was a poor novel, Michael Crichton does nail one thing right in the author’s note. Global Warming is following a very similar trajectory to Eugenics.
It is a HIGHLY political issue. Many people need to disabuse themselves of the idea that scientists ae somehow above politics and ideology. Working in a technical field, I have found such people to be even MORE susceptible to such degenerate thinking. I’ve lost count of the number of people whose scientific knowledge I respect, but I want to run screaming into the night when they start yammering on any other topic. I can’t belleive such people can be so naive on various aspect of reality and human nature, but they are.
Personally, I don’t care about the GW issue. I’m such a misanthrope at this point in my life that anything thhat messes with humanity is fine by me. When I watch asteroid movies, I root for the asteroid.
But this whole “EVERYONE AGREES AND ANYONE WHO DISAGREES IS AN IDIOT” is just propaganda in the fine tradition of Stalin. Just tell the lie often enough. Or was that Hitler? Ah, who cares.
August 6th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
Max, I realize the U.S. isn’t at fault for gw. I believe that our actions influence others, and that by not signing the Kyoto Agreement we give tacit approval for others to ignore both the concept of global warming and the idea that there might be solutions to it. Whether or not Kyoto alone would solve the problem wasn’t my point: agreement that the phenomenon exists and a beginning of how to solve the dilemma it presents was my point. However, I can see that if there is a real disagreement about the existence of global warming, then the U.S. choice to ignore it’s existence and not cooperate with any international attempts to address the problem won’t make any difference. But, should the rest of the world decide to accept gw as fact and act accordingly, the long-term consequences for the U.S. in continuing to ignore the problem could have real consequences.
As for altruistic capitalists: I agree, there are few such animals (the maker of those fleece jackets aside); capitalism and good works seem to be incompatible. Legislation forced seat belt installation; legislation produced lemon laws; legislation forced auto makers who wanted to sell cars in the nation’s largest market to comply with CA’s stricter-than-federal pollution emission regulations (laws which automakers have been trying to subvert since they were enacted); legislation forced drug makers to test their products before they put them in the pharmacies (at least until recently); and so on. (And, I remember those seat belt debates; the public had to be dragged kicking and screaming into using them.)
As for Toyota’s motives: I’m not postitive, but I think there might be a hint of good will in their designing of alternatively-fueled vehicles. True, the Prius is a test vehicle of sorts, geared to test the market for such cars. But Japan’s auto industry has been modifying the designs which it sells in Japan for years, primarily because of their cost of gasoline and the increasing number of automoblies on Japanese roads. Legislation in Japan allows for registration fees to be based on the cc’s of engines, for example. And while many of the vehicles sold in Japan get considerably more mpg than do the same vehicles sold in the U.S., Japanese car makers do sell cars based upon the regulations in place in the various states, which is why the emission controls of vehicles sold in CA are not put in place in cars sold in other states. Toyota just might be attempting to provide the tree-huggers in CA with more eco-friendly vehicles. Japan also strictly regulates speed limits and two years ago enacted laws which forbid driving while talking. The Japanes auto industry, while now privately operated businesses, still remembers that they were once heavily controlled and regulated (and subsidized) by the government.
As for industry leading the way:in this country the coal mining industry is quietly gearing up to begin supplying coal to old and newly-proposed power plants across the U.S. with the current administration’s full support. One of the heaviest contributors to air pollution - an industry which, for the most part, refused to clean up its act by cleaning its emissions output at the plants and chose to shut down coal-fired power plants and lay off thousands rather than comply (and it was able to do so because most of those coal plants were owned by a few energy industry giants) - is surely the prime example of an industry which is leading the way in public welfare.
Most folks would abandon harmful practices if they had an alternative to that practice. This country effectively eliminated public transportation as a viable alternative to driving in the early part of the last century when the auto and rubber industries overwhelmed public transportation using both legislation and the sales of cheap automobiles. The domination of the automobile in this economy has pretty much eliminated any new ways of transportation from arising, in spite of the public’s dissatisfaction with much of the by-products of that industry: clogged roads, air pollution, highway deaths, insurance costs, etc.
When the government of this country, at least, gets involved with supporting changes which clearly benefit the public and which the public supports, then change will happen. There will be no need for the Big Dig in Boston, a fiasco primarily paid for, not by the taxes of the citizens of Massachusetts, but by the rest of us. I can imagine what might happen if citizens woke up one morning and decided that they no longer wanted to fund such bottomless pits as this and demanded a real solution to the public transportation problems.
August 6th, 2006 at 2:21 pm
Plus, there are temperature records from the 20th century that indicate an increase in average temperature.
Global average temperature is increasing. The debate is over the cause. See my post above.
Unfortuately, 100 years of temperature measurements is hardly proof of anything other than a short-term trend.
That’s the downfall of “global warming”.
It is demonstrable that the world is getting warmer in the short term. It is NOT demonstrable that this is:
a) abnormal
b) caused, or even influenced in a significant way, by human activity
c) not going to stop tomorrow
d) going to go on in a runaway burn and destroy the earth
The planet has been this warm in the past, indeed, I am sure I’ve read that paleoclimatologists (or whatever they are called) have noted that there have been periods when it was WARMER in the past.
This is not to say that we should continue to burn fossil fuels as fast as we can dig them up, but I will suggest that in the next 100 years, wars and pollution related to the use of fossil fuels will kill more people and destroy more environment than all the global warming in that time period, however the warming is caused.
August 6th, 2006 at 2:23 pm
That previous post is the long way of saying:
“We shouldn’t be concerned about global warming - we should be concerned about how and why we destroy our environment in general.”
August 7th, 2006 at 5:19 am
Pure ego here (my degree was in EE not multiple degrees across all the discipline needed) but hey this is my take on Global Warming.
1) Is the climate changing? Umm yep - bit of a no brainer there to start with.
1a) has it always been changing? Would have to say yes it has.
1b) But I guess the issue is time scales and rates of change and absolute amounts.
1c) Is there such a thing as the global climate? There seems to be too much variation accross the earth to be able to nail a single definition of global climate down.
2) Have humans affected the climate. Can’t beleive that we haven’t, UHI, land use chages, deforestation, agriculture, massed house and road buildings …. (and thats just us in Europe).
2a) But in what way have each of these affected the climate, positive or negative, if these are even sensible terms of reference? Sorry not I’m smart enough to answer that one.
3) Can we do anything about it in a predicatable way? To my mind and knowledge of control theory, not very well, not if we can’t answer Q2.
So i guess all I am doing is repeating the Squids message slightly differently (mine in caps)
“We shouldn’t ONLY be concerned about global warming - we should be concerned about how and why we destroy our environment in general.â€
Because i get the feeling that politicians are using Global Warming as an excuse not to do other harder things to help the world. But that is another rant entirely.
August 7th, 2006 at 2:00 pm
Don’t know, why my posting yesterday isn’t here (spamfilter?). Anyway, I expressed in detail why I see it completely the way Max does.
August 7th, 2006 at 4:24 pm
Evolving Squid: It is demonstrable that the world is getting warmer in the short term. It is NOT demonstrable that this is:
a) abnormal
Yes it is. The smoking gun is that the rising temperature trend is occurring at the same time as an unprecedented rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration. This makes the current warming trend stand out among similar trends in the past that lack large CO2 rises.
b) caused, or even influenced in a significant way, by human activity
If CO2 concentration rises, the Earth will warm. This is a basic consequence of CO2 infrared absorption properties, and to deny increased CO2 has the capability to warm the planet is to deny well-known and laboratory verified physics.
The obvious following question is what is causing the CO2 rise. There is no simple demonstration that humans are a major cause of that, although it can be shown easily that one source, volcanoes, are not. If volcanoes were the major source, the Mauna Loa CO2 record should spike every time a major eruption (El Chicon, Pinatubo) occurred. The record does not reflect these eruptions at all. Beyond that, the only way to figure out the carbon sources are through difficult carbon-balancing studies. That topic is a little out of my realm, so I will point you to the Real Climate page “How much of the recent CO2 increase is due to human activities?”
c) not going to stop tomorrow
Come on. The climate is hard to move, but it has inertia. Like pushing on a military hovercraft, getting it to move is hard, but once it is going, God help anyone in the way. The oceans are the real kicker here, as they store enormous amounts of energy (relative to land or the atmos), and so once they are perturbed enough to start changing, it would likely take several hundred years for them to return to “normal” if the initial perturbation was immediately removed.
d) going to go on in a runaway burn and destroy the earth
Don’t be silly…
I would like to make an additional comment here: Don’t forget that there are MANY ways to measure climate change. Global mean temperature is just one of them. Relying on global mean temp alone can lead to incorrect conclusions, as I discussed above. Modern GW doesn’t look substantially unusual in the long-term temperature record alone (ignoring that almost all other changes occurred when Earth has much more ice coverage), but it most certainly looks unusual when taking CO2 measurements into account as well. There are many other indices to consider when monitoring climate change, like changes in average diurnal and annual temperature ranges, changes in equator-pole temperature differences, land-ocean temperature differences, precipitation changes, and, of course, the physical effects warming has on other aspects of the planet (e.g. glaciers). Global mean temperature is useful to measure, but it is only one number, and one number can only carry so much information. Be careful drawing conclusions from one number alone.
September 4th, 2006 at 11:48 pm
Here is just a minuscule fraction of the huge amount of evidence for
the anthropogenic greenhouse effect (human-induced climate change) :
Compiled by S. C. Raine (mungascr) from media sources listed.
1. Over the past century the Earth has warmed by 0.63 degrees, if
carbon dioxide levels are doubled by the end of this century as
predicted it will bring about 3 degrees of climate change. (Tim
Flannery `3 degrees to disaster’ in `The Advertiser’, 2005-May-16th.)
2. 2-3 degrees of climate change would result for Australia in
catastrophic loss of ancient mountain rainforest, complete loss of
the * world’s * coral reefs, complete devastation of Kakadu National
Park, rising sea levels and storm surges. (Tim Flannery `3 degrees to
disaster’ in `The Advertiser’, 2005-May-16th.)
3. To stabilise (not restore – stabilise) the planetary climate CO2
levels need to be cut by 70 % by 2050. The Kyoto protocol only cuts
emissions by 5% if it is implemented successfully. (Tim Flannery `3
degrees to disaster’ in `The Advertiser’, 2005-May-16th & `Climate
of Concern’, Adelaide Review, March 2004.)
4. The 2003 European summer heatwave which killed 19,000 people was
the hottest on the continent in 5 centuries according to researchers.
(Advertiser, 04-March-6th.)
5. The nature of rainfall has changed in Australia since 1975; the
heavy persistent winter rains have become lighter and more variable
and we’ve experienced five droughts and two floods – a statistical
oddity expected only once every 5000 years.
6. (Tim Flannery `3 degrees to disaster’ in `The Advertiser’, 2005-
May-16th.)
7. The North Polar icecap has lost 40 %of its thickness and is
predicted by the end of this century it will have disappeared
entirely in summer – destroying the Arctic habitat on which polar
bears ,seals , etc ..depend. (Tim Flannery `3 degrees to disaster’
in `The Advertiser’, 2005-May-16th.)
8. A leaked Pentagon report suggests climate change could be sudden
and dramatic with the biosphere lurching from one climatic state to
another in less than a decade with apocalyptic consequences. (Weekend
Aust’n Magazine, P.8, 2004, March 20-21st.)
9. The 1990’s were the warmest decade in the past 2000 years as
evidenced by tree-ring and sediment data analysed by a Swedish
research team. (Advertiser, `05 March 1st.)
10. All 18 Peruvian glaciers have been melting; incl. the Pastouri
glacier covering the most popular skiing peak in the Andes which has
shrunk by 19 m every year since 1980. It now covers 25 % less than a
quarter of a century ago. Peru has lost 20 % of its glaciers in the
past 30 years. This increases the likelihood of severe mudslides in
the short term and drought in the longer term. ( Advertiser, 04-Aug.-
7th.)
11. The Climate Research Group at the University of Illinois has
stated that there is a 45 % chance that the Gulfstream current will
be halted by the end of this century and a 70 % chance of it being
halted by 2200 due to climate change. This would have extremely
harmful effects on the Northern hemispheres climate esp. for Britain,
Europe and North America. (P.10, `Guardian Weekly’, `05-Feb-11th-
17th.)
12. Extra CO2 in the atmosphere is not only raising temperatures but
also making the oceans more acidic : CO2 reacts with water to produce
carbonic acid. This threatens to wipe out entire marine ecosystems.
(P.10, `Guardian Weekly’, `05-Feb-11th-17th.)
13. A 2003 University of Texas study discovered 99 species of
birds, butterflies and Alpine Herbs have shifted 600 m north each
year because of global warming. (P.13, Guardian Weekly, 20-26th
May ‘05.)
14. Fish in the North Sea have migrated to cooler waters as the sea
warms – 21 species have shifted their distribution in line with
rising sea temps and 18 species have moved much further north.
Research conducted by the University of East Anglia & the (UK) Centre
for Environment Fisheries and Aquaculture. (P.13, Guardian Weekly, 20-
26th May ‘05.)
15. Greenland’s icesheet is melting faster than predicted as shown
by photographs and measurements of its major glaciers (Recent TV news
report)
***
Draw your own conclusions from the above but remember :
This is just a mere handful of the evidence for radical human-induced
climatic and environmental change for the worse. There’s a coastline full more of such information and research indicating the same grim tidings relating to our planetary environment and what we are doing to it.
Moreover, note that there is also a time lag factor with the climate
change and that not only are the effects and pollutants working in a
cumulative manner they are also interacting with each other with
potentially numerous unforeseen and grim results –things could
snowball very quickly for the worse.
I strongly feel that we do have a very serious problem here which we
are not taking adequate steps to address and that climate change and the
consequences of human environmental abuse pose our very gravest
threat.
I really fear for the future and advocate immediate dramatic action
if we wish to avoid some very calamitous changes which gravely
threaten not just Western society but all Humanity!