... insects that carry disease are spreading into new areas, bringing the West Nile virus to Canada and malaria to high valleys.

Dr. Paul Epstein, who teaches at Harvard Medical School and once worked in Africa, said the shift is coming faster than physicians anticipated.

"Things we projected to occur in 2080 are happening in 2006," he told The Washington Post. "What we didn't get is how fast and how big it is, and the degree to which the biological systems would respond. Our mistake was in underestimation."

Source:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.ph...imatechange.xml

Another nail in the coffin of those that prefer fantasy over fact!

thats what happens during a interglacerial period. what do you expect. more ice?

Amazing ... PhD meteorologists and geologists find the results surprising and you shrug them off.

I wonder why you haven't your own Nobel Prize by now given your great understanding of geophysics.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2006/05/predict-your-climate.html

A random number generator gives results statistically indistinguishable from any and all climate models. Choose your conclusion beforehand, turn the crank, get your inarguable scholarly result without detectable error.

That doesn't happen in real science. It doesn't even happen in the soft sciences.

the problem with meteorlogist is that they dont look beyound the last few years.

most geologist are not surprised by it because they know we are in an ice age and in a interglacerial period. it does not take someone with a noble prize to be able to look at the big picture. it just takes the ability to look beyound your own nose.

medical doctors are often surprised because they believe that the way things are now is the way they should always be. after all the human body does not change that much, why should the world be any different.

dehammer wrote:
"the problem with meteorlogist is that they dont look beyound the last few years."

And you know this how?

Show a bit of integrity and back up your mindless nonsense with facts.

If you can point to a link that shows that the vast majority of meteorologists have made their predictions based on "the last few years" data then lets see it.

Otherwise I'm calling this fabrication what it is ... a complete fabrication.

Didn't your mother teach you lying is a sin?

Morgan you are last person on this whole board who should EVER MENTION ANYONE LACKING FACTS.. you are great at running your mouth, calling people names, but you don't know jack about what you CLAIM is happening, it is obvious your just another political parrot, you know the lines, yet utterly lost when facts are needed, your basis of "facts" in science is the very definition of pseudointellectual, I have seen people, myself included asking you to post the facts, but we just get morgan name calling and telling us to go find it! LMAO.. what a moron.

And when it comes to facts on the net, its just like you full of crap everywhere you go, you can find a "fact" about anything on the net, that is why you need to add the who, what, when, where, and why, just because someone puts it on the net makes it so?

STUPIDITY

Post those names morgan, post when the studies were done, post who did them, you dont post nothing when it comes to facts.. you just TELL EVERYONE you are enlighened and hope we can catch up, then leave calling someone a name yet again.. post your facts, and not some www.internet.com address, you demanding facts, the person lacking the MOST FACTS on this whole board, is now telling others to post their facts?? LMAO.. now thats a good JOKE. I have a idea POST YOURS, now that would be a real change.

Unlike you, most of us post the who, when, what, why, and where of what we reference.. would you like me to show YOUR LACKING by quoting YOUR OWN POSTS.. I will galdly show you just how consistent YOU REALLY ARE in your posts.. care to see morgan contradicting morgan over and over again?

I think we could do with a little more science and little less shouting.

Amaranth

look at any weather stat and its always showing the last century, which in terms of glacieral periods and interglacerial periods, is the same thing as looking at yesterdays weather.

show me any site that using data more than 1 million years. 10000 years. 1000 years. they arent there. why? because there were no weather man and no scientific measurements. therefore as far as they are concerned, there is no data there that can be used to aid them. the closest you are going to get is the british naval data and that is not much more than 200 to 300 years old. most of that is ignored since it was taken out at sea and only where the ships happened to be. since they were sailing ships they were mostly in the northern hemisphere and mostly in the atlantic or near coast. since that is the oldest data there is, this is the farthest data most meteorologist use. there are some that use the data from ice cores, but that is limited to the current ice age. even this is argued over, with most having no interest in either side.

its only common sense that meteorologist are not going to use data that is not mearsured scientifically. since that is limited to the last century in most place, that is the limit of their data.

show me where common sense is wrong in this case instead of demanding that i give you the entire database of meteorologic knowledge.

meteorology is primarily concerned with predicting the weather for tomorrow and next week, with as much of a long term (read months) forcast as they can get a decent percentage chance of being right. few are concerned with years, unless they are being paid strickly to look for data, most of the time by ppl that demand they look for specific data. as an example, the ppl that fund the global warming trend research almost always demand that the researchers focus on man made warming. researchers paid by oil companies and such face demands to find non man made causes only. few are ever paid to look for anything and everything. this type of research results in two opposing groups, one that says that only man is responsible, and the other that says that man has not had any influence what so ever. there are few of us that are inbetween that are able and willing to look at both sides and see that both sides have good arguements and that they both have a part of the truth, but neither has all of it.

There are accurate temperature records that go back a few hundreds of thousands of years from ice cores in Antarctica and Greenland.

yes, but there are still arguements to the precision and most are not useable except to state that in a given year the tempature dropped to such and such a temperature. they are really not useable by meteorologist who are concerned with day to day highs and lows. those are good for long range patterns, but not things that the meteorologist need. how hot did it get on july 4 in the year 2000 years bc. for that matter how hot did it get on july 4 1705 in dallas tx. what was the low. what was the air pressure. wind speed, or direction. did it rain, or was it in the middle of a drought. yes there are scientist that are interested in these but not the majority of meteorologist.

dehammer you are just plain wrong.

Measurements from tree rings correlated with measurements from ice cores correlated with measurements from the deep oceans correlated with measurements of ocean level correlated with temperature measurements correlated with many other factors over many years all substantiate the exact same thing.

The overwhelming majority of meterologists and other scientists have concluded that global warming is a fact and have found that a substantial part clearly correlates with human activities. Your argument floats like a lead balloon. Give it up as you are just looking laughably foolish.

tree rings are only good for the life of the tree. since there are no trees from preice age, that doe not give a long enough time frame.

the thing about ice cores and tree rings is that they give only part of the picture. both are limited to the current ice age.

meteorologist that do study the long term ice cores will tell you that we are in a interglacerial period. geologist that study glaceral deposits will tell you that the ice age has had glacial periods (ice sheets extending) and interglacieral periods (ice sheets retreating). this is not the first time during this ice age that we have had a interglacieral period. nor is it the farthest that the ice sheet have melted. nor are they melting that much faster. the ones that say that man is the sole cause are not looking past the begining of this interglacerial period. most of them are not willing to note that the interglacerial period started before man was capable of doing that much damage to the enviroment.

as to all geologist not understanding what im saying. check this out

Lecture 24.
The Historical Geography & Biogeography of Tidal Salt Marshes
Key words: Geography, Biogeography: The Extent & Distribution of Marshlands (Distinctive Landscapes & Ecosystems)
The Extent & Distribution of Marsh Organisms
Historical
Past, Present, and Future
Tidal Marshes vs. Salt Marshes

Slide 1: Sea level fluctuations on varying timescales. In the last 20,000 years sea level has risen approximately 120 m.

http://geography.berkeley.edu/ProgramCourses/CoursePagesFA2002/Geog40/Geog40.Week10.html

it shows that in the past the sea lvls have been both lower and higher than they are now, and that covers times before man rising to two feet.

you will note, unless you refuse to see, that the sea change in the last 10 k years have actually been rather mild compared to the 10 k just before that. i do believe that was little pre industrialization period.

"There is no way of knowing for sure how many humans there were long ago, but there are estimates that we numbered about 4 to 5 million around the dawn of agriculture." http://www.sustreport.org/resource/es_timeline.html
less than 5 million ppl on the entire planet 10000 years ago. spread over the entire world, including the americas. much of them incapable of doing more tool working than putting flint on a shaft. while flint may be a good choise for an arrow head, it would have taken a long time to clear much from a forest to make a large farm. concidering that most of the space needed for farming was prairie anyway, why whould they have wasted their time cutting down trees for farm land. most of the trees cut down were use for home, which usually held large families. since most of the ppl before 8000 years go traveled year to year, their homes were generally made from light woods making them moveable. these trees would have been quick to be replaced by the forest.

in otherwords man did not creat the interglacerial period. he did not cause the majority of ocean rise. if he has acclerated it in the last 200 years, its hard to tell.

dehammer wrote:
"tree rings are only good for the life of the tree. since there are no trees from preice age, that doe not give a long enough time frame."

I've already figure out that you are incapable of remembering what you wrote on a previous page. But you've sunk to a new low not even reading what you wrote on the same page. Here's a refresher:

"the problem with meteorlogist is that they dont look beyound the last few years."

Now lets try this again using very small words. Tree rings allow for tracking climate for more than "the last few years."

As Mark Twain said:
"It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."

show me a tree ring that shows day to day tempature changes and ill show you meteriologist that are interested in it. yes there are some meteorologic researchers looking at tree rings and even a few looking at ice cores. but most of those doing so are not meteorologis.

perhaps i should have said the vast majoity of them are not interested. the majority track the day to day weather patterns. the tree rings tell ppl what the growth patterns were like during that year's growth season. that tells them that it was very dry, wet, extreamly cold or not. it does not tell them the tempature of the days. it does not tell them if it rained on a specific day. these are the things most meteorologist are interested in. these are the things that meteorologist need for accuracy of forcast. these done exist in tree rings, nor in ice cores.

the only thing tree rings show is if there was a good growing season, or not. the tempature could have been great, but no water. or there could have been plenty of water, but the tempature was too low, or the skys could have been over cast much of the time. any of these would have cause a smaller than normal ring. they cant give you accurate climate data. only averages of good growth conditions or not.

in addition there are not many areas that have tree rings going back more than few years. there are some that can go back more than a thousand years, but there are not many areas with that kind of data. in terms of glaceral periods 1000 years is not that long ago. there is even one group of trees that go back as far as 4600 years, but they only tell you what it was like in that part of california. that still does not give accruate information on the climate beyound that time. in terms of glacerial period this is of no use since the last glacieral period ended 14000 years go.

the big problem with these is that none of them can tell you what happen before the ice age. meteorologist are not interested in that period (for the most part) because there is no data for it and because its useless in telling them what the weather is like during an ice age, or more specificly, what happens during an interglacerial period.

if you cant post without insulting ppl, dont post

you are still ignoreing the fact that the oceans have been rising for 20000 years, with the majority of it being done in the first half of that time frame. since man did not start burning off woods (when it was needed) until 8000 years ago (assuming that he did that much) he still did not cause the majority of the global warming in the last 20000 years. what is 200 years of acurate day to day information compaired to 20000 years of global warming.

show me the meteorologist that will give an explination of how man (who was a hunter gatherer at that time) was responsible for a 100 meter ocean rise between 20000 and 10000 years ago. not one of them can claim that industrialiazed nations caused that.

here is something else to check out

"In conclusion, the totality of these several observations suggests that all of the hype surrounding the subject of a Gulf Stream shutdown due to a warming-induced increase in freshwater input to the Arctic Ocean is without a sound basis in either observation or theory."


http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V9/N19/C1.jsp

let me guess, these are not real scientist either?

your original statement indicated that doctors were surprised that insects were moving into an area that had been too cold for them before. when i pointed out that we were in an interglacieral period and that was to be expected, you turned into a discussion on meteorology, which is mainly the study of weather, and its prediction. for the most part meteologist arent concerned with if we are in an interglacerial period or not. they mostly are concerned with how hot is it going to be tomorrow, or if its going to rain. tree rings cant help them there, nor can ice cores.

the meteorologist that are concerned with tree rings, will tell you that there is no indications that there is a change in global warming to that lvl.

other meteorologist have this to say

"In light of these several observations, we suggest that the slight global warming evident in the satellite record of the past quarter-century was simply a natural consequence of El Ni?o activity, which will likely subside somewhat as the non-CO2-induced Modern Warm Period (which we believe to be a product of earth's natural millennial-scale oscillation of climate) becomes more firmly entrenched at a slightly higher temperature commensurate with that of the Medieval Warm Period.

Sherwood, Keith and Craig Idso

PS: For more information pertinent to the warming that produced the Little Ice Age to Modern Warm Period transition, see Climate Oscillations (Millennial Variability) in our Subject Index. "

http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V9/N19/EDIT.jsp

in otherwords the "global warming" is the result of mini ice age ending.

WHEN meteorologist look beyound the last century, they discover exactly what i said.

Maybe the science you should be arguing here is climatology?

i agree. climatology would be more interested in long term than meteorologist.

here is another quote that might interest ppl

What it means
The results of this study add to the growing body of evidence that the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age were global phenomena. What is more, they indicate there is nothing unprecedented about Current Warm Period temperatures in this region, which according to the data presented in the authors' Figure 3, remain about a degree Celsius lower than the peak warmth of the Medieval Warm Period.

http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V9/N19/C2.jsp

Well I'm certainly blown away by the credentials of the fine people at co2science.org.

The chairman has a PhD in geology.
The president has a PhD in agriculture.
The vice presidnet has a PhD in botany.
The ops manager has a BS in finance.

And their advisory board is similarly unqualified.

I wondered whose payroll they're on as they don't indicate their source of funding. Then I did what a researcher should do ... did some research.

Here's who Craig Idso, Chairman of the group is:
"From 2001-2002, C. Idso served as Director of Environmental Science at Peabody Energy in St. Louis, MO. According to a newsletter from Basin Electric, a Western Fuels Association member company, Craig and Keith Idso produced a report, "The Greening of Planet Earth Its Progression from Hypothesis to Theory," in January 1998 for the Western Fuels Association. Western Fuels Association is the suspected tfunder of the Center, though there is nothing more than circumstantial evidence. The Center does not reveal its funding sources."

Yep he's a shill for the energy industry. Thanks dehammer. Great job of something or other.

the point is that there is evidence of meteorologist that don't all agree with you. so what if the person that is president of the group that owns it is is in geology. they still have meteorologist doing the research.

most of the ppl you posted are paid by ppl that want to advance the idea that man is responsible for global warming. do you say "well their research is this because they are funded by ppl who what their research to claim this". no you claim that it is unbiased. i have said many times that their is few ppl that are not biased in one form or fashion. so what if one site i give you is funded by energy companies. does that mean their research is of no use. no. it is just as useful as the ones that are funded by pro global warming advocates. stick to the issues, if you can (you have shown a disturbing lack of this ability), instead of insulting everyone that is not in agreement with you. (are you sure your not a politician?) i have in other threads given you links to ppl that were not paid by either side that have given data that indicates that man is not responsible. yet you refuse to discuss them. why? cant find anything to insult or belittle them?

by the way, here is something you should get before you insult me

Climatology is the study of climate, and is a branch of the atmospheric sciences. In contrast to meteorology, which studies short term weather systems lasting up to a few weeks, climatology studies the frequency with which these weather systems occur. It does not study precise instances of atmospheric phenomena (for example cloud formation, rainfall and thunder), but rather their average occurrence over years to millennium, as well as changes in long-term average weather patterns, in relation to atmospheric conditions. Climatologists, those who practice climatology, study both the nature of climates - local, regional or global - and the natural or human-induced factors that cause climates to change. Climatology considers both past and potential future climate change.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatology ]

before you belittle ppl for not making mistakes you better clean up yours first.

as i stated before meteorologist are not concerned with more than a relatively short time period. climatologist are the ones that are interested in ice cores, and tree rings. i was correct the first time.

dehammer wrote:
"the point is that there is evidence of meterologist that done agree with you."

I know you are hard of thinking ... but a geologist is NOT a meteorologist. Neither is a botanist. Neither is someone whose degree is in agriculture. Where do you get your ideas? Certainly not from reading.

And these people are NOT a source of serious information. They are paid shills for the energy industry. Do you understand the concept of paid lobbyists? Paid advocates? Prostituting ethics for money? Are you familiar with the concept?

so the ppl that the run the site are not meteorologist. if you check on who writes the articles, and who does the research, you ll find some of them are.

also botanist would know more about tree rings.


do really believe they are any different than the ones that push the global warming scare. they refuse to see any thing that is not in their agenda as part of the cause of the problem. they refuse to see the sun as part of the cause, they refuse to accept that the fact that we are coming out of the "Little Ice Age" period (i put that into quotation so that you would see it as a full name instead of giving you ammunition to make yourself look foolish by breaking it down) and are heating up due to it. they refuse to see that the earth has been warmer in the last few millennium as that would mean that man and specifically Americans did not create it with their cars.

over the last few weeks Ive learned much, such as how the suns sunspots activities can create weather patterns that can cause ice ages. or that the El nino is millennium old and has been creating both short and long term weather patterns like the high temperatures of the last decade. Ive learned that the increase in the sunspot activities indicate that we will be having exceptional bad hurricane seasons.

Ive also did a lot of research on the theory of relativity, and all that is involved. mostly due to things said in this forum.

i have made a few mistakes, but i try to learn from them.

why don't you try to learn from some source other than the politically approved source you have. try reading something other than what proves what you already believe.

as far as a geologist not understanding how the changes in temperature and co2 and things are affecting things, who do you think would know more about things before the current ice age.

the earth has not always had ice. who would know this better than a geologist. a meteorologist? he only uses the data he gets to predict things like rain, wind, and related things for the near future. for that they required data that is not in ice cores, geological data, or tree rings.

as someone quote recently "its better to keep your mouth closed and have ppl think you are a fool, then to open it and remove all doubt.

dehammer wrote:
"so the ppl that the run the site are not meteorologist. if you check on who writes the articles, and who does the research, you ll find some of them are. also botanist would know more about tree rings."


School children know about tree rings. How that data is interpreted with respect to other information contained in historical and geological records is not their area of expertise.

Lets try this again ... you pointed not to a serious science web site you pointed to four people that are on the payroll of the energy industry. Of course they can dig up one or a dozen papers that support their claim. I can dig up paper supporting the fact that the invisibile purple rhinoceros created the universe. Paid shills are not a source of unbiased information. Wake up!

then why do you use them. all of your sites are the same. WAKE UP yourself. do you really think those ppl are doing that research with their own money. no, most of it is from government grants, and from sponsors. in other words, they are paid shrills.

Interesting take on warming and hurricanes....

Monster hurricanes

Study questions linkage between severe hurricanes and global warming

New research calls into question the linkage between major Atlantic hurricanes and global warming. That is one of the conclusions from a University of Virginia study to appear in the May 10, 2006 issue of the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

In recent years, a large number of severe Atlantic hurricanes have fueled a debate as to whether global warming is responsible. Because high sea-surface temperatures fuel tropical cyclones, this linkage seems logical. In fact, within the past year, several hurricane researchers have correlated basin-wide warming trends with increasing hurricane severity and have implicated a greenhouse-warming cause.

But unlike these prior studies, the U.Va. climatologists specifically examined water temperatures along the path of each storm, providing a more precise picture of the tropical environment involved in each hurricane's development. They found that increasing water temperatures can account for only about half of the increase in strong hurricanes over the past 25 years; therefore the remaining storminess increase must be related to other factors.

"It is too simplistic to only implicate sea surface temperatures in the dramatic increase in the number of major hurricanes," said lead author Patrick Michaels, U.Va. professor of environmental sciences and director of the Virginia Climatology Office.

For a storm to reach the status of a major hurricane, a very specific set of atmospheric conditions must be met within the region of the storm's development, and only one of these factors is sufficiently high sea-surface temperatures. The authors found that the ultimate strength of a hurricane is not directly linked to the underlying water temperatures. Instead, they found that a temperature threshold, 89?F, must be crossed before a weak tropical cyclone has the potential to become a monster hurricane. Once the threshold is crossed, water temperature is no longer an important factor. "At that point, other factors take over, such as the vertical wind profile, and atmospheric temperature and moisture gradients," Michaels said.

While there has been extensive recent discussion about whether or not human-induced global warming is currently playing a role in the increased frequency and intensity of Atlantic hurricanes, Michaels downplays this impact, at least for the current climate.

"The projected impacts of global warming on Atlantic hurricanes are minor compared with the major changes that we have observed over the past couple of years," Michaels said.

He points instead to naturally varying components of the tropical environment as being the primary reason for the recent enhanced activity.

"Some aspects of the tropical environment have evolved much differently than they were expected to under the assumption that only increasing greenhouse gases were involved. This leads me to believe that natural oscillations have also been responsible for what we have seen," Michaels said.

But what if sea-surface temperatures continue to rise into the future, if the world continues to warm from an enhancing greenhouse effect?

"In the future we may expect to see more major hurricanes," Michaels said, "but we don't expect the ones that do form to be any stronger than the ones that we have seen in the past."


###
Michaels' co-authors are Robert E. Davis, associate professor of environmental sciences and Paul C. Knappenberger, former U.Va. graduate student in environmental sciences.

Reference:
Michaels, P. J., P. C. Knappenberger, and R. E. Davis, 2006. Sea-surface temperatures and tropical cyclones in the Atlantic basin. Geophysical Research Letters, 33, doi:10.1029/2006GL025757.

nice find.

ill warn you, da will claim these are not real scientist, since they are not meteorologist.

after all "what would a climatologist know about climates?" according to da, its the meteorologist that know all about it. even then it has to be the political correct ones or they are not real scientist either.

as for me, i agree with you.

I don't comment on research until it is published, I've read it, and others have weighed in on the credibility of the conclusions.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

no thanks, smoking is bad for your heath and it messes up your brain. maybe you should quit ... if its not too late....

hmm,

mosquito bites transfer it to birds that migrate to the south, in the winter the birds fly north then again in the summer...

this is a quote from http://westnilevirus.nbii.gov/
The West Nile virus (WNV) was first detected in the Western Hemisphere in 1999 and has since rapidly spread across the North Americcan continent into all 48 continental states, seven Canadian provinces, and throughout Mexico. In addition, WNV activity has been detected in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Guadeloupe and El Salvador.


I do not see how this has to do with global warming...

and what high vally's?
considering malaria is mainly in Africa, Asia and Latin America...

"I do not see how this has to do with global warming..."

The change in climate extends the range of the
parasite vector to new territory.

For West Nile in the Western Hemisphere though,
we can thank the airlines.

Pragmatist

As to the origional subject, "TheCO2 Science` Statement:
They limited their study to data from 1960 on.
I can recall a Sci. Amer. article , published in
the '50`s that linked freshwater flows in the
arctic to European climate.
The study was based on data from sediments and
historical records back several hundred years,
and showed a strong corelation.
I feel that D.A.s suspicions concerning this
group are well founded.
Pragmatist

the point Ive tried to make several time is that there is evidence that its not man that is creating this situation. man may be contributing to it, but to claim that its all man made is rather as far off as these ppl claiming that man is not at all responsible. if your going to find the true answers you cant turn off one side just because they are being funded by your opponents, unless your willing to look at who is funding and why the reports from your side.

i have stated more than once that there was a problem with accepting any reports from anyone, because most of them are political in nature. than means that any data that does not support their political beliefs are either ignore or discarded and discounted.

at one point da accused me of being a political patsy (my term not his), but the reality is i don't have a political leaning. I'm as likely to vote democratic as republican, because to me their all thieves. its just a matter of trying to get the one that is the likely to do the least damage.

the same is true of my view of global warming. i don't hide my head in the sand and say its not happening, but neither do i ignore data that says its one thing or not one thing.

these ppl are a good example. da decrees them because one of them is a botanist. who better than a botanist would be able to understand what tree rings and remains from animals and trees could tell. one of their articles was about tree rings in japan that showed signs that the "Little Ice Age" that plagued Europe was world wide. another showed the same thing from American and south America. proponents of the "man is the only cause of global warming" are ignoring the fact that we are still coming out of that. they also ignore the fact that preceding it there was a period of warming that was much hotter than it is now.

those who claim that man is causing the seas to raise are ignoring the fact that 30 thousand years ago, the seas were a little bit higher than now, then dropped (about 20000 years ago) to 120 meters lower than it is now, then shot back up. even assuming that in the early days of agriculture, man burned a large portion of the forest, something that has not been proven, this would have taken place several thousand years after the largest part of the rise of the seas.

i will not, nor have i ever said that man is not partially reponsible for it. but its a matter of how much did we do, and could we really have done anything but slow it down, even if we had known a long time ago about it. as far as the earth is concerned there is little difference bewteen us and insects. niether of us really matter to what the earth is doing or going to do. (no im not saying that the earth is thinking, but a boulder will role down hill without thinking and water will find its own lvl without thinking, so doing something does not require thought.)

not arguing or anything. just pointing something out.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
the closest you are going to get is the british naval data and that is not much more than 200 to 300 years old. most of that is ignored since it was taken out at sea and only where the ships happened to be.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

these records were also taken from the ships decks,
not at sea level and not of water temperature.

the wind speed would also need to be known to have more correct measurements due to the chill factor of wind as the instruments used were affected by wind chill factors.

apx 13,000 years ago durring the last ice age
there was a massive methane ice release that set in motion the end of that ice age.
there are large pocks in the ocean floor where these methane ice releases occured.

the methane warmed the earth and more methane was released warming the earth even more.
coastal populations were wipped out by the waters from the melting ice.
these cities or there remains have been found around the globe hundreds of feet below current sea level.

those methane releases wipped out most of the human population on the earth at that time.

currently the U.S. is literaly surrounded by large methane ice deposits whos methane release is vulnerable to sea temperature changes.

what we are about to undergo has probably occured over and over again , we can find evidence of this every where.

we can argue and fuss and get all bent out of shape about climate change and what caused it
or we can try to learn from what history we actually have and do something about it.

those who work together to accomplish a goal
can accomplish that goal easier and faster than those who only complain and fuss about the goal or they just end up creating a goal of only fussing and arguing.

i fully agree with all of this. unfortunately, its much easier to get funding for studies, if you sensationalize it. blaming it on cars and big industry is quite sensational. that makes it very political. warning that ice is going to melt is not very sensational. it does not get the political push that big money funding gets. its hard to create a scare tactic based on ice melting, esp the ice we don't see. ice in antarctica and ice land is easy to do if there are other things going on with it.

thanks for the approval ( not dissagreeing )

the problem is known , the cause is known , the results of the problem are known.

what we need is a solution to the known problem.

we cannot expect a government that is so highly dependant on the income from the problems source
to fund anything that will eventually remove that income.

the known problem is that the earth is warming.
the known results is certain catastrophy.

we cannot stop pumping out the oil.
we will lose coastal grounds if we do.

we need to find a way to stop the flooding and find it soon.

we need to find a way to cool the earth.

we need to try our best to control the climate.

you dont have to have ice when reflecting the suns rays.
ie...

white reflective roofing. streets. buildings.
paint the places where the ice was white.
paint the deserts white.

put up a shield between the earth and the sun.
the shield could be a gas.

use sand on the ocean floor for building purposes.

when we can control the flooding then we can stop pumping the oil.

otherwise we lose ground.

when trying to get funding remember to keep the oil flowing dont try to stop it.

try to work around it make the problems effects
less and you might get some funding.

G'day Daniel,

This is where you disappeared to. The arguments you were using in the "Global Warming" discussion are rehashed here. The same counter arguments seem to be used as well.

I really have to agree with those that oppose your arguments. You make sweeping statements and when asked to back these with any reference to real research ignore the question.

I found this discussion fascinating by what was argued, not by whether it was of any assistance to anyone reading the argument at all.

Meteorologists really are not involved in global warming debates. The field of meteorology is by its nature, very short term. It is a very valuable field and in the last fifty years, the gains have been enormous. Meterologists can now predict the landfall of cyclones, typhoons and hurricanes (all the same thing but I like to be inclusive of various cultures here) and in moderate climates a great many areas have accurate weather forcasts three days out and some reasonable sense of reliability as much as seven days.

But what does this have to do with global warming? Or with the name of this thread "As the Earth Warms". I find the timing of this thread interesting. It was about the time that you were asked to put up or shut up in the main global warming thread by a number of people.

Tree rings, ice cores, deep ocean somethings, sea levels somehow are all said to have correlated. Huh! Where? What study or studies have shown any of this? Tree rings go back around 3,000 years, about a third of this interglacial period. Ice cores go back around 800,000 years. The rest, I have no idea what you are talking about. They were too vaguely put.

Tree rings tell you bugger all about climate. They tell you about seasons. They do not tell you much about CO2 levels. They can tell you whether there was volcanic activity or major forest fires but other than that they tell you only whether there was a good or a bad growing season. Not why. In other words you can have a cool summer but good rain and mild conditions and a really distinct growth ring or you can have extremely hot weather and good rainfall and another really distinct ring or hot weather and very dry conditions and a really crappy ring.

The rings indicate only whether the season overall was good or bad for the tree, not the variables that made it so.

Ice cores have their own problems but the science of that is much more complicated. This means that someone doing a study on ice cores can make assumptions about things that are rarely challenged. Talk about soft science. The other problem is that ice cores are precious and are not subject to scrutiny by just anyone who wants to have a look at them. So the accuracy of the data is only as good as the honesty or abilities of those that are reading them. But once again, ice cores do not tell you temperatures, humidity, maximums, minimums, wind speeds, ocean currents or anything else. They can be used to show trends but only in very relative terms.

I really didn't like your comment to dehammer concerning what the vast majority of "meterologists" have concluded since you offer no evidence to substantiate such a comment. Unfortunately, since you included "other scientists" your statement is valid, if snidley put.

Actually the vast majority of those scientists that work in the field of global warming do agree that global warming is a fact. I think the figure is around 85% presently but it could have changed since I last saw a report on it. Whether the majority agree on whether it is man made is a different question and I'm not at all sure you would be right in your statement.

But being in the majority does not make one right. A staggering 92% of Germans in 1938 through Hitler's policies were right for Germany. This was after the arrest of disadents, jews, the disabled (such as myself and my heritage is German, just a different time), the immoral etc. By your argument Hitler's policies must have been correct because the vast majority of those with the expertise to judge (the German people) agreed with it.

Science is riddled with very very big issues where the vast majority of scientists just knew that a particular view was wrong only later to be shown that the majority didn't have a clue. Actually, there is pretty much not a single major advancement of science which has occurred without it being against the majority that held opposing views.

So if you are going to argue that someone's ideas "float like a lead balloon" or are "laughingly foolish" perhaps you should try to stick to the science of the argument, not what others or even the majority think.

Daniel, I ask you to do a simple exercise. Find a major article published in the last three years that critisises the science of global warming. Now find how many articles are published each week that support global warming. It takes a very foolish person or a brave man to swim against such overwhelming numbers and that has become the self fulfilling prophecy of global warming as a fact and being man made.

Regardless of that immense tide I again offer to look at any study you wish to put up in support of global warming and point out the major flaws, if any. You might be really luck and actually find one that for once does not have major flaws. It would be a refreshing change.

But I have a huge advantage. I have sufficient academic background in various fields to understand how studies are conducted and the good fortune to have been granted sufficent intelligence to analyse both the studies and the underlying data. Over the years I have also developed the unpleasant ability to find fault in arguments where there is really a fault. That has never made me popular but in my previous fields it did make me a decent living!

But my biggest advantage is that I derive no income from the field of climatology (the word you should have used by the way), do not care if my views are published, have enough degrees to last a couple of life times and do not need any more, have no ability to teach at University and even if I did the last offer had nothing to do with global warming and so my "crackpot" ideas in this field would not affect that offer at all. But I really do feel for those that are committed to these fields, want to participate in them, and also have a family and earn some income, but just do not believe the current party line or worse have very good evidence to suggest the opposite to the current majority opinion.

How about offering some reference to research rather than insults to those that profer different views.


Richard

G'day Paul,

I liked your comments about ships. You are right about just how inaccurate the figures are because of the various variables to the way the temperatures were recorded. There are many more but you made a good point and one that is often overlooked when figures for sea temperatures are used for the 20th century or air temperature above ships in the same period.

I have a problem with your proposition concerning methane deposits and this causing the end of the last ice age. I know the terminology gets messed up all the time but this Ice Age has been around considerably more than 1 million years. The glacial period that ended a little more than 11,000 years ago is probably what you are referring to.

Your methane theory is something I have not come across as the cause of the end of the last glacial period but a few of your comments can be directly addressed. There was not large loss of human life at the glacial/interglacial period boundary. Quite the reverse in fact. The populations of the world expanded around that time. There is a great deal of evidence as to populations of man from the transition from hunter/gatherer to agrarian societies and a vast amount of studies relating to populations around the times you mentioned.

There were pretty much no cities 11,000 years ago. The largest settlements were really quite small indeed.

While I am not an expert in methane deposits I had the luck to read about the methane that is available as perhaps an alternative energy source around the US only a week or so ago. This is not on the ocean floor. Because of salinity, the bottom of the oceans are not frozen wastelands at all. The methane is in sediment deposits and these have been around for geological periods (ie an awful long time more than one or two inter-glacial periods). They are not all that easy to extract because in order to exist at all they need a combination of factors that thus far have not been found other than beneath the ocean floors. From the science that was discussed in how they were formed and how they could be extracted it would appear that not even switches to or from full blown Ice Ages would dislodge the deposits. I understand there is a theory, based on reasonable evidence, that major methane release did occur and it is possible this was at the same time as climate change. This is around 55 million years ago. Just why it happened then, I have no idea, but that is the only reference to methane deposits being released I could find.

As to attempts at cooling the planet, do you really want to live in a glacial period? Only about 2% of the population would survive. Painting a few roofs white is not going to change a thing by the way as the grime that would build up on the roofs would drop their albedo (solar radiation reflectively) substantially fairly quickly and the percantage surfaces would be tiny in the scheme of things. But let's say you came up with a way to actually cool the planet. Do you really believe you are God? That you could work out a way to cool the planet by just the right amount without affecting the myriad of interconnected systems?

This is a science forum. Perhaps you could point out any reference to massive methane release 11,000 odd years ago. Methane would leave traces and would be well known. Surely you would have no difficulty in finding major references to it.

Richard

try these they may not all be correct as this is just a google search I did.
I havent read them yet , I was working from memory.
I am not at all sure how you could even imagine that a person could be GOD.
I dont want to argue with you .. hopefully you will extend the same to me.
we can discuss this if you wish.
but if you resort to namecalling then you will find yourself discussing it without me.


methane ice release 11000 years ago

Execelent place to browse... National Geophysical Data Center...entire earth + sea floor 2 minute color relief

The place Im refering to.
Huge Pock Marks Where the methane ice releases occured

I'll try and find an article that refers to the pock marks on the ocean floor.

here is (my) thoughts on this matter...

at the time before the earth warmed due to the methane release , everywhere that is now above the ocean was covered in ice.
nobody lived there...

thus no cities were there...
it makes sence to me.

look at the reliefs and see the old river beds under what is now the oceans.
Old Rivers
they are distinct you can follow the paths of these old rivers.

they run from what is now our shore line to deep in the ocean floor.

warm water would not do this only cold icy water would seek the ocean floor.

pay particular attention to the gulf of mexico it is criss crossed in an amazing pattern.

I believe that the reason for the methane ice release was that the oceans kept getting smaller and there depth became less and less , methane ice cannot survive at a depth less than apx 1500 ft , just a little over 1 lap around a 1/4 mile track...thats not far at all when you think of it.

as the ice built up the oceans receded and the water pressure was reduced.

one release led to another and another.
and the warming began.

think of trying to climb up very steep soaking wet mountains as seen in the imagery while torrents of melting water pushed against you.

most of those who tried to escape were probably washed back down into the oceans and drowned.

it all makes sense to me.

they have discovered that about 22000 years ago or so, the ocean levels were 120 meters lower than they are now. that's about 400 feet. its been that low before. that's a lot of pressure off the sea floor.

also if you check out other threads here, they have discovered that the arctic was almost tropical several million years ago. it occurred rather suddenly apparently. that could have been caused by a major release in methane ice. the thing is, the temperature was a lot higher before that release than it is now.

G'day Paul,

The reference to God was to make a point. It was certainly not an attempt to name call at all. That is something I do not agree with on any forum for discussion. I do hope you appreciate there is a big difference between exaggerating to emphasise a point such as the reference to God and actually calling someone a God or believing they think they are.

As best as I could find, there is no evidence for any significant release of methane 11,000 years ago. It is not an area in which I have any particular expertise at all, as it has never been brought up in the area where my fascination lies. Having looked at the information available, methane has the potential to make major climate changes if released in large quantities. It may well have done so, as I previously said 55 million years ago (or the methane might have been released in response to a massive climate change - I do like these chicken and egg questions especially when there seems to be no science to support either argument well).

As to "rivers" on the ocean beds, dehammer is right in respect to massive rises and falls in ocean levels. In this Ice Age (somewhat more than a million years in geologic time), there has been a great many fluctuations in sea levels. They have been around 120 metres lower than they are now and around 40 metres higher. There is less evidence, but still some evidence, to suggest that lower levels have occurred.

Now 160 metres is a very long way indeed. It means the difference between much of the continental shelves being exposed and well underwater. To use a nice simple example, Sydney Harbour, is quite famous for its natural beauty (and the yearly fireworks that are amongst the first in the world - it starts at Tonga, then NZ, then eastern Australia). It is a river bed as are a great many other major world harbours. 20,000 odd thousand years ago, there was a creek running where ferries now travel. The creek could be waded across in drought times. The water edge for the coast was as much as 8 kilometres (about 5 miles) further out that it is now, thus what is seen on most continental shelves are the remnants of rivers, creeks, etc that flowed during the last lower period.

The theory that makes sense to you would be a good theory if any evidence supported it and that is what these forums are for. To discuss the evidence available. The references you provided did not actually suggest that there was a major release of methane 11,000 years ago or that this was the cause of this interglacial period.

As to the far distant past, the evidence is that the world was a pretty hot place indeed. At different periods the world was much hotter than today but generally, and this is a very big generalisation, the earth has cooled over the millennia.

What is not a generalisation is just how recent human habitation has been. Humans did not get swept back down to sea by rising sea levels in the times that climates changed greatly because humans just were not around during almost all of those changes. Human life is pretty much confined to this Ice Age. Before that and our ancestors were more ape like than human like. It was only about 700,000 that the acceleration towards human like creatures began, with the use of fire becoming widespread and therefore, the need to digest raw food being reduced meant that other developments could occur.

Humans have suffered greatly due to the flip flops between interglacial periods and glaciations in this ice age and my guess is that floods caused some losses but most of the losses were the change to environment that made life harsher.

Pretty much all modern human development has been in this one very very small interglacial period. Before that settlements were not permanent. Think of the way of life of the Inuit, American Indians, Australian aborigines, New Guinea tribesman, for an idea of how life was for most humans before the dawn of this interglacial period and the settlement near the Mediterranean that ended up in "civilisation".

You also mentioned deep ocean floor patterns as part of a theory on methane release. This is also not an area of expertise but I understand that there are some really fascinating reasons for the patterns but they were not made because the water is normally warm and into it intruded "rivers" of cold water.

Very cold water is part of the ocean depths. It is near to freezing anyway. Whether the world above the sea is warm or cold makes pretty much no difference to the temperature of the water at significant depths (I say pretty much because the very small differences caused by very slow vertical currents actually do have a significant effect on climate but in terms of what would normally be considered "warm" and "cool", the difference is negligible). So icy waters flowing from above the oceans just wouldn't do it. The icy water entering from the Antarctic for instance, is pretty much the same temperature as the water it eventually reaches at depth, close to zero C.

Paul, you have an interesting perspective on the world and obviously are interested in this topic. It is with evidence that even seemingly outlandish theories have been proved correct or had to be discarded. Plate tectonics is perhaps the classic example in Earth Sciences of a theory that was really taken as a crackpot theory until eventually the evidence was presented that was too overwhelming to ignore anymore (amazingly that took around 60 years after the evidence was available but that is one of the really big drawbacks of theoretical science, peer review and the inertial in scientific thought where it does not conform to the mainstream).

As to methane causing climate change whether in the short term or in the much longer time frame, there does, in the end, need to be evidence to suggest that this is a valid explanation. Certainly in the short term, there does not seem to be any such evidence at all.


Richard

there is a large amount of methane about to be released into the atmosphere that has been forcasted
to release billions of tonnes of methane as the permafrost warms , the methane comes from peat.
which was formed about 11,000 yrs ago.
there might be a method to control the release.
Methane Consumming Bactierium and Microbes ... nice to know that they do exist.

thank you for your concern rics about my interest
I live here too perhaps that is the foundation for my interest, and I would hope that my children could breath clean free fresh air as I have.

earths atmospheric mass --> 5000 trillion metric tonnes.

current atmospheric methane content by volume 1.745 ppmv

releasing 1 billion tonnes into 5000 trillion tonnes may not seem to be alot.

but when the release is a greenhouse gas its effects may and probably will be drastic to the climate.

G'day Paul,

Thus far your links in support of your positions have included google search references. That is NOT a reference nor of any value. Because of the way Google does searches, the top entry or even the top few entries may differ between your search and a search conducted at a later time.

A link to a search does not even suggest what reference you actually wished to refer to.

I have trouble with your last comment which included the statement that the permafrost will warm and that this will release methane in rather large quantities. From ice core samples of previous hot periods such methane releases do not seem to have occurred and the question of the melting of permafrost is a prediction based on little hard science.

These are just that sort of predictions used in newsaper articles on global warming, without reference to any actual science. They are often based on "common sense" logic. In this instance, the release of methane just does not seem to have occurred during times of permafrost retreat after the flip to an interglacial period. If it has not occurred in the past, the prediction that it will occur due to warming that is currently occurring (if it really is occurring and is not simply a fluctuation inherent in the climatic system during an interglacial period), really has to be treated with a great deal of sceptiscism.

As to when peat was actually formed, I think you will find there are many different types of peat deposits (the forerunner of coal production from previous deposits of plant matter) and the ages of such deposits vary from peat that has just been laid down to deposits that date back a great deal further than 11,000 years.

There was a study of permafrost peat deposits in Siberia that showed signs of thawing that suggested that this could release methane. The study is very much based on suposition, it seems to me, with once again a lack of hard science.

As I stated earlier Permafrost peat deposits have thawed in the past during several periods of warming on this earth and the records that exist do not support that this led to atmospheric methane upsurge.

This is one of the principal problems with global warming arguments. Quite aside from the argument whether there is sufficient evidence to support that any prolonged warming is really occurring, all manner of disasters are predicted because of global warming, and in these areas the predictions seemed to be little better than crystal ball gazing. Massive methane release that actually had an effect on the world's climate or at least coincided with a major change in climate really only is evident once in time of vertebrate life. That was 55 million years ago. There just does not seem to be any precident for the predictions relating to methan deposit release being an inevitable result of current warming, which in turn will lead to other disastrous effects.


Richard

Hi RicS,

So you're saying that the following article is absolutely baseless?

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18725124.500

Quote - "In May this year, Katey Walter of the University of Alaska Fairbanks told a meeting in Washington of the Arctic Research Consortium of the US that she had found methane hotspots in eastern Siberia, where the gas was bubbling from thawing permafrost so fast it was preventing the surface from freezing, even in the midst of winter."


That's a million square kilometers with a couple of billion tonnes of trapped methane bubbling away.

What 'Hard Science' leads you to believe this will not release large amounts of methane into the atmosphere?

Blacknad.

G'day Blacknad,

Good question. There is a big difference however between peat bogs or marshes giving off methane (something that I understand they are rather prone to doing) and this being released on a massive scale. The historic records do not seem to bear out such releases. The historic records do not also seem to bear out the supposition that methane release correlates with major warming events (with one very big possible exception).

The reference to which you refer, is an article that is full of "may"'s and "could"'s. The fact that such a large mass of methane may actually be subject to sudden release is cause for concern. But it does depend on what type of environmentalist you are. Should the current environment be preserved at all costs, even if the devastation of a natural environment has a natural cause? Or should the fact that the only certainty on this planet is that it is constantly changing and as long as the environmental changes are not caused by man and such changes when caused by man are not likely to be significantly negative mean that nothing should be done in the face of such changes?

Or to get really fundamental, what can man do to reverse the change in the landscape in Siberia and Alaska even if caused by man. If all CO2 and other greenhouse gas release by man were stopped right now, the changes would already be such, according to the various models that say that man made global warming is already very much with us, that they would continue to happen. Oh, and stopping all greenhouse gas production would condemn pretty much all but a very few of the world's population to death.

Back to the methane specifically. Aside from anything else, it the methane that is currently locked into the bogs in Siberia would make a very good, environmentally friendly source of energy, if harnessed correctly. For a long time peat was the primary source of energy needs for substantial populations (but wasn't harnessed very efficiently or cleanly for that matter either but that is not to say it could not be done).

The article referred to is not a research paper. It quotes a warming trend for the region that does not appear to be backed up by satellite data. It also does not mention at all where the 3 degree figure actually came from. It highlights the following:

"This is an ecological landslide that is probably irreversible and is undoubtedly connected to climatic warming"

Yet, even supposedly being a reputable scientific publication, New Scientist offers no research or reference to any research that backs such assertions up. It simply does what seems to pass for science nowadays, it quotes the opinions of scientists without needing any research at all to back up such opinions. If I approached New Scientist with a counter view I can absolutely guarantee that I would be told that it was not newsworthy unless backed by major research. I actually wonder if, even if backed by major research whether it would get a hearing.

The article also fails to mention that the earth is prone to the release of stores of carbon dioxide and many other gasses, now considered to be greenhouse gasses (which now seems to be anything that can exist in the atmosphere - really the biggest greenhouse gas is water vapour - it makes up around 98% of the total greenhouse gasses available). Such releases occur with volcanic activities and with changes in environments for purely natural reasons.

As best as can be determined from the evidence available, the release of such greenhouse gasses, almost never results in global warming. It has resulted in global cooling a few times. And that is the difficulty with all of these types of stories. A natural event is occurring (or it might even be man made - unlikely in this case but I'd be happy to concede the point). Since this event has been noticed or reported on during the period where all world natural events are indicators of global warming, then it must be part of the global warming cycle. Then of course, the hysteria is added to by using what is occurring to say that it will accelerate the global warming process. How come it just has not occurred in the past? And please do not say it is because man did not effect nature in the past.

The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is insignificant compared to what has been the norm in the earth's history, yet most of the time the world was colder. Methane and other gasses' concentrations have also varied yet they too do not seem to correlate with climate change. The reason for this is pretty simple. The principal mechanism for temperature control on the earth is water in the atmosphere. Doubling, tripling or quadrupling CO2 in the atmosphere changes the mix by a very small effect and it would seem that water in the atmosphere as a principal means of temperature stabilisation on a planet is self correcting to a large degree. It works so well in fact that according to a recent study on the tropics, the temperatures in the tropics has stayed within a couple of degrees of its current average for many millions of years regardless of glaciations, interglacial periods or the coming or going of Ice Ages.

It really is a very simple question. What makes everyone so sure that greenhouse gas is being released because of global warming or that it will cause global warming when all the evidence that is really available from the earth's history show that it has done no such thing in the past (in the case of CO2 despite being in concentrations that are several hundred percent higher than the worst estimates of what man has been able and is going to be able to produce in the foreseeable future).

Richard

RicS wrote:
"The historic records do not seem to bear out such releases."

And you, having found this to be facdt by research rather than just making it up off the top of your head because it was convenient you can, of course, point us to a credible reference source that supports this statement?

Please do so or have the integrity to admit it is pure drivel!

Thanks Richard,

Regarding the above quote...

Could it be possible that the records do not show such major releases of methane into the atmosphere, because overall, the levels of methane historically would have always been far lower than today.

Two thirds of methane is produced by the following: wetlands and rice fields, as well as the digestion of ruminants and termites, waste disposal sites, and the gas produced by sewage treatment plants.

During the last interglacial period some of those producing factors would simply not have existed or in the case of ruminants would have existed in far fewer numbers.

Also IF humanity has contributed to global warming in tandem with a natural cycle, then it may be that temperature increase is faster than in the past and therefore the incidence of 'positive feedback' is also faster. Simply put, melting of peat bogs in the past may have been slower, allowing more time for methane to be broken down.

So because methane (as you say) has not been shown to be significant in previous warmings, may be no indicator that it is not playing a significant role today.


RicS Said - "Good question. There is a big difference however between peat bogs or marshes giving off methane (something that I understand they are rather prone to doing) and this being released on a massive scale."


That is exactly the point isn't it. In the past the unfreezing of peat bogs was probably far slower allowing for a gradual and much more manageable breakdown of methane in the atmosphere (CH4 molecules last on average 9 years in the atmosphere - but during periods of higher concentration will probably last longer due to there not being enough OH radicals to go around). What we may be seeing today is a quicker release being much harder for the planet to deal with ? exacerbated by the far higher biogenic production due to a greater human population, along with their bovine friends and paddy fields.

Blacknad.

Richard,

I am glad to see you have jumped to a conclusion on this. There's nothing like standing firm on an issue ? but it seems that others are less sure than you are.

Scientists at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies certainly feel that the jury is still out.

http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/features/methane/


Note part of the summary:

?Over the last 30 years, methane has gone from being a gas of no importance, to ? in some researchers eyes, at least ? possibly the most important greenhouse gas both for understanding climate change and as a cost-effective target for future emission reductions. Whether some of these new ideas stand up to the scrutiny of the wider climate research community remains to be seen, but one thing is certain, the scientific journey of methane is not yet complete.?


Blacknad.

G'day Daniel,

How do you prove a negative? How about you point to any research that shows that methane has been the trigger for global change in the past (except the 55 million year ago occurrence which I'm happy to concede).

That is the problem with your posts. You insist that anyone but you back up general statements. Please point to research, ice core sample analysis or anything else you might wish to use that actually indicates that methane release was a climate change trigger, then I'll discuss the matter further with you.


Richard

G'day Blacknad,

A really reasoned argument. Thank you.

What you say may well be true. It is a primary difficulty in climate change that so little records exist and the study of historic climate has for a very long time been consigned to a very low level. It is also more difficult to study historic climate than simple look for fossils to study evolutionary paths. I understand how difficult it is to extrapolate from the scant fossil record for many periods just what was around let alone attempting to understand climate on a world scale. The evidence is not directly available and even indirect evidence is difficult to locate and subject to interpretation.

In broad brush terms the climate of the world is somewhat known. The concentrations of CO2 has at least a degree of certainty to it as does the concentration of oxygen, etc. So arguments about what happened in the past can only be as good as the evidence thus far uncovered.

How about a simple counter logic to yours as a starting point. This interglacial period has been of much longer duration than the "average" for this ice age. The oscillation of interglacial periods to glacial periods seemed to have settled down to a fairly consistent pattern starting around 120,000 years ago. This interglacial period breaks the mold in that it is several thousand years longer than the norm.

If peat bogs that are under permafrost existed in equal quantities during all interglacial periods then it would be expected that the extra years would eventually cause a difference in pattern of release to occur. The same goes for the retreat of glaciers and a number of other things. Given a long enough interglacial period and glaciers melt, the permafrost retreats etc.

Since humans have certainly not extended this interglacial period by several thousand years then the differences could also be considered to be natural, could they not?

I also have some problems with the suggestion that the numbers of ruminant animals being fewer in previous interglacial periods. We were not around to count them as we now are. We can currently say with some accuracy how many cows exist on this earth but we have no idea what that figure was even 2,000 years ago. However it is reasonable to assume that there were large numbers of ruminant animals (and they are not the only methane producing animals by the way) in the past. There is evidence of vast herds that roamed the earth in past geological times and in much more recent times. Before man?s impact in large numbers in many parts of the world, the numbers of herbivores that produce methane are actually so large they are difficult to imagine. I do remember vaguely a passage from an explorer?s diary of a couple of centuries back where he was talking of the migration of grass eaters in Africa, saying that he witnessed the movement of many millions of animals that stretched from horizon to horizon and took literally days to pass. While that is anecdotal and it could be argued that was a concentration in one small area and does not necessary mean than the whole world was overrun by herbivores, I still find it useful as a way of at least considering that number of ruminants in the world is not necessarily determined by whether man decided to domestic some of them.

Think of buffaloes as another example. The numbers of these creatures during the last interglacial periods would be truly breathtaking. Indeed, until man decided to slaughter them a few hundred years ago, it is quite possible - at least from the information I have read - that they existed in far greater numbers than the grazing stock that eventually replaced them.

This is one of the real problems in discussing climate change. To argue effectively your expertise needs to be truly immense, covering a large number of dissimilar fields. I lay no such claim and so I'm open to any discussion as to the number of animals that existed over time or evidence that what I have just suggested is wrong. I'm dredging into memories of study that is not directly related to my interests to address what has been suggested, and obviously I could be mistaken.

It is also true that methane went from nothing 30 years ago to the big bogie today. But this seems to have happened without any correlating increase in evidence as to why this has occurred. Have studies uncovered prior correlations between methane and climate from ice cores for instance other than the obvious that there should be somewhat more methane in warmer periods?

It is true in one ice core study that methane concentrations have changed from a stable 600 ppb (and parts per billion is what we are talking about here) to around 1400 ppb today (actually there are higher figures but these are not from ice samples but from air samples), with the trend of acceleration starting around 1800. While the acceleration has been in modern times, it is the 1800 start that would give me pause for thought if I was trying to establish a correlation between methane concentrations and human activities.

In earlier ice cores there has been shown a small correlation between fluctuations in methane and climate. But that should be expected. The warmer the climate, the more methane that should be produced. What the correlations do not show is methane CAUSING any climate change. As best as can be analysed, the methane fluctuations follows the climate (a slight lag has been picked up in some studies) and then we get right back to a chicken and egg question. But in this case the likelihood is much less than methane came first since there is such an obvious explanation for fluctuations simply due to increased biological activity, photosynthesis etc during warmer periods.

Finally, if methane really is a greenhouse gas 30 times or 50 times as effective at trapping atmospheric heat than CO2 for instance, so what? Its concentrations could be in the order of several magnitudes higher and it would still be dwarfed the effect CO2 is said to have and the effect that water vapour really does have.

I do hope this gives some pause for thought even if you do not agree with a word written. I find the very best ways of assisting me in research is to have someone with a violently counter view review it. Those that agree with you rarely suggest anything that actually makes you think about your own position or, if necessary, alter it.


Richard

QUOTE]Originally posted by RicS:
How about a simple counter logic to yours as a starting point. This interglacial period has been of much longer duration than the "average" for this ice age. The oscillation of interglacial periods to glacial periods seemed to have settled down to a fairly consistent pattern starting around 120,000 years ago. This interglacial period breaks the mold in that it is several thousand years longer than the norm.

If peat bogs that are under permafrost existed in equal quantities during all interglacial periods then it would be expected that the extra years would eventually cause a difference in pattern of release to occur. The same goes for the retreat of glaciers and a number of other things. Given a long enough interglacial period and glaciers melt, the permafrost retreats etc.

Since humans have certainly not extended this interglacial period by several thousand years then the differences could also be considered to be natural, could they not? [/QUOTE]

Hello again Richard and thanks for your response.

It seems to me, to be less about the length of time of the interglacial period and more about the warming over the past few decades. We are currently pumping 20 billion metric tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. CO2 takes about 100 years to breakdown. Obviously our output has been increasing, and exponentially so in the last few decades, but how much CO2 have we put into the atmosphere last century. Now you would argue that in relation to H20 in the atmosphere it is insignificant. I would say that combined with naturally rising temperatures, the CO2 and other greenhouse gasses we have released may have tipped us into a situation where we are seeing slightly faster than normal warming. It may not take that much human activity to upset a delicate planetary cycle.

The point is that it may not take much of an unnatural temperature rise to start a cascade that could have massive consequences.

The culprit here being CH4.

According to Hydrogen Now Journal, where records show a rapid rise and fall in warming above and beyond the standard interglacial cycle, the likely cause is methane.

You should not confuse the relationship between methane and warming. Because methane increase lags slightly behind temperature does not mean it is not having a causative effect. It likely contributes towards raising temperature and this causes massive amounts of methane to be released from hydrates and such.

There are vast deposits of Methane hydrates all over the world. They take the form of frozen/slush methane hydrate found on the seabed of the arctic ocean, silt in river deltas like the Gulf of Mexico and permafrost covering layers of methane (phenomenal amounts in the Northern hemisphere).

Rising temperatures will affect release of methane from the silt and seabed hydrates and obviously as permafrost melts it is released. The potential for a very significant methane release over a short period of time is clear. The Siberian permafrost alone could unload a couple of billion tonnes ? compared to an estimated current total annual worldwide release of 550 million tonnes.

Quote from Hydrogen Now Journal (Issue 3, Article 2)

?The theory for these rapid rises and falls of temperature, based on the geological records from 55 million years ago, is that gradual global warming due to some natural cause had resulted in temperatures 5 to 7 degrees centigrade higher than average ( i.e. higher than today's temperatures). At this point methane trapped in methane hydrate deposits started to be released into the atmosphere and accelerated the rate of warming. This would result in further warming releasing more methane. As the atmosphere warmed different types of methane deposits would start to be released and so a cycle of methane release leading to increased warming leading to more methane release from other areas of methane deposits elsewhere in the world would become established as global warming effected different areas of the world.?


Now none of this is set in stone and is still up for debate, but it may be that with our CO2 production combined with the natural warming cycle we may have kick-started a potential runaway scenario where methane release is out of control and once started will not be stopped until it has run its course ? we can reduce our CO2 output but we cannot stop permafrost from melting and releasing CH4 when it starts.

Blacknad.

Beautifull
1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1= 13

adding up everything involved,not just 1 or two things usually renders a more clearer result.

when the last huge methane release occured there was plenty of ice to melt.
now there isnt.

we can expect to loose Florida and most of our coastal and inland low lying areas.

it sounds extreme I know but elevations tell the story and pictures tell of past encounters with flooding.

any warming will result in more releases and more
warming which will result in more water content of the atmosphere.

more warming , more releases , more water...
more rain. more storms. more flooding.

the oceans will begin to release its methane when the water temperatures get high enought.

unless we can stop the release in siberia using some currently known method , such as methane consumming bacterium and microbes then we may well be in deep do do.

or at least it will smell like we are.

G'day Blacknad,

A quick comment. Do you have a good picture of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere over the last, say, 60 million years. Do you know that for almost all of that period the CO2 levels were many many times what they are now?


Richard

here's another idea of what could have happened.

a meteoroid struck the earth 55 million years ago

http://six.pairlist.net/pipermail/meteorite-list/2003-June/092195.html

causing a lava sheet to appear.

http://www.book-of-thoth.com/article1406.html

which released enough heat and greenhouse gasses to warm up the world fast enough and far enough to release a large methane pocket

the result. the arctic reached 70 degrees for a few hundred millennium. this fits all known data (at least known to me). an increse in methane at that time, a higher tempature, a meteiord strike, and a lava shelf (not the biggest by any streatch)

G'day Blaknad (again),

Since I'm preparing a document for another matter at the moment summarising my views on Global Warming I thought I would include some of the draft in this thread. If you are interested in any references after I've done this for any of the statements I've made feel free to post it or email me for them (the same goes for anyone else interested enough to read it) But that will take a little time. Moderator: Since what I am proposing is the equivalent to four or five pages of normal text please let me know if it is against policy.

With respect to methane, I have a small request. Prove any of it! What happened 55 million years ago is unknown aside from there was a methane release. Why is unknown. The sequence of events is unknown. The Journal you quote is providing just one of many suppositions without any evidence to back it up. That happens often in science in the absence of evidence and it is good that suppositions are put forward because it actually might lead someone to be able to find some evidence to refute or support any of them.

As to methane release, you seem to be confusing the massive release of methane 55 million years ago with the relatively small increases in methane that accompany any rise in the earth's temperature.

Where is there any proof at all that there is a relationship between methane release and warming? Not theories or supposition, actual data that supports this.

I'm not being antagonistic here. I would be interested in any proof that can be established but thus far in the methane debate, I have seen no science at all and a whole lot of supposition.

I would also be interested in what stopped massive methane releases during other periods on this earth when it was very much warmer than it is now, when there was no locked ice on the earth at all. If the warming of the earth and the loss of locked ice leads to the release of methane in massive quantities as has been suggested will occur in the near future, how come it has not happened in the past. The methane deposits were there. We know that in several periods of very warm periods there was a whole lot of it because eventually it turns to coal and that is one industry that has been around for a long time and the geology etc has been very well studied.

Food for thought, I hope.


Richard

MASS EXTINCTION:
Has an Impact Done It Again?
Richard A. Kerr
Researchers claim to have found more proof of a second major impact that triggered a mass extinction.

from http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/302/5649/1314

they believe that the methane deprived the deep oceans of o2, which caused mass extinction of many sea animials.

Hi Richard,

I would be interested to read your paper.

With respect to methane - it is a greenhouse gas - it is 21 times more effective than CO2 at trapping heat - it currently comprises 20% of the total radiative forcing from all greenhouse gas - if even a fraction of the estimated 70 billion tonnes that Siberia alone holds are released into the atmosphere it will drive up temperatures. The question is by how much.

If say 2 billion tonnes of CH4 are released from melting permafrosts over a decade (okay - not going to happen yet but it may eventually release that quickly) then we will have the equivalent of another 40 billion tonnes of CO2. This is not insignificant especially when added to the ever greater amount of CO2 occuring anyway.

The Hard Science is being worked on and until the jury is in we should count it a distinct possibility that the methane effect may be significant. What should concern us is that the positive feedback, when truly underway, would be beyond our power to stop.

I cannot prove it, but for my money the balance of probability is that methane will play its part along with CO2 etc. in causing real problems for humanity.

I am saddened to hear some here saying, 'this has all happened before and the planet recovers'. That may be so, but the last time it happened there weren't six billion humans on the planet. It is not only the impact on the planet that should concern us (after all, it will right itself in time), it is the potentially devastating impact on the human race and other species. Rising sea levels and increased weathering will not be a party you want to invite your friends to.

Blacknad.


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"The more people there are on the planet, the less each of us can use the atmosphere for waste disposal without contributing to further global warming." - Population Action International, 2000

"One hundred and fifty years ago humans started a grand,
uncontrolled experiment with carbon on earth. We don't know exactly how the experiment will turn out, but it will certainly change our climate and our lives." -George Kling

I would also like to read your paper.

I would like to find out if there are any of your thoughts and work in the paper or if it is just a collection of other peoples thoughts and work.

so far I have seen that you only give credit to proven things as you call them.

have you proven something that the paper is about or
is it about something that is not yet proven?

G'day

G'day Paul and Blacknad,

I'm actually involved in research currently at the request of an institute. It involves the review or study of studies on Global Warming, almost wholly focusing on the data used and its validity or otherwise.

It is a study which should take me more than a year. It actually takes a bit of time even to find out what data was used for some major studies, let alone gain access to the data, then review it and any suppositions, assumptions or extrapolations used to create the data. Since the number of studies to be reviewed is not currently been finalised, this could take me a while. I am significantly disabled and mostly bedridden. Because of the effects of my condition and medication my brain does not function as it should and I either cannot work for extended periods or it takes me longer to get the work done.

As to whether the bits of a draft paper I was proposing to post contains any new thoughts or is a collection of others thoughts: the thoughts are mine, the studies are other peoples. The only research I did in this field was in the late 70s and into the 80s and that was on a very specific field relating to the boundaries between glaciations and interglacial periods and their causes. It fascinated me that such a complex system also seems to find a way to remain stable for a time and then flips to another period and this quickly becomes stable. It also fascinated me just how long it took to go from one state to the other. At the time the prevailing wisdom was several thousand years. I thought so to and was asked to write a paper on just that topic but all the evidence I found pointed to an extremely rapid change. You could say at this point I became serious sidetracked and call on the expertise of biologists, vulcanologist and several other fields to correctly understand the evidence which was available.

In addition to that research I was assisting in research on whether any accurate estimate of the average temperature could be made and what changes could be observed year to year if this was true. I was the bunny who had to actually research possible sites to find out whether changes were made to equipment, whether mines were built nearby, and a myriad of other things which could alter the accuracy of temperature records when compared year to year. This was before satellite data of course. What astounded me was just how difficult it was to obtain any accurate data. I thought that ocean air temperatures might be a way to achieve some consistency but after the research we did, we found there was no way at all to obtain even remotely accurate data.

The paper that I am currently preparing is simply a summary of my current views on Global Warming based on the small amount of research I have done recently and my reading of various papers and their data over the years. It is a field which fascinates me so I tried to look at major research papers and data where it was readily available. The object of the exercise is to establish my current biases and then look redo the paper at the end of the research and see how much has changed. My views may be counter to the mainstream but in this instance it was one of the reasons for obtaining the grant in the first place. Apparently they already have similar research conducted from ?true believers? and wanted a different perspective.

Having explained this much it might not be of further interest but it is not any difficulty for me to produce as I need to work on my drafts anyway. The major difference will be the lack of references (as there are several a paragraph and that would increase the size of the post enormously) and the much less formal writing technique I adopt in drafts. I like to write as I would if I was giving a verbal presentation and later I adapt this.


Richard

I understand your position or view point on this matter now.
and am glad for you that you have found an outlet that is profitable to you concerning the paper.
also you have an oportunity to do something in the field that deeply interest you.
I expect that you may deliver a extremely precise document as the result of your interest in the field.
but I also expect that you should not hold back the truth.

lets run through it one time.
starting with our current climate.

• the earth has been warming from a balanced or stable state to a unbalanced or unstable state due to our pollution or whatever cause you may wish to attach to it.
• the state that the earth is in at this time is the melting of the stabilising factors
  (our planets cold stuff)you might say.
  the stuff that cools down the hot stuff.
• without the stability factors the stability cannot exist.
  when some of the cool stuff (ice) melts away as it is doing as you read this and uncovers things that were frozen ( methane ) then the instability gets even less stable.
• this instability is sort of like a snowball rolling down a hill getting bigger and bigger as it rolls.
  it feeds itself by producing more and more heat.
  ....time passes....
• the trouble with its feeding habits is that it will eventually cause enought heat to make the earth belch ( volcanoes ) this throws up a shield of dust that plunges the earths temperatures downward again.
• the earth is now heading back into a ice age again. .... time passes .... as the ice age progresses the water in the oceans move to north and south pole regions , as the water pressure in the oceans are reduced once again methane is released from hydrates.
  another sudden change occurs and the earth begins to warm again....time passes....
  it reaches a point of stability again.
  where we used to be.

what else could lie dormant , waiting for the right temperatures and pressures to occur.

what else could actually bring about climate change so suddenly.

why doesnt the earth stay hot when it heats up?
why doesnt it stay cold when it gets cold?

its really very simple , but simplicity doesnt sell books or make anybody any money , it just makes sence.

I wish you well.

the one problem i see with the calcualtion on the release of methane from siberia, is that it assumes all of it will be in methane. the only way that can happen is if it says wet 24 7 until the gass is release. if it dries out, the methane oixdies into co2. even with things as they are now. a large part of it is dry most of the year. only the lakes are staying wet and those will drain off as soon as the peat on the bottom decays enough to stop blocking the water. if it does not decay, there is no problem. if it does the water will drain, again, after a time, no problem.

another problems is that the higher the methane levels in the atmosphere, the more oxidation occurs there. lightning does not set off much, since there is so little. but let the concetration get up, and the storms will be come real boomers.

G'day Paul,

Your theory is very neat and seems to explain a number of things. The big problem is there is no evidence for it. There is no evidence at all to support the supposition that methane is the trigger for either interglacial/glaciation switches or the beginnings or ends of Ice Ages. If there was then that would be the predominant theory and would have been for much of the last century when reasons were actively sought. If you disagree, please point to data or research which conforms with your view.

Otherwise it would be an excellent theory. It actually closely parallels a theory that does fit the available evidence but for which the cause is not established. The theory goes that for whatever reason, the various mechanisms which keep the earth within the parameters of say a glaciation are upset. The balance is tipped, to use your words. Once this occurs, then warming starts and the snow and ice that covers large expanses of the ground start to melt earlier into the seasons and the extent of the meltback is further. Simply because of the loss of snow and ice, a huge drop in solar reflectivity from the earth's surface (albedo) occurs, and this leads to further warming. Thus, the snow and ice coverage at the end of the season comes later and does not extend as far south (this really is a mechanism only of the Northern Hemisphere within this Ice Age).

The next season comes around and the increased residual warmth means that it comes even earlier and the retreat extends much further. Depending on just how you view the evidence, it could be as little as three seasons before the acceleration is so great that the conditions are no longer a glaciation but the beginnings of an interglacial period.

Basically, the theory is the same as yours but without the need to introduce methane as a trigger. But what is the trigger? I honestly don't know and have never seen enough evidence to suggest excatly the mechanism. Seven out of ten times glaciations in this Ice Age start at the same time as there is a large increase in volcanic activity. There is strong evidence, based on the changes in temperatures over the last several hundred years being so exactly related to solar variations, that solar variations may be part or even the main reason for the trigger.

There are some differences however between your theory and the one I have just described. There is nothing to suggest that increased warming of the planet will result in increased volcanic activity. Volcanic activity may correspond with the return to glaciations more often than not but that would not explain the return without the increased volcanic activity or even if the volcanic activity increase is directly related to return to a glaciation as a cause. I understand volcanic activity varies in relation to solar activities and it could well be that a solar activity which might be the cause of the return to the glaciation also triggers the volcanic activity, the two only being related in the cause. As far as I know there just isn't the evidence to support the proposition that volcanic activity causes returns to glaciation aside from the inference which can be drawn because the two coincide more often than not.

There is strong evidence to suggest Ice Ages come and go because of the shifting of plate tectonics; distance from the sun; long term changes to solar radiation received by the earth. In all of those changes only once is there a significant methane event and that was 55 million years ago.

There is very strong evidence to suggest that the switch between glaciations and interglacial periods in the periods we can study (this end of this Ice Age) have at their core solar radiation changes.

I might state that the earth's climate tends to remain stable in either an interglacial or glacial period in that it does not constantly switch backwards and forwards between the two. But there is significant variation of temperatures within each of those states.

Your probably will not like my paper at all. The truth as I see it, includes the points that there is actually very little evidence to support the proposition that there is even any Global Warming and since it is a summary of my views, precision is not the way I would describe it. It is not meant to be a presentation of research, which really should have precision.

I can say as part of the process in arriving at just what form my research would take I was asked to review four research articles on global warming briefly. Out of the four I could not conclude that the data used in any of them was accurate or free from personal interpretation or manipulation to such a large extent that the reliability of the data, in my view, was unsatisfactory.

Until my research is concluded and published, the individual studies I am asked to review of course cannot be specified. However, as I have said to DA Morgan several times, I'm happy to look at any research paper released on global warming, and if the data can be accessed, comment on this forum about the veracity of the underlying data. That was taken up just once and all I had to do was point to the comments in the report itself concerning the reliability of the data to throw strongly into doubt the conclusions drawn.


Richard

what i have trouble with some times, is the fact that so many ppl believe the earth is so isolated from the suns influence. yes, if you asked them, they will acknowledge the influence earth has on the seasonal influence the sun has on our tempature. some will even acknowldge the effect it has on earthquakes and things, but it seems odd to me that few of the ppl that argue that man is the cause of global warming will acknowldge the amount of variation that occurs in the sun, or how much that variation will affect the earth. personally, im still learning about what all can affect the earths weather, and ive been reading for some time. how can they say without bothering to read it, how much (as an example) jupiter could be affecting us.

ric
I didnt think this up myself, I only put things together that others found.

if I count 5 nails laying on a table and call them 5 nails all I have done is count them.
but what of the table?
and what the table sits on?
and what supports the ground the table sits on?
what holds the nails on the table?
what holds the table on the ground?

question everything or you get it wrong...

I used to watch a tv show called connections which was very interesting to me and this may be the reason I try to put things together so much.

we really dont need to use any thing that burns and causes pollution to make energy there are many other ways around it.
but we do.

why do we?
because people want to profit from the fuels they have to sell or can aquire to sell.

I could completely stop using any form of currently used energy If I choose.
I could build a machine that generates energy from nothing.

why dont I?
maybe I have connected something thats more important at this time.

it may be that with such a machine the climate could be lowered however it would take a lot of energy from clean sources to combat the pollution we produce today.

it would provide a feasible method of controlling our climate by providing energy for the massive atmospheric control system we will need in the near future.

it really does sound extreme doesnt it.

it really is extreme.

why arent things like this in use today?

because people want to sell fuel...

...... I edited this ............

actually its not that people want to sell fuel.
its that people want to make money.
so if there can be a way found that would replace this money that these people make then they would imediately forget about selling the fuels and sell what replaced the fuels.
.....................................