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> measures like reducing our emissions from power generation and more electrified transportation would have a real impact. This always confuses me, because hu

> measures like reducing our emissions from power generation and more electrified transportation would have a real impact. This always confuses me, because human CO2 emissions are about 3% of natural emissions. If the planet were so sensitive to +/- 3%, wouldn't it have gone past the point-of-no-return millions of years ago? But here we are today, and the ice core data shows wild fluctuations over periods of tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of years that greatly exceed anything we've experienced.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
ximeng 9y ago
https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Chapter06_FINAL.pdf https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Cha... Page 471 has a pretty clear diagram that explains the change - increase beyond the natural ability of the carbon cycle to mitigate the change leading to steady increases in industrial area (last 150 years effectively). I don't see ice core data showing wild fluctuations over periods of 10-100k years and the ppm of atmospheric carbon is relatively stable over this period.
- alphapapa 9y ago
  Some say that the IPCC is an unreliable source, considering the former IPCC scientists who have whistleblown about their political bias and manipulation of results. How would you answer that concern?
  - alphapapa 9y ago
    I see, answered by downvoting. Insert fingers in ears, close eyes, move right along, nothing to see here.
    - ximeng 9y ago
      I didn't down vote (or answer). I don't have an opinion on the bias, having only read through the scientific report, but do think the science on the IPCC side looks better than anything I've seen on the other side, and that reasons for it being biased exist on both sides. Therefore tend to side with what looks like the better science.
      - alphapapa 9y ago
        My apologies. Shouldn't have assumed you were the one who downvoted. > Therefore tend to side with what looks like the better science. But the point is that the science is highly suspect. When scientists on the IPCC break rank and make themselves pariahs, virtually ruining their careers, that should tell you something.
        ximeng 9y ago
        I am judging this on reading parts of the IPCC reports (see for example https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FINAL_full.pdf https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FI...) and the NIPCC report published by the Heartland Institute (https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/Books/Why%20Scientists%20Disagree%20Second%20Edition%20with%20covers.pdf https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/Books/W...). Reading these two you will see two very different approaches, which reflects much of the debate I see on these subjects, including some of your comments. The NIPCC report is openly political opening with a complaint about Obama's treatment of climate change as a serious issue. It talks about circumstantial evidence, debate amongst scientists, and has a petition organised to collect signatures. (This apparently gathers signatures from 31,478 scientists of which only 9,021 have PhDs.) The IPCC report is filled with detailed diagrams and explanations of the science behind global warming. The approach generally seems sensible to someone like me with some understanding of the scientific method, although I am not qualified to analyse in depth. I am sure anybody reading it would learn something about the climate and how we can analyse it. Now I don't follow the political debate on whether the IPCC is biased by funding or some other supposed disincentives for scientists to report truthfully. On the other hand I do see that there is less obvious evidence of political bias from reading the published reports. If someone wanted to understand the science it is fairly clear to me the IPCC report would be a much better starting point than the NIPCC report. There are some very clear incentives to "break rank", as you put it. There are significant financial incentives for people who stand to lose from climate change mitigation, for example in the oil industry, to fund people to investigate the case against climate change. Again, I don't really feel in a good position to judge who is right and who is wrong here, but I would expect if the scientific case was highly suspect as you'd say that people would have funded equally convincing scientific reports on the other side. The fact that I haven't been able to find such reports suggests to me that there is not a convincing case against the science to be made. (Edit: also I suspect the politicisation of climate change debate and the bureaucratic process of the IPCC probably means that the science is less effective than it might otherwise be, and that the communication of this science is less convincing than it could be, to the detriment of the quality of the public debates. As I mentioned in another comment it's quite painful to link to the IPCC report and they prevent people from redistributing it without permission, meaning the format is basically fixed in an unhelpful set of massive PDFs. Sad!)
donarb 9y ago
It's not change that is alarming, it's the rate of change. In the past, you'd have something like 1 degree C of change over the course of tens of thousands of years. Now you have that same change in less than a few hundred years. Short of a massive asteroid hit, the Earth hasn't experienced that sort of short term change.
- alphapapa 9y ago
  > It's not change that is alarming, it's the rate of change. This is the new line, parroted by the faux scientist-turned-political celebrity Bill Nye in response to the reasonable arguments against alarmism. The worst part is how the parrots aren't even well coordinated. There are plenty of people still claiming that the change itself is alarming. In fact, Bill Nye himself said in an interview with Tucker Carlson, one in which he said exactly your "it's the rate of change" line, that, if not for humans, the climate today would be as it was 150 years ago--necessarily implying that the climate does not change but for human activity, a claim that even skeptics don't believe. In other words, an egregious strawman. When their claim is essentially, "1 + 1 = 3!", you should be very skeptical.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

ximeng 9y ago

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Chapter06_FINAL.pdf https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_Cha... Page 471 has a pretty clear diagram that explains the change - increase beyond the natural ability of the carbon cycle to mitigate the change leading to steady increases in industrial area (last 150 years effectively). I don't see ice core data showing wild fluctuations over periods of 10-100k years and the ppm of atmospheric carbon is relatively stable over this period.

alphapapa 9y ago
Some say that the IPCC is an unreliable source, considering the former IPCC scientists who have whistleblown about their political bias and manipulation of results. How would you answer that concern?
- alphapapa 9y ago
  I see, answered by downvoting. Insert fingers in ears, close eyes, move right along, nothing to see here.
  - ximeng 9y ago
    I didn't down vote (or answer). I don't have an opinion on the bias, having only read through the scientific report, but do think the science on the IPCC side looks better than anything I've seen on the other side, and that reasons for it being biased exist on both sides. Therefore tend to side with what looks like the better science.
    - alphapapa 9y ago
      My apologies. Shouldn't have assumed you were the one who downvoted. > Therefore tend to side with what looks like the better science. But the point is that the science is highly suspect. When scientists on the IPCC break rank and make themselves pariahs, virtually ruining their careers, that should tell you something.
      - ximeng 9y ago
        I am judging this on reading parts of the IPCC reports (see for example https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FINAL_full.pdf https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/syr/SYR_AR5_FI...) and the NIPCC report published by the Heartland Institute (https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/Books/Why%20Scientists%20Disagree%20Second%20Edition%20with%20covers.pdf https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/Books/W...). Reading these two you will see two very different approaches, which reflects much of the debate I see on these subjects, including some of your comments. The NIPCC report is openly political opening with a complaint about Obama's treatment of climate change as a serious issue. It talks about circumstantial evidence, debate amongst scientists, and has a petition organised to collect signatures. (This apparently gathers signatures from 31,478 scientists of which only 9,021 have PhDs.) The IPCC report is filled with detailed diagrams and explanations of the science behind global warming. The approach generally seems sensible to someone like me with some understanding of the scientific method, although I am not qualified to analyse in depth. I am sure anybody reading it would learn something about the climate and how we can analyse it. Now I don't follow the political debate on whether the IPCC is biased by funding or some other supposed disincentives for scientists to report truthfully. On the other hand I do see that there is less obvious evidence of political bias from reading the published reports. If someone wanted to understand the science it is fairly clear to me the IPCC report would be a much better starting point than the NIPCC report. There are some very clear incentives to "break rank", as you put it. There are significant financial incentives for people who stand to lose from climate change mitigation, for example in the oil industry, to fund people to investigate the case against climate change. Again, I don't really feel in a good position to judge who is right and who is wrong here, but I would expect if the scientific case was highly suspect as you'd say that people would have funded equally convincing scientific reports on the other side. The fact that I haven't been able to find such reports suggests to me that there is not a convincing case against the science to be made. (Edit: also I suspect the politicisation of climate change debate and the bureaucratic process of the IPCC probably means that the science is less effective than it might otherwise be, and that the communication of this science is less convincing than it could be, to the detriment of the quality of the public debates. As I mentioned in another comment it's quite painful to link to the IPCC report and they prevent people from redistributing it without permission, meaning the format is basically fixed in an unhelpful set of massive PDFs. Sad!)

donarb 9y ago

It's not change that is alarming, it's the rate of change. In the past, you'd have something like 1 degree C of change over the course of tens of thousands of years. Now you have that same change in less than a few hundred years. Short of a massive asteroid hit, the Earth hasn't experienced that sort of short term change.

alphapapa 9y ago
> It's not change that is alarming, it's the rate of change. This is the new line, parroted by the faux scientist-turned-political celebrity Bill Nye in response to the reasonable arguments against alarmism. The worst part is how the parrots aren't even well coordinated. There are plenty of people still claiming that the change itself is alarming. In fact, Bill Nye himself said in an interview with Tucker Carlson, one in which he said exactly your "it's the rate of change" line, that, if not for humans, the climate today would be as it was 150 years ago--necessarily implying that the climate does not change but for human activity, a claim that even skeptics don't believe. In other words, an egregious strawman. When their claim is essentially, "1 + 1 = 3!", you should be very skeptical.