Climate Change - Bad News

[Knight of Albion]

1) They're concerned with climate. Methane isn't the biggest concern. co2 is.

2) It isn't.

3) I looked at thousands upon thousands of acres of corn this summer and talked to a specialist who is
1) not retired
&
2) an technical advisor to the farmers (my uncle works for CropQuest).

1) "Pound for pound the comparative impact of CH4 (methane) on climate change is over 20 times greater than C02 over a hundred year period" - Environmental Protection Agency

2) No, livestock production contributes more to greenhouse gas emissions/climate change than all forms of transport combined. The only debate is exactly how much more. Either way it is the one source of major greenhouse gas emission that we could most easily act upon at personal and international level, but it seems 'we' don't want to...

3) If that is so then it's strange that a farmer's network site only last month declared that whilst corn harvest was better than expected "Overall corn harvest on the northern half of the Corn Belt is still significantly behind the five year average."
As for my retired Texan farmer friend (and his warning that this could be a bad year for corn mould) who apparently doesn't know what he is talking about... whilst your uncle who works for CropQuest apparently does....
corn Archives - Crop Quest

 

[Knight of Albion]

Really, it's no more worth debating the reality of anthropogenic global warming with denialists than it is debating creationists. Climate change is a fact. The only productive discussions we can have about it are on what we're going to do about it, and how to adapt to a hotter world.

Spot on.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Can't name one, huh? With all this "consensus" the names should be household words.

James Hansen, Michael Mann, Phil Jones, Kevin Trenberth, Ben Santer, Nicola Scarfetta, Keith Briffa, Gavin Schmidt, Tim Osborn, & Tom Wigley. Most of these would be household names for the wrong reasons. Mann (with Bradley & Hughes) published MBH98 & MBH99, lumped together under the prominent graphic "the hockey stick graph". Jones, from CRU, was perhaps the name in climategate, but Osburn (and perhaps Wigley, I can't recall) were named to. Everyone should know the "father" of global warming James Hansen. Briffa & Schmidt are both contributers to realclimate.org. Although Hansen, Mann, & Jones are huge names both in the climate science community and in mainstream media reports on climate science/politics, most of the big name scientists are completely unknown to the public. How many scientists whose central focus is evolutionary science are known to the public? Dawkins, usually (or for ID/Creationist proponents, add Dembski & Behe). Physics? Hawking, Penrose (the mathematician), & Einstein. Half the people who are Chomsky fans don't know he's a linguist.

For me, a vast number of scientists, even huge ones, are last names (e.g., Spelke & Baillargeon; Miller, Weaver, Ritchie, Lashley, & Marr; West, Lockwood, & Fröhlich; Podesky & Rosen; etc.). When I know first names, such as in the case of Marc Hauser, it's usually not for scientific achievement (in that example, quite the opposite). The names are nothing. The research is everything.

 

[metis]

James Hansen, Michael Mann, Phil Jones, Kevin Trenberth, Ben Santer, Nicola Scarfetta, Keith Briffa, Gavin Schmidt, Tim Osborn, & Tom Wigley. Most of these would be household names for the wrong reasons. Mann (with Bradley & Hughes) published MBH98 & MBH99, lumped together under the prominent graphic "the hockey stick graph". Jones, from CRU, was perhaps the name in climategate, but Osburn (and perhaps Wigley, I can't recall) were named to. Everyone should know the "father" of global warming James Hansen. Briffa & Schmidt are both contributers to realclimate.org. Although Hansen, Mann, & Jones are huge names both in the climate science community and in mainstream media reports on climate science/politics, most of the big name scientists are completely unknown to the public. How many scientists whose central focus is evolutionary science are known to the public? Dawkins, usually (or for ID/Creationist proponents, add Dembski & Behe). Physics? Hawking, Penrose (the mathematician), & Einstein. Half the people who are Chomsky fans don't know he's a linguist.

For me, a vast number of scientists, even huge ones, are last names (e.g., Spelke & Baillargeon; Miller, Weaver, Ritchie, Lashley, & Marr; West, Lockwood, & Fröhlich; Podesky & Rosen; etc.). When I know first names, such as in the case of Marc Hauser, it's usually not for scientific achievement (in that example, quite the opposite). The names are nothing. The research is everything.

Well said, imo.

What I find just mind-boggling is why those who are not really not that familiar with what the research is indicating would be so careless as to ignore the vast majority of research climatologists and go instead with a very small group who may have some reservations? As I've seen this debated over and over again ad nauseum, it's obvious that this element is mostly influenced by the political right, who have a vested interest in the status quo than in any objective scientific approach.

 

[BSM1]

James Hansen, Michael Mann, Phil Jones, Kevin Trenberth, Ben Santer, Nicola Scarfetta, Keith Briffa, Gavin Schmidt, Tim Osborn, & Tom Wigley. Most of these would be household names for the wrong reasons. Mann (with Bradley & Hughes) published MBH98 & MBH99, lumped together under the prominent graphic "the hockey stick graph". Jones, from CRU, was perhaps the name in climategate, but Osburn (and perhaps Wigley, I can't recall) were named to. Everyone should know the "father" of global warming James Hansen. Briffa & Schmidt are both contributers to realclimate.org. Although Hansen, Mann, & Jones are huge names both in the climate science community and in mainstream media reports on climate science/politics, most of the big name scientists are completely unknown to the public. How many scientists whose central focus is evolutionary science are known to the public? Dawkins, usually (or for ID/Creationist proponents, add Dembski & Behe). Physics? Hawking, Penrose (the mathematician), & Einstein. Half the people who are Chomsky fans don't know he's a linguist.

Now you're talking. Check these out:


laude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris; J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting; Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University; Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society; Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences; William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton; Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.; William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology; Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT; James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University; Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences; Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne; Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator; Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service; Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.

Polar opposites. Your turn.

 

[Aquitaine]

Would there be potential of wave power? I don't know much about it but... There's plenty of coastline here though!

True - there could be. The UK is a very wet and windy place, so it would appear that Wind and Wave power would be our strongest forms of renewable energy, at least to a Renewable Energy layman like me. ^_^

 

[sandandfoam]

I suppose some doomsday cult is bound to be right some time.

 

[Riverwolf]

I suppose some doomsday cult is bound to be right some time.

Uh... we're not trying to bring anything about, and the actual measures everyday people can take to prevent it are so minor as to be non-intrusive. Just recycle if that's all you can do.

If you can't afford to stop driving because of your work, or you can't afford solar panels or some other form of alternative power, or whatever, that's fine. We're not part of the groups that were putting out that terrible pro-environment propaganda from the early 90s.

 

[Riverwolf]

Now you're talking. Check these out:


laude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris; J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting; Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University; Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society; Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences; William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton; Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.; William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology; Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT; James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University; Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences; Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne; Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator; Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem; Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service; Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.

Polar opposites. Your turn.

Again: names are nothing. Research is everything.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Then there is the Global Warming Petition Project signed by 31,487 American scientists, including 9,029 with PhDs.

Global Warming Petition Project

 

[Riverwolf]

Then there is the Global Warming Petition Project signed by 31,487 American scientists, including 9,029 with PhDs.

Global Warming Petition Project

And again, I point to Mexico City's week-long curfew.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Polar opposites. Your turn.

It appears I didn't make my point. So this time, instead of just listing names, I'll only use some from research I have now:

A National Strategy for Advancing Climate Modeling (2012). National Research Council.
by Chris Bretherton, V. Balaji, Thomas Delworth, Robert E. Dickinson, James A. Edmonds, James S. Famiglietti, Inez Fung, James J. Hack, James W. Hurrell, Daniel J. Jacob, James L. Kinter III, Lai-Yung Ruby Leung, Shawn Marshall, Wielaw masloski, Linda O. Mearns, Richard B. Rood, & Larry L. Smarr

AR5 Lead authors:

Ayako Abe-Ouchi, Juerg Beer, Andrey Ganopolski, Jesus Fidel González Rouco, Eystein Jansen, Kurt Lambeck, Juerg Luterbacher, Tim Naish, Timothy Osborn, Bette Otto-Bliesner, Terrence Quinn, Rengaswamy Ramesh, Maisa Rojas , XueMei Shao, Axel Timmermann, Deliang Chen, Maria Cristina Facchini, David Frame, Natalie Mahowald, Jan-Gunnar Winther, Lisa Alexander, Stefan Broennimann, Yassine Abdul-Rahman Charabi, Frank Dentener, Ed Dlugokencky, David Easterling, Alexey Kaplan, Brian Soden, Peter Thorne, Martin Wild, Panmao Zhai, Shigeru Aoki, Edmo Campos, Don Chambers, Richard Feely, Sergey Gulev, Gregory C. Johnson, Simon A. Josey, Andrey Kostianoy, Cecilie Mauritzen, Dean Roemmich, Lynne Talley, Fan Wang, Ian Allison, Jorge Carrasco, Georg Kaser, Ronald Kwok, Philip Mote, Tavi Murray, Frank Paul, Jiawen Ren, Eric Rignot, Olga Solomina, Konrad Steffen, Tingjun Zhang, Govindsamy Bala, Laurent Bopp, Victor Brovkin, Josep Canadell, Abha Chhabra, Ruth DeFries, James Galloway, Martin Heimann, Christopher Jones, Corinne Le Quéré, Ranga Myneni, Shilong Piao, Peter Thornton, Paulo Artaxo, Christopher Bretherton, Graham Feingold, Piers Forster, Veli-Matti Kerminen, Yutaka Kondo, Hong Liao, Ulrike Lohmann, Philip Rasch, S. K. Satheesh, Steven Sherwood, Bjorn Stevens, Xiao-Ye Zhang, François-Marie Bréon, William Collins, Jan Fuglestvedt, Jianping Huang, Dorothy Koch, Jean-François Lamarque, David Lee, Blanca Mendoza, Teruyuki Nakajima, Alan Robock, Graeme Stephens, Toshihiko Takemura, Hua Zhang, Krishna Mirle AchutaRao, Myles Allen, Nathan Gillett, David Gutzler, Kabumbwe Hansingo, Gabriele Hegerl, Yongyun Hu, Suman Jain, Igor Mokhov, James Overland, Judith Perlwitz, Rachid Sebbari, Xuebin Zhang, Akintayo John Adedoyin, George Boer, Roxana Bojariu, Ines Camilloni, Francisco Doblas-Reyes, Masahide Kimoto, Gerald Meehl, Michael Prather, Abdoulaye Sarr, Christoph Schär, Rowan Sutton, Geert Jan van Oldenborgh, Gabriel Vecchi, Hui-Jun Wang, Julie Arblaster, Jean-Louis Dufresne, Thierry Fichefet, Pierre Friedlingstein, Xuejie Gao, William Gutowski, Tim Johns, Gerhard Krinner, Mxolisi Shongwe, Claudia Tebaldi, Andrew Weaver, Michael, Anny Cazenave, Jonathan Gregory, Svetlana Jevrejeva, Anders Levermann, Mark Merrifield, Glenn Milne, R. Steven Nerem, Patrick Nunn, Antony Payne, W. Tad Pfeffer, Detlef Stammer, Alakkat Unnikrishnan, Edvin Aldrian, Soon-Il An, Iracema Fonseca Albuquerque Cavalcanti, Manuel de Castro, Wenjie Dong, Prashant Goswami, Alex Hall, Joseph Katongo Kanyanga, Akio Kitoh, James Kossin, Ngar-Cheung Lau, James Renwick, David Stephenson, Shang-Ping Xie, Tianjun Zhou (I'm tired of listing them)

McGuffie, K., & Henderson-Sellers, A. (2005) (3rd ed.) A climate modelling primer. Wiley
Royer, D. L., Berner, R. A., & Park, J. (2007). Climate sensitivity constrained by CO2 concentrations over the past 420 million years. Nature, 446(7135), 530-532.

James Hansen, Makiko Sato, Pushker Kharecha1, David Beerling, Robert Berner, Valerie Masson-Delmotte, Mark Pagani, Maureen Raymo, Dana L. Royer & James C. Zachos (2008). Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim?. Open Atmospheric Science Journal, 2, 217-231.

Donald Wuebbles, Gerald Meehl, Katharine Hayhoe, Thomas R. Karl, Kenneth Kunkel, Benjamin Santer, Michael Wehner, Brian Colle, Erich M. Fischer, Rong Fu, Alex Goodman, Emily Janssen, Viatcheslav Kharin, Huikyo Lee, Wenhong Li, Lindsey N. Long, Seth C. Olsen, Zaitao Pan, Anji Seth, Justin Sheffield, Liqiang Sun (2013). CMIP5 Climate Model Analyses: Climate Extremes in the United States. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

Cayan, D. R., Das, T., Pierce, D. W., Barnett, T. P., Tyree, M., & Gershunov, A. (2010). Future dryness in the southwest US and the hydrology of the early 21st century drought. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(50), 21271-21276.

Wi, S., Dominguez, F., Durcik, M., Valdes, J., Diaz, H. F., & Castro, C. L. (2012). Climate change projection of snowfall in the Colorado River Basin using dynamical downscaling. Water Resources Research, 48(5), W05504.

Rosina Bierbaum, Joel B. Smith, Arthur Lee, Maria Blair, Lynne Carter, F. Stuart Chapin III, Paul Fleming, Susan Ruffo, Missy Stults, Shannon McNeeley, Emily Wasley, Laura Verduzco (2013). A comprehensive review of climate adaptation in the United States: more than before, but less than needed. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 18(3), 361-406.

Lesnikowski, A. C., Ford, J. D., Berrang-Ford, L., Barrera, M., & Heymann, J. (2013). How are we adapting to climate change? A global assessment. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 1-17.

Whitman, A., Vickery, B., Stockwell, S., Walker, S., Cutko, A., & Houston, R. (2013). A Climate Change Exposure Summary for Species and Key Habitats (Revised).

David G. Anderson, Kirk A. Maasch, Daniel H. Sandweiss, Paul A. Mayewski, Daniel H. Sandweiss, Kirk A. Maasch, C. Fred T. Andrus, Elizabeth J. Reitz, James B. Richardson III, Melanie Riedinger-Whitmore, Harold B. Rollins, Martin Grosjean, Calogero M. Santoro, Lonnie G. Thompson, Lautaro Nu´n˜ez, Vivien G. Standen, Betty J. Meggers, Barbara Voorhies Sarah E. Metcalfe, Fred Wendorf, Wibjörn Karlen, Romuald Schild, Douglas J. Kennett, James P. Kennett, Atholl Anderson, Michael Gagan, James Shulmeister, Tracey L.-D. Lu, Konstantin A. Lutaenko, Irina S. Zhushchikhovskaya, Yuri A. Mikishin, Alexander N. Popov, Lars Larsson, David Sanger, Heather Almquist, Ann Dieffenbacher-Krall, David G. Anderson, Michael Russo, Kenneth E. Sassaman, Madonna L. Moss, Dorothy M. Peteet, Cathy Whitlock, Douglas J. Kennett, Brendan J. Culleton, James P. Kennett, Jon M. Erlandson, Kevin G. Cannariato
authors of Anderson, D. G., Maasch, K., & Sandweiss, D. H. (Eds.). (2011). Climate change and cultural dynamics: a global perspective on mid-Holocene transitions. Elsevier

Watts, R. G. (Ed.). (2002). Innovative energy strategies for CO2 stabilization. Cambridge University Press.

Bhaskar R, Frank C, Høyer KG, Næss P, Parker J (Eds.) (2010). Interdisciplinarity and Climate Change: Transforming Knowledge and Practice for our Global Future. Abingdon: Routledge

Jonko, A. K., Shell, K. M., Sanderson, B. M., & Danabasoglu, G. (2012). Climate feedbacks in CCSM3 under changing CO2 forcing. Part I: adapting the linear radiative kernel technique to feedback calculations for a broad range of forcings. Journal of Climate, 25(15), 5260-5272.

I'm getting seriously bored typing names and titles and I haven't even gotten from my general folders and books to the specific sections/folders on specific areas of climate change. There are thousands upon thousands of names out there attached to studies supporting the view of the IPCC (the "mainstream" view). Giving me astronauts and similar no-names with degrees is nothing.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Then there is the Global Warming Petition Project signed by 31,487 American scientists, including 9,029 with PhDs.

PhDs in what and why does it matter? A lead researcher in anti-global warming circles is Canadian Steve McIntyre. He's not a scientist, but a rather brilliant guy with a good deal of time on his hands. He's published research in climate science journals and this is the 2nd IPCC report he's been asked to advise on. He doesn't have a PhD and he isn't a scientist, yet he knows more than many a astrophysicist, ecologist, engineer, climate change modeler, etc. What matters is not whether someone has a degree or whether they are a scientist, but whether they are familiar with the science itself. And the only way to determine that is to see what they have written about it (even if it isn't peer-reviewed, as this will still give you an idea of what they know or don't know). For every petition of scientists, one can simply cite the NAS, NRC, APS, AGU, NASA, and countless other organizations of thousands upon thousands of scientists which have officially announced they support the mainstream (IPCC) view. I happen to know people who are members of these organizations who don't, so petitions and so forth matter little to me (the petition you cite has had people who want off of it because they've changed their minds). They shouldn't matter to anybody. If you don't want to read the research, then you have only the majority to go by. And the majority supports the IPCC view.

 

[Falvlun]

From that petition, I am curious as to how limiting greenhouse gas emissions could possibly harm the environment.

 

[Quintessence]

From that petition, I am curious as to how limiting greenhouse gas emissions could possibly harm the environment.

Yeah, that was among the most bizarre statements there, to be sure.

In fairness, though, determining what constitutes "harm" is really not all that straightforward. Making claims of something doing "harm" must presuppose a normative state. For the most part, presuming some particular state should be normative is a subjective, value-laden judgement. Reality is dynamic. All actions do "harm" from a certain point of view.

My other thought was that these guys obviously missed the memo about the sea level rises, because that is going to be massively catastrophic to many, many human communities.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

PhDs in what and why does it matter? A lead researcher in anti-global warming circles is Canadian Steve McIntyre. He's not a scientist, but a rather brilliant guy with a good deal of time on his hands. He's published research in climate science journals and this is the 2nd IPCC report he's been asked to advise on. He doesn't have a PhD and he isn't a scientist, yet he knows more than many a astrophysicist, ecologist, engineer, climate change modeler, etc. What matters is not whether someone has a degree or whether they are a scientist, but whether they are familiar with the science itself. And the only way to determine that is to see what they have written about it (even if it isn't peer-reviewed, as this will still give you an idea of what they know or don't know). For every petition of scientists, one can simply cite the NAS, NRC, APS, AGU, NASA, and countless other organizations of thousands upon thousands of scientists which have officially announced they support the mainstream (IPCC) view. I happen to know people who are members of these organizations who don't, so petitions and so forth matter little to me (the petition you cite has had people who want off of it because they've changed their minds). They shouldn't matter to anybody. If you don't want to read the research, then you have only the majority to go by. And the majority supports the IPCC view.

Yes, I agree generally with your point. Based on my understanding from my own research, AGW climate models are deeply flawed but nevertheless the movement has developed into a quasi religion with its 'priesthood' of paid researchers followed by a mostly uncritical msm and true believers who just accept their authoritarian position. I do presume however that those who signed the petition see it likewise.

 

[Riverwolf]

Yes, I agree generally with your point. Based on my understanding from my own research, AGW climate models are deeply flawed but nevertheless the movement has developed into a quasi religion with its 'priesthood' of paid researchers followed by a mostly uncritical msm and true believers who just accept their authoritarian position. I do presume however that those who signed the petition see it likewise.

There's a difference between those of us who recognize the harm we're doing to ourselves (not the planet, mind you; ourselves), and Captain Planet.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

From that petition, I am curious as to how limiting greenhouse gas emissions could possibly harm the environment.

Well raising CO2 is greening the planet...

Elevated carbon dioxide making arid regions greener

31 May 2013
AGU Release No. 13-24

WASHINGTON, DC—Scientists have long suspected that a flourishing of green foliage around the globe, observed since the early 1980s in satellite data, springs at least in part from the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in Earth’s atmosphere. Now, a study of arid regions around the globe finds that a carbon dioxide “fertilization effect” has, indeed, caused a gradual greening from 1982 to 2010.

Focusing on the southwestern corner of North America, Australia’s outback, the Middle East, and some parts of Africa, Randall Donohue of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Canberra, Australia and his colleagues developed and applied a mathematical model to predict the extent of the carbon-dioxide (CO2) fertilization effect. They then tested this prediction by studying satellite imagery and teasing out the influence of carbon dioxide on greening from other factors such as precipitation, air temperature, the amount of light, and land-use changes.


The team’s model predicted that foliage would increase by some 5 to 10 percent given the 14 percent increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration during the study period. The satellite data agreed, showing an 11 percent increase in foliage after adjusting the data for precipitation, yielding “strong support for our hypothesis,” the team reports.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

There's a difference between those of us who recognize the harm we're doing to ourselves (not the planet, mind you; ourselves), and Captain Planet.

Riverwolf, AGW refers to human derived CO2, not pollution in general., and CO2 does not harm the environment.

Environmental destruction through human activity in general including particulate atmospheric pollution is another matter, not to be confused with the climate change debate.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

Yes, I agree generally with your point.

My point is simple. One has either 2 choices. One can either try to get a handle on the research itself, which (believe you me) takes years and years of research and a background in multivariate mathematics, physics, and some other odds & ends, or one can accept the majority opinion: anthropogenic global warming is real, dangerous, and happening now. That's not an exclusive "or", btw. Many a person who has done such research has concluded that AGW is real, happening, and dangerous. I am personally not as convinced as many. But then, I'm famous for uncertainty.