Global Warming: Fact or Fiction

[Berzerker]

Earth was even warmer in the Mesozoic, that doesn't mean that if the sea suddenly rose 6 meters and global average temperatures increased 5 degrees everything would be fine. Even mild temperature increases could contribute to significant desertification, while sea level rises would be disastrous for human populations near the coast (i.e. the majority of all humans).

Not sure what all that has to do with what I said, but desertification aint so much about temperature as aridity. The driest desert on the planet is covered by ice. The Sahara Desert shrinks when the monsoons return every 41,000 years, the monsoons are generated by the Sun reaching higher latitudes as the Earth's tilt changes over time.

It is also disingenuous

Oh BS, go talk to someone else if you think you're a damn mind reader.

to write off the currently increasing temperatures as mere rebounding from the little ice age, unless the rapid increase in nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide, methane, etc. levels in the atmosphere can be explained as being caused by the end of that cool period, rather than rapid human industrialization.

Certain gases do increase naturally as the world warms, but I didn't write off anything nor did I say we haven't put any gases into the atmosphere. WTH? Dont put words in my mouth to accuse me of dishonesty. I asked how much of that post little ice age warming was from a natural rebound and how much was from us. cya

 

[Cheetah]

The end of discussions whether Global Warming (or more precisely: Climate Change) is fact or fiction - will it ever happen?

 

[azzaman333]

Humans probably have some influence on GW, however there are many that are harming the credibility of the theory by making outlandish statements that inevitably are proven wrong.

 

[Erik Mesoy]

There really needs to be a poll option looking roughly like this: "Fact - but the allegedly required responses are not".

 

[Shekwan]

Screw the Netherlands. A warmer Canada is a more prosperous Canada. Sorry, Amsterdam. I do think you're a nice city.

Plus Canada is the new Amsterdam anyways.

 

[Merkinball]

There really needs to be a poll option looking roughly like this: "Fact - but the allegedly required responses are not".

Quoted for epic thruthiness.

 

[El_Machinae]

The only reasonable objection I've seen to AGW concerns is that we don't know what's going to happen to cloud albedo for each increment in temperature rise. I have seen a LOT of unreasonable, recycled objections. I've not seen any reason to think that CO2 won't act as a greenhouse gas.

"Climategate" is remarkably overblown in the mass media, and most of the 'smoking guns' really aren't (but the news system is not designed to rebut its previous hysteria on specific reports). In depth analyses continue to show that climategate is not really anything other than a minor scandal.

And I'm tired of people acting as if an attack on Al Gore is a reasonable proxy for AGW concerns.

 

[Merkinball]

"Climategate" is remarkably overblown - El Mach

I know quite a few tree hugging professors that think otherwise.

 

[emzie]

I know quite a few tree hugging professors that think otherwise.

And this is more money needs to be spent on science education. An anecdote is like the doctor who says, "well, despite the clinical trials, in my personal practice..." which is code for "I'm an awful doctor" You can't base opinions on cherry picked individuals or facts -- this goes for any side of any discussion about anything.

 

[Merkinball]

And this is more money needs to be spent on science education. An anecdote is like the doctor who says, "well, despite the clinical trials, in my personal practice..." which is code for "I'm an awful doctor" You can't base opinions on cherry picked individuals or facts -- this goes for any side of any discussion about anything.

The clinical trials with manipulated sample data that avoided oversight and criticism from the FDA?

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

I know quite a few tree hugging professors that think otherwise.

That's all of the climate research community, yes?

 

[emzie]

The clinical trials with manipulated sample data that avoided oversight and criticism from the FDA?

You missed the point. The point was that a doctor who looks at clinical data, studies, research and ignores their conclusions in favour of personal anecdote is a bad doctor. He may end up being right, be he arrived at the right conclusion by chance and luck.

Climategate is overblown. Have some scandalous things occurred? Yes. Does that dismiss the entire idea of global warming? No. You can't just look at specific instances of academic impropriety and ignore the other data which still overwhelmingly forms a consensus. The doubters could be right, but they have yet to demonstrate that they are.

That's all of the climate research community, yes?

Basically this.

 

[Merkinball]

That's all of the climate research community, yes?

Sustainable Engineering.

You don't have to be a member of the climate research community to know that manipulating data, hiding data, distorting data collection, fudging recorded data, shunning criticism, and only opening your published data to friendly sources is bad science.

I mean, if I do a masters thesis I am expected to have an open invitation to anyone for my thesis defense. I'm not allowed to pick and choose who can and cannot attend it simply to avoid hard criticism and bolster my own research. What happened at East Anglia is the epitome of unethical science. If a graduate student, or a doctoral student, or a university were to do similar actions, they'd be shunned from the scientific community. If I were to do that for my thesis defense, I would never find a job, and I would probably be booted from my university for academic dishonesty. I have had classmates that have been failed for simply plagiarizing a simple sentence from Wikipedia. Why are scientists given so many free passes as opposed to young students who don't know any better and are doing such comparatively harmless things?

What has been taking place for about fifteen years now when it comes to this sort of stuff regarding global warming is the stuff that graduate students, and even college freshman entering into a BS program, are taught in the earliest stages of their education.

You don't cheat.
You don't manipulate data.
You don't manipulate your controls.
You don't shun criticism.

The scientific method in its entirety is thrown away when you do these things.

Anybody that pretends that what has occurred in East Anglia and the IPCC was "overblown" is doing a disservice to science as a whole.

 

[emzie]

You seem to be missing the point that East Anglia (or any specific institution, person, school ect) wasn't a filter for the world's combined climate data. I would wager that the case for global warming occurring could be overwhelmingly made without using any data or report prepared by the University.

edit:

Making a comparison to something I'm much more familiar with, the Piltdown Man hoax was a paleontolical scandal. The notion that because this "missing link" was a hoax, then evolution must be wrong is downright silly.

 

[Merkinball]

So in the absence of science we'll build arguments out of conjecture. I'm convinced.

 

[emzie]

So in the absence of science we'll build arguments out of conjecture. I'm convinced.

That's not what I said. I won't pretend to be an expert on the subject, so I will repeat what I said earlier: I have faith in the scientific method to resolve the truth of the matter. Forgeries, impropriety and downright academic fraud do not have any relevance to valid data. If this scandal expands to show a vast green conspiracy, I'll be a bit less sure of my stance.

 

[El_Machinae]

You seem to be missing the point that East Anglia (or any specific institution, person, school ect) wasn't a filter for the world's combined climate data. I would wager that the case for global warming occurring could be overwhelmingly made without using any data or report prepared by the University.

East Anglia wasn't nearly as bad as most people seem to think it was. Yes, there was some technical impropriety: this will likely be disciplined. A huge portion of any suspect 'impropriety' is quite understandable (I mean, for gods' sake, these people get death threats). Reviews are obviously ongoing, but I've not seen any that suggest that there's any bad science going on. And most of the 'smoking guns' are certainly not 'smoking guns', but misinterpretation followed back a lack of follow-up.

I could go into any institution and ask for the original data on any of their papers and be met with laughing shrugs about how long it would be to collect the original recordings, let alone the original samples. Yes, institutions are supposed to keep them, but you'd need a really good reason to motivate the people who've stored the data to figure out where the data are and how it's organised.

The data for AGW is strong despite Anglia and with Anglia. These are rival institutions with rival data collection methods. The competition to be correct is fierce. The deniers, motivated as they are, cannot seem to bring any type of mental competence to their critiques.

 

[Merkinball]

That's not what I said. I won't pretend to be an expert on the subject, so I will repeat what I said earlier: I have faith in the scientific method to resolve the truth of the matter. Forgeries, impropriety and downright academic fraud do not have any relevance to valid data. If this scandal expands to show a vast green conspiracy, I'll be a bit less sure of my stance.

That's fine, you can believe that. But I will not. If it was an isolated incident I'd be less skeptical, but it's not an isolated incident. This has been going on for fifteen years, it includes East Anglia, the IPCC, NASA, and many scientific journals as well as the mainstream press. If you're dog pees on the rug for years and years and years, why are you going to suddenly think it's okay to leave in the house when you go out for the day?

 

[emzie]

Treading close to Glenn Beck-esque reasoning.

@elm: Yes, but I'm bending over backwards to concede a point so that I might make a much more important one!

 

[Merkinball]

Treading close to Glenn Beck-esque reasoning.

@elm: Yes, but I'm bending over backwards to concede a point so that I might make a much more important one!

Glenn Beck reasoning? You mean like pointing out an extremely isolated incident in one branch of science to justify your denial for pragmatic and prolonged malpractice in another branch of science?