Slim

Out of curiosity, where do you get the 2-10% increase in intensity? And what is 'intensity' a measure of? Wind speed, minimum barometric pressure? Anyway, the study I looked at stated that damages increase in very non-linear fashion as the strength of the storm increases, so a small increase in the intensity (of a stronger storm) will cause far more damages than several lesser storms. Here's the study, if you're interested. I have glanced through a couple others, as well. While I find your first statement there dubious, I agree there is no certainty. And we cannot wait for it, either, I fear. Also, one thing I forgot to mention earlier is that funding CO2 mitigation will help to combat all the negative aspects of AGW, not just the potential for stronger storms. So it would be hard to argue that spending more on storm protection at the detriment of CO2 mitigation is a cost-effective solution, when reducing emissions would help prevent AGW and all the other crappy stuff that comes with it, too. Well, I don't know how I can argue further on this with you if you cannot accept the consensus of the experts in the field. I'm not trying to be rude... I just don't know how we could continue the conversation if you dismiss their findings. You've touched upon a major obstacle: fossil fuels are just too damn cheap and easy to use for us to STOP burning them. That's the great thing about 'em. And you're right, alternative energies cannot easily replace fossil fuels yet. So we can wait for the technology to catch up (which is your position, yes?) or we push the process by introducing policies that encourage alt. energy developement and/or tax traditional fossil fuel use making them less cost effective (which will likely drive up energy prices, hurt the economy a bit, etc). But we can't wait, as the scientists have told us. We have to start making some serious policy changes right away if we want to avoid the worst of the worst. And yes, in the short term, we'll probably take an economic hit. But it beats the alternative. Based on the information available to us, strong shifts in policy to cut emissions is the best option. How is this illogical?

Possible, but it sure sounds unlikely. A lot of these studies are warning that any increase in temperatures will most likely dramatically worsen the high-intensity tropical storms. So yeah, you could argue that it's not certain... but that doesn't change the fact that it's very likely. According to who? What study has determined this? I find it very troubling that you can so easily dismiss EVERY possible strategy to combat AGW. Are you saying that the science is wrong on this? Is the IPCC totally misguided?

Which begs the question: which is better - more low-intesity storms that we are used to and prepared (sorta) for, or high-intesity storms that were not planned for when infrastructure was built. I would be inclined to believe that fewer storms that are more powerful would cause more damage. Of course, I don't know of any studies that have compared estimated storm damages without AGW forcing with estimated storm damages that take into account AGW forcing. Out of curiousity, doesn anyone know of any studies like that? In any case, I would imagine that the high-intensity lower-frequency storms are more damaging overall. That still doesn't mean you can't divert funds from other projects to combat both issues we've discussed. I strongly disagree with that, if only because of scientific estimates on positive feedbacks. That's not the only reason I disagree with you, though. I'll elaborate later.

Seems there are several studies done that support the idea of more intense tropical storms (as waldo provided) and the IPCC has this to say: So I don't think we can discount it or trivialize this problem. We should probably be preparing for these more powerful storms. The IPCC disagrees with you. While you can claim otherwise, fact of the matter is you and I aren't climate scientists, and I'm going to believe the experts on this. The problem I see with this argument is that you seem to assume we can't both prepare for worse natural disasters AND fight to reduce CO2 emissions at the same time. Why can't we?

I've been idly scanning this thread a bit... Tim, just to clarify: Are you making the claim that there is no scientific consensus that extreme weather will be exacerbated? Also, are you asking for specific empirical evidence of how much worse a tropical storm has become due to AGW?

I would think that would be pretty darn swell. Hell, cut off all the foreign aid to the middle east (including Israel).

When was a scientific organization proclaiming this?

I disagree. Contrary evidence needs to stand up to criticism and review. Otherwise you could make up ANY argument you wanted, no matter how outlandish or baseless. Do you have a better solution to vetting scientific findings? Because peer-review sounds like the best way (albeit ponderous) to do it. Well... I hate to sound rude... but (to borrow your Flat-Earth reference) if I was to argue with someone that the earth was, in fact, round and they refused to accept it... it doesn't matter that I didn't convince them. Didn't make the earth any flatter, just proved they were stubborn. In the same way, if people keep referencing the global cooling myth from a few years back... yeah we can dismiss it, because it doesn't do anything to disprove AGW. It doesn't make the earth any flatter. This is a pretty strong accusation, and I would like some proof to support it. I can't just take you on your word that the reason we have an AGW theory is because it's 'politically popular'. Even that premise is flawed. 'Politically popular'? Seems there would be a lot more push from, well, EVERY industry to suppress AGW theory. Lobbyists for industry hardly want more regulation and control on pollution/emissions. And please, no more 'GW-religion' tripe, please. I hardly consider myself a AGW crusader. I'm just trying to follow this issue logically, 'cause it sounds like it's going to affect myself and my kids a lot.

But, could you not simply attribute that to... well... capitalism???

Okay, so your proof of this conspiracy is the fact that there are businesses out there that plan to profit on global warming-based initiatives?

I'm... sorry, but that doesn't really respond to my point. I can't very well go expecting some evil scheme based on a wink and knowing look from some random internet forumgoer, no offense.

But it may be too early to get enough information from weather trends, right? I was under the impression that while AGW is expected to alter weather patterns in a noticeable way, in order to be definitive about it we would have to wait to gather enough data... by which point, it would be too late. Basically, we can't really take a weather event happening right now and say "A-ha! Global warming strikes again!" But we could in a decade or two say, "A-ha! Those increasingly longer and harsher droughts across the globe are most likely a direct result of global warming!" Granted, one isn't as fun to say. IOW, we can't really use weather patterns to judge the progress of climate change (yet). Or am I off base?

See this is where you folks start to lose me... you're implying a massive conspiracy on a global scale amongst the scientific community (that's been going on for decades). You're implying that nearly every major scientific organisation around the globe is in on it. This is really really really hard for me to take seriously. If my options are basically: a ) The consensus of the majority of climate science experts or b ) An international conspiracy the likes of which the world has never seen before Well, it's kind of a no-brainer.

Okay, I'm going to try and examine your reasoning here. You say that evidence presented by those trying to disprove AGW is usually dismissed as 'anecdotal' or 'not peer-reviewed', correct? Your opinion is that those reasons are insufficient to legitimately dismiss the evidence, I gather? Now I'm not a scientist, but I would say that if someone presented evidence that they claimed challenged a well-established and overwhelming accepted theory (such as AGW) and their evidence IS actually anecdotal that's a pretty damn big problem. In the same vein, if a study comes out that challenges the main theory of AGW, and it isn't peer-reviewed, that's a pretty damn big problem too. From what I understand, if a study isn't peer-reviewed than it loses a lot of credibility (it may not be wrong per se, but it needs to stand up to a review before we can seriously consider it). That seems to be how science works... you can't just say that your study doesn't have to be peer-reviewed in order to be legitimate.

Yeah, that's what puts me off the discussion sometimes as well.