Climate change deniers have often claimed that heating from carbon dioxide has never been "proven" but rather only seen in the lab or models.
Here is one more blow to the deniers. For the first time ever, global warming from anthropogenic carbon dioxide production has been demonstrated in nature. This just a day after this study measured a huge increase in sea level rise in the northern US over just 2 years.
Will this evidence finally silence the deniers and motivate policy makers into action?
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Global Warming Finally Seen in the Wild
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(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @12:16PM
Come on, this isn't slashdot -- you don't need to follow their clickbait ways, SoylentNews.
(Score: 0, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday February 27 2015, @12:31PM
Sometimes a bad article is worth posting just so people can shout it down properly. What and how often is pretty subjective though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Funny) by sudo rm -rf on Friday February 27 2015, @01:28PM
Two Minutes Hate,
from George Orwell's novel Nineteen Eighty-Fourfrom the well-known news site soylentnews.org [soylentnews.org] , is a daily period in which Party members of the society ofOceaniaSoylentia mustwatch a film depictingread an article describing the Party's enemies (notablyEmmanuel Goldsteinagw deniers andhis followerssystemd) and express their hatred for them. [almost but not quite exactly from wikipedia [wikipedia.org]]just kidding.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @12:36PM
This isn't even clickbait. They know we won't read t.f.a. so they just told us what we ought to think, with all the grace and respect of a sledgehammer to the cranium.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 27 2015, @03:09PM
Interglacial period.
(Score: 0, Troll) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday February 27 2015, @12:20PM
This is about as much evidence of global warming as a harsh winter is of a lack of global warming. Science, bitches, do it right or STFU.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by c0lo on Friday February 27 2015, @01:32PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by ikanreed on Friday February 27 2015, @02:17PM
To clarify your point. The papers present analysis of models that are sufficiently detailed to project localized effects, and find corroboration of those localized effects in post-hoc observation. This is a kind of natural experiment in line with the normal application of the scientific method.
Unfortunately, if our disagreements could be settled by statistical validation through natural experiments, they'd already be settled.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:49PM
An argument is not about reality but about warring tribes if the arguing has gone on for a long period of time with no vaguely consensus outcome. See abortion, gay rights, and global warming.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @02:48PM
Can we get a new moderation option? Say, "Okie" ?
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:05AM
"Within this 2-year period, the coastal sea level north of New York City jumped by 128 mm."
Uh, just that one spot along the coast? Did someone tilt the ocean??
More seriously, did they account for the fact that the tidal bulge migrates?
Did they account for flow from adjoining oceans?
Just 128mm in a system with that much flux?
I'm thinking this is a lot like that "warmest year ever by an amount that's smaller than the margin of error".
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:42AM
To me, the quoted sounds as the statement of a fact: I assume they measured it at a point, they communicate the results about that spot.
In contrast with your "Uh, ...", that throws in a half-arsed strawman hypothesis, a behaviour I can say is not a very sciency one.
If you are really interested about the ocean levels globally, here they are at a glance [nasa.gov]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @05:15AM
Link threw a plugin error. Anyway... my problem is that given subsidence issues and overall ocean variance, I have a rough time believing 2.6 inches is something to get worked up about. Nominally-solid rock in Yellowstone moves that much.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:30AM
Then, feel free to google "nasa sea levels". You may get to this page for a start [nasa.gov].
2.6 inches in 2 years (yes, I know, better bulkorder your wedding cake [xkcd.org]).
As for the reason to get worked out, internalize that those inches are an average and think what happens at the maximum [wikipedia.org].
Maybe it would help also to recall others may not have a Yellowstone park [rtcc.org] or can't relocate [discovery.com] that easily [grida.no]. You know? Less US-centrism and more empathy, maybe avoiding being called insensitive clod in the process?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:38AM
"Annual sea level rise around the Solomon Islands of 8 millimetres is almost three times the global average"
So, again, the ocean is not flat. Such a difference implies bulging more than rising. Also, I'd like to know how many of these shoreline measurements are in an area of subsidence, like, say, New Orleans or Venice. As to those low-lying Pacific islands, they aren't exactly permanent to begin with... they come and go regardless.
And those of us who live on the edge of the frozen north will have nowhere to go when you cool the earth, you insensitive clod! ;)
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 28 2015, @07:55AM
Don't be that lazy, google for it, come with some links and I'll mod you informative.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Friday February 27 2015, @12:30PM
Of course not - as Upton Sinclair pointed out a century ago: It is impossible to get somebody to believe something when their livelihood depends on them not believing it!
And this isn't even close to the only evidence of global warming "in the wild". We've already observed glacial and polar melting, sea level rises in a lot of places, higher global average temperatures, the predicted weaker jet stream (which is why we're getting arctic blasts in the US that used to not happen), major droughts in Texas and Oklahoma and California and quite a few other places, wild animals ranging closer to the poles than they used to, and a bunch of other effects that I'm not thinking of at the moment.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Hairyfeet on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:37AM
It doesn't have a damned thing to do with livelihood, it has to do with the AGW platform being hijacked by scammers selling magic beans [youtube.com] so they can pull a reverse robin hood [nakedcapitalism.com] for their own obscene self enrichment [jrdeputyaccountant.com].
Do we need to not pollute, cut down on the crap that ends up in our air and water? Of course we do, that is just common sense, we live in a fishbowl after all. What we do NOT need to do is let a bunch of 1%ers sell us a big fat scam that won't do a damned thing about AGW except transfer obscene amounts of wealth from the poor and middle class into their own already bursting pockets. If you go look at the AGW platform BEFORE Gore and his pals at Goldman Sachs jumped on board? There was plenty of scientific debate about what solutions would be best while minimizing the impact to the poor, the kind of thing a sensible scientific minded platform would be expected to discuss, rational, logical, well thought out. After? "ZOMFG the sky is falling you have to accept our carbon indulgences because they'll SAAVE TEH EARF ZOMFG!"
We're supposed to be the smart ones, don't fall for the magic beans.
ACs are never seen so don't bother. Always ready to show SJWs for the racists they are.
(Score: 5, Informative) by moondrake on Friday February 27 2015, @12:35PM
Paper is here [nature.com].
I have only glanced at it quickly. But before all the criticism starts, it seems to me hat they do not show evidence of global warming, they merely limited themselves to trying to establish whether lab and model predictions are valid for the earth-atmosphere system. Their data was in agreement with this idea: CO2 changes the absorption spectrum of the atmosphere, and this increases the amount of energy that is retained.
This is a quite important part of the puzzle, but it does not discuss what will happen with this energy. The deniaskeptics will claim this energy is simply dissipated or used in ways that does not increase T. Or claim the study is to limited, or just shows correlations (the latter is valid I think, although a causative relation is likely based on our understanding of the physics involved).
(Score: 4, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Friday February 27 2015, @03:31PM
not global warming, but radiative forcing
Colloquially known as the "greenhouse effect."
(Score: 4, Insightful) by bradley13 on Friday February 27 2015, @01:35PM
Um, no. That's what happens when you put words in your opponents' mouths - you simply get it wrong.
I am as skeptical as they come, and I have never said that CO2 as no effect. Of course it has an effect. Skepticism comes in the following forms (among others):
(1) How much will CO2 absorption affect the climate? All the evidence indicates that climate is dominated by negative feedback. CO2 may have a small effect, none at all, or even (unlikely, but possible) a negative effect.
(2) What is the temperature of the earth, anyway? Why do we only have access to "modified" data - where is the raw data? Oh, right, lots of it has been "lost" [theregister.co.uk]. Without objective, unaltered data, how are we supposed to check (1)?
(3) What if warmer is better? What is the ideal temperature of the planet? In the past, it has been lots warmer and lots colder. If the planet is warming, this could well be a good thing.
(4) Essentially all of the predictions made by AGW have been wrong. Apparently, our understanding of climate, and the models we use to predict it, are utterly inadequate. We need a lot more basic science before we can talk about predictions decades or centuries in the future.
None of these concerns or questions are addressed by articles like TFA. I am skeptical, because I do not trust people who hide (or lose) the data, continually make predictions that don't pan out in reality, and demand huge amounts of money for projects based on their data and predictions.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Friday February 27 2015, @03:03PM
I am as skeptical as they come, and I have never said that CO2 has no effect.
The summary didn't say you had. Perhaps the summary should have said "Some climate change deniers" and "...blow to those deniers."
CO2 may have a small effect, none at all, or even (unlikely, but possible) a negative effect.
None of these concerns or questions are addressed by articles like TFA.
Aren't they? I'll admit I didn't read the article, but the summary does say:
global warming from anthropogenic carbon dioxide production has been demonstrated in nature.
and would therefore seem to be an answer to #1 (that answer being "at least a bit" - vague, but an answer nonetheless).
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2, Interesting) by VortexCortex on Friday February 27 2015, @08:14PM
I'm sorry. I'm not a denier, I'm a sceptic. This is because I am a scientist. Denial implies an accepted truth that is being denied. If you can't see the obvious propaganda being spewed, I can't help you.
I could inform you that there are people using propaganda to manufacture consent for various things, such as war, militarization of the police, and depopulation agendas. Point being, I have far more evidence of these than for AGW. Are you in denial that there is not, in fact, a majority consensus among climate scientists over global warming? No, you may merely be ignorant of the fact, having done little fact checking on your own. It's illogical to accept facts from the news that's been lying to you for decades. [youtube.com]
A rationalist will ascribe probabilities to outcomes. Unlike people using the term "denier", I question everything investigate both sides of an issue. I currently believe that man has influenced his planet's climate, with 90% certainty. However, I'm 80% certain that the degree of man's influence has occurred has been inaccurately reported, and exaggerated by scaremongers. Why? One example: I've recently seen news that said 2014 was the hottest year on record according to average global temperature, then I went and looked for hotter average years and found that 1995 was warmer than 2014. See, that kind of blatant misinformation tempers my belief or disbelief in the reporters and publishers of such things.
I put it to you that there is strong evidence you've been influenced by propagandists. I cite your lack of concern with the use of the term "denier" when describing the opponents of what you believe to be true with near-fanatical adherence.
It's typically pointless to argue with climate change believers. I had the same damn arguments in the 80's with "Global Cooling" zealots. By their predictions we should be in an ice age. By AGW models our farmlands should all be deserts by now. I take the middle ground as it is most obvious that scaremongering predictions haven't held true, and for that am labelled a "denier" by those that would have you not be sceptical of anything they report.
How rigorously have you studied the evidence yourself? Have you tried to see things from the other point of view (not just via the straw-man arguments presented by your own side)? Could it be that you're merely echoing what appears to be consensus created by propagandists when, in fact, no consensus exists? I suppose next you'll tell me that #GamerGate is dedicated to harassing women; I mean, that's what most of the "reputable" news and journalists are reporting... blatantly incorrectly, I might add. Label me a "misogyny denier" too while you're at it; I don't believe propaganda.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @09:02PM
The "Global Cooling" argument is a red herring put forth by the disingenuous or the ignorant. Perhaps if you had done your research you would have found that the concern about global cooling in the late 70's was the effect of aerosols. There was not a community consensus on the issue because it was not known which climate effect was dominate, cooling from all the aerosols (dominated by chlorofluorocarbons from all the cans of hairspray, deodorant, Freon-12, etc.), or warming from CO2 emissions. Peter Gwynne wrote a Newsweek story about the cooling scenario as put forth by some scientists. That article is now held as the "proof" that "they" all thought we were going into an ice age, and that's what everybody believed at the time. Can you believe it? The shining example showing scientific consensus on the issue is a 1975 article [insidescience.org] in Newsweek (who knows, maybe those earlier issues were peer-reviewed), and because of that, we are to not listen to anyone who studies this issue.
I don't know how old you are, but if you have some grey hairs you'll remember when CFCs were banned and the passage of the Clean Air Act. What do you suppose happened since [skepticalscience.com]? Measurements of aerosols in the atmosphere have declined over the last several decades, ozone hole closing up, etc. Now, if 40 years ago it seemed that the climate effects of aerosols and CO2 emissions were roughly on par, and we've removed a lot of the aerosols from the atmosphere, at first blush it would not surprise me that CO2 emissions are now the dominant effect.
If you're throwing around phrases like "global cooling zealots" when talking about the 70's (at least get your decade correct, or at least know that those heated arguments and the good fight you were fighting in the 80's were obviously not with people doing climate science - I shouldnt' talk, in the 80's I was having heated arguments with those people who act like zealots about bloodletting with leeches - HA, who's right now bloodsuckers!), you should not cast aspersions on others about propaganda parroting.
(Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Friday February 27 2015, @09:55PM
I'm not a denier, I'm a sceptic.
Well that's fine, and I'd have no reason to assume otherwise, except that you too seem to think the summary is calling you, personally, a denier. I don't see how it is.
I cite your lack of concern with the use of the term "denier" when describing the opponents of what you believe to be true with near-fanatical adherence.
Firstly, how do you know what the summary is trying - and perhaps failing - to express by the use of the term "denier"? Why do you automatically assume it includes rational skeptics? Secondly, how do you know that this makes deniers opponents of what I believe? I haven't made any claims one way or the other about global warming. The closest I've come is to say that the demonstration claimed by the summary seems to contradict the OP's assertion that "None of these concerns or questions are addressed by articles like TFA," when, in fact one - and it is just one - of those concerns is exactly what TFA seems - based, as I went out of my way to admit, only on my reading of the summary - expressly to address.
Any "lack of concern" is only because the distinction between sceptics and deniers has nothing to do with the fact that all I was taking issue with was the OP's insinuation that he, personally, was being offended by the summary.
How rigorously have you studied the evidence yourself?
Not at all. But then again, how many claims have I made one way or the other on global warming?
All I wanted to express was my opinion that the OP seemed to be overreacting to a perceived slight that wasn't even aimed at him, and you seem to have done the same again.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 1) by Arik on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:04AM
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by wonkey_monkey on Saturday February 28 2015, @12:28AM
"Denier" is just the snarl-word that believers use to label skeptics.
What, then, is the word "believers" in this context, if not an equal-but-opposite snarl-word?
And what, then, are we to call actual deniers, if some sceptics are going to insist that every use of the term "denier" must be an insult against them?
Or do you propose that there are no deniers, and that everyone who argues against the existence of AGW is de facto a rational sceptic?
There is no distinction
What you mean is, I assume, that you think there is no distinction in the mind of a "believer" between sceptics and deniers. But that's just an assumption, and one that might speak more to your prejudices than the submitter's. Why can't a "believer" be capable of making that distinction?
You can't have it both ways.
The choice of vocabulary simply announces the religion of the poster.
It might, or it might not. How do you know the poster wasn't quite deliberately targetting actual ignorant deniers? I'm not saying he wasn't, but the fact that you've automatically taken such righteous offence over it announces more about you than the summary announces about the submitter, in my opinion.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 1) by Arik on Saturday February 28 2015, @09:48AM
Of course it's a direct counterpart, and intentionally so. Sauce for the goose...
"And what, then, are we to call actual deniers"
If I ever found one, I imagine the word 'idiot' is what would come to mind.
The world is not short on idiots but none come to mind of that particular flavor.
"Or do you propose that there are no deniers, and that everyone who argues against the existence of AGW is de facto a rational sceptic?"
As I say, I have yet to encounter such a thing. Probably there is some idiot somewhere you could point me to but proving the existence would not prove the relevance.
Do a lot of people (on both sides) conveniently find their position aligns with their pecuniary interests as they perceive them? I expect so. But that really proves nothing in either case. There is no lack of rational cause to be skeptical. Science stripped of skepticism is just another church.
"What you mean is, I assume, that you think there is no distinction in the mind of a "believer" between sceptics and deniers. But that's just an assumption, and one that might speak more to your prejudices than the submitter's. "
It's not 'just' an assumption, no. It's something learned through experience. Perhaps it is a premature generalization, but it is far from just an assumption.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @03:20PM
Will this evidence finally silence the deniers and motivate policy makers into action?
I sure hope not. That is not how science should be done. Even the effect of global warming was someone at some point going 'hmm thats weird and not what I expected'.
To silence your 'opponents' is nothing more than politics. There is one thing GW does not need is more politics...
Call it what it is. It is pollution. Pollution is waste. Waste is leaving money on the table.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Immerman on Friday February 27 2015, @04:41PM
Except nobody has a problem with the scientific "opponents" - those doing real, valid science and coming to different conclusions. But there's only a handful of such people, and their work is rarely inflammatory enough t be quoted. They're vastly outnumbered by those "scientists" doing absolute worthless bunk work on the petro-industry's dime in order to sow confusion. Work which is so riddled with internal inconsistencies and outright lies that nobody with even a basic understanding of the topic would give it a second glance.
And then you have the vast bulk of deniers, who couldn't do a proper statistical analysis on a ham sandwich, but happily swallow the petro-industry's FUD hook, line, and sinker, and then stick their finger in their ears and shout "nuh-uh" whenever they're shown real science.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Immerman on Friday February 27 2015, @05:09PM
Not in the mood for a protracted rebuttal, so I'll just address (3)
Even if warmer would be better for human civilization, we'll be talking a multi-century transition time during which the weather will be far more chaotic and unpredictable - climate lines will be moving considerably faster than most plants can spread, and agriculture will be brought to its knees by problems like the flooding, droughts, and polar vortices that we're just beginning to see. We will adapt, but it's likely to be considerably more expensive than transitioning to non-fossil fuels would be.
Plus there's the little issue that the Earth's climate is a bistable system, and every time it's transitioned between states has been accompanied by large-scale extinction events - that might not be a huge problem for us if the planet were currently healthy, but humans have already caused one of the larger extinction events in history, and the ecosystem is currently struggling mightily. Wipe out most of the remaining species and there's a very real chance that it might be thousands of years before the planet is capable of supporting more than a few million people again - it wouldn't be the first time such devastation hit the planet, just the first time in human history. That might also be better for us in the long term, but would be very, *very* ugly while it's happening.
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:18AM
The process may have already started.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2012/10/25/contrary-to-what-you-hear-global-warming-has-been-good-to-africa/ [forbes.com]
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090731-green-sahara.html [nationalgeographic.com]
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by ksarka on Monday March 02 2015, @10:38AM
Do you also go to the responsible people of _your country_ and ask for raw bank statements of every financial transaction involving _your country_ so you could evaluate whether the statements regarding the financial activity of _your country_ at the end of year are correct?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Covalent on Friday February 27 2015, @03:20PM
I'm a scientist by trade and by nature: This makes me a skeptic by day and a skeptic by night. But this is THE Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, not some "I MAKEZ THE TROOTHS CUZ INTERWEBZ LOLZ". These people used real, peer-reviewed, scientific methodology to, for the first time, give evidence that all of the laboratory data and computer models match reality.
So for all of the "Data or it didn't happen" folks, here is your data. Now what?
You can't rationally argue somebody out of a position they didn't rationally get into.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @03:37PM
The difference between a skeptic and a denialist is that skeptics can be convinced with evidence and logic, but denialists will never, ever accept anything that runs counter to their delusion and will continue to use shifting goalposts and logical fallacies to justify their preconceived (or spoon-fed) beliefs. Denialists make skeptics look bad by making it seem like "skeptics" are just delusional nutbags.
(Score: 1) by soylentsandor on Saturday February 28 2015, @10:35AM
Read GP's sig, it's all there :)
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday February 27 2015, @04:55PM
La la la la I'm not listening!!!!
There is no data set that will ever convince these folks. That's the simple truth of the matter. And the media will continue to pander to them (and many other anti-scientific viewpoints like evolution or vaccination) by suggesting there's a debate on a point of demonstrable fact. And the oil and natural gas and coal industries will continue to pay big bucks to ensure that the issue is more confused in the public mind than it is in the scientific mind.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by darkfeline on Friday February 27 2015, @03:30PM
This is the thing that confuses me the most. It doesn't even matter if you believe in global warming or not, it doesn't even matter if global warming is "real" or not. If you think dumping megatons of pollutants into the environment is a good idea and won't result in some horrible unintended side effects in the future, I would like to file an official request to eject you off this planet.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Friday February 27 2015, @04:43PM
This is the thing that confuses me the most. It doesn't even matter if you believe in global warming or not, it doesn't even matter if global warming is "real" or not. If you think dumping megatons of pollutants into the environment is a good idea ...
The thing is this - if you think you are smarter than scientists and believe in the dogma that CO2 is not a greenhouse gas, then it's not pollution. Pollution means *undesirable* emissions. If deniers believe CO2 is not a greenhouse gas, then it's not really pollution. Aside from Global Warming, the only change it's doing is acidifying the oceans, but it's not anywhere near NOx acid-rain era. So it's not really a big deal, "if you believe".
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Thexalon on Friday February 27 2015, @05:02PM
Of course, "if you believe", then evolution is a lie promulgated by Satan, vaccinations are a plot to give kids autism, space aliens had to be involved in building the Pyramids, the US government is run by lizard-men, flouridation of water is a post-WWII communist conspiracy, and gravity is the result of the FSM's Noodly Appendages pushing things to the ground. Belief is a lousy way of deciding anything useful.
But you're right that believing that as a non-scientist you are smarter than a scientist about their area of expertise is the root of a lot of this nonsense.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @10:07PM
Except it doesn't matter what they "believe", because CO2 is demonstrably a greenhouse gas. Therefore, by "believing" something counter to reality they are by definition delusional.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Saturday February 28 2015, @06:00PM
It doesn't matter if CO2 is a greenhouse gas or not, you are disrupting the delicate balance of the extremely fragile and rare ecosystem that exists on our planet. Whether it be nitrogen, argon, oxygen, CO2, helium, or bananas, dumping massive amounts of it is a Bad Thing.
And last I checked, CO2 isn't the only thing produced by burning coal or gas.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday February 27 2015, @06:52PM
Yes, with the next stop being Venus.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @11:58PM
Except that CO2 is not pollution.
It's a natural, normal component of the earths atmosphere, and has been since long before there were humans around.
Indeed, this is one of the dangers that warmists unwittingly court - they spend so much time worrying about perfectly normal CO2 emissions they give real pollution a pass. And that is not ok. I can remember back when pollution - real pollutants, sulfur dioxide, lead, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides etc. - were a very real concern. We've made real progress in minimizing pollution and our environment is cleaner today than when I was a child, but that can reverse very quickly. Especially if everyone is too busy pointlessly worrying about CO2 to pay any attention.
(Score: 2) by gnuman on Friday February 27 2015, @04:13PM
Will this evidence finally silence the deniers and motivate policy makers into action?
1. Deniers can't be silenced more than Roman Catholic Church would admit in 1500 that Earth is not the center of the universe - how many generations did that take?
2. Policy makers care about their next election so ... good luck with that.
Anyway, the "huge sea level increase" is not really sea level increase, more like a changing oceanic currents piling up water in one spot. What can you say about that except that the days of Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Drift are numbered. Northeast coast of US and eastern Canada may soon be renamed into Snowbank.
And it's not just oceanic currents. The decreasing gradient of temperatures between arctic and south is causing the Jet Stream to weaken. This in turn results in weather patterns getting "stuck" in one spot and me enjoying -25C weather for the last 2 months. It's like northern Siberia and this is southern Canada - at about same latitude as Paris. But who knows, maybe if Arctic melts and North Atlantic Current stops, Paris could enjoy my weather and I enjoy Paris weather!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:47PM
with all nuclear pollution finding its way into the ocean it would be in our best interest to keep the global ocean coast line as small as possible.
oh wait...
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27 2015, @04:48PM
Only one site being measured, and said site (southern coast of Alaska, by any chance?) is sinking at the rate of half an inch per year. As in, it's getting closer to the Earth's CORE!
(Score: 2, Interesting) by TLA on Friday February 27 2015, @07:18PM
I'm the parent AC and am at a loss as to why this is being modded "funny", when it was the BBC's Horizon programme that thoroughly debunked one of the BBC's own babies (being the pro-AGW agenda) probably without even realising it. The debunk was also pointed out by National Geographic who asked the great unanswered question as to why a town that had sunk due to tectonic subduction was being used as the only model for AGW being responsible for rising sea levels, and more to the point why out of 34 consecutive data points only twelve and nonconsecutive points were being used by the pro-AGW crowd to argue their point, when there is in fact two thousand one hundred years of unbroken record aggregate data indicating that we are in a normal environmental cycle that means in about 50 years we're likely to see vineyards in Northern Scotland before we're hit in about two hundred years by cool summers and particularly harsh winters again.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:31AM
I remember the last time such an uproar went around, someone pointed out that the oceans' natural fluctuation is significant, a matter of several feet. Which is why when I read TFAs, my first thought was ....so, how does 128mm compare to the margin of error? Does that even cover daily thermal expansion in the surface layers? how about tectonic creep?
128mm. A bit over 5 inches in two years. Seriously?? Some land masses manage more than that.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/01/110119-yellowstone-park-supervolcano-eruption-magma-science/ [nationalgeographic.com]
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by TLA on Monday March 02 2015, @08:41PM
I can well believe it, I'm less than a hundred miles away from a tidal bore (the Severn Estuary) which enjoys spring tide ranges up to 25 feet HIGH and were it not for weirs, would rush 40-50 miles inland. Twice a DAY.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Monday March 02 2015, @09:05PM
Woah. I knew that area had significant tides, but had no idea it was that powerful!
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by TLA on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:24AM
yep. It's basically a giant-arsed funnel with a mouth between Weston Super-Mare and Penarth (just outside of Cardiff) about 9 miles wide, to the West is the Bristol Channel which empties into the Celtic Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The whole thing is fed from the spinward side by four rivers making up the largest (by volume and by total length) single river system in Britain: the Severn/Avon/Usk/Wye Basin. The amount of water coming in from the seaward side twice a day gives a high tidal range (between high tide mark and low tide mark) of a measured 49 feet at Beachley, Gloucestershire. There's a sport of riding the Bore from Newnham up to Tewkesbury - 9.5 miles on the water if you can stand up for that long doing 8 knots and going around some fairly terrifying bends! Best I ever managed was 1.5 miles on my belly (and a rented board) in 1995. Didn't even make it to North Saul. Almost, but not quite.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:04AM
Well, that'll bang your head on the rocks... I found footage of a Severn bore wave, and man, it was bookin', doing about 12mph. Anything in its way is gonna get hit damn hard.
And then there's its cousin,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XddX1PXSl6s [youtube.com]
And then I found this, an ordinary wave peaking at 111 feet in just a couple minutes,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5g6I-FOguQ [youtube.com]
and 128mm in two years starts to sound like a measurement error.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Username on Friday February 27 2015, @05:40PM
Over the existence of homo sapiens the global temperature has been cooling [wikipedia.org], and glacial periods have been increasing. Maybe this could offset the glacial cycle enough to indefinitely extend the holocene epoch.
Then again, our species will probably go extinct in about 200k~300k years, when our evolutionary subspecies outcompetes us for resources. Forcing us down the path of the neanderthals.
So maybe we should engineer a way for global warning to extended it just enough for the length of our species. Leaving the metasapiens with the glacial period, because they deserve it for driving us to extinction.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:23AM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Five_Myr_Climate_Change.svg [wikipedia.org]
Does anyone else think this looks like a natural oscillation that's getting out of hand??
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by CirclesInSand on Friday February 27 2015, @08:35PM
Will this evidence finally silence the deniers and motivate policy makers into action?
He's a denier! Torches and pitchforks, get the heretic!
Has there ever been a more reliable method of changing public opinion than namecalling, heretic/terrorist/communist/denier ? The article doesn't even link to the original paper, and the original paper is paywalled anyway. And if I bothered to get past the paywall, I don't expect to find torrents to raw data, links to the actual program code used by the "models", the software used to compute the results, anything.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Reziac on Saturday February 28 2015, @04:38AM
That's a good point. Is any of the modeling software opensource?
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 1) by TLA on Monday March 02 2015, @10:38PM
even if it were, the data is being systematically and selectively destroyed to leave the cherrypick pro-AGW points. What it's basically left us with is a hockey-stick global temperature curve that starts to rise - constantly - from 1979, using just TWELVE data points between then and 2013. That's what the pro-AGW crowd are using to ram carbon trading scams down our throats and expecting us all to swallow the bullshit.
The fact of the matter is, there is a complete data set, using global sampling from many different sources, and it shows over the last five million years the current trend is a slow fall in temperature followed by a rapid rise, peak then a slow fall. It seems to *follow* a similar trend on one of the solar cycles by about six weeks. IT DOES NOT follow CO2 levels, in fact CO2 levels FOLLOW TEMPERATURE CHANGES, therefore CO2 is NOT an agent of temperature change it is more than likely a direct result of it.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Monday March 02 2015, @11:58PM
Yep, all that and more.
I used to think global warming, even AGW, was a real thing. But *the proponents' own numbers* convinced me otherwise. There's too much cherry-picking (among data that in all probability amounts to statistical noise against the greater natural climate swings) and too much fudge-factoring, not to mention the greater picture of Earth's long-term climate. And then there's the degree of relative influence. Humanity produces vastly more water vapor than it does CO2, yet we're not trading water credits?? oh, I see the problem... you can't tie water credits to energy subsidies!
And then there's those niggling details you mention about the timing of solar cycles and CO2 levels... I was rather impressed what a good fit the solar cycle is for what we see here on Earth, and without sanding down the data.
And another minor detail, that they put so much faith in tree rings as a measure of temperature... er, no. The primary factor in tree ring width isn't temperature, it's water.
I like this guy for an even-handed approach... a typical article:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2015/02/on-natural-climate-variability-and-climate-models/ [drroyspencer.com]
...a climate scientist who doubts?? Heresy!!
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.