 Poster: A snowHead
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Folks, science is not exact nor is it all knowing.
The answer to any question must always be that "We don't know for sure, but our best estimation is........"
None of this is new. No one knows who is right or wrong, but it is foolish to fully commit to any one view while discounting all others.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I read the IPCC AR4 WG1 summary for policymakers, and lots of bits of the technical summary and FAQs, and a few bits of some of the chapters when they came out earlier this year. I've read enough to think that the case for significant anthropologic climate change is not yet proven and that populist views are currently largely hyperbole. Imho this is due to a self-promoting and self-perpetuating system consisting of media doom-mongers and professional scientific climatologists whose relevance and livelihood depend on ensuring that this be made an issue. Of course it may be one, but I think currently it's sensible to be sensible but not to be dramatic in changes we make to our lives.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| Quote: |
I think currently it's sensible to be sensible
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Don't you think that is just a wee bit too controversial. 
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T Bar, you know I avoid controversy 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| laundryman wrote: |
| Kenzie wrote: |
| I'm sure if I was selective enough I could find the work of over 500 scientists to enable me to argue that they are doubtful on many theories (ie some agree, some disagree). |
Try "relativity" or "quantum mechanics" or "thermodynamics", etc, etc. The point about these theories is that (while no theory can ever be said to have provided the final word) they can be used to make accurate predictions, which climate science, as yet, cannot. Therefore, therories in that field cannot be said to be "settled" to anything like the degree of others in different fields of natural science. |
Model validation exercises are available, ie:
http://grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg2/623.htm
It's obviously a tricky thing to validate a predictive model that is predicting things 20-100 years into the future. Scientific rigor would dictate we wait for the real data, but I'm not so sure ...
It's also worth pointing out that the greatly increasing computational power (that's my job!) and better data should greatly improve model results, but as you say, we'll have to wait for the validation...
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gortonator, my point is that if a model has succesfully predicted changes over a decade, I'm prepared to give it a lot of credence for the next decade or longer (or until events prove it to have been inaccurate). I don't think any model has demonstrated this so far (but I'm willing to be proved wrong). It could be that that a model invented recently may be accurate, but we'd need to give it a decade or so before we could say so confidently.
I don't think more number crunching ability is likely to be the answer; better understanding of the underlying physical, chemical and biological processes is likely to be much more useful, IMO (and make the modelling easier!).
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laundryman, agreed, but look at the model validation results that have been published. Google is your friend here - some seem at least 'reasonable' (words used by IPCC) and vaguely convincing in at least spotting trends over more than a decade.
Bigger computers make it possible to execute models faster and based on smaller resolutions (10 sq metres is the aim, I believe for our regional models). Of course improved models are important too - but when you make changes to your model, you have to validate again. it's a slow and very time-consuming process, especially when models takes weeks to run.
Should you need help sleeping, you can read all about it 
http://readthis.pnl.gov/MarketSource/ReadThis/B2951_not_print_quality.pdf
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Is there any scientific fact in that a major contributor to global warming is the hot air spouted in internet forums?
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Guvnor, bloody hell its hot in here!!! global warming/climate change/raining/fog is much like relegion take something unprovable and rant on about how it will kill everyone unless they do what you say and give you money..
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There's a finite amount of fossil fuel buried beneath the ground, and some day we'll use it all up. In fact, most reports suggest that oil output has already peaked.
My question is this: do the models predict a different final outcome for the earth's climate if the CO2 is released over, say, the next 100 years instead of the next 70?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Picture the scene......Resort X, 1950's, and a couple of old shepherds with an entrepreneurial spirit stand in the high meadows one summer, tending to their flocks, as has been done for many generations before them....
'Tell you what, Gunther, the old glacier is looking lovely in the sunlight today, isn't it?'
'I agree Petr, I reckon there must be a few quid in it somewhere for us.....those townies don't know what they are missing out on up here...'
Many years of development follow, diverting water courses, clearing '00s of square miles of forest, ploughing pastures, disrupting wildlife, prior to installing 000's of tons of concrete, electicity supplies, roads, transport links, hotels, restaurants, bars with flashing lights and dodgy bands playing cover songs of 80's hits, etc etc, Petr and Gunther kicking back and watching the euros roll in......
The little Heidi comes back from her expensive Swiss finishing school in tears.....
'Grandfather, Uncle Petr, we have been so foolish....all this development to create an industry for rich townies has come back to haunt us.....the glacier is shrinking, Mother Nature is being poisoned, and it is all our own fault. Why did we not think of the children? Will someone please think of the children?'
'What shall we do, Petr?' Asks Gunther
'7 day lift pass for the price of 6?' says Petr.....
'Champion...that'll do for me'
Next day, a new thread opens on  to tell all of the astonishing bargain.....and before you can say 'what a lot of absolute tosh you spout, Guvnor', Resort X is the new Margate, airlines are running 14 flights a day to a neighbouring country for a quid (plus taxes), people discuss long and hard about which colour zinc they should appy to their nose, Jellied Eels and Tayto crisps are available on draft, and chalet hosts are swapping recipes from Jamie Olivers latest novel in their Ugg boots....
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Guvnor, I actually suspect the hot air produced by the England Rugby team in the last month far exceeds anything generated from these forums. Today we will see validation of their theory that they have a talented back line, however I fear we'll only see more comedy rugby. I hope I'm wrong.
And back to topic, many of the new lifts in the Pacific Northwest are powered by wind generation. Not quite sure exactly how that works, but that's the claim ... and there's certainly some pretty massive wind farms around here.
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You know it makes sense.
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gortonator, with the greatest of respect, given our favourite Allies love of all things gas guzzling, I am not sure a few wind powered lifts will make much impact.....however, I can't disagree on the rugby comments 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| Guvnor wrote: |
| gortonator, with the greatest of respect, given our favourite Allies love of all things gas guzzling, I am not sure a few wind powered lifts will make much impact..... |
small steps, mate, small steps ...
Now off to work in my 4L V6 Nissan Xterra.
Only joking - I ride my push bike. Keep Xterra in garage for ski trips
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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| slikedges wrote: |
| Of course it may be one, but I think currently it's sensible to be sensible but not to be dramatic in changes we make to our lives. |
It's certainly easier not to make any changes, as for sensible I think not!
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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roga, it's sensible that you'll find life much less of a problem if when faced with 2 options, neither demonstrably better, you choose the easier one
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Manmade or not, things are definitely warming up:
news story
"The Arctic's Northwest Passage has opened up fully because of melting sea ice, clearing a long-sought but historically impassable route between Europe and Asia, the European Space Agency said. Sea ice has shrunk in the Arctic to its lowest level since satellite measurements began 30 years ago, ESA said, showing images of the now "fully navigable" route between the Atlantic and the Pacific "
Rising sea levels could become the big issue:
"Polar regions are very sensitive to climate change, ESA said, noting that some scientists have predicted the Arctic would be ice free as early as 2040. Almost all experts say global warming, stoked by human use of fossil fuels, is happening about twice as fast in the Arctic as elsewhere on the planet. Once exposed, dark ground or sea soak up far more heat than ice and snow."
Property values in East Anglia could be in for a bit of a downturn (Sorry FenlandSkier ) 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| AxsMan wrote: |
| Almost all experts say global warming, stoked by human use of fossil fuels, is happening about twice as fast in the Arctic as elsewhere on the planet. |
Please see the graph I put up earlier. For the last several years, the earth as a whole has not warmed at all. So if the Arctic is warming twice as fast, it is not warming either!
Certainly, the arctic ice is receding. Perhaps the Arctic is warming while other regions are cooling, or perhaps there is a time lag between temperature rises and ice melt.
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I find tamino has posted something useful for every occasion:
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2007/08/31/garbage-is-forever/#more-357
Even if you start at 1998, a particularly warm year because of an El Nino event, there is still a warming trend.
Interestingly enough, in a paper in Nature in 1972 C.S. Sawyer predicted a temperature rise of 0.6C by the end of the century (i.e. 2000) - measured rise in temperature was 0.5C. There a short article about the paper here. (This is the original paper.
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| AxsMan wrote: |
Manmade or not, things are definitely warming up:
news story
"The Arctic's Northwest Passage has opened up fully because of melting sea ice, clearing a long-sought but historically impassable route between Europe and Asia, the European Space Agency said. Sea ice has shrunk in the Arctic to its lowest level since satellite measurements began 30 years ago, ESA said, showing images of the now "fully navigable" route between the Atlantic and the Pacific "
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Off Topic
The history of the search for a Northwest Passage is facinating, paricularly the tragic fate of the Franklin Expedition and later the first successful crossing by the great Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen in 1906 and the second in 1940 by a RCMP Officer Henry Larsen in a ship the St Roch (which I have seen on display in Vancouver Maritime Museum - well worth a visit  )
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Hoppo, that's not particularly convincing.
2006 was an el Nino year as well. It was cooler than 1998.
The HadCRU dataset has a warming of 0.018 +/- 0.016 K/yr (according to tamino) in the last decade. In other words, nought is only just outside the experimental error. Furthermore, he's assumed the trend to be linear: the moving average that the UEA CRU has plotted (posted by me above) shows the most of the warming occurred in the very early years of the decade, and that (within experimental error) it has now levelled off.
By the way, I'm not too impressed by a web page where the author feels he has to label other people's views as "garbage" seven times. Such hysterics would not be necessary if the figures spoke unequivocally for themselves. To think the page is headed "Open Mind" as well!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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laundryman, and as I pointed out that fit takes 1998 as it's start point, which as an exceptionally warm year reduces any warming trend. The long term trend is around 0.2C per decade.
The reason tamino is a bit forthright in his presentation is that the same old 'garbage' reappears again, and again, and again, and again. I find tamino rather useful, because he normally goes to the trouble of downloading the data and fitting it himself.
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| Hoppo wrote: |
| The long term trend is around 0.2C per decade. |
Which will have reduced in each of the last 5-6 years, in which there has been no discernible warming.
| Quote: |
| I find tamino rather useful, because he normally goes to the trouble of downloading the data and fitting it himself. |
I'm happy to subcontract that to the University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit, although they were naughty earlier this year when they represented January (which was unusually warm) as if it were a whole year - 2007 has returned to the recent average since then.
Incidentally, was this tamino fellow clever enough to predict the current half-decade stasis in the global mean temperature?
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| AxsMan wrote: |
Manmade or not, things are definitely warming up:
"The Arctic's Northwest Passage has opened up fully because of melting sea ice, clearing a long-sought but historically impassable route between Europe and Asia, the European Space Agency said. Sea ice has shrunk in the Arctic to its lowest level since satellite measurements began 30 years ago, ESA said, showing images of the now "fully navigable" route between the Atlantic and the Pacific "
"Polar regions are very sensitive to climate change, ESA said, noting that some scientists have predicted the Arctic would be ice free as early as 2040. Almost all experts say global warming, stoked by human use of fossil fuels, is happening about twice as fast in the Arctic as elsewhere on the planet. Once exposed, dark ground or sea soak up far more heat than ice and snow."
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Maybe not, this quote taken from here
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| Another thing about this summer is the record loss of sea-ice area in the arctic 2.92 million sq km)and the record sea-ice area gain (16.26 million sq km) in the Southern Hemisphere. The ice loss in the arctic may seem quite alarming but, the 1930’s also saw huge ice-loss and recovered. As recent as 1994/5 is another example 1994-1995 ice area decreased by around 700,000 sq km then increased the next year by 500,000 sq km,by 2001 it was back to near normal. If you apply the GW argument to this huge ice-loss then logically you should also have seen similar decline in sea-ice area in the Antarctic. |
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Whitegold, How can we believe your claims when you even misrepresent the article you linked to ..
"Authors Dennis Avery and Fred Singer looked at the work of more than 500 scientists and argue that these experts are doubtful the phenomenon is caused by man-made greenhouse gases."
So 2 (not 500) researchers claim that global warning is not happening by claiming that some other 500 scientists are doubtful
And here are the claims of those two researchers countered.
Why don't you admit that you don't want to believe that climate change is real and leave it at that. I haven't seen one post from you that hasn't been proposed and disproven already.
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Diarmuid, what definition of "climate change" do you use?
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You know it makes sense.
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| Diarmuid wrote: |
| Why don't you admit that you don't want to believe that climate change is real and leave it at that. |
Because that would be far too simple and sensible I'd hazard 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| laundryman wrote: |
| Diarmuid, what definition of "climate change" do you use? |
I was using the colloquial definition.
To clarify I am specifically referring to climate change as per wikipedia "referring to changes in modern climate which according to the IPCC are 90-95% likely to have been in part caused by human action"
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Poster: A snowHead
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That doesn't say what changes either. "In part" could be 0% to 100%. It's absurd to quantify the likelihood of something so nebulously defined.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| roga wrote: |
| Diarmuid wrote: |
| Why don't you admit that you don't want to believe that climate change is real and leave it at that. |
Because that would be far too simple and sensible I'd hazard |
or he could say 'he doesnt' believe that man made global/warming/climate/change/raining is real
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| laundryman wrote: |
| That doesn't say what changes either. "In part" could be 0% to 100%. It's absurd to quantify the likelihood of something so nebulously defined. |
If you are looking to get an exact definition of what scientists are referring to man influenced climate change you need to go further than one line on a skiers discussion board. There are plenty links on google/wikipedia that will enlighten you more than I could
| CANV CANVINGTON wrote: |
or he could say 'he doesnt' believe that man made global/warming/climate/change/raining is real
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He could, and I could say I don't believe in evolution. However that doesn't make what we said a) any closer to the truth or b) in line with mainstream scientific thought.
Reference
The majority of climate scientists agree that global warming is primarily caused by human activities such as fossil fuel burning and deforestation.[14][15][16] The conclusion that global warming is mainly caused by human activity and will continue if greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced has been endorsed by at least 30 scientific societies and academies of science, including all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries.
A 2004 essay by Naomi Oreskes in the journal Science reported a survey of 928 abstracts of peer-reviewed papers related to global climate change in the ISI database.[17] Oreskes stated that "Remarkably, none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position. ... This analysis shows that scientists publishing in the peer-reviewed literature agree with IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences, and the public statements of their professional societies."
Benny Peiser claimed to have found flaws in Oreskes' work,[18] but his attempted refutation is disputed.[19][20][21] Peiser later withdrew parts of his criticism, also commenting that "the overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human impact. However, this majority consensus is far from unanimous."[20]
Scientific opinion on climate change
People have got to realise that the most of the debate in scientific circles has closed on this point. The question now is the impact.
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| Diarmuid wrote: |
| ..........People have got to realise that the most of the debate in scientific circles has closed on this point. The question now is the impact. |
Oh dear - that smacks of "we have moved on" to close discussion.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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| Diarmuid wrote: |
People have got to realise that the most of the debate in scientific circles has closed on this point. The question now is the impact. |
This is nonsense.
There is plenty left to debate.
The world was circa 30% covered in ice 15k years ago. Now it is roughly 10% iced up.
Most of it melted long before factories, cars, planes and overpopulation.
Further, humans have been shedding bodyhair for millions of years. They continue to lose it today.
Mother Nature has long been preparing humans for a hotter planet.
Make no mistake, global warming is cyclical. It is mostly natural.
Humans contribute. But they are a secondary, not primary, cause. They are a minor, not major, player.
The impact will be that I will get a wicked tan. I will have to ski a bit higher. And East Anglia will get washed away. It's all good
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| Quote: |
| People have got to realise that the most of the debate in scientific circles has closed on this point. |
I think that is fundamentally to misconceive how science progresses. Debate "closes down" (which is only ever temporary) not when there's a majority of scientists who are inclined to a particular hypothesis (the majority of scientists is frequently wrong), but when theory fits closely with the available facts; when the theory is proven to make accurate predictions repeatedly.
The hottest year on record is 1998 - the year after the Kyoto treaty was signed. The AGW theory and climate modelling was already in full swing. If any climate research group fully understood all the processes that drive the world's climate, they would have been able to predict that there would not be a hotter year for 10 years at least and that the years 2002-2007 would show no warming (or cooling) trend. Perhaps such forecasts did exist - I'd be delighted to see them.
Please note that I think it is entirely plausible that global warming since 1850 has been caused partly or even mainly by human activity. However, the notion that this is "settled" and - even more - the idea that current climate forecasts are reliable is misconceived IMV.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I see none of the previous four posters have dealt with the fact the the people who study climate have come to a consensus on this?
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Make no mistake, global warming is cyclical. It is mostly natural.
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And why should I believe you over the scientific community?
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I think that is fundamentally to misconceive how science progresses. Debate "closes down" (which is only ever temporary) not when there's a majority of scientists who are inclined to a particular hypothesis
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And I agree with you. So why are you ignoring all the links and quotes I included above?
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Diarmuid, If they can't predict the weather 10 days out with any accuracy, why should I accept that they can predict the next 10 years, or 20 or 50? 
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FAQ
but apart from (5) and (6) There's not much I can argue with there. (And (11) is right on the money 