Submitted by Charlton Stanley (aka Otteray Scribe), Guest Blogger
Approximately 1,000 weather reporting stations all over the world have been monitoring local temperatures for decades. Temperature data have been compiled and analyzed by NASA scientists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York.
Nine of the 10 warmest years on record have occurred since the year 2000. The tenth? From the 20th Century, that was 1998. Temperature rise is not completely steady and consistent from one year to the next. That is due to factors such as volcanic eruptions and other natural causes; however, trends are the important thing.
We can see from the short video below the flip that Earth continues to experience warmer temperatures than several decades ago. The average temperature around the globe in 2011 was 0.92 degrees F (0.51 C) warmer than the mid-20th century baseline. Weather experts warn that a consistent global average change of even a half-degree Fahrenheit can have catastrophic effects on global weather patterns. Anyone recall April and May 2011?
130 years in 27 seconds:
Thanks, JoF,
This is important stuff. Looks as if the climate change deniers showed up with the usual reasons to not do anything.
I don’t find it convincing that there is a real scientific controversy regarding global warming.
The idea that reputable scientist are genuinely divided seems contrived to me.
An important question that others have raised is ‘what is the downside to taking steps now?’
It seems to me that most of what we do for global warming is consistent with the necessity to change energy sources anyway.
I, personally, would much rather start the transition to renewable energy sources now while we still have plenty of oil in the ground rather than wait.
If you think the increases in cost due to converting to other sources of energy are disruptive now, just wait till oil production starts to decline with nearly 10 billion people trying to enter the middle class in a generation or two.
Transition to renewable energy will take decades if not generations.
If we don’t start now we risk that even the 1% will have trouble affording gas for their Bentleys and Maybachs.
Lake North Pole. Think about it.
TY, OS. Good to see you are back in business.
Sorry, that should read:”this temperature rise can be directly attributed to the amount of carbon being released by human activity into the atmosphere.”
To Paul and all those who point out that the earth’s climate has fluctuated over time: All the data shows that never before has temperature risen so quickly, and this temperature can be attributed to the release of carbon into the atmosphere.
What can be done about it? Walk and bike more; recycle plastics; and buy locally produced food products, preferably vegetables. They’re better for you and require less energy to produce.
And oppose the XL pipeline. while the repubs in the Senate focus attention on Benghazi, a real scandal has developed around the environmental impact study prepared for the State Dept.
Paul,
“So lets assume that man caused global warming is correct (despite credible scientists that say solar variability may be significant). Now what?”
Yes. The educated, rational population has stopped assuming, and is facing reality.
Which “credible scientists” say exactly what about solar variability? No weasel words, please.
“Now what?” is obvious.
Slow the activities that cause global warming. End the profligate use of fossil fuels. Reverse population growth, immediately.
Will that inconvenience you?
Will going extinct inconvenience you?
Humans, and the plants and animals that keep humans alive, evolved under fairly narrow climatic conditions.
We’re doing everything we can to drastically change those conditions.
We will go extinct if we change the conditions rapidly, as we’re doing. Human-caused climate change is measured in decades. Evolution is measured in millions of years. No time for slow evolution to keep pace. More to the point, “we” won’t keep pace. We call ourselves the “human race.” We’re losing a race of our own making. We set impossible rules for ourselves. Multiply obscenely, use up all the resources, poison everything with our waste, and survive? No.
We exhibit all of the responsibility of a colony of bacteria growing in a petri dish. It dies in its own waste products.
The planet doesn’t know we’re here. It doesn’t care, and it won’t do anything to save us. Magical, invisible people won’t help us, either.
That’s what.
Thank you…
Oil-Qaeda is a terrorist org. that hates our children.
RTC 1, August 5, 2013 at 9:26 am
Well, this topic will surely warm the hearts of many posters on this blog. One’s position on climate change is often a very strong indicator of political affiliation. I recall watching Nitt Romney’s acceptance speech to the Republican convention, when the crowd broke into laughter at his mention of global warming, as though it were some kind shibboleth. The crowd, however, seemed to laugh uncomfortably, with less conviction than in it might have in years past.
MM does make a valid point about the flaw of climate science; the data is imperfect. Reliable measurements of atmospheric CO2 date back to only 1958. The rest of our data rely on proxy records, like tree rings, the chemical composition of corral shells, and dust taken from ice cores. None of this data translates easily into infotainment, and the bottom line usually involve solutions that require hardships, like walking more and using less.
The public demands certainty.
================================
The public, like everyone else, relies on trust and faith, well known by the students of Epistemology.
Who you believe is what you believe.
“You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows”, but you need someone you trust to really believe either denialism or Climate Scientists.
Data comes in many forms.
We don’t have to live 26,000 years to know that there is a climate cycle based on the axial precession of the Earth.
We don’t have to go far to find an oldie but goodie who remembers when “the weather did not used to be like this.”
Some remember when there was no worldwide pollution too.
Well, this topic will surely warm the hearts of many posters on this blog. One’s position on climate change is often a very strong indicator of political affiliation. I recall watching Nitt Romney’s acceptance speech to the Republican convention, when the crowd broke into laughter at his mention of global warming, as though it were some kind shibboleth. The crowd, however, seemed to laugh uncomfortably, with less conviction than in it might have in years past.
MM does make a valid point about the flaw of climate science; the data is imperfect. Reliable measurements of atmospheric CO2 date back to only 1958. The rest of our data rely on proxy records, like tree rings, the chemical composition of corral shells, and dust taken from ice cores. None of this data translates easily into infotainment, and the bottom line usually involve solutions that require hardships, like walking more and using less.
The public demands certainty. They’re being told by the corptocracy that researchers can’t predict how warm temperatures will get by a certain date. Climate study isn’t weather forecasting. Science has models that suggest ranges and predictive outcomes, sounding less certain compared to blowhard politicians and the blathering idiots on Fox. Always listen to the guys who yell the loudest, they know what they’re talking about. Why else would they be yelling? Besides, Al Gore can’t be trusted. The parties that sow doubt in the public mind have a strong financial incentive for doing so. They pay climate researchers to act as shills and wage media blitzes to discredit researchers who try to warn us of the dangers of global warming. Big Coal, Big Oil want wring every last dollar out us that can; they reduce their costs by outsourcing the deleterious health effects of their products rather than produce them cleanly and safely. Once their done ripping the tops off mountains and fouling our rivers and aquifers, they’ll charge us top dollar for clean water. That, I believe, is the end game.
Climate science is still relatively young, but the data collected is genuine, and there are many ways of testing its accuracy and the reliability of predictions drawn from it. Interestingly, last year one of the Koch-funded scientists changed his position on climate change after reexamining the data, one more inconvenient truth. It may be instructive to remember around the beginning of the last century, before the discovery of antibiotics, most people didn’t believe in bacteria, either. Up until the 1920’s, infielders were at risk of losing their lives from infection if they were spiked while turning a routine double play. Climate research is based on real science, whereas economics is an art. Think of the difference between climate science and economics as the difference between astronomy and astrology. The Republican argument against global warming is based chiefly on economic reasons.
Oh No!!! Stop it, stop it stop it……….. I live in South Florida, I don’t want my house to be under water when the Oceans rise to cover almost everything south of Lake Ocochobee………… Glug, glug…….
History of Denialism / History of Climate Science
(video presentation by Professor of Science History)
Note: Key times in the video are shown below in min:sec format.
(Note also: GW = global warming; GG = greenhouse gas, CC = climate change):
00:40 – Schwarzenegger: no debate, GW is happening.
06:20 – Proper amount of GG is good, keeps us warm.
07:00 – Too much GG is a bad thing.
07:09 – Tyndall in mid 1800’s began research into GG.
07:45 – Arrhenius did first degree calculations re: CO2 content.
08:25 – Callendar discovered GG increases in 1930’s.
09:02 – Hulburt accord in 1930’s.
09:43 – Depression / war stopped GG research.
10:00 – Gilbert N. Plass developed CO2 atmospheric calculations.
10:49 – Suess & Revelle do paper in 1957 warning of GW dangers.
12:30 – Dr. Revelle warned of polar ice cap melt in TIME interview.
13:25 – CO2 levels discovered to be high.
16:30 – Lyndon Johnson in 1965 says fossil fuels causing GW.
17:00 – GW, CC not political originally.
18:20 – White of NOAA, 1978, warns of GW dangers.
20:52 – Polar Areas to be impacted 4 times more than other areas.
24:20 – IPCC formed in 1979 with consensus on GW.
26:00 – Bush I signed GW treaty.
26:45 – Denial of GW begins.
27:40 – Luntz injects GW denial propaganda into political debate.
28:25 – Oil baron Cheney propagates GW denial.
29:00 – Oil companies do massive scale denial propaganda.
29:30 – Marshall Institute
30:30 – Marshall Institute formed to support Reagan SDI (star wars)
32:50 – Marshall Institute “cigarettes not related to cancer”.
36:50 – Marshall Institute does GW denial campaign.
42:54 – Marshall member Seitz worked for big tobacco.
47:20 – Singer of Marshall Institute politically attacks GW.
53:35 – Cigarette smoking is ok rhetoric applied against GW science.
It is warm in here, it is not just you OS.
The deniers onboard (e.g. ModernMiner) your current post say we don’t have enough data.
They say the Earth is billions of years old and has always had weather.
Therefore, no damage has been done to the global climate system and can’t be done by human civilization.
Brilliant.
Psychological denial does damage to cognition as you know professionally.
(Modern (past 65mil. yrs.) Global Climate System Changes Gently, Agnotology: the study of ignorance generators within our culture).
So lets assume that man caused global warming is correct (despite credible scientists that say solar variability may be significant). Now what?
If you want to cut down on carbon that means drastically reducing fossil fuel burning. Our food growing and distribution requires oil and gas. What will it mean for growing and distributing food if we drastically reduce consumption of fossil fuels? Do you think wealthy people are going to relinquish their tropical fruits? Their vegetables from warmer climates they eat in winter? No way. So who goes without food?
Before you declare the cause and what medicine we need, what will the cure cause?
And for a side show, read some of the stuff about sun spots and what is happening to our sun these past few years. And for more laughs, read the reports about solar activity forecasts from 10 years ago where they predicted a whopper of a year for sun spots in this solar cycle. These are scientists that are prominent on the global warming mill. They were so dead wrong as to be laughable. Please, check our our current solar cycle before you kill people for lack of food.
“Our food growing and distribution requires oil and gas.”
Paul,
Currently it does but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t alternatives to be explored.
“Do you think wealthy people are going to relinquish their tropical fruits? Their vegetables from warmer climates they eat in winter?”
Food distribution can still go on using alternative fuel sources. Electric cars become electric truck and ships powered by solar energy, etc.
“Before you declare the cause and what medicine we need, what will the cure cause?”
The cure will cause scientific innovations and new areas of jobs and industrial growth, doesn’t seem so bad to me.
“And for a side show, read some of the stuff about sun spots and what is happening to our sun these past few years.”
Whatever the cause of climate change is, climate change is and will affect us all, so the idea of preparing for it seems to be a prudent one. The polar ice cap is melting and the sea level is rising. The cities on the shores of this country need to start preparing now for instance. Fossil fuels have caused major pollution problems in major cities of the world and the direct cause is pollution due to the use of fossil fuels. Also fossil fuels are not renewable and so alternatives must be developed for that contingency. What has allowed the human race to dominate this planet was the human ability of foresight and adaptation. What is currently stifling our ability to foresee and adapt to a changing climate is simple short term greed and fear of diminished profits.
While those with narrow interests fight the mobilization of humanity to adapt to these changes and learn to deal with them to ensure our continued survival, the clock ticks on. The irony is that in meeting these challenges and learning to adapt ourselves, we would also greatly enhance the climate for industrial growth and economic opportunity.
but don’t worry,if the feds don’t act, the states will.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/north-carolina-bans-latest-science-rising-sea-level/story?id=16913782
insert fingers into ears, say lalalala really loud. it’ll go away.
Mike Appleton: “In addition, there are many people who are terrified that policy changes will adversely impact their lifestyles.”
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Myopia is a common human failing. Wanting short term gain, but like most psychopaths, have no ability to plan for the future. When their multi-million dollar beach mansions have five feet of water in the living room, it will be a little late.
I should have added that the science of climate change is also rejected by Christian dominionists and other religious fundamentalists who believe that God would not permit the destruction of the planet by the hand of man.
Our refusal to consider policy changes in response to climate change is wholly unrelated to differences of opinion in the scientific community. It is driven solely by economics. More specifically, important corporate interests want to avoid the capital requirements necessary to clean up their act. In addition, there are many people who are terrified that policy changes will adversely impact their lifestyles.
What Bob Kauten said. We can’t wait any longer.