Global Warming: Still Happening
by Jasmin Malik Chua, Jersey City, USA on 08.22.07
Photo credit: Mixmaster
Sorry to bust in on your party, climate-change deniers. Even though NASA has admitted that its estimates of average temperatures in the United States needed recalibrating, it doesn't change the fact that the planet is heating up at a frenetic, unnatural pace.
The corrected data shows that the hottest year in the United States on record was 1934, not 1998, as previously thought. NASA's recalculation reduced global average temperatures since 2000, however, by a whopping one-thousandth of a degree, which means that a clear warming trend still exists.
In fact, looking at the five-year period from 2002 to 2006 was still the hottest in the last century, warmer than the same period from 1930 to 1934.
"The deceit behind the attempts to discredit evidence of climate change reveals matters of importance," said Jim Hansen, director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. "This deceit has a clear purpose: to confuse the public about the status of knowledge of global climate change, thus delaying effective action to mitigate climate change."
He adds: "The danger is that delay will cause tipping points to be passed, such that large climate impacts become inevitable, including the loss of all Arctic sea ice, destabilization of the West Antarctic ice sheet with disastrous sea level rise later this century, and extermination of a large fraction of animal and plant species."
Meanwhile, researchers at Britain's Met Office predict that although the next three or four years would show little warming, the real heat will start after 2009. ::Telegraph, ::Real Climate, ::Climate Progress, and ::Reuters
You better believe it's still happening and picking up steam. If, as the Brits say, the real warming won't start until after 2009, you can look at the weather this year and ask, "Will it get worse than this? You might have noticed the Cat 5 hurricane that just landed in Mexico or the flooding that's affected millions in Asia, not to mention the US, England, Europe and Africa. Or how about the extended droughts in the US Southwest, Australia, Africa and China?
Yeah, it's still happening, all right. Don't get complacent just cuz you're buying green clothing. Enjoy life, but remember we're at a unique crossroads in human history.
Who knows what to believe. There's always conflicting information and people trying to predict the future. The truth is, nobody knows. In the 1970s there was even a theory that we were entering the next ice age.
Look for yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling
The global cooling prediction of the 70's was put forward by very few researchers and gained most of its shock value and subsequent buzz from a Newsweek article published at the time (April 28, 1975); accompanied by an ominous front cover. Newsweek had a great deal of influence back then.
There's a lot more consensus on global warming and data available from many, many credible sources to back it. Point taken about predicting the future though.. nature doesn't particularly care about what we forecast, it will do its own thing. If anything, I think we're in for quite a few nasty shocks none of us have seen coming.
All scientific assertions are just hypotheses, but some are better than others. Global cooling was an interesting hypothesis, but it didn't stand up to testing.
The Global Warming hypotheis has been tested thousands of times more than Global Cooling, and still it stands. That's a big big big difference.
That being said, let's not lose perspective. I've been fighting denialists for years, because they use pseudoscience and faulty reasoning. But I really want them to be right, and me to be wrong.
Instead of whining about "it may not be true" or "you can't predict the future" or "there's conflicting information".
Yeah, right. It's too comfortable sitting in your own diaper full of your own crap. You don't want to change, even though its the right thing to do.
How about doing something about it just in case? We would be better off even if global warming is a farse.
Hope for the best, plan for the worst. Too many deniers are hoping for the best, ignoring the possibility for the worst.
New York city experienced the coldest August temperatures in history with a high of only 59 degrees. If weather forecasters can't get the weekly forecasts right, why do we conclude that we can predict years into the future?
The Great Global Warming Swindle.
Even if global warming is real, a global carbon tax will do nothing to stop it. It will fund the Global government that you idiots want though.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/march2007/100307Swindle.htm
New York city experienced the coldest August temperatures in history with a high of only 59 degrees. If weather forecasters can't get the weekly forecasts right, why do we conclude that we can predict years into the future?
The weather v. climate canard is the dumbest "objection" out there. Please try harder.
> You might have noticed the Cat 5 hurricane that
> just landed in Mexico or the flooding that's
> affected millions in Asia, not to mention the US,
> England, Europe and Africa. Or how about the
> extended droughts in the US Southwest,
> Australia, Africa and China?
Because of course there's never been a cat5 hurricane, flooding and droughts before.
John Abele said
Stop being delibrately ignorantCan you correctly guess what number you'll get if you throw a die?
No.
And yet you can assume on average if you throw the die 6000 times that 1000 of the times you'll throw a 1.
Short term weather prediction is to long term climate prediction like
your doctor's opinion concerning smoking: he can't tell you if you'll get a cold tomorrow but he does know the chances of you getting cancer in 30 years are extremely high.
I don't doubt that the Earth is warming up.
I do wonder on man's impact on that.
I still believe we are coming out of an ice age and this is what the results are.
[i]it doesn't change the fact that the planet is heating up at a frenetic, unnatural pace.[/i]
frenetic and unnatural
are you sure?
has this never happened before?
Why are climate denialist trolls even allowed to post here at this point? Is there a point to having to put up with their tail-chasing pack of lies?
"it doesn't change the fact that the planet is heating up at a frenetic, unnatural pace."
What exactly is a natural pace, then?
The problem in talking about Global Climate Change is how it is presented.
Many people agree that the Global Climate is changing, it has done so since the existance of time.
The problem with the argument of most people that use the turm man made global warming is wrong. The basis for the man made climate change is CO2. Which with all serious data is not a cause for climate change, instead it is a product of climate change.
"Stop being delibrately ignorant
Can you correctly guess what number you'll get if you throw a die?
No.
And yet you can assume on average if you throw the die 6000 times that 1000 of the times you'll throw a 1.
Short term weather prediction is to long term climate prediction like
your doctor's opinion concerning smoking: he can't tell you if you'll get a cold tomorrow but he does know the chances of you getting cancer in 30 years are extremely high."
-----------
One day of weather is more significant to your life than a 100 year climate trend to the life of the Earth.
Thats right John Abele, they can't even predict tornadoes in Brooklyn how are they supposed to predict global warming...unless of course global warming might have something to do with things like tornadoes in Brooklyn. Hmm.
Bendu- no.
In other words, ignore that evidence over there and only pay attention to what I tell you. Hansen lost all credibility when he claimed he was being muzzled while spending most of his time being interviewed. What was he getting paid for? Not to mention how uncooperative his office was in providing information to the guy who uncovered the faulty calculations. Where's the oversight in his office? If global warming is so important shouldn't his office be held to the same legal and professional standard as an engineering firm responsible for a bridge collapse?
Fraud always presents it's own evidence as anyone who spends any time with a critical eye on the IPCC temperature chart will understand. Trend lines that disappear when they depart from the desired values. Ad hoc curve fitting after discarding data with no reason given. Tree rings accurate to 0.2 degrees C. and a trend not much bigger than the highly optimistic error.
Isn't that what science is all about? Is global warming hypothesis, theory or law? I can guaranty it is not a law, unlikely a valid theory and yet the "scientist" are trying to stifle debate on what is at best a good hypothesis? And good hypothesis is a stretch since water vapor isn't included in any ones calculations and none of the theories back track. Why was 1934 so warm? If you can't answer that question, global warming is a fraud.
Should it surprise anyone that the loudest proponents of global warming have little if any science education?
The comments posted so far worry me greatly. This is because there have been no posts that make me think that any of the posters have read ANY research on the topic. I expected better from this site's readers. I guess thats what happens when a story is posted on digg.
Please people read a little on the topic and not just things that support your own viewpoint (no matter what that may be). You might be surprised how compelling (given an open mind) alternative arguments can be.
Hey global warming people, might want to read this, you might learn something...
http://agw-heretic.blogspot.com/2007/06/answer-is-blowing-in-solar-wind.html
So where are these long term climate predictions that have proved so accurate that any new predictions are gobbled up like revalations on stone tablets?
If its hot, its proof of global warming, if its cold, its proof of global warming, if its rainy, its proof of global warming, if its dry, its proof of global warming. This is the hallmark of a psuedoscience and I am still skeptical.
Please show me some climate predictions made say, 5 or 10 years back which correlate todays average CO2 content with average global temperatures. I am legitimately interested in seeing these.
NASA's recalculation reduced global average temperatures since 2000, however, by a whopping one-thousandth of a degree, which means that a clear warming trend still exists.
You didn't even read the article you linked to. It was one-hundredth of a degree. but it beat the 1938 temp by one thousandth
Does anyone else remember back in the 1990's when the depletion of the ozone layer was the major topic of concern. Am i the only one still concerned about this? Or is climate change (Global Warming) the only topic of concern these days. Perhaps I'm just being ignorant but shouldn't we all be more concerned with the effects pollution has the our health and the atmosphere that protects and sustains us, rather then yet unknown (CO2?) reasons for slight changes global temperature.
Just a thought.
John Abele: Current temperature in New York City is 75 degrees F. What on earth are you talking about a high of 59 degrees? Besides, climate change projections don't predict uniformly warmer temperatures, they often show extreme variability including unusual cold. I think you've just weakened your case.
Treehugger.com?
Anyway... global warming and cooling is a well known naturally occurring cycle, not enough is known to say if we have affected it to where its taking place at an 'unnatural' rate. At the very most Ill consent to saying humans may be causing it to insignificantly speed up or slow down or whatever the cycle is doing on its own already.
An insightful second opinion is here:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6393326099470628258&hl=en-GB
Global warming doesn't exist, therfore I will continue burning ungodly amounts of gasoline in order to fill the air with as much green house gas as is humanly possible.
Sorry to bust in on your party, Jasmin, but you're an idiot. Don't ever write about science. Ever.
It amuses me to no end that people who think Global Warming is a load of bull are automatically assumed to be outright deniers of climate change. Climate change is very real, and accepting that fact does not necessarily meant that a person believes that Global Warming is a valid theory. Global Warming implies that mankind has had a direct impact on the heating of the globe, and while it's very likely that they have, it is not quite so likely that we as a species are the sole root of it as many of the Global Warming proponents would have people believe.
Climate change is real. Global Warming may or may not be.
no joke brian. How conceited are we to think we can do anything to whole planet? It has just been proven that planting more trees (like we have been told to do for so long) in the higher latitudes has a net warming effect on the planet. There were scientists in the sixties that told us we needed to put a thin film of oil on all the lakes in N. America in order to suppress evaporation.
>>New York city experienced the coldest August >>temperatures in history with a high of only 59 degrees. If >>weather forecasters can't get the weekly forecasts right, >>why do we conclude that we can predict years into the >>future?
>The weather v. climate canard is the dumbest "objection" >out there. Please try harder.
It's only a dumb "objection" when it's used to refer to cold spells or record lows (or low highs, in this case), right? But let a heat wave hit or a new record high be set and it's front-page news.
More hypocricy...
right?
Wrong.
More hypocricy...
Dumb opinions about climate change, can't spell. Quelle surprise.
Oh dear....when will the Sky Is Falling types ever learn?
Guys, pretty much every single prediction you've made has failed utterly--so much so that NOW you're in the same shoes as the "world is gonna end tomorrow" crowd. When it manifestly does NOT end you say, "Well, okay not today, but just wait until NEXT WEEK!".
So now it's gonna "get serious" in 2009? I remember last year a bunch of British scientists (the same ones I wonder? that would be an interesting check) saying that we'd passed the tipping point and that nothing we did would stop it.
Guys, global warming and global cooling are natural and the way the world works. Deny it all you want--the facts don't need to bother you I guess--but anybody looking at the history of the planet can tell you this.
Wake me when it gets as warm as it was when the Vikings put settlements in Greeland--THEN, maybe, I'll worry about it.
Until then live your lives peacefully and as cleanly as possible, which is what I do (100% of my power comes from wind and solar) and set examples. Be a candle in the darkness, don't curse the world for not being brighter.
Ferretman
Mount St Helens belched out more greenhouse gasses in one blast than man had since the dawn of the industrial revolution. The result? Global temps FELL on average the next two years. Wonderful how nature takes care of itself. After that, things went back to normal, and trees LOVE carbondioxide.
no, not like it's hot in Arizona any way
One scientists says yes to Global Warming, the
next one says no to it.
I go with the 'NO' opinnion in as much as fluxuaations in weather happen all the time.
Climate change is the name I prefer to use to describe our mess in the weather. Every day there are REAL HARD CORE DISASTERS. Pain and suffering and death are our daily news.
Everybody will probably call me crazy, but I have come to the conclusion that God is having to turn His face away from this man made moral disaster
called Planet Earth, with its wars, murder, and criminal types, that removes His protection from us.
He gives us free will to choose our actions and we have chosen badly.
Then there is this thing called entropy. We are growing old as a planet and running down.
Old things fall apart and lose control.
What is the answer? Who knows?
Finally some common sense.
As of today, there is no evidence that CO2 is warming the planet. Conversely, we cannot conclude that it is not. That said, there are so many natural forces mcuh greater than CO2 concentrations, that small changes in CO2 get lost in the noise. Many scientists are predicting a cooldown in the next 20-30 years based on sunspots, cosmic radiation, or fluctuation in ocean currents. All natural. IF after all these natural variations play out, and the temperature is still rising, then maybe CO2 is having a real effect.
I've been hearing a lot of the Vikings lately, especially pertaining to their settling in Greenland. And its beginning to get on my nerves.
A clarification is in order. When Eric the Red(i believe) went to Greenland, it wasn't green. It was frozen white. They named it Greenland as part of their advertising stratergy to lure people there. something similar to their advertising about the volga river. They brought people to russia the same way they got people to Greenland. By telling them how warm the place was.
The name Greenland (Grænland in Old Norse and modern Icelandic, Grønland in modern Danish and Norwegian) has its roots in this colonization and is attributed to Erik the Red (the Inuit call it Kalaallit Nunaat, meaning "Land of the Kalaallit (Greenlanders)")
There are two written sources on the origin of the name, in the The Book of Icelanders (Íslendingabók), an historical work dealing with early Icelandic history from the 12th century, and in the medieval Icelandic saga, The Saga of Eric the Red (Eiriks saga rauða), which is about the Norse settlement in Greenland and the story of Eric the Red in particular. Both sources write: "He named the land Greenland, saying that people would be eager to go there if it had a good name."
As an aside, the word Russia comes from the word "Rus", which is what the original inhabitants of that place used to called the Viking setlers.
global warming is not only an overwhelming assertion for the worlds current probs. but its also a little extreme. But on the other hand if global warming is true. if it really is true. then were talking about global crisis. Floods, hurricanes, droughts, economic deconstruction. but also the effort to prevent or "solve" this "big problem" would alter society in an unconvincing way. That last effort to fix man kinds deconstruction of the world as we know it would cost much more than money. Global depression. Low resources, little or no money that is spent willingly for self benefits. everyone would struggle, everywhere. Either way, the worlds fate that is chosen for the better will alter not one significant group of people, but alter the entirety of mankind. Were all in this catastrophe, if there is one, together. Maybe this single obstruction in the obstacle of mankind's path will bring everyone together. Maybe not, but everything that everyones suggested so far has been nothing but theory. Im just adding one to this long list full of inquiries and assertions.
Well, Global warming or cooling is sure in this year.
I'm sure afraid it will happen.
People are saying it will and it will not.
Who to believe?