Global warming - a suggestion

[Aussie_Lurker]

Do you not bother to read Yosef? The paper you cite in #104 was the one which got rebutted recently, when it was shown that the scientists had spliced two different data sets together without telling readers-i.e. the "Hide The incline" paper I referred to in post #102. Not only did they splice graphs, they also used a "trick" to remove the long-term warming trend. The scientists who rebutted this paper showed that, if you remove the tricks used by McLean et al, there is a significant divergence between SOI & global temperatures stretching back slightly more than 30 years. This is exactly the same kind of divergence that was recently shown between Solar Activity-so what does that leave as potential causes for global warming?

Aussie.

 

[702]

Sometimes forest fires starts naturally, therefore humans are never responsible for starting forest fires.

Anyway, to get back to Civ V more directly. If there was a way that the game could somehow calculate if global warming should "start" one result could changes in the types of tiles, so a snow tile could turn to a tundra tile for instance (I'm not sure we know all the types of tile yet, but some very good guesses can be made). In Civ 4, at different latitudes you found different terrain types, well with global warming perhaps in the boundary/ecotone regions between different types (e.g. where you have a mix of some kind of grass/plain with desert) then the "cooler" tiles could turn into the "warmer" ones.

 

[Ahriman]

If there was a way that the game could somehow calculate if global warming should "start" one result could changes in the types of tiles, so a snow tile could turn to a tundra tile for instance

The possibility of beneficial transformations and higher agricultural yields in northern regions has been debated. I've seen a number of arguments suggesting that rather turning into bounteous farmland, warming area in Canada just won't have the soil quality to support serious agriculture, and that much of the the melting taiga/tundra in Russia would just turn into boggy/marshes (with melted permafrost).

So it might be inaccurate for example to turn turnda into grassland, and plains vs grassland obviously depends on rainfall as much as temperature, and the rainfall projections from different models are still highly variable.

It'd also create some weird incentives, for the civs on the poles to be trying to pollute as much as possible so that their terrain would turn into something useful...

 

[bite]

Moderator Action: You have been warned to keep the disscustion civil, but several players have continued to yell at each other. I do not wish to close this thread because there is a lot of good discussion going on, however, if voices become raised again I will close this thread. i.e. last warning.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

I actually agree with Chongli here.

Mechanics that permanently destroy your stuff in a completely random way, and in a way where there is *nothing* you can do about it, is intrinsically not fun. The mechanic is intrinsically broken.
Trying to make it reversible through worker action just makes a MM mess; please lets not go back to workers playing whack-a-mole with pollution.
.

The way to deal with it (global pollution effects) would be through
1. Having the effects be temporary, but not something you could 'Target' on a hex by hex basis to remove... ie the removal is automatic.
2. Civic choices, techs that help hexes in your territory recover faster.
3. Diplomatic or unilateral civics/buildings, etc. that reduce the causes.

I actually have a model in my sig, its based in Civ 4 so it talks about squares but the same model could be applied to hexes.

Basically, in the period from the Industrial-> late game the damage would get worse and worse unless
1. Civs adopted environmentalism
or
2. Civs Built Recycling plants+Clean power, (the late game solution)

If Civs did one of those, then they wouldn't contribute
If Civs did both, they would actually reduce the amount of 'Global Env Damage'
[of course they would have to not use nukes either]
Techs like Ecology could help make it go away faster.

The idea behind environmentalism would be to make it not worthwhile Except for preventing Global pollution, so if you have it you are helping your competitors... it should really only be worth doing if you don't want Global Pollution to interfere with your win... Or if you can successfully force your neighbors into it as well.



The reason this is/way it can be Fun is that it makes the later game like a race.... its not just who can get the space ship first, but getting a space ship before Global pollution decimates your population.

It can provide late game rewards for preparing for it by preseving forests in your terrain or researching techs like ecology.

It would Not act to restrain a player from getting nukes/polluting industries
It would give players a reason to want to diplomatically force Other players into specific Civics (I'll pay you if you adopt environmentalism, I'll pay you if you go no nukes..... and those nicely go into UN type ideas)

Indeed that would be a key difference in game types... In a diplomatic win, one player would have successfully used Diplomacy to get everyone to unite behind them to be able to get these thing approved, and a Diplomatic win world would probably be substantially cleaner than a Tech Win world... which would be a Lot Cleaner than a Conquest/Domination win world (with the Mass nuke possibility)

 

[KingYosef]

Do you not bother to read Yosef? The paper you cite in #104 was the one which got rebutted recently, when it was shown that the scientists had spliced two different data sets together without telling readers-i.e. the "Hide The incline" paper I referred to in post #102. Not only did they splice graphs, they also used a "trick" to remove the long-term warming trend. The scientists who rebutted this paper showed that, if you remove the tricks used by McLean et al, there is a significant divergence between SOI & global temperatures stretching back slightly more than 30 years. This is exactly the same kind of divergence that was recently shown between Solar Activity-so what does that leave as potential causes for global warming?

Aussie.

Again, this has no relevance on what I posted because we aren't just talking about the last century, we are talking about understanding climate change within many ice age eras that have come and gone. The science is showing that warming AND cooling is a natural process of factors that make man on earth of no relevance. That is precisely why the previous ice ages have come and gone without the influence of man, or Carbon products or bi-products.

 

[KingYosef]

Civ 5 should definitely exclude global warming for many reasons.

1. The title 'Global Warming' has changed in the wake of scandals being exposed and lack of scientific data to a more general name, 'Climate Change.'

2. The science behind Global Warming is not empirical.

3. What about Global Cooling.

4. Without a Al Gore Leader Head global warming is just not possible.

 

[ori]

1) is not true - as has been pointed out in this thread. The term Climate Change is a rather old one with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change having been created in 1988

2) while there is considerable debate about some of the data and the controversy about some of the IPCC reports and the University of East Anglia did create some rather problematic questions for them - the science behind Climate Change and even man-made climate change is both empirical and overwhelmingly pointing into the direction of human influences being one driving factor in the rapid climate change we see today.

3) Global Cooling is not what is happening today - local cooling along with a general increase in global temperature maybe.

4) Al Gore is overrated - by pretty much everyone. But while he is important for the public perception of Climate Change especially in the US he doesn't have all that much importance for the actual existence of Climate Change.

The real question imho is not whether human influences help change our climate - but whether its necessary/advisable/feasible to do anything about it beyond phasing out fossil fuels (for which there are other good reasons).

 

[Chalks]

1. The title 'Global Warming' has changed in the wake of scandals being exposed and lack of scientific data to a more general name, 'Climate Change.'

It wasn't changed "in the wake of the scandals". It wasn't changed at all. Some people have started calling it something different because stupid people don't understand that just because a theory is called "global warming" it doesn't make everything warmer. It is still a global temperature increase and if people weren't so thick, it would still be called "global warming".

2. The science behind Global Warming is not empirical.

The affect of greenhouse gasses as atmospheric insulators is empirically proven. The output of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere is empirically proven. The global temperature increase is empirically proven.

I'm not sure what science you're trying to debunk with this sweeping statement.

3. What about Global Cooling.

You see point 1 where I talked about people not understanding what the hell the terms "global warming" mean? Go find a mirror.

4. Without a Al Gore Leader Head global warming is just not possible.

The global scientific community thinks you're wrong. Your fixation on Al Gore just further cements the idea that you don't actually know what science is. It's not about people, it's about facts.

 

[eireksten]

4) Al Gore is overrated - by pretty much everyone. But while he is important for the public perception of Climate Change especially in the US he doesn't have all that much importance for the actual existence of Climate Change.

Al Gore annoys me just as much as Lord Monckton (or what he's called). Those two have such exaggerating (and most of the time manipulated) views on global warming that most people don't get a chance to actually learn what's going on. Instead you get two poles of opinions; Those who don't believe in Al Gore, and those who don't believe in the climate skepticists (ie. Lord Monckton).

Okay, so that's not entirely the truth. But it's true enough to cause some major political problems around the world...

The real question imho is not whether human influences help change our climate - but whether its necessary/advisable/feasible to do anything about it beyond phasing out fossil fuels (for which there are other good reasons).

While I agree with you on a political/scientific basis, I believe the real question here is whether or not modeling global warming (or climate change) in Civilization adds anything to the game. And if so, how could it best be implemented.

 

[Chalks]

I believe the real question here is whether or not modeling global warming (or climate change) in Civilization adds anything to the game. And if so, how could it best be implemented.

Exactly. There are lots of real things that Civilization doesn't implement. If it should be removed, it should be for gameplay related reasons.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Yosef, contrary to what you claim, Paleo-climatology has revealed a great deal about the factors which drove climate change prior to the industrial era. In the Pre-Quaternary Era (up to 8 million years ago), the planet's average temperature was a good 5 degrees warmer than at any point during the "modern" age-courtesy of the CO2 rich atmosphere during that time (CO2 concentrations were 10-20 times higher than they are now). During the Quaternary Era-up to the start of the Interglacial which brought us into the Holocene-the bulk of the climate change has been driven primarily by changes in Total Solar Irradiance brought about by the Milankovitch cycles (c. 100,000 year changes in the Earth's orbit which bring us closer to, or further from, the sun). However, though its TSI which initially drove these warming & cooling, it was changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations which sustained it these changes. So when the planet cooled, more CO2 was taken up by carbon sinks which led to the planet getting even *cooler* (glacial periods). Then, as the planet's orbit got closer to the sun, the Earth Warmed, causing the carbon sinks to release the CO2 back into the atmosphere-causing it to warm further still (until peak CO2 concentrations were reached). This is why ice-core data shows CO2 levels rising & falling between 180ppm & 280ppm. The point is that changes in CO2 & temperature continued long after solar irradiance had leveled out.
We are currently in the *middle* of the current Milankovitch cycle, so all changes in climate, up to the start of the Industrial Era, have been shown to be entirely caused by changes in sunspot numbers. It was these changes that led to the Medieval Warm Period (a roughly 0.6 degree warming over about 600 years) & the subsequent Little Ice Age (a 0.6 degree cooling over about 300-400 years). Sunspot Numbers peaked around the 1940's, leveled off around the early 1950's, & have been trending downwards for the past 40 years-yet average global temperatures have still risen at a rate of +0.1 degrees per decade since 1950-the fastest rise in global temperatures in more than 10,000 years. Yet what's the cause? Volcanism is no higher or lower than normal, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation has been trending slightly downwards for the past 30 years (which should be causing cooling) & sunspot activity has been falling for the past 40 years. The only thing which has been rising over this time period has been CO2 levels in the atmosphere-a gas which has been Empirically Proven to trap/absorb & re-emit Long-wave Infrared radiation (indeed, this ability of CO2 & methane was shown as far back as the 19th century).
So you see, Yosef, that all the existing evidence shows CO2 to be the most likely cause of global warming (a warming trend which hasn't actually ceased, in spite of claims by the Denialist Cult). The Contrarians have yet to provide a single shred of proof to debunk this evidence, which is why they choose to play political games instead (like hacking computers (a criminal offense) & posting e-mails out of context). If they're engaged in such grubby tactics, then it makes you wonder what they've got to hide.

P.S: you talk of controversy, yet you happily ignore the obvious controversy in the McLean et al paper you cite. The paper was thoroughly debunked on the basis of attempts to "hide the incline" in temperatures over the last half century (by splicing Weather Balloon & Satellite Data). That's bad science bordering on deception.
Also, whilst we're talking controversy, what about the now-defunct Global Climate Coalition which-in an internal memo-*admitted* that, in spite of the research of fellow denialists, all the available evidence strongly suggested that humans were to blame for global warming-whilst at the same time they were publicly spreading Denialism through the mass media?
What about all the so-called Think Tanks spreading denialism which have obvious ties to the fossil fuel industry-like Lavoisier Group, George C Marshall Institute & JunkScience.com?
What about the controversy surrounding certain bogus "petition projects", or the way "Energy & Environment" was set up to *only* publish the "research" of scientists spreading denialism-no matter how poorly researched these papers were (just look at the Beck paper as perfect proof of this).
Compared to all of these scandals, a few e-mails that reveal climate scientists as all too human is really just a storm in a tea-cup, yet guess what the Denialist Cult chooses to focus its attention on? Thats not *skepticism*, thats just *gullibility*!

Aussie.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Chalks, in an interview I heard a leading political analyst say that the term was changed to Climate Change by US politicians at the behest of the business lobby. This lobby believed that Global Warming sounded too threatening, wheras Climate Change sounded much more....neutral. The change to the term was made against the wishes of scientists & environmentalists. Those of us in the scientific community who *know* what we're talking about *still* call it GLOBAL WARMING!

 

[Ahriman]

Actually, I've mostly read just the opposite, many "pro-climate change" (pro in the sense of understanding that it is real and caused by GHG increases) have shifted towards using climate change rather than global warming precisely because warming sounds nice and fuzzy and friendly. Some journalists (Friedman) are trying to encourage Global Heating or Global Boiling.

Most scientists I've met use the two interchangeably, because they know what they mean, so aren't bothered by which term gets used (and because AGW is a quick acronym).

Personally I prefer climate change, because it emphasizes the non-temperature impacts, like precipitation changes, that are likely to occur, and because it gets away from any connotation of equal-impacts-everywhere (which can thus be "de-bunked" by a single counterexample).

 

[Chalks]

Chalks, in an interview I heard a leading political analyst say that the term was changed to Climate Change by US politicians at the behest of the business lobby. This lobby believed that Global Warming sounded too threatening, wheras Climate Change sounded much more....neutral. The change to the term was made against the wishes of scientists & environmentalists. Those of us in the scientific community who *know* what we're talking about *still* call it GLOBAL WARMING!

How do politicians in the US change the name of a scientific theory?

It's stuff like this that makes me love america. Go ahead and just decree what the scientists of the world use. By all mighty power of being awesome.

 

[Ahriman]

How do politicians in the US change the name of a scientific theory?

People can change the terms they use to talk about thing, and the language in which people frame things really matters. Politicians know this more than most.

Politicians can have huge impact over the language used to discuss issues.

Hence the abandonment of the term "Liberal" in the US, thanks to the success of the Right in tarring it as being synonymous with communism. [Or how many in Europe have destroyed "liberal" by making it synonymous with laissez-faire.]

And how "socialist" and "fascist" seem to have lost all actual content, given their useage by many people.

And the politician-induced creation of codewords, like "state's rights".

Go ahead and just decree what the scientists of the world use.

It's not about decreeing what term scientists or academics or policy wokns use. Its about being able to influence what terms non-specialists use. Because the terminology matters in affecting people's opinions.

Sadly, people are able to be both FOR "public healthcare" and AGAINST "government-controlled healthcare" at the same time.

As in; "keep your government hands off my medicare!".

People are stupid like that.

 

[frekk]

Civ 5 should definitely exclude global warming for many reasons.

1. The title 'Global Warming' has changed in the wake of scandals being exposed and lack of scientific data to a more general name, 'Climate Change.'

Actually that's just a little Orwellian language engineering, and has nothing to do with anything except a desire to make it go away.

2. The science behind Global Warming is not empirical.

It's entirely empirical.

3. What about Global Cooling.

What about it?

4. Without a Al Gore Leader Head global warming is just not possible.

Very scientific.

What is it with people trying to foist their politics on a game?

Anyway, I do agree that global warming shouldn't be in the game ... but not for any realism factors! It's just not a fun element, and it comes so late in the game - the part of the game played the least - it's not really worth having.

 

[KingYosef]

Yosef, contrary to what you claim, Paleo-climatology has revealed a great deal about the factors which drove climate change prior to the industrial era. In the Pre-Quaternary Era (up to 8 million years ago), the planet's average temperature was a good 5 degrees warmer than at any point during the "modern" age-courtesy of the CO2 rich atmosphere during that time (CO2 concentrations were 10-20 times higher than they are now). During the Quaternary Era-up to the start of the Interglacial which brought us into the Holocene-the bulk of the climate change has been driven primarily by changes in Total Solar Irradiance brought about by the Milankovitch cycles (c. 100,000 year changes in the Earth's orbit which bring us closer to, or further from, the sun). However, though its TSI which initially drove these warming & cooling, it was changes in atmospheric CO2 concentrations which sustained it these changes. So when the planet cooled, more CO2 was taken up by carbon sinks which led to the planet getting even *cooler* (glacial periods). Then, as the planet's orbit got closer to the sun, the Earth Warmed, causing the carbon sinks to release the CO2 back into the atmosphere-causing it to warm further still (until peak CO2 concentrations were reached). This is why ice-core data shows CO2 levels rising & falling between 180ppm & 280ppm. The point is that changes in CO2 & temperature continued long after solar irradiance had leveled out.
We are currently in the *middle* of the current Milankovitch cycle, so all changes in climate, up to the start of the Industrial Era, have been shown to be entirely caused by changes in sunspot numbers. It was these changes that led to the Medieval Warm Period (a roughly 0.6 degree warming over about 600 years) & the subsequent Little Ice Age (a 0.6 degree cooling over about 300-400 years). Sunspot Numbers peaked around the 1940's, leveled off around the early 1950's, & have been trending downwards for the past 40 years-yet average global temperatures have still risen at a rate of +0.1 degrees per decade since 1950-the fastest rise in global temperatures in more than 10,000 years. Yet what's the cause? Volcanism is no higher or lower than normal, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation has been trending slightly downwards for the past 30 years (which should be causing cooling) & sunspot activity has been falling for the past 40 years. The only thing which has been rising over this time period has been CO2 levels in the atmosphere-a gas which has been Empirically Proven to trap/absorb & re-emit Long-wave Infrared radiation (indeed, this ability of CO2 & methane was shown as far back as the 19th century).
So you see, Yosef, that all the existing evidence shows CO2 to be the most likely cause of global warming (a warming trend which hasn't actually ceased, in spite of claims by the Denialist Cult). The Contrarians have yet to provide a single shred of proof to debunk this evidence, which is why they choose to play political games instead (like hacking computers (a criminal offense) & posting e-mails out of context). If they're engaged in such grubby tactics, then it makes you wonder what they've got to hide.

P.S: you talk of controversy, yet you happily ignore the obvious controversy in the McLean et al paper you cite. The paper was thoroughly debunked on the basis of attempts to "hide the incline" in temperatures over the last half century (by splicing Weather Balloon & Satellite Data). That's bad science bordering on deception.
Also, whilst we're talking controversy, what about the now-defunct Global Climate Coalition which-in an internal memo-*admitted* that, in spite of the research of fellow denialists, all the available evidence strongly suggested that humans were to blame for global warming-whilst at the same time they were publicly spreading Denialism through the mass media?
What about all the so-called Think Tanks spreading denialism which have obvious ties to the fossil fuel industry-like Lavoisier Group, George C Marshall Institute & JunkScience.com?
What about the controversy surrounding certain bogus "petition projects", or the way "Energy & Environment" was set up to *only* publish the "research" of scientists spreading denialism-no matter how poorly researched these papers were (just look at the Beck paper as perfect proof of this).
Compared to all of these scandals, a few e-mails that reveal climate scientists as all too human is really just a storm in a tea-cup, yet guess what the Denialist Cult chooses to focus its attention on? Thats not *skepticism*, thats just *gullibility*!

Aussie.

It has nothing to do with being "debunked." These scientists that have peer-reviewed published works are researchers that understand the natural elements of the Earth's history. It is as plain as day that the previous ice ages had to come and go somehow without the presence of man. Saying that we are at fault is not empirical, and in fact, is not the most popular theory anymore amongst the scientific community. The MAJORITY does not believe that man is the factor in the RATE or the PROCESS by which our Earth WARMS and COOLS.

You have yet to provide me with a logical model that is better than the majority of what scientists are now coming out with. I asked you if you had a better peer-reviewed model.

You can downplay the recent scandal all you want, it still won't have any effect on the better data. Here is another great read for the readers that want to see why Global Warming theory has crashed in the scientific community...

Top Climate Change Scientist Admits Global Warming is a Hoax

 

[KingYosef]

Here is another little gem for those who want a good laugh... Dennis Miller on Global Warming

 

[Chalks]

Top Climate Change Scientist Admits Global Warming is a Hoax

Let me go ahead and post one of the replies to that article here:

Hey Red, ever heard the expression, "garbage in garbage out?"

Your headline says, "Top climate scientist admits global warming is a hoax", is interesting, but it isn't true.

According to your own sources, being unorganized with his paper work from two decades ago is the only thing that Dr. Phil Jones admits to. Certainly no fraud and there is nothing in the content to even remotely suggest that he "admits global warming is a hoax."

In fact, the highly editorialized copy has several contradictory statements and states that Jone's admission that warming periods have happened before, but were NOT due to man-made--implies that he saying today's global warming is not caused by human activity. That is just laughable, because every climate scientist knows that previous warming periods happened in natural cycles in the past, before pollution of the current population of 6.5 billion people, cars, and methane from animals--have thrown the Earth's C02 out of balance, trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

This is a paragraph from your source:

But he (Jones) denied he had cheated over the data or unfairly influenced the scientific process, and said he still believed recent temperature rises were predominantly man-made.

How do you get "admits global warming is a hoax" out of this?

Do you even read your own sources? Your headline is the fraud. You and firesisle get your science from the same biased sources, but all your wishful thinking won't change the truth.

The reason US main stream media did not pick up this story is the same reason you jumped on it--because it is highly misleading and you misrepresented it even more.

Darharr.

You don't read any of your own sources either do you?

It seems to be a pattern with you, just doing a quick google for things that back up your argument without even reading them first.

You're not fooling us, mate.