7 ms·

It has been warmer before, only a few thousand years ago and the proof is there that it may have had many previous ice free periods. there is also proof that ju

It has been warmer before, only a few thousand years ago and the proof is there that it may have had many previous ice free periods. there is also proof that just a thousand years ago we were warmed and that is based on Chinese studies of clams. the key take away is that climate is more cyclical than many are willing to give credit too, studies of the Greenland Blocking Index when taken back more than a hundred years show the occurrences of similar warming periods. So what to do about, study it and try to understand all the causes without focusing on simplistic the sky is falling scares which rarely do more than tire an already tired public of what many perceive as merely scare tactics

daveguy 10y ago
It's not the absolute temperature that is alarming. It is the change in temperature. Previous changes have been over millennia. These changes have been over 100 years. The graphic that puts it in the best perspective I have seen is an xkcd cartoon (be sure to scroll all the way to the end): https://xkcd.com/1732/ https://xkcd.com/1732/
- bolololo 10y ago
  How do we know what was the temperature 1000 or 3000 years ago?
- zeveb 10y ago
  You know, my takeaway from that graphic is that higher temperatures appear to be pretty well-correlated with improved human quality of life. And of course the graphic doesn't show a cost-benefit analysis for any of its three future scenarios. Would it be worth a nickel to preserve the current environment exactly as it is? Maybe (although maybe some change would be good; I don't know). Would it be worth $1 quadrillion a day to prevent a single town of 1,000 people from being submerged by rising oceans? Almost certainly not. What are the costs of each scenario, and what are the benefits? Is it worth losing a few houses in Miami if it means that Oslo produces more food? That the world has always been changing has always been true, whether respecting climate or any number of other factors. That we're affected by change has also always been true. That we can have an effect on it is relatively new, and that we ought to is unproven. Frankly, the 20th century makes me very suspicious of any technocratic solution which claims to be able to predict every possibility and make the best choice (remember the Aswan Dam!). That doesn't mean we should do nothing, either (doing nothing is itself a choice which needs to be justified too!), but it means we should be very suspicious of easy answers which claim to be all benefit and no cost.
  - codecamper 10y ago
    how's that for mixing correlation & causation. Sorta like, I've noticed that I have a good time when my bank account is low. Low bank accounts must mean good life havin'!
    - zeveb 10y ago
      > how's that for mixing correlation & causation. I'm just noting the correlation. In some cases it's likely that causation goes one way (e.g. post-industrial changes), but in other cases it's not (e.g. well before there were enough men to make a mark on the Earth). Of course, even back then there's still a post hoc, propter hoc fallacy to watch out for: the mere fact that civilisation has done better as the world has warmed — if it is even a fact — doesn't mean that warming is the cause. It could be as simple as increased sunlight leading to both more plant growth and more heat, and more plant growth leading to more food & other resources for man's use. Which — if the case — would raise the question of how much is too much: a greenhouse in winter can be great, but an unvented greenhouse in summer can be unlivable for plants or anything else.
  - sharemywin 10y ago
    Why not ask a bean counter? http://evanmills.lbl.gov/pubs/pdf/climate-action-insurance.pdf http://evanmills.lbl.gov/pubs/pdf/climate-action-insurance.p... Also, look up US drought and climate refugees if you want to see where the real problems are going to come from. Turning huge swathes of the equator uninhabitable just seems like a bad idea to me.
  - jamesblonde 10y ago
    You really don't understand anything about dynamical systems do you? It's incredibly naive to assume we will land in some nice stable equilibrium where it's a couple of degrees warmer globally. The truth is we don't know where the climate will end up, but we know that we are in the process of exiting our current 'stable equilibrium'. The worst case scenario (and that is the only one we should be concerned with!) is a global mass extinction event. We've already had 5 of them - one of which was due to runaway greenhouse warming - https://cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/big-five-extinctions https://cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/big-five-extinction...
benmarks 10y ago
I have yet to see a legitimate study which doesn't acknowledge directly or indirectly the cyclical climate trends. What they do tend to point out are data from the current period which are extraordinary in size or in scope. "study it and try to understand all the causes without focusing on simplistic the sky is falling scares..." This is one such study. It's looking at a region and noting an unprecedented trend. Perhaps you meant to refer to the article's positioning, rather than to the study itself?
dcosson 10y ago
Who cares if it's been warmer before or if it would warm (albeit much more slowly) anyway due to natural causes. The fact is, we know the warming is driven by greenhouse gases and while there are some of these occurring naturally we are certainly making things much worse. Your arguments are no reason not to take a aggressive stance on cutting carbon emissions. Put another way, the real question is not are we causing it but can we slow or stop it by making changes. And the answer to that is undeniably yes. As to the argument that the earth survived warm periods a thousand years ago so it's no big deal - are you kidding? There are billions more people alive today, and probably hundreds of millions in places that will be affected by sea level rise or droughts, not to mention the economic impact of other extreme weather events.
- thisisdallas 10y ago
  > Put another way, the real question is not are we causing it but can we slow or stop it by making changes. And the answer to that is undeniably yes. This. Whether it's man made or natural, it's the main issue. The main issue is that global warming is obviously a negative issue. Can it be stopped? If so, what are the steps to stop it and how do we proceed. Why would we not try to stop something negative?

daveguy 10y ago

It's not the absolute temperature that is alarming. It is the change in temperature. Previous changes have been over millennia. These changes have been over 100 years. The graphic that puts it in the best perspective I have seen is an xkcd cartoon (be sure to scroll all the way to the end): https://xkcd.com/1732/ https://xkcd.com/1732/

bolololo 10y ago
How do we know what was the temperature 1000 or 3000 years ago?
zeveb 10y ago
You know, my takeaway from that graphic is that higher temperatures appear to be pretty well-correlated with improved human quality of life. And of course the graphic doesn't show a cost-benefit analysis for any of its three future scenarios. Would it be worth a nickel to preserve the current environment exactly as it is? Maybe (although maybe some change would be good; I don't know). Would it be worth $1 quadrillion a day to prevent a single town of 1,000 people from being submerged by rising oceans? Almost certainly not. What are the costs of each scenario, and what are the benefits? Is it worth losing a few houses in Miami if it means that Oslo produces more food? That the world has always been changing has always been true, whether respecting climate or any number of other factors. That we're affected by change has also always been true. That we can have an effect on it is relatively new, and that we ought to is unproven. Frankly, the 20th century makes me very suspicious of any technocratic solution which claims to be able to predict every possibility and make the best choice (remember the Aswan Dam!). That doesn't mean we should do nothing, either (doing nothing is itself a choice which needs to be justified too!), but it means we should be very suspicious of easy answers which claim to be all benefit and no cost.
- codecamper 10y ago
  how's that for mixing correlation & causation. Sorta like, I've noticed that I have a good time when my bank account is low. Low bank accounts must mean good life havin'!
  - zeveb 10y ago
    > how's that for mixing correlation & causation. I'm just noting the correlation. In some cases it's likely that causation goes one way (e.g. post-industrial changes), but in other cases it's not (e.g. well before there were enough men to make a mark on the Earth). Of course, even back then there's still a post hoc, propter hoc fallacy to watch out for: the mere fact that civilisation has done better as the world has warmed — if it is even a fact — doesn't mean that warming is the cause. It could be as simple as increased sunlight leading to both more plant growth and more heat, and more plant growth leading to more food & other resources for man's use. Which — if the case — would raise the question of how much is too much: a greenhouse in winter can be great, but an unvented greenhouse in summer can be unlivable for plants or anything else.
- sharemywin 10y ago
  Why not ask a bean counter? http://evanmills.lbl.gov/pubs/pdf/climate-action-insurance.pdf http://evanmills.lbl.gov/pubs/pdf/climate-action-insurance.p... Also, look up US drought and climate refugees if you want to see where the real problems are going to come from. Turning huge swathes of the equator uninhabitable just seems like a bad idea to me.
- jamesblonde 10y ago
  You really don't understand anything about dynamical systems do you? It's incredibly naive to assume we will land in some nice stable equilibrium where it's a couple of degrees warmer globally. The truth is we don't know where the climate will end up, but we know that we are in the process of exiting our current 'stable equilibrium'. The worst case scenario (and that is the only one we should be concerned with!) is a global mass extinction event. We've already had 5 of them - one of which was due to runaway greenhouse warming - https://cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/big-five-extinctions https://cosmosmagazine.com/palaeontology/big-five-extinction...

benmarks 10y ago

I have yet to see a legitimate study which doesn't acknowledge directly or indirectly the cyclical climate trends. What they do tend to point out are data from the current period which are extraordinary in size or in scope. "study it and try to understand all the causes without focusing on simplistic the sky is falling scares..." This is one such study. It's looking at a region and noting an unprecedented trend. Perhaps you meant to refer to the article's positioning, rather than to the study itself?

dcosson 10y ago

Who cares if it's been warmer before or if it would warm (albeit much more slowly) anyway due to natural causes. The fact is, we know the warming is driven by greenhouse gases and while there are some of these occurring naturally we are certainly making things much worse. Your arguments are no reason not to take a aggressive stance on cutting carbon emissions. Put another way, the real question is not are we causing it but can we slow or stop it by making changes. And the answer to that is undeniably yes. As to the argument that the earth survived warm periods a thousand years ago so it's no big deal - are you kidding? There are billions more people alive today, and probably hundreds of millions in places that will be affected by sea level rise or droughts, not to mention the economic impact of other extreme weather events.

thisisdallas 10y ago
> Put another way, the real question is not are we causing it but can we slow or stop it by making changes. And the answer to that is undeniably yes. This. Whether it's man made or natural, it's the main issue. The main issue is that global warming is obviously a negative issue. Can it be stopped? If so, what are the steps to stop it and how do we proceed. Why would we not try to stop something negative?