White House issues new dire climate report: Scientists: Extreme weather will worsen if pollutants aren't curbed

[HAL 9000 96]

I liked 84.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Must have missed some important stuff in almost 200 posts.

Any strategy that combat global climate change beyond having phony target limits that few if any nations have met in the last 20 years?

If there's no measurable reduction, then what? More money in research, harsher penalties on industry and people?

What if the effects are so slow in a limited human lifespan that no one really notices the climate change or merely accepts it as inevitable?

Sounds crazy but if you recall growing up with all the scary predictions about life in the year 2000 as so terrible and different, it really hurts the cause.

1984? Wow, really scary year there.

We successfully reduced acid rain through a cap and trade system. So the question isn't whether we can reduce carbon emissions but whether or not we will be able to slow the rate of climate change. The numbers suggest we can.

[Peikko 1,575]

1984 wasn't scary - it was a work of fiction (well, not the year, clearly that was all too real - but the predictions where never meant to be taken seriously)

Year 2000 stuff, quite a different kettle of fish. A case of, it was successfully counteracted so people decided it was never serious

[tmma 467]

Must have missed some important stuff in almost 200 posts.

Any strategy that combat global climate change beyond having phony target limits that few if any nations have met in the last 20 years?

If there's no measurable reduction, then what? More money in research, harsher penalties on industry and people?

What if the effects are so slow in a limited human lifespan that no one really notices the climate change or merely accepts it as inevitable?

Sounds crazy but if you recall growing up with all the scary predictions about life in the year 2000 as so terrible and different, it really hurts the cause.

1984? Wow, really scary year there.

1984-Good book and a good year for me. I was into glam rock and had multicoloured big hair.

I remember 'Space-1999' on TV when I was a kid. I grew up thinking by 1999 we'd all be living in some sort of environmental bubble on the moon.

[HAL 9000 96]

Must have missed some important stuff in almost 200 posts.

Any strategy that combat global climate change beyond having phony target limits that few if any nations have met in the last 20 years?

If there's no measurable reduction, then what? More money in research, harsher penalties on industry and people?

What if the effects are so slow in a limited human lifespan that no one really notices the climate change or merely accepts it as inevitable?

Sounds crazy but if you recall growing up with all the scary predictions about life in the year 2000 as so terrible and different, it really hurts the cause.

1984? Wow, really scary year there.

We successfully reduced acid rain through a cap and trade system. So the question isn't whether we can reduce carbon emissions but whether or not we will be able to slow the rate of climate change. The numbers suggest we can.

Acid Rain!!!

I used to have to coat my shell with basic sunscreen to neutralize the pH.

Must have missed some important stuff in almost 200 posts.

Any strategy that combat global climate change beyond having phony target limits that few if any nations have met in the last 20 years?

If there's no measurable reduction, then what? More money in research, harsher penalties on industry and people?

What if the effects are so slow in a limited human lifespan that no one really notices the climate change or merely accepts it as inevitable?

Sounds crazy but if you recall growing up with all the scary predictions about life in the year 2000 as so terrible and different, it really hurts the cause.

1984? Wow, really scary year there.

1984-Good book and a good year for me. I was into glam rock and had multicoloured big hair.

I remember 'Space-1999' on TV when I was a kid. I grew up thinking by 1999 we'd all be living in some sort of environmental bubble on the moon.

Hey there's some interesting stuff coming out about actually returning to the Moon on a more permanent basis, and it appears it isn't political posturing like the last time a Presidential Proclamation was made on the topic...

[scandal 951]

Bill, so where do you stand on those points?

The earth is a dynamic system. There are large contributers to the system. Man is a contributer. Man's contribution is measurable and somewhat significant in the short term, but probably insignificant in the long term, given the magnitude of the large contibuters. There are some mathematical models for "natural systems", in the way the things in nature propagate, that without detroying the base structure, that no matter what stress is applied to the system, that the base structure will continue to be replicated in the system as a whole.

You haven't defined short and long term. Over the really long term, i.e. geological timespans, you are absolutely right.Much of Earth's history we HAD no atmosphere, or we had an atmosphere of vastly different composition with vastly different concentrations of N2, O2, CO2, methane. And undoubtedly, no matter what humans do, at some future time after we're long gone, again the Earth will revert to vastly different atmospheres (and thus climactic conditions). Human activity has been a factor for a blink of an eye, geologically speaking. The Earth is 4.5 billion years old. Humans have existed for several million. Human activity that could possibly have significant effects (deforestation, species extinction, etc.) is a factor over at most 10,000 years or so. The Earth, and life on Earth, long term , doesn't give a ####### about human activity and will bounce back. We came, we'll do our little bit, we'll go extinct, and the planet will go on and life on the planet will go on long after we are gone. Until, of course, the sun becomes a red giant which will end it all.

However, that long term isn't what matters to us humans. There's a short term that we as humans have every reason to be concerned about, measured in decades and in human generations. The planet has had previous episodes of global warming types of conditions. Temperatures were higher, Antarctica was part of the super continent of Gondwana and supported tropical lifeforms. We know from the geological record what life on Earth was like then, and it won't be very comfortable for humans as a habitat. Think Venus, for a moment, as an extreme example of a greenhouse effect.

Sure, we could through our activities push the planet back to those kinds of conditions. And it won't mean the end of life, or even necessarily the end of humanity. But it will mean vast changes in the lifestyle humans currently have, and most of them are likely to be uncomfortable to say the least. Consider New York and the eastern seaboard being submerged, for starters. These are not trivial consequences. This is not about the temperature in December being a tiny bit balmier.

To your more specific query, in our effort to be able to control the enviroment in which we live, we forget that events over which we have no control jeopardize our existence to a greater extent than those things we can control.

That is true, of course. We could be hit by an asteroid the size of Manhattan next week. The sun could send out massive solar flares and fry us. There could be sudden vast tectonic movements of the continental plates, causing a new mountain range bigger than the Himalayas to suddenly rupture along the the California coast and turn Sonoma county into sherpa-territory. There could be a massive outbreak of airborne lethal bacteria which wipes out 20% of humanity in 3 weeks. There could be a rapid burning away of the ozone layer leading everyone who steps outdoors to instantly go blind and contract melanoma by being exposed to direct bursts of UV radiation. Shall I go on?

The point being, we do control our destiny to a certain extent. It is human nature to try to control our destiny. To ignore known dangers and threats that could affect our lives and those of our children and grandchildren is irresponsible. To argue that other things can kill us, so why bother, doesn't make much sense to me.

As far as the release of carbon into the atmosphere in the form of CO₂, I would like to know exactly how much hydrocarbon is left to be released, and whether, or not, for what is left, will the impact be all that significant in the short, or long term. I have already seen some studies that suggest that quantity and exploitation has already peaked, and within a decade it will be a non-issue, given the leadtime necessary to do any remediation of the problem.

It short, we will run out of oil before we find a way to solve the problem petroleum use has caused. However, the need to develop alternative sources of energy is real. That should be more of a concern than the issue of carbon sequestation.

Keep in mind that carbon-based fossil fuels consist of much more than petroleum. Coal is far and away a larger source of trapped carbon, and there are hundreds of not thousands of years worth of extractable coal in the continental US.

Post #3 for today.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Thank you, HAL, and welcome back.

I've never wanted to get into arguing over the science behind the theory of Global Warming because I believe that I have at least a decent grasp at understanding scientific process of how scientific theory comes into being.

What Gary and many others here have argued time and time again, is first, that Global Warming isn't actually taking place, or that if it is, it isn't being accelerated by carbon emissions. I think Bill has expressed those views, but correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm just hoping that we can all concede that:

1. Global Warming is a scientific theory

2. There is a consensus among the scientific community on that theory.

3. Hal, you'll have to help me on this, but the contention man-made carbon emissions are accelerating climate change is also a scientific theory.

Well, people's ability to come to conclusions in science isn't always necessarily accurate. As a scientist I am always willing to accept that even the most sound theory- even what some define as 'law' and 'fact' have potential to be disproven by virtue of the nature of how the data was acquired. Nevertheless...

There is the accepted notion that given sufficient, strong, correlative evidence, even at low statistical inference levels, that a set of observations can still support a hypothesis as being significant enough to be able to reject the 'No change- Null' hypothesis. That is one of the pillars of scientific reasoning.

So given these basic steps of thought:

1. GW is indeed a theory with scientific underpinnings and evidence to make the theory plausible AND strongly correlative.

2. There is a consensus, with debate, about the mechanisms of the theory of GW, both natural and artificial. What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial. The scientific community is by and large quite clear on this, and this indeed is fact.

3. Yes. This is also a heavily tested theory, with strong ties to your point #1.

Claiming that CO2 is a lagging factor behind mean global temperature (and therefore prone to be discredited) is an inaccurate and incomplete picture of how global temperature propagates. Remember, the argument tends to claim that since the atmosphere occupies such a large volume, any physical effects from increased greenhouse gas is mitigated in that volume. But right there you have a counterargument:

a. The atmosphere is not uniform. Gases do not evenly spread about it. And in the layers where they do, Brownian motion (random) makes the gas molecules distribute. Since each molecular bond can hold energy, a more evenly distributed amount, at higher concentrations, will in turn hold more heat energy.

b. Energy is not a linear phenomenon. The more concentrated gas molecules exist within a defined space, the more intermolecular collisions will occur. This increases the amount of energy released as a result of these collisions. Think of it as placing two marbles in one box and moving the box around. Then add marbles to the box, one at a time, repeating the same motion. The number of audible collisions will do what?

You need to clean this up a little bit.

High pass or low pass filter?

Pretty clear to me.

I was trying interpret this sentence fragment. Feels like an additional verb might clarify for me what your thought was here:

What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial.

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Must have missed some important stuff in almost 200 posts.

Any strategy that combat global climate change beyond having phony target limits that few if any nations have met in the last 20 years?

If there's no measurable reduction, then what? More money in research, harsher penalties on industry and people?

What if the effects are so slow in a limited human lifespan that no one really notices the climate change or merely accepts it as inevitable?

Sounds crazy but if you recall growing up with all the scary predictions about life in the year 2000 as so terrible and different, it really hurts the cause.

1984? Wow, really scary year there.

1984-Good book and a good year for me. I was into glam rock and had multicoloured big hair.

I remember 'Space-1999' on TV when I was a kid. I grew up thinking by 1999 we'd all be living in some sort of environmental bubble on the moon.

Started college for real that time, and got laid a lot that year, if I remember right.

[HAL 9000 96]

Thank you, HAL, and welcome back.

I've never wanted to get into arguing over the science behind the theory of Global Warming because I believe that I have at least a decent grasp at understanding scientific process of how scientific theory comes into being.

What Gary and many others here have argued time and time again, is first, that Global Warming isn't actually taking place, or that if it is, it isn't being accelerated by carbon emissions. I think Bill has expressed those views, but correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm just hoping that we can all concede that:

1. Global Warming is a scientific theory

2. There is a consensus among the scientific community on that theory.

3. Hal, you'll have to help me on this, but the contention man-made carbon emissions are accelerating climate change is also a scientific theory.

Well, people's ability to come to conclusions in science isn't always necessarily accurate. As a scientist I am always willing to accept that even the most sound theory- even what some define as 'law' and 'fact' have potential to be disproven by virtue of the nature of how the data was acquired. Nevertheless...

There is the accepted notion that given sufficient, strong, correlative evidence, even at low statistical inference levels, that a set of observations can still support a hypothesis as being significant enough to be able to reject the 'No change- Null' hypothesis. That is one of the pillars of scientific reasoning.

So given these basic steps of thought:

1. GW is indeed a theory with scientific underpinnings and evidence to make the theory plausible AND strongly correlative.

2. There is a consensus, with debate, about the mechanisms of the theory of GW, both natural and artificial. What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial. The scientific community is by and large quite clear on this, and this indeed is fact.

3. Yes. This is also a heavily tested theory, with strong ties to your point #1.

Claiming that CO2 is a lagging factor behind mean global temperature (and therefore prone to be discredited) is an inaccurate and incomplete picture of how global temperature propagates. Remember, the argument tends to claim that since the atmosphere occupies such a large volume, any physical effects from increased greenhouse gas is mitigated in that volume. But right there you have a counterargument:

a. The atmosphere is not uniform. Gases do not evenly spread about it. And in the layers where they do, Brownian motion (random) makes the gas molecules distribute. Since each molecular bond can hold energy, a more evenly distributed amount, at higher concentrations, will in turn hold more heat energy.

b. Energy is not a linear phenomenon. The more concentrated gas molecules exist within a defined space, the more intermolecular collisions will occur. This increases the amount of energy released as a result of these collisions. Think of it as placing two marbles in one box and moving the box around. Then add marbles to the box, one at a time, repeating the same motion. The number of audible collisions will do what?

You need to clean this up a little bit.

High pass or low pass filter?

Pretty clear to me.

I was trying interpret this sentence fragment. Feels like an additional verb might clarify for me what your thought was here:

What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial.

Yes I just realized your point. Thanks. To finish that particular sentence:

"What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial, is the proportion of what contributes to the whole change observations."

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Thank you, HAL, and welcome back.

I've never wanted to get into arguing over the science behind the theory of Global Warming because I believe that I have at least a decent grasp at understanding scientific process of how scientific theory comes into being.

What Gary and many others here have argued time and time again, is first, that Global Warming isn't actually taking place, or that if it is, it isn't being accelerated by carbon emissions. I think Bill has expressed those views, but correct me if I'm wrong.

I'm just hoping that we can all concede that:

1. Global Warming is a scientific theory

2. There is a consensus among the scientific community on that theory.

3. Hal, you'll have to help me on this, but the contention man-made carbon emissions are accelerating climate change is also a scientific theory.

Well, people's ability to come to conclusions in science isn't always necessarily accurate. As a scientist I am always willing to accept that even the most sound theory- even what some define as 'law' and 'fact' have potential to be disproven by virtue of the nature of how the data was acquired. Nevertheless...

There is the accepted notion that given sufficient, strong, correlative evidence, even at low statistical inference levels, that a set of observations can still support a hypothesis as being significant enough to be able to reject the 'No change- Null' hypothesis. That is one of the pillars of scientific reasoning.

So given these basic steps of thought:

1. GW is indeed a theory with scientific underpinnings and evidence to make the theory plausible AND strongly correlative.

2. There is a consensus, with debate, about the mechanisms of the theory of GW, both natural and artificial. What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial. The scientific community is by and large quite clear on this, and this indeed is fact.

3. Yes. This is also a heavily tested theory, with strong ties to your point #1.

Claiming that CO2 is a lagging factor behind mean global temperature (and therefore prone to be discredited) is an inaccurate and incomplete picture of how global temperature propagates. Remember, the argument tends to claim that since the atmosphere occupies such a large volume, any physical effects from increased greenhouse gas is mitigated in that volume. But right there you have a counterargument:

a. The atmosphere is not uniform. Gases do not evenly spread about it. And in the layers where they do, Brownian motion (random) makes the gas molecules distribute. Since each molecular bond can hold energy, a more evenly distributed amount, at higher concentrations, will in turn hold more heat energy.

b. Energy is not a linear phenomenon. The more concentrated gas molecules exist within a defined space, the more intermolecular collisions will occur. This increases the amount of energy released as a result of these collisions. Think of it as placing two marbles in one box and moving the box around. Then add marbles to the box, one at a time, repeating the same motion. The number of audible collisions will do what?

You need to clean this up a little bit.

High pass or low pass filter?

Pretty clear to me.

I was trying interpret this sentence fragment. Feels like an additional verb might clarify for me what your thought was here:

What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial.

Yes I just realized your point. Thanks. To finish that particular sentence:

"What is unclear at this stage of research, due to the multiple, complex, combination of factors that contribute to the phenomeon, both natural and artificial, is the proportion of what contributes to the whole change observations."

Bingo! Now I can agree with your statement.

[HAL 9000 96]

Thanks for reading.

[ready4ONE 5,400]

How about, instead of cap and trading carbon...

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200907/climate-engineering

[nowhereman 1]

DIRE and EXTREME in the title.

If you have nothing worthwhile to add then you are just trolling.

Well, your useless comment added no value.

Actually it did... yours was just plain stupid. If you're bored go mow the lawn or something.

Let me explain it so even someone of your intelligence can understand.

By using DIRE and EXTREME the Obama administration is using scare tactics. Is this more 'change'?

Most of the people on this thread are making intelligent remarks & you do a drive by with some dumb jab at the Obama administration... this wasn't meant to be a political thread & your remarks so far have contributed nothing of value. Go make your 8th grade level insults in another thread please.

[Ban Hammer 13,352]

DIRE and EXTREME in the title.

If you have nothing worthwhile to add then you are just trolling.

Well, your useless comment added no value.

Actually it did... yours was just plain stupid. If you're bored go mow the lawn or something.

Let me explain it so even someone of your intelligence can understand.

By using DIRE and EXTREME the Obama administration is using scare tactics. Is this more 'change'?

Most of the people on this thread are making intelligent remarks & you do a drive by with some dumb jab at the Obama administration... this wasn't meant to be a political thread & your remarks so far have contributed nothing of value. Go make your 8th grade level insults in another thread please.

if the white house issued the statement and a thread was made about it, it's a political thread.

[nowhereman 1]

DIRE and EXTREME in the title.

If you have nothing worthwhile to add then you are just trolling.

Well, your useless comment added no value.

Actually it did... yours was just plain stupid. If you're bored go mow the lawn or something.

Let me explain it so even someone of your intelligence can understand.

By using DIRE and EXTREME the Obama administration is using scare tactics. Is this more 'change'?

Most of the people on this thread are making intelligent remarks & you do a drive by with some dumb jab at the Obama administration... this wasn't meant to be a political thread & your remarks so far have contributed nothing of value. Go make your 8th grade level insults in another thread please.

if the white house issued the statement and a thread was made about it, it's a political thread.

That's weak Charles & you know it... Lucky Strike's only intention was to take the thread off topic & make it yet another bash Obama thread. There are 3,982 of those threads already; this one shouldn't be 3,983 (there is actually intelligent discussion going on, for a change).