Alaskans sweat through long, hot summer

[True_Blue]

For proof of climate change in the Arctic, look no further than Alaska’s long, hot summer, according to one of the country’s top climate scientists.

Last year Alaskans sweated through the warmest May, June, July and August of the century, with average temperatures almost 5 degrees Fahrenheit above normal. Such heat was largely driven by the warmest ocean temperatures ever measured in the Northern Hemisphere, matched globally by the fourth-warmest year on record.

Large swaths of the state saw sparse rainfall but still got zapped thousands of times by lightning. That led to Alaska’s worst fire season ever, with an estimated 6.5 million acres burned.

Throw in melting glaciers, disintegrating permafrost, diminishing sea ice, coastal erosion, changes in vegetation and wildlife, insect infestations, rising sea level, and increasing exposure to contaminants brought on air and sea currents, and Alaskans know firsthand about the potential damage and cost caused by the shifting climate.

more....
http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/02272005/news/66813.htm

[Technowitch]

1. Engaging sarcasm filters...

Oh, but there's NO PROOF of global warming!!!

Yeesh...I hope one day the same level of ridicule is brought upon the doubters as there is now on those who insisted for years there was "no proof" that cigarettes cause cancer.

[Rex]

2. The Earth will adapt

I wonder if we will.

[Gman]

8. Earth doesn't need us and will do just fine

However, we need the Earth to be liveable.

[Liberal Veteran]

3. The melting glaciers, erosion, and permafrost melts are myths!

Perpetrated by the evil-anti-corporate-radical-left-environmentalists.

Pay no attention to the bizarre weather around the world!!! It's all part of the plot!

[Dimsdale]

7. Junk Science, don't you know? n/t

[Skittles]

4. I cannot access this article?

would like to read it

[NMDemDist2]

5. here's the link

http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/02272005/news/66813.htm

[True_Blue]

6. Sorry....I fixed the link

I had posted a link to the printer friendly version....for some reason the link didn't work.

[Skittles]

10. thank you True_Blue

interesting and very ominous :o

[Blue_In_AK]

9. The argument against man-made global warming we get up here...

...is that because dinosaur fossels have been found on the North Slope and elsewhere, it proves that Alaska was once much warmer than it is now; therefore, this is just a natural cyclical thing. I don't believe that, but that's what they say. Perhaps it's time for the next great extinction. Maybe the next round of evolution will produce more earth-friendly creatures than human beings have been.

[vonSchloegel]

11. Technically, there is no proof.

According to accepted methodology, the observed results need to be compared with a control. In this case such a control would have to consist of a similar planet in the same orbit around the same sun, where no carbon was brought to the surface and burned. Since this is impossible, the theory of man-made Global Warming is purely speculative.

Although computer models have become quite accurate at explaining historic trends, they have been incapable of predicting future warming, which makes the accuracy of those models highly questionable.

What the antagonists say is correct. We cannot tell whether the current recorded warming is because of man, volcanoes, solar activity, or anything else. Since the Earth has cycled in and out of ice ages for eons before the hairless apes learned to control fire, there is a good chance the warming Alaska is experiencing is a perfectly natural event.

[daleo]

12. The methodology only applies to experimental sciences.

Clearly, the geological and geophysical sciences can rarely meet these conditions (neither can many other sciences, such as as epidemiology, for example). Yet, we have to draw conclusions from observation and theory as best we can, and act on these conclusions when necessary.

Epidemiology is a good example of this. We can't do proper randomized control trials on smoking, to absolutely prove that it causes cancer. Yet, we have acted anyway, both collectively and individually on the observational evidence we have. Usually, we just can't afford to ignore threats, even if there is a residuum of doubt.

[vonSchloegel]

13. with smoking

you can always find a control, since not everybody smokes.

[daleo]

14. A case control, not a randomized control trial.

That's the gold standard of experimental science.

[vonSchloegel]

16. Okay,

let's take two different planets from similar backgrounds. Ideally, twin planets that were separated shortly after formation...

Without the ability to demonstrate a link, Man-made Global Warming remains in the realm of theory. And the history of science is replete with accepted theories being disproven. Like the one from the 1970s that speculated automobile pollution would start a new ice age.

[daleo]

18. No, we need several dozen planets, of the same class, more or less similar

Make a random assignment of them as to whether they will have their fossil fuels rapidly extracted and converted to CO2.

Make sure the planets that don't have this happen are still "drilled" so they don't really know which treatment they received. Double blind the study, so we aren't sure which planet received which treatment.

Then monitor their temperatures over the next several hundred years, to see how they respond. Analyse the data, and see if the planets with the increase in CO2 have had a statistically significant increase in temperature. If so, we can conclude with great certainty that the rise in CO2 caused global warming.

Of course that is all a bit unlikely, so we will have to settle for less conclusive evidence, such as observational and historical studies, in conjunction with theory and modeling. This is how geology and geophysics are normally done anyway. It is interesting that the companies most fervently opposed to global warming studies (oil, coal, etc. corporations) use these very methodologies to find deposits of oil, gas and coal. You don't hear them complaining about the limitations of theory, observation, and computer modeling when it comes to that, though.

All science has some uncertainly associated with it, as does all human knowledge. In this case, it is the possible consequence of taking the wrong actions that ought to take precedence - i.e. the cautionary principle. In my opinion, of course.

[bpilgrim]

17. that puts you in a tiny shrinking minority of paid propagandist 'scientist

Coming in from the cold over global warming?
Fiona Harvey
2/25/2005


THE latest study to suggest that global warming is a real phenomenon, and one caused by human action, adds further weight to a body of scientific evidence that has been accumulating steadily in recent months, as research institutions and governments have made the issue a higher priority.

The phenomenon has come up during President George W Bush's current visit to the European Union, as it has been a matter of severe disagreement between the Bush administration and EU member states.
Several big scientific studies have recently come to fruition, most notably a four-year examination of the Arctic by more than 250 scientists that found the ice cap was only half the thickness of 30 years ago.

Others, that include evidence that the sea is growing more acidic and that biodiversity is under threat, were presented at a climate change conference in Exeter, south-west England, earlier this month.

...

Moreover, a central contention of Bush President on climate change, reiterated by the US delegation to the Kyoto protocol talks last December, is that there has to date been insufficient scientific research to establish whether or not climate change is really occurring, and is the result of human action if it is.

The latest study from the Scripps Institute challenges that view.

http://www.financialexpress-bd.com/index3.asp?cnd=2/25/2005§ion_id=4&newsid=13500&spcl=no

bone-up

peace

[vonSchloegel]

20. Warming is provable,

the cause is not. There is no evidence that the warming, melting, rising, changing etc. is not a perfectly natural event.

And science is not determined by majority rule either. Remember that the majority of scientists once believed the sun orbited around the earth in the middle ages, and in the last century, that time was a constant.

BTW are you suggesting that Global Warming scientists don't get paid?

[Toots]

23. is not a perfectly natural event.

In this context I would guess you are saying human activity is not natural. I believe actions have consequence even if you can't see it immediately.

[bpilgrim]

25. so is mans contribution as stated by the scientist in their latest talk

you must not have read it.

"BTW are you suggesting that Global Warming scientists don't get paid?"

i am talking about getting paid to shill... big difference.

peace

[vonSchloegel]

27. Manmade Global Warming Scientists

are being paid to shill. It's just for the opposing lobby.

[jwcomer]

26. You are full of it

vonSchloegel,

I'm sick of your red herrings and straw men.

In the middle ages, there were no scientists. Hence it is absurd to discuss what the majority of scientist in the middle ages thought. The scientific method is a product of the Enlightenment; and Descartes is largely attributed as the father of the scientific method. The middle ages were dominated by mysticism and should not be confused with modern times. Having a conversation with a "scientist" from the Middle Ages would be like trying to discuss evolution with a Fundamentalist. In other words because you each have completely different frameworks the argument is futile.

The straw man from before, about a theory from the seventies. Come on! That is apples and oranges. In the seventies there was no general consensus. There are probably 100 times as many scientists working in the field today as then (and they are now of a higher caliber in general.) We have computers with 100,000x the calculational power today. We have a much better understanding of the relavent processes today. Besides just because someone in the seventies said such a thing does not discredit modern theories. Your argument is totally absurd!

Scientist get paid... so what? Everyone gets paid. How dare you impugn the integrity of every worker in the world. That is the staggering implication of your statement. Are you actually suggesting that every one of these scientists is corrupt? Are you out of your mind?

Your mind has been poisoned with propaganda and it is a very sad thing to see.

[vonSchloegel]

28. When a model

is capable of predicting future warming accurately, I will believe it is fact. Until then I will treat it as pure hypothetical theory.

If these computers so powerful why is an accurate weather forecast more than three days out still questionable? If a ten day forecast is nearly impossible, a hundred year forecast is unthinkable.

I believe the real question is, with such a void of evidence in Global Warming theory, why do you believe it so vehemently? For some environmentalists, belief that man has irreparably destroyed the planet, causing an impending apocalypse, is an article of religious faith.

Anyway, since man is a part of nature, anything done to the planet by man is natural. Why is man-made warming any worse than the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs?

[alarimer]

21. The amount of Co2 in the atmosphere has increased

From their studies of ice cores, scientists are able to measure the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere both before the industrial revolution and since. They have shown that the amount has increased greatly, especially in the last 40 years.

[The White Tree]

22. Does that really matter?

Conceding your point for the sake of argument, we may never have the "definitive proof" particularly for some people. However, it seems equally or much more probable that the amount of carbon burned by humans in the last 200 years, in addition to other factors such as the release of ozone destroying chemicals, is going to have some kind of effect on the natural state of the Earth.

Earth systems exist in what is called a steady-state, in other words subtractions from systems are constantly replaced by additions in a continuous balanced cycle. The more we stress one system such as the carbon cycle by forcing carbon into the atmosphere, the more likely we are to disrupt the cycle in some way that will have repercussions for the entire planet.

We see this on a small scale with other nutrient cycles in places like the Chesapeake Bay where small scale human induced loading of nutrients such as Phosphorus and Nitrogen create the conditions for algal blooms that deplete the oxygen in the water faster then it can be replaced by the steady state mechanism that has existed for millenia. The result is oxygen-less lifeless zones.

Do we really want to take the chance that if we do nothing about global warming in deference to our ignorance about the Earth (as you stated, "We cannot tell whether the current recorded warming is because of man, volcanoes, solar activity, or anything else."), that the effects to ourselves and the planet will be completely benign?

I for one do not.

[d_b]

15. It was in the 90's last June.

Hell for a lifelong Alaskan.

[anarchy1999]

19. And away we go.............our lives are going to change.

Economic crash or no Crash according to the IMF. What is coming at us is a train wreck, the likes of which we've not seen, ever.

[KansDem]

24. Well, well...I wonder what the Intelligent Designer has in store for us?

Get the scientists on this right away!

[progressivebydesign]

29. I believe in Global Warming.. but hasn't this been an El Nino year?

California got all of our rain and snow this month, and we in the Pacific NOrthwest got sunshine. If it was global warming that would explain it, then wouldn't California be unseasonably warm right now, too? My friend in Belgium is still getting lots of snow and rain.. when it's usually a bit more springlike. Does it whack things out of balance.. where some places are colder than they should be, also? Or is the PNW and Alaska thing explained this time by an El Nino?? I think Global Warming is an absolute phenom, and threat, but could one hot summer be attributed to another influence?