Greenland ice SIMPLY WOULD NOT MELT in baking +8°C era 120k years ago
Scientists analysing ancient ice samples say that the Greenland ice sheet withstood temperatures much higher than today's for many thousands of years during a period of global warming more than 120,000 years ago, losing just a quarter of its mass. It had been widely suggested - by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change …
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Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
Nobody presents climate models as gospel, that's nonsense. What they're being presented as is the best currently possible explanation that fits the data. But don't let that get in the way of a good persecution fantasy.
"Not what you said" is not an alternative model - try coming up with something better.
@ Nobody presents climate models as gospel
The politicians do. The IPCC does. The BBC does.
Real scientists don't, but they are drowned in the noise.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
But the Vostok Ice sheet results suggest it was 6 degrees colder 120000 years ago.
But thats data for you.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
> Look at a graph of our population over time... it can either continue but this would require the population of new worlds and habitats- or it could plateau (but by what mechanism?)
It could plateau by the same mechanism that has caused zero (and even decreasing) population growth of Western societies (excluding immigration). The more education and wealth the lower the birth rate, so the answer isn't to bring Western society down to the level of the 3rd world, it is to bring the 3rd world up to the level of Western society.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
> Which would be fine if the anti-common-sense Inquisition didn't spout these models as gospel and denounce all else as heresy.
>
> But they do. Which is not science, it's politics.
And the other half of the anti-common-sense inquisition (The Peoples Front Of Common-Sense?) spout every little issue with the model as if it completely invalidates everything ever said by any climate scientist anywhere and proves them all to be members of some communist-anarcho-environmentalist-lefty-pinko conspiracy to take us back to the stone age.
As you say politics not science
Re: it's 42
What do you get when you multiply Six by Nine?
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
>It could plateau by the same mechanism that has caused zero (and even decreasing) population growth of Western societies (excluding immigration). The more education and wealth the lower the birth rate, so the answer isn't to bring Western society down to the level of the 3rd world, it is to bring the 3rd world up to the level of Western society.
Correct. The problem is, however, that we don't have enough planet to give everyone the same quality of life as those of use in the West. For everyone on Earth were to use the same resources as European would require about three Earths.
If could provide healthcare, sanitation and education to all in a resource- efficient manner, then yeah, we're in with a chance- since if women are are confident that their children will survive, they generally choose to have fewer of them. It does pose some problems along the way, both in societies in which parent rely upon their children for care in old age, or societies in which this care is bought (one of the reasons Japan is researching robots).
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
"(but by what mechanism?)"
At least in part by gradual empowerment of women in the third world, who are increasingly unwilling to lie on their backs pumping out babies and instead becoming involved in their families' business affairs ... according to a NewScientist article a few years back anyway.
Re: it's 42
Probably from a humanities graduate who has never even heard of base 13, never mind being able to count in it.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
One of the truly bizarre aspects of this whole climate dialog thing is that it _starts_ in a stupid place.
Those who angrily oppose any real consideration of global warming almost always gloss over the fact that dumping untold millions of tons of crap anywhere is about as far away from passive as you can get. The base position is basically "unless you can prove that dumping unto millions of tons of crap is bad, it should be considered benign".
This is, of course, a scientifically suspect position. And, interestingly and critically, it was NOT the official position of the politicians (at least in the USA) until G W Bush and his cronies managed to flip the debate from "prove it's good" to "prove it's bad".
And THAT is politics, and bad science.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
What about continental drift? Have Greenland and Vostok moved relative to the equator, arctic regions and each other in 120,000 years? If Greenland was closer to the equator, and Vostok closer to the North Pole, that might explain the differance in temperatures.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
"The problem is, however, that we don't have enough planet to give everyone the same quality of life as those of use in the West. "
Sure, we have plenty of land. That statement is provably wrong.
OTOH, there are some other resources we may not have enough of, but land is NOT one of them.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
'(but by what mechanism?) '
Funnily enough (A)GCC will be the least of our problems, the thing that made the humans so successful (the selfish gene) will be our downfall.
Human population will breach 9bn but will struggle to reach 10, lowered child mortality (the 3 D's) means population ageing followed by drawn out crash.
You, as an average parent will always be better off personally and can give a better start to your progeny if
a) you know they will outlive you
and
b) you restrict yourself to 2 or less
There is nothing anybody can do about this (we were only following our genes sir)
The tipping point in the west is when they can no longer attract fecund immigrants.
(hint: this will happen on our watch)
Re: it's 42
@Michael Habel : "What do you get when you multiply Six by Nine?"
I get 54. What do you get?
Re: it's 42
Don't worry about it. The Vogons will be along soon to build a Hyperspace bypass.
Re: "so the models are evidently wrong"
The real good news is that the (real) scientists, whilst warning us about what their current models forecast, are still busy trying to validate, disprove and refine them. The bad news is that the politicians are still in denial, probably because the effects of climate change will be minimal before the next election, so can be safely left to the next crowd ...
Re: it's 42
The famous "42" is actually an approximation of 41.9897682229666...
The Adams cosmological constant is related to the Fine Structure constant as follows:
a^-1 = 137.035999084... = 1 + (e/2)*(sqr(2)+Gr) + (π*Adams) [exactly]
Where e = 2.78128...; Gr [golden ratio] = 1.618...
I hope this helps.
Re: it's 42
what do you mean, base 13 ? you only have ten fingers.
Re: it's 42
We already build it; we just loaded you all into a virtual reality matrix to get around all of those tedious intergalactic planning laws...
Re: @ Nobody presents climate models as gospel
To paraphrase Hanlon: Never attribute to conspiracy that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
The planet will be fine
...it's survived mega-volcanoes and asteroid strikes.
We on the other hand, are probably FUBAR.
Keep up the good work Lewis!
Keep looking all the "we're doomed" climate panic-mongers!
Do I deny that climate is being marginally affected by what we humans do? No
Do I deny it's the "end of the World" if we don't do something an it? Of course I do, it's a patently ridiculous assertion. Have you seen some of the extremes the Earth has gone through over the billions of years of its existence?!
Worst case scenario? Humans manage to wipe themselves out some time over the next couple of hundred years. Ah well. That will teach us then. Meanwhile the planet will continue - after all, a couple of hundred million years ago over 90% of all life on the planet was wiped out ... And "Gaia" is looking pretty diverse at the moment.
For those who keep telling me and everyone else to 'do something' - I suggest you pop over to China and the USA have a word with the nice people running those countries, have a nice time! Meanwhile, I will continue to cheer on people like Lewis - well done mate :-D
"Worst case scenario? Humans manage to wipe themselves out some time over the next couple of hundred years. Ah well. That will teach us then."
I think that's what the ' "we're doomed" climate panic-mongers' are saying.
I admire your more philosophical attitude but I have to say, wimpy thought it may be of me, that I'd be a bit upset if that happened.
Re: Keep up the good work Lewis!
Er... how is "we wipe ourselves out" not roughly the same as "we're doomed"? Surely the point of highlighting dangers is to avoid them, rather than let them be an inevitability?
This is always fun, an interview of a man who writes for a magazine that exists to prop up people's sense of entitlement to £20,00 wristwatches and Bentley automobiles (The Spectator), by the president of the Royal Society:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36Xu3SQcIE0
The hack has rings run round him and admits to being no more than "an interpreter of [cherry-picked] interpretations" and then whines in his column that the interview constituted "intellectual rape". Aw, diddums.
@Lord Voldemortgage
Yup, get where your coming from. Problem is the majority of Climate-mongers keep pushing the "we are destroying the Earth" not the (more honest) "we are setting the scene for the breakdown of advanced society and loss of majority chunk of population" (yup, just doesn't have that ring to it ;) & it won't create the same level of panicky "something must be done" knee-jerking that is so popular.
Couple of hundred years....?
So you won't be around to worry about it then...
Re: Keep up the good work Lewis!
"Surely the point of highlighting dangers is to avoid them..." what, like the Bush/Blair claims of Iraqi "WMD" or the assertion by the IPCC that the Tibetan Glaciers would be gone in 20-odd years...
You know, if the climate change lobby constituted a sober & scientific debate rather than a screaming manifesto where anyone who questions becomes the societal equivalent of a fiend who ties you to a chair then blows cigarette smoke in your face; maybe I'd take it more seriously.
Meanwhile, I await the "worst case" scenario of a 53metre rise in sea level should the entire Antarctic ice field melt; I live 250metres above seal level ;)
Re: Keep up the good work Lewis!
As usual, Lewis cherry picked the parts of the report that fitted his agenda. Here's the whole "good news quote":
"Until the past few years, most researchers had thought that Greenland contributed at least half of the 6–8 metres of Eemian sea-level rise that has been deduced from records of ancient corals and other markers2. Yet the NEEM core implies that Greenland’s ice sheet lost at most one-quarter of its volume, and contributed no more than 2 metres of sea-level rise. “The good news is that Greenland is not as sensitive to climate warming as we thought,” says Dahl-Jensen. “The bad news is that if Greenland’s ice sheet did not disappear during the Eemian, Antarctica must have been responsible for a significant part of the sea-level rise,” she adds. These two ice sheets, the world’s biggest, have been stable for most of the current interglacial period. But since temperatures began to soar a couple of decades ago, Greenland and Antarctica have been shedding ice fast. Between 1992 and 2011, they lost around 2,700 billion and 1,350 billion tonnes of ice, respectively."
( http://www.nature.com/news/greenland-defied-ancient-warming-1.12265 )
Note that the good news is "only" a 2 metre rise in sea level, but hey ho, we'll all be dead by then - except for the future generations whose climate we're fucking with.
Get honest, Lewis!
Here is a direct quote from Prof Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, author of the paper: "Even though the warm Eemian period was a period when the oceans were four to eight meters higher than today, the ice sheet in northwest Greenland was only a few hundred meters lower than the current level, which indicates that the contribution from the Greenland ice sheet was less than half the total sea-level rise during that period,"
Somehow, the article by Lewis failed to mention the fact that the oceans were a few meters higher back then -- and that the cited work estimated some 2 meters of sea level rise to stem from Greenland glaciers melting.
Get honest and stop picking out the nuggets of data you like -- science does not work that way! This article illustrates the reasons why 'climate skeptics' are not taken seriously in the scientific community: They pretend that selectively reporting and interpreting data is OK. I am looking at you, Lewis.
And don't come back with 'climategate', etc, if you actually follow up on those stories, you'll find serious scientific discussion based on serious scientific data. Unfortunately, it's work if you want to seriously contribute to the discussion. But this kind of selective reporting is just CRAP.
Re: Get honest, Lewis!
Lewis is indeed a bit selective, but perhaps he is an pessimist and "only" 2 meters makes him happy, or perhaps he newer read the whole report.
Re: Get honest, Lewis!
Yeah, Lewis has been a little outspoken without discussing all the facts in the recent past.
Which is why I didn't even read the article or the report; I just came straight to the comments section to see what everyone else was saying. Less work for me that way.
Re: Get honest, Lewis!
I don't even bother reading the Lewis Page global warming articles anymore, I just skip to the comments.
Re: Get honest, Lewis!
You may or may not agree with the presented balance of Lewis's articles, but I think he deserves credit for at least writing them in proper English sentences. Unlike many of the hacks we see around here and almost all of the commentards.
I marvel at so many who think their opinions are going to be taken seriously when their communications demonstrate a level of intelligence inferior to that of primordial soup.
the truth is somewhere in the middle
As we have all seen both sides of the global warming/ice melt/climate change issue find evidence to support their own side of the debate (my limited understanding is that most scientists lean toward this being a bigger issue than the deniers admit). So, that being said, wouldn't it be wise to err on the side of caution and to the extent possible by good science in combination with research and development/engineering use as much renewable energy as possible?
Of course, this is not where the old money and standard huge profits are derived so we have a huge uphill battle on that front.
Re: the truth is somewhere in the middle
wise..
Lewis Page...
do you see what you did there
Re: the truth is somewhere in the middle
I have no aversion to being down voted but I'm curious about the number of down votes on my comment above. I thought that was quite reasonable, no name calling and the use of renewables would preserve the non-renewables for usages where that would make the most sense and the use of good science and engineering to help advance technology and knowledge. What issue(s) are people having with that?
Great stuff - it needs to be more widely known about
Lewis - you need to address the brain-washed people who set our taxes etc and get them to see the sense that you are writing here. Can you get some of the traditional press to publish your articles as well?
Re: Great stuff - it needs to be more widely known about
Yes, because otherwise the dastardly climate scientists will continue to cover-up the conspiracy by publishing in widely-available journals.
Oh, wait.
"I suggest you pop over to China and the USA have a word with the nice people running those countries, "
"Two wrongs make a right"
Vested interests say "plough on" I need my carbon taxes now!
Predicting systems with a massive number of variables...
...is tricky. Who knew?
Odd, I'm beginning to think Lewis has an agenda...
Maybe you should start writing for Faux News, instead of a tech news web site?
Re: Odd, I'm beginning to think Lewis has an agenda...
Stan. There's a little link at the top of the pages that says 'Science', not 'Computer Science' but 'Science.
Please explain to this fool what's not clear about the science aspect of the article?
Re: Odd, I'm beginning to think Lewis has an agenda...
...Says the Anonymous Coward.
My point was more that Lewis seems to be a single-minded chode. He could actually be a well educated, highly respected scientist. But I doubt it. And his opinions on climate change are the worst part this site.
Re: Odd, I'm beginning to think Lewis has an agenda...
No science here, Lewis must be paid to troll.
And the antarctic stuff is wrong, it's losing ice rapidly.
Hopefully the real science is good news, there probably was less soot in those days though.
Time and again though the IPCC is shown to be too conservative, it's always worse than their predictions.
The warming isn't stalled either, just the air temps, the seas are still warming just as fast as ever.
The point of trying to do something about it is because the fallout will cost more money than we have.
Remember there is enough food to feed everyone on the planet but people starve because they can't afford it.
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