What are your beliefs on climate change?

[Bluegoat]

When he finishes in the basement see if he will come explain to us. :)

 

So I've taken him a cup of tea to see if he'll expand.

 

What he said is the trouble is that weather forcasting is very local, and the times are pretty specific - you want to know that it will rain in such and such a town starting at 10 and ending before midnight.  These things are really difficult to predict because many tiny variables effect how it plays out.

 

With climate change, it's about the total energy in the system, and typically any predictions about various areas are covering quite a large area, like a big chunk of a continent - it might say something like marked decrease in rain in North America leading to significant desertification.  Not - it won't rain in Salt Lake City on August 6th.

Edited December 16, 2016 by Bluegoat

[hornblower]

 

So you are happy to accept what the experts wrote in AR5 about the possibility of what is discussed in the OP of this thread? Specifically, that the IPCC has HIGH CONFIDENCE that it is EXCEPTIONALLY UNLIKELY that either Greenland or West Antarctic Ice Sheets will suffer near-complete disintegration at any time within the 21st century.

 

That would be a good start.

 

It's a bit hard for me to tell since you did not like the post I made in which I pointed this out to you previously.

 

you're linking to a draft. I've read the final. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Chapter12_FINAL.pdf

 

What page & paragraph are you specifically talking about? 

[Bluegoat]

I think the oil industry might be a red herring at this point - they pretty much seem to accept human created climate change as well.

[hornblower]

I think the oil industry might be a red herring at this point - they pretty much seem to accept human created climate change as well.

 

exactly. They do. 

 

 

[Guest]

Are you in the fuel industry, lol? All the info for our influence in warming is in that Nasa link. There is just the prediction based on our use and abuse of the planet that has already happened and will surely continue. There is no "model" and there does not need to be.

 

Yes, our planet does react to changes in biosphere, cryosphere and geosphere.

 

You are mentioning geospheric activity with a volcanic eruption putting light-reflecting particles in the atmosphere.

 

We as humans are killing our earth with fuel burning and tree loss.

 

You tell me how much the fuel industry is worth and why they would protect their interests?

 

You completely lost me. I didn't refer to anything about the fuel industry at all. I'm not saying the planet isn't reacting or that people aren't abusing it either. I'm asking about the accuracy of predictor models from what we discussed by some in earlier posts. 

[Guest]

So I've taken him a cup of tea to see if he'll expand.

 

What he said is the trouble is that weather forcasting is very local, and the times are pretty specific - you want to know that it will rain in such and such a town starting at 10 and ending before midnight.  These things are really difficult to predict because many tiny variables effect how it plays out.

 

With climate change, it's about the total energy in the system, and typically any predictions about various areas are covering quite a large area, like a big chunk of a continent - it might say something like marked decrease in rain in North America leading to significant desertification.  Not - it won't rain in Salt Lake City on August 6th.

 

If he doesn't mind elaborating...... I'm also wondering about things like hurricanes. They (NOAA I think) come out each year and try to say within a certain parameter, if it's going to be a bad storm year or not. I can't remember where I read it, but I want to say it's got like a 50% accuracy on if they're correct on there being many named storms, or a few named storms. Wouldn't those types of prediction fall under more of the total energy? Like predicting El Niños and La Niñas? 

 

ETA: And thanks for asking him. :) 

Edited December 16, 2016 by texasmom33

[hornblower]

I'd also like to point out that the IPCC (as demonstrated by reg above) does post drafts & preliminary reports from their working groups. They're not hiding stuff. They put it all out so that scientists and all citizens around the world can read it all and think about it.



& you know what, I'm not going to play whackamole with people who want to parse a sentence in documents which are thousands of pages long, and who are intent on proving some obscure point to fit their political agenda (which as far as I can make it is a combination of "drill baby drill" and "liberals can't tell me what to do". Because really? What OTHER reason do people have for continuing to try to deny man made effects on climate?)

I don't have an advanced degree in climatology, statistics, or computer modelling. I'm going to let the SMEs  argue about the minutiae on such and such a page. 

[treestarfae]

You completely lost me. I didn't refer to anything about the fuel industry at all. I'm not saying the planet isn't reacting or that people aren't abusing it either. I'm asking about the accuracy of predictor models from what we discussed by some in earlier posts. 

 

Skeptics use uncertain regional models as dismissal of climate change.

 

You can find info about fuel industry skeptics in link below.

 

Global Warming Skeptic Organizations

 

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/solutions/fight-misinformation/global-warming-skeptic.html#.WFQ21OS7rIU

[RegGuheert]

you're linking to a draft. I've read the final. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Chapter12_FINAL.pdf

 

What page & paragraph are you specifically talking about?

 

Actually, I linked to the Final Draft.  That is the version of the report that most accurately reflects what the SMEs have to say about the subject.  The final report that you linked to is produced by a high-political process which eliminates anything from what the experts wrote that is not deemed "politically correct" by the reviewers at that level.

 

Simply put, what I linked to IS what the SMEs wrote in AR5.  The fact that what those experts wrote has been censored by others for political reasons should be a HUGE red flag to anyone reading this material.  This process of distortion is the reason many principled scientists left the IPCC.  They did not want their name associated with science which was being so horribly distorted.

 

It's sad that so many cannot (or will not) see the massive corruption of science that is going on, even when it is illustrated so clearly in an example such as this.  Unfortunately, this travesty is simply par for the course in climate science today.

 

I encourage everyone reading this thread to take this example as an object lesson in how a politicized process can take good science performed by good, well-meaning scientists and distort it to mean just the opposite of what it actually indicates simply by committing a lie of omission.

[RegGuheert]

Actually, I linked to the Final Draft.  That is the version of the report that most accurately reflects what the SMEs have to say about the subject.  The final report that you linked to is produced by a high-political process which eliminates anything from what the experts wrote that is not deemed "politically correct" by the reviewers at that level.

 

In fact, the table that I transcribed earlier DID make it into the Final Version of AR5 as Table 12.4 on page 1115 (87 of 108 in the PDF linked), apparently unscathed.

 

So, I will ask hornblower again:

 

So you are happy to accept what the experts wrote in AR5 about the possibility of what is discussed in the OP of this thread? Specifically, that the IPCC has HIGH CONFIDENCE that it is EXCEPTIONALLY UNLIKELY (<1% chance) that either Greenland or West Antarctic Ice Sheets will suffer near-complete disintegration at any time within the 21st century.

[MistyMountain]

The article is not talking about near complete disintegration of the ice sheets in Antartica and

Greenland.

[RegGuheert]

The article is not talking about near complete disintegration of the ice sheets in Antartica and

Greenland.

 

It actually is talking about the same area as the authors of AR5 that I quoted: West Antarctica.

 

 

The new study challenges that reasoning. It also emerges as mounting research has pointed at one region of Antarctica in particular — the Amundsen Sea sector of remote West Antarctica, centered on the enormous, marine-based Thwaites glacier â€” as particularly vulnerable.

Bolding is mine.

Edited December 16, 2016 by RegGuheert

[MistyMountain]

I know it is the same area but the article seems to be saying that Thwaites sheet in West Antartica is particularly vulnerable with melting and that a certain type of calving will occur in the area with pictures. There are even pictures that talk about it taking several hundred years in the Admunsen area.

[Reefgazer]

Yes, definitely tell your DH thank you for answering all these questions! Can you ask him one more question, as well?is there any good information out there on the accuracy of predictive models of climate change, say with in the past hundred years or so. I realize there might not be any data on this, because climate change has accelerated very recently. But I was just wondering if there was any data on how accurate this predictive models are?

 

If he doesn't mind elaborating...... I'm also wondering about things like hurricanes. They (NOAA I think) come out each year and try to say within a certain parameter, if it's going to be a bad storm year or not. I can't remember where I read it, but I want to say it's got like a 50% accuracy on if they're correct on there being many named storms, or a few named storms. Wouldn't those types of prediction fall under more of the total energy? Like predicting El Niños and La Niñas?

 

ETA: And thanks for asking him. :)

[hornblower]

Yes, definitely tell your DH thank you for answering all these questions! Can you ask him one more question, as well?is there any good information out there on the accuracy of predictive models of climate change, say with in the past hundred years or so. I realize there might not be any data on this, because climate change has accelerated very recently. But I was just wondering if there was any data on how accurate this predictive models are?

 

While you're waiting for that answer from him, have a read through this https://www.skepticalscience.com/climate-models.htm

 

It explains how models are tested using hindcasting. 

Edited December 17, 2016 by hornblower

[luuknam]

It's already happening.  You can look at satellite images of Louisiana and see how the coastline has changed over the past 20 years.

 

 

Or you can look at how the coastline of, e.g., The Netherlands has changed over the past 6,000 years (hint: a LOT):

 

 

It starts with a map of NL currently, then after a couple of seconds it goes to 4,000BC, and by 45 seconds in we're in the 13th century AD building dikes (actually we were building dikes and draining lakes before that, but it's not really in the video), so anything from there on doesn't really count, though it does illustrate how much you can do with strategically placed dikes etc. In fact, currently 26% of NL is below sea level (dark blue), and an additional 29% has the potential of river flooding (light blue), which, fwiw, are the most densely populated areas of the country, and yet, nobody is really worried:

 

http://www.pbl.nl/dossiers/klimaatverandering/content/correctie-formulering-over-overstromomgsrisico

 

If the sea rises, it'd mostly just cost money to make bigger dikes, but at this point in time, we're still draining more water to create more land.

 

Anyhow, I do believe climate change is real, and I think there's a human component to it, but anecdotes about coastlines don't mean much.

[Bluegoat]

I think I might have reachedthe limit of dh's knowledge on this, without sending him to do research.  He's now telling me he hates weather.

[treestarfae]

Any new news with climate change?

[KathyBC]

We didn't cause change.  Change IS inevitable.  What's up for "debate" is whether or not we have increased the rate of change, or I suppose whether our actions have caused changes that wouldn't have otherwise happened.  And.....I am not debating that either way.  Because the reality is....It doesn't MATTER what we "did."  There are 6 or 7 billion of us.  Of COURSE our being here will impact the planet.  We are beings capable of creating nuclear explosions.  Of COURSE we can and do have an impact. 

 

BUT...it doesn't matter what we do, we will not stop the climate from changing.  Even if we stop every single industrial thing that has ever happened, ever, and go back to living in ice age level tribal villages, which, would never happen anyway, the climate WILL change.  

 

 

We have to reframe our goal to....what will help save human lives.  We shouldn't be trying to "save the planet."  The planet isn't in danger.  Only our livelihoods and human race are in danger.  We have to reframe our goals to, what helps humans and a species continue.  And, being efficient with our use of resources, fulfilling our energy needs as cleanly as possible, cleaning up our messes, etc etc...all that is part of what helps us continue.  So don't think I am arguing against keeping our environment clean or anything like that.  I "believe" in the concept of "reduce, reuse, recycle."  But, we should be doing these things because it keeps OUR "house" clean...not because it will stop climate change. 

I wish I could like this a couple dozen times.

[goldberry]

Argh, there should be a zombie thread warning before I try to read 6 pages that seem really familiar because I read them months ago!

[Catwoman]

Argh, there should be a zombie thread warning before I try to read 6 pages that seem really familiar because I read them months ago!

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

 

Not this thread again! :eek:

[Mimm]

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

 

Not this thread again! :eek:

 

Hey, I thought it was an interesting thread. :)