Will this be the only way to see Earth in the future?
The scientific evidence is now overwhelming that unchecked growth in fossil fuel use throughout the next half-century will produce a global climate catastrophe.
Kicking off this series is Tim Flannery, director of the South Australian Museum and biologist at the University of Adelaide. His new book, The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth (Grove Atlantic) is one of the best and most readable popular books on the subject.
For me, the two key facts that I know are true is that the climate system is full of positive feedback loops — things that tend to reinforce an existing trend. And secondly, that our understanding of the way the climate system works is very far from complete. If you put them together, the indisputable conclusion that you can draw is that all the climate modeling we’ve produced so far is deeply conservative. Things are worse than climate models are suggesting.
“If you put them together, the indisputable conclusion that you can draw is that all the climate modeling we’ve produced so far is deeply conservative.”
Given that our knowledge of the way climate works is far from complete, the only conclusion I draw is all of the climate modelling we’ve produced so far is likely to be just plain wrong. If we don’t know how things work, it’s an amazing leap of faith (rather than science) to somehow indisputably know in what way the models are wrong.
After all, if we knew how they were wrong and why, we could just fix them.
I saw this movie already.
Don’t worry, the earth will survive the weather changes. Humans, I am not so sure about.
I guess there is no proof that it’s directly related but this as been the warmest winter in Canada.
http://www.newsvine.com/_news/2006/03/13/131968-winter-warmest-ever-on-record-in-canada
Kicking off this series is Tim Flannery, director of the South Australian Museum and biologist at the University of Adelaide
Biologist != Climatologist
The only “indisputable conclusion” is that this guy doesn’t have any credibility.
Deinonych: Agreed. This article is about three authors and their books, not people who are experts themselves.
Paul: Why is the other option always “force the entire world to stop using all fossil fuels tomorrow”? Why did you have to end a skeptical yet reasonable post with a complete straw man? When was this ever advocated as a solution?
OK,
Let put aside global warming for 1 sec.
As we dont have records old enough to really tell HOW this planet works.
NOT HOw Mankind WANTS it to work.
Looking at nature, and a forcast that by 2050 the world population will increase by 3billion MORE persons.
Nature has a balance, when there is a bad winter or areas are over used/eaten, and rabits, and others die off, then the wolf and cyote populations drop.
There is only so much room in a fish bowl, before you run out of oxygen. And we are cutting down the trees that filter the air.
Mole rats are interesting as they Overrun an area, they end up soiling they nest to the point that it causes the group to die off or move out.
Ramifications of to many persons…NOt enough jobs to work, commercialization cant survive, as not enough people have money to buy anything.
We are eating our way, OUT of a home…Look at the forests we are cutting down for more food, and look at the oceans and rivers, and try to find enough fish to eat, and then find enough room to Live…
Can ANYONE say…soylent GREEN…watch the movie if you cant read.
i just posted my thoughts on GW in the above article about the russian scientist.
But this article is just hype for some clown who wrote a new book about something that he has as much knowledge about as I do.
I just read an interesting bit about the hole in the ozone…..prior to the 1950’s we had no way to detect this hole, but when we did have a means, there it was. Immediatly the anti-human/fossil fuel crowd jumped on it as proof positive that we caused it. But, how do they know this? That hole could have been there for 2 weeks or 40,000 years, we have no way of knowing, and it has expanded and contracted over the years since it was discovered.
My point is, people need to take a breather, stand back and shut up until we actually KNOW how our climate system really works.
GW has been happening since the end of the last ice age. If it wasn’t, most of the northern countries would still be under 100 foot of ice.
This is a natural happening, that the human population may be having a miniscule impact on.
We need to find other means to fuel our society and we need to protect animals and their habitats and we need to find a healthy way to dispose of out waste, those are good things. But, GW is happening no matter what we as a species decides to do, it’s mother nature’s way of cleaning the planet now and then.
Joshua: We already know that global warming has been happening naturally on its own. That’s not in dispute. The issue is that the rate at which it’s happening.
The best of our scientific knowledge says that humans are likely to be having a significant impact. That should be cause to try to change our behavior. The problem is, at least from what I’m seeing on these boards, too many people have this bullshit idea that the only option is to take drastic, all or nothing remedies that will destroy the economy.
Maybe there was a hole in the ozone layer before, maybe there wasn’t. The fact is we took steps to correct it, it’s smaller now, and there was no massive economic upheaval. Maybe it would have shrunk anyway, but we saw a probable threat, responded by attacking the probable cause, and we got the results we wanted. We played the odds and we won. The other option would be to ignore a probable threat and risk it becoming much worse and much harder to remedy. Again, if you don’t see the remedy in bullshit exaggerated terms this seems like a smart course of action.
Your portrayal of people on the other side of this as “anti-human” diminishes your credibility. When you use puerile political terms such as this it demonstrates a lack of any appreciation for the other side and throws all your characterizations into doubt. You don’t have to agree with me, just debate on the facts and leave the name calling to the little kids.
Who’s idea was it to change the name from ” Global Warming” to “Climate Change” ? The first is a very accurate description of the problem… the other sounds so harmless… OH, now I get it, nevermind.
GW is happening no matter what we as a species decides to do, it’s mother nature’s way of cleaning the planet now and then.
Scary thought, but believable.
Nice Star Trek pic