Top U.S. Climate Scientist Issues New Warning On Catastropic Sea Level Rise
Top U.S. Climate Scientist Issues New Warning On Catastropic Sea Level Rise
James Hansen, the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute Of Space Studies and the top U.S. climate scientist, has issued a new warning about the threat of a catastrophic rise in sea levels. He warns further that many scientists aware of such a rise are reluctant to discuss it out of fears of appearing “alarmist.”
From Hansen’s new paper in the journal Environmental Research:
I suggest that a “scientific reticence” is inhibiting the communication of a threat of a potentially large sea level rise. Delay is dangerous because of system inertias that could create a situation with future sea level changes out of our control. I argue for calling together a panel of scientific leaders to hear evidence and issue a prompt plain-written report on current understanding of the sea level change issue.
Climate Progress has more. This week, CNN’s Anderson Cooper has been reporting live from the source of much of this sea level rise — the disappearing glaciers in Greenland. Last night, Cooper interviewed biologist Jeff Corwin, who laid out the massive changes taking place in Greenland:
Today, it’s actually losing ice at about 100 billion tons a year. I mean, that’s incredible. One hundred billion tons of ice is disappearing. And, of course, it just doesn’t go up in smoke. The ice melts. Not only do you have to deal with water being lifted up, with the potential sea level going up virtually 20 feet, but also salinity. People aren’t thinking about this problem. What happens when a saltwater environment becomes more fresh lake?
Watch Cooper’s excellent report:
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) left yesterday with a bipartisan delegation to Greenland to see first hand the effects of the global climate crisis. Read her release on the trip HERE.
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It should be fascinating to hear what SOH Pelosi has to say when she returns fron her latest trip. Granted that it will be attacked by those who still believe that dinosaurs and human beings romped together approximately 4000 years. However, for those whose beliefs are struggling to maintain some scientific awareness, her comments should be extremely interesting.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:06 pmHow long till trolls show up to disparage the article and anyone who takes it seriously?
May 26th, 2007 at 2:08 pmThis will be my number one issue is choosing the next President. I think Edwards is ahead of the other on this. That of course assumes Gore doesn’t enter the race.
At every meeting, luncheon, speech, Americans must ask their Politicians how they are addressing Global Warming.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:14 pmSpeaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) left yesterday with a bipartisan delegation to Greenland to see first hand the effects of the global climate crisis.
Lets hope Nancy pays attention. I am seriously losing any faith in her, since she keeps misplacing tables ( to put impeachment on ) and failed to stand up to Bush on forcing a timeline to end the Iraq fiasco.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:16 pmSome species die and some others adapt and change. Wait for new deceases.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:20 pmWhat happens when a saltwater environment becomes more fresh lake?
And the reverse?
Why aren’t they pointing outthe obvious, that what is melting and becoming contaminated as well is fresh water. I always thought of a portion of it as a reserve of fresh water when we became desperate after draining the natural aquafers… Like a savings account.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:27 pmI always thought of a portion of it as a reserve of fresh water when we became desperate after draining the natural aquafers… Like a savings account.
Comment by unbelievable
Less snowpack = less water moving into aquafiers and lower water levels.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:30 pmSome species die and some others adapt and change. Wait for new deceases.
Comment by Juan C — May 26, 2007 @ 2:20 pm
Homo sapiens sapiens could be one of those species if the planet wants to survive…
Only 30-something percent of the US population accepts Evolution is a fact… If you wanna get the attention of the 60-something percent that reject Evolution, make up some fairytale about magical unicorns and evil leprechauns - they will be more inclined to believe you…
May 26th, 2007 at 2:32 pmWTF happened to andrew card!? Did someone get to you guys?
May 26th, 2007 at 2:33 pmHow long till trolls show up to disparage the article and anyone who takes it seriously?
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:08 pm
about 30 min
May 26th, 2007 at 2:34 pmLet me ask a question…
Say it is true and carbon emissions are causing this,
There is no way to end carbon emissions and live in an industrialized world. So when you need to cook dinner you will need to light a wood fire in the post industrial world. Then there is all of the daily methane output from all animals that pass gas. Then there is output from all decomposition. How will you keep warm in the cold? How will you keep cool in the hot? How will you pump water (since the rivers and streams are going dry)?
Following this train of thought Nancy and friends will jump on the Bush NWO population cull plan since killing several billion people will decrease output but still allow Nancy to enjoy industrialization. Welcome to Soylent Green posters. I’m sure you know that a process was invented (used for turkey & chicken remains) called thermal depolymerization that converts bio material into oil. Billions of dead can be billions of barrels of energy for a greatly reduced population.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:34 pmCould well be, unbelievable. It is my understanding that human activity is badly depleting the Ogalala Aquifer that runs under the Great Plains from the Gulf of Mexico all the way up into Canada at a scary rate. It took tens of thousands of years to fill it, and we’ve managed to drain it in a little over 100 yrs. Plus the depeletion of the top soil on the Great Plains is going on at an equally fast rate.
Anyone know anything about that nasty thing going on in Australia - some sort of primitive saltwater weed that’s taken off completely over the last few years? Apparntly it’s invasive as hell and stings like crazy when you come in contact w/ it. Doesn’t its rapid growth ahve something to do w/ increases in temp and chages in salinity?
You change temperature, atmosphereic composition, the basic pH of saltwater by a few percenage points, and you have NO IDEA what the consequences might be for life on this planet. Andromeda Strain, anyone?
May 26th, 2007 at 2:35 pmGeez, Mr. President, you’re late. Have a little trouble letting the air out of your inflatable livestock after a long night?
May 26th, 2007 at 2:36 pm.
.
.
Another consequence of the ice melting is the loss of a mechanism that reflects sunlight away from the earth.
The more water that appears, the less the sunlight will be reflected from the earth, causing increased global warming.
It’s a vicious circle.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:37 pm.
.
.
And while Nancy is in Greenland to watch ice melt will she think to ask where all those glaciers came from in the 1st place? These same experts tell us that 20,000 years ago most of the northern hemisphere was covered in ice miles thick. How did that happen? Were did it all go? Did the early Homo sapiens drive Hummers? The inconvenient truth is that the climate isn’t static, it’s constantly changing and evolving. History did not begin the day you were born, stuffed happened before you existed.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:38 pmThere is no way to end carbon emissions and live in an industrialized world.
No, but there are certainly saner ways to go about this than we’re currently pursing.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:38 pmLess snowpack = less water moving into aquafiers and lower water levels.
Comment by Wayne — May 26, 2007 @ 2:30 pm
Indeed… And because we’ve allowed our public education system to become little more than a babysitting service, the average american isn’t ableto connect those most basic of dots.
Last night was graduation. I actually had parents thank me for essentially doing my job. I couldn’t believe that they were surprised that I was trying to teach their kids something useful. It was so surreal…
They should replace the garbage they call Science textbooks with anything written by Carl Sagan. The fact that he writes, in Cosmos, that Newton died a virgin would grab the attention of basically any high school student, and possible make Physics cool. :D
May 26th, 2007 at 2:39 pmThere is no way to end carbon emissions and live in an industrialized world.
Comment by Saywho — May 26, 2007 @ 2:34 pm
Solar energy, wind energy, hydro-electric energy, kinetic energy from ocean waves… I challanged my students to come up with ways to provide alternative energy to their buildings they designed, and I was amazed to find out that combinations of these sources are actually viable alternatives.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:42 pmNature will always strike a balance. We live in a closed ecosystem. If man-unkind upsets the balance too much, events will occur that will reduce or eliminate the population of man-unkind.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:43 pmOh no, tell me that Global Warming isn’t all you have left …
tsk, tsk, tsk ….
May 26th, 2007 at 2:44 pmIndeed, Beefeater, and stuff happens while you’re busy sticking your head up your own rear end.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:45 pmJason,
I feel like the caveman on that Geico commercial….um, what?
May 26th, 2007 at 2:47 pmAnyone know anything about that nasty thing going on in Australia - some sort of primitive saltwater weed that’s taken off completely over the last few years?
I actually just did some research on the Great Barrier Reef for a project I gave to my students. Global Warming is destroying so much that we don’t see… I haven’t heard about the seaweed - but read about the impacts of a viscious type of sea star that is thriving in the warmer water and destroying acres of coral a day…
The GBR is expected to become extinct in a few decades due to human alterations to their environment…
You change temperature, atmosphereic composition, the basic pH of saltwater by a few percenage points, and you have NO IDEA what the consequences might be for life on this planet. Andromeda Strain, anyone?
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:35 pm
Precisely! Evolution occurs slowly - not at the rate in which our greed and self-centeredness have demanded of it!
May 26th, 2007 at 2:48 pmNature will always strike a balance. We live in a closed ecosystem. If man-unkind upsets the balance too much, events will occur that will reduce or eliminate the population of man-unkind.
Comment by Briseadh na Faire
Ya know, Briseadh na Faire (what is that name, BTW, Welsh?) I agree w/ ya completely. I shudder to think of the ways in which nature will compensate for human effect on the planet.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:48 pmGeez, Mr. President, you’re late. Have a little trouble letting the air out of your inflatable livestock after a long night?
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:36 pm
That’s freaking hilarious!
May 26th, 2007 at 2:48 pmCorrect the spelling in the title please
May 26th, 2007 at 2:50 pm. Only 30-something percent of the US population accepts Evolution is a fact… If you wanna get the attention of the 60-something percent that reject Evolution, make up some fairytale about magical unicorns and evil leprechauns - they will be more inclined to believe you…
Comment by unbelievable
Where did you get the 30% statistic? That is really frightening if it is true. I think the silent majority believes in evolution, hopefully. If there are that many naysayers we are screwed.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:51 pmNo, but there are certainly saner ways to go about this than we’re currently pursing.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:38 pm
No BUT LOL Is it everything before or after the BUT that is BS??
#1) when the oil is gone then the majority of us will die.
#2) we can’t FIX this no matter what anyone says or does.
The ending of industrialization is not an evolutionary step for humanity. When we cease to grow we face culls or extinction. The total population numbers will return to that of prehistoric man since the only fuel left would be wood. So we deplete the oil and loose uranium and then move to coal. Emissions continue to rise and then we revert to wood. We decimate most of the forests and the remaining population starts over as prehistoric man.
The cycle of life and death. If Nancy gets with the NWO and goes to the controlled burn (population cull) she may be able to have her cake and eat it too.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:53 pmPrecisely! Evolution occurs slowly - not at the rate in which our greed and self-centeredness have demanded of it!
Comment by unbelievable
I’m so surprised that more people can’t understand this. Michael Critchon made his reputation off of “The Andromeda Strain” and yet he ridicules anyone whose truly concerned about global warming.
As far as the other comment (”inflatable livestock”), hey, I do what I can.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:54 pmAnd while Nancy is in Greenland to watch ice melt will she think to ask where all those glaciers came from in the 1st place?
I’m guessing you don’t know. I do if you want an education…
Did the early Homo sapiens drive Hummers? The inconvenient truth is that the climate isn’t static, it’s constantly changing and evolving.
Yes, it is changing - but at a very SLOW rate. You know - million and billions of years. We’re making it change faster than evolution adapts, therefore ensuring that the damage will not be natural, but unnatural in ways that upset the eco-system.
In essense - we are creating our own destruction.
History did not begin the day you were born, stuffed happened before you existed.
Comment by beefeater — May 26, 2007 @ 2:38 pm
‘History’ is actually an account of the past. I think you meant that time did not begin the day we were born. Although, if you were into arguing such things, you could say that personal time did - but universal time is eternal.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:54 pm#17, unbee,
What color is the sky in your world? It doesn’t surprise me that you are amazed by your students intelligence - I always suspected you were a fraud.
You are correct that there are carbonless forms of energy, but they are far more expensive, so unless and until Dems explain to the public that these forms are more expensive, but worth it, the population won’t move towards it. Griping alone never solves a problem.
#16, unbee,
You are part and parcel to the dumbing down of education, desiring that schools be turned into places of indoctrination of liberal doctrine, instead of places of education and critical thinking.
Finally, the greatest source of greenhouse gases - Rosie O’Donnell has been let go 3 weeks early, along with her bitch head writer, who was escorted out of the building for defacing Elizabeth Hasselback’s photos presented in the office by their employer. That alone may be enough to stave off Global Warming.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:54 pmOh no, tell me that Global Warming isn’t all you have left …
Comment by Jason M. Hendler — May 26, 2007 @ 2:44 pm
The fact that you’ve been hiding since November shows that it isn’t.
Crawl back under your bed.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:55 pmI’d like to think you have some valid point to make, Saywho, but after reading your last post twice, I fail to see it.
May 26th, 2007 at 2:57 pmIndeed, Beefeater, and stuff happens while you’re busy sticking your head up your own rear end.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:45 pm
Now there’s a concise scientific answer, I’m beginning to understand your “handle”
May 26th, 2007 at 2:57 pmRight, Jason M. Hendler, the wingnut who thinks life is improving for the Far Right because rosie has been banished from “The View”.
Go back to watching women’s daytime television shows, Jason. You’re in over your head when you come over here.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:00 pm#27, Saywho,
If you are worried about Global Warming leading to humanity’s extinction, then what do you make of Islamist slaughters in the Sudan, Somalia and Chad, as well as AIDS, malaria, etc and the Chinese / Indian natural resource grabs in Africa. Seems to me that native Africans will be the first to go in your great cull.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:01 pmSorry to ask, but what in the hell does a wildlife biologist know about Greenland’s ice? Oh, just about as much as he learned from watching Al Gore’s movie and reading the latest from NASA.
100 billion metric tons of ice, what does that do for sea level rise?
Quick, how many years of 100 billion metric ton ice loss would it take to get to 20 feet?
Answer: 20,320 years
I think I’ll make a wildlife biologist and Al Gore joke out of this, because that’s what this is, a joke. Quick kids, the Earth is going to drown within 20,000 years, get your scuba gear ready at once!!
Bahaha, you guys are such dupes.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:02 pm“Where did you get the 30% statistic?”
A friend emailed me an article on a recent poll, in January I think - and then I read it in two different Science books by college Professors. I forget the exact percent - but it was shockingly low compared to all other Industrialized Nations.
“That is really frightening if it is true. I think the silent majority believes in evolution, hopefully. If there are that many naysayers we are screwed.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 2:51 pm”
I think it goes back to the recognition that 21st century segregation is about liberal v. conservative areas/states… Evolution is still whispered in the Bible Belt. I would say the percentages of Evolution acceptance where I live is more like 5%. Seriously. One of my students asked me if I believe in Evolution, as if he’d just asked me something really subversive. When I said that I did, he seemed to be relieved that he wasn’t alone.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:02 pm#34, tRoS,
Please, I come over here when I need to wipe my feet.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:03 pmYa know, Beefeater, the number of times I’ve read your posts and found absolutely nothing of value, no facts, no informed discussion, nothing worth debating, it’s clear there’s no point in being civil w/ you. It appears the ony reason you come on board at TP is to be obnoxious and insulting, so therefore, you reap what you sow. Please stick your head back up your own rear end and leave the rest of us alone.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:04 pmYou change temperature, atmosphereic composition, the basic pH of saltwater by a few percenage points, and you have NO IDEA what the consequences might be for life on this planet. Andromeda Strain, anyone?
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:35 pm
Thing is, the stuff we can figure out so far is bad enough. With more cold fresh water being poured into the ocean on top of that warm saltwater, we stand a good risk of slowing the great ocean conveyor, thus bringing about a great freeze and at the precise same time, reducing the food nutrient balance of the ocean (Thus reducing fish stocks. Not a good thing in a hungry world.)
Jason M. Hendler
Jason, frankly I sincerely doubt a man who believes that science fiction is better then science fact, has much room to talk about intellegence or the quality of education in America.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:05 pmThis is the first scientist I’ve heard mention system inertias. I think the implication is that once the climate change starts to cause real problems, as in major cities getting flooded over, it may be too late to do anything. For example, higher temperatures with sea levels rising would cause increased evaporation. And at a time when we are counting on water receding it will be raining more.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:05 pmSo, by when could we except the Bush crime family’s “compound” in Kennebunkport to be completely submerged? Although the scenario creating such an event would truly be catastrophic for billions around the globe, the idea of the Bushies someday experiencing their own version of Katrina provides at least one measure of poetic justice.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:05 pmI’m so surprised that more people can’t understand this.
After two years in the public education system, I’m not. I left my last job as a Science teacher because I was harrassed by students who didn’t like the fact that my explanation of the birth of solar system was sans god, and that my administration didn’t support me.
Michael Critchon made his reputation off of “The Andromeda Strain†and yet he ridicules anyone whose truly concerned about global warming.
Ironic, isn’t it…
As far as the other comment (â€inflatable livestockâ€), hey, I do what I can.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
And it doesn’t go unappreciated, either :)
May 26th, 2007 at 3:06 pmOh no, tell me that Global Warming isn’t all you have left …
tsk, tsk, tsk ….
Comment by Jason M. Hendler
Global warming isn’t a political problem, it’s a human problem.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:06 pm“Please, I come over here when I need to wipe my feet”??? What the F…?
Somehow, Jason, this comes across as incoherent, which is what I’d expect from you. Rosie is calling, Jason. Time to go back to the sofa and hit the bonbons.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:07 pmComment by unbelievable
Another thing that is rarely mentioned is that once the pole ice has melted to a certain point, the worldwide currents of the ocean will slow and/or break down. The cold artic current transports organic matter thoughout the oceans which feeds plankton and other small marine life, which in turn feed the rest of ocean life.
When those currents stop or slow, we could have a majorocean die-off.
If the oceans die, we die soon after.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:11 pmChildren, children, quiet down, and let the grown up Republicans administer energy policy for you. You failed to communicate to the public why they should spend 4X the money for electricity, etc., so you have forfeited your chance to fix things.
You never can administer the bitter pill, being more desirous of everyone’s approval than their general well being.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:12 pmDreamCrusher
A biologist would have a strong interest in it. Currents work via the difference in density between cold and warm saltwater, and the warm saltwater is instrumental in bringing all of those nutrients that sink beneath the “Dead” zone in the sea back up to the surface where plankton can use it.
With all of that fresh, cold water pouring into the ocean, this process is being retarded, because fresh water is less dense then saltwater. As a wildlife biologist studies ecosystems, such a huge impact on the said ecosystem would be of major interest, and perhaps central to several studies into depleting fish stocks.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:13 pm#1) when the oil is gone then the majority of us will die.
#2) we can’t FIX this no matter what anyone says or does.
Comment by Saywho
Well since you have ALL THe ANSWERS the real scientists should just pack up and go home. Duh. I think the point is nobody has all the answers but limiting emissions is something that we can’t afford not to do. It’s really enlightened though to throw your hands up in the air and cry we’re f*cked were f*cked we’re all going to die. Accomplishes a lot but keeps YOUR stock prices high for the time being. Well as long as you’re happy we’ll all just sacrifice our children’s future.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:13 pmChildren, children, quiet down, and let the grown up Republicans administer energy policy for you. You failed to communicate to the public why they should spend 4X the money for electricity, etc., so you have forfeited your chance to fix things.
You never can administer the bitter pill, being more desirous of everyone’s approval than their general well being.
Comment by Jason M. Hendler
Indeed, more incoherence for “Professor” Hendler.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:15 pmSolar energy, wind energy, hydro-electric energy, kinetic energy from ocean waves… I challanged my students to come up with ways to provide alternative energy to their buildings they designed, and I was amazed to find out that combinations of these sources are actually viable alternatives.
Comment by unbelievable — May 26, 2007 @ 2:42 pm
To this I say go on and do it! How are you going to mine gallium and silver to make solar cells? Hydro-electric requires ice capped mountains and rivers flowing DOWN and global weather change made quick work of those. You want to float devices (made of plastic) in the oceans then the inevitable comes and all is destroyed. Wind power needs devices that are made from mined material and some wind.
Bottom line is we are going to do all of that but in the end we will not be able to prevent massive cull or extinction. Think it through and you will see that jumping from system to system requires resources that we simply do not have for the population. If you don’t kill each other we will simply dehydrate or starve in the end.
People will need to resort to group think and fight or flight to get beyond this period. Look at Iraq and tell me that the 750,000 dead or more is not a Cull. This will expand to Iran shortly. By the way I subscribe to Darwin however the Book of Revelations seems to resemble the current condition of the world. Regardless if we can go extinct the current conditions point to it louder than the posters here call to salvation or hope.
The party is OVER
May 26th, 2007 at 3:15 pmplaces of education and critical thinking.
Finally, the greatest source of greenhouse gases - Rosie O’Donnell has been let go 3 weeks early, along with her bitch head writer, who was escorted out of the building for defacing Elizabeth Hasselback’s photos presented in the office by their employer. That alone may be enough to stave off Global Warming.
Comment by Jason M. Hendler
Sure Einstein, Rosie is gone, global warming is over, yadayada. We won’t even talk about it any more. No run along and let the grown ups chat.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:16 pm“Please, I come over here when I need to wipe my feetâ€
Wow, if only we measured up to your educational standards….
And I love how the pessimistic conservatives are talking about how these climactic changes are all about a natural cycle, including humanity’s influence on those changes, but hey, if this is all about our survival, hasn’t our scientific advancements been all about prolonging our overall existence? You know, maybe utilizing our scientific knowledge to prevent this excessive heating and, perhaps, maybe even preventing extincting during an ice age as well? Maybe that’s we also PROJECT what could possibly come, so that we make the necessary ramifications in order to PREVENT ourselves from losing significant numbers in our species? I mean, I know there has been a greater interest in destroy islamo-fascists (ouch, there goes a few more of my brain cells), so it’s more acceptable to show our indifferences as far as the outcome of this planet and its inhabitants. It’s Bush’s and the American way! UGH!
May 26th, 2007 at 3:17 pmWhat color is the sky in your world?
Blue today. A cople days ago it was grey,and last night it was black. I’m guesing yours is raining in fire… constantly.
It doesn’t surprise me that you are amazed by your students intelligence - I always suspected you were a fraud.
I’m never amazed by their intelligence. I’m amazed at how the school system and church oppress their intelligence.
I am amazed at your ignorance, however.
You are correct that there are carbonless forms of energy, but they are far more expensive, so unless and until Dems explain to the public that these forms are more expensive, but worth it, the population won’t move towards it. Griping alone never solves a problem.
If the choice is between healthy/alive but less wealthy and rich but dead, expense isn’t an issue to anyone but the greedy corporations which make a killing off the profits of conventional methods and your even greedier Republican Party who assists them. It’s we liberals who want sustainable, clean energy. We know it costs more, but we are willing to give up the Mercedes to have it. Are you?
The first step in solving a problem is in admitting there is a problem. You should try it.
You are part and parcel to the dumbing down of education, desiring that schools be turned into places of indoctrination of liberal doctrine, instead of places of education and critical thinking.
Let’s see, shall we? I managed to teach my students how to have creible points of view - regardless of political affliation, taught them critical thinking skills through problem solving, provided them an awareness of the rest of planet as well as taught them how to be solution-oriented in times of crisis. If you consider that dumbing them down, then you’ve lost whatever grip on reality you might have ever once possessed.
For the record, Jason, I am an Independent. Sometimes I like the conservative solution - but most times I like the liberal solution because reality has a liberal bias. If my students become more liberal as a result of having known me, it is not because I preached liberalism, but taught them how to find their own truths.
Finally, the greatest source of greenhouse gases - Rosie O’Donnell has been let go 3 weeks early, along with her bitch head writer, who was escorted out of the building for defacing Elizabeth Hasselback’s photos presented in the office by their employer. That alone may be enough to stave off Global Warming.
Comment by Jason M. Hendler — May 26, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
Not that we needed it, but there was further proof that you neocons have ZERO sense of humor.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:17 pmGo back to watching women’s daytime television shows, Jason.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 3:00 pm
That was a better response than mine :D LOL
May 26th, 2007 at 3:19 pmIndeed, Beefeater, and stuff happens while you’re busy sticking your head up your own rear end.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 2:45 pm
Now there’s a concise scientific answer, I’m beginning to understand your “handleâ€
Comment by beefeater
Gee beefeater, we just thought your “handle” implied that you were proud of having your head perpetually up your own ass.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:21 pmIf the oceans die, we die soon after.
Comment by Wayne — May 26, 2007 @ 3:11 pm
Great points. I imagine these same folks don’t know that the majority of our oxygen is put into the system by coral reefs. Bad enough we’ve destroyed the secondary filtration system - the forest system.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:24 pmThat was a better response than mine :D LOL
Comment by unbelievable
I’m glad I was able to bring a little levity to your day. Fighting w/ trolls is exhausting. Gotta go for the time being.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:25 pmThe party is OVER
Comment by Saywho — May 26, 2007 @ 3:15 pm
No it isn’t. You just lose your drama to say it is.
Go do the research. The costs for these energies is dropping as they become more available. And, you people seem to be missing that once the price of gas triples, it will be equal…
May 26th, 2007 at 3:27 pmGlobal warming notwithstanding,
George W. Bush is a COXUCKER punk TRAITOR to the USA.
And a WAR CRIMINAL who will BURN IN HELL for his MURDER of innocents.
THAT is the bottom line.
I had a debate with someone telling me “George Bush is ’saved’”.
A nun in 2nd grade told us “ACTIONS speak louder than WORDS”.
TRUE…
So, Bush’s ACTIONS as a liar and MASS-MURDERER WAR CRIMINAL
speak LOUDER that his WORDS of being “saved”.
CALLING yourself “saved” does NOT allow you the ACTIONS of a LIAR, THIEF, and MURDERER.
Jesus will tell this scumbag Bush “I NEVER knew you. Depart to HELL”.
Thank you God and Jesus…
May 26th, 2007 at 3:30 pmFighting w/ trolls is exhausting. Gotta go for the time being.
Comment by the republic of stupidity — May 26, 2007 @ 3:25 pm
It definitely is tiring to repeat basis logical arguments over and over for these half-wits who don’t care about the future of the planet beyond their own appointments with the grave. If it’s 200 or 2 million years down the road, they think it is something to be mocked. It’s mind-numbing.
See ya later! Thanks for the humor :)
May 26th, 2007 at 3:32 pmYes, it is changing - but at a very SLOW rate. You know - million and billions of years. We’re making it change faster than evolution adapts, therefore ensuring that the damage will not be natural, but unnatural in ways that upset the eco-system.
Comment by unbelievable — May 26, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
20,000 years ago ice covered the northern hemisphere, that’s not millions and billions. So where do the “consensus of scientists” start their timeline? Maybe wherever it’s convenient to fit The Goreacles truth? The end if the last mini-ice age? The invention of refrigeration?
May 26th, 2007 at 3:33 pmRemember at one time the “consensus” of scientific thought had the earth being flat. Maybe it still is in some people’s world.
Saywho
As you Republicans run around like headless chickens with the fall you guys engineered, we liberals will have made plans and survive.
You guys will go hide out in your basements, armed to the teeth and eating canned goods, while we will be out looking for sustainable means of surviving the cold, complete with finding ways to adapt to the new world.
You will come out a few weeks later and likely get scalped, because those of us who don’t hide in basements from the bad things in this world, will kind of remember who it was that strove their utmost to prevent any real progress being made.
Heck, we might even have new courts for crimes against humanity like recklessly endangering the survival of the entire frigging species.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:37 pmAnd it doesn’t go unappreciated, either :)
Comment by unbelievable
Perhaps you need to teach closer to a major metropolitan area. If a science teacher dared to mention intelligent design in the greater Chicagoland public schools they’d be out of a job, pronto.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:38 pm20,000 years ago ice covered the northern hemisphere, that’s not millions and billions.
Oh jesus… The span of the planet and its process is billions of years old. The ice didn’t just show up. It took millions of years of processes for it to accumulate, because the geography was naturally prepared in advance.
So where do the “consensus of scientists†start their timeline? Maybe wherever it’s convenient to fit
How about with facts? Scientists extract a 750,000 year old core of ice. That’s more than your selection of 200,000.
The Goreacles truth? The end if the last mini-ice age? The invention of refrigeration?
Is that an attempt at humor?
Remember at one time the “consensus†of scientific thought had the earth being flat. Maybe it still is in some people’s world.
Comment by beefeater — May 26, 2007 @ 3:33 pm
Not it wasn’t. We’ve known since the beginning of Science in the days of the Egyptians that the Earth was not flat. It was never a Scientific consensus. It was a religious ignorance forced upon humanity in the Dark Ages.
I’m reading Cosmos by Carl Sagan right now. I highly recommend it. Chapter 3 gives a wonderfully human and detailed account of the history of astrophyics.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:43 pmYou will come out a few weeks later and likely get scalped, because those of us who don’t hide in basements from the bad things in this world, will kind of remember who it was that strove their utmost to prevent any real progress being made.
Comment by Bruce Gorton — May 26, 2007 @ 3:37 pm
I was thinking they would de-evolve down there into some sort of fitting physiology to match their mental state - something blind, cold-blooded, and fetid :D
May 26th, 2007 at 3:46 pm#56 - unbelievable,
May 26th, 2007 at 3:47 pmI always thought that coral, being an animal, consumed oxygen and bonded it to calcium and carbon (CaCO3 = Calcium Carbonate) to form its support structure. Alga, moss and yeast were supposed to be be the primary oxygen providers when I went to school.
Well since you have ALL The(SIC) ANSWERS the real scientists should just pack up and go home. Duh. I think the point is nobody has all the answers but limiting emissions is something that we can’t afford not to do. It’s really enlightened though to throw your hands up in the air and cry we’re f*cked(SIC) were f*cked(SIC) we’re all going to die. Accomplishes a lot but keeps YOUR stock prices high for the time being. Well as long as you’re happy we’ll all just sacrifice our children’s future.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 3:13 pm
This is the same post going over and over with you. If our best thinking got us to this point Shane (humans caused global warming) then I’m sure your carbon tax will solve it!
All of the scientists agree we have a massive problem regardless of the cause. The only thing they suggest is that if we cut emissions than we may possibly be able to change the weather more.
We can’t fix this! To cut emissions is to cull the population PERIOD. Since most of us will not willingly be depolymerized the last resort is war! We nuked Japan so it will be clear as to the path humanity will take at the end!
Your children have no future as long as you and I are alive so what are you going to do Shane the pain? Sure we are going to try everything but you know in your heart that we crossed the Rubicon long ago. Frankly, I don’t want to live near people like you Shane since your optimism is simply a facade to hide your denial.
At this point our only chance as a species is to cull by war and hope that all the ICBMs stay in their silos, holes and subs. Shane what are you going to tell your kids to do in the future with all of the nuclear waste and poison of today? OUR BEST THINKING GOT US HERE TO THE BRINK. The cull is already here.
Look at the USA Shane. Open your eyes and look. We trade top soil for oil and are about to enter a depression. We have resorted to taking resources. Taking them! Does this resemble anything other than desperation by the US?
There is no future for all 6.8 Billion of us. When the time comes you will do what you have to in order to survive or perish. This is Darwinism!
PAX
May 26th, 2007 at 3:48 pmI was thinking they would de-evolve down there into some sort of fitting physiology to match their mental state - something blind, cold-blooded, and fetid :D
Comment by unbelievable
Troll turning into slugs. Not that big of a change.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:50 pmGo do the research. The costs for these energies is dropping as they become more available. And, you people seem to be missing that once the price of gas triples, it will be equal…
Comment by unbelievable — May 26, 2007 @ 3:27 pm
Unbelievable, what is MONEY??
May 26th, 2007 at 3:51 pmPerhaps you need to teach closer to a major metropolitan area.
Oddly, my school is about half way in between liberal Atlanta and ultra-liberal Athens (about 40 miles from each city).
Eventually, I’m going to get my Masters Degree in a different subject and teach college. For now, I like educating the children of conservatives on truth. I figure it’s what upsets Jason so much. He knows that my respectful, knowledge is power, think for yourself approach is creating future liberals :D
If a science teacher dared to mention intelligent design in the greater Chicagoland public schools they’d be out of a job, pronto.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 3:38 pm
Glad that hear that. It makes me feel better about fighting them on their own soil :D
There were about 40 references to the Christian god in last night’s public graduation ceremony.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:51 pmBruce Gorton,
Yes, a biologist would be interested in the effects of large amounts of fresh water on salt water populations of fish, but he would have no clue on measuring the rate of ice melting across an entire island such as Greenland, nor does he have any clue about climatology. Trotting out a biologist as a fact witness for climatology is a bit disingenuous, isn’t it?
And the fact that nobody has touched yet:
100 billion metric tons of ice melting on Greenland, per year, has only caused 0.3mm sea level rise, per year, which means it would take 20,000 years for the sea level to rise 20 feet.
Come on, let’s see if I can get a single honest liberal here to acknowledge this incredibly simple, and very inconvenient, truth.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:56 pmI always thought that coral, being an animal, consumed oxygen and bonded it to calcium and carbon (CaCO3 = Calcium Carbonate) to form its support structure.
Comment by WaltTheMan — May 26, 2007 @ 3:47 pm
“Aside from feeding on plankton, many corals form a symbiotic relationship with a class of algae, zooxanthellae, of the genus Symbiodinium. Typically a polyp will harbour one particular species of algae. Via photosynthesis, these provide energy for the coral, and aid in calcification.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coral
May 26th, 2007 at 3:57 pmYour children have no future as long as you and I are alive so what are you going to do Shane the pain?
OUR BEST THINKING GOT US HERE TO THE BRINK. The cull is already here.
Comment by Saywho
Haven’t beren called Shane the pain since I was in 5th grade, thanks. The difference between you and scientists is scientists now they don’t have all the answers. Man survived thousands of years before the industrial age but you think altering the course of civilization in any way implies certain doom.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:59 pmYour sense of panic seems to suggest obsessive compulsive disorder accompanied by clinical depression. I’d see about getting medicated.
Troll turning into slugs. Not that big of a change.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 3:50 pm
LOL
I think Saywho is Rachel. Same paranoid doomsday approach to facts, and she changes positions of issues from liberal to conservative depending on mood.
May 26th, 2007 at 3:59 pmAnd the fact that nobody has touched yet:
100 billion metric tons of ice melting on Greenland, per year, has only caused 0.3mm sea level rise, per year, which means it would take 20,000 years for the sea level to rise 20 feet.
Actually, I did. If your numbers are correct, why does it matter if the destruction is now or in the future? We shouldn’t dismiss it justbecause it’s not imminent.
“Come on, let’s see if I can get a single honest liberal here to acknowledge this incredibly simple, and very inconvenient, truth.
Comment by DreamCrusher — May 26, 2007 @ 3:56 pm”
You did. You ignored my comment. Don’t blame us.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:03 pmComment by DreamCrusher
James Hansen, the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute Of Space Studies and the top U.S. climate scientist, has issued a new warning about the threat of a catastrophic rise in sea levels. He warns further that many scientists aware of such a rise are reluctant to discuss it out of fears of appearing “alarmist.â€
From Hansen’s new paper in the journal Environmental Research:
DreamCrusher, did you even read the top of this thread or did you skip right to the video and then start your denial.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:05 pmI think Saywho is Rachel. Same paranoid doomsday approach to facts, and she changes positions of issues from liberal to conservative depending on mood.
Comment by unbelievable
I never really read much Rachel, she was taking her leave just about the time I started reading here. And I tend to buzz through really long posts, no patience at all.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:08 pmHeck, we might even have new courts for crimes against humanity like recklessly endangering the survival of the entire frigging species.
Comment by Bruce Gorton — May 26, 2007 @ 3:37 pm
Heck, you might just be dead too? I don’t have a basement so what other idiotic assumptions are you going to make today?
May 26th, 2007 at 4:09 pmThe alga which form a symbotic relationship with the coral, supply the O2 that makes the CaCO3. We could argue that the fact that, since the alga may be able to slip an occasional molecule past the coral, that coral reefs are a major source of O2, but the root source is the algae.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:11 pmI never really read much Rachel, she was taking her leave just about the time I started reading here.
You mean you missed all the fun ; )
She’s been calm lately compared to then, but the aggitation today suggests you might get to see an episode first hand… Ugh!
And I tend to buzz through really long posts, no patience at all.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 4:08 pm
I don’t mind long if informative or interesting - but arduous troll posts - I agree, I just scroll past them too. Not worth the energy.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:16 pm“Comment by WaltTheMan — May 26, 2007 @ 4:11 pm”
Read the whole article. Coral reefs are more than just the polyps…
May 26th, 2007 at 4:17 pmYes, a biologist would be interested in the effects of large amounts of fresh water on salt water populations of fish, but he would have no clue on measuring the rate of ice melting across an entire island such as Greenland, nor does he have any clue about climatology.
What makes you say that? If it is central to his research there is a pretty strong certainty that he would know, as measuring the rate the ice is melting at would be a very important part of his work. If it wasn’t in his field of expertise, or if he felt unsure of his own ability to handle the question, he would ask a colleague to help him get the right answer. These guys don’t work alone, they work in teams.
100 billion metric tons of ice melting on Greenland, per year, has only caused 0.3mm sea level rise, per year, which means it would take 20,000 years for the sea level to rise 20 feet.
Except it is accelerating. It is currently 100 billion metric tons a year, what happens with it is 1000 billion?
May 26th, 2007 at 4:25 pmGee beefeater, we just thought your “handle†implied that you were proud of having your head perpetually up your own ass.
Comment by shane
Had to go out for a bit, Shane. Thank you for B*#ch-slapping this fool around while I was gone. Why do these trolls deliberately choose such provocative names (MAF54, BottomBoy, Beefeater) and then complain when they provoke the response they clearly want? Just… amazing…
May 26th, 2007 at 4:28 pmHeck, you might just be dead too? I don’t have a basement so what other idiotic assumptions are you going to make today?
Comment by Saywho — May 26, 2007 @ 4:09 pm
With your talk of “Oh we are all doomed” I am kind of surprised.
I won’t die in it. Reason? I live far enough inland to avoid the worst of the weather going nuts, I have a knack for not getting killed by other people, my basic nature is such that I don’t panic, and I am willing to adapt to changing circumstances.
Also, I don’t believe myself or anybody else to be doomed. I feel that action can be taken to both prevent the worst case scenario with global warming, and survive should the worst case come to pass.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:35 pm#81 - unbelievable,
I read the article. If you read my comment, you could see that.
I have subsribed to Scientific American since 1953. Somewhere in that 18 foot combined height pile (Actually four and a half piles.) in my garage is an article about the chemistry of the coral reef. I can’t motivate myself to sort through about 650 magazines to prove my point. I cede.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:38 pmHaven’t beren(SIC) called Shane the pain since I was in 5th grade, thanks. The difference between you and scientists is scientists now(SIC) they don’t have all the answers. Man survived thousands of years before the industrial age but you think altering the course of civilization in any way implies certain doom.
Your sense of panic seems to suggest obsessive compulsive disorder accompanied by clinical depression. I’d see about getting medicated.
Comment by shane — May 26, 2007 @ 3:59 pm
Go on and work it all out Shane. In your heart you know that we will all perish at some point? How many people died on 9-11? How many died in WW2? How many T-Rex survived Shane?
Again our best thinking bought us the atomic bomb. Our best thinking allowed everyone to shut out Jimmy Carter for bigger cars under Regan. Our best thinking allowed a million gallons of liquid nuclear waste to make it into Washington Stat’s drinking water made during WW2. Our best thinking got people like you to consider taking anti depressants and now those compounds have made it to the water. Your best thinking leads you to insults when faced with your mortality. Your best thinking scientists want to cast nuclear waste in glass and throw it in the ocean. You’re best thinking scientists made GM corn that apparently is killing all of the honey bees.
What was your point Shane on the membrane? You said, “But you think altering the course of civilization in any way implies certain doom.” I never made that claim at all. Here you are inventing a debate I never made. The point I did make is that “WE” can’t “FIX” this at all since our best thinking sealed our fate. Since I am a complete and happy man I am not subject to panic. I don’t know how long we have and I’m not going to bother wondering since there is nothing that we can do about it.
I merely brought up the observation that your understanding of resources is majorly lacking and over time I trust you will achieve a greater understanding of exactly why you are not going to beat this?
Best approximation of our situation…
http://dieoff.org/Olduvai.gif
PAX
May 26th, 2007 at 4:44 pmSaywho
Hello david. Our best thinking also figured out that that was all wrong. Got another one?
May 26th, 2007 at 4:49 pmunbelievable,
Actually, I did. If your numbers are correct, why does it matter if the destruction is now or in the future? We shouldn’t dismiss it justbecause it’s not imminent.
1. No you didn’t, unless you did so under another name.
2. It matters because it is being presented under the guise of a “crisis” of the present.
3. We shouldn’t dismiss it because it’s not imminent? That what you said about the threat from Iraq too? LOL!
You did. You ignored my comment. Don’t blame us.
I’m pretty sure you didn’t, and I just checked again, so unless you’re posting under different names….
Bruce,
Yes, you’re quite right, the biologist probably checked with his colleague, like, say, James Hansen… ;) But that gets back to what I was saying, he’s relying on others for that knowledge, not his own expertise. So then if Hansen is being less than honest, like Gore and his 20 feet, then he’s not very reliable, now is he?
Except it is accelerating. It is currently 100 billion metric tons a year, what happens with it is 1000 billion?
Well, it’s not 1000 billion, and no research points to it being that or becoming that, so why are we even talking about it other than you trying to validate alarmist propaganda?
Look, even the IPCC did not include any of this nonsense, because that’s what it is, nonsense.
I have a personal interest in the global sea level, as it will direly affect some property I will be inheriting at some point in the future, but you know what? This is BS from one end to the other, and I know that most of those here who are smart know that but don’t want to admit it because Al Gore said so.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:50 pm“but you know what? This is BS from one end to the other…”
Comment by DreamCrusher
At lst, your one true area of expertise, revealed.
May 26th, 2007 at 4:57 pmThis article describes the califacation of the process:
May 26th, 2007 at 4:59 pmhttp://www.globalcoral.org/corals_and_coral_reefs.htm
DreamCrusher
1st: If he is studying it is central to his research he should be an authority on it. If you are going to study effect, establishing cause is fairly important. That he should be able to answer the question does not point to him being dishonest, it just points to him knowing his subject.
2nd: All you are interested in is avoiding the facts and changing your behaviour. The fact is that there will come a point of no return, in which due to the amount of methane being released by melting ice will start fueling global warming even if humans stop producing as much CO2 as we do currently.
We have heard you guys repeatedly offer the same mantra, and frankly we aren’t listening anymore. You are inheriting coastal property? Good for you, lets see it when the next few hurricanes hit.
May 26th, 2007 at 5:02 pmBless Pelosi’s heart, but she has no idea what to do to stop glaciers from melting, so she gets a paid vacation by taxpayers to Greenland for nada.
May 26th, 2007 at 5:09 pmBruce,
1. Should? Yes, for all scientists always do what they should do. All scientists should tell the truth, but uh, I have a secret: a respected Norwegian scientist falsified an entire study, so did a South Korean one. So tell me some more about should. Oh and the fact that he brought up “virtually 20 feet” shows that he’s on the Al Gore Boat of Cherry-Picked Single Source Science, instead of you know, reality.
2. Avoiding the facts? Actually, I presented the facts here, that this ice melting was only causing 0.3mm sea level rise - a fact Think Progress and everyone else here left out completely. This fact, inconvenient to the message being promoted here, means that it would take 1000 years for the sea level to rise a single foot. Let’s also keep in mind that there are not unlimited amounts of ice on Greenland, either. Even at your hypothetical (aka not scientifically corroborated) 10x rate, it would be 2000 years for it to rise 20 feet, and a century to rise one foot. That’s of course assuming a great deal, relying on a single variable, which is of course madly insane.
So excuse me for laughing when you claim I am avoiding facts. I have presented more facts here than anyone, the only problem is, they are all inconvenient to the gospel being presented here.
Fact: The IPCC does not stand behind the 20 foot sea level rise scenario - at all.
Fact: Greenland is covered by 630,000 cubic miles of ice.
Fact: 630,000 cubic feet of ice melted would raise sea level 23 feet.
Fact: Greenland losing 80 cubic miles of ice per year.
Fact: It would take 7875 years for all this ice to melt if this rate were sustained.
Source
So, according to one set of scientists, 20,000 years. According to another, around 8,000 years. In either case: whoop-dee-freaking-doo.
We have heard you guys repeatedly offer the same mantra, and frankly we aren’t listening anymore.
I know, you only listen to Al Gore, even though he’s full of it, as I just again so easily showed.
You are inheriting coastal property? Good for you, lets see it when the next few hurricanes hit.
Well, there are no hurricanes there, so I doubt that, I’m afraid. Of course, you’re probably a True Believer and think that hurricanes increase due to global warming, because Al Gore said so.
Even though, you know, the scientists do not agree on that at all.
May 26th, 2007 at 5:23 pm> Fact: It would take 7875 years for all this ice to melt if this rate were sustained.
The human brain likes to work with linear extrapolation. This is like saying that a bullet in a gun will never move more than 1 m/s because that’s its speed after about 1 ms or so.
> Look, even the IPCC did not include any of this nonsense, because that’s what it is, nonsense.
Negative, baby.
From “New Scientist”:
Yet last week’s summary report virtually ignored most of the Exeter findings. One concern is that the huge ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica could be close to disintegration. This would cause rises in sea levels that would be measured in metres, but the report restricts itself to noting that sea levels are rising by 3.1 centimetres a decade - still almost twice the rate of the early 1990s. Current climate models assume that the ice sheets will melt only slowly, as heat works its way down through ice more than 2 kilometres thick. But many glaciologists no longer believe this is what will happen.
In reality, they say, ice sheets fracture as they melt, so water can penetrate to the bottom of the ice within seconds, warming its full depth and lubricating the frozen join between ice and the bedrock. Physical break-up of the ice sheets will happen long before thermal melting, they say.
Richard Alley, a US glaciologist who has published widely on the dangers, says climatologists have yet to be convinced that they need to rewrite their models, even though the rate of ice loss in Greenland has unexpectedly doubled in the past decade. The report does note that permanent Arctic sea ice is contracting by 7 per cent every decade.
“Our chapter of the report will say that Greenland is doing things that could make it disintegrate much faster than people think,” Alley says. “But we don’t have a strong basis yet for projecting exactly what the ice sheets will do,” So, he says, the summary excluded the new thinking.
Last week another IPCC author, Stefan Rahmstorf of Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, published a paper showing that world sea levels are rising 50 per cent faster today than predicted in the last IPCC report in 2001 (Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.1136843). Co-author Jim Hansen of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies believes this is the first sign of a dramatic acceleration of sea level rise likely in the coming decades, as ice sheets start to disintegrate.
Both acknowledge in the paper that there may not yet be enough data to extrapolate a trend, but the IPCC last week reduced its estimate of worst-case sea level rise in the coming century from 88 to 59 centimetres. Real-world evidence was specifically excluded, the IPCC said, because it is not yet included in the models.
“Real-world evidence was specifically excluded because it is not yet included in the models”
Researchers outside the IPCC process have been outspoken in condemning this approach. Bob Corell, a leading US meteorologist and chairman of the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment, warned before the report’s publication that any prediction of sea level rise of less than 1 metre would “not be a fair reflection of what we know”.
The IPCC team also sidelined findings from the British Antarctic Survey. BAS researchers say that the Antarctic Peninsula is warming faster than almost anywhere on the planet. They have documented a sharp decline in sea ice around the peninsula, and warn that the giant West Antarctic ice sheet is “unstable and contributing significantly to sea level rise”.
In contrast, the IPCC summary claims there are “no statistically significant average trends [in sea ice],” and that this is “consistent with a lack of warming, reflected in atmospheric temperatures averaged across the region”. It asserts that overall “the Antarctic ice sheet… is expected to gain in mass due to increased snowfall”.
Of course, I do believe that we will know one way or another…
May 26th, 2007 at 5:42 pmAs usual the deniers are missing the big picture. The melting of antartica is complementing the melting of Greenland and the rate is exponential increase. Didn’t you pay attention? 10 years ago the loss was nil. Now it’s 100 Billion tons and as those ice rivers tunnel all the way down, there are larger collapses of the ice structure that will make the rate jump in leaps and bounds.
–
The current estimate is 155 GT ice loss per year, less 54 GT accumulation, for a net loss of 101 GT/year. (Luthcke et al 2006). (GT stands for gigaton—a gigaton is 1,000,000,000 metric tons, or 1,000,000,000,000 kilograms.) This shift to a net melt is of course at just the beginning and the rate can be expected to increase as the planet warms.
http://co2.cms.udel.edu/SeaLevel_DE.htm
–
And there will be huge trouble before 20 feet, here’s 3 feet:
–
“A one-meter [three-foot] sea level rise would submerge a substantial amount of Bangladesh,” Jonathan Gregory, the study’s lead author and a climate scientist at the University of Reading in England, said in a telephone interview.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/ news/ 2004/ 04/ 0408_040408_greenlandicemelt.html
–
and don’t forget there will be all the ice sliding off before the major melting:
–
Since this sheet is unstable and could slide much more quickly than melting, sometimes only the unstable portion of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet is discussed. Considering only the portion that might slide off before melting, that part would raise global sea level by 4 to 6 meters (O’Neill and Oppenheimer 2002).
–
And again, we’re not at a static point in our climate with green house gases, we’re at a RAPIDLY ACCELERATING DYNAMIC:
–
May 26th, 2007 at 5:42 pmBy this time, at the end of this century, assuming continued large CO2 emissions and assuming the time lines in Figure 5 are correct, we will be committed to melting Greenland and possibly the West Antarctic ice sheet.
—
http://co2.cms.udel.edu/SeaLevel_DE.htm
This document is based on peer-reviewed literature but attempts to be readable by the general public. It is scientifically grounded, provides references, and has been reviewed by colleagues. It is intended to review and provide perspective on existing science, not advance science, and is not expected to be submitted for publication in the scientific literature. Copyright © 2007, University of Delaware. Permission granted for use and redistribution of this information as long as the original source is cited. This document, and some of the separate images are available at http://CO2.cms.udel.edu.
Dreamcrusher your handling of theoretical statistics is based on a naeive static model and ends up being pedestrian cherry-picking. To get educated investigate actualy peer-reviewed scientific literature through libraries and on the net you can look more at noaa.gov and http://www.ipcc.ch/ The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate change–look at the media releases because that is most understandable to the non-scientist. Same goes for climate news at noaa.gov follow the links. Best of luck.
May 26th, 2007 at 5:45 pmI won’t die in it. Reason? I live far enough inland to avoid the worst of the weather going nuts, I have a knack for not getting killed by other people, my basic nature is such that I don’t panic, and I am willing to adapt to changing circumstances.
Also, I don’t believe myself or anybody else to be doomed. I feel that action can be taken to both prevent the worst case scenario with global warming, and survive should the worst case come to pass.
Comment by Bruce Gorton — May 26, 2007 @ 4:35 pm
This sort of post you made is nothing but wishful thinking and only serves to change the subject. I will try to keep this brief but something inside compels me to go down each and every path you suggested in your reply.
You suggested that, “I won’t die in it.” You assume that I know what “IT†you’re talking about. Are you talking about a cull, or famine or war? You will in fact die Bruce and “IT†does not even matter. You don’t know when that moment will come but we can assume it will come just the same. You could die tonight by slipping in your shower or choking during dinner.
In reading on it appears that you feel safe from the weather. You live inland so you are less threatened by storms and waves. You didn’t mention drought leading to another dust bowl as severe weather (or did you)?
You claim that, “I have a knack for not getting killed by other people, my basic nature is such that I don’t panic, and I am willing to adapt to changing circumstances.” Bruce, that is all well and good yet until the knife is twisted in your ribs the first time all you have is optimism. People will kill for food or water or land or no reason at all. I hope for your sake that you have gun?
Panic is fear and if you are alive, panic will help you to run away and do something Darwinian called “Flight.” Flight is necessary from time to time but since you don’t panic you simply will not survive. Your claim paints you as the immobile deer staring at the headlights of a truck watching the end come.
Adaptation is good but if there is no food or water your adaptive abilities will be useless. Should the temperatures go to extremes adaptation will not replace a Carrier Air Conditioner nor will it help if it should get even warmer. You may be displaced in the future in some work camp. Will you even want to adapt at that point? You cannot “choose†to adapt Bruce. You adapt or you don’t but you cannot choose to. You must be talking about acceptance!
I will stop there. Bring something to a knife fight other than your D**K Bruce. We are running out of energy and between that and global warming the urgent problem is the 85M barrels of oil. No oil = no food…
Even if we could make free energy today that would not FIX global weather. I don’t know if we are doomed from the weather since I don’t see how we are going to get around the fossil fuel today. We are using all of the alternatives and putting more and more resources into development of alternatives. The bottom line is that global warming is the same thing as peak oil.
Oil is nothing more than liquid sunlight and we pissed all of the high quality easy to get oil away. If that caused global warming there is no way to put all of that carbon back. It can’t be done by us, it will not be done by us since we used all of the energy to do that already. Then someone will say, “Plant trees!” Great idea, don’t they grow better with soil and water?
How about all of that nuclear waste Bruce? Should we just cast it into glass and drop it into the ocean?
The party is OVER
May 26th, 2007 at 5:45 pm#96 - jigsaw,
May 26th, 2007 at 5:57 pmI live but 900 feet from the Atlantic Ocean and in the past ten years, I have noticed an intrusion of tidal flats. I can actually harvest clams on my back 40. Wasn’t even moist ten years ago.
WaltTheMan, that’s a very interesting example, I wonder what personal counterexample someone might come up with to explain how the Atlantic is actually retreating, heh. At least you get a good clambake out of the climate change deal! Having any for Memorial day weekend?
May 26th, 2007 at 6:02 pmI suggest that the “scientific reticence†that Mr. Hansen suspects is really the conflict of his peers that don’t want to be disagreeable towards him, but also don’t want to appear to be supporting his brand of quack science.
May 26th, 2007 at 6:06 pm> The party is OVER
Naaah, it’s just getting fracking more difficult. Getting off plastics, SUVs, beef, McMansions, air travel, highways, clean water, maybe getting off antibiotics, state-provided education, state-provided security etc… will not stop me from PARTYING!! As long as TELECOM STAYS UP.
For relief, let’s have an interview with Bruce Sterling about his SciFi Novel, “Heavy Weather” (must have been 10 years ago or so)
http://www.sflit.com/novaexpress/13/bsi-1.html
I think it’s too late. We should have done something back in 1963, you know? We should have paid attention when there were people picketing on Earth Day in 1970. We blew it. We had a chance, and it’s too late now-whatever’s gonna happen, is gonna happen. I think it’d be a good idea to start phasing back our carbon right now. I think there probably ought to be massive carbon dioxide taxes, we oughta to start worrying seriously about sh*t like methane and so forth. But I don’t think the government-any government, anywhere, has the power to actually enforce that. I don’t understand how the hell you’re gonna get a CO2 tax-and even if you do that, people are just gonna move offshore, they’re gonna go do it in Mexico and Brazil and wherever it is that people don’t give a f*ck about the environment, and a lot of people don’t. And we will not be the first civilization destroyed by environmental disaster either. I’ve spent some time out in New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, a while ago, looking at the old Anasazi ruins out in the Southwest. There’s a people who basically bootstrapped theirselves up from corn farmers up to the point of a pretty well advanced Neolithic civilization. They had little skyscrapers in there, and pottery and textiles and the whole nine yards. They ran out of water-they f*cking died, man. There was no appeal from this. I mean, imagine a couple of Anasazis sitting around over their pottery saying, “Well, what do you think we ought to do about the fact that there’s no rain today, Two Dogs?” “Well, Striped Blanket, I think what we ought to do is die.” There is no alternative. It’s the weather, man. You can’t do f*ck about the weather.
May 26th, 2007 at 6:09 pm#99 - jigsaw,
May 26th, 2007 at 6:27 pmActually they are infant Quahogs, only good for chowder. I prefer the steamers (pissers) at a cook out and shuck a peck or two of the Cherry Stones as an appetizer.
Naaah, it’s just getting fracking more difficult. Getting off plastics, SUVs, beef, McMansions, air travel, highways, clean water, maybe getting off antibiotics, state-provided education, state-provided security etc… will not stop me from PARTYING!! As long as TELECOM STAYS UP.
Comment by El Tonno — May 26, 2007 @ 6:09 pm
The party is OVER, implies that all of the easy to get, cheap oil is long gone. I didn’t say that PARTYING LIKE ITS 1999 was over though I’m sure those nearly 1 million Iraqis that we killed are part of the dead crowd?
Is that a CULL over there or were they all terrorists?
The party is OVER
May 26th, 2007 at 6:31 pmThe head in the sand folks that believe that God is dictating their fate take this to mean they have no responsibility on a personal level for the global climate crisis we are in. It’s ” God’s Will” and therefore why bother? It feeds their personal lack of accountability to leave it to God. If that’s the way God wants it, fine.
May 26th, 2007 at 6:33 pmDumb people will be the first to go which includes all the Bushies, people who do not belie e in Evolution and global warming naysayers. Obviously this process is ongoing and we are seeing the results of the actions mankind has taken in the industrial age. Clearly it is moving faster than the scientists previously realized as is evidenced by the currently occuring issues we see virtually across the planet. Frogs, fish, bees disappearing in mind boggling numbers to name just a few.
Those that do know that Darwin is correct and all life is interconnected and interdependant will be the survivors as they will pass on knowledge to their offspring while the people who believe people walked with dinosaurs will not. They will teach their children their fairy tales and therefore doom them to extinction. The end result will be a smarter humankind. Our time will go down in history as what NOT to do to the Earth. We will die off like the dinosaurs. The strongest and brightest will survive albeit in far smaller numbers than we have now.
Even the most strenuous action probably will not help much, the situation is more than imminent, it is already occuring. Rising sea levels are displacing people this very moment in Indonesia and other areas. 20 meteres a YEAR at the current rate. It will take catastrophe to wake people up and the catastrophe will greatly cull humans and begin Mother Nature’s healing from the damage we have done. Some life forms will die, some will proliferate. A new balance will be struck. In a battle for the Earth, mankind loses to Mother Nature. It’s not nice to fool with Mother Nature and she will win every time.
> Is that a CULL
The polite term is either “collateral” or “under the rug”
May 26th, 2007 at 6:35 pmActually they are infant Quahogs, only good for chowder. I prefer the steamers (pissers) at a cook out and shuck a peck or two of the Cherry Stones as an appetizer.
Comment by WaltTheMan — May 26, 2007 @ 6:27 pm
Seafood is poisoned with mercury and many other toxins. Filter feeders and scavengers pack the highest levels but don’t worry we will fix this minor issue too, along with the global weather change. Don’t forget that our best thinking has had us dump chemical wastes directly into the oceans. There are several million barrels of military chemical weapons down there too. Don’t forget that a few broken arrows are in the Atlantic off of North Carolina and that was our best thinking at work as well.
May 26th, 2007 at 6:40 pmjigsaw, et al:
The scientists measured 100 billion tons melting between 2003-2005, which was less than they had previously thought. During this time, the sea level rose 0.3mm per year. 0.3mm.
So to make Al Gore, James Hansen, and the wildlife biologist’s scenario of an impending 20 foot rise true, you’re telling me that I need to stop thinking linearly, and just assume out of the blue that this will grow exponentially - even though it hasn’t the last 30 years.
What you’re essentially asking me to do is believe in the Al Gore Gospel, without any scientific reason at all, other than “it could happen”, which eh… isn’t scientific.
Meanwhile, the IPCC, supposedly the commanding authority on sea level, adjusted DOWN their maximum estimate on sea level rise from around 90cm to around 60cm within the century. That is based on the science they currently have.
So, pardon me if I don’t feel inclined to believe the Al Gore Gospel, but I’m not a religious man, I don’t believe in God, and I don’t believe in Al Gore if he does not present evidence to back up what he says.
Alright? Again, I have a personal stake in the global sea level, and I do not believe this for one second because it is preposterous and coming from men who are living on scaring the crap out of people for political reasons.
May 26th, 2007 at 6:42 pmDreamCrusher et al.
You people are all hang up on “Al Gore” like he was your personal anti-jesus or something. That’s senseless.
Meanwhile, the IPCC, supposedly the commanding authority on sea level, adjusted DOWN their maximum estimate on sea level rise from around 90cm to around 60cm within the century. That is based on the science they currently have.
1) They aren’t
2) They didn’t
3) It isnt’t
Once again: Both acknowledge in the paper that there may not yet be enough data to extrapolate a trend, but the IPCC last week reduced its estimate of worst-case sea level rise in the coming century from 88 to 59 centimetres. Real-world evidence was specifically excluded, the IPCC said, because it is not yet included in the models.
Real-world evidence was specifically excluded
YAWN!
May 26th, 2007 at 6:53 pmhey dreamcatcher
sounds like you got your eye on your parents’ beach front property.
May 26th, 2007 at 7:22 pmGo earn your own way and stop waiting on someone to give you something. Your beach front property will be underwater.
I have seen the 20 metere rise in the ocean in Indonesia with my own eyes, it is real and it is happening right now. The ocean has taken homes, schools whole towns. Waves are bigger, twice as big as a decade ago. You are falling for a statistic there is no way you can quantify. You are fooling yourself. Any fool can see we have already displaced huge tracts of sand by altering shorelines all over the US. You seem to know little about the realities of our coastlines TODAY much less years from now when you apprently hope to score property someone else worked for.
El Tonno,
Al Gore isn’t my anti-jesus, but he is the Think Progress crowd’s Holy Saint. Don’t inversely project their idolatry onto me.
And they did adjust down their max estimate for sea level rise, it says so right in the quote you put up, genius.
Real-world evidence was specifically excluded
In other words, their whole figure is based on models, as is much of the other stuff in their report. None of it is based on anything real. Yeay. The NASA findings were published last year. Why didn’t the IPCC include them?
You want to know why? Because they wanted to leave the door open for Al Gore and his Alarmist Club.
But hey, don’t believe me. Let’s chat in 40 years and see who’s right.
May 26th, 2007 at 7:37 pmWhat color is the sky in your world?
Blue today. A cople days ago it was grey,and last night it was black. I’m guesing yours is raining in fire… constantly.
It doesn’t surprise me that you are amazed by your students intelligence - I always suspected you were a fraud.
I’m never amazed by their intelligence. I’m amazed at how the school system and church oppress their intelligence.
I am amazed at your ignorance, however.
[…]
Comment by unbelievable — May 26, 2007 @ 3:17 pm
! … CLASSIC unbelievable… i truly enjoy reading these kinds of posts…
May 26th, 2007 at 7:48 pmfun and entertaining and enlightening… crack me up… :-)
…
Face it- Armageddon (or ANOTHER of the Earth’s myriad of cycles) is getting started - - and there’s NOTHING you can do to stop it. BTW, you may have noticed sea fossils found on the plains and in the deserts. Hmmmm….. However did that happen??
May 26th, 2007 at 7:53 pmDreamCrusher, you’re not getting it, the IPCC report is the most CONSERVATIVE CONSENSUS that is a mere theoretical baseline! That’s what happens when you try to get so many countries to agree, you get a watered down statement, but at least it’s a huge compendium of qualified research. It’s point is that it confirms the need for action on climate change EVEN THOUGH it UNDERESTIMATES the rate of change based on real-world observations that are ACCELERATING. That’s where these special updates by NASA and so forth become so important. And guess what, Al Gore doesnt run any of these organizations, so quit with your straw-man fallacies.
And again, in case you missed it, here’s what ignoring “real-world evidence” means as far as the ipcc report goes, THE REALITY OF CLIMATE-CHANGE WILL BE GREATER THAN THAT PREDICTED BY THE IPCC REPORT:
–
“They “don’t take into account the gorillas _ Greenland and Antarctica,” said Ohio State University earth sciences professor Lonnie Thompson, a polar ice specialist. “I think there are unpleasant surprises as we move into the 21st century.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ wp-dyn/ content/ article/ 2007/ 01/ 28/ AR2007012800478_pf.html
–
May 26th, 2007 at 7:57 pm“CLASSIC unbelievable… i truly enjoy reading these kinds of posts…
fun and entertaining and enlightening… crack me up… :-)”
Comment by katy
Katy - Thank you for confiming you, Lora and unbelievable are the most witless posters here at TP….Unbelievable hasn’t said anything funny since she and Zooey clawed and hissed at one another in “Rosie-esque” fashion…..
May 26th, 2007 at 8:37 pm