Is Global Warming a Natural Phenomenon?

[The Black Rabbit]

"But would you agree that one who did has no business writing in a broadsheet newspaper when it is not in the publics interest to know, because they are wrong?"

In a word. NO.
Two words actually...
Absolutely not.

Firstly see my earlier post specifically regarding WRONG or INSANE.

Free press. Freedom of speech.

Ignore David Belllamy ( probably sensible) or believe him (maybe a little dangerous).
I give the British public that choice. I think we can handle it, I'd like to think we are intelligent enough. Its not like he's writing this misleading information in scientific journals eh? It was the telegraph (wasn't it?).
The same press that are certainly exaggerating one side of the argument (yes Strontium, the scientific consensus side) can surely exaggerate t'other side also can't they?
Of course they can.

I think we are dancing around Semantics again here.
Maybe its horses for courses. I don't read David Bellamy in the Telegraph and then go out into the garden , cut down the trees and have a big bonfire, because everything is fine now - Global Warming isn't happening.... phew!
Maybe some people do? Yes - I suppose that might be dangerous.

As Matt xyz suggested, we could have this debate for years - I just seem to get very frustrated with a few scientists who cannot admit the shortfallings of science, and its refreshing to hear someone like you suggesting the opposite.
Thanks.
Doug

[Strontium]

I think that for you to suddenly hark about the "shortfallings" of science after we berrated David Bellamy for talking a load "pop science" non-sense is hypocritical to say the least. And now you talk of dancing around semantics, I dont think so, you tried to convince us that we should listen to non experts who express their thoughts in public - and no it was the Times that published it, you mean to tell me you cant look back in the same thread and find that out for yourself - (thread bating?) post number 26..Times online! Free speech you see is very overrated, which is why science is peer reviewed, and no one said there was no shortfall in science, isnt that the POINT in doing more science, make better judgement about nature, get up to date understanding of the world.

Your argument lies in a different place, about the press, and is not centered on the global warming debate - but about how there is exaggeration of the global warming issue. You say that its good to have a broad opinion, and we should allow anyone's discussion, on the basis that there is much exaggerated press. On what reasoning should this be so? because there are jobs and reputations, careers, in the balance? I dont think that holds any water either, I wouldnt buy a substandard service in anything just because someone needs to be paid for their ineffectual skills. Much less if there is far too much fat on the land, and there is still plenty of money to be made if you can convince people that there IS a plentifull environment that will support you.

[The Black Rabbit]

I (genuinely) apologise if I've offended you Strontium.
I guess we will disagree on this, and freedom of speech, which I (naturally?)assumed was certainly not overrated? I'll chew that one over sometime!

Doug

[RantingSquirrel]

Originally Posted by ChasCreek

After seeming various arguments for both sides, I must admit that I do feel that it is a natural occurence, a cycle in solar activity etc.

However we have been damaging the enviromnet in many different ways for a long time and even if what we have been doing has only been a small part of the whole we still need to do something about our way of living / treating the planet and a lot of the 'actions' being undertaken / proposed under the 'global warming' banner will do good anyway for the planet irrespective of whether they actually are affecting global warming.

I do wonder sometimes if there are alterior motives in things. We had the 'cold war' with Russia back in the 1970's and we now know that Russia didn't have even a small percentage of the capabilities we were being led to believe they had.

I feel that governments need a focus for their population, in the 70's it was the cold war, now it is global warming. It would be far easier to get people to make changes to their lifestyles if you tell them you are going to turn the planet into a desert in less than a 100 years so better be greener, than to say well the global warming is mainly a natural thing, but well we are running out of natural resources so we need to change lifestyles. Shock tactics get responses.

So I think that we are probably only a factor in a much wider natural cycle, however the changes that are being made / will be made under the 'we are responsible for global warming' banner are for the good of the planet anyway so it's good propaganda. And of course the truth is that no one will really know the truth (rather like the cold war) for a good many years until governments can disclose the truth without having a backlash.

The sunpot/solar activity data has been hotly debated for a long time. Recent evidence (by the Royal Society) appears so show that the recent changes in temperatures are not related to solar activity...

http://www.pubs.royalsoc.ac.uk/media...pa20071880.pdf

Kind regards

[Paul mabbott]

It's even hitting the USA now.
Drought in southern US paints a dry future - Telegraph
And with typical common sense they (a) use a fire engine to ferry water around (thus contributing to further warming) and (b) pray.

One day they may realise what they're doing to the world but I fear it may be too late ...

[Coley]

Originally Posted by StuartDH

and my guess is that there are more than one or two members in the forum who know a little bit more about the subject than David Bellamy

And my guess is Black Rabbit doesn't know enough about Climate Change to know that Bellamy doesn't.

[The Black Rabbit]

Originally Posted by Coley

And my guess is Black Rabbit doesn't know enough about Climate Change to know that Bellamy doesn't.

I'm no climatologist thats for sure Coley.
I know a little about a little.
Thats all.
Doug

[RantingSquirrel]

The following reports very simply show how man has affected the recent climate. I've read the entire original IPCC report and found it scary (even though it was 'watered down' in terms of key phrases after lobbying from China/India/US). The 'new' reports are produced by WWF and sums up/collates key findings from the IPCC report. Does not take long to read. Not very happy stuff and shows why something needs to be done asap.

WWF - What you should know: WWF summary for policy makers (IPCC Working Groups I and II)

[Strontium]

Hi Ranting Rabbit,

Is this one of the documents that you speak of? Only about 1MB of pdf doc to download.

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/technical-pap...versity-en.pdf

Thanks for the other link btw.

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by Interpreter

This is a little tongue in cheek.

If cows and vegeterians are to blame for most of the greenhouse gasses being emitted today, what was happening 65 million years ago? How much CO2 would an 80 ton brontosaurus produce at one end and methane at the other and how many of these creatures could the earth support before global warming became an issue?

Just a thought.

Ha! I've a chart in one of my books that shows just how much methane animals produce in a day and how many kettles it would boil! Joking aside, it might have been more interesting if they had done it on rice fields.

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by Coley

And my guess is Black Rabbit doesn't know enough about Climate Change to know that Bellamy doesn't.

I seem to remember David Bellamy got his figures wrong over climate change - something to do with a typo?! was on telly a while back. Not talking about DB in particular but there is a tendency to put some scientists on pedestals and then take everything they say as gospel, which is a little dangerous. We also still have a tendency to dismiss research that is contrary to mainstream findings, also not a good idea (we've not learned anything from Darwin after all.)

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by StuartDH

"Global Warming is a Natural Phenomenon" is something that I hear on almost every debate about global warming and climate change on the TV and radio. While we're definitely coming out of an ice age, it seems as though many feel that this is the only/main reason why the planet is getting warmer and that global warming is a natural phenomenon without significant change by man.

As a result, should we be looking to re-label 'global warming by human action' to enable people to more easily identify the distinction between natural climate change and anthropogenic climate change?

To go back to the original question then! I'm not sure as people are still going to use whichever label fits in best with them at the time. Unfortunately so many people are caught up in the materialistic trap that I don't think it will work; it's a label that will just get pushed aside for the main part. As it's caused by a bit of both perhaps one should never be mentioned without the other but how you work that one around the media who knows!

[The Black Rabbit]

Originally Posted by tufftie

I seem to remember David Bellamy got his figures wrong over climate change - something to do with a typo?! was on telly a while back. Not talking about DB in particular but there is a tendency to put some scientists on pedestals and then take everything they say as gospel, which is a little dangerous. We also still have a tendency to dismiss research that is contrary to mainstream findings, also not a good idea (we've not learned anything from Darwin after all.)

Absolutely Tuftie, but of course you can approach your (highlighted) comment from two sides...
Doug

[RantingSquirrel]

Originally Posted by Strontium

Hi Ranting Rabbit,

Is this one of the documents that you speak of? Only about 1MB of pdf doc to download.

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/technical-pap...versity-en.pdf

Thanks for the other link btw.

Hi never seen a Ranting Rabbit
I've not actually read that report which you provided a link for (but have now saved a copy). The reports I linked to are the new Fourth Assessment (i.e. this Nov) concise reports on climate change (the full ones are much longer...IPCC - Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) designed to hopefully make it easier for politicians in Bali to get a grip on issues, and understand man made climate changes. Given that I understood it easily (though I do have env qualifications), there should be no excuses for politicians failure to act and come up with successor to Kyoto (in theory......)

[The Black Rabbit]

Tuftie...
Your reference to DB's "typo" is this I assume...
( text (c) Monbiot.com)

"So it wasn’t looking too good for Bellamy, or Singer, or any of the deniers who have cited these figures. But there was still one mystery to clear up. While Bellamy’s source claimed that 55% of 625 glaciers are advancing, Bellamy claimed that 555 of them - or 89% - are advancing. This figure appears to exist nowhere else. But on the standard English keyboard, 5 and % occupy the same key. If you try to hit %, but fail to press shift, you get 555, instead of 55%. This is the only explanation I can produce for his figure. When I challenged him, he admitted that there had been “a glitch of the electronics”.(17)

So, in Bellamy’s poor typing, we have the basis for a whole new front in the war against climate science. The 555 figure is now being cited as definitive evidence that global warming is a “fraud”, a “scam”, a “lie”. I phoned New Scientist to ask if he had requested a correction. He had not been in touch."

Very enlightening eh?
What Monbiot et.el are basically saying is that DB's whole argument against (A)GW is based :
a)On a dodgy website (penned by an ex-architect, not a scientist)
b)On a case of "sausage finger" when using his keyboard, rather like the decimal point fiasco with regards to the amount of iron in spinach...
c)An inability to admit fault?

Maybe Bellamy IS bonkers after all?
Maybe he is....
Shame.

Doug

[Adam Cheeseman]

Wonder what will come out of next week's: Earth - power of the planet on BBC2 Tuesday @ 9pm. He's covering the atmosphere.

Cheers,

Adam

[JeffH]

Originally Posted by Adam Cheeseman

Wonder what will come out of next week's: Earth - power of the planet on BBC2 Tuesday @ 9pm. He's covering the atmosphere.

Cheers,

Adam

Yet more 'hot air' I suspect - possibly one of the largest factors contributing to the problem

Jeff

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by The Black Rabbit

Absolutely Tuftie, but of course you can approach your (highlighted) comment from two sides...
Doug

True

[tufftie]

Originally Posted by The Black Rabbit

Tuftie...
Your reference to DB's "typo" is this I assume...
( text (c) Monbiot.com)

"So it wasn’t looking too good for Bellamy, or Singer, or any of the deniers who have cited these figures. But there was still one mystery to clear up. While Bellamy’s source claimed that 55% of 625 glaciers are advancing, Bellamy claimed that 555 of them - or 89% - are advancing. This figure appears to exist nowhere else. But on the standard English keyboard, 5 and % occupy the same key. If you try to hit %, but fail to press shift, you get 555, instead of 55%. This is the only explanation I can produce for his figure. When I challenged him, he admitted that there had been “a glitch of the electronics”.(17)

So, in Bellamy’s poor typing, we have the basis for a whole new front in the war against climate science. The 555 figure is now being cited as definitive evidence that global warming is a “fraud”, a “scam”, a “lie”. I phoned New Scientist to ask if he had requested a correction. He had not been in touch."

Very enlightening eh?
What Monbiot et.el are basically saying is that DB's whole argument against (A)GW is based :
a)On a dodgy website (penned by an ex-architect, not a scientist)
b)On a case of "sausage finger" when using his keyboard, rather like the decimal point fiasco with regards to the amount of iron in spinach...
c)An inability to admit fault?

Maybe Bellamy IS bonkers after all?
Maybe he is....
Shame.

Doug

It was that issue but it was a television programme where DB, after a bit of trying not to, admitted that this was the case!

[zan]

I haven't read all the previous posts, so apologies if I'm repeating information you've already got.

I think part of the problem is the vast amount of information out there and the timescales involved. If you look at the geological record over the past x million years, then yes you will see the climate fluctuate over time. These are natural occurrences, that's fine. They happen relatively slowly and generally allow time for animals\plants to adjust\evolve into the new conditions.

the difference is that when you look at the last 150 years (has anyone seen the 'hockey stick' curve?) there is clear evidence that we are accelerating the rate of climate change far beyond what it would otherwise be. It's a complex story, without doubt: CO2 has a warming effect; soot particles and e.g. vapour trails from planes have a cooling effect and how they interact is what drives our influence on the climate. But we are having a significant effect beyond natural fluctuations.

I base my opinions on the views of scientists I respect and evidence I have read for myself in the scientific literature. It's a huge subject, but it's becoming more and more obvious that the 'its all natural' argument is being continuously worn down (often better) research to the contrary.

But like I said, this is just my own opinion. I don't expect I'll change anyone's mind through this post, but I would encourage people to really look at the research (or check new scientist or similar) that's been done before jumping to conclusions. The 'it's all natural' argument gets way too much press attention compared to the volume of work on the subject and it's easy to believe it'll all work out.

as a final thought, have a look at this video. If you can dispute the logic, please let me know

YouTube - Most Terrifying Video You'll Ever See

Zan

[robingoodfellow]

Ha, ha, that was an impressive. Award that man an eco-medal!