Climate a Non-issue in Federal Election

[TimG]

actually it's accepted everywhere, only people who can't comprehend the science have problems with it.

Of course that is the big lie that the AGW freaks keep repeating. There are many people out there who have no issue with the basic science of the GHGs but reject the premise that a warmer world is something to panic about.

[Battletoads]

It's mostly accepted by politicians like AlGore who set themselves up to make billions on carbon credits, and UN one-worlders who want to control us. Not much science behind it though. Look at the absorption spectrum of CO2 and compare it to water and methane, if you know what an absorption spectrum is. Then get back to me.

The fact that other molecules can absorbs IR radiation as well or better than carbon dioxide is neither a new or shocking concept.

in fact its been known for decades...

in fact theirs and entire spectroscopic discipline dedicated to using the strong IR absorbances generated by polar-covalent bonds to study molecules...

Why do the wingnuts act as if this is some big secret?

[WIP]

No surprise that that sonofabitch Terence Corcoran doesn't want climate or environment issues getting in the way of helping his rich friends and benefactors get even richer!

The greed-is-good and climate change deniers may see this as good news, but for me it is further confirmation of my pessimistic outlook that the human race will not deal adequately with the global problems that threaten future generations.

[WIP]

Of course that is the big lie that the AGW freaks keep repeating. There are many people out there who have no issue with the basic science of the GHGs but reject the premise that a warmer world is something to panic about.

Are you enjoying the storms and increasingly volatile weather we are having over the last few years? The melting of Arctic sea ice has made the Jet Stream unstable and created more extreme changes in temperature; add that to the 7% more moisture that a one degree warmer global atmosphere contains, and future increase of 2 to 5% F will make going outside a real adventure in the coming years!

[RNG]

The fact that other molecules can absorbs IR radiation as well or better than carbon dioxide is neither a new or shocking concept.

in fact its been known for decades...

in fact theirs and entire spectroscopic discipline dedicated to using the strong IR absorbances generated by polar-covalent bonds to study molecules...

Why do the wingnuts act as if this is some big secret?

That was my field of study as a post-grad.

The question I still have is, have any of the computer models they use for their conclusions been modified to be able to handle water vapor?

[Battletoads]

That was my field of study as a post-grad.

The question I still have is, have any of the computer models they use for their conclusions been modified to be able to handle water vapor?

If you actually had a graduate degree that specialized in any field of spectroscopy you'd have found the answer to that question several minutes after you thought it up.

[RNG]

If you actually had a graduate degree that specialized in any field of spectroscopy you'd have found the answer to that question several minutes after you thought it up.

Totally wrong. I have been searching forever. The Chemical Institute of Canada has asked this question of it's members and there is no answer as of two months ago. Who's computer model of climate can handle water vapor? Instead of smart-ass comments, give me some information. Specifics will do.

[Battletoads]

Totally wrong. I have been searching forever. The Chemical Institute of Canada has asked this question of it's members and there is no answer as of two months ago. Who's computer model of climate can handle water vapor? Instead of smart-ass comments, give me some information. Specifics will do.

a quick search of the database of ACS journals brought up everything I needed to answer the question. (and TBH I don't even consider that 'looking for information' its more like a google search)

Tell me RNG, where did you get this graduate degree of yours?

[Bonam]

Totally wrong. I have been searching forever. The Chemical Institute of Canada has asked this question of it's members and there is no answer as of two months ago. Who's computer model of climate can handle water vapor? Instead of smart-ass comments, give me some information. Specifics will do.

Err, this is a very poorly framed question. What, exactly, do you mean by "handling" water vapour? The spectroscopic properties of water vapour are as easily handled in a model as those of CO2 or any other gas. However, water vapour is unique in the Earth's atmosphere in that it forms clouds. Additionally, changes in humidity have effects on weather through their interplay with evaporation rates from bodies of water, dew points, and precipitation. Modeling these effects is substantially more difficult since they are unstable/chaotic phenomena, unlike the Earth's overall climate which is a slowly drifting equilibrium system.

Models of climate have to make assumptions and use the average/estimated effects of water vapour on cloud cover and precipitation. Direct numerical simulation of the Earth's atmosphere on long timescales is computationally impossible at present. That is why weather predictions are only good for a few days out at most, after that, the results diverge too far from the weather models.

Despite these limitations, climate models can work over long timescales because local chaotic weather effects average out, and we have plenty of empirical data on precisely how they average out. That's not to say we should take the output of any particular climate model as fact, but to dismiss them out of hand is not a good approach either. Whatever their inaccuracies may be, they are our best (and only) tool to try to understand how climate will evolve over the coming decades.

Edited April 29, 2011 by Bonam

[TimG]

Despite these limitations, climate models can work over long timescales because local chaotic weather effects average out, and we have plenty of empirical data on precisely how they average out.

I realize that is taken as a given by many however there are credible scientists arguing that climate is not predictable like the weather. The basis for their argument is that the climate is chaotic as well as weather and the use models and experience from hydrology to support their argument.

It is worth noting that the position of the earth cannot be predicted much beyond 10,000 years despite the fact that we understand the laws of gravity really well. The problem is we cannot possibly know all of the initial conditions and those errors amplify over time.

[Bonam]

I realize that is taken as a given by many however there are credible scientists arguing that climate is not predictable like the weather. The basis for their argument is that the climate is chaotic as well as weather and the use models and experience from hydrology to support their argument.

It is worth noting that the position of the earth cannot be predicted much beyond 10,000 years despite the fact that we understand the laws of gravity really well.

And yet we know that the Earth's climate has remained relatively constant for over 3 billion years. Throughout that entire period, we've been in a temperature range where liquid water has existed on the Earth's surface. Considering how narrow this range of temperature is, and that effects such as the brightening of the Sun by over 40% over this period haven't perturbed it, shows that the Earth climate system is remarkably stable.

Whatever anyone might say, history has shown that the Earth's climate has responded very gently to even very large perturbations, and this constitutes empirical proof of its stability and well-behavedness. If the Earth was a chaotic/unstable system, a 40% change in the primary forcing factor (the incoming solar radiation) would have caused changes many orders of magnitude greater, especially having had billions of years to take effect. Instead, the Earth has warmed only very very slowly, slower by far than the Sun has brightened. You really couldn't ask for a more stable example of a system.

I realize stability and chaos are two separate things. Something can be stable and yet still chaotic. But if something is stable, then the chaos that can happen has to lie within a small region in the parameter space around the stable attractor. So yes, we could get small shifts (maybe a few degrees at most) that look chaotic. But that is not the case for larger and longer term changes in climate.

As for the position of the Earth not being able to be predicted in 10,000 years. I'll make you a prediction right now. It's semimajor axis around the Sun will be within 0.1% of its present semimajor axis (unless humankind purposefully alters the Earth's orbit). While I'm at it, I'll also predict that the inclination of the Earth's orbital plane with respect to the Sun's equatorial plane will remain the same to within one arc second.

The problem is we cannot possibly know all of the initial conditions and those errors amplify over time.

That depends on the nature of the phenomenon being modeled. Phenomenon that are governed by hyperbolic equations like the wave equation do indeed behave this way. On the other hand, elliptic equations like the diffusion/heat equation smooth out errors in boundary data over time. In fact, one can get remarkably accurate solutions to diffusive problems even with sloppy initial data. Luckily for us, the evolution of the Earth's climate is governed primarily by diffusive effects.

Edited April 29, 2011 by Bonam

[TimG]

And yet we know that the Earth's climate has remained relatively constant for over 3 billion years.

You have an odd definition of 'relatively constant'. We are talking about a less that 0.7degC rise which is being blamed on CO2. The natural variations in earth's climate swamp that.

Whatever anyone might say, history has shown that the Earth's climate has responded very gently to even very large perturbations, and this constitutes empirical proof of its stability and well-behavedness.

Which is one of the reasons why runaway global warming is not going to happen.

I'll make you a prediction right now. It's semimajor axis around the Sun will be within 0.1% of its present semimajor axis

And I will predict that the climate will be plus or minus 10 degC from its current level. I am sure you will be right but that does not make the prediction useful if you were trying to determine if an asteroid was going to hit the earth. When it comes to climate precision matters and the climate cannot be predicted with the level of precision which the modellers claim.

On the other hand, elliptic equations like the diffusion/heat equation smooth out errors in boundary data over time. In fact, one can get remarkably accurate solutions to diffusive problems even with sloppy initial data.

Only if the system is ergodic and there is evidence that says the earths climate is not ergodic even if it is stable within a confined range. Edited April 29, 2011 by TimG

[Bonam]

You have an odd definition of 'relatively constant'. We are talking about a less that 0.7degC rise which is being blamed on CO2. The natural variations in earth's climate swamp that.

I think you know very well what I mean by relatively constant. Of course it will vary by more than 0.7 C due to changes in the Sun. The important thing here is not the magnitude of the changes, but the fact that they demonstrate that the system is stable. The relevance of this is that a stable system is easier to predict. Hence, the models have a better chance of making meaningful predictions than if the system was unstable.

Which is one of the reasons why runaway global warming is not going to happen.

I agree. The system would need to reach a bifurcation for "runaway" global warming to happen. That bifurcation requires probably a ~70 C rise in average temperature and, physically, it entails the oceans boiling away. If that did happen, we'd probably have a rapid (few hundred/thousand years) rise in temperature on the order of 100-200 C, until we had a climate comparable to Venus. Anyway, long before this happened, the Earth's surface would no longer be habitable to humans anyway.

Any smaller changes than that will very likely be self-limiting, by nature of our stable equilibrium system.

And I will predict that the climate will be plus or minus 10 degC from its current level. I am sure you will be right but that does not make the prediction useful if you were trying to determine if an asteroid was going to hit the earth. When it comes to climate precision matters and the climate cannot be predicted with the level of precision which the modellers claim.

Fortunately we don't need to predict asteroid impacts 10,000 years in advance, only a few decades of warning is needed. And we can indeed predict the movement of bodies in orbit around the Sun with extreme precision over a few decades timescale. Again though, the movement of orbital bodies is a different kind of problem. There is no damping, no diffusion, it has much less inherent stability.

Climate is more complex, there are many more effects to take into account besides just the inverse square law for gravitational interactions, but in the end, I strongly suspect it is more inherently stable and predictable. Throw in a little bit of damping and diffusion into a system and the solutions instantly become much much more predictable and accurate. It is harder to properly understand and include all the effects in the models of climate than of gravity, but if one gets all the science right, I really think that climate should be predictable over long time scales.

Only if the system is ergodic and there is evidence that says the earths climate is not ergodic even if it is stable within a confined range.

A strict ergodic property is not at all required of the system for my statement to be true.

Edited April 29, 2011 by Bonam

[TimG]

It is harder to properly understand and include all the effects in the models of climate than of gravity, but if one gets all the science right, I really think that climate should be predictable over long time scales.

This is more a statement of faith than fact. You have acknowledged that our inability to determine the initial conditions means that it is impossible to predict with useful precision the orbit of the earth over long time scales. Climate is more complex yet it is "predictable" because we don't need the initial conditions. Many scientists would disagree with you.

http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/r-210.pdf

A strict ergodic property is not at all required of the system for my statement to be true.

Sorry. I forgot to mention that climate may not be stationary either. Why would anyone assume that the CO2 sensitivity is the same for planet covered in mile high ice sheets and CO2 starved vegetation as it for planet today? Edited April 29, 2011 by TimG

[eyeball]

Are you enjoying the storms and increasingly volatile weather we are having over the last few years? The melting of Arctic sea ice has made the Jet Stream unstable and created more extreme changes in temperature; add that to the 7% more moisture that a one degree warmer global atmosphere contains, and future increase of 2 to 5% F will make going outside a real adventure in the coming years!

It's sure made working at sea a lot harder. The wind is incessant and a calm sea has become a far rarer thing.

I suspect anyone who's ability to make a living is weather dependent is likewise finding it harder to do so.

[Pliny]

Science is science until politicians get a hold of it. Then you may as well throw the science in the garbage.

The inculcation of the concept that there are too many people and too few resources is the driving force for many of our percieved problems. This concept is stamped in our educational process and escapes no one. After all, the evidence is too immense to ignore. One need only look around. Does anyone here on this forum not have a concern about the huge population and the dwindling resources? Global warming, climate change, famine, peak oil, population control, planned parenthood, pollution, ozone depletion, recycling, alternative energy, plumbing, poverty, are all based in the idea that there are either too many people and/or too few resources.

If one looks though, this is the subject of economics and has existed since there have been more than one person in the world. So far we have muddled through. But there has been no shortage of doomsayers throughout that existence, warning us about ourselves and our evil ways for which we will be punished by death. Their solutions haven't changed over time either. We must stop what we are doing or we will all die - or at least go blind. We must follow them. We used to just have to appease the gods or fall down on our knees and pray but that isn't good enough anymore.

When this fear starts to rule us and our economics becomes based in fear the doomsayers will have won the day. When our attention is on stopping, what will be our actions but destructive? We must stop population growth, development, consumption, production, and force those who are unwillingly to "co-operate" and see the error of their ways. The collective good must be the prime consideration.

I sure live in a simple world. Everything boils down to purpose and we are only trying to solve the problem of the means to distribute resources that allow our continued existence and enhance it. I would say though that most of the complexities we face develop out of the simple idea that there are too many people and too few resources. But really, our greatest enemy is ignorance. We were told when it was fashionable that we couldn't understand God and now that He is no longer in vogue among the intellectual class and can thus be discounted we are told that we cannot understand science. Couched in political demogoguery(how polticians ever came to "understand" is one of those mysteries) and "damned" statistics this may be true.

Essentially, all that we are presented with by politicians today is an unknown and the imperative we do something about it. How about we continue along our merry way, solving problems as we have always done?

Why won't that work? Now that we have trying to get to heaven out of the way we can concentrate on bigger, we-are-all-condemned-to-hell, problems, I suppose.

[Pliny]

It's sure made working at sea a lot harder. The wind is incessant and a calm sea has become a far rarer thing.

I suspect anyone who's ability to make a living is weather dependent is likewise finding it harder to do so.

You're just getting older, eyeball. Perception is reality as they say and life ain't getting any easier, is it?

[eyeball]

You're just getting older, eyeball. Perception is reality as they say and life ain't getting any easier, is it?

No, but what does that have to do with a harsher climate?

My log books tell a pretty clear story of tougher weather over time and the effect this has had on productivity. I'm also hearing the same thing from other skippers.

[MayDayMayDayMayDay]

Blind, deaf, dumb--ignorant to all the evidence. I've been travelling the far east for the past year; and ven though I've been very focused on the immediacy of our activities, I've also been very connected to unfolding world events of earth-shaking and earth-destroying proportions. While I’ve been absent, Deepwater Horizon unfolded and has since been relegated to the recycle bin of collective memory more efficiently that any desktop computer. Now Fukushima, a category 7 nuclear disaster over which the "critical mass" of nuclear industry PR has just about seamlessly galvanized its "containment" of further negative “fall-out” from a disaster that has turned from critical to chronic in its effects on the future of the region. Yes; although there was a response delay after the disaster, the great invisible hand of power has right-clicked the mouse and hit the delete button as this incidental file of nuclear meltdown is transferred to the memory hole of the recycle bin once more. You too will forget without knowing how your memory was manipulated.

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

The Japanese government has already floated a plan as part of rebuilding a better, stronger nation. The area around the crippled Fukushima plant is to become a vast field of solar collectors and wind-powered turbines--a plan formulated without explaining the underlying rationale. Well, folks, the area is now a vast uninhabitable wasteland (13,000 square kilometres) entrenched in an exclusion law. However, with careful attention to levels of exposure, construction of the solar fields is technologically feasible, albeit at a greater cost than would otherwise have been the case. The other advantage is the extraordinarily low maintenance cost and therefore human on-site presence that will be required for solar fields in this wasteland. Unfortunately, this great idea is unlikely to be anything more than a speech to salve the open, post-disaster wounds of those directly affected by the catastrophe and the fears it has spread around the world--another item for right click-delete when we’re all under that soporific influence of PR lullabies.

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Fortunately we have a magnificent twenty-fifth anniversary to celebrate the possibility that even deleted files can be recovered! Chernobyl! The Ukraine has just raised, with great difficulty, €750,000 (Japan said it couldn’t contribute under the current circumstances) of a €1.6 billion price tag for construction of a dome that will continue to contain the hundreds of tons of nuclear material bursting to get through the decaying concrete sarcophagus that was naively postulated at the time to contain the catastrophe forever. The dome will have to be constructed offsite to avoid exposure to killing radiation and then rolled and lifted into place--the heaviest lifting job ever done in the histeory of humankind. But don’t worry, the €1.6 billion, state-of-the-art dome that will hopefully be in place before another catastrophic release of radioactive clouds over Europe and around the earth; and it will protect you until the end of your days—until the end of the century, that is—89 years. Just leave it for your children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, great-great-grandchildren, great-great-great grandchildren; and so on, to deal with this madness for the next one-hundred thousand years. No problem—just a blink of an eye in the history and destruction of the earth (See Into Eternity trailer: www.intoeternitythemovie.com).

In addition to this objective attempt to contain a disaster that is definitely not over, there are aspects of control that are more immediate and largely overlooked in the forests of Chernobyl, where there is poor forestry management and recourse at least once in the recent past to firefighters using a horse and cart to bring in water for a thankfully containable fire. But each time a forest fire occurs, more radiation is released into the atmosphere. So far it has been sheer luck that one of the huge wildfires we so often have to deal with in Canada has not happened in the forests of Chernobyl. In an attempt to forestall an aftershocking catastrophe, Patrick Evans writes in "Forest fires around Chernobyl could release radiation, scientists warn" (The Guardian, April 26, 2011):

"A consortium of Ukrainian and international scientists is making an urgent call for a $13.5m (£8.28m) programme to prevent potentially catastrophic wildfires inside the exclusion zone surrounding Chernobyl's ruined nuclear power plant.

The fear is that fires in the zone could release clouds of radioactive particles that are, at the moment, locked up in trees, held mainly in the needles and bark of Scots pines....

Dmytro Melnychuk, rector of the national university, said: 'Strontium-90, plutonium, and americium-241 are all extremely susceptible to upward atmospheric migration and dispersal via heat from fires. They create problems for firefighters and others who breathe them in. Radioactive smoke landing on crops … even 150km or more from the fire can create such concentrations of radiation in food it will be harmful to eat. Our studies, together with Yale University, have shown it is imperative we take measures to control the radiation [in] Chernobyl's forests.'"

What on earth does each of us have the courage, honesty, and personal integrity to learn from all of this?

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Of course for Canada there are huge domestic environmental issues to be addressed, not least of which is Alberta's (our home Province) tar-sands oil production which--as the rest of the world understands--is the filthiest, most health-hazardous, per-barrel oil production there is. To forge ahead with this project is unconscionable. Alberta seriously lobbied the Federal Government in the 1950s (under pressure from the oil industry) to detonate underground nuclear weapons in the oilsands to force the earth to unlock its treasures. Now it is seriously considering nuclear power plants for the extraction process—all this in a province that has more sun and wind than just about anywhere in North America.

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

From: Lois Corbett

National Campaign Manager, Green Party of Canada

“Four decades of public concern and very hard work has seen some success. Parliament set up Environment Canada in 1971. Public concern in the next two decades helped push through the Canada-US Acid Rain Treaty. A few especially noxious chemicals, like DDT, were banned. And governments in Canada and the US forced the soap companies to reduce phosphates in detergents--helping, in part, to stem off attack on lakes and rivers in Canada, especially Lake Erie.

Another high mark was signing the Kyoto protocol in 1997, pledging to bring greenhouse gases down to 1990 levels.

And now decades of your hard work is threatened. Harper's government held power for less than a year before trying to change the Kyoto emissions target from 1990 levels to 2007 levels. Just before being found in contempt of Parliament, the Harper government tabled a budget that cut 20% of Environment Canada's funding--while tar sands' subsidies were left untouched.

Environmental regulations are under assault and the tar sands are expanding. We are seeing the impact of environmental chemical exposure on our children's health. There is no cap on greenhouse gases and corporations profit and pollute with no thought to the future bill that ordinary citizens will be forced to pay.”

In both domestic and foreign policy--for the future of the earth and generations to come--Elizabeth May and the Green Party of Canada can be trusted.

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

[nittanylionstorm07]

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

In Saanich-Gulf Islands

In Saanich-Gulf Islands

In Saanich-Gulf Islands

In Saanich-Gulf Islands

In Saanich-Gulf Islands

Otherwise, vote NDP

Otherwise, vote NDP

Otherwise, vote NDP

Otherwise, vote NDP

Otherwise, vote NDP

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/George_Stroumboulopoulos_Tonight/1595682788/ID=1901644264

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/George_Stroumboulopoulos_Tonight/1595682788/ID=1901644264

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/George_Stroumboulopoulos_Tonight/1595682788/ID=1901644264

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/George_Stroumboulopoulos_Tonight/1595682788/ID=1901644264

http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/Shows/George_Stroumboulopoulos_Tonight/1595682788/ID=1901644264

Edited April 29, 2011 by nittanylionstorm07

[Pliny]

Environmental regulations are under assault and the tar sands are expanding. We are seeing the impact of environmental chemical exposure on our children's health. There is no cap on greenhouse gases and corporations profit and pollute with no thought to the future bill that ordinary citizens will be forced to pay.”

What future bill? By the sounds of it you won't be around nor will any of us.

In both domestic and foreign policy--for the future of the earth and generations to come--Elizabeth May and the Green Party of Canada can be trusted.

Canadian Election, May 2: Voting Green

Elizabeth May can be trusted to do what? Save the planet? Just what we needed - another savior.

Canadian election, May 2: Not voting Green.

[Pliny]

No, but what does that have to do with a harsher climate?

Harsher weather or harsher climate?

My log books tell a pretty clear story of tougher weather over time and the effect this has had on productivity. I'm also hearing the same thing from other skippers.

Your log book is a log of weather not climate. Is it warmer now than it was?

It seems weather events these days are significant. So who is arguing weather and who is arguing climate. If I say it was a cold winter I lose the climate change argument because I am arguing weather.

If you say the weather is harsher (or warmer, which used to be the old argument) I lose the argument because I am ignoring facts.

I know that the mean temperature has risen .7 degrees C over the last century. Although, science doesn't use Fahrenheit some people like to report that the temperature has risen 1.5 degrees over the last century - 1.5 is more dramatic than .7.

Sounds political to me.

Edited April 29, 2011 by Pliny

[eyeball]

Harsher weather or harsher climate?

Your log book is a log of weather not climate.

It's a record of increasingly stormier weather that now it seems is becoming a new state of normal.

Is it warmer now than it was?

No, it's colder actually.

It seems weather events these days are significant. So who is arguing weather and who is arguing climate. If I say it was a cold winter I lose the climate change argument because I am arguing weather.

If you say the weather is harsher (or warmer, which used to be the old argument) I lose the argument because I am ignoring facts.

I know that the mean temperature has risen .7 degrees C over the last century. Although, science doesn't use Fahrenheit some people like to report that the temperature has risen 1.5 degrees over the last century - 1.5 is more dramatic than .7.

Sounds political to me.

Whatever it is weather has more energy behind it than it used to, which is what scientists predicted would happen.

[WIP]

It's sure made working at sea a lot harder. The wind is incessant and a calm sea has become a far rarer thing.

I suspect anyone who's ability to make a living is weather dependent is likewise finding it harder to do so.

I don't see how anyone over 40 can't recognize that something is different over the last few years! I don't work outdoors, but even I can see the difference with how I have to check the thermometer out on my front porch and the latest weather forecast before I can figure out how to dress to go out for a run. It doesn't matter whether it's spring, summer, fall or winter, every day is different than the day before, as the temperatures go up and down without any stable day-to-day trends.

[WIP]

Since this thread was established to celebrate the fact that climate change has largely been pushed off as an issue during this campaign....not in small part due to the successful marginalizing of the Green Party...I want to add that I see this as a failing of our democratic system, and a reason why I can't get all that excited about the campaign, even though Harper is floundering in his quest for a majority government.