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Comments 121001 to 121050:

121001. vancouverd at 00:31 AM on 16 April 2010
        Hockey stick is broken
        Is it safe to say "the last few decades are the hottest in the last 500 to 2000 years"? My local skeptic threw "Vostock Ice Core data which clearly shows the Roman Era as Warmer than now" at me ...
121002. Alexandre at 00:24 AM on 16 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        Karl_from_Wylie #75 That's reasonable. Do check data presented as facts, and try to understand the methodology. Apply the same standards when you see a denier claim, too.
121003. pdt at 21:32 PM on 15 April 2010
        Models are unreliable
        Tom Dayton quoted from another source, ""Thus statistical fits to the observed data are included in the climate model formulation, but these are only used for process-level parameterisations, not for trends in time."" I'm not sure what "process-level parameterisations" means. Presumably one needs a model of cloud properties for a range of atmospheric conditions in order to predict climate trends with time. Either you get the properties from an understanding of the physics of cloud formation and their properties or you infer them from fitting to measured climate data. "Process-level parameterisations" sounds like the fitting. Again, I'm not judging it, I'm just trying to understand it. The language is just not familiar to me. My modeling experience is in a different field.
121004. Tony Noerpel at 21:31 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Hi John you mean 75 million years later here since your first bullet item was the end Ordovician: "75 million years ago in the Late Devonian period, the environment that had clearly nurtured reefs for at least 13 million years turned hostile and the world plunged into the second mass extinction event." I have to agree with Michael Le Page though I too think your site is one of the best. Except for the K-T, most major and minor mass extinctions don't lend themselves to unilateral causes. This may be why they are so rare. However, anthropogenic impacts are not just CO2 or climate related. We may be having an even bigger impact on the nitrogen cycle for example so John Russell may also be correct. We may be changing too many aspects of the Earth system too fast. Tony
121005. CBDunkerson at 21:20 PM on 15 April 2010
        Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
        chriscanaris #40, again I point out the fallacy of your argument... sea ice extent is a proxy at two removes for sea ice volume. Data shows that the ice volume has continued to decline... therefor no 'recovery trend' exists to have this 'statistical significance' argument over. That sea ice broke up more and/or was more spread out (the two factors differentiating 'extent' from 'volume') for a few years is irrelevant to the overall state of the ice... which is still declining.
121006. John Russell at 21:14 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Paulm: I think it's perhaps slightly premature to call what's happening at the moment a mass extinction event (MME), however if there are intelligent creatures around on Earth in a few million years time perhaps they'll refer to the period we're rapidly moving into as the 'AME' -- Anthropogenic Mass Extinction. Sounds a lot more serious than 'anthropogenic global warming', does it not?
121007. Michael Le Page at 20:55 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        For once, I have to disagree with one of your postings, John. You present a very speculative study as far more definitive than it really is. Vernon may be right about ocean acidification being the coral killer, but the case is certainly far from proven, and may never be. I think your claim that dramatic climate change always produces mass extinctions needs major qualifications added too. The PETM was a pretty dramatic temperature increase, for instance, but it led only to a very minor marine extinction extinct. More recently, there have been some dramatic climate changes with no evidence of associated extinctions - the so-called Quaternary conundrum. Other experts I've spoken to (I've been writing a related article) say this could just because no one has looked at the fossil record closely enough, but the jury is certainly still out on this issue. Otherwise, though, a great site with great content - keep up the good work!
121008. thingadonta at 20:53 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        You and Veron (2008) are inferring rapid C02 changes and ocean acidifications at mass extinction periods by looking at coral reef extinctions. This inference has little/no evidence to support it, other than circumstantial. Corals reef extinctions and coral reef 'absences' in the fossil record occur for other reasons than by rapid C02 changes and inferred ocean acidification. "Throughout Earth's history, there have been periods where climate changed dramatically" Wrong/selective. Most mass extinction events occurred in geological times of tens of thousands of years. This is not what is generally meant by "change dramatically". Your point 2 above should say 75 million years later, not "ago". This Later Devonian event didn’t 'turn hostile’; it was a slow process, with multiple waves, that occurred over millions of years. The Mass extinction at the end of the Permian was caused by cascading factors that occurred over several hundred thousand to a few million years, related to Siberian Traps volcanism. Most genera took about 10 Ma years to recover, the corals were not in any way special. The End Triassic mass extinction (I think it is actually Mid Triassic) was associated with Gondawana continental breakup and injection of vast rift-related volcanism in South America, Australia, South Africa and Antarctica. Most of the hard rock aggregate on the East Coast of Australia, the towering cliffs in Tasmania, South America and so on are associated with this. It was volcanic, and slow, like most mass extinctions. The End Cretaceous was associated with Deccan Traps volcanism in India (not long after it separated from Africa) and bolide impact. This is the only certain mass extinction event associated with bolide impact, but volcanism played a major part as well (a one two punch). “The fossil record shows coral extinction occurred over much longer periods." This is because it was a result of slow, gradual, volcanically active periods. They were not periods of 'quickly changing atmospheric c02'. They were periods of slow increases in volcanism. Veron is not a volcanologist. Neither was Alvarez, who rejected both the stratigraphers and the volcanologists who informed him his bolide impact theory in 1980 at the K/T boundary wasn't all that was going on at the time. Time proved the volcanologists right, and as usual, the physicists who like to dabble in earth history got it wrong eg: • Kelvin and the age of the earth early 1900s, when stratigraphers told him the earth was much older than his calculations-he wouldn’t listen ; • the geophysicists and other non-earth physicists -including Albert Einstein-who rejected plate tectonics in the 1920s-1950s - the stratigraphers told them the rocks proved the continents moved well before plate tectonics was discovered, • Alvalrez and bolide impact 1980s, and • John Cook solar physicist 2008- now inferring mass extinctions of corals were rapid and associated largely with rapid c02 changes, I suspect most volcanologists would say this is a gross oversimplification, or at worst invalid. There is little/no evidence that slow volcanic processes were associated with inferred ocean acidifications, and corresponding reef extinctions. The reefs went extinct, like most other things, because of slow sea level changes (there is good correlation betwen sea level changes and marine extinctions), changes in volcanism (producing a variety of slow effects-again a very good correlation, but importantly-generally not with C02 changes), bolide impacts (really the only one that is 'rapid'), continental break ups (eg Triassic), continental joinings (well known to reduce biodiversity as previously separate and endemic species compete with and then extinguish each other), and many other factors. C02 change is slow, doesn’t follow these other factors or most mass exticntions, and plays a relatively minor part in the history of the earth. You're selective references to the vast peer reviewed literature on mass extinctions does not give readers the full picture of the state of understanding and history of debate in this field.
121009. nhthinker at 20:37 PM on 15 April 2010
        CO2 lags temperature
        http://web.mit.edu/fnl/volume/215/rizzoli_stone.html "The paucity of observations in the tropical Atlantic and Indian oceans have considerably retarded our understanding, modeling, and prediction of these coupled modes, which are extremely important not only because of their societal consequences but because it is through them that the ocean actually drives the atmosphere. These regions and coupled mechanisms should constitute a priority of observational and theoretical research. " The confidence of CO2 forcing to the levels that climate models currently predict is tenuous, at best. Indeed, the understanding is still retarded. But it is improving all the time. Can you point to a researcher that has not put out predictions that did not turn out to be serious exaggerations of actually measured impacts?
121010. Argus at 19:43 PM on 15 April 2010
        Visual depictions of Sea Level Rise
        #86 The last sentence should end: - two *kilometers* per month.
121011. Peter Hogarth at 19:11 PM on 15 April 2010
        Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
        tobyw at 10:57 AM on 15 April, 2010 I guess in winter the re-freeze will be pretty quick, and there’s precious little sunlight to warm the temporary open water. In summer the Russian routes are increasingly ice free. However, I didn’t know this is one of the NSIDCs frequently asked questions. They say effects are minimal (no doubt about anthropogenic though!)
121012. Berényi Péter at 18:51 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        I have copied Figure 1 above to a carbon dioxide history reconstruction. You can see that CO₂ either changes fast or not at mass extinction events. The same is true for times of prolific reef growth. Also, reefs can happily grow with carbon dioxide levels above 2000 ppmv, sometimes.
121013. Argus at 18:44 PM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        JMurphy #78 I wish it were easier than that, but thank you!
121014. Argus at 18:30 PM on 15 April 2010
        Visual depictions of Sea Level Rise
        How is it possible that the sea level is rising in one part of the Pacific, and at the same time falling in another part? Over a 15-year period? Can anyone explain that? - I would rather believe that the measurements are faulty. Also, how can we trust satellites to measure the sea level with millimeter precision? These satellites probably lose many millimeters in altitude for each time they circle the earth (the ISS typically loses two meters per orbital period - two meters per month).
121015. JMurphy at 18:06 PM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        Argus, right click on the red time and date next to someone's name, copy the shortcut (or left click on it and copy what's showing in the Address bar), and paste it into the Comment box. Then use the (a href="") (/a) tags - with the correct brackets, of course.
121016. Argus at 17:51 PM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        Somewhere in the area from around comment #56 to #71, a comment must have been deleted, because the references are off by one. This could be confusing. So, if comments are deleted for reasons, numbers should be revised within the afffected area. Alternatively, some people seem to know how to reference a comment with a hyperlink. Please tell us how you do that!
121017. James Wight at 17:14 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Sorry, I meant to link to this Wikipedia page.
121018. James Wight at 17:09 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Re #15 response According to Wikipedia, the Devonian spanned 416 to 359 million years ago, and the main extinction event was about 364 million years ago. So where does the "75 million" come from?
121019. Andy Skuce at 17:01 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        @ 15 James Wight Response: Sorry, that should be "75 million years ago". Around 75 million years ago, there was a period of 13 million years when corals were thriving. Then things went horribly wrong... Yabbut that wasn't in the Devonian (which was 354-410 million years ago)... :-)
121020. RSVP at 16:42 PM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        To Karl_from_Wylie and Et al I also thought about the fact that the UK is not the entire planet, but then had musings along the lines of doug_bostrom's comment, "we've only got one reputation per login", and abstained thinking it wasnt worth bringing up. After reading your last comment about flawed methodologies, I would add that natural selection would likely have an affect on the timing of seeds over the course of 200 years. In other words, a seed produced in the year 1800 is not the same as a seed planted in 2000, especially as affected by an urban heat island.
121021. Doug Bostrom at 16:23 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Hey, John, do you have a reference on the anoxia outcome?
        Response: I was just quoting the Veron paper - I suggest reading through the paper, following any references and report back to let us know what you find :-)
        
121022. Paul Magnus at 15:57 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        ...and the Earth will enter the sixth mass extinction. What is the definition of a MEE? It seems to me that we are entering one now. I think we should be referencing what we are seeing now not as a Climate Crisis, but as a Mass Extinction.
121023. HumanityRules at 15:44 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Here John, for your list on reef references. http://www.nova.edu/ncri/11icrs/proceedings/files/m25-06.pdf Looks at real world areas of the ocean aftered by ENSO to suggest what may happen to reefs worldwide with increasing CO2.
121024. James Wight at 15:41 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        "In the Late Devonian period 75 million years, the environment that had clearly nurtured reefs for at least 13 million years turned hostile and the world plunged into the second mass extinction event." I don't understand what you're trying to say here. To what do the "75 million years" and "13 million years" refer?
        Response: Sorry, that should be "75 million years ago". Around 75 million years ago, there was a period of 13 million years when corals were thriving. Then things went horribly wrong...
        
121025. HumanityRules at 15:39 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        2.cbrock "John Harte at the University of California.... the extinction holocaust" I was critised for suggesting alarmist were peddling catastrophes and asked to show examples of scientists doing this. You may have just done that for me. The particularly wording Prof Harte uses here is the most offensive language imaginable.
121026. HumanityRules at 15:32 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        This is just about reef ecosystems?
        Response: Veron 2008 uses the fossil record of coral reef extinctions to glean certain facts about past mass extinctions - by looking at the nature, timing and geographical spread of coral extinction, they deduce that global atmospheric CO2 levels changed dramatically during each of the 5 mass extinctions. While ocean acidification was devastating to marine ecosystems, obviously other factors were in play such as the mass extinction at the end Triassic where 80% of all land quadrupeds also went extinct.
121027. chris1204 at 15:29 PM on 15 April 2010
        Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
        Albatross @ 25 in response to Humanity Rules @20 'The long-term trend is statistically significant, the short term trend is not, there is no way of getting away from that fact.' We have no way of knowing except via the passage of time whether the short term trend will eventually be statistically significant. I think this is broadly equivalent to what statisticians call a Type II or Beta error - rejecting a statistically non-significant trend because of insufficiency of data. Wikipedia amusingly calls it an 'error of excessive skepticism.'
121028. Doug Bostrom at 15:26 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Karl (#8) not to leave your last post unanswered, it's really not possible to have a productive discussion about nonspecific complaints. But the article hardly seems a ringing indictment: We focus on three key topics: the impact of climate change on water supplies, food, and biodiversity. The investigation reveals that the IPCC's broad conclusions were sound. Indeed, the stringent rules of the IPCC means the report sometimes understated the potential impacts of climate change - on biodiversity, for instance. Going on, we see some details of the "flawed methodology" you refer to. We've got the Thomas paper, which was criticized this way: when New Scientist contacted the authors of those critiques, none demurred from the IPCC finding. One, John Harte at the University of California, Berkeley, said most of his criticisms suggested that Thomas underestimated extinction rates. Far from the IPCC being guilty of exaggeration, he says, its caution may have led it to underplay the extinction holocaust awaiting the planet's biodiversity in the coming century. The article goes on to discuss a problematic report on drought, where instead of 179 million persons at risk of water shortage, the net turned out to be "just" 40 million. A gaffe alright, but not an indication that nothing's happening, eh? Finally there's the matter of crops yields in Africa (again). A clear case of the IPCC ending up with a squishy conclusion. But anything in the article questioning the basic premises this entire matter hinges on? No. And anything talking about exaggerated extinctions, in the New Scientist article? Any problems with hyperbole noted? No, the opposite. And I can just about guarantee that by now we'd have heard of 'em, if such there were. After all, New Scientist looked into that specific issue, right? So I don't agree with you, Karl. I don't see a refutation of multiple avenues of mainstream science or a reason to seriously imagine we've got thousands of researchers on a delusional path. Nope.
121029. Steve L at 15:12 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Hi John, when I last read the Veron paper it seemed to me that some of the CO2 reconstructions didn't seem wholly congruent with what I'd seen elsewhere. Now, looking at Veron's figure 3, I wonder how it would compare (and how the question marks reflect uncertainty ranges). I'd like to see the most recent and best or consensus reconstructions of atmospheric CO2 and marine pH. Two minor comments: (1) for the end Cretaceous, you say "tropical marine life was decimated," but decimated has two common uses. Which usage do you mean? (2) At the end you say Earth will enter the 6th mass extinction, but many biologists say that the 6th extinction is well underway. I thought it was Stuart Pimm, but Google disagrees -- the idea precedes 1995.
121030. scaddenp at 15:02 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        I am struggling to follow your logic. The article states: "The investigation reveals that the IPCC's broad conclusions were sound. Indeed, the stringent rules of the IPCC means the report sometimes understated the potential impacts of climate change - on biodiversity, for instance. But our findings suggest there may have been problems with the way its conclusions were presented." In what way does this imply that the methodologies are wrong and thus the conclusions cannot be trusted? If the criticism is that methodologies lead to underestimation, then surely you conclude that the conclusion should be taken as best case, rather than of no value at all. Highlighting some areas for improvement in not a reason to chuck the baby out with the bath water as the investigation clearly and unequivocally states.
121031. Karl_from_Wylie at 14:44 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        #7 Bern Call me cynical, it like saying, "Hey I don't agree with your methods but your conclusions agree with my pre-concieved conclusions on the issue, so you're study is good."
121032. Karl_from_Wylie at 14:41 PM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        #5 doug_bostrom Please see the points the author made at NewScientest Although the author supports the ultimate conclusions, the entire article challenges the methodologies of the IPCC. I question whether one can support conclusions if the methodologies are not acceptable.
121033. Karl_from_Wylie at 14:18 PM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        #74 Alexandre "Try to find something as comprehensive showing cooling, or insensitivity of ecosystems to temperature, or whatever your working hypothesis is. " I don't have a "belief" to defend. I am not a denier. But I am skeptical of things that are presented as fact, when discovered that the underlying methodologies are flawed, or when people don't follow the rules they set for themselves.
121034. James Wight at 13:08 PM on 15 April 2010
        Ocean acidification: Global warming's evil twin
        John, have you considered posting this as a reply to the argument "Ocean acidification isn't going to happen"?
        Response: I was planning to do a synthesis of a number of papers into a single post but rather than let perfect be the enemy of good, for now I've used this post to add the 107th skeptic argument "ocean acidification isn't going to happen". Thanks for the suggestion.
        
121035. Doug Bostrom at 12:54 PM on 15 April 2010
        Are we too stupid?
        Shawnhet, the reason why PV systems and the like are "unaffordable" is the same reason why, for any country with substantial access to coal and the willingness to burn it, nuclear also is unaffordable, at least in the eyes of the economist's "rational man" and his present inability or unwillingness to integrate external costs of fossil fuel consumption into his equations. The capital cost of coal generation plant commissioning is substantially less than that of nuclear, somewhere in the neighborhood of half as much. And of course that's the estimate for "overnight" building costs, the perfect world. Folks like to ascribe the cost intensive nature of nuclear plant construction to excessive regulations, but I would caution anybody expecting to winnow down the overnight capital cost of a nuclear plant by eliminating regulations, operating rules and the like to think again. It's too easy to condemn construction standards and inspections without taking into a account the reason for each and every iota of regulation; there's not as much fat in nuclear regulation as we might imagine from popular literature. I've got nothing particular against nuclear power; clearly in certain contexts it works. My point in singling out nuclear plants is simply to help avoid making the mistake of imagining investors will flock to nuclear plants if given half the chance. Where are those investors today? Putting the money where they get faster ROI, such as coal plants. Why? At least in part because we're not doing full cost accounting for using coal and other fossil fuels for electrical generation. So, whatever are our pipe dreams of future energy supply, as long as there's plentiful coal and an incomplete accounting structure the private sector will have a strong preference for building coal generation plants and will continue to ignore the entire spectrum of seemingly more expensive systems.
121036. shawnhet at 12:13 PM on 15 April 2010
        Are we too stupid?
        Doug, It seems as though your only response is to make carbon more expensive. The point about PV systems is not that they are cheaper now than all other forms of energy *right now*, but that their cost effectiveness is increasing exponentially quickly. This makes them a better investment *long-term* than the marginal sorts of improvements you are talking about in #83 IMO. As I have said before, nuclear power is the simplest near term solution for *large* reductions in GH emissions. These have already been used by, for example, the French. I don't really follow the example of the solar capture technology you advocate, but if I understand you correctly implementation of it requires a tax increase on carbon emissions(IOW it is currently too expensive, but when carbon is priced "correctly" this tech would be simple and easy to implement). As I have already argued, I think these sorts of tax increases will be increasingly difficult to bring forward, so I recommend other options. As to why the different options will be funded, this is not so terribly difficult to understand. I am pretty sure that most industrial countries actively impede the construction of nuclear power plants, we could move to a lower carbon footprint with just a shift in priorities (see the French example). As for why PV will be funded, again it comes back to the exponential nature of the growth. When PV finally becomes truly economical whoever has invested in the winning version will become absurdly, disgustingly wealthy (similar to folks who bought IBM in the 50s or Microsoft in the early 80s). You can hardly go a full week these days without some new piece of research or product that increases the efficiency or decreases the cost of solar power. Government investment in research can only speed that along. IMO, you continue to argue for a false choice where there is no way to make any progress on the GH gas front without what you might call pricing carbon accurately. There are clear alternatives that do not require this, and that would work. Cheers, :)
121037. tobyw at 10:57 AM on 15 April 2010
        Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
        Russia among other nations has had a fleet of ice breakers and ice breaking cargo ships operating in the Arctic, breaking ice to open their ports and rivers and even taking excursions to the North Pole. The latest of 8 operating nuclear powered versions will make ten knots through 8 feet of ice with a maximum ice depth of 9 feet. The USSR's first nuclear ice breaker was launched in 1959. The first of the latest Antarctica class was launched in 1975 they are used for clearing the sea lanes north of Siberia and for sightseeing, with excursions to the North Pole. The effect of breaking up all this ice and exposing the broken surfaces to the warmer seawater plus the heating effect of sunlight on the exposed water cannot help but have an effect on the system. Broken ice would experience accelerated melting in the summer and slower ice build up in the winter due to precipitation falling on water and not having a chance to freeze and accumulate as it would on ice. How much has this disturbance changed the balance of nature in the arctic? -T http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6OHHGrVM3g&feature=related http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4RQXkI3B8w&feature=related http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_icebreakers http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin_(nuclear_icebreaker) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arktika_(icebreaker) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arktika_class_icebreaker http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Manhattan_(1962) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_breaker http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_powered_icebreaker
121038. Bern at 10:47 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Re #4 Karl_from_Wylie: I'd echo Doug Bostrom's question in #5 above. I'd also add this one: if the only identified flaws in a methodology are that it underestimates adverse impacts of CO2 emissions, should we not take action to mitigate the impacts that it predicts? Or should we wait until we know with more certainty how bad the train wreck is going to be before we think about applying the brakes? Call me cynical, but that's like saying "Hey, this analysis suggests only some of the passengers in the first carriage are going to be killed, but there are some train experts who think it could be worse, so hold off on that brake lever until we figure out exactly what's going to happen."
121039. Alexandre at 10:44 AM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        #68 Karl_from_Wylie The IPCC is doing a great job gathering the available science on this issue. I recommend Rahmstorf 2007 as a reference of how their projections are doing compared to observations. But even if you don't like this panel: I'm sure you're aware of the fact that the IPCC does not produce science itself. It just gathers it in a report. The evidence in this case, therefore, is not the AR4, but the underlying 75 peer reviewed papers. Try to find something as comprehensive showing cooling, or insensitivity of ecosystems to temperature, or whatever your working hypothesis is.
121040. Andy Skuce at 10:02 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        I haven't managed to get hold of Veron's paper, so it's premature for me to comment on it. However, there were reefs in the Palaeocene, after the K/T event. A big decline in reefs seems to have happened later at the Palaeocene-Eocene thermal maximum. Reference
        Response: Here's a link to the full version of Veron 2008.
        
        Thanks for the link to Decline of coral reefs during late Paleocene to early Eocene global warming (Scheibner 2008). I'm building a list of peer-review papers on the risks to coral reefs and have added this paper.
        
121041. JMurphy at 09:48 AM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        Ah, Karl_from_Wylie, you DO think headlines are the most important part of an article. OK, we disagree then : I will stick to the contents of the articles themselves and will treat them as more important than the headlines above them. In fact, I only really scan headlines before moving onto the detail contained in the articles, but that's me.
121042. Doug Bostrom at 09:31 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Which methodology, Karl? Can you be more precise?
121043. Karl_from_Wylie at 09:29 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        #2 cbrock The point of the article, is how can conclusions be trusted if the methodology is questionable.
121044. watchingthedeniers at 09:26 AM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        To be frank, Karl's posts are full of non sequiturs and logical fallacies. Your analogy is a poor one: what did you hypothetical men die off? Could they have lived to 100+ Was it cancers? What % of the population does that demographic apply to. What is the average life span? 40 years? 50? 90? Hence, it does not follow that it is an appropriate analogy. Re IPCC credibility and the so called "scandals" - those arguments won't fly here. Climategate investigation: no proof of fraud, better disclosure called for Mann, Jones et.al cleared of all wrong doing.
121045. Karl_from_Wylie at 09:20 AM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        #71 JMurphy "....Was it "Please add a section to the "Climate Alarmist" section." ? Bingo! Headline reads, "Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years" But when read, the article is only about the UK. Analogy..... Headline - "Worldwide, men are dying at a high rate" Story - Men over the age of 90 years old are dying at a rate higher than the general population. Studies are suggested for other age groups to be studied.
121046. Doug Bostrom at 09:18 AM on 15 April 2010
        Sea level rise is exaggerated
        On the other hand: "Sea levels in New Zealand have remained relatively stable throughout the past 7000 years, but salt-marsh cores from southern New Zealand show evidence of a recent rapid rise. To date and quantify this rise we present a proxy sea-level record spanning the past 500 years for Pounawea, southeastern New Zealand, based on foraminiferal analyses. Ages for ten sea-level index points are established from AMS14C, Pb concentrations, stable Pb isotopes, pollen markers, charcoal concentrations and 137Cs. Sea level was rising slowly (0.3 ± 0.3 mm yr−1) from AD 1500 to AD 1900, but during the 20th century the rate increased to 2.8 ± 0.5 mm yr−1, in agreement with instrumental measurements commencing in 1924. This is the first sea-level record from the southern hemisphere showing a significantly higher rate of sea-level rise during the 20th century as compared with preceding centuries." A 20th century acceleration of sea-level rise in New Zealand Found in list of articles citing the Hannah article cited by butareyousure...
        Response: Just letting you know I've added a new argument "New Zealand sea level is not accelerating" along with the two peer-reviewed links from these last two comments. Good to have these papers at our fingertips for future reference.
        
121047. butareyousure at 08:53 AM on 15 April 2010
        Sea level rise is exaggerated
        Speaks for itself! "These new results indicate that relative sea levels in New Zealand have been rising at an average rate of 1.6 mm/yr over the last 100 years - a figure that is not only within the error bounds of the original determination, but when corrected for glacial-isostatic effects has a high level of coherency with other regional and global sea level rise determinations. There continues to be no evidence of any acceleration in relative sea levels over the record period." http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2004/2003GL019166.shtml
121048. Tarcisio José D at 08:03 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Fine subject for discussion Mr. John. A possible explanation for these extreme events is in the soil sealing caused by excess ammonium in the soil derived from the decomposition of organic matter. This is not "peer-rewied" but it is a matter to be discussed because in the sealing soil, the rain water does not infiltrate. It runs through the surface and goes straight into the oceans. To balance the evaporation rate of water into the atmosphere nature calls for the warming of the oceans. This sealing is a natural cause and is verifiable olso in forest soils. Here in Manaus the infiltration of water into the soil goes up to 20 cm depth only. With the lack of water to evaporate soil temprature in summer reaches 48 degrees centigrade. This problem must be present throughout the intertropical zone. In the Americas, Africa and New Zealand.
121049. cbrock at 08:03 AM on 15 April 2010
        Earth's five mass extinction events
        Karl_from_Wylie But when you read the New Scientist article, you find "But when New Scientist contacted the authors of those critiques, none demurred from the IPCC finding. One, John Harte at the University of California, Berkeley, said most of his criticisms suggested that Thomas underestimated extinction rates. Far from the IPCC being guilty of exaggeration, he says, its caution may have led it to underplay the extinction holocaust awaiting the planet's biodiversity in the coming century." So one of the big issues with the IPCC process is that they often end up being conservative to build consensus statements.
121050. JMurphy at 08:00 AM on 15 April 2010
        Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
        Karl_from_Wylie, you state that you read the last sentence in the last paragraph from this article (which calls for more study to determine regional and global results), and yet then claim that it supports your comments in your first post. Since the 'comments' in that first post of yours consisted of just three sentences, perhaps you could show which ones are supported : Was it "Please add a section to the "Climate Alarmist" section." ? Can't see how but await your explanation. Was it "If a study shows something is happening in the UK, it must be a world-wide phenomenon." ? Reading that last sentence from the article again, I can't see how. Was it "Ha ha." ? Hmmm... Perhaps you read a lot into headlines, since you spent most of your response to me, detailing how 'alarming' the headline on this article is because it doesn't mention the word 'UK' ? Don't you think that the article is more important (the article that mentions the 'UK' and 'British' in the first paragraph), or do you believe that headlines matter most.

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