The world may not be warming after all, claim experts (article headline)

[Technodaoist]

So what this article is saying...

http://www.themoneytimes.com/featured/20100214/world-may-not-be-warming-after-all-claim-experts-id-10100444.html#comment-78323

Is that the idea that Climate Change is a warming trend created by man-made activities should be mocked and laughed at because (wait for it)

The data has tainted by local warming trends due to man-made activites...

Just had to leave a comment on their site about that - I doubt it'll make it past the first read.

[OKIsItJustMe]

1. See also

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=230280&mesg_id=230280

[Technodaoist]

3. TY - just saw that on the list

I missed it by a half hour... :)

[tinrobot]

20. The relevant quote

“The story is the same for each one. The popular data sets show a lot of warming but the apparent temperature rise was actually caused by local factors affecting the weather stations, such as land development.”

So, we're not warming because we have too much land development near the measurement stations, which is warming them up.

Brilliant deduction...

[farmout rightarm]

2. So it's like "My dog ate my thesis entitled "I have no dog""

uh uh uh uh huh

[theoldman]

4. There are many experts that don't believe in evolution.

My question is, who made these people experts? If you are an expert in the same subject that I am an expert we should agree.

[OKIsItJustMe]

"Experts" in a field do not necessarily agree

Consider, expert economists do not necessary agree on the causes of our current economic crisis.
http://www.newsweek.com/id/232111

So, why would you assume that all climate "experts" would agree?

[theoldman]

15. What makes you think they are all experts.

If an economist does not understand our current economic crisis they are not an expert. They are just an average economist, not an expert economist. Personally I don't think any of our economists are experts.

[OKIsItJustMe]

17. Pick any field

"Experts" in any field will disagree.

[Technodaoist]

23. So you're an expert on experts?

Funny, so am I.

And we disagree... How odd is that?

(on edit - think i replied to the wrong one... silly technology)

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[HeresyLives]

6. Well obviously you never understood it,

if you turn on it over some drivel written in a British tabloid.

[Teaser]

7. just be glad you're smarter than them

it helps, really.

[OKIsItJustMe]

8. What makes you believe it was all hype and BS?

Seriously. Why do you say that?

[twitomy]

9. Instead of "devasted"...

Shouldnt you feel a bit relieved that perhaps this supposed calamity is not and may not even happen? Its like swearing you think you are having a heart attack and being "devastated" to find it was only hearburn..

[Name removed]

11. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[OKIsItJustMe]

13. So, here's the thing

This generation is setting up conditions for the next one.

Dick Cheney famously observed that "deficits don't matter." Now, Republicans are worried about us running up bills that our Grandchildren will need to pay.


By the same token, "Climate Change" isn't something to worry about this year or next, as much as it is for future generations. So, in that sense, something "really important" is going to happen in your life. Our actions today will affect the world they will know.

[guardian]

18. Doomers are only happy

when they contemplate the destruction of mankind. There is no room for good news. Their confirmation bias allows them to only see the negative.

Funny how most of them still refuse to live the lifestyle they advocate for others in order to "save the planet."

[theoldman]

10. There was a book released last year "Ice Age".

Read it and you will understand why the earth is getting warmer in a hurry. Everything points to a big increase in polition. You have to have more knowledge than your relatives.

[Kablooie]

12. Umm, then why is ice all over the world disappearing at an astonishing rate?

It seems that this fact in itself is enough to trigger major warning signals.

[OKIsItJustMe]

16. You know, it seems that way to me too...

It seems really silly to argue about whether or not the planet is warming, when land ice and sea ice are melting, when sea levels are rising.

Of course, a growing number of researchers believe a sizeable portion of the melt is caused by "black carbon" (AKA "soot.")
http://newscenter.lbl.gov/feature-stories/2010/02/03/black-carbon-himalayan-glaciers/

Black Carbon a Significant Factor in Melting of Himalayan Glaciers

February 03, 2010
Julie Chao 510-486-6491 [e-mail]

The fact that glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are thinning is not disputed. However, few researchers have attempted to rigorously examine and quantify the causes. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientist Surabi Menon set out to isolate the impacts of the most commonly blamed culprit—greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide—from other particles in the air that may be causing the melting. Menon and her collaborators found that airborne black carbon aerosols, or soot, from India is a major contributor to the decline in snow and ice cover on the glaciers.

“Our simulations showed greenhouse gases alone are not nearly enough to be responsible for the snow melt,” says Menon, a physicist and staff scientist in Berkeley Lab’s Environmental Energy Technologies Division. “Most of the change in snow and ice cover—about 90 percent—is from aerosols. Black carbon alone contributes at least 30 percent of this sum.”

Menon and her collaborators used two sets of aerosol inventories by Indian researchers to run their simulations; their results were published online in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics.

The actual contribution of black carbon, emitted largely as a result of burning fossil fuels and biomass, may be even higher than 30 percent because the inventories report less black carbon than what has been measured by observations at several stations in India. (However, these observations are too incomplete to be used in climate models.) “We may be underestimating the amount of black carbon by as much as a factor of four,” she says.

...

The irony is, melting ice (even if it is not caused by warming) will cause warming, due to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albedo#Snow">albedo changes.

[obliviously]

14. I'm cold! Just sayin'

[WarKillsChildren]

19. Big Oil

Bribery and intimidation pays off.

[NickB79]

21. Isn't this essentially the "urban heat island" argument all over again?

The same argument that got CNN's head meteorologist laughed at, since it had already been debunked?

http://mediamatters.org/research/200601250007

"On the January 25 edition of CNN's American Morning, co-host Miles O'Brien transitioned from a report on global warming to a weather forecast by describing CNN meteorologist Chad Myers as "a little bit of a skeptic on global warming." Although Myers denied the label, he proceeded to put forward the theory -- a favorite of global warming skeptics -- that the growth of urban areas worldwide has skewed global warming data. Wholly apart from the question of the appropriateness of CNN hiring a meteorologist apparently known among the staff as "a little bit of a skeptic on global warming," the so-called "heat island" theory promoted by Myers has been debunked by several recent studies."

[bhikkhu]

22. ...somebody tell the trees, and the ice, and the oceans, and so on

the same dumb-ass "heat island" idea that's been around for ages, and has long been adjusted for in the data. Just another crap story to attenuate the confusion for a little while longer...

[Technodaoist]

24. Follow Up

TheMoneyTimes actually posted my anonymous, screened comment. I probably shouldn't be surprised, but always am...

So credit where credit is due.