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John Hartz at 11:27 AM on 24 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
Recommended supplemental reading:
'It's heart-wrenching': 80% of Blue Mountains and 50% of Gondwana rainforests burn in bushfires by Lisa Cox & Nick Evershed, Environment, Guardian, Jan 16, 2020
Australia's bushfires to push global emissions to new high: Met Office by Peter Hannam, Environment, Sydney Morning Herald, Jan 24, 2020
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BarbNoon1 at 11:23 AM on 24 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
I made the decision take the heat for returning when I said I was done, because facts matter to me, and “winning” in a discussion is not why I wrote in the comments section in the first place. I was not happy with the continuous “regenerative farming” fallacies that are here in the comments, so I am copying some of my source’s article (that I posted earlier and below).
“On the smallest scale, one cow requires a minimum of 2 acres of pasture land and 20–30 gallons of water daily. That is, assuming the two acres are fully covered with good grazing land (in some places, cows require more acreage because the pasture isn’t filled out with healthy grass for grazing). Additionally, in the winter months, grain will often have to be purchased. But for the sake of argument, let’s assume optimal efficiency, or 2 acres per cow, assuming no change in the total number of cattle and swine currently consumed in the United States, we would need more than 2.5 billion acres of land. The problem, as it happens, is that there are fewer than 2.3 billion acres in the entire United States, including all the mountains, swamps, deserts, and otherwise unsuitable land areas you can imagine. Alaska alone accounts for 17% percent of the United States’ total acreage. And remember, that 2.5 billion required acreage is only for cattle and swine. Would you like to include the 250 million grass raised turkeys, 7 million sheep, and 8 billion chickens currently consumed each year?
On the farm neighboring me [author], here in the Dominican Republic, there are 82 head of cattle on 200 acres. The farmer has told me that these 200 acres have reached maximum capacity. That’s about 2.44 acres per cow. It takes two years for a grass-fed cow to reach full maturity, at which point it can be slaughtered for about 450 pounds of flesh. That means my neighbor can expect to produce approximately 36,900 pounds of meat, every two years (82 x 450 = 36,900). He projects that we will have at least 100,000 pounds of organic produce, from our two acres of land, after two years. On two acres of land, over a two year period, one can produce 450 pounds of animal flesh or 100,000 pounds of plant produce, using almost no water, compared to the 20–30 gallons required for each cow, every day.
Can something be sustainable when it isn’t even feasible?
https://nutritionstudies.org/grass-fed-beef-a-sustainable-alternative/Eclectic, you are skilled at debating and at casting doubt on evidence. When I said you “mansplained,” I was aware you might not be male, but in my fatigue, it was the only word to describe how you treat sincere people.
I originally said I felt environmentalists should be vegan. I stand by my opinion, and all of you concerned only with CO2 can still be vegan and just talk about CO2. When animal agriculture poisons our waterways, land and air and is not an efficient way to feed the world. It’s not time for a “distribution” excuse - meat is terribly inefficient, and as many as 25,000 people lose their lives every day due to hunger; we need a better system and only veganism will feed the world and allow us to re-wild many areas.You claimed that the fertilizer spray of pig waste would be taken care of with regenerative farming, but pig waste (and all animal waste) on the ground also causes environmental issues. https://mission-blue.org/2015/02/whats-the-role-of-mass-animal-agriculture-in-ocean-degradation/
Here is a video and transcript about heart disease in children. This talks about fatty streaks in arteries. https://nutritionfacts.org/video/heart-disease-starts-in-childhood/ This next video talks about how heart disease may start in the womb. They looked at the arteries of fetuses from mothers with normal cholesterol levels and from pregnant moms with high cholesterol, and fetal arteries from mothers with high cholesterol contained dramatically greater lesions. https://nutritionfacts.org/video/heart-disease-may-start-in-the-womb/
Last, this article, from the BMJ, tells the harm of dietary cholesterol. 395 ward feeding studies. This is “not too new” or “too small.” And I did post the Framington Study earlier which was large. This study shows that whether you are genetically inclined to have low cholesterol or high cholesterol, the cholesterol you avoid in your diet is important for your health. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2125600/
I am sure you will find everything unworthy. However, I showed why every environmentalist should be vegan (unless you live with no access to grocery stores, or are some rare exception), because eating vegan is the healthy diet that helps the environment the most and I definitely showed why “grass fed, grazing or regenerative farming will not work to feed the population and will still greatly pollute.
Moderator Response:[DB] In the absence of confounding factors like associated fat intake, there's no clear relationship solely between dietary cholesterol intake and cardiovascular risk:
"Evidence from observational studies conducted in several countries generally does not indicate a significant association with cardiovascular disease risk"
Even interventional studies, while showing mild improvements in some markers, showed no significant outcomes benefit:
"the findings were not significant for the stronger predictor of CVD risk, LDL cholesterol, or HDL cholesterol concentration"Should people make healthier eating choices? Yes.
In the scheme of things, is that action bigger than switching global energy usage from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources? Not even close.
Let's keep this closer to the topic of this post, please.
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Markoh at 10:21 AM on 24 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
PS @9 if a bushfire is measured by severity rather than hectares, the 1851 Black Thursday fires are hard to beat.
After Melbourne having a record 47 degrees, 25% of Victoria burnt in one day. a ship 30 km off the coast was under ember attack. One million sheep died.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Thursday_bushfires
Moderator Response:[PS] The only "unprecedented" claim referenced by this site refers to NSW and the claim is from Rural Fire Service. " The scale of the bushfires is “unprecedented” for this point in the season, RFS spokeswoman Angela Burford said."
We like fact-checking; we dont like strawman arguments.
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Markoh at 09:49 AM on 24 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
PS @9 Yes 1973 1974 was the worst on record and burned 117 million ha. Ref Australia Institute of Disaster Respurces.
I am surprised it is not common knowledge in Australia, given the number of people claiming 2019 2020 is the worst (egged on by MSM) it is clear it is not common knowledge. I wish people would fact check.
knowledge.aidr.org.au/resources/bushfire-new-south-wales-1974/
as a reference, 2019 2020 has burned less than 20 million ha
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Nick Palmer at 09:45 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
Eclectic #9 "The idea of Rational Economic Man is a fiction from the Eighteenth Century"
I think what is left out of economic considerations is that economics assumes that markets work best, and most efficiently, if everyone has 'perfect information' to make decisions with. I can see that if that happened, then markets really would be effective at providing for needs and avoiding dangers. If the world had perfect information about the actual rigidly defined results and timescales of climate policies and the definite results if such policies were not employed, I think it would be very easy for the people of the world to decide what to do -
One Planet Only Forever at 09:40 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
Mbryson and others,
It may be more accurate to declare that the pursuit of expanded awareness and improved understanding and the application of that learning to develop sustainable improvements for the future of humanity is not governing human behaviour.
During the enlightenment it could have appeared likely that better understanding would govern. But the competition for status based on popularity and profitability has produced the opposite result. It has developed many harmful unsustainable pursuits that end up being very difficult to correct.
The resistance to correction can be attributed to a variety of things including the concept of Loss Aversion. Loss aversion is the reluctance to accept or pursue a change even if it may be beneficial. But it is more likely that the power of resistance is a desire to not lose any developed perceptions of status or opportunity for benefit even if it can be understood that the status and opportunity are from a harmful unsustainable pursuit.
And it is even more likely that the lack of rapid significant penalty for misleading marketing is the root of the problem. The current winners are not interested in going onto the slippery slope of having harmful unsustainable pursuits excluded from competitions for popularity and profit. And they want to keep more of any winning. They would not like to see Their downward spiral of correction of undeserved status and a future where Their pursuits would be effectively limited to helping develop sustainable improvements for humanity.
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nigelj at 09:33 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
Regarding JM @10, the book to read is Dark Money about The Kochs and others. This review allows you to read some interesting excerpts for free, click on look inside.
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JohnMashey at 09:19 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
Over decades, Big Tobacco did denialism directly, via entities like Tobacco Industry Research Council, but over time moved to use more and more "independent" entities like front groups, think tanks and most of all, the Tea Party, a joint creation of Philip Morris & Kochs, via Citizens for a Sound Economy. In the 1980s, they also created a network run by GMU's Robert Tollison of academic economists across the USA to writeopeds and testify to local legislatures. That progression is detailed in the peer-reviewed paper I summarized & linked (open access) at Desmog.
Big Fossil has followed the same path. The Kochs seed-funded a large network of thinktanks, have spent much money on academics. Most fossil funding is usually invisible, except for accidents and ExxonMobil Foundation, whose use was silly, because it was publicly visible in IRS Form990 reports and the numbers were rounding error in daily profits. They took flak, which must have amused the Kochs, as they were spending more, so they mostly quit using EMF in the mid-2000s ... but in fact, kept funding some, like ACSH (Desmog, Sourcewatch). Latest numbers I have are $75K each year 2011-2016, for example.
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John Hartz at 07:53 AM on 24 January 2020Waking up to climate change | Australia's Bushfires
Recommended supplemental reading:
Scientists hate to say ‘I told you so’. But Australia, you were warned by Will Steffen, The Conversation AU, Jan 22, 2020
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John Hartz at 07:32 AM on 24 January 2020It's CFCs
Recommended supplemnental reading:
Closing the Ozone Hole Helped Slow Arctic Warming by Chelsea Harvey, E&E News/Scientific American, Jan 22, 2020
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John Hartz at 07:29 AM on 24 January 2020It's ozone
Recommended supplemnental reading:
Closing the Ozone Hole Helped Slow Arctic Warming by Chelsea Harvey, E&E News/Scientific American, Jan 22, 2020
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Eclectic at 06:54 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
Mbryson, you are very correct, I think.
The idea of Rational Economic Man is a fiction from the Eighteenth Century, pre-dating the insights from Darwin, Freud, and modern psychology / neurology.
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Doug Bostrom at 06:38 AM on 24 January 2020Waking up to climate change | Australia's Bushfires
Maybe the answer to Adam's question is "all of the above."
Anecdotes:
- Skeptical Science experienced a substantial surge of usage disproportionately sourced from the US beginning the latter part of 2016 and through most of 2017. This could certainly be attributed to political events in the US.
- During January 2017 January Skeptical Science was used by 69,980 persons in Australia. This current January— so far— the site has been used by 139,371 persons in Australia, with Australia moving from fifth to second largest country traffic source for the respective periods.
- Each time Greta Thunberg gave a major address in 2019, Skeptical Science saw dramatic daily traffic surges in the immediately following period.
- Earlier in 2019 when the "XR" movement began to generate headlines of various kinds, Skeptical Science saw a correlated rise in traffic.
Our traffic overwhelmingly arrives via search on climate topics. Increased public curiousity about and awareness of the climate issue for any sufficiently conspicuous reason could be expected to result in more search leading to Skeptical Science. It's unlikely there's any single factor driving this.
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mbryson at 04:14 AM on 24 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
It's crazy-stupid that some apparently bright people deny there can be negative externalities: externalities are real, as any serious economist will acknowledge. Moreover, sometimes they aren't exactly external (that is, they affect the persons who ignore them, but later in time). I suspect, as Nigel says, that psychological issues underlie / contribute to the absurd conviction that actual human choices are always rational in the economic sense of that word--in particular, a gut-level desire to go on with BAU.
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michael sweet at 21:14 PM on 23 January 2020Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
Nigelj:
On your last post without citations you add the comment:
"Electricity grids need reactive power as you probably know. Solar and wind power are poor at providing reactive power although it may improve"
If you had read the peer reviewed paper by Brown et al I have cited for you several times you would know that this is another example of a deliberate falsehood that nuclear and fossil fuel advocates tell to make everyone think renewable energy will not work. In the past grid operators said reactive energy was not needed. There are many ways to provide ancillary services (including reactive power) cheaply in a renewable grid. In many cases if the controls are reprogrammed ancillary services can be provided for free.
The Tesla battery in Australia currently provides better quality reactive power at a lower cost than fossil generators are capable of providing. I am surprised that you are not aware this facility provides the reactive power you claim is missing from renewable energy systems.
If you read the citations you are provided you will post less obvious deliberate falsehoods. Reactive energy was not discussed in this thread before your post. It was not necessary for you to make this false claim. I hope that you are simply uninformed and not repeating claims you know are false.
Moderator Response:[PS] Your tone here is unhelpful for constructive discussion. Please keep it polite. Furthermore, please note the comments policy.
"No accusations of deception. Any accusations of deception, fraud, dishonesty or corruption will be deleted. This applies to both sides. You may critique a person's methods but not their motives."
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nigelj at 18:53 PM on 23 January 2020Waking up to climate change | Australia's Bushfires
Good video.
"What changed in 2019?"
My take. Nothing all that special about 2019, just that young people have seen Kyoto fizzle out without achieving much, and probably thought give Paris a go, now that looks ineffective so they have had enough. Same with plenty of Adults. Its not just climate that reaches tipping points, so do social phemomena. Things like attitudes and desire for change take time to develop and for silent agreement to spread, then reach a tipping point. Theres a good book on this called "The Tipping Point."
Maybe this was reinforced by bad weather, but that seems secondary. There was nothing spectacularly bad about last years weather was there? Trump may have been more of a factor with his bluster and craziness.
"And what will it take to start reducing global CO2 emissions?"
So many things have to change, and so many psychological barriers have to be removed its going to need a miracle. That or truly terrible weather lasting a solid 5 years, something thats a real step change and impossible to ignore or make excuses for like the denialists try and do. These bushfires might prove to be a big motivation.
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Eclectic at 17:41 PM on 23 January 2020It's magma
Cpske ~ check out the Myth #196 of the Most Used Climate Myths (top left corner of page).
The short story : climate is changed by alterations in the 240 watts/squ.meter absorbed by the planetary surface. The 240 figure changes somewhat with solar changes ~ alterations in solar output, over the longer term or over the 11-year solar cycle) . . . or is changed by ice-albedo alterations . . . or is changed by major volcanic eruptions throwing aerosols into the stratosphere . . . or is changed by man-made industrial pollution aerosols . . . or is changed by alteration in the levels of Greenhouse gasses (of course).
OTOH, the flow of heat from the depths of the Earth is at an average rate of 0.09 watts/squ.meter ~ so very tiny that it is rightly ignored in climate measurements & calculations. This geothermal heat flow data is determined from temperature measurements take at a range of depths in deep boreholes. There's no evidence of significant variation in this geothermal flow, nor any reason to believe it could alter the climate ~ even over thousands of years. Yes, there are magma plume hotspots (such as formed the Hawaii islands) but they are fairly steady . . . and any new hotspots are too small in area to change the planetary average (the Earth's surface area being 510 million square kilometers).
Cpske, if it's not too much trouble for you, I would be interested in having a look at the "static" you mentioned. I regularly have a look at some of the Deniosphere blogs ~ such as WattsUpWithThat [WUWT], which does occasionally (well, rarely!) have articles of minor scientific interest. But mostly the WUWT articles are rather childish propaganda . . . and the comments columns are 95% full of crackpot ideas & political ultra-extremism & more general intellectual insanity & recycled long-debunked climate "theories". WUWT can be amusing, if you find amusement in Schadenfreude. But I haven't noticed any "geothermal nonsense" there recently.
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Norm Rubin at 16:37 PM on 23 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
nigelj, you may be thinking of "the bystander effect"? The more people know about a problem and COULD do something to solve it - whether they actually are or not - the less likely any individual is to step up.
International conferences and treaties and accords are a closer fit to the Tragedy of the Commons, IMO.
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cpske at 15:03 PM on 23 January 2020It's magma
Hey, could you guys offer a refutation argument that it's magma pockets that are heating the earth, not CO2? I am seeing a lot of static about it recently and would like to post a counter-argument.
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scaddenp at 08:26 AM on 23 January 20202019 in climate science: A continued warming trend and 'bleak' research
Blueball. A number of things. Firstly, Canada gets that headline because it has significant area in the arctic and that is the portion of earth that is warming the fastest. (eg see the video graphic at https://climate.nasa.gov/). Not a lot of cities up there.
Secondly there a couple of issues with the graphs at your link. They show monthly average daytime highs not average temperature. The mechanism of AGW warms night faster than day (eg see this paper of observations). They also present the temperatures with a range that covers all of Canada. This is good for looking at temperatures between places but given large year to year variation, it makes trends difficult to spot. You can make any trend disappear if you make the y axis big enough.
I dont know of any website that will give you quick graph of any weather station, but this website shows how to download and graph any station you like.
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Blueball at 08:00 AM on 23 January 20202019 in climate science: A continued warming trend and 'bleak' research
Sorry, I meant for this to be one post...
I am uncertain about this claim "twice as fast", shortly after this declaration, the Liberals announced a climate emergency. I am not sure what this amounts to but the rhetoric has certainly notched up recently.
When I visit Www.yourenvironment.ca I can look at the recorded temperature of any city in Canada dating back upto 150 years and I was expecting the hockey stick graph I see so regularity here, there and everywhere. But the graph is completely flat. No discernable rise in temperature in any city in any province.
What am I to believe? Who am I to believe?
Moderator Response:[DB] The accuracy of the climate temperature station record in Canada is verified and affirmed, here:
"One last point from this CCC analysis of temperatures: it's also worth noting the magnitude of recent Arctic warming. The slope of the 30-year trend in this region is 5 to 6 C/century — a rate of warming that's much higher than the rest of the world."
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Blueball at 07:51 AM on 23 January 20202019 in climate science: A continued warming trend and 'bleak' research
In Canada, there is a media campaign declaring that Canada is warming twice as fast as the rest of the world.
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nigelj at 05:15 AM on 23 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
There's another psychological / political factor. The climate issue has become politically tribal. Once the tribe takes on a position on climate, so peoples views become stubborn. Dissension is not tolerated.
I also think that ideally we dont wan't to over do the big government component, because there are some legitimiate concerns there. Yet its very difficult to see how you resolve this mess without things like a carbon tax. So I'm completely stumped over this.
But this is the thing. There are literally a dozen psychological, ideological, political and cost factors that are impediments to change. Plus the climate problem is huge and requires multiple changes. Taking all this together, I don't see mitigation and lifestyle changes adequately fixing the climate issue, or even coming close.
We might be heading towards dangerous experiments with geoengineering, or sucking CO2 out of the air with fans and neutralising it chemically. However I will continue to advocate for the more usual solutions.
Nick Palmer, similar to the tragedy of the commons but theres another name for it.
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Jim Eager at 00:43 AM on 23 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
John exhibits exactly the kind of uncritical thinking that those seeking to intentionally disseminate climate misinformation and disinformation rely upon. 117 million hectares of dry open grass/scrub savanna simply does not compare with 10 million hectares of dense temperate forest, much of which has never burned before in recorded history.
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Nick Palmer at 23:55 PM on 22 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
My view nowadays is that increasingly since 2007, Big Fossil Fuel no longer directly sponsors denialism. It's not in their corporate material, in their reports or websites. They do, however, contribute to organsations which use denialist memes and rhetoric when lobbying politicians etc but I think this is a separate thing.
My opinion is that the giant energy companies do accept the mainstream science these days but are, justifiably, worried about some of the solutions put forward by extreme environmental activists and some progressive/left leaning politicians which, to 'big business', look like 'communism by the back door'. Professor Katharine Hayhoe is recently actively using the term 'solutions averse' to describe such behaviour. She is now using an approach of researched and justifiable optimism that, without crushing capitalism or using heavy handed Big Government that we can do this - we can solve it.
Nowadays, when tackling a denialist who has proved to be 'solutions averse' I have taken to saying something like:
'If you so scared of the Big Government solutions, carbon taxes etc, why don't you get busy coming up with efficient, economical freemarket solutions to the problme instead of spreading denialst memes and propaganda just because they have been shown to sway the minds of the the voting masses?' -
Markoh at 23:39 PM on 22 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
Scaddenp @2 I totally agree. The number of people I know who boldly and loudly advertise their green credentials and then frivolously get on a plane for a holiday, astounds me. Worse still, some go business class which is nearly 3 times the emissions (eg 737 Max 9 has 220 seats for all economy and 43 economy seats are removed to create 16 business class seats for a 2 class service. Refer 737 Max specs)
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Nick Palmer at 23:33 PM on 22 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
"This ideology holds that capitalism and personal freedom are inextricably linked. Even a small action like a tax on tobacco could be the start of a slippery slope of ever-increasing regulation, leading to government controlling every part of our lives."
It's good to see this in the book. It does tend to be US types who most have that particularly extreme notion of 'freedom' though. Not all freemarket or libertarian types do, for example the wonderful Potholer54 (Peter Hadfield) who has done a couple of videos on freemarket solutions to climate change.
I have to say that I think the 'fossil fuel lobbyists are behind denialism' argument is getting outdated. The truth I think is more nuanced despite what the Oreskes' of this world insinuate.
nigelj #2 I think you might mean 'the tragedy of the commons' -
Markoh at 23:19 PM on 22 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
Barbnoon1 @39. Coming from a farming family, of course grass fed cattle are sustainable. As long as the paddock is not overstocked the cattle can feed on the grass forever whilst fertilising the paddock.
if what you really meant is relative productivity per unit area of land compared to other forms of meat production, then that is a different issue.
However comparisons of beef to pork and chicken is not a like for like comparison due to vastly different animal husbandry standards. Most chicken is produced in tiny cages, whereas most beef is to use the chicken term "free range" in a paddock. A relevant comparison is free range chicken to beef.
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pawanranta at 20:53 PM on 22 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
Solar & wind power can definitely solve half of the problems caused by greenhouse gases emission and resulting in climate change. The second issue that needs to be addressed is adopting energy-efficient techs at the consumer level. The Victorian state government offering free/discounted LED replacement for residential and commercial establishments. I think its a great initiative. Energy efficient systems coupled with the renewable power source is the way forward.
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Eclectic at 16:47 PM on 22 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
Thanks, BarbNoon1 . . . yes, we are getting well off-topic, and should close our conversation. Though it has had topical relevance, in that it's emphasized the importance of "climatism" and "veganism" keeping out of each other's way.
And it has given me some worthwhile mental exercise . . . as well as some amusement ~ e.g. your "mansplaining" comment. Surely, Barb, you aren't as very non-PC as to presume you know my gender?! And in my "low key, subtle" suggestion, was there any allusion by me to women rather than to vegans generally? Hummmph !
You stating "I will not return" ~ is often a poor move. You may very well not comment further . . . but everyone knows you are very likely to return to see if I have replied. Which gives me the last word. As now :-
Cholesterol in the diet is unimportant compared with the cholesterol innately produced by the liver ~ and you ought to know that. All that business of liver enzymes / genetics / high-density & low-density lipoproteins, etcetera. Let's call it "personplaining" !
The absorption of B12 is rather more complex than you seem to think : not merely a matter of "how many micrograms went into my mouth today." Young children need very careful attention to nutritional requirements to avoid developmental damage as they grow on a vegan diet ~ sadly, some parents think it's just a matter of a shovel plus "X" number of calories / total protein. If the parents are klutzes, then it's safer to go ovo-lactarian for the children. Which the prudent parent will do anyway (keeping human evolution in mind ~ and keeping in mind we probably still don't know everything we ought to, about human nutrition and gut biome). And the children like it.
And I refer you back to the general criticism I made of medical research. Anecdotes are even worse !
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Eclectic at 15:09 PM on 22 January 202097% consensus on human-caused global warming has been disproven
Andrew Strang @70 :
The short answer is . . . No, it's not.
There's been endless talk downplaying "the 97% consensus" ~ just as there's still endless talk (mostly within the Flat Earth Society) that the Earth is not really Round.
Regarding climate aspects, much of the naysaying has been like the speech delivered by the Defendant's lawyer trying to minimize his client's guilt. Rhetorical sophistry, distortions, cherry-pickings, and outright misleading information. (The only difference here is that the lawyer won't utter a 100% mendacity . . . yet there are many prominent climate-change deniers who routinely do cross that line.)
But some lawyers will go up pretty close to the line. Sort of :-
"Yes the victim died later in hospital, but my client is not actually guilty of murder because it was a flesh-wound and my client's knife only made an entry wound and the blade did not come out the other side of the body. The whole thing is really a case of poor treatment by the surgeons."
Andrew, it's a sad fact that the "op-eds" in Forbes are aimed at the reader who knows the business/financial field and is not easily fooled there . . . but who knows so little about science, that he is easily fooled in the science & climate field. (And there are some Forbes readers who want to be fooled because, consciously or subconsciously, they have a guilty conscience about fossil fuels . . . and here we might justifiably point at the very author of the article and his role with fossil fuels or "energy" as prefers to call it. Motivated Reasoning at work, eh. )
Why does Forbes publish op-eds / articles which are little short of morally criminal? Perhaps it's their politics . . . or what they suspect is their reader majority politics . . . or perhaps they fear losing major advertisers.
Andrew , consider three important points :-
(A) What is happening in the real physical world.
(B) What are the causations acknowledged by the expert scientists when you speak with them or survey their personal opinions.
(C) What does "the science" show ~ and in essence, modern mainstream science is what is published in the respected peer-reviewed scientific journals (tens of thousands of scientific articles).
(B) and (C) together or separately, can be called the consensus. In practice, (B) is the result of (C) . . . but you will find science-denialists bending over backwards to say: "Ignore (C)" and: "Let's do some creative accounting with the figures & definitions in (B)". ~Hence the Forbes article, amongst others!
Andrew, the consensus "(C)" is well over 99.9% . . . and there are some rare contrarian scientific papers ~ but they've all been shown to be very faulty.
(B) is well over 90% (the small remnant usually due to personal political extremist views, rather than any actual scientific evidence).
(A) is simply a rapidly warming world ~ ice melting, seas rising & acidifying. The more you educate yourself on the subject, the more starkly obvious it all is.
And yet there are still denialists busily denying the facts. Go figure !
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BarbNoon1 at 14:44 PM on 22 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
Forgot this source:
https://nutritionfacts.org/video/how-the-egg-board-designs-misleading-studies/
I take cherry-flavored B12.
https://nutritionfacts.org/video/omnivore-vs-vegan-nutrient-deficiencies-2/ -
BarbNoon1 at 14:34 PM on 22 January 2020Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming
Yes, I really want to get out of this conversation, and we are off-topic, but I can't believe you don't know that cholesterol is bad for you!
When study results, funded by the dairy industry came out in 2010, Dr. Jeremiah Stamler immediately criticized them, followed by other prominant doctors such as Dr. John McDougall. Of course, Time Magazine writers did not know that, and they put "Butter is Back" on the cover. However, the science has not changed. Marketing is just more skillful. The huge industries repeated the same studies in 2014 in order to look like they had more "evidence," but the truth is, cholesterol still can cause heart disease.https://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2014nl/apr/saturatedfat.htm
We have to be "very scientific" about following a vegan diet? Really? I have many friends who have been vegan for over 40 years (I guess I have to show my sources, Hope Bohanic, Kim Stallwood, Fiona Oakes and Butterflies Katz are a few.) Fiona Oakes runs and holds about 7 world records in ultra marathons and eats once a day, at the end of the day after training and then taking care of an entire animal sanctuary - she is 50 and has been vegan since about age 4. Source? Running for Good documentary.
39% of Americans are deficient in B12. You'd better be careful about that deficiency! We can get B12 from plants - there is new evidence that duckweed has tons of B12 and there are four plants found so far that have B12. The few vegan parents who had children who died starved them! Just being vegan was not the problem.
https://www.parabel.com/plant-based-nutrients-parabels-water-lentils-found-to-be-rich-source-of-vitamin-b12/
If you want the article for Dr. Jeremiah Stamler it is called, "Diet-Heart. A problematic revisit." However, I can no long access it - scientific document.
https://www.ars.usda.gov/news-events/news/research-news/2000/b12-deficiency-may-be-more-widespread-than-thought/
Back to topic:
Population, what we eat, and how we live are all intertwined in the climate change problem. If you want a march specifically for fossil fuels, do so. But most people don't even know the solutions to bring fossil fuels under control, and most people cannot do anything about it themselves, except hold signs in marches or write their representatives.
Your opinion differs from mine on what is important. Eclectic, you made your points and I made mine. I will not return. Please try to refrain from "Mansplaining," telling women to be low key, subtle, and repeatedly saying things like, "You really SHOULD know this!" Obviously, there are things you do not know about as well. -
nigelj at 13:02 PM on 22 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
john @9, the 1974 - 1975 bushfire season did burn 117 million hectares, but almost all of it was grasslands in the outback towards central Australia that had zero economic impact and value. It was waste lands essentially. Nobody even noticed until some satellite data appeared. Refer Bushfires in Australia on wikipedia and read the tables and source material.
So comparing that season with now is an apples with oranges comparison. The current bushfires are in forests and around urban areas.
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Andrew Strang at 12:36 PM on 22 January 202097% consensus on human-caused global warming has been disproven
Is this criticism of the 97% consensus significant?
https://www.forbes.com/sites/uhenergy/2016/12/14/fact-checking-the-97-consensus-on-anthropogenic-climate-change/#75c776d21157 -
john. at 12:08 PM on 22 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
As this is your first post, Skeptical Science respectfully reminds you to please follow our comments policy. Thank You! Apparently the bush fires in 1973 '74 buned 117 million hectares. So far this year it's been 10 million.
How can you say that's unprecedented?
Moderator Response:[PS] Please show us the source of figures so readers can ensure that you are comparing like with like. My understanding is that the "unprecedented" claims (this is the link Yale give their article) concern location and fire intensity but clarity from source would be appreciated.
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Markoh at 08:04 AM on 22 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
PS @5 A week in itself is not significant but what happens in that week can have enormous statistical significance. Could anyone argue the bushfires in the New Years week was not enormously statistically significant?
Simiarly with the large rainfalls in Eastern Australia the past week. Had these rainfalls occurred 3 weeks earlier and fallen in 2019, these rainfalls would have turned large areas of Easter Australia into having normal rainfall in 2019.
The rain events of that week would then have had enormous statistical significance and continued the BOM trend of Australia trending getting wetter over the last 110 years.
BOM chart showing a Australia getting wetter with more red prior to 1950 and more blue after 1950:-
www.bom.gov.au/climate/history/rainfall/
Moderator Response:[PS] Can you provide analysis to show that the rainfall event "would have had enornous statistical significance"? Without it, you are sloganeering again. You might like to look at analysis here but also note that temperature as well as rainfall is very important in bushfire. More relevant for climate and bushfire is probably PdsI which looks at temperature and precipitation.
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Estoma at 07:32 AM on 22 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
I first became aware of the climate controversy in the early 90's. In perticular, Rush Limbaugh teaming up with former Washington State govenor, Dixie Lee Ray who had a PhD in biology. Ray had been sent by Limbaugh and his allies to RIO. I still remember her telling Rush why AGW was bogus. "I'm a scientist. I know!" I remember Rush proclaiming how silly AGW was. As an example he wrongly insinuated that volcano's dwarfed anything man could do.
https://larouchepub.com/eiw/public/1992/eirv19n25-19920619/eirv19n25-19920619_036-dixy_lee_ray_battles_rio_green_a.pdf
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nigelj at 06:29 AM on 22 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
takamura_senpai, ego is a factor in all this, but imho there's more to it. You can't expect people to make big changes to their lifestyles when they don't see the entire group doing this, or most of the group. It not a rational response for them to sacrifice themselves for little gain. There's a technical term for this problem but I just cant recall it.
The only way to counter this is probably a strong carbon tax that forces people to all make some sort of change more or less in unison. Unfortunately this comes up against the people with ideological opposition to taxes and they are very influential. Because of this I'm inclined to think we are not going to fix the climate problem, not properly anyway.
Don't have a "peer reviewed study" to back this up and I'm not going to spend all my morning trying to find stuff I've read on it. So if my comment doesn't meet the websites standards I guess just do whatever you want.
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nigelj at 06:28 AM on 22 January 2020Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
Sorry posted 143 on the wrong thread.
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nigelj at 06:27 AM on 22 January 2020Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
takamura_senpai, ego is a factor but there's more to it. You can't expect people to make big changes to their lifestyles when they don't see the entire group doing this, or most of the group. It not a rational response for them to sacrifice themselves for little gain. There's a technical term for this problem but I just cant recall it.
The only way to counter this is probably a strong carbon tax that forces people to all make some sort of change more or less in unison. Unfortunately this comes up against the people with ideological opposition to taxes and they are very influential. Because of this I'm inclined to think we are not going to fix the climate problem, not properly anyway.
Don't have a "peer reviewed study" to back this up and I'm not going to spend all my morning trying to find stuff I've read on it. So if my comment doesn't meet the websites standards I guess just do whatever you want.
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william5331 at 05:13 AM on 22 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
Some time ago I read a study based on the analysis of Stalactites and Stalacmintes that suggested that there is a 200 year cycle of wet and dry periods in Australia. Moreover, the wet period is coming to an end and a dry period starting. Add climate change to this and Aus looks to be in a spot of trouble. If the past couple of centuries were the wet period what must the dry period look like augmented by climate change.
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takamura_senpai at 21:27 PM on 21 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
I try. More warm ocean => more water vapours =>more blocking infrared radiation above Australia and NOT produce more clouds
Main: more water vapours NOT produce more clouds
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MA Rodger at 21:09 PM on 21 January 2020Ocean acidification isn't serious
This has all got a bit shouty in a couple of days. Perhaps to return to the initial question @84. Markoh asks:-
"The bit I don't get is that all the limestone deposits in the world which is calcium carbonate were produced when the atmospheric CO2 was many times higher than today. So how did all the shellfish create so much shells that it formed huge limestone deposits with the very high atmospheric CO2 back then??"
I should point out that there is an SkS OP that directly addresses this question (Why were the ancient oceans favorable to marine life when atmospheric carbon dioxide was higher than today?) but perhaps a more succinct answer would be useful here.
Although limestones apparently predate shellfish, shellfish (or molluscs with mineral shells) date back to the Cambrian period when ocean pH was lower than today (perhaps 7.9pH or as low as the 7.3pH modelled by Ridgwell 2005). It is only in the last 30My that ocean pH was high as today (& atmospheric CO2 as low as today). With rising atmospheric CO2, the ocean pH is now falling (today it has fallen from 8.2pH to 8.1pH) and making the chemistry of shellfish more difficult. Those organisms using high--magnesium chemistry (as opposed to argon- or low magnesium-chemistry) will be especially vulnerable as will organisms who do not calsify their shells 'internally', but all will suffer. The last example of CO2 driving ocean acidification (the PETM 55My ago) saw limestones entirely absent from geological formations.
However, it is not the ocean pH that is directly the problem. It is the low concentration of calcium ions that makes shell-formation difficult and such concentrations being pushed low by dropping in pH, not by low pH. Thus over most of the last 500 million years, ocean pH was much lower than today and during these times shellfish thrived.
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takamura_senpai at 21:07 PM on 21 January 2020How did climate change get so controversial?
"How did climate change get so controversial?" - because human egoism. Not only cars and electricity, ALL goods have a CO2 price.
Individual egoism against little problems for all in very far future. What was/is/will win?
Car users say many things, but still use a cars. Same with all others.
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Markoh at 21:05 PM on 21 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
Jim @3 "Moreover, it’s not just this one year, Australia has been unusually hot and dry for the past several years" I think that changed in this last week with much of Eastern Australia getting 1-2 months rain in a day. Wet and Wild theme park was closed due to Errrr too much water.
Moderator Response:[PS] Borderline sloganeering. Climate is not changed in a month or a year. Trends are what matter. Are you seriously suggesting problem is over?
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Markoh at 20:57 PM on 21 January 2020Australia's heat and bushfires are signs of fundamental shifts in its climate
There is also the issue of fuel loads. Aboriginal Australians have been very critical of current day forest management and are advocating to bring back mosaic burning like they did for all those thousands of years. It makes sense to have a series of small fires rather than one big one.
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Eclectic at 17:02 PM on 21 January 2020What's Happening To Tuvalu Sea Level?
Markoh @79 , thank you for re-opening this thread after nearly 8 years.
Your abc.net reference also describes how some of the Tuvalu islands are shrinking, and others are growing (a matter of coral sand being washed up onto them). A similar mixed picture, with other Pacific coral islands, and elsewhere in the world too.
Since the worldwide sea level is rising (according to tide-gauge measurements, and satellite measurements) at a slow but accelerating rate (due to the ongoing global warming plus an accelerating ice-melt . . . it comes as no surprise that many low-lying islands (coral and non-coral) are beginning to suffer problems. Not only the absolute sea level rise : but the rise plus stronger storm-urges are causing pollution of the fresh-water "lens" which, via bores, usually provides the necessities for the local population on such low islands.
It is vastly expensive for them to "transport in" such fresh water supplies. And the local trees suffer from brackish water at their roots. Result :- those islands become practically uninhabitable, long before the sea gets to ankle-level.
Also no surprise: the locals are not happy about the situation.
Markoh (as I asked and re-asked on your other thread today) ~ do you have a valid point that you wish to make?
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Markoh at 16:06 PM on 21 January 2020What's Happening To Tuvalu Sea Level?
Hang on, the ABC Fact Check determined that Tuvalu has grown by 2.9% in the four decades to 2014?
www.abc.net.au/news/2018-12-19/fact-check-is-the-island-nation-tuvalu-growing/10627318
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nigelj at 15:49 PM on 21 January 2020Is Nuclear Energy the Answer?
michael sweet @141
nigelj: "Its clear an 80% solar and wind grid needs much less storage than a 100% grid. Orders of magnitude less. Nuclear power is one way of filling in the 20%. I have never said its the only way. Hydro would work in some places" my emphasis.
MS: "Your claim of "orders of magnitude less [storage]" is not supported by your reference. It appears you made this up. The inference that nuclear can reduce storage by "orders of magnitude" is simply nuclear industry propaganda."
nigelj :The magazine reference I quoted stated "Geophysical constraints on the reliability of solar and wind power in the United States posits that the U.S. electrical grid could be 80% powered by a solar-heavy+wind power combination using just 12 hours of energy storage to smooth out the variability. .....To reach a 100% wind+solar U.S. electricity grid would require 3 weeks of energy storage. " Clearly 12 hours of storage is "orders of magnitude" less than 3 weeks of storage exactly as I stated.
Perhaps the reference is wrong, but that is not my fault.
I never intened to mean that an 80% solar and wind power grid had to have nuclear power or only hydro power filling the gap, just that it was a possibility. Plus New Zealand has a lot of hydro power so I'm probably subconsciously influenced by that. Other possibilities are geothermal power, or biofuels steam turbine power, etcetera. I don't care. Whatever works.
Electricity grids need reactive power as you probably know. Solar and wind power are poor at providing reactive power although it may improve. The Drax biofuels turbine system supplies reactive power to the UK grid to help out the renewables component, which has a lot of wind power. Nuclear power , geothermal power and hydro power also provide plenty of reactive power.
I also never said a 80% solar and wind power grid didn't need battery (or similar) storage, just that it needed a lot less storage than a 100% grid.
You either don't comprehend what people say, even when its simply put or skimmed it a bit fast. I assume the later.MS: "When you say "Sometimes the consensus view is just wrong and the research on this issue [Linear Response No Threshold] is rather old and inadequate" and you dismiss a 2006 National Academy of Sciences expert consensus report you are repeating nuclear industry propaganda."
No I'm expressing my own opinion.
MS "You exchange a lot of posts on the unmoderated RealClimate forum. Much of the material posted there would not be allowed at SkS because it contradicts the peer reviewed literature and is untrue. Be careful what you repeat here that you read there."
Obviously you haven't read much of it, because I've spent half my time attacking claims made by the pro nuclear lobby, and also promoting renewable electricity. However I think they make some good points on some aspects of things that persuades me theres some place for nuclear power in the mix. I'm not alone.
"If you continue to repeat unsupported nuclear industry propaganda here I will continue to call you out. Renewable energy can provide ALL POWER to the world at a cost similar or lower than BAU."
I think renewables will win the day and you will be proven right. But its all speculation right now because we dont have a 100% renewables grid to know. The papers modelling costs are theoretical. Modelling costs is hard and has a bad track record.
France has nuclear power and some of the cleanest electricity in the world. They have already arrived at a clean grid.
I can't see a problem with a grid that has some nuclear power in it if people want. Its not actually a big deal to me. I don't accept your argument this undermines trust in renewables. People are not stupid. The world has long had grids with multiple sources of power.
This is probably going to be my final set of comments on this particular issue. I'm getting fed up with the bickering and accusations made against me about what I say or who influences me. I think for myself. I've had to waste time over this. I made my comments in good faith quoting an article froma main stream source, not some denialist / nuclear power website.
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