Scientists stirred to ridicule ice age claims

[Dogmudgeon]

Forget the sudden climate change; here comes Controversy!

Scientists stirred to ridicule ice age claims

19:00 15 April 04

NewScientist.com news service

Climate scientists have been stirred to ridicule claims in an upcoming Hollywood blockbuster that global warming could trigger a new ice age, a scenario also put forward in a controversial report to the US military.

(snip)

And Wallace Broecker of Columbia University, New York, US, who has warned for two decades that the Atlantic circulation is "the Achilles heel of our climate system", seriously questions both the speed and severity of the changes proposed.

In a letter to Science, he accuses the DoD authors of making exaggerated claims that "only intensify the existing polarisation over global warming". He adds: "What is needed is not more words but rather a means to shut down CO2 emissions." Such action could avert any Gulf Stream shutdown in the next 100 years.

Of course it won't happen. Hollywood made a movie about it. And Whitley Strieber and Art Bell were involved in it.

That's proof! Scientifickal Proof most Rigo(u)rous, I say!

"Stirred to ridicule" -- that has a nice sound to it. A sound produced when you rub hundreds of thousands of livid Skeptics and millions of dollars of anti-Environmentalist "think tanks" against less than 100 climatologists dependent on governmentally-sponsored funding.

You can add to that my own recent post, The Coming Global Internet Shitstorm.

This time, the eye candy should be accompanied by some political candy.

--bkl

[1monster]

1. I heard something similar to this several years ago on a PBS show

that Alan Alda hosted. There was a different scientific show every week that explored everything from spiders to the Tower of Pisa to what caused the last Ice Age.

The theory goes something like the Polar Ice Caps melt cause a whole lot of water inundating low lying (and some higher elevations) areas near oceans, river, and lakes.

The Polar Ice Caps are the air conditioner of the world. Once they are gone, the air currents will change which could lead to a rapid cooling of the Earth. Some scientist speculate that and ice age could happen far more quickly than conventional wisdom allows. Our children or grandchildren (should they survive the melting of the Ice Caps) may get to see if this theory is correct. In the meantime, check out this link:


http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/04/0420_040420_earthday.html

[Physicist]

2. ice age claims questionable, global warming a certainty

You can't blame the scientists for ridiculing a movie in which an ice age envelops the Earth in 5 days! Lot's of people who support taking action to reduce global warming (the good guys) have criticized the science in the movie.

I think the real significance of the movie is the way people react. The audience is going to identify with the hero, the scientist who is trying to stop manmade climate change. I think that will be the important part, and we should capitalize on that.

In the movie, global warming causes global cooling. There is legitimate debate about the specifics of how much climate change there will be and about what the consequences will be.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. Sure I blame them ... just a little

It's a movie.

Entertainment.

Maybe it will make people more aware of the problem -- I hope so. But how many scientists are going to say anything good about a movie when their funding is in jeopardy? Even if they know it's just a disaster flick, they know that their patrons (government and private grant-making foundations) want this movie to be ridiculed.

Getting a photogenic scientist to pose in a white coat in a lab has always been good PR for the home insititution, but the pressure on scientists to provide "desirable" answers has increased dramatically in the last few years. Which is what I think is driving the large amount of "scientific" criticism of this movie.

I've been interested in this topic since the late 1970s, when Wallace Broecker and company first proposed the oceanic thermohaline current theory of climate change. Now, do I think this movie will be true to what we know? Heck, no! It's a disaster film, and it shows the worst of everything in a concentrated dose! I'd probably be considered a "believer" since I think the changes now happening are irreversable and not entirely generated by humanity ... except that the weather usually changes without concern for dramaturgy.

When (or If, provided you disagree with the idea) New York City faces the Ice Age, it won't come in with a massive tidal wave; it will come in with several years without summers, accumulating snow that lasts later in the year and starts earlier, and more stormy springs as warmer and colder air clashes over the weather convergence zone.

So why all the fuss?

NASA sent a memo around in early April telling their scientists to NOT talk about the movie. Team Bush is actively opposing any and all environmental science funding, pulling as many grants and cancelling as many NASA, NOAA and EPA projects as they can; they're even considering abolishing the National Weather Service. It has reached the point where we have a less-effective oceanic monitoring system now than we had in 1960, after IGY and the space race caused a push in science-related spending and education.

Sure, I hope this movie makes people more aware of the dangers of climate disruption. BUT ... I hope much more that the public becomes aware of the pressure on scientists to do the bidding of the Misadministration. There's some awareness of the pressure on scientists in the medical field, and it's a start, but we need to make sure that the scientific community can't be used as a mouthpiece for political or financial thuggery.

Because if that ever happens, it would be a real disaster.

--bkl

[NNadir]

3. The correct term for what is going on is "Climate Change" not

global warming. There will undoubtably be places on the globe that will be cooler, drier, hotter, wetter, at least in the short run.

I have no idea of the content of this movie, and I'm sure I'll probably never know about it since I'm unlikely to watch it.

Still, Hollywood and brainless media aside though, this business with the atmosphere is the most risky experiment ever undertaken by humanity, completely reckless and absurd. Anything, no matter how silly, that raises conciousness is probably a good thing.

[happyslug]

5. The "Mad House" Century

Occurred about 120,000 years ago. You had a sudden increase in Water levels of about 20 feet (As if the West Antarctic Ice Sheet had fallen into the ocean OR the Greenland ice sheet had melted) followed within 100 years a DROP in ocean levels of 80 feet and the start of the Ice Age.

Based on ice cores from the East Antarctic Ice Sheet (Which has existent-ed for Millions of Years unlike the West Antarctic and Greenland Ice Sheets) just before the Mad House Century Carbon levels in the world were reaching what we have at the present time. Thus such a scenario would take about 100 years (unlike the Movie which reduces it to years not decades) global warming may lead to a new ice age.

The best theory of HOW this occurred is that when the West Antarctic Ice Sheet fell into the Ocean, it released into the Southern Ocean tons of trace elements that reached into the organic deserts of the Southern Pacific and Indians Oceans.

The oceans team with life, mostly Plankton except in the Southern Indian and Pacific Oceans. These are Organic Deserts. Plankton simply does not grow in these areas. Now when trace elements (Mostly iron) is introduced into these area Plankton appears and thrives until the trace elements are used up, than the Plankton dies out. The present theory is that the rest of the world's oceans are feed trace elements (Including Iron) with the run off from the World's Rivers. The Southern Ocean (The ocean around Antarctica) has a circular motion so that all of the run off from Antarctica stays in the Southern Ocean. Thus the Southern Indian and Pacific Oceans get little or none of these trace elements and life can not survive without them.

Under the present theory of what happened 220,000 years ago, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet fell into the Ocean exposing the islands that makes up Western Antarctica (East Antarctica is a solid land mass, West Antarctica is a serious of Islands surrounded by ice sheets grounded on the ocean floor). Once this mass fell into the ocean, world sea levels went up 20 feet. It also permitted a wider connection between the Atlantic and Pacific ocean than what Drake's Strait does today. This would break up the Southern Ocean Circulation system AND exposure hugh area of land to erosion (and thus thee introduction of iron and other trace elements into the Southern Pacific and Indian Oceans).

Once the trace elements were introduced, Plankton would re-appear and start to re-produced as long as the trace elements keep coming into the Southern Pacific and Indians Oceans. In the process of re-producing the Plankton remove Carbon from the atmosphere and you get a reversal, LESS CARBON IN THE ATMOSPHERE AND A GENERAL COOLING OF THE WORLD. This leads to the reestablishments of the West Antarctic Ice sheets but only after the start of a new Ice Age.

The problem is whatever is the World's Oceans circulation system at any time will remain the system until something else forces a change. The present systme has existed since the start of recorded history and we assume it is the "Normal" system but other circulation systems has existed within the last 1/2 million years. Systems tend to stay in a constant mode until upset and that is why the ice age lasted as long as it did.

The Present World Circulation system is based on the equalization of the ocean's salt content between the high content of the Caribbean and Mediterranean Seas and the much lower Salt Content of the Pacific. The present system does this by moving the high salt and high temperature waters of the Caribbean to Northern Europe by the Gulf Stream. In the area between Greenland the Norway, this current has no place else to go (It is blocked by the cold water coming out of the Arctic, which is feed by rivers coming from the Himalayas via Siberia) but down. It can NOT go down before that point for the Gulf Stream flows on top of the North American Plate and thus it pushes northward till it hits the water coming out of the Arctic. Now at that point the Mid-Atlantic trench starts so the high salt content water has a place to go, ie. DOWN. The problem is to go down the water must release what heat it is containing. This heat is why Western Europe is warmer than any other area of its attitude in the world (and if the circulation system is changed will make Western Europe more like Newfoundland, COLD and snowy most of the year).

Anyway once the high salt content water falls into the Mid Atlantic tench it flows south and is joined by high salt content water from the Mediterranean Sea. It continues to flow south in deep water only till it is south of Africa than it flows east through the South Indian Ocean and the South Pacific. Once the water reaches the pacific, the high salt content water falls into the various trenches of the Pacific (The deepest in the world).

Now want goes in has to come out. Thus from the Pacific an ocean current flows (but this time on the top of the ocean not in the deep ocean) from the South Pacific through the South Indian through the South Atlantic and back into the Caribbean where the system started (The above is a simplification but seems to the be system is use today).

The West Antarctic Ice Sheet is just south of South America and is bypassed by the World's Circulation system. If the West Antarctic Ice Sheet should disappear it would expose a new area of islands and open ocean. The water from the Pacific instead of going through the Indian Ocean may just go through this new sea directly to the Atlantic. This would stop the flow of water and once stopped may take thousand of years to re-start. Thus the Melting of the West Antarctic Ice sheet may stop the flow of the Gulf Stream and thus make Western Europe inhabitable (or not as habitable as it is now). The affect on North American would be longer term, permitting the re-establishment of the North American Ice Sheet that disappeared only 10,000 years ago.

Thus while it may take a 100 years, such a worse case scenario is not only possible but happened 220,000 years ago.

http://www.imaja.com/change/environment/can/journal/madhousecentury.html
http://www.earthisland.org/eijournal/summer98/wr_sum98d.htm