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> While this week’s sharp temperature spike resulted from the arrangement of these intense weather systems, scientists say such spikes are probably becoming mor

> While this week’s sharp temperature spike resulted from the arrangement of these intense weather systems, scientists say such spikes are probably becoming more frequent and intense. Rising greenhouse-gas concentrations are increasing average temperatures and shrinking Arctic sea ice. Earlier this week, the National Snow and Ice Data Center reported January Arctic sea levels were the lowest on record. This entire paragraph is why people deny global warming. They admit we don't know if this is unusual. In fact we know it's a normal occurance, just it's 'probably' happening more often yet.... jump to Global Warming. This is not science, this is politics and it's why people go hard the other way.

tutanchamun 10y ago
Even if it were politics (which I don't think this is), what would we loose by upping our overall energy efficency and reducing our reliance on fossil energy (plus be more considerate of nature etc.)? I have never really thought about it, so I'm really curious about your thoughts, but as a cynical I would guess we only "loose" our coziness because it would require change which we humans seem to don't like.
smallnamespace 10y ago
Unfortunately, we don't have the luxury of running a double-blind placebo controlled trial on the relationship between CO2 emissions and the climate.
- bmh_ca 10y ago
  Venus already gave evidence. The Mariner missions gave us the atmospheric observations that clued us in to the possibility of CO2 as a greenhouse gas in the first place.
  - mikenuman 10y ago
    You really should look at the diameter of Venus cf. Earth and the relationship between core temp & surface distance from that temp.
    - unlikelymordant 10y ago
      Are you saying venus atmospheric temp is due to heat from the core leaking out? This is not the case, the heat absorbed from the sun and the heat radiated by venus is basically identical. Its atmospheric temp is pretty much entirely due to greenhouse effects mostly from co2.
- mekazu 10y ago
  We know the greenhouse effect is real (just walk into a greenhouse and you'll know), so the only remaining question is whether CO2 causes a greenhouse effect in the earth's atmosphere. That should be reasonably easy to prove right? Sounds like basic chemistry (which I never did).
  - yessql 10y ago
    Check out Venus.
  - ckarmann 10y ago
    Basic models with albedo and heat generated by the core shows that the Earth should be much colder than it is now. The greenhouse effect is studied since the 19th century and explain why the planet is not at freezing temperature all year round. That's pretty solid science and is also validated by studies of other planets. The remaining parts are: (1) Do humans induces a rise of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere? and (2) is the rising level of CO2 in the atmosphere provoking a rise in temperature on global scale? It's my understanding that (1) is a simple yes: just do an accounting of the number of carbon atoms, and you realize that getting atoms of carbons out of the rocks to the surface of the planet at industrial scale means that there must be more carbons either in natural carbon storage (forests, oceans) or in the atmosphere. Since forests are not growing and the absorption of CO2 by the oceans does not seem to be very efficient, it means humans are increasing level of CO2 above themselves. Carbon doesn't magically disappear. It has to be somewhere. (2) is the one that get difficult. There are a lot of arguments for (a lot of data points to rise both in CO2 and temperatures, a lot of models show the same thing) but all of this is modeling and correlation when what we are doing in extrapolation: is the relationship between CO2 and temperature going to stay the same as it is, or does some counter-effect going to kick in and make things smoother, or on the contrary, some effect on the atmosphere will accelerate global warming? Until we have a perfect model of the atmosphere or until we have actually got there and realize we have screwed up things or not, we can not say we have a scientific proof, and we can't be sure at which speed it's gonna happen. But the amount of circumstantial evidence is so overwhelming and there is so much at stake that in my opinion it is not reasonable to act like it's not happening or like you need hard mathematical proof to consider it a reality.
mablap 10y ago
If you think this is not science, your conception of what science is is flawed. People deny anthropogenic global warming because they don't want to look at the details, take the time to really understand the issues. Most people have no clue about anything going on around them except for what pays the bills (and even then). I was listening to some random radio host telling how "stupid" doctors and healthcare administrators are, that we should be concentrating our efforts on "prevention" rather than fitting a brand new hip onto a 96 year old person. He then went on to cite cancer patients in particular: we should not cure cancer, we should prevent it. His recommendation? "Preventative" MRI and SCANs for everybody over 30, because these would help "detect cancer" earlier. I don't have to explain to you how clueless that man is/was. But there you have it. The general population is clueless about everything and people speak out of their asses all the time. So in a sense, you were right, but it's the other way around: the problem is politics and human nature, not science.
- vivekd 10y ago
  Hold on a second, even given that global warming exists, there is no way this warm period is caused by global warming because you can't equate local weather to general climate. The fact that the arctic or any region is experiencing warmer than usual weather lately doesn't mean that climate change is happening or that the weather is a result of climate change. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-skepticism-fueled-by-gut-reaction-to-local-weather/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-sk...
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - sgt101 10y ago
    No, it doesn't. The causality is unidirectional; there is no entailment in the sense that a period like this could occur without global warming or without global warming effects being responsible for this particular episode. However, the prior probability of this event is influenced by the warming of the system overall. The expectation that an event like this will occur in a given season is higher if you have a warmed planet than not. That doesn't mean that it will happen, or that if it happens it's because of global warming. If there is global warming this event is more likely and should be expected more often.
simonh 10y ago
I have to agree completely with this comment. A Global Warming denier will read this as saying: "Specific circumstances caused this, but probably Global warming is making things worse." SO this isn't evidence of Global Warming and even mentioning it is just going to piss people off. I even accept that the statement is completely true. I'm convinced such spikes really are probably becoming more frequent and intense due to Global Warming. However we're not talking about how I would read and understand this but how it would be perceived by a skeptic. On that score aaron695 is spot on.
WillyOnWheels 10y ago
Concerns about global warming are really concerns about dramatic temperature variances that occurs too quickly for humans to adapt to.

tutanchamun 10y ago

Even if it were politics (which I don't think this is), what would we loose by upping our overall energy efficency and reducing our reliance on fossil energy (plus be more considerate of nature etc.)? I have never really thought about it, so I'm really curious about your thoughts, but as a cynical I would guess we only "loose" our coziness because it would require change which we humans seem to don't like.

smallnamespace 10y ago

Unfortunately, we don't have the luxury of running a double-blind placebo controlled trial on the relationship between CO2 emissions and the climate.

bmh_ca 10y ago
Venus already gave evidence. The Mariner missions gave us the atmospheric observations that clued us in to the possibility of CO2 as a greenhouse gas in the first place.
- mikenuman 10y ago
  You really should look at the diameter of Venus cf. Earth and the relationship between core temp & surface distance from that temp.
  - unlikelymordant 10y ago
    Are you saying venus atmospheric temp is due to heat from the core leaking out? This is not the case, the heat absorbed from the sun and the heat radiated by venus is basically identical. Its atmospheric temp is pretty much entirely due to greenhouse effects mostly from co2.
mekazu 10y ago
We know the greenhouse effect is real (just walk into a greenhouse and you'll know), so the only remaining question is whether CO2 causes a greenhouse effect in the earth's atmosphere. That should be reasonably easy to prove right? Sounds like basic chemistry (which I never did).
- yessql 10y ago
  Check out Venus.
- ckarmann 10y ago
  Basic models with albedo and heat generated by the core shows that the Earth should be much colder than it is now. The greenhouse effect is studied since the 19th century and explain why the planet is not at freezing temperature all year round. That's pretty solid science and is also validated by studies of other planets. The remaining parts are: (1) Do humans induces a rise of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere? and (2) is the rising level of CO2 in the atmosphere provoking a rise in temperature on global scale? It's my understanding that (1) is a simple yes: just do an accounting of the number of carbon atoms, and you realize that getting atoms of carbons out of the rocks to the surface of the planet at industrial scale means that there must be more carbons either in natural carbon storage (forests, oceans) or in the atmosphere. Since forests are not growing and the absorption of CO2 by the oceans does not seem to be very efficient, it means humans are increasing level of CO2 above themselves. Carbon doesn't magically disappear. It has to be somewhere. (2) is the one that get difficult. There are a lot of arguments for (a lot of data points to rise both in CO2 and temperatures, a lot of models show the same thing) but all of this is modeling and correlation when what we are doing in extrapolation: is the relationship between CO2 and temperature going to stay the same as it is, or does some counter-effect going to kick in and make things smoother, or on the contrary, some effect on the atmosphere will accelerate global warming? Until we have a perfect model of the atmosphere or until we have actually got there and realize we have screwed up things or not, we can not say we have a scientific proof, and we can't be sure at which speed it's gonna happen. But the amount of circumstantial evidence is so overwhelming and there is so much at stake that in my opinion it is not reasonable to act like it's not happening or like you need hard mathematical proof to consider it a reality.

mablap 10y ago

If you think this is not science, your conception of what science is is flawed. People deny anthropogenic global warming because they don't want to look at the details, take the time to really understand the issues. Most people have no clue about anything going on around them except for what pays the bills (and even then). I was listening to some random radio host telling how "stupid" doctors and healthcare administrators are, that we should be concentrating our efforts on "prevention" rather than fitting a brand new hip onto a 96 year old person. He then went on to cite cancer patients in particular: we should not cure cancer, we should prevent it. His recommendation? "Preventative" MRI and SCANs for everybody over 30, because these would help "detect cancer" earlier. I don't have to explain to you how clueless that man is/was. But there you have it. The general population is clueless about everything and people speak out of their asses all the time. So in a sense, you were right, but it's the other way around: the problem is politics and human nature, not science.

vivekd 10y ago
Hold on a second, even given that global warming exists, there is no way this warm period is caused by global warming because you can't equate local weather to general climate. The fact that the arctic or any region is experiencing warmer than usual weather lately doesn't mean that climate change is happening or that the weather is a result of climate change. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-skepticism-fueled-by-gut-reaction-to-local-weather/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/climate-change-sk...
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- sgt101 10y ago
  No, it doesn't. The causality is unidirectional; there is no entailment in the sense that a period like this could occur without global warming or without global warming effects being responsible for this particular episode. However, the prior probability of this event is influenced by the warming of the system overall. The expectation that an event like this will occur in a given season is higher if you have a warmed planet than not. That doesn't mean that it will happen, or that if it happens it's because of global warming. If there is global warming this event is more likely and should be expected more often.

simonh 10y ago

I have to agree completely with this comment. A Global Warming denier will read this as saying: "Specific circumstances caused this, but probably Global warming is making things worse." SO this isn't evidence of Global Warming and even mentioning it is just going to piss people off. I even accept that the statement is completely true. I'm convinced such spikes really are probably becoming more frequent and intense due to Global Warming. However we're not talking about how I would read and understand this but how it would be perceived by a skeptic. On that score aaron695 is spot on.

WillyOnWheels 10y ago

Concerns about global warming are really concerns about dramatic temperature variances that occurs too quickly for humans to adapt to.