Climate Change why are we still even debating it?

[Longeyes]

Please take the time to study this, climate change is proven no matter the naysayers would have you believe. Opinion is not an arbiter of truth science fortunately is.
These graphics reveal the findings of the IPCC published this January. http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/...limate-change/

We need solutions now not dissent, this is the biggest threat humanity now faces.

[majicbar]

The fossil fuel industry has spent hundreds of millions to shape public debate, sewing confusion and doubt were they can not outright bring an ignorant public to believe climate change to be a lie. Moreso they have bought politicans with easy campaign money to blind their belief even in the face of obvious global change. Science has faileto provide smoking gun evidence of the truth, one sometimes needs to present the evidence in more than graphs. But is the public open to spending more time to understand when the opposition provides simplistic dogmas that feed that public ignorance. By highlighting the lesser evidence that contradicts the primary contention the greater truth can be magically hidden, though in plain sight. The proof of global climate change
is found in ocean ph, in almost all glaciers in rapid retreat, in oceans rising, in CO2 PPM record levels, in the severity of storms, in the disruption of patterns beyond statistical expectation. Instances of local exceptions do not contradict the greater claim of climate change. Temperatures are only one measure of change, change is the whole broader calculus of the environment as a whole.

[norenrad]

I don't think it's whether it's happening, I believe it's the cause. My belief is that this is a force of nature that has been going on since the Earth was formed. An example is that climate change killed the mammoths and the plethora of evidence that the Earth has experienced warm and cold climate changes as far back as we can see.

[majicbar]

I don't think it's whether it's happening, I believe it's the cause. My belief is that this is a force of nature that has been going on since the Earth was formed. An example is that climate change killed the mammoths and the plethora of evidence that the Earth has experienced warm and cold climate changes as far back as we can see.

Pretty much the opinion of paleontologists is that human beings killed off the mammoths, both in the Americas and Europe, climate if anything was improving making the lives of mammoths easier. The same can be said of several other species that were either a food source for man or a competive hunter of those food sources. While the history of the Earth shows warming and cooling periods, this one is qualitatively different. The net effects that are evidenced in the oceans has not been seen in other warming events. Oceans are however problematic in that the evidence in rocks become consumed in ocean spreading or mountain building over hundreds of millions of years. But except for that caviat, this period is unique, special, extraordinary.

[atmjjc]

You have to look at this politically; just about every politician who is screaming climate change has huge personal investments in solar or non-carbon type energy. Al Gore and you guessed it, Barack Obama have the most investments and scream the loudest over fossil fuel use.

You must also distinguish pollution from fossil fuel use, as in cars, which is blamed by some as the cause of climate change.

I received this in my inbox the other day concerning climate change.

-------------------------

Email

Professor Ian Plimer could not have said it better! If you've read his book you will agree, this is a good summary.

Okay, here's the bombshell. The volcanic eruption in Iceland, since its first spewing of volcanic ash has, in just FOUR DAYS, NEGATED EVERY SINGLE EFFORT you have made in the past five years to control CO 2 emissions on our planet - all of you.

Of course you know about this evil carbon dioxide that we are trying to suppress - it’s that vital chemical compound that every plant requires to live and grow and to synthesize into oxygen for us humans and all animal life.

I know, it's very disheartening to realize that all of the carbon emission savings you have accomplished while suffering the inconvenience and expense of: driving Prius hybrids, buying fabric grocery bags, sitting up till midnight to finish your kid's "The Green Revolution" science project, throwing out all of your non-green cleaning supplies, using only two squares of toilet paper, putting a brick in your toilet tank reservoir, selling your SUV and speedboat, vacationing at home instead of abroad, nearly getting hit every day on your bicycle, replacing all of your 50 cents light bulbs with $10.00 light bulbs ...well, all of those things you have done have all gone down the tubes in just four days.

The volcanic ash emitted into the Earth's atmosphere in just four days - yes - FOUR DAYS ONLY by that volcano in Iceland, has totally erased every single effort you have made to reduce the evil beast, carbon. And there are around 200 active volcanoes on the planet spewing out this crud at any one time - EVERY DAY.

I don't really want to rain on your parade too much, but I should mention that when the volcano Mt Pinatubo erupted in the Philippines in 1991, it spewed out more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than the entire human race had emitted in all its years on earth. Yes folks, Mt Pinatubo was active for over one year - think about it.

Of course I shouldn't spoil this touchy-feely tree-hugging moment and mention the effect of solar and cosmic activity and the well-recognized 800-year global heating and cooling cycle, which keep happening, despite our completely insignificant efforts to affect climate change.

And I do wish I had a silver lining to this volcanic ash cloud but the fact of the matter is that the bush fire season across the western USA and Australia this year alone will negate your efforts to reduce carbon in our world for the next two to three years. And it happens every year.

Just remember that your government just tried to impose a whopping carbon tax on you on the basis of the bogus “human-caused” climate change scenario.

Hey, isn’t it interesting how they don’t mention “Global Warming” any more, but just “Climate Change” - you know why? It’s because the planet has COOLED by 0.7 degrees in the past century and these global warming bull artists got caught with their pants down.

And just keep in mind that you might yet have an Emissions Trading Scheme - that whopping new tax - imposed on you, that will achieve absolutely nothing except make you poorer. It won’t stop any volcanoes from erupting, that’s for sure.

But hey, relax, give the world a hug and have a nice day!

[majicbar]

The increase in rain and snow are consistent with a warming climate, but so are clear skies and hot temperatures. The point we miss seeing is that the overall energy in the atmosphere is greater now than before. With the oceans acting as both a thermal and chemical sink the heat flow is diguised leaving us to think things are maybe not so bad. This increase in heat changes how some processes act and how things act. With these changes we really cannot predict how things will be evolving. We very well may osscilate between extremes in the processes with no real way to fight them.

I am feeling that the best way to get rid of carbon in the atmosphere is to freeze it to dry ice, scavenge the oxygen and use the carbon to replace steel used in transportation, cars and planes, and in buildings which would be lighter, stronger, taller than those with steel. The net enrgy balance of this course would do more to bring carbon back into control than energy used to just pump it back into the ground and loose the oxygen in the process.

[norenrad]

These sites explain that humans were not the principle cause of the mammoth's decline, climate played a role:

http://discovermagazine.com/2013/oct...oolly-mammoths

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24034954

"In place of tundra grew a vast, arid grassland that paleobiologist R. Dale Guthrie has called the mammoth steppe, stretching from Ireland to Kamchatka and across the Bering land bridge to Alaska, the Yukon, and much of North America. The grasses, broad-leaved herbs, and low shrubs of the steppe provided nutritious food, and in addition to mammoths, nourished a profusion of other outsize, exuberantly hairy mammalian megafauna—woolly rhinoceroses, enormous long-horned bison, and bear-size beavers, as well as the fearsome carnivores that hunted them: saber-toothed cats, cave hyenas, and giant short-faced bears."

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/20...s/mueller-text

This explains a place that is frozen now, but wasn't frozen then.

[norenrad]

"Earth’s oceans, forests and other ecosystems continue to soak up about half the carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere by human activities, even as those emissions have increased, according to a study by University of Colorado and NOAA scientists published today in the journal Nature.

The scientists analyzed 50 years of global carbon dioxide (CO₂) measurements and found that the processes by which the planet’s oceans and ecosystems absorb the greenhouse gas are not yet at capacity.“Globally, these carbon dioxide ‘sinks’ have roughly kept pace with emissions from human activities, continuing to draw about half of the emitted CO₂ back out of the atmosphere."

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories...rbonstudy.html

I think that if we are truly concerned, we should start looking at how much of our vegetation is being destroyed. If I remember right, vegetation plays a large role in our climate and should be protected.

[calikid]

Of course you are right Aquila. Global warming is a problem, and mankind should do what it can to reduce emissions that contribute.
But when I think of the dozens of volcanic eruptions that occur each year, tossing carbon into the atmosphere in quantities that dwarf man's emissions, I wonder how big an impact we can have on the problem. I do see that we should try, but the problems are complex and multi faceted.

[whoknows]

Truly the prob is multi faceted! And we need to become cognoscente of the whole. I personally have more worries about what we're doing to our fresh water systems, not leaving out the land and oceans. I remember as a kid they used to say the oceans were so rich that they could feed mankind for hundreds of years no sweat. That no longer seem as certain.

We no so little about these systems and their interaction. As much as we can we need to take a step back and look at the macrocosm and our part in it.