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And in Nordic countries I’ve honestly heard people say that the fact that it’s pretty cold right now is evidence against global warming. That whole ”global” par

by pimmen 7y ago

And in Nordic countries I’ve honestly heard people say that the fact that it’s pretty cold right now is evidence against global warming. That whole ”global” part really trips people up. Does anyone know how to explain this nice and clear to people who aren’t that well versed in variances and means? I really struggle.

jen729w 7y ago
It’s more complicated than it appears. Europe, for instance, may indeed get colder as a result of the warm ocean flows from the west being cut off by melting ice from the Arctic. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2001/jun/21/globalwarming.physicalsciences https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2001/jun/21/globalwa... Hot and dry in Canberra today, and the smoke from the fires is insane.
- saiya-jin 7y ago
  It might end up true on average, but my home country in central/eastern Europe (Slovakia) is definitely getting warmer. Long harsh winters of the childhood are gone (having snow 3 months in a row feels surreal these days), ticks and other creepers which were not present in the area I grew up are not very common (altitude cca 750m). I think what most people have trouble realizing is that global warming indeed is a chaotic shift in many weather patterns and only overall average is rising. Ie it might just rain more during summer due to changed water circulation, which will take average yearly temperature down. Most people equate global warming with less snow during winter and heat waves in the summer and imagine it as a equal rise of say +2 all over the place, spread over whole year.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  I forget the correct name for the event, but there's good precedent. At the end of the last ice age, during the large scale melting, there was a great North American lake formed of melt water, held back by glaciers. When that finally melted into the Atlantic, enough freshwater was dumped to turn off the thermo haline circulation (inc Gulf Stream). Europe tipped into another mini ice age, as the whole globe warmed.
  - CalRobert 7y ago
    "The Younger Dryas was the most recent and longest of several interruptions to the gradual warming of the Earth's climate since the severe LGM, about 27,000 to 24,000 years BP. The change was relatively sudden, taking place in decades, and it resulted in a decline of 2 to 6°C (3.6 to 10.8°F) and advances of glaciers and drier conditions, over much of the temperate Northern Hemisphere. It is thought to have been caused by a decline in the strength of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, which transports warm water from the Equator towards the North Pole, in turn thought to have been caused by an influx of fresh, cold water from North America to the Atlantic. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_meridional_overturning_circulation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_meridional_overturnin...
    - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
      Thank you!
volument 7y ago
Not true. We used to have snow here in Finland at this time of the year, but nowadays we are mostly waiting to have snow for Chistmas at least.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
kresten 7y ago
It’s “climate change”, not just global warming.
- ben_w 7y ago
  Although this is 100% true, saying that does come across as shifting the goalposts. Part of the problem is that a decade before I was born, enough newspapers breathlessly reported “scientists” “predicting” “a new ice age”. Despite the fact those headlines misrepresented the scientific consensus of the time so badly that it’s appropriate for me to put all those scare quotes in that sentence, the meme remains potent.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    That seems to have been very specifically just in the US. The rest of the world did not breathlessly report a coming ice age. UK and Europe barely noticed. Here in the UK I can remember just two pieces about it, in the end of the news "silly stuff and wacky ideas" slot. Don't believe Horizon, Equinox or any of the others ever covered it, even though there was one or two episodes every series for outlier and controversial ideas, and I watched them religiously back then. I had a remaindered paperback I bought around 1980 about the coming dawn of a new ice age. Firmly in the realm of wacky conspiracy theory next to Chariot of the Gods, even in the late 70s.
    - ben_w 7y ago
      That’s ironic, given that I’m from the UK and it was my British teachers in my secondary school who first made me aware of the meme.
      - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
        Interesting, I wonder what sources they were relying on. I recall it as something of a silly minority idea of the time, that had its moment. And that it was just a moment -- far less of a moment than Chariot of the Gods that did get TV programmes and discussion off the back of its idiocy. I don't ever remember seeing it in the papers we got at home. Maybe it got exposure via the Daily Mail or similar lover of fake and dodgy news or outrage - never read those. It was only much, much later I heard it was taken far more seriously in the US, with pieces in media that should perhaps have known better, or checked sources...
rstuart4133 7y ago
Farmers in Australia have been pointing out for a while now the higher temperatures isn't the worst aspect of global warming. They can plan for and work around higher temperatures by planting different crops, irrigation or whatever. What they are finding hard to handle is the increasing variability. This was driven home to be when an interviewed farmer said they plant 3 crops now, whereas the used to bet on one - which ever one would handle the predicted conditions. Now they have no idea what the conditions will be, so the plant 3 crops in the hopes that one will do OK and crossed fingers - the others won't be a right off. The "pretty cold right now" is the same thing at work. You had record high temps earlier this year. Now you are having an unusual cold snap. This about how the effects the poor bugger trying to grow something.

by pimmen 7y ago

jen729w 7y ago

It’s more complicated than it appears. Europe, for instance, may indeed get colder as a result of the warm ocean flows from the west being cut off by melting ice from the Arctic. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2001/jun/21/globalwarming.physicalsciences https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2001/jun/21/globalwa... Hot and dry in Canberra today, and the smoke from the fires is insane.

saiya-jin 7y ago
It might end up true on average, but my home country in central/eastern Europe (Slovakia) is definitely getting warmer. Long harsh winters of the childhood are gone (having snow 3 months in a row feels surreal these days), ticks and other creepers which were not present in the area I grew up are not very common (altitude cca 750m). I think what most people have trouble realizing is that global warming indeed is a chaotic shift in many weather patterns and only overall average is rising. Ie it might just rain more during summer due to changed water circulation, which will take average yearly temperature down. Most people equate global warming with less snow during winter and heat waves in the summer and imagine it as a equal rise of say +2 all over the place, spread over whole year.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
I forget the correct name for the event, but there's good precedent. At the end of the last ice age, during the large scale melting, there was a great North American lake formed of melt water, held back by glaciers. When that finally melted into the Atlantic, enough freshwater was dumped to turn off the thermo haline circulation (inc Gulf Stream). Europe tipped into another mini ice age, as the whole globe warmed.
- CalRobert 7y ago
  "The Younger Dryas was the most recent and longest of several interruptions to the gradual warming of the Earth's climate since the severe LGM, about 27,000 to 24,000 years BP. The change was relatively sudden, taking place in decades, and it resulted in a decline of 2 to 6°C (3.6 to 10.8°F) and advances of glaciers and drier conditions, over much of the temperate Northern Hemisphere. It is thought to have been caused by a decline in the strength of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, which transports warm water from the Equator towards the North Pole, in turn thought to have been caused by an influx of fresh, cold water from North America to the Atlantic. " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Younger_Dryas https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_meridional_overturning_circulation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_meridional_overturnin...
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    Thank you!

volument 7y ago

Not true. We used to have snow here in Finland at this time of the year, but nowadays we are mostly waiting to have snow for Chistmas at least.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

kresten 7y ago

It’s “climate change”, not just global warming.

ben_w 7y ago
Although this is 100% true, saying that does come across as shifting the goalposts. Part of the problem is that a decade before I was born, enough newspapers breathlessly reported “scientists” “predicting” “a new ice age”. Despite the fact those headlines misrepresented the scientific consensus of the time so badly that it’s appropriate for me to put all those scare quotes in that sentence, the meme remains potent.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  That seems to have been very specifically just in the US. The rest of the world did not breathlessly report a coming ice age. UK and Europe barely noticed. Here in the UK I can remember just two pieces about it, in the end of the news "silly stuff and wacky ideas" slot. Don't believe Horizon, Equinox or any of the others ever covered it, even though there was one or two episodes every series for outlier and controversial ideas, and I watched them religiously back then. I had a remaindered paperback I bought around 1980 about the coming dawn of a new ice age. Firmly in the realm of wacky conspiracy theory next to Chariot of the Gods, even in the late 70s.
  - ben_w 7y ago
    That’s ironic, given that I’m from the UK and it was my British teachers in my secondary school who first made me aware of the meme.
    - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
      Interesting, I wonder what sources they were relying on. I recall it as something of a silly minority idea of the time, that had its moment. And that it was just a moment -- far less of a moment than Chariot of the Gods that did get TV programmes and discussion off the back of its idiocy. I don't ever remember seeing it in the papers we got at home. Maybe it got exposure via the Daily Mail or similar lover of fake and dodgy news or outrage - never read those. It was only much, much later I heard it was taken far more seriously in the US, with pieces in media that should perhaps have known better, or checked sources...

rstuart4133 7y ago

Farmers in Australia have been pointing out for a while now the higher temperatures isn't the worst aspect of global warming. They can plan for and work around higher temperatures by planting different crops, irrigation or whatever. What they are finding hard to handle is the increasing variability. This was driven home to be when an interviewed farmer said they plant 3 crops now, whereas the used to bet on one - which ever one would handle the predicted conditions. Now they have no idea what the conditions will be, so the plant 3 crops in the hopes that one will do OK and crossed fingers - the others won't be a right off. The "pretty cold right now" is the same thing at work. You had record high temps earlier this year. Now you are having an unusual cold snap. This about how the effects the poor bugger trying to grow something.