Have you looked at the North Pole lately?

DocTim420 · Mar 4, 2017

That kinda is my point--those are "best questimates" and, IMO any science based on "questimates", can not be definitive or absolute (aka "settled science").

This still occurs today--how can NOAA have temperature data from places where there are no temperature measuring instruments? IMO, questimates from computer modeling can not be more accurate than "real data".

igrowone · Mar 4, 2017

DocTim420 said:
That kinda is my point--those are "best questimates" and, IMO any science based on "questimates", can not be definitive or absolute (aka "settled science").

This still occurs today--how can NOAA have temperature data from places where there are no temperature measuring instruments? IMO, questimates from computer modeling can not be more accurate than "real data".

guestimate implies little confidence in the derived values
it's a very complicated topic, but these proxy measurements have a great deal of real world correlations that have been extensively studied
people(in general) are not going to be persuaded by such abstract arguments
which kind of takes us to where we are, if the changes aren't dramatic and negative there is no perceived threat
in my own very humble opinion, we seemed to have hit that point, changes are beginning to become more dramatic
people will change their behavior when they have to, and not before

DocTim420 · Mar 4, 2017

Not a question of "persuasion"...just a question of "accuracy".

I was at a party and the discussion was how accurate can be science's "questimates" be about the damage caused by mankind. The "smartguy" in the room said if it were not for "mankind", then weather patterns today would be that of an "ice age"--specifically the one Northern Hemisphere experienced during 1600/1700s. His rationale was basically "its settled science" and "the data was empirically gathered".

The day after the party I did some research and found this graph--hmmm, I say he is full of bullshit!

From what I see, since early 1900s, the earth has been in a global warming period (not a cooling period)--a cycle that has repeated at least 4 times in the past 4500 years. Hot-cold-hot-cold....

Source: http://www.longrangeweather.com/global_temperatures.htm

igrowone · Mar 4, 2017

no question that earth's temperature moves around
can't speak to the party 'expert' you bumped into, but there are judgements on both sides that are less than perfect
the experts that really are experts are judging that the human contribution is large and dangerous
are they right?
from what they've shown, i believe that they are

DocTim420 · Mar 4, 2017

Yep...opinions vs "facts". I "believe" in "opinions"--and as I grow older (I am north of 60), my opinions change overtime--but seldom do "facts" change.

In the 60s and early 70s, smog was nasty in Los Angeles. I had a bumper sticker on my car that said "Smuck Fog", and it was common to have "smog alerts" dozens of times during the summer. When "smog alerts" were called, no athletic activities were permitted in school, your eyes burned, shortness of breath (as if a small weight was pressing on your lungs) and there was a orange/brown haze that hung everywhere. We had a white car that would turn yucky tan if you did not wash it once a week. The last "Stage 3 Smog Alert" in LA area was in 1974.

During the 70s I also spent years outside the US in countries where wood/kerosene/coal burning stoves were the norm. The air quality there was worse than the smoggy LA.

Fast forward 40 years--no smog alerts and the foreign countries I recently visited are pristine and rather clean (more or less...lol).

This was LA back in "the day"--

St. Phatty · Mar 5, 2017

I bet the North Pole & South Pole crews

smoke a fair amount of herbage

during those long winter & summer storms.

Or, long stormless nights.

And on those long stormless summer nights.

They can't just be taking weather readings and studying the geology.

trichrider · Mar 6, 2017

armedoldhippy · Mar 6, 2017

'dramatic changes", yes. so far here, the closest thing to "winter" we had was a cold snap in November. not enough time below freezing to kill off any insects, summer is going to suck. dogwoods & Bradford pears that don't normally bloom until April here already have. ditto a lot of the flowers in my yard. there are about half a dozen that do not show above ground until June that are already 6" tall. got birds nesting that generally don't until May/June as well. "nothing out of normal to see here folks, move along..." :tiphat:

and awayyyyy we go, where it will stop, nobody knows.

igrowone · Mar 6, 2017

further to the north(ny), bouts of warm and cold
definitely not normal, lakes that used to freeze completely when i was a kid did not completely freeze
record warm january, can't say i minded that
i like warm to hot conditions, but there are limits

Pinball Wizard · Mar 7, 2017

when the ice is gone, the party is over

DocTim420 · Mar 15, 2017

Ancient Astronaut Aliens?

Ancient Astronaut Aliens?

Now there is a frozen algae plume...aka green ice.

A MASSIVE expanse of BRIGHT GREEN ice 20 times the size of New York has been photographed by a NASA satellite on a routine fly-over of an isolated corner of Antarctica.

The luminous-looking green ice already covers about 650 square miles (about 1000 square kilometres) – and it is growing by the day.

NASA scientists who spotted the bizarre green ice among the thousands of routine survey pictures taken from 700 miles up US satellite Landsat 8 by are baffled.

As ever aliens have been blamed by online conspiracy theory forums.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/science/779141/Green-ice-Antarctica-NASA-pictures-mystery-theory

And you gotta wonder what is this 2.5 mile long object moving under the Pacific Ocean?

http://www.express.co.uk/pictures/galleries/11240/spotted-massive-object-moving-under-Pacific-Ocean-pictures

Floridian · Mar 15, 2017

That looks a lot like a profile of an alien with a pointy chin and low ears!

DocTim420 · Mar 15, 2017

Of course we all know about "sailing stones"--rocks that move in the desert on thin sheets of ice. But imagine moving a 2.5 mile object along the sea floor. Hard for my mind to wrap around that idea.

igrowone · Mar 15, 2017

green does make one think it's a algae bloom of some kind
it's the end of the summer there, temps are at their maximums
the other 'thing', that is freaky looking if only because of its size

Floridian · Mar 15, 2017

Mother nature has freaked out the humans since the beginning and will continue to do so,and we will come with our observations and explanations which don't amount to much.Somewhere an entity laughs hysterically I imagine

igrowone · Mar 22, 2017

here's another record
record low maximum extent, and it's the 3rd consecutive record
2015, 2016, and 2017 all records - record low this fall? i wouldn't bet against it

DocTim420 · May 1, 2017

...history is littered with the human wreckage of scientific errors...

...history is littered with the human wreckage of scientific errors...

From New York Post--http://nypost.com/2017/04/28/times-columnist-blasted-by-nasty-left-for-climate-change-piece/

A New York Times columnist who was “harangued” for months by “bullying Trump supporters” says he’s now being blasted by the “nasty left” — after he penned a piece about how absurd it was to blindly support climate change, without listening to both sides of the argument.

Former Wall Street Journal writer Bret Stephens has now managed to draw ire from the left after his column ran online Friday.

As a noted “never Trumper” and climate skeptic, he has seen his fair share of hate mail and Twitter trolls over the past year-and-a-half — but nothing like what he’s endured since his article was posted, he says....

Anytime the lefties read something and get pissed, its worthy of taking a peak. Following is a cut and paste of the last part of this column (the first half discussed Clinton losing the election)...

Climate of Complete Certainty

When someone is honestly 55 percent right, that’s very good and there’s no use wrangling. And if someone is 60 percent right, it’s wonderful, it’s great luck, and let him thank God.

But what’s to be said about 75 percent right? Wise people say this is suspicious. Well, and what about 100 percent right? Whoever says he’s 100 percent right is a fanatic, a thug, and the worst kind of rascal.

— An old Jew of Galicia

...Last October, the Pew Research Center published a survey on the politics of climate change. Among its findings: Just 36 percent of Americans care “a great deal” about the subject. Despite 30 years of efforts by scientists, politicians and activists to raise the alarm, nearly two-thirds of Americans are either indifferent to or only somewhat bothered by the prospect of planetary calamity.

Why? The science is settled. The threat is clear. Isn’t this one instance, at least, where 100 percent of the truth resides on one side of the argument?

Well, not entirely. As Andrew Revkin wrote last year about his storied career as an environmental reporter at The Times, “I saw a widening gap between what scientists had been learning about global warming and what advocates were claiming as they pushed ever harder to pass climate legislation.” The science was generally scrupulous. The boosters who claimed its authority weren’t.

Anyone who has read the 2014 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change knows that, while the modest (0.85 degrees Celsius, or about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit) warming of the Northern Hemisphere since 1880 is indisputable, as is the human influence on that warming, much else that passes as accepted fact is really a matter of probabilities. That’s especially true of the sophisticated but fallible models and simulations by which scientists attempt to peer into the climate future. To say this isn’t to deny science. It’s to acknowledge it honestly.

By now I can almost hear the heads exploding. They shouldn’t, because there’s another lesson here — this one for anyone who wants to advance the cause of good climate policy. As Revkin wisely noted, hyperbole about climate “not only didn’t fit the science at the time but could even be counterproductive if the hope was to engage a distracted public.”

Let me put it another way. Claiming total certainty about the science traduces the spirit of science and creates openings for doubt whenever a climate claim proves wrong. Demanding abrupt and expensive changes in public policy raises fair questions about ideological intentions. Censoriously asserting one’s moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts.

None of this is to deny climate change or the possible severity of its consequences. But ordinary citizens also have a right to be skeptical of an overweening scientism. They know — as all environmentalists should — that history is littered with the human wreckage of scientific errors married to political power.

I’ve taken the epigraph for this column from the Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz, who knew something about the evils of certitude. Perhaps if there had been less certitude and more second-guessing in Clinton’s campaign, she’d be president. Perhaps if there were less certitude about our climate future, more Americans would be interested in having a reasoned conversation about it.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/28/opinion/climate-of-complete-certainty.html

Yep...very important paragraph--no side has a monopoly on "science"--especially when "science" is married to "political power".

But ordinary citizens also have a right to be skeptical of an overweening scientism. They know — as all environmentalists should — that history is littered with the human wreckage of scientific errors married to political power.

WilliametteWilly · May 1, 2017

That is a pretty awesome article. Thanks for posting it. I always tell people, we should research climate change, but you can not take computer models as fact. They are just very in-depth complex hypothesises. That are based off a very small sampling of the Earth's weather patterns. A couple hundred years of data to show patterns over billions of years, seriously that is like polling one American and saying 100% of Americans want that person's pick for president. Lets do the research and use alternative forms of power. No one is against those things. Let's all be skeptical of our handlers though.

igrowone · May 1, 2017

^^^ not bad posts, reason seems to dominate on this thread for some reason
here's a concise summary of the state of the climate based on the mainstream science
current co2 levels are about 405 ppm, and they are going up further
the equivalent co2 levels, which includes methane, nitrous oxide, and others - that's about 450 ppm but more of a debatable point
put into context, the last time the earth had this level of greenhouse gases there were no hominids
not just no people, but not anything remotely like the human race
this is dramatic, the climate isn't nearly as dramatic as the level of gases, it is taking time to respond
how much longer? my opinion(and just my opinion) is not much longer
stay tuned here for the latest

DocTim420 · May 1, 2017

Yep...but when science is married to politics, it fucks up the message because which do people trust more? Science or Politics? Making it a hybrid/marriage of the two also makes the two unrelated concepts inseparable--"science/politics".

If you believe my "Politics"...then you must believe in my "Science" too--you doubt my "Science" then you must also doubt my "Politics". Not a good spot to be in...imo.

Besides, intelligent people disagree all the time--whereas those who are "less intelligent" are influenced easier and more apt to become "compliant sheeple" with heads nodding "yes", just like those silly bobble head sport figures.

Have you looked at the North Pole lately?

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