Climate change could mean the extinction of our species

[trish]

We were told by "scientists" that the world was heading into another ice age and we were all going to die.

The quotation marks around "scientists" is appropriate here. I notice you have not cited extensively, if at all, from the professional peer reviewed literature of the 1970's. Of perusal of that literature would tell you there was no professional consensus on the issue of climate change. I already addressed this here http://www.hungangels.com/vboard/sho...3&postcount=16 . The 70's was 30-40 years ago. What field of modern science hasn't advanced through enormous strides in the last 40 years? In the 1970's computer models were in their infancy. Computers themselves were in their infancy. The memory and the computational speed that are required to numerically solve the complex partial differential equations that describe climate evolution just weren't available in the 1970's. Neither was the satellite data that now supplies a continuous feed of climatological and meteorological data that covers the entire globe as well as continuous feeds of data on solar output. The older, "traditional" sources of climate data (ice cores, trees rings and other fossil evidence) have also been more thoroughly investigated and more thoroughly understood. In the 70's no professional consensus was possible. Indeed in the 70's both cooling and warming were hypothesis under consideration. Even then warming was the more viable hypothesis, (since the greenhouse mechanism was well understood) though there wasn't yet a concern with runaway warming. Because of a local dip in temperatures the ice-age scenario captured the public's imagination. News sources then, as today, were eager to publish the latest possible doomsday hypothesis that wasn't yet ruled out by the then current evidence.

Thirty to forty years later climate scientists are in basic agreement: the Earth is experiencing a climatic shift. Less of the heat radiated by the Earth's surface is making it beyond the atmosphere and escaping into space. These observations are quantitatively consistent with the predictions of climate models based on the chemistry and physics of insulating gasses in the atmosphere.

The deniers are desperate. One denying tactic is to cast aspersions. One such attempt was climategate. Independent investigations have exonerated the climatologists who have been maligned by the hackers (and their backers) who have illegally broke into the email records of several English universities in a vane attempt to dig for scandal that wasn't there. Another such attempt is to point to an 35 year old hypothesis, the "next-ice-age-hypothesis" which has been examined and eliminated and claim, "look what those nincompoop 'scientists' told us forty years ago!" Usually when a hypothesis can be eliminated it's called progress. Only a denier could spin it the other way. Yes, the deniers are desperate. Some cling to the claim there's no climatic heat imbalance at all. Some claim the entire fucking solar system is warming, based on evidence so scant it makes ones head spin. Some claim global climate change is a United Nations ploy to establish world government. That's what all this denying is really about: fear that there may be good reason for human beings to cooperate to secure their mutual welfare__fear that 'rational' self-interest may not be the panacea that libertarians claim it to be. Some people would rather several hundred million people die than change their 'world view'. Some people would rather several hundred million persons die then suffer a profit loss.

[hippifried]

Yeah, really. There's always some conjecture or another happening. It's happening now. Who the hell is Peter Gwynne? He was an editor from Newsweek that sent a couple of reporters out to ask why Anchorage was warmer than Miami for a while one winter. The Newsweek research dwelled on the study of localized opacity of aerosol polution that filtered solar radiation, & the dip in the warming trend that had been happening for a couple of decades. But the effects of CO2 were well known & the Gaia effect was gaining traction. This Newsweek thing has been the cornerstone of climate change deniers since the warming consensus was reached in '88.

Rush Limbaugh is full of shit, & so are you, along with the rest of his sycophants. You don't know what you're talkin' about.

[Faldur]

Don't know bout the rest of em Trish, but there is no desperation here. I'm looking at the biggest get rich scheme in the history of the world and I get a good laugh at it.

And Hippi, there were enough articles to max 3 post limits, figured one set was adequate to make my point. I've lived through this before, the same desperate rantings.

[trish]

I've lived through this before...

No. You haven't. You have not lived through a prior time (the 70's) when there was a scientific consensus on the issue of global heat imbalance. You know this, but refuse to acknowledge it. There was plenty of talk about both hypothesis in the 70's. You know this. But refuse to acknowledge it. (One of the early articles on warming was written in 1971 by Rasool and Schneide published in Science). As I pointed out in the post above, there have been enormous advances in data collection, data crunching as well as strides and refinements in our theoretical understanding of atmospheric chemistry and dynamics. You know this, but have not addressed it. The cooling hypothesis has long been eliminated. You know this. That's why you have to go all the way back to the seventies to revive it. Since then professionals in climate science are in agreement on this issue. This you know and you know it was not the case in the 70's. But instead of acknowledging any of these things and modifying your argument to meet these points, all you can do is desperately attempt to redirect the argument with the lie, "I've lived through this before..."

[Faldur]

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/196642

And the beat goes on..

[trish]

And the beat goes on..

It certainly does. I don't doubt you will ever run out of cheap rags that sell their claptrap using banners like: *** DEBATE: IS CLIMATE CHANGE AND GLOBAL WARMING JUST A CON?...*** Did you imagine you were citing the work of a fair and balanced writer? The article begins...

A high-level inquiry ... found ...

Yeah, those nameless high-level inquiries (which are neither subject to peer review nor held accountable by any scientific body for their conclusions) set the hallmark standards for all scientific investigations.

You do realize the 2007 U.N. report on climate change is a report of the consensus on climate change. Finding errors in a report is like finding errors in a newspaper article. The consensus, the evidence and the proofs are to be found in the peer reviewed literature which you again fail to address. Modern climatological research published in peer reviewed journals, with very few exceptions, make the case (or detail various aspects of the case and the evidence) that Earth is no longer capable of radiating away a sufficient quantity of heat to maintain current climate patterns. As a denier, that is the claim you need to debunk. It is not sufficient to simply claim, "Washington will have a warm winter," nor is it sufficient to show, "The Himalayas aren't going to melt for another two score years," nor is it sufficient for you to point out, "The U.N. report is not error free." To make your case (that the hypothesis of global warming is false) you must show: the Earth is indeed radiating at least enough heat into space to maintain climate stability, in spite of the 390 ppm concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. I haven't heard anything from you that remotely supports your claim. Perhaps you can tell us, if the Earth isn't warming, then exactly how is the Earth's radiant heat escaping? How much energy is radiating back into space and at what wavelengths?

[hippifried]

Don't know bout the rest of em Trish, but there is no desperation here. I'm looking at the biggest get rich scheme in the history of the world and I get a good laugh at it.

And Hippi, there were enough articles to max 3 post limits, figured one set was adequate to make my point. I've lived through this before, the same desperate rantings.

& yet with the entire planet in on the giant conspiracy to soak up money like a sponge, our oh so super-smart & easily amused ditto-head Faldur hasn't figured out a way to cash in on it.

Do you even know the difference between an article & a post? Limbaugh as a primary source of information? Pity might be in order, but not from me.

You haven't lived at all. Hangin' out in moms basement doesn't count. Desperate rantings is all your know, if that.

[Faldur]

Lol, hanging out in moms basement? Oh brother... and I don't recall quoting Limbaugh? Mind pointing it out to me?

The largest abusers of carbon emissions are the people running around in a mad panic telling all of us we need to change. Yes a large "money soak", your words not mine. If these people believed the shoe shine they are trying to sell us they would walk the walk, and not live like a rock star and tell the world to change. I really feel sorry for you guys that bought in to this bull shift. Just look to the carbon credit money goes and you will find the wizard behind the curtain..

[hippifried]

Try post #30.

[Faldur]