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Post by sentient on Jun 15, 2010 3:12:30 GMT
AGW is not saying there will be a catastrophe, all AGW is saying is that humans are causing the earth to warm.
And this is a bad thing, right? At the classic end of a typical, acknowledged extreme interglacial that has no insolation hope of becoming a double-interglacial like MIS-11? I'm sorry, the orbital dynamics are not with us here, and the clock is necessarily running out well after the usual 10kyr thermal interglacial peaks.. you'd better hope whatever it is we do causes the earth to warm. It does so anyway rather strongly and rather quixotically at the end of every other interglacial, producing a 6 meter excursion in sea levels after a double peak ending in the last one, the Eemian. That old, pesky signal to noise ratio problem. And then there's that gosh-awful quiet sun. Talk about tipping points....... It's the ramifications of that which have the risk of catastrophe as the worse case scenario.
You have to get above 6 meters to net a worst case scenario. It happened at the close of the last interglacial, I have read nothing to suggest it could not happen again. There's no rule book by which earth has to respond to such a change in a way that maintains the status quo.
Hello? Come in? You were breaking up there. Can you hear earth now? The actual effects are largely uncertain and the system is so complexYou're pulling our legs, right? Just a minute....Just a minute.....Dave, I'm picking up an error on the AE-35 unit .....europe became 5C cooler in summer at the expense of a region elsewhere that becomes 5C warmer.That would be the dreaded see-saw effect again. Bloody thing pops up all the time between the hemispheres, and particularly so when major climate changes are naturally imminent. Such as at the end interglacials, terminations, sub-orbital excursions (think D-O events) etc. Uncommonly common old chap. For all we know...... And how much do any of us really know about climate? I often think of climate like Hooter's jingle "Delightfully tacky, yet unrefined" Chaotically nonlinear, yet vexingly punctual. Until we understand it, no computer will. The more one learns, the more one learns there is to learn. MIS-11 seems to have lasted 28kyrs, but it was a two thermal peak interglacial. MIS-9, 3rd interglacial back, stayed above 3.6 parts per mil O18 for perhaps 13kyrs, MIS-5 about 12kyrs. Other estimates cut those by about 1-2kyrs, sliding the present age of the Holocene, 11kyrs, not particularly extraordinary. And abrupt coolings and warming populate the proxy records of the most recent end-interglacials. Meaning noise gets greater and "signal" needing particular emphasis to even be noticed. What we know, at least. Warmist's need to work on their signal strength some more. We had 20-feet of Gore at the last end-interglacial. Is that all you got? That's what is proposed, as well as refuted, to have been the cause of the end-Eemian highstand. We might very well be the cause, but it does happen anyway
for all that we know.Attachments:
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Post by hunter on Jun 15, 2010 3:41:26 GMT
I'll explain the potential catastrophe from the AGW perspective. AGW is not saying there will be a catastrophe, all AGW is saying is that humans are causing the earth to warm. It's the ramifications of that which have the risk of catastrophe as the worse case scenario. A number of greenhouse gases are rising due to human activity and will affect the energy balance of Earth's climate invoking a significant change to compensate. Part of that change will be significant warming, but that's not going to be the only change. There will be knock on effects on various interconnected systems in the world. For example precipitation patterns, ice sheets, sea ice, habitat ranges of species, and probably hundreds more. These in turn will likely have knock on effects on other systems in turn and ultimately on us. The actual effects are largely uncertain and the system is so complex that some effects will probably come out of left field. But risk isn't mitigated by not knowing what will happen. The reason things like loss of arctic sea ice cover over the summer and fall months are focused on is because these are big imminent changes to the climate with possible large knock on effects on other systems. There's no rule book by which earth has to respond to such a change in a way that maintains the status quo. For all we know an Earth with very little arctic ice cover in summer months has different weather patterns than we have observed to date. The Earth's climate wouldn't care much about moving into a new configuration where western europe became 5C cooler in summer at the expense of a region elsewhere that becomes 5C warmer. that is why there is a difference between AGW and CAGW. Your arguments falls apart because you do not really believe what you are saying. You are a committed true believer to CAGW. Your ridiculous claims about the 'observed changes' in weather due to Arcitic ice change are insultingly ignorant. Please peddle them somewhere else. |
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Post by socold on Jun 26, 2010 19:53:04 GMT
AGW is not saying there will be a catastrophe, all AGW is saying is that humans are causing the earth to warm.
And this is a bad thing, right? It could be - there will be other changes than temperature. Many many changes. Expecting all those changes to come up roses is optimistic in my opinion. Can we afford to be optimistic when you admit we don't understand how the climate will respond and that the climate is a chaotic system? [QUTOE]At the classic end of a typical, acknowledged extreme interglacial that has no insolation hope of becoming a double-interglacial like MIS-11?[/QUOTE] IPCC report says: "It is virtually certain that global temperatures during coming centuries will not be significantly influenced by a natural orbitally induced cooling. It is very unlikely that the Earth would naturally enter another ice age for at least 30 kyr." "Only a strong reduction in summer insolation at high northern latitudes, along with associated feedbacks, can end the current interglacial. Given that current low orbital eccentricity will persist over the next tens of thousand years, the effects of precession are minimised, and extremely cold northern summer orbital configurations like that of the last glacial initiation at 116 ka will not take place for at least 30 kyr (Box 6.1). Under a natural CO2 regime (i.e., with the global temperature-CO2 correlation continuing as in the Vostok and EPICA Dome C ice cores), the next glacial period would not be expected to start within the next 30 kyr (Loutre and Berger, 2000; Berger and Loutre, 2002; EPICA Community Members, 2004). Sustained high atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, comparable to a mid-range CO2 stabilisation scenario, may lead to a complete melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet (Church et al., 2001) and further delay the onset of the next glacial period (Loutre and Berger, 2000; Archer and Ganopolski, 2005)." So not only does it look like there will be no imminent glacial period, but banking on one occuring anyway and corresponding exactly with the next few hundred years and exactly cancelling out the human effect is highly far fetched. The last time sea level rose 6 meters above present there were no humans outside africa. So the past does not provide comfort about a smaller change occuring today. This is more evidence that the climate doesn't care about us and will just switch into different states and force massive change on us. Climate is a chaotic non-linear system. A nudge by human emissions could be enough to do all sorts of changes. The climate hasn't seen 500ppm co2 levels for the past 10 million years. What will that do? Neither of us knows how the climate will respond to such a nudge. Our ignorance is why there is a threat of catastrophy. If you could prove that our nudging of the climate system would have no effect you would disprove that threat of catastrophy. |
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Post by socold on Jun 26, 2010 19:54:30 GMT
Your ridiculous claims about the 'observed changes' in weather due to Arcitic ice change are insultingly ignorant. Please peddle them somewhere else. Prove that a regular loss of arctic sea ice during summer months will have no effect on weather systems in at high latitudes. If you can't do that then you have no basis to assume it won't. As I am putting forward a threat you can't dismiss a threat based on ignorance. Threats don't disappear just because you don't understand how things work. |
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Post by icefisher on Jun 26, 2010 20:12:07 GMT
If you can't do that then you have no basis to assume it won't. There is no requirement that individuals have a basis upon which to make assumptions. So your point is meaningless.
As I am putting forward a threat you can't dismiss a threat based on ignorance. Threats don't disappear just because you don't understand how things work. I can dismiss anything you put forth you are unable to demonstrate to be true whether I understand how things work or not. That is the very essence of freedom. |
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Post by socold on Jun 26, 2010 20:15:23 GMT
If you can't do that then you have no basis to assume it won't. There is no requirement that individuals have a basis upon which to make assumptions. That's just semantics. Assumptions have no basis, doesn't alter my point. You cannot dismiss the threat of AGW by appealing to ignorance of how the climate works. You also have the freedom to ignore valid points with word games. |
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Post by icefisher on Jun 26, 2010 22:49:57 GMT
There is no requirement that individuals have a basis upon which to make assumptions. That's just semantics. Assumptions have no basis, doesn't alter my point. You cannot dismiss the threat of AGW by appealing to ignorance of how the climate works. I can dismiss anything you put forth you are unable to demonstrate to be true whether I understand how things work or not. That is the very essence of freedom. You also have the freedom to ignore valid points with word games. [/quote] Freedom is not a word game it is something worth killing and dying for. The burden of proof is on you and since you don't have it you resort to trying to reverse the burden of proof. |
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Post by scpg02 on Jun 27, 2010 1:40:08 GMT
Freedom is not a word game it is something worth killing and dying for. Amen! |
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Post by sigurdur on Jun 27, 2010 1:45:26 GMT
Freedom is not a word game it is something worth killing and dying for. Amen! And if you love your enemy, it will drive them nuts. |
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Post by scpg02 on Jun 27, 2010 2:59:58 GMT
And if you love your enemy, it will drive them nuts. Hard to love your enemy when they are denying you your rights. But I get your point. |
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Post by socold on Jun 27, 2010 3:49:40 GMT
The only burden of proof on me is to provide grounds of a threat:
1) co2 is rising due to human activity
2) It's rising beyond levels seen for millions of years and will rise a lot further if human emissions continue
3) Such a rise in co2 has a significant effect on Earth's energy budget
4) The Earth's climate is not stable. The paleodata shows it is a chaotic and non-linear system and great shifts can suddenly occur when it's nudged.
5) The climate and environment in general has a lot of interconnecting subsystems. Changing one significantly can have a knock on effect on others.
There is an analogy with a sleeping bear. There is a risk of catastrophe if you poke a sleeping bear with a stick. That threat is based on knowing that bears can get aggressive and may respond as such to being poked. But sure the bear might just ignore it, or might just move and sleep somewhere else. But there is no burden of proof required to warn that poking the bear is risky.
The knowledge we have about climate shows there is a risk of catastrophic changes to the climate and/or environment if co2 continues rising. It's a plausible threat. I don't have to prove what will happen, I only have to point out that it's plausible.
On the otherhand if you argue that catastrophic manmade global warming is false the burden of proof is upon you to prove that none of the aspects of climate or the environment as a whole will react to the changes in a catastrophic way. Of course that is impossible, as skeptics well know the climate is not understood nearly well enough for us to guarantee doubling co2 won't have a catastrophic effect.
Case in point was the CFC-ozone hole issue. Man introduced a molecule not seen in nature before - CFCs. Doing so had unforeseen consequences. The molecule ended up acting as a problematic catalyst for ozone destruction and had a particularly significant effect on the antarctic ozone hole size. This was because the effect was multiplied in the presence of a certain type of stratospheric clouds over the antarctic.
If we stick within natural limits that are tried and tested by our current climate there should be little risk. But go outside that range and introduce new molecules into the atmosphere such as CFCs and you are taking a risk. Raising co2 to 500ppm is also outside the tested range of the current climate and again there is a risk.
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Post by icefisher on Jun 27, 2010 4:17:05 GMT
The only burden of proof on me is to provide grounds of a threat and I have done that.
1) co2 is rising due to human activity Yes its rising because of humans and it is rising because it is getting warmer. That is probably a good thing, not a threat.
2) It's rising beyond levels seen for millions of years and will rise a lot further if human emissions continueThe evidence is weak and uncorroborated. A gypsy can read tea leaves and reading icecore bubbles is not a heck of a lot different.
3) Such a rise in co2 has a significant effect on Earth's energy budget
Significant? What evidence do you have?
4) The Earth's climate is not stable. The paleodata shows it is a chaotic and non-linear system and great shifts can suddenly occur when it's nudged.
Nudged? What tea leaves are you reading here?
5) The climate and environment in general has a lot of interconnecting subsystems. Changing one significantly can have a knock on effect on others.No surprise there!
This is a analogous to a sleeping bear. There is a similar risk of catastrophy if you poke a sleeping bear with a stick. That threat is based on knowing that bears can get aggressive and may respond as such to being poked. But sure the bear might just ignore it, or might just move and sleep somewhere else. But there sure is no burden on me to prove how the bear will react in order to justifiably warn that poking the bear is risky.
Risk depends upon what kind of stick you have or what else you may be carrying in your holster. Mankind has stuck a lot of bears and so far it is the bears that have come out the worst for it.
The knowledge we do have shows there is a risk of catastrophic changes to the climate and/or environment if co2 continues rising. It's a plausible threat. I don't have to prove what will happen, I only have to point out that it's plausible.
There is risk crossing the street. And plausible risk isn't enough to convince me. You have to convince at least half the public that plausible risk is sufficient to regulate carbon and you are not even close to getting my vote.
On the otherhand if you argue that catastrophic manmade global warming is false the burden of proof is upon you to prove that none of the aspects of climate or the environment as a whole will react to the changes in a catastrophic way.
Wrongo! |
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Post by hunter on Jun 27, 2010 5:10:20 GMT
this evasive bs that socold is rleying on to obfuscate the issue is why I have started using the term CAGW. C = 'catastrophic'.
If all the true believers can come up with after ~$50+ billion is that we may be warming things up a bit, we should start freezing climate research finds and selling their assets.
From Hansen in 1988 to the latest crap from the IPCC and CRU, it has all been about catastrophe, apocalypse and NOW.
Either there is a catastrophe or they are friggin' liars.
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Post by socold on Jun 27, 2010 5:33:52 GMT
this evasive bs that socold is rleying on to obfuscate the issue is why I have started using the term CAGW. C = 'catastrophic'. Why do you think the catastrophe has to occur immediately for there to be a threat from rising greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere? Out of interest do you also disbelieve the vostok co2 record like icefisher does? |
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Post by icefisher on Jun 27, 2010 5:48:56 GMT
this evasive bs that socold is rleying on to obfuscate the issue is why I have started using the term CAGW. C = 'catastrophic'. Why do you think the catastrophe has to occur immediately for there to be a threat from rising greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere? Out of interest do you also disbelieve the vostok co2 record like icefisher does? I never said I disbelieved the Vostok co2 record Socold. I never said I believed it either. There are lots of things I am unsure of as I usually wait for a significant amount of evidence before I believe in stuff. I am certainly open to evidence if any is available. |
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