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Global Warming: Natural Or Man-made? - Page 48

Efforts to curtail world temps will almost surely fail

The goals set a few months ago in Paris to prevent further rising of worldwide temperatures are almost sure to fail and will never be achieved, according to a new study. Ref. Source 4d.

Man-made Natural Warming Global

1200 years of water balance data challenge climate models

Water availability in the Northern Hemisphere has seen much larger changes during the past twelve centuries than during twentieth century global warming, a new study reports. The team concludes that climate models overestimate wet and dry extremes as temperatures increased during the twentieth century. The new results can help to improve the ability of climate models to predict future hydroclimate changes. Ref. Source 9p.

Global Warming: Natural Or Man-made? History & Civil Business Politics

Cause of global warming: Consensus on consensus

A research team confirms that 97 percent of climate scientists agree that climate change is caused by humans. Ref. Source 9u.

Page 48 Man-made Natural Warming Global

Mechanism discovered for plants to regulate their flowering in a warming world

A new mechanism that enables plants to regulate their flowering in response to raised temperatures has been discovered by researchers. The finding could potentially lead to the development of technology allowing us to control the physiological response of plants and mitigate the impacts of warming temperatures. Ref. Source 1p.

Man-made Natural Warming Global

A climate warming warning: Warmer temperatures are affecting lakes in the oilsands region

Scientists have identified climate warming as the dominant driver of an increase in algal growth in the Athabasca oilsands region of northern Alberta. Ref. Source 3x.

Global Warming: Natural Or Man-made?

I'll admit that I have not read through all 48 pages or all the articles referenced by the New and Informer bots, but in reading through the first several pages at the comments people were making, it breaks my heart, as a scientist. We as informed consumers cannot just read news articles and trust that they are reporting facts correctly. There are many 'journals' available for 'scientists' to 'publish' in that are not worth the paper (Or silicon) they are printed (Or stored) on. As a scientist, we know which journals these are and don't trust them or anything, but the news loves to get some of these 'articles' and write news stories about them because they are titillating. Newspapers and some 'scientists' have political agendas that they want to match to their readership. And science is an ever growing and changing field; we may hold one theory in high regard one day and change our minds almost overnight because of new evidence. Most science is pretty well established and fewer 'bedrock' kind of changes are being made, but things like atmospheric science is a relative baby that is still changing as we gather more evidence.

I saw several people post about how a lot of climate data was models and predictions which are inherently flawed and difficult to make, which is true, but if they are done properly (Read 'with scientific rigor') then there are error bars and quantified uncertainty (Which newspapers rarely report) that must also be considered. These models are amazingly accurate given the range and depth of data they have to model, but there is still some variability that news articles love to pick up on and act like it is a bigger deal that it really is. For instance does it matter if the global mean temperature rises by 2 C or 3 C, sure it does, but the main point is that the temperature is going to rise.

I found an excellent article that explains (In 3 parts) what global climate conditions are like and how much of our current problems are explained by human activities vs 'natural' phenomenon. I don't have enough CP to post the link directly, but the title is "How would you figure out whether Global Warming is real?" on ScienceBlogs by Ethan. I encourage you to go read the article (He is an astrophysicist and understand the science involved in measuring atmospheric changes).

There is no doubt that the earth is heating up, and there is no doubt that carbon dioxide levels are rising at an alarming rate due to human activity. There is also no doubt that carbon dioxide is a 'greenhouse' gas that retains heat. The only questions still to be answered are how much the earth can correct on its own and how quickly. The earth has been hotter than it currently is, and obviously life survived; however that doesn't mean that we can continue to ignore human impact on global climate.

I saw several arguments about a heating trend vs a cooling trend, and I think these are on some local scale. Sure there are places that are having record lows being set where ice is as thick as it ever has been in the last several decades. That does not mean that the global mean temperature is going down. We have enough satellites measuring the earths temperature at enough points that we can take a global average (And have been able to for several decades) and overall temperatures are increasing. The earth has a homeostasis mechanism that is going to try to counteract this warming by cooling certain areas, but that does not negate the overall warming trend. Also just because the earth heats up does not mean that everywhere is going to be drier or wetter, different areas react to increased heat in different ways. What global warming is most likely to cause is a global climate disruption: wet areas will get more dry, dry areas will get more wet, cold areas will get hotter, and hot areas will experience more extreme temperature swings (Including towards cold). You can't look out your window and say 'well today is not the hottest weather ever so global warming isn't a thing.' We can't even look at a single year and say it wasn't the hottest year ever, so global warming isn't a thing. We have to compare 1 decade to another, which is difficult as humans without external readings.

Sorry for the long rant and charged speech, but this is more than a political issue used to control those in power. It is not the job of some eco-terrorist to point out and enforce legislation about global warming. It is real and must be dealt with or there will be climate disruption unlike any we have seen before and may be more than we can adapt to. According to the trends of Earth before humans evolved, we are due for another ice age, but temperatures remain artificially high due to human activity. Oceans are some of the highest acidity levels ever recorded (Going by ice cores). Whether we survive the direct effects or not, it seems unlikely many other plants and animals will be able to adapt and survive without our intervention.

Global Warming Natural Man-made - Page 48

Doesn't the earth naturally go through cycles of warming and cooling? If its naturally like this and we're in that warming phase then how can they be sure its because of emissions?

Global Warming Natural Man-made Politics Business Civil & History - Page 48

Abelard, I will try to answer your question as best I can, though I do not claim to be an expert on atmospheric chemistry or physics. Yes there are heating and cooling cycles in the Earth's climate. These cycles last 100,000 years or so and during these cycles the icecaps go from almost completely melted to covering all the way down to a longitude of about 33° (Around Dallas, Texas, North Africa, and very North India). We are able to use ice cores to track the fluctuation in temperatures by measuring oxygen isotopes and ice layer thickness. We have been on a pretty steady 100,000 year cycle (90,000 years of 'Ice Age' and 10,000 years of 'interglacial warming'), and we are currently at the very tail end of the 10,000 year 'interglacial warming', meaning that global temperatures over thousands of years should be cooling. And if we look over the last 2000 years or so (From Roman Age through to Modern Age), we see that temperatures have decreased by about 2 °C globally until 1950. If we look though from 1950 to present (2015), we see that temperatures have risen by 0.5 °C. This is what's alarming. It took nearly 2000 years to cool by 2 °C, but only about 60 years to heat back up by a 0.5 °C. At this rate we are going to cause a huge climate disruption. The Earth has been trying to start another 'Ice Age', but we have been stopping it, which is causing a lot of violent storms and worrying changes in local climates. Over a long enough period, it is possible to draw whatever trends you want to support your conclusions (Assuming you 'cherry pick' your data), but if you actually go an look for yourself and compare the overall data, you can see what's really happening for yourself. The article I referenced in my last post actually covers some of this very well.

Edited: Alchyrogue on 9th May, 2016 - 12:53pm