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Comments 35501 to 35550:
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bill4344 at 12:34 PM on 24 June 20142014 SkS Weekly Digest #25
'garned'? er...
Moderator Response:[JH] Oops! Fixed. Thanks.
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mancan18 at 10:15 AM on 24 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Classifying people into left, right, socialist, communist, greenie, or fascist is not going to reflect the scientific consensus along political lines. Such terms are lazy pseudo-intellectual classifications of people so that opposing political arguments in a debate can be easily dismissed using a stereotype.
With regard to global warming and climate change, it seems that people who believe that AGW is actually happening seem to have at least a rudimentary understanding of some aspect of the science, while those who don't believe that AGW is happening do so more for political or commercial reasons than for scientific reasons.
To the wider public, the AGW debate appears to be more political than scientific and may be the cause of the disinformation/ignorance gap. Also, the scientists and political groups arguing that AGW is happening spend more time on the indications and the impacts of AGW, rather than the basic science behind the theory which isn't articulated often enough in a manner that the wider public understand.
The whole global warming debate can be easily summed up in terms the public can understand:
* That CO2 is a greenhouse gas due to the interaction of the CO2 molecule and infrared radiation from the sun causing it to warm, just like microwave radiation in a microwave oven heats water molecules and cooks our food, or long wave radio waves being bounced off the ionosphere to make long range radio communications possible, or ultraviolet light causing sunburn, or ozone stopping ultra violet light making life possible on the planet.
* That CO2 is accumulating in the atmosphere mostly from burning fossil fuels and land clearing, and if the planet doesn't warm as a result, then some of our understanding of the basic science which forms the basis of our technological society is seriously flawed. This is the basis for the Global Warming argument.
* That warming of a fluid or gas increases the turbulence of the motion of the atoms of the gas or fluid. It is true in a container in a lab and it is true for whole planet. This increased turbulence will change the weather patterns which will change the global climate. This is the basis for the Climate Change argument.
Everything else is the mere observation of the data and the interpreting what it means. That is where the confusion occurs.
The basic science can be easily understood. despite all the noise of the current wider debate.
If the planet doesn't warm due to increasing greenhouse gases then that indicates a deep flaw in our scientific understandin and those who believe it won't warm believe in magic.
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Dikran Marsupial at 06:05 AM on 24 June 20141934 - hottest year on record
To add to the existing answers from DSL, in response to scott's question "Why do you only use the 48 states ...?"
because the temperature of the contiguous US states (i.e. the USA excluding Alaska and Hawaii) is a temperature index widely used by US national meterological organizations, such as NOAA (the National Temperature Index).
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DSL at 05:14 AM on 24 June 20141934 - hottest year on record
Scott4,
1. where does it say land "mass"? It's surface area.
2. What is the surface area of the Earth? Wiki says it's 510,072,000 km2. Now, what is the surface area of the 48 contiguous? Wiki says 8,080,464.3 km2. Divide one by the other. Maybe wiki is wrong, but I suspect that someone would have noticed by now.
3. How many states were there in 1934? -
Scott4 at 03:54 AM on 24 June 20141934 - hottest year on record
Where is your source for the 48 states being only 2% of earth's land mass? Why do you only use the 48 states and why only land mass?
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billthefrog at 02:51 AM on 24 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
Re #7
Whilst not exactly a definitive statement as to SSTs, one of the FAQs on the UK Met Office web site states ...
The most plentiful measurements of temperature over the oceans are sea-surface temperature measurements. Air temperatures measurements are also made over the oceans, but these measurements are prone to a number of problems. During the day the sun heats the ship's hull causing temperature measurements to be artificially high. This can be avoided by only using measurements made at night, at the cost of reducing the number of available observations by half. Air temperature measurements from buoys are unreliable so those cannot be used either. In using sea-surface temperature anomalies we assume that the anomalies of sea-surface temperature are in agreement with those of marine air temperature. Tests show that night marine air temperature anomalies agree well with sea-surface temperature anomalies on seasonal and longer time scales in most open ocean areas. Globally the agreement is very good (Rayner et al, 2003).
Hopefully that might be of some help.
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One Planet Only Forever at 00:07 AM on 24 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
I agree that "socioeconomic-political terms" are not clear ways of communicating because they are "open to interpretation".
For this issue a more meaningful scale would be one with the following limits:
- Will fight to maximize potential benefit from things that are understood to be unacceptable (unsustainable and harmful actions).
- Will forego potential personal benefit and fight for the development of a sustainable better future for all. ("sustainable" is another term needing to be defined every time as "something that all humans would be able to concurrently develop to do if they wished and that could be continued indefinitely on this amazing planet.". Many people merge sustain with prolong. Some people deliberately try to do that in their messages.)
On that scale, the different levels of acceptance of any of the facts of this matter would be expected to appear consistently, and the reason for the difference would be clearer. Any results contrary to such expected results would deserve deeper investigation.
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CBDunkerson at 21:40 PM on 23 June 2014CO2 is not the only driver of climate
likeithot wrote: "...for me to "believe" in AGW there would have to be a clear correlation between the beginning of human CO2 emissions and evidence of warming."
Um, there is a clear correlation between the beginning of human CO2 emissions and evidence of warming... so long as you are looking at the full picture.
If you look at the five minutes after the first coal power plant went online, no you won't see any correlation. Nor is it clear for the first decade or two. However, look at CO2 levels and temperature levels for the first hundred years since the industrial revolution and there is a very clear correlation. Both have gone nearly straight up at rates faster than anything seen previously in century level resolution proxy data.
Thus, this argument amounts to, 'I will cherry pick a time frame too short to see the correlation and then pretend it is not happening'.
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wili at 13:47 PM on 23 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25B
I do, actually, foth. I found some of them fairly clever, though.
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scaddenp at 07:44 AM on 23 June 2014CO2 is not the only driver of climate
Reply to likeithot from here.
Thank you for responding. Now what climate science actually states is that climate will respond to the net effect of all forcings. A huge amount of climate science also goes into understanding the internal variability that is inevitable when you unevenly heat an ocean-covered planet. Unfortunately, important processes (especially ENSO) for determining surface temperature defy predictive modelling. So, to quote the modellers - "climate models have no skill at decadal level prediction".
Given these constraints, and the multiple forcings at work in climate, what then do you think the data should like that would convince you that the attribution to CO2 is accurate?
If you are stumped, then perhaps you should read the IPCC WG1 chapter on attribution to see the approaches that have been done so far.
One very important consideration to think about is that while surface temperature has a very high degree of variability, you do expect total ocean heat content to vary a great deal less in response to a constant forcing.
And as an aside, if you dont want to have your comment moderated, then try reading and complying with the comments policy. If you want to bluster with uninformed rhetoric, then there plenty of sites on the internet that will welcome your comments. If you want to discuss the science, then welcome, and please study what the science says so we can have an informed discussion.
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foolonthehill at 06:18 AM on 23 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25B
wili
My personal rating is that only 4 out of 12 of the presented cartoons have a direct relevance to climate change.
Does anyone agree with my 33.33% result and can we form a consensus?
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wili at 02:49 AM on 23 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25B
A good source for future cartoons of the week (or month or year)?
Moderator Response:[RH] Embedded link that was breaking page formatting.
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MA Rodger at 21:09 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
likeitnot (presently)@16 wishes to see "a clear correlation between the beginning of human CO2 emissions and evidence of warming" as proof that AGW is real, as the basis for such a "belief." Interestingly, such a 'clear correlation' can be discerned even though CO2 is not the sole agent of AGW.
Scripps Institute present an excellent graphic of CO2 levels for various time intervsals. This shows the present CO2 increases can be traced back to the early 1800s.
It then just requires a short trip to the UN IPCC AR5 WG1 report to examine Figure 5.7 and note that the start of the present trend in rising temperatures also began in the early 1800s. Further, the recent rising temperature trend is not just unique in scale over the last millenium or two, but also unique over the entire Holocene era.
I would consider that to be pretty clear.
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likeithot at 20:13 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
scaddenp:
Maybe you'll get to read this before it gets censored, I don't know, but since you asked I'll answer.
Since climate change is nothing new, for me to "believe" in AGW there would have to be a clear correlation between the beginning of human CO2 emissions and evidence of warming.
On the contrary, neither the temperature record (warming trend from before introduction of human produced CO2) nor the glacial melt trend (a pre-existing trend from before any greenhouse effect from industrial CO2) coincide in time or scale to human production of CO2.
Moderator Response:[Dikran Marsupial] Please do not challenge moderators to censor or delete your posts, this is rather childish behaviour, and in future will result in your posts being deleted. Please read the comments policy and abide by it. If you think that your post is likely to be off-topic, then simply make your comment on a more appropriate article and continue the discussion there (and post a comment here linking to the continuing discussion on the other thread).
Note you would only expect to see such a clear correlation if anthropogenic CO2 forcing were the only forcing that affected the climate and in the absence of significant internal variability, so this article may be a good place to discuss your question..
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chriskoz at 19:35 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
It would be interesting to compare how the climate science denialism has been evolving over time among US politicians. Does anyone have the appropriate historical data?
I recall that in late 1990s during pres Clinton and early 2000s, the level of science acceptance in Congress, although lower than the climate scientist's 90% at that time, was roughly universal, i.e. there were no difference along political lines, or free market support. The latest schism as shown of the figure, is the apparent result of a successful denial campain by fossil fuel inductries and other special interest groups.
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KR at 14:46 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
As a hopefully informative side note on US politics, these politics are strongly shaped by the election system. Namely, by "plurality wins". Whoever gets the largest chunk of the vote wins that House delegate, that Senator, or the President.
The more common Parlimentary systems end up with more proportional representation, with small groups from many small parties, and as a result coalitions are required to obtain the majority, with the last 1-2% fringe addition having a strong effect on policy due to the need for those fringe parties to obtain a majority.
The US plurality method results in the current two-party system, with those parties (by the standards of other political systems) only slightly right and slightly left of center - as the parties _must_ appeal to the center/independent/uncommitted votors to win.
As a result, while there are extremist parties in the US, few have any influence - and the US Tea Party (an astroturfed movement driven by monied interests attempting to block regulations affecting their bottom line) exemplifies this, as the _only_ way they have made headway is by running as Republicans. Not as a separate party.
Now, back to the discussion...
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Tom Curtis at 14:05 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
PhillipeChantreau @10, socialism is not committed to any particular form of ownership of property per se, and certainly not only to state ownership of property. From wikipedia, we learn that:
"Socialism is a social and economic system characterised by social ownership of the means of production and co-operative management of the economy, as well as a political theory and movement that aims at the establishment of such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to cooperative enterprises, common ownership, state ownership, citizen ownership of equity, or any combination of these. There are many varieties of socialism and there is no single definition encapsulating all of them. They differ in the type of social ownership they advocate, the degree to which they rely on markets or planning, how management is to be organised within productive institutions, and the role of the state in constructing socialism."
Of particular importance is that there now exist several versions of socialism in which while ownership of capital is social, neither it, nor decision making are centralized. This is often to be achieved through industrial democracy.
Further, it is also possible to be a socialist and favour a mixed economy either as an interim measure or as a long term compromise necessary because other values (democracy) take precedence and prevent measures that might otherwise be necessary to achieve what is considered to be the ideal economic system (for a given socialist theory).
Having said that, the term is often, and outragiously abused in the US where its "popular" meaning appears to be anything but a fully libertarian capitalist state.
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scaddenp at 13:11 PM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
The narrative behind likeithot's comment is that climate science is closed shop, somehow practised only by a cadre of people with a common political values, and possibly only in the US. It also believes that non-experts views on a subject are equally as valid. Yeah right.
Very well, the 97% consensus statement is about those who know what they are talking about.
Likeithot - going to tell us what future data would change your mind? Or are your beliefs so deeply founded your values that you cannot imagine data that would change your mind. Or perhaps, since you obviously havent read much climate science, you are going to propose data that is its odds with the science's predictions. (eg you seem to believe that decadal periods of neutral or cooling are at odds with the theory).
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John Hartz at 11:01 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Believe it or not, but the Communist Party of the USA has its own website.
The Socialist Party USA also has its own website.
Caution is however advised — the NSA most likely records the email address of everyone who visits either site.
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PhilippeChantreau at 10:46 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
I don't want to add a layer of pedantism to this exchange but I confess that get quite irritated specifically by the way the word "socialism" is used in the US by most. Socialism means state ownership of the means of production, it should be used according to that definition. Indeed, it is not very applicable nowadays, but there are still nations in the world that could be called socialist.
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Tom Curtis at 10:18 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Rob @8, I will certainly concede that in the US, and to a lesser extent in Australia socialism, communism and fascism are politically moribund, and the terms used primarilly as means of denigrating the various shades of center right to right positions actively presented by parties. That, however, is not the case world wide. I certainly do not know enough about Peruvian politics to say to what extent they are moribund in Peru (and hence irrelevant to From Peru).
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Rob Honeycutt at 09:01 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Tom... What I'm saying is the terms are generally used today a way to be dismissive of an opposing moderate political points of view.
I don't think John is polling opinions in any extremist nations, so I wasn't considering that relative to my comments.
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Tom Curtis at 08:44 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Rob Honeycutt @4, that is an odd comment given that there still exist socialist governments (Venezuela comes to mind) and politically active communist parties (and fascist parties, including 2 active in Australia, and 1 active in New Zealand) around the world. The stipulation "... in the same form ..." may make your statement correct, but only in the way that nobody steps in the same river twice. Liberal, liberal/democratic, christian/democratic, libertarian and conservative parties have also changed over the decades, and as we do not consider that to indicate their ceasing to exist, neither do the changes in comunist, socialist and fascist parties indicate the end of communism, socialism or fascism as political movements.
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grindupBaker at 06:30 AM on 22 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
Prior to this sea-surface temperature reference I'd understood that ocean temperatures such as in GISTEMP were measured below the surface to varying amounts perhaps as much as a few metres and "sea-surface temperature" was not measured. I'd like to be disabused with some authoritative detail if that's not so, but otherwise I'd suggest that persons of SKS comment quality start being precise with the phrasings. Additionally, I think it's a poor aspect of the science that 2 entirely dissimilar measurements (air temperature a few feet above the surface and ocean temperature a few feet below the surface) are cobbled together into a single number. It seems to have led to much silliness of "debate" (most definitely in quotes).
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amhartley at 06:03 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Am I missing something? Seems to me that, to measure the gap between scientists’ perceptions & the public’s, we don’t need to ask the public “how many climate scientists agree that humans are causing global warming,” but rather “are humans causing global warming?” I think the gap that matters is not that between scientists’ beliefs & the public’s beliefs about scientists’ beliefs, but instead the gap between scientist’s beliefs & the public’s beliefs about the same thing: anthropogenic global warming.
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wili at 05:57 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Rob, I would say the same thing about 'left' and especially 'far left' particularly in the US context--there is essentially no such thing, not as an effective political force, at least.
The other depressing thing along these lines (depending on how you think about it, I suppose) is that there is little difference between 'left' and 'right'--essentially between Dems and Repubs--as to life style choices being affected by concern about GW. Essentially no one in the US avoids air travel (or long distance travel in general) because of its GW footprint.IIRC, Republicans are actually more likely to have installed solar power on their homes than Democrats are.
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Rob Honeycutt at 02:52 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
I would suggest that the terms "socialist" and "communist" (and "fascist" for that matter) are not proper terms applied to today's political environment. They're early 20th century concepts that no one adheres to today in the same forms they existed previously.
Today these terms are used to try to ridicule those who people disagree with on political issues.
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Tom Curtis at 01:38 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
From Peru, the survey was in the US, so by "far left" they mean left leaning liberals, or at most what I call "welfare capitalists", ie, people who believe social justice and reasonable standards of living can only be achieved by grafting a comprehensive welfare system onto a capitalist economic structure.
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From Peru at 01:12 AM on 22 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
"At the left of the political spectrum, perceived consensus is below 70%. Even those at the far left are not close to correctly perceiving the 97% consensus"
What are we calling "far left"?
Are we talking about liberals, socialists or communists?
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John Hartz at 05:23 AM on 21 June 2014An externally-valid approach to consensus messaging
Over the past couple of days, a lively discussion of this issue has been going on in the comment thread to the article, Defending the consensus, again!, posted on the And Then There's Physics website.
I have posted a link to John Cook's OP on that thread.
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One Planet Only Forever at 03:08 AM on 21 June 2014How will El Niño impact weather patterns?
Better understanding the complex interrelationships involved in the climate on this amazing planet helps provide better information to people who would benefit from advance notice of the likely weather. Many human pursuits can be more successful if better weather infromation is available. Crop growers, in particular, would benefit from better forecasts of the expected weather through the upcoming growing season. Ocean transport companies and human activity that rely on it also benefit from knowing in advance what weather can be expected along their most efficient, busiest routes.
A small aside. The ONI (NOAA's reporting of the 3 month average surface temperature of the tropical Pacific Ocean - link below) for MAM is -0.2, which is in the neutral range (The ONI for FMA was -0.5). Even with the index neutral the global average surface temperatures for April and May in the GISTEMP and NOAA records are nearly as high as the highest monthly value that occured during the 1997/98 El Nino.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensostuff/ensoyears.shtml
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Chris Winter at 01:45 AM on 21 June 2014Ridley, Murdoch, and Lomborg Attempt to Greenwash Global Warming
A useful reference on this question is a book by Richard Preston: DRIVEN TO EXTINCTION: The Impact of Climate Change on Biodiversity. He discusses animals more than plants, but on pp 175-179 he decribes the work of Blake Suttle, an ecologist who set up experimental plots in the Angelo Coast Range Reserve of California's Mendocino county.
Suttle's aim was to measure the impact of increased rainfall on local biodiversity. He found it increased for the first two years, as expected. But then it declined, and by the fifth year there was only half the original number of species. Grasses had crowded many other species out, and as a result the nutritional value per square foot dropped sharply.
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dorlomin at 23:42 PM on 20 June 2014The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
How often is the data updated? I am curious as we are expecting a warmish year and would like to use the trend calculator to keep up to date with changes in the "no warming meme"
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Synapsid at 08:16 AM on 20 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
The title of the article about sea-surface temperature being a lousy indicator of global climate is incorrect. Stephen Briggs referred to surface air temperature, not sea-surface temperature; the correction is in an update at the end of the article.
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scaddenp at 07:37 AM on 20 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
Well assuming "Kiwiiano" is in NZ, then he/she has it a lot easier than much of western world because of the high renewable generation. However reducing your carbon footprint by individual lifestyle change is always going to be a losing proposition. Far more obtainable is moving to alternative energy and more efficient use of energy which is something nations do rather than individuals. On the other hand, if you believe all government is evil and unnecessary except for courts and defense, then a problem that needs collective solution is a challenge to your values.
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Kiwiiano at 05:53 AM on 20 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
chriskoz@1:They believe the meme because they don't want to face the alternative, profound changes to their current lifestyles. How would you reduce your carbon footprint to 10% of everything you've taken for granted? I certainly find it a struggle.
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PhilippeChantreau at 05:15 AM on 20 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
Denisaf, I'm not sure I understand your comment better than others but here my response to what I do understand from it:
Humans in the past decided to build and operates extensive infrastructure devoted to the use of horses for transportation, agriculture, war, etc. Did they "cancel" that commitment? Not specfically, but they found something better and moved on. In effect, that cancelled it. Humans will have to find better solutions again and move on again, or be set back quite a bit.
As for anthropogenic, it does not mean intentional, if that's what you were trying to say. Of course, it is unintentional only up to the point that humans become aware of all the consequences of their "commitment" to that infrastructure and then decide to keep up the commitment. We are there, so, as of right now, the disruption is both anthropogenic and intentional. With knowledge comes responsibility.
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AuntSally at 04:53 AM on 20 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
Didn't understand denisaf's comment...
I like "Dangerous Climate Change," too. Perhaps "Dangerous Climate Disruption," though the word "disruption" already connotes something unsettling, I think.
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Composer99 at 04:09 AM on 20 June 20142014 SkS Weekly Digest #24
Synapsid:
I can't say whether derp takes a dim view of Skeptical Science sharing editorial cartoons generally or not. It wasn't my intent to say so.
That being said, what I can say, based on the texts of derp's comments at #1 and #5, is that it certainly seems that way.
In particular, derp wrote "cartoons like this", which implies multiple cartoons, whether multiple discrete instances of objectionable cartoons, or the genre as a whole.
Further, derp's follow up in #5 clearly suggests belief that this is a longstanding issue, which has translated into what derp believes to be "not much engagement with this blog anyway".
My intent was to respond to the overall sentiment of derp's comment, which denigrated "cartoons like this" as being beneath adult communication, so in the end it doesn't really matter if derp meant this cartoon alone, a handful of cartoons like it, every single cartoon shared by Skeptical Science, or editorial cartoons as a genre.
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John Hartz at 01:16 AM on 20 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
ubrew12: I second your endorsement of Richard Heinberg's article, So You Want to Change the World? Better Read This First posted on EcoWatch.
I encourage everyone reading this thread to carefully read Heinberg's article. It is insightful and thought-provoking.
In addition to including Heinberg's article in the above OP, I also posted a link to it on the SkS Facebook page. I am pleased to report that it has "reached" more than 15,500 people.
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DSL at 00:29 AM on 20 June 2014Ice picks: Five pieces of ice news revealing earth’s ice cover is in serious decline
One can actually see quite well from the topographical map that Greenland is not a bowl. It's more like a broken dish, filled well over rim level with ice cream. A few of the cracks in the bowl run nearly to the base of the dish. A lake would undoubtedly form in the base of the dish, especially with rebound lifting the land, but most of the water in the current ice mass would be lost to the oceans during the melt period. The mass of the ice cream would squeeze the lake water out the cracks.
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Jim Hunt at 23:20 PM on 19 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
Whilst we're debating semantics I used the term "dangerous climate change" in the article because that's the phrase used by the UK Met Office, who were one of the organisers of the conference. See for example:
http://econnexus.org/can-global-warming-be-limited-to-two-degrees/
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billthefrog at 21:19 PM on 19 June 20142014 SkS Weekly Digest #24
Further to what DSL just stated, I've recently posted something to that effect on Neven's Arctic Sea Ice blog. In addition to May 2014 being 0.06 C above the previous record (2010 and 2012 jointly), the March-April-May quarter was LOTI's second highest at 0.07 C below 2010. (And 0.04 above the next highest.)
It could be premature to look toward the devoloping el Nino just yet, but NOAA's 3.4 index might just have started to edge towards positive numbers. (It could be transient, or it could be the start of something.)
If the next 7 months LOTI figures match their 2013 equivalents, the Jan-Dec average will be about 3rd on the list. On the other hand, as DSL has pointed out, the average for the first 5 months already matches the 2010 J-D figures. So, will there be a significant el Nino event later this year, and, if so, what will it do to these numbers?
Get your (crystal) balls out.
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Dikran Marsupial at 21:18 PM on 19 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
denisaf, the fact that society has committed itself to a substantial degree to its infrastructure does not change the fact that it is anthropogenic climate disruption. I don't see how that argument means that Anrthopogenic Climate Disruption is a misleading term. The infrastructure is anthropogenic, any climate disruption that is caused by the infrastructure is likewise anthropogenic.
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denisaf at 21:00 PM on 19 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
Anthropogenic Climate Disruption is a misleading term. The greenhouse gas emissions that are the major cause of climate disruption are due to the operation of technological systems (power stations, vehicles, etc.). There is a commitment for this infrastructure to continue to use fossil fuels as long as it exists. Humans have only made the decisions about the construction and operation of this infrastructure. They cannot decide to cancel that commitment!
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denisaf at 20:47 PM on 19 June 2014Transformational Climate Science at Exeter University
2C warming is mentioned. I understood it was qualified as 2C of warming by the end of the century. This is consistent with the view that warming will continue as long the atmospheric concentration level (currently 400 ppm) is so high that it continues to act (has Hansen termed it) as a blanket. Increased emissions into the oceans will not totally offset the continuing emissions from fossil fuel usage even when they are reduced by sounder energy policies. There is too much infrastructure committed to using fossil fuels for this rate of usage to decrease rapidly.
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scaddenp at 20:08 PM on 19 June 201497% consensus on human-caused global warming has been disproven
I would also point out the accusations of " sycophant research" is simply empty rhetoric - a dismissive to hide that fact that there is no counter-theory, and at odds with the mass of hard data collection that is the core of climate research.
FF companies have the scientists, the money, computer power and the motiviation to find alternative theories. Instead they invest in PR. Why do you think that is? Perhaps because of what their own scientists tell them? I work in petroleum science - denialists are rare among scientists.
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ubrew12 at 19:43 PM on 19 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
chriskoz@1: I think, in a nutshell, that's the purpose of this website, and of others like it. "Why, indeed, is this happening?" is what Cook and others (Peter Sinclair at climate crocks) have been asking, and the answers have been illuminating about human behavior and the 'calculus' by which vested commercial interests prey upon societies understanding of 'truth' in service to their profitability.
Changing the subject, I really enjoyed the Ecowatch article 'So you want to change the World? Better read this first.' about how societies really only change when infrastructural requirements (resource depletion, new technologies), force them to (and that this is one of those times). It's illuminating to see modern trends put in a 'cultural anthropologists' perspective. A quote: "How can you know if your idea fits the emerging infrastructure? There’s no hard and fast rule, but your idea stands a good chance if it assumes we are moving toward a societal regime with less energy and less transport (and that is therefore more localized); if it can work in a world where climate is changing and weather conditions are extreme and unpredictable; if it provides a way to sequester carbon rather than releasing more into the atmosphere; and if it helps people meet their basic needs during hard times." From here on out, 'may you live in interesting times' is our fate. It's useful to have such thinkers working to provide a useful guide to how to respond to these challenges.
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chriskoz at 19:19 PM on 19 June 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #25A
Within '6 ways the planet is different than the one your dad was born into', I found the 'Unprecedented' Climate Extremes in Last Decade by WMO, where they show decadal temp trends. And indeed, the 2001-10 decade shows the largest trend to date (at the extreme value of last 4 decades since 70s when AGW really kicked off). Given that data from WMO, it's mind bogling why the "global warming stopped in last 17y" meme is still alive. Why people are so irrational, that they still believe is such nonsense?
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Dikran Marsupial at 17:52 PM on 19 June 2014Ice picks: Five pieces of ice news revealing earth’s ice cover is in serious decline
jetfuel wrote "If Greenland is topographically like a bowl, wouldn't flow from melt beneath the ice actually send water inland and then in December-Febuary it would all solidify."
not necessarily. While Greenland is topographically like a bowl, the rim is not of equal height around the edge, which means that rivers could form, eroded in the gound under the ice, that transport the meltwater to the sea. These seem quite evident in the figure above, e.g. on the West coast at about 68 North. The fact that any "inland sea" that forms under the ice would be under several kilometers of ice sheet pressing down on it, suggests it will be unlikely to have a very great volume, so it is not a given that large amounts of meltwater can pool there.
The fact that independent measurements show that there is ice loss in Greenland suggests there is a flaw in your theory that suggests there is little or none.
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