AHHHHHH.... FINALLY SOMETHING THAT MAKES SENSE !!!!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17611404

And this is also amazing:

http://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/research/2011/111201HuberGlaciation.html

The solar cycle triggers a massive melt off at a point well below where the stuff froze despite the huge loss of albedo?  Neat trick.

You really thought that made sense?

I guess it's not too surprising, you're easily confused after all.  I don't even want to think about how many times you've told me to stop blaming the industrial CO2 output on rising ocean temperatures.  I was already bored of correcting you a few pages back, it's not even worth insults at this point.

I don't like gov't interference in my life and global warming requires gov't intervention so therefore the science of AGW is wrong. My confirmation bias will guide me in overcoming any cognitive dissonance.

Alternately, I like gov't control and I don't like cars or pollution therefore the science of AGW is correct!

Interesting paper on US public perception here: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959378013001660

Most of it is behind a paywall but the highlights are available.

Also, probably late in hearing about this book, but came across it today:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_of_Doubt

Chronicle detailing how a few scientists in the US were employed to cast doubt and challenge scientific consensus on tobacco dangers, acid rain, the hole in the ozone layer, and AGW. In all cases, they do no original research themselves, they simply attack the reputations of scientists, spread disinformation, and try and focus on and enlarge any small anomalies they can find.

Yes, that makes sense too.

And that's exactly how conspiracy sites work.

There are so many sites spreading nonsense, it's hard to find out what's real and what's not. That's a disadvantage of the internet, if the number of websites with misleading content is great enough, they can actually disinform the public, because it gets really hard to find the few websites that make sense and even if you find them, they don't always look pretty, they have scientific language which may be hard to understand, they don't have flashy graphics or catchy phrases, and you're already biased by reading all kind of nonsense. That's an inconvenient truth.

The paper only speculated on that, it's an "accepted" mechanism. I've found this study that concludes that the ocean is not that great a carbon sink:

http://www.bitsofscience.org/ice-age-co2-ocean-3569/

In any case ... how much rise in CO2 was there really in the past 10,000 years - about 100 ppm. Even if the oceans were responsible for that, you had 100 ppm rise due to a temperature rise of about 3 degrees during 10,000 years, and then that cannot possibly explain the CO2 rise of another 100 ppm associated with 0,6 degree within 150 years. (and on top of that it completely ignores the partial-pressure difference due to the CO2 we are creating each year, and you're also conveniently ignoring the timescales).

Back to temperatures... the farther north you go, the more the temperature rise is due to global warming. So I've been thinking, perhaps the arctic temperatures are more convincing than "global" temperatures, because that's where much of the excess heat ends up (by winds and ocean currents).

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/01/23/409099/arctic-temperatures-continue-rapid-rise-2011-breaks-record/

Let's see... there's a 3 degree celcius difference over 130 years. Such a number should be well above noise level.

The picture of the Antarctic is a little more blurry. It's a shorter timespan, only 50 years.

http://www.enn.com/climate/article/45378

Anyway I think this should be convincing even to Psychoak. And if it's not, please indicate what kind of temperature rise would be convincing on the arctic, antarctic (and globally).

An excellent description of the AGW sites ...   Orwell's Ministry of Love would be so proud 

 

“The whole educational and professional training system is a very elaborate filter, which just weeds out people who are too independent, and who think for themselves, and who don't know how to be submissive, and so on -- because they're dysfunctional to the institutions.” 

“Either you repeat the same conventional doctrines everybody is saying, or else you say something true, and it will sound like it's from Neptune.” 

Noam Chomsky

Yes, that's true.

That's why it takes a scientific community so long to adopt new ideas. After all, the whole climate discussion isn't anything new, it's started in the 70's at the very least.

So finally the scientific community overcomes the inertia and adopts the GW, because of overwhelming evidence (observations and deeper understanding of the physical processes, which go hand in hand)... and now there's all that crap that "normal" people are spreading.

It's just unbelievable.

Lots of people claim they know the truth. It's up to you to judge whether their claims are sound or not.

As far as I'm concerned, the majority of the anti-GW websites fall in the category of conspiracy-theorists.

Wow  , that quote flew right over your head.

Did I misunderstand you?

I'm sorry... your quote applies to a scientific community as well.

Someone claims something new. The community tries to disprove it because they don't believe it. More evidence builds up over the years. Finally (can take as long as 30 years) the evidence becomes very convincing and most scientists will change their mind, they will discard the things they've learned in favor of the new theories and observation. Some will never change their mind, they will keep thinking the same thing till they die and will keep trying to disprove new concepts. But those are a minority. Some people are just very stubborn, scientists included.

Yeah...

It's just too hard to argue with people that can't comprehend the argument.  Have fun living in your AGW bubble while it lasts.  I'm through talking to the horribly confused wall.

The irony.

Putting aside the accuracy of your retort, he's not actually arguing.  He's been telling me things like the ice core data isn't accurate and the oceans aren't causing the current CO2 buildup for pages.  It was funny the first couple times he trashed his own previous arguments in an attempt to convince me of something I've never said.  At this point, I'm just feeling sorry for his offspring.

Too bad, I found this amazing article.

http://phys.org/news/2013-03-global-goat-populations-rocket.html

Be amazed...

Be further amazed - http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424127887324030704578426280702003120

I'm always amazed by politics.

http://mining.about.com/od/Coal/a/Top-5-Coal-Fires-Hotspot.htm

#5, a coal fire that's been going for 6,000 years ... amazing!

And from this article, the title is amazing: 

http://intellectualventureslab.com/?p=11324

And the conclusion is also amazing in its simplicity... the results of even the most complex modeling can be summarized by just a few heat-balance concepts... isn't that amazing ... that details in weather patterns, ocean circulation etcetera play a minor role in the bigger picture ....

I was wondering a bit about the process of heat capture by CO2... and in principle, a higher CO2 content would trap more heat near the ground and would lower the temperature higher up (like what happens between the troposphere and the stratosphere). But if the atmosphere gets hot, the gas becomes light and moves up, and emits its heat higher up in the atmosphere... therefore the troposphere heats up as a whole, and its totality helps trapping heat.

The thing I don't really get about the global warming, is that the Antarctic isn't warming up as much as the Artic. It is warming... but a lot less.

http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/GW_NotGlobal.htm

http://www.climate-change-knowledge.org/uploads/James_Hansen_2012_temperatures.pdf

I can think of these factors:

- The ice radiates little heat that CO2 can capture (during the summer)

- It's cold and there's not much water vapor

- It's high altitude (a 2km ice sheet...) with lower air pressure (and thus less CO2 density)

- There is not much warm wind coming in, it's a cool low pressure zone with lower atmosphere circulation going outward - so that the only wind coming in comes from high altitudes, but that is heated less because it's colder and has less water vapor...

http://www.weather.com/blog/weather/8_20620.html

- The ice is very cold and takes time to warm up. Maybe that slows down the warming trend a little.

- Part of the "warmth" could be absorbed by melt, at the edges of the ice-sheet (this rapidly cooling down winds that blow inwards, whenever they do).

Perhaps a combination of these factors reduces the warming effect, it could be something regional and unique for the Antarctic.

Ohy my... amazing as well:

http://www.satellitetoday.com/publications/st/feature/2013/07/15/recent-satellite-data-inconclusive-on-climate-change-prompts-new-mission/

300 billion tonnes of melt a year, woohoohoo. That's a lot.

And what about this:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121010191749.htm

It's a direct attack by CO2 on glaciers!

This is about cloud cover:

http://mclean.ch/climate/Cloud_global.htm

I didn't know that 2/3 of the earth is covered in clouds, on average... I thought it was far less than that.

Of course there are skeptics...

http://www.c3headlines.com/2013/02/evidence-declining-cloud-coverage-real-cuprit-80s-and-90s-global-warming-solar-sunshine-bill-gates.html

I dunno what to think of this. Clouds reflect heat (daytime), but they also trap heat (daytime + nighttime + direct absorption). So will 1% more or less clouds really make a difference?

http://science1.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2002/22apr_ceres/

"Fewer clouds would open a window through which heat could escape to space and thus cool the planet." That is exactly the opposite of the skeptic... isn't that just amazing. Oh wait, that hypethesis was wrong, observations proved that.

And there's a very big difference in behaviour between upper clouds and lower clouds... upper clouds trap net heat, lower clouds reflect net heat... that's interesting, but that's really hard to incorporate in models Like this dude argues:

http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/cloudiness.htm

But of course ... well ... does cloud cover really depend on temperature, and to what extent can it mitigate other warming effects (by CO2 and general water vapor increase) ?

This is a more in-depth discussion...

http://www.euclipse.eu/summerschool/Lectures/Bony_2.pdf

And what about that darned humidty...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_humidity

"useful rule of thumb is that the maximum absolute humidity doubles for every 20 °F or 10 °C increase in temperature."

- How about that... does that mean there will be twice the precipitation when temperatures actually rise by 10 degrees? I think it will... after all, if air travels over the ocean, the ocean will supply all the water vapor it needs (the water is cooling down in the process).

- Also, more water vapor means lighter air, leading to increasingly strong convection.

- Also, air will absorb more moisture from the ground (because it can contain more water). Since ground doesn't have extra capacity to hold moisture ... it will probably mean that the ground will become drier in general. Even if there's more intense rain, rain is easily transported away by rivers and after the rain, the ground will dry up quicker. In an extreme case, you might get huge rivers, meandering through shrublands... brr. I hope I'm wrong about this. Maybe I'm wrong...

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/12/counterintuitive-models-wrong-rainfall-more-likely-over-drier-soil/

It might be perfect for growing grapes because they have deep roots... lots of sunshine and the occasional shower to supply the deeper groundwater might give us the perfect growing conditions for the perfect wine.

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/grapevine-root-systems-59167.html

This seems comforting, apparently deserts are getting greener...

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/08/26/climate-change-is-making-deserts-greener.html

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2008/04/26/202588/is-450-ppm-or-less-politically-possible-part-0-the-alternative-is-humanitys-self-destruction/

It's interesting to read this article from 5 years ago... just before the global crisis.

"If there’s no action before 2012, that’s too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment."

Currently, there is no action at all and according to that article, we're quickly heading towards our doom because of possible feedback effects.

They write "Clearly, 800 to 1000 ppm would be ruinous to the nation and the world, creating unimaginable suffering and misery for billions and billions of people for centuries to come"

And I agree with that, because there's a huge risk for multiple feedback effects.

But... the timeline seems a bit exaggerated to me, I doubt we'll reach such levels by the year 2100. With 86 years to go, at 2 ppm/year we'll add about 170 ppm by the year 2100, that means a level of 570 ppm. Unless we will produce more in the future.

In 2008, we added about 30 billion tonnes of CO2 each year into the atmosphere, that is about a 1% increase or about 4 ppm/year. Half of that is absorbed by forests and the ocean, that is 2 ppm/year.

If we would increase our carbon fuel consumption by 50% in the coming years, then we'll end up putting 6 ppm/year into the atmosphere. Assuming that 2ppm/year is the limit for forest/ocean intake of CO2, that means a 4ppm/year increase in CO2.

Well... then we'll add 4*86 = about 340 ppm by the year 2100. That would mean a level of 740 ppm.

Wow... the current trend in energy policy is to open up more and more sources of carbon (coal, oil, gas). There are new technologies which make this possible...

So, we may actually reach a dangerous level within 1 century... a 50% rise of energy consumption is quite possible...

Omg - omg - omg.

That nutshell's the hysteria pretty well.

Speaking of Omg - omg - omg:  Keep walkin'

You are just part of the collective stupidity of mankind.

As if antarctica is going to save us ... instead, it will drown us (my country at least) with 50 meters of water. Omg omg omg.

I've shown you the math, do you deny that as well? Do you deny that it's an actual possibility that we'll reach 750 ppm by 2100 ?

Careful.

Remember....attack the topic of the debate...not the person...;)

I've been accused of worse.

Yet you appear to be casually dismissive of, if not willfully blind to, inconvenient facts contrary to the AGW hypothesis.

BTW, who said Antarctica was going to save us?

GeomanNL -

If you go back and review your comments you will see several you made stating "this is my last comment on this thread" and yet you continue to comment and in some instances even replying to yourself if no one has commented in a couple of days.

Pretty much everything that can be said has been said already and several have gone the attack the messenger way.

Perhaps it is time to apply the "this is my last comment on this thread".

I'm not casually dismissive of other facts.

I'm just saying that atm the global warming effect is too small and is masked or trading off with others climate factors.

But physical modeling and paleontological evidence suggest that the warming effect will become very strong.

And evidence also suggests that a mere 10 degree rise is already pretty catastrophic for large parts of the globe.

And now I'm concluding that we're heading too quickly for comfort into a very very dangerous territory.

I'm saying:

if energy consumption rises by 50% over the next century (which is probably an underestimation)

and if energy keeps being produced by coal, oil, gas (which is probably a good assumption given that more and more reserves are opened).

then we're entering a level of 700 to 800 ppm CO2 within 100 years,

which is dangerous because there can be some serious feedback events which we humans have no control over, and which can skyrocket the CO2 content to 2000 ppm even if we stop producing CO2 at that moment. Permafrost, methane bubble, deforestation.

and if we've passed that point, then there's nothing we can really do, short of physically extracting CO2 from the air which is a monstrously expensive job. Putting it in the air is easy, getting such quantities out and storing them safely is almost impossible.

So we're in the process of killing our own planet, knowingly and wilfully.

And my country won't exist anymore by that time, it's simply gone. Maybe some of you people are from higher areas, or from cold northern countries that can use some global warming, but the equator and the Netherlands... those are going to be destroyed.

(If we continue like this).

At first I thought, the increase in CO2 is pretty slow and we'll have time for more analysis. However, the rate of CO2 production is so astronomical and the feedback effects can be so astronomical as well ... that maybe we don't have the time to wait 50 more years to see if the global warming effect is "real" or not, while we increase energy production in the meantime. And then to take 30 years more to decide what kind of action to take ... because democracies are so incredibly slow... and then to realize that there's only 20 years left to stop all CO2 production, which is just not realistic.

I think the alarmsts have a good point ...

And yes I'll just stop posting now on this subject, I've made my point and that's enough. So one last time. omg - omg - omg ^^

It's all tap-dancing.  The 'models' either work or they don't.  'Excuse' is not in a scientist's lexicon.

I have one thing that I don't understand about anti AGW people. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, amongst many others. Do they really think mankind could raise the level of CO2 above 1000 ppm without ANY consequences? Or do they question the greenhouse effect of the gases?

So how is it that mankind releases greenhouse gases, but it does not have an effect on global temperature (I guess anti AGW believers think this way)?

I do not really want to dig through 43 pages of comments, if someone could help me out with this I would appreciate it.

Essentially, their answer is "those scientists are lying bastards and I know better than they do".