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Tom Curtis at 10:23 AM on 14 March 2015It's the sun
As Dan Pangburn does not appear interested in following reason, I thought I would short cut the argument. His claim is that the integral of TSI explains the temperature history since 1880. Therefore, I took the record of TSI forcing used in Kevin C's simple response funtion climate model (default setting). I tested the regression of offsets of that forcing to 1960 to determine which best correlated with the GISS LOTI. As it happened, 0 offset was best. I then regressed the resulting integral of TSI against the GISS LOTI up to 1960, and projected the regression on to 2010:
For the record, the correlation over the full interval is 0.917 and the r squared is 0.841. I did not calculate the Root Mean Squared Error, but as you can see it is lousy. Sufficiently so as to falsify the model.
For comparison, here are the full forcings with a simple, two box response function as shown with default settings minus ENSO from Kevin's model:
R squared is given as 0.877. Better than the integral of TSI, but not stunningly so. The overall fit, however, smashes the Pangburn model. If you hold to the quaint notion that scientific results should be determined by empirical evidence, then there is no question as to which model is superior.
Dan Pangburn may not be happy with my regression. If not, however, it is incumbent on him to do better - and to tell us how he did it. Absent such an attempt, his counter theory is not science. It is merely a thought bubble. And until he does better, showing us the graph of the regression and explaining his methods, we are quite right to ignore that thought bubble.
Moderator Response:[PS] As you pointed out earlier, there is rather large gap in Dan's physical understanding. Are you going to put up the CO2 time integral as well?
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Riduna at 09:45 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
Tom @ 10 … “increased rainfall”. More likely fresh water run-off from increased ice sheet mass loss?
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mancan18 at 09:28 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Excellent article Howardlee.
Always wondered about an asteroid impact being solely to blame for the extinction of the dinosaurs. This thesis seemed to become entangled with the nuclear winter arguments regarding the impact of a nuclear war. Hence the reason it became the accepted idea as to what caused the demise of the dinosaurs. I would have thought that if there had been significant climate cooling due to blocking out the sun from the aerosols ejected into the atmosphere from an asteroid impact, then there would have been a significant drop in the CO2 levels due to the reduced activity of plants before the vulcan outgassing of CO2 had its full impact. A large asteroid impact on the scale of Chixulub should have a similar climate impact as a single LIP, and it seems that you need a few LIPs occuring over a short geological period to actually trigger a mass extinction event.
Perhaps, now that it is possible to date geological evidence more accurately, then a more refined history of of the sun's orbital dynamics, maturity and radiation levels; atmospheric composition; continental drift; vulcanism; climate change; and extinction events can be done. This may help put some of these controversies to rest.
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billthefrog at 08:40 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
@ scaddenp #20
Yep, that's what my gut-feel says - it's just that I've never seen anything formal, and certainly don't expect to be right about anything just on gut-feel.
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billthefrog at 08:35 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
@PluviaL #14
Last year I went to a lecture given by Bill McGuire, the Emeritus Professor of Geophysical & Climate Hazards at University College London. His talk was entitled "Waking the Giant", and it examined the effects wrought by isostacy as a direct consequence of past climate change. (And I've got a signed copy.)
cheers bill f
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billthefrog at 08:24 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
@ funglestrumpet #16
I'm pretty sure that ubrew12's point was that a longitudinal shock wave emanating from Chicxalub could have had percussions (pun intended) at the hot spot responsible for the basaltic mega-eruptions at the Deccan Traps. I don't for one moment think that some form of planetary-scale exit-wound was being mooted.
I once did some sums in preparation for an astronomy presentation, and calculated that the kinetic energy of the impactor was roughly equivalent to the total solar energy hitting TOA for about one month. The term "made the planet ring like a bell" is one that I have seen applied to this little nudge.
@ Howard
One of my chums, sadly no longer with us, was a Fellow of the Geological Society of London, and he always had a soft spot for the Deccan Traps as the "culprit".
There is, of course, another "suspect" - namely the so-called Shiva Crater Impact Spot. Does this have any real support in the rock-bashing community? (Those with any familiarity with the Hindu pantheon will appreciate the name.)
cheers bill f
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howardlee at 07:07 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Pluvial @ 14:
On climate afffecting volcanism yes there is, but in a tiny way. The first is a feedback in which melting ice reduces pressure on magma chambers in glaciated parts of the world, encouraging them to erupt. Example: Iceland today. The other is in rising sea levels supressing mid-ocean-ridge volcanism (and the converse). This is a mild, slow, long-term negative feeback completely dwarfed by human emissions. Minus the cosmic periods, your complex medium waves idea is very similar to this feedback.
Asteroid storms - I have seen a suggestion of long term periodicities in asteroid impacts but would have to dig further to find that paper. As is clear in the article, there is no evidence that they have much effect on the inner workings of the Earth or even its long-term climate, which is surprising.
Cosmic periods - there was a suggestion a while back that there was a periodicity in the cosmic ray flux into the atmosphere based on the motion of our solar system through the arms of the Milky Way galaxy, but that has been refuted by more accurate mapping of the arms and our place within them.
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howardlee at 06:39 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Villabolo @15: All I have found is this paper researching the atmospheric "erosion" by the Chicxulub impactor. It states that "no more than about 7% of the vaporized bolide plus atmospheric mass will escape the gravitation of the Earth," in other words there will be a net gain, not loss, of mass. As they say in the title - surprising!
Massive atmosphere loss happened at the time of the formation of our moon, mainly by a thermal process called "Jeans escape." That drove off our first atmosphere and replaced it with rock vapor, until volatiles expelled by cooling magma replaced it. But Earth retained a substantial atmosphere through the Late Heavy Bombardment,when the planet was pelted with large asteroids. This paper suggests there was probably a net gain of atmosphere through that time, in agreement with the paper above.
We had a number of very large impacts since then (Manicouagan, Acraman, Popigai, Sudbury, Vredefort, and Chicxulub) with no reports of anything suggesting significant atmosphere loss.
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funglestrumpet at 06:30 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
@ ubrew12
Why would a body, such as an asteroid, exit at the antipodes of its impact point?
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MA Rodger at 06:12 AM on 14 March 2015Measuring Earth's energy imbalance
bcglorfindel @52.
I think you'll find the problem with creating a global data series using both ERBE & CERES mainly boils down to calibration issues. There is one graph that I can recall that does stitch the two together, fig 2e in Allan et al (2014). The green trace WFOV uses ERBE data.
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villabolo at 05:37 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
howardlee @ #10:
Yes I know. What I was wondering was whether a substantial part of the atmosphere would have been ejected into space making our current atmosphere thinner than before. I didn't find a comment on the effects on the atmosphere in the link you cited.
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scaddenp at 05:30 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
Bill - on time scales of one to two hundred years, isostacy doesnt figure much in the calculation.
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PluviAL at 04:56 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
One of the funnest, most informative, article I have read here; moving first graphic;).
Such a broad perspective brings up two questions 1) Is there a periodicity to asteroid "storms"? It'd be kind of like we have shooting star storms, but for different causes. 2) Does climate affect volcanism and seismicity?
The argument here is that volcanism affects climate, but the other seems just as likely to me through GIA, it just conjecture on my part, but the science seems to be moving in that direction.
Thus we could have feedback mechanisms between, cosmic periods, volcanism, climate change, back to volcanism, then climate change again. I call this idea, complex medium waves (CMW), because the period may be affected by chemical changes in the lithosphere, thus magma chemistry and flow characteristics. This may take tens of thousands of years, so it may fit well in this argument.
It is just conjecture on my part because I have no education, and little study along those lines, but I am very curious to know more. This story is very helpful, especially with the rich sources. Nice work.
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It's the sun
Dan Pangburn - "...further discussion is useless." I'm afraid I would have to agree.
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Dan Pangburn at 03:53 AM on 14 March 2015It's the sun
KR - To see the effect that TSI has on temperature requires the time-integral of TSI. Without even that trivial science skill, further discussion is useless.
Moderator Response:[PS] By all means feel free to link to or post what you mean by a "time integral of TSI". Be sure to do the same for the CO2 forcing.
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wili at 03:15 AM on 14 March 2015Scientists link Arctic warming to intense summer heatwaves in the northern hemisphere
"A decline in summer storminess is consistent with model projections of the impacts of a warming Arctic"
Could someone explain why this would be the case?
It seems counterintuitive to me, but then I am often surprised by how my idiot intuition leads me astray when making assumptions about how climate works. :-/
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wili at 03:07 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
curiouspa, besides following JH's advise, consider that seasons still exist. Then think somemore. In particular, consider what happens to the saltiness of the surface water around Antartcica after a bunch of that landbased ice sheet melts during the summer, and what are the likely, predictable consequences of that for ice extent during the next winter.
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billthefrog at 02:33 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
@ Tom Curtis #15
Hi Tom,
Yep, I realise there is a slight density difference between sea water and fresh water, with sea water being in the order of 2.5% - 3% more dense.
One needs to look closely at the figure of ~4 cms additional SLR that Prof Peter Noerdlinger is talking about. This, however, is not based solely on a total melt out of sea ice (i.e. ice that has formed at sea).
Instead, he has also included the contribution from ice shelves (ie ice that has formed on land and has subsequently flowed out onto the sea surface).
From figures available on Cryosphere Today, the annual average area of global sea ice (NH + SH) is 19 million sq kms. If one takes an average thickness at a reasonably generous 2 metres, and somehow smears this over the approx 360 million sq kms of ocean surface, that would give us an ice coating of just over 10.5 cms.
As the density of ice is around 92% of fresh water, this would in turn equate to a fresh water "film" of some 9.71 cms in depth floating on top of the denser sea water below. Comparing densities of fresh and salt water, the same mass of salt water would have been about 9.47 cms deep.
Obviously, the difference between these is only in the order of 2.5mm, and that's why I ignored this second (third?) order effect in my earlier response to curiouspa.
Ice shelves are a different matter all together, and I am somewhat surprised by the fact that they have been lumped together in this fashion. Massive chunks of ice coming down from the Jacobshavn Isbrae, from Petermann, Pine Island or Thwaites, or, more spectacularly from things like the Larssen B Shelf most assuredly do contribute to overall SLR.
cheers bill f
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CollinMaessen at 02:25 AM on 14 March 2015New Series: Science Communicators – Why We Love Communicating Science
Thanks everyone for the suggestions, I've added them to my notes. :)
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It's the sun
Dan Pangburn - If CO2 isn't the point of discussion (or rather, the relative influences of anthropogenic GHGs and the myth that 'it's the sun' responsible for all recent climate changes), then why did you bring it up? Particularly when your claim is so unsupported?
In the meantime, since we are concerned with changes in temperature, graphing those against changes in TSI is entirely appropriate to investigate correlations.
Regarding the oceans, both Rob and I have agreed that GHGs have little effect on how the oceans absorb SW radiation - but you seem to be missing the physics where GHG changes greatly affect how the oceans lose that energy, causing a forcing imbalance and therefore warming the oceans.
Climate temperatures are a balance between incoming energy gain and outgoing loss scaled by the Stephan-Boltzmann relationship, and changes in a balance can come from a finger on either side of the scales.
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macoles at 00:37 AM on 14 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Thanks howardlee, can't wait to tell my science loving 11 year old daughter about this great example of scientific process in action.
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Dan Pangburn at 00:35 AM on 14 March 2015It's the sun
Rob - I agree and restate: Atmospheric CO2 increasing from 3 parts in 10,000 to 4 parts in 10,000 can not significantly change the rate that the oceans absorb sunlight.
KR - The effect of CO2 is not the point of discussion here.
Temperature change, in degrees K, multiplied by the effect thermal capacitance (thermal inertia?), in Joule sec/m/m/K results in units Joule sec/m/m.
Forcing is in Joule/m/m.
My only point here is that it is misleading to compare these on the same graph. The correct comparison is between the temperature change and the time-integral of the net (you can call it total) forcing.
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CBDunkerson at 00:08 AM on 14 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
In terms of global ice changes I think looking at the rough percentages helps;
- Antarctic land ice: 90%, decreasing
- Greenland land ice: 9%, decreasing
- All other ice: 1%, decreasing
So yes, it is possible to find examples where ice is increasing (e.g. Antarctic sea ice & individual glaciers), but those are a subset of 1% of the planet's total ice... and even that 1% is overall in decline.
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howardlee at 22:36 PM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Ranyl - basically yes! The late Cretaceous, before the eruptions, was quite cool, with some suggestion there was even ephemeral ice in Antarctica. But the climate was overall warmer than the 20th century and CO2 levels higher. Ocean currents were also different as Antarctica was still connected to South America and Australia. So there were important differences between then and now, but the fundamentals of rapid greenhouse gas emissions and pollution leading to abrupt climate change, acidification and environmental disaster are the same.
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wili at 22:20 PM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
What should we make of the FOUR cyclones now swirling around the Western Pacivic and over Australia? Pam just hit cat 5 status.
Elsewhere: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-31862881
"Angola floods kill at least 35 children and 27 adults".
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Tom Curtis at 21:25 PM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
billthefrog @14, melting of sea ice does raise sea level. The reason is that the ice, being fresh, is less dense than the salt water on which it floats. As a result, it floats higher than it would if floating in fresh water. The difference in the amount of ice above water between the ice floating and salt water and equivalent ice floating on fresh water is excess volume that contributes to sea level rise. The total melting of all sea ice including floating ice shelves would raise sea level by about 4 cm. (Paper)
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billthefrog at 20:17 PM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
@ scaddenp
As you well know, there is also the matter of isostacy to consider - especially at the local level. It is a standard (great white?) con trick to talk about there being a drop in measured MSL at such-and-such a place, and present this as a supposed counter argument to concerns over sea level rise.
In many areas that, until the geologically recent past, were covered by the Fenno-Scandian or Laurentide Ice Sheets, the crust is still physically rebounding following the loss of giga tonnes (terra tonnes?) of ice since the days of the last glacial maximum.
What I don't know* is whether or not isostacy has any overall meaningful impact on global sea level. Any ideas? (*That sentence should really have commenced... "Amongst the unimaginably vast number of things I don't know, is whether...)
@ curiouspa #
" ... Is the loss of Arctic sea ice a direct contibutor to sea level rise? ..."
I you look up "Archimede's Principle", especially the corollary regarding a body that is floating on a fluid, you should be easily able to work the answer out for yourself.
cheers bill f
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ranyl at 20:16 PM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Thanks Howardleevery thorough,interesting to read and insightful.
And very scarey!
Aren't we putting something like 3xmega eruption ratesof CO2, not to mention, SO2, CFC's for ozone, and a wholehostofother very toxic stuff into the world ecosystem and all at a rate imagineably quickly and from a low CO2 start (meanign CO2 input has more warming potential)..
If we have any ancestors they really are going to wonder..
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scaddenp at 13:33 PM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
"uncertain at this point why." which should be understood as multiple factors at play with uncertainty over which ones are the most important, as opposed to "havent a clue what's going on".
Actual sources of sealevel rise are land ice loss, thermal expansion and land water storage change. ( see here for article on this). I dont think it is totally accurate to say sea ice change makes no difference but it is miniscule compared to the others.
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One Planet Only Forever at 11:31 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
Jim Hunt@6,
Thanks for the link to the extra information.
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curiouspa at 11:30 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
scaddenp-thanks.
I looked over links provided. Consensus seems to be that overall Antarctic ice on land is decreasing based on loss of thickness. Sea ice is increasing a little, and uncertain at this point why.
One statement I saw "when land ice melts and flows into the oceans global sea levels rise on average; when sea ice melts sea levels do not change measurably"
Does that imply that expected sea level rise is mainly from land ice loss, such as Greenland ice loss in the Arctic? Is the loss of Arctic sea ice a direct contibutor to sea level rise, or only secondarily thru loss of albedo and resultant ocean warming?
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Tom Curtis at 10:58 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
curiouspa @8, the gain in Antarctic sea ice is less than the loss in Antarctic land ice in terms of volume. The loss in Arctic land plus sea ice is greater than the loss in Antarctic land plus sea ice, a fact partly due to the fact that the Arctic has warmed more than the Antarctic (for well known reasons the explanation of which is partly explaineded by scaddenp @9). The Southern Ocean has been warming so that the Antarctic sea ice has grown even though the water on which it floats has been warming. That is due to the fact that:
1) increased rainfall due to the warming has resulted in fresher surface water, that freezes at a higher temperature; and
2) increased windspeed due to warming results in ice being pushed further north before it melts, with the open water created by the export of ice refreezing because it is further south.
Your intuition that "... if both poles were heated about the same amount, both would lose a similar amount of ice" is, therefore, incorrect (quite aside from the fact that the Arctic has been heated more).
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howardlee at 10:47 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Villabollo - I don't know that the atmosphere in the Cretaceous was thicker (assuming you mean height of the atmosphere, rather than density) - perhaps someone else can chime in. The height of the troposphere - the layer with sufficient density to make a difference to the asteroid - is about 7-20km. An asteroid travelling at cosmic speeds of about 30,000mph (48,000kph) would travel through that in about 1.5 seconds. Even if the height of the troposphere was higher I doubt it would make much difference.
If you feel like an amusing exploration of this theme check out this "What if" post
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howardlee at 10:21 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
ubrew12 - great minds think alike, so they already looked into the idea that Chicxulub triggered the eruptions ("antipodeal focusing"), but no. Adrian Jones looked into that in his recent paper and concluded that earlier work was correct in establishing that India was in the wrong place at that point in its continental drift. The forces in rock opposite a Chicxulub impact are also apparently not quite enough to fracture rock. If they coincided with an area primed for an eruption anyway they might just set it off, but otherwise not.
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Same Ordinary Fool at 09:29 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
To me this is as momentous a geological mystery as the story of Continental Drift. Then there were many different arguments from various fields, though they all led to one conclusion, that was eventually observed - in the spreading sea floor under the Atlantic ocean. The dinosaur whodunit is more traditional, with multiple suspects.
It's inevitable that geological research will be done more with lab coats and a little less with boots on the ground. That's where the answers lie. But to this observer part of the appeal of geology was its simplicity, that resulted in part from the greater unknowns. Just following fossils and formations, looking for an informative outcrop. And what's on top is younger.
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q41019573 at 08:44 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Amazing, interesting, informative, educational, and I'm 67. Thank you very much.
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scaddenp at 08:34 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
curiouspa - please see the link I provided on Antarctica sea ice for why Antarctica sea ice is expanding - it is paradoxical on first glance because sea temps are rising. However for overall Antarctic ice loss see here. Measurement is done with GRACE satellite or from height of ice sheet. As to assymetry between poles consider:
South pole is on land at around 2000m altitude - North pole in sea as is most of Arctic ice with exception of Greenland.
Antarctica is isolated to some extent from rest of planet by circumpolar current and winds. Arctic weather is influenced by air masses from lower latitudes.
Ozone depletion also plays a part in Antarctic radiative balance.
Sea ice in Arctic is year round phenomena. Because sea ice is at lower latitudes in Antarctica, (higher latitudes are covered by land) most of it is completely melted out in summer.
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villabolo at 08:06 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Don't know if this is on topic but I've heard that the atmosphere may have been thicker during that epoch. If it were would that have made a difference? How would the atmosphere have been affected by such an impact?
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curiouspa at 07:14 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
For wili,
I think if both poles were heated about the same amount, both would lose a similar amount of ice. The Arctic would lose sea ice and the Antarctic would lose an equal amount of land and sea ice.
I'm not excluding that there can be variations with net overall global loss. I just want to know the facts-simply stated- is Antarctica gaining or losing ice? It may be there is overall loss of ice but increase in sea ice only. The only satellite data I can find is sea ice since 1979. Thanks.
Moderator Response:[JH] If you enter "Antarctica" into the SkS search box, you will find a wealth of information about what's going on there.
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scaddenp at 07:14 AM on 13 March 2015Measuring Earth's energy imbalance
Chpter 2 of IPCC AR5 discusses the measurement in 2.3.1. You might like to start with the references from there. I understand there are some difficulties with accuracy in the raw data though making it hard to get a precise measure of magnitude. ARGO data may be a more accurate way to get TOA imbalance.
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shoyemore at 06:43 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
I remember two articles in Scientific American in the 1980s explaining the rival theories. The Deccan Traps were advanced as the alternative to the asteroid. It was a little shocking to read a popular very media-friendly theory attacked. Over the years I assumed the volcano account had receded or been discounted. Great article.
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uncletimrob at 06:23 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Thank you! A most interesting article that takes me back to early undergraduate lectures nearly 4 decades ago. Another for the recommended reading list.
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bcglrofindel at 05:58 AM on 13 March 2015Measuring Earth's energy imbalance
I'm not sure where the right place to ask this is, so please redirect me if I'm in the wrong place. Does anyone know where I can track down the Top-Of-Atmosphere net energy/radiation data from CERES and prior to that ERBE? I've been looking and looking for an easy referencable observed energy balance graph covering the satellite era and can't seem to find them. I can find summaries of the overall trend for CERES, and pieces of ERBE from sometime in the 80's, but nothing by way of a simple graph. Surely with one of the express purposes of these satellites being to measure incoming and outgoing radiation somebody has put together a net radiation graphic of some form already somewhere? If I could be pointed in the right direction it'd be greatly appreciated.
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ubrew12 at 05:55 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
I'm not a scientist so am free to speculate: If you tunnel through Earth to the spot opposite the Chicxulub Crater, you will be in the Indian Ocean. Hmmm.
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howardlee at 05:29 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Yes there's a pretty strong pattern. I think the end-Ordovician is now perhaps the only exception of the phanerozoic, linked by some to the first spread of vascular plants causing CO2 reduction and Global Cooling, resulting in the Hirnantian Glaciation.
John Mason has a post due out soon on the Permian Mass Extinction - the most extreme example.
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wili at 05:17 AM on 13 March 2015So what did-in the dinosaurs? A murder mystery…
Thanks. I always find myself treating the end-Cretaceous extinction as the exception to the general rule that mass extinctions have been caused by GW, which was too bad, since it's the only mass extinction event that most people (think they) know something about.
Now I can just point to this article.
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Andy Skuce at 05:03 AM on 13 March 2015Consensus and geoengineering - how to convince people about global warming
I have been critical of Dan Kahan in a recent post here, but I think there's a lot of value in most of what he has written. I wrote a long post on SkS sometime ago that was broadly appreciative of his work. I think he is right to worry about getting more people, especially those on the political right in the USA, to accept the science. He's not alone in that.
Where I differ with him is that I see consensus (or information) messaging as part of a two-pronged approach, along with his cultural cognition stuff, whereas he seems convinced that consensus messaging is counter-productive. I think the study that Dana highlights in this post effectively removes that worry.
One irony is that the tone of some of Dan's informal remarks about consensus have themselves been rather harsh and they actually risk polarizing those of us who are trying to nudge public opinion in the direction of reality. If communicators are going to change the status quo, it's going to take all of us.
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scaddenp at 04:57 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
curiouspa - You might want to look (and continue any discussion) on this thread. Short answer - Antarctia is losing ice but there is a statistically significant increase in the sea ice around it. Just dont fall for idea that this somehow offsets arctic ice loss (it is small by comparison and has little climate impact since it occurs in winter). In particular, you need to look at why these things are happening. The skeptic argument is that its getting warmer in arctic but cold in Antarctic so cant be CO2/anything to worry about. Not true.
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swampfoxh at 04:44 AM on 13 March 2015Consensus and geoengineering - how to convince people about global warming
I suspect (and probably hope) that the science community can probably appreciate that the "personas" in the US political power structure are as much a part of the problem as the fossil fuel industry and the average voter himself. On the one hand, President Obama, gives the appearance that he supports blocking the XL Pipeline while he opens up the Atlantic offshore drilling sites and certain Arctic continental shelf areas for drilling. But, I don't see the scientific community (the hard science guys) saying much of anything about this hypocrisy. Could it be that the great majorities of scientists are political liberals and deign to criticize this guy? KR's looking for getting things done and wants the science to point the way to sensible public policies, but unless the scientific community is prepared to ridicule the inappropriateness of the power structure's "wacko" decisionmaking on climate remedies, even good science will give us nothing to bite into. Massive population reduction, for example, is a sensible public policy if we are going to fix the climate problem. Total curtailment of global coal fired power plants is another. A permananet moratorium on global land clearing operations is yet another sensible public policy. The shutdown of global synthetic fertilizer producers is yet another. Shutting down the global internal combustion engine manufaturers, yet another. But, the recent US-EPA 30% reduction mandated for coal-fired power plants is not a sensible public policy when the science realizes that just this one category requires at least an 85% reduction in emissions and that should have happened 12 years ago!
I think I know what y'all are going to say about my doomsday scenario, but I want to hear it anyway, so, fire back. I have class tomorrow and I'd like to tell my students what you have to say. Thanks.
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Jim Hunt at 03:42 AM on 13 March 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #11A
OPOF @2 - There are a range of Arctic sea ice metrics, which peak at different values on different dates. I've been covering a range of them today, to coincide with The Economist's Arctic Summit:
http://GreatWhiteCon.info/2015/03/some-statistics-for-the-2015-economist-arctic-summit/
The "15% extent" ones are currently at their lowest level for the date by a considerable margin. Cryosphere Today area is also at a record low today, but only just.
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