From the news on February 10:
RIO DE JANEIRO (AFP) – The worst heatwave to hit Rio de Janeiro in 50 years turned the city into a pre-Carnival furnace Wednesday, and killed 32 elderly people further south, officials said.
According to the Inmet national weather service, recorded temperatures in Rio were well above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees) — and felt more like above 50 degrees.
“The heatwave in Rio is seen as historic. February right now is the hottest month for the past 50 years,” meteorologist Giovanni Dolif told the O Globo daily.
On Monday and Tuesday, the scalding conditions proved deadly for 32 elderly residents in Santos, a city close to Sao Paulo and 350 kilometers (220 miles) south of Rio.
Half of them succumbed in their homes and the other half died as they sought help in clinics, a spokeswoman for the city’s health service told AFP.
The heatwave made Rio the hottest place on the planet on Tuesday, save for Ada, a town in eastern Ghana, according to data from the World Meteorological Organization.
Opponents of any measures to try to control increased pollution of the environment have been gleefully pointing to both the incredible scandals out of the environmental research facilities in Scotland and to the “snowmaggedon” that is still going on over the East Coast of the United States of America. They point to this as evidence that any talk of future global warming is junk science and should not be taken seriously until we have increased evidence. The only problem is that this type of viewpoint ignores quite a bit of other evidence that is also present but conveniently not quoted. For instance, I followed the AFP link and found the news story quoted above on the main page of several newspaper websites in other parts of the world, right along the massive snow stories from the United States.
Of course, it is only as you put those two stories together that you have some nice evidence for the changes that are taking place in the global climate situation. Side by side, one can see the evidence for a system that is starting to “wobble” and become less stable. This is precisely what the scientists have been warning about, a less stable system that will tend to eventually stabilize, but at a temperature higher than that which we have had for quite a while.
The problem with all too many of those who claim that no changes are taking place is that all too often their claims are based on limited instances of events that supposedly do not match global warming. All too often the skeptics do not do the additional research necessary to see whether the facts they are quoting are the full facts. For instance, you may have read quite a few stories listing a number of glaciers that are growing at an increased pace instead of shrinking. That is absolutely true. However, what most of those stories fail to tell you is reflected in the chart in this story. That chart is a graph of a massive number of worldwide glaciers. The glaciers with lines pointing to the right are growing; the glaciers with lines pointing to the left have been shrinking. As you can see from the chart, it is absolutely true that, on the whole, glaciers around the world are shrinking. What about those who are growing? As Father Orthoduck said above, the system is wobbling, it is not warming up uniformly in all places. Again, the data is consistent with a wobbling environment that is trending hotter.
The final supposed winner argument is the Scotland argument. Supposedly, this proves that all scientists are deliberately changing information. Frankly, for those of you who read this and are Christians, this argument is on the same exact level of logic as arguing that a few pedophile priests prove that all priests are hidden pedophiles or arguing that the televangelist and megachurch scandals prove that all successful pastors are hypocrites. It also ignores the masses of data that have been collected by meteorological facilities around the world since the 1800’s. This data has been collected by people from different countries, of different political backgrounds, from long before any thought of global changes existed. Moreover, the data has been part of the public record since the 1800’s in many countries. It would be very easy to tell whether worldwide data had been altered. In fact, at least one of the scandals was caught precisely because reviewing staff was able to compare a statement in a report to the previous original statement on the record and realize that it had been altered.
Because science is not exact, many of the opponents have been having a field day pointing to unknown areas. But, one need not have every detail figured out in order to be able to spot massive trends, and that is what has been happening in the environmental studies. Can mistakes be made? Of course, but eventually one has to go with the evidence. The problem is that the opponents want us to wait to take any action until it is a sure thing, by which time there will be no action to be taken. The final proof of global warming will be global warming and we should not wait until then to take action. And this is the connundrum. Science is, indeed, imperfect. Perfect proof is usually only present by hindsight.
For those of you who are Christian and use apologetics by Josh McDowell (a fine writer), you know how little the evidence you present matters to the one listening. It is the rare person who decides to commit to the Lord based on the evidence Mr. McDowell presents, despite the fine documentation he provides. Let Father Orthoduck ask you a question. Are you behaving in the area of science the same way as that person to whom you present the McDowell apologetic evidence? Would you consider the possibility that a closed mind is a closed mind regardless of whether it is the mind listening to “Evidence that Demands a Verdict” or the mind listening to compilations of data (yes, that are imperfectly interpreted)? Remember that the saying about exceptions not disproving a rule is there because there is such a thing as anomalous findings. Look at events such as the East Coast “snowmageddon” and then read some more to find out that it is balanced by a killing heat wave on the east coast of Brazil. Consider the possibility that this is actually evidence for a planet whose controls are beginning to wobble. Too many opponents of global warming theory look at the trees and forget to also look at the forest.
I do not think that anyone denies that the weather is changing. I also do not think that anyone denies that human beings should be cognizant of their effects on the environment. Good stewards care for that which they have been given. I also think that pundits and wingnuts on both sides of the argument have caused the vast middle to be in confusion and even denial. There is evidence that the weather of this globe of ours has periodically changed down through time–ice ages and warm ages–and that our sun has varied in its presentation from time to time–solar flares and etc. I am not a weather scientist, but I think we must find a middle ground between the global warming nay-sayers and those who seem to have made almost a religion of the global warming concept. We must continue to do everything we can to reuse resources, to protect resources, to find ways to use energy sources that are renewable, to make sure we have clean water, clean air and that we protect the flora and fauna that share this globe with us. We also must continue to study this precious gift we have been given of a world that sustains life and strive to understand more of the vast interactions of the divergent life of this place we call home. Screaming at each other and passing laws about things that cannot really be legislated while flying in private jets to conferences that do nothing to either change things or study issues more closely is not the answer. My own private answer to the whole thing is recycle, reuse, repurpose, be careful of what products I choose to use, be more careful of my own personal use of technology and more careful of my immediate environment. I try to be a good steward of that which has been given to me. My yard has places that are left wild so that the natural flora and fauna of my area have refuge. I have knick knacks–but I seldom buy anything new. I yard sale, thrift shop and trade. I recycle. I offer what I cannot use to others rather than send it to the landfill. I don’t use chemicals on my lawn or pour them down my sink. I have more land than house and it has trees on it!! I do what I can. If everyone did the same, there would be much less problem. IMHO. Alix
Alix sums it up beautifully. I will add the following, though:
Over the last 10000 years or so we have experienced several warming and cooling periods. During the late Neoltithic to the early Broze Age, for instance, the weather was such the grape growing haddpened in Scandinavia. This was followed by a cooler age – so cool that in the 470’s AD the Rhine froze, precipitating an avalanche of Germanic tribesmen into Gaul, hastening the end of the Western Empire. This was followed by the medieval warming period (one of the sticking points in the email saga). I don’t have thereference handy, but towards the end of this period we see one monk writing to another, complaining about the Olive harvest in the same Rhine Valley. Around 1250 – 1300 the weather cooled (one of the reasons the Viking Settlements in Greenland and North America failed), failed harvests occurred, the Mongols moved west and brought the black death with them. Climate change precipated catastrophic events… Up to the 1700’s, the Thames froze over regularly – and then we started warming again. But the climatic extremes can always happen, especially at turning points. There is some evidence that we are currently making a downward turn again…
All this is caused by several different cycles, independant of each other. Sunspot cycles, Milankovich Cycles, Oceanic temperature cycles… the list goes on. At times, these cycles might superimpose and cause even greater disaster.
I’m not saying that man has no affect on these things either. But – as a professional earth scientist, I view the shrillness of the debate with great concern. I also find increasingly that the peer review system is breaking down – the most awful nonsense is published etc. Also, science reporting is going down the drain, rapidly (actually, a lot of reporting in the newsetainment world is). These statements of course affects both sides of the debate – and I think one should be careful that one’s own political and ideological predispositions do not affect the conclusions one comes to, and the positions you take. This malady is quite serious, currently.
Where I do concur with Alix is that in the midst of this, we should encourage good stewardship – cutting down on pollution, encouraging careful development, stopping the squandering of resources etc. The AGW debate/show is detracting from this, the greater issue.
Given the notion that everyone should be grateful and careful with anything to which he or she has been given I think we are once again witnessing the arrogance of mankind. It started in the garden when man/woman thought God could be usurped. It reached cataclysmic proportion when man arrogantly thought he could build a tower to reach into “the heavens”. Babel must have become a huge source of belly laughter both in heaven and on earth. To think that mankind can “destroy” the earth is similarly arrogant. The same could be said about man’s ability to save the earth. God is sovereign and despite the pronouncement of a leading politician from California, that “we’ve got a planet to save”, I’m betting on God and I will be shorting feeble mankind.
Well, you know it is interesting: much of the Apocalypse is depicts natural catastrophe.
I don’t see what the big deal is about the global warming controversy; all the things we’re supposed to change to prevent climate change are things we should be changing anyway, for other reasons.
Hi. Unfortunately, the primary science in favor of warming has not taken into account sun spot activity in their models. Our climate has changed rather regularly through the history of earth. I believe much of today’s efforts on climate control is based on human presumption and the “what has happened in recorded history is what we can base our projections – i. e. maybe only 100 years.
Many more deaths have been attributed to the very cold weather we have been having.
Follow the money to see why this “global warming” scam will continue:
http://theoldadam.wordpress.com/2010/02/03/why-the-scam-will-continue/
Sigh, if you wish, I can post you a couple of articles that show that denying global warming is also a conspiracy by other entrenched economic interests who wish to continue their polluting ways. And those articles purport to trace the money trail to Congress to prevent the passage of “green” legislation.
Sadly, this has been my complaint. People would rather believe in conspiracy theories than in research. So, which conspiracy theory do you want to believe, the international liberal cartel one or the international conservative cartel one?
Since all the liberal conspiracy theories turn out to be busts…I’ll stick with the ones who are skeptical.
This is one giant scam.
Another post on just how ‘money’ is a main driver in this fraud:
http://www.climategate.com/follow-the-money-bbc-exposed-in-biggest-climate-racket-on-planet
An excellent quote from Anthony Watts:
“Exaggeration and alarmism have been a chronic weakness of environmentalism since it became an organized movement in the 1960s. Every ecological problem was instantly transformed into a potential world-ending crisis, from the population bomb to the imminent resource depletion of the “limits to growth” fad of the 1970s to acid rain to ozone depletion, always with an overlay of moral condemnation of anyone who dissented from environmental correctness. With global warming, the environmental movement thought it had hit the jackpot — a crisis sufficiently long-range that it could not be falsified and broad enough to justify massive political controls on resource use at a global level.”
All right, you asked for it. Here are a couple of links from the other side claiming that opposition to global warming is a conservative conspiracy.
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/12/ta120309.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming_conspiracy_theory
My point was not whether you or I could find websites promoting some type of conspiracy. My point was that there was no discussion, only claims of conspiracy theories BY BOTH SIDES. If you want, I can keep overloading you with links that show that opposition to global warming theory is a conservative conspiracy. But, that would prove nothing.
Sadly, there is no principled discussion left on almost any of the issues that are front-burner in this country.
No problem with the othere side being presented!
BUT, the pro-warming side DOES have a problem with the skeptics side being presented. The e-mails at Anglia clearly show that. The lack of willingness to public debate shows that. That Al Gore et al say, “The debate is over” shows that.
You realize, of course, that I would say exactly the same thing about those who call themselves skeptics? And, that is the problem. Each side wants the other side to be the first to admit that they are biased. Somehow we have to break past that and return to the type of discussion in which each side assumed that the other side was doing reasonable work and was respectfully disagreeing. There is no respectful disagreement left anymore. That is my plaint.
There is no one in this world who is sane but thee and me and sometimes, I wonder about thee…..sigh….Alix
This is the latest bombshell:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7026317.ece
Sigh, there is no bombshell there Steve. Notice the last couple of paragraphs. It points out, yet again, that the data does not rely only on temperature collecting stations, but on quite a bit of other data. These are just some folk, who, as the article points out, have not been peer reviewed, making claims based on only one small part of the data set. Remember that glacier graph I put up. That is a little harder to fake than the climate skeptics would wish. The article also points to other data that is hard to fake.
Pro-warmers have been saying all along that the earth has been warming due to man. Now a pro-warmer admits that the earth has cooled in the last decade (as skeptics have been saying for a couple of years now).
Also, that it was warmer hundreds of years ago.
That’s a bombshell. That puts the lie to the theory. Unless one is tied to it for political or financial reasons.
What is all this pro-warmers, and pro-coolers? Ridiculous. One thing that is constant in nature is that nothing in constant. Climate changes, sometimes dramatically. All good Christians, and all men period, should be mindful of their impact on the environment, although perhaps not so obviously religiously as some of the left wing types.
I don’t think climate change can be used as an excuse for a left wing global redistribution of wealth and an attack on the fundamentals of capitalism, anymore than I think denying it is changing at all is an excuse to just do whatever you want. Let’s all have some common sense about it, for heaven’s sake.
This all started when the left latched onto climate change as a way top push through their agenda by playing on man’s natural fear of change of any variety, and then as soon as the right retaliated it went downhill. And given that it almost immediately turned into big money it has gotten even nastier. Let’s just use some common sense measures in our personal and business lives, promote those common sense measures, and then do what humanity has done for thousands of years (with the blessings of God) – adapt to a changing climate!
Steve and Scott, thank you for proving my point. Both of you are completely unable to discuss global warming without claiming that those who believe it is happening are either “tied to it for political or financial reasons” or “as an excuse for a left wing global redistribution.” That is, you are both completely unable to actually talk science alone. I has to be science plus a conspiracy.
Talking trash is easy. As I pointed out to Steve, I can point out several websites that claim that it is those who are skeptical of global warming who refuse it for financial reasons or because they do not care about the environment. The only problem is that it becomes impossible to discuss an issue when either side or both sides resort to conspiracy theories as an explanation for why someone has a different opinion.
So, as I pointed out earlier. Discussion is impossible. But, if discussion is impossible, then all that is left is raw political power. Whomever is stronger will get to make the rules. But, that brings us back to the reasons why discourse has failed. Discourse has failed because neither side is willing to discuss the issues. Both sides only discuss spin unrelated to the actual issue.
Forgive me, Father, but you might be reading a lot of your own thinking into what I wrote. Since you want to read so much into what I wrote then perhaps you can add this: if you think big money is not a part of the global warming scare on both sides, and if you think there are not political elements using this on both side as well to advance their own political and/or business agendas then you are a bit naive. Pretending like those opposing interests are not there and not working hard to bring their own point of view to the forefront of public consciousness does not make it go away. I did not, ‘talk trash’. I gave a short appraisal of the situation that is entirely accurate. HAd I known that I would be forced to write a rebuttal in response to a ‘trash talker’ lebel I would not have bothered.
And feel free to finish the sentence you quoted:
I don’t think climate change can be used as an excuse for a left wing global redistribution of wealth and an attack on the fundamentals of capitalism, anymore than I think denying it is changing at all is an excuse to just do whatever you want.
I’m right smack in the middle, Father. I advocate common sense and unbiased look at the actual data, both current and historical. I reject all labels because I think the extremes of the arguments are ridiculous. Labeling it ‘man-made’ global warming is even more ridiculous given our current state of knowledge, especially since the weatherman is rarely right 24 hours in advance. Thus we are left with the fact that climate does change, it is changing, and that it will always change. Whether or not that is due to man is open to debate, but there is no way to prove it – it is an issue of faith in that regard! Thus, being so, we must apply the principles of our faith and be good stewards in our individual and business lives. Climate is changing, and the opposite is impossible. One could argue that the relatively stable climate the last few hundred thousand years was an aberration, even. Once we all agree that the data shows that climate does what climate will do, what else is there to say? The dynamics of such a chaotic system are way beyond anything we currently know or can know and while it may include man’s activity, it most certainly includes external influences such as the sun that we just do not know ebough to be able to factor in.
So I say that climate changes – always has and always will – and there is no way currently to pinpoint a bullet point list of exact causes, how those causes cause climate change, and to what degree. And I say that there are vested interests left and right that are trying to use it to their advantage, which is so obviously true anyone can see it.
But I’m a trash talker. What?? This is why people can’t discuss it:
“Discourse has failed because neither side is willing to discuss the issues. Both sides only discuss spin unrelated to the actual issue.”
This is a fundamentally flawed premise, that everyone is in a camp. There is no ‘side’, there are no ‘camps’, or at least there aren’t for clear-thinking people. There is only logic and common sense. And logic and common sense dictates that climate changes, will continue to change, and that anyone who desires a steady-state climate desires a fantasy. Why does that make me a trash talker? Why am I pointed to and told I have picked a side and am unable to discuss the science? In short, where is the ‘respectful disagreement’ you advocate? Anyway, I believe I am finished with this conversation. Yet another reason to stay out of the debates and just watch the fireworks I guess.
Yep, you are right. I misquoted you. I am wrong.