High Court to Weigh Climate Change Case

Just what we need... a bunch of lawyers deciding on a technology issue that is beyond the capability of most climate scientists to understand. In the middle ages, the climate was 5 degrees above earth's long term normal, 3 - 4 degrees warmer than it is now. The present global warmup is within the usual climate cycles for the earth. The world should just accept this warming trend rather than try to legislate a change in climate.

Belius, you are right-on. Global warming is the product of the Democrats and tree huggers. We, the republicans/industrialist should not pay any attention to those winnie

Democrats are "winners" - not winnie.

I just read the article on PhysOrg.com. Looks like another lawsuit from uninformed legislators who know little or nothing about science. If memory serves me correctly the #1 greenhouse gas would be.....Water Vapor. Maybe a lawsuit against all things that emit water would be better. The earth climate is cyclical in nature and we are just going through a warming trend. Lets spend our time working on real problems not politically motivated ones!

I love you guys. You take a few facts and pretend you have some sort of informed opinion that is superior to the lawyers.

There is absolutely no doubt that climate change is occuring. Go to google scholar and do some research rather than just repeating what you've heard pundents say. Here are some articles to get you started.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1990381.ece
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6098974
http://www.terranature.org/globalWarmingPatagonia.htm

Your uniformed opinions are out of date. Global warming is a confirmed fact. You might as well argue that the Earth is flat.

Roger

It depends on which study you quote. Other studies show the ice fields are receeding, BUT they are getting thicker in the remaining areas. Total volume seems to be steady.

I have no personal knowledge of the facts either way, however, I have heard of studies that show measurements of the entire earth, from space show no "Global" warming. There is no doubt that there are cases of localized climate changes.

I believe the process of grants applications and who is doing them, plays a part in each sides foregone conclusions.

You Wrote "I have no personal knowledge of the facts either way" "I believe the process of grants applications and who is doing them, plays a part in each sides foregone conclusions."

Well I guess that means you can disregard any scientific findings you want, it explains why you can question global warming when there is a mountain of data supporting it.

You should also know that their are no studies from the past 3 years that say icefields are getting thicker in areas (You're talking about Greenland).

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11385475/

No, I'm afraid the begining of this decade has pretty much eliminated the doubt that existed in the nineties and eighties.

Of course, it is a fact that the earth is warmiong. No one disputes that. The issue is whether it is a part of the natural cycle or whether it is man made and reversable. The scientific community believes the former while the unknowledgeable do-gooders bellieve the latter.

You wrote: "Of course, it is a fact that the earth is warmiong. No one disputes that."

Actually people do dispute that. I'm glad you don't, but I'm afraid your underestimating the level of denial out there.

You wrote:"issue is whether it is a part of the natural cycle or whether it is man made and reversable."

The old climate cycles were controlled primarily by the precession of the Earth's axis of rotation. The change in temperatures in the last 150 years is drastic and inconsistant with temperature variations at this point in the traditional cycle. In fact the climate is approaching levels usually seen at the warmest parts of the cycles, which shouldn't be coming for several thousand years from now. So its pretty clear its not a natural effect.

Also CO² levels and Methane levels are off the map. Never in the last 750,000 years have levels been even close to this high. For everyone who doubts greenhouse gases can heat the Earth, I recommend the following experiment. Park your car facing the sun, roll up your windows and sit around. In five minutes you'll be pretty hot, this is because glass is pretty much transparent to visible light but reflective to IR, so the IR is trapped in the car and heats the air in the car. In the same way, CO² and Methane are transparent to visible and traps IR. They are also heavy, so they sit close to the surface of Earth, meaning they not only trap IR, but do so close to the surface, where we live.

If I seem frustrated, it's because I read a ton on the mechanisms, science, solutions, climate effects, etc. on this and I constantly find myself debating people who's knowledge consists of a nightline clip and a michael crichton book. Also, people assign positions to me that I don't have, for instance:

I'm not in favor of Carbon Trading, the Kyoto Protocol, or any of that other useless stuff that does nothing to solve the problem aside from making ourselves feel less guilty. From my point of view, denying the problem or offering the Kyoto Protocol as a solution amount to the same thing, not helping.

The only solution, which would have a ton of positive effects, is developing Fusion (not fission), which would pretty much reduce energy costs to pennies, solve global warming, and seriously cut off revenue streams to hostile governments in oil producing nations. Solar would be good to invest in as well. Ethanol is useless. It doesn't work on so many levels, its almost comical if it wasn't so potentially tragic. Fuel Cells need work and the payoff isn't nearly good enough for the investment its getting. Its a superficial solution at best.

Roger,

I would say that both you, and your antagonists, are partially right, partially wrong...and all seemingly looking into the wrong crystal balls. Seems to this writer that, while it makes sense to study, even try to mitigate the effects of climate trends--either natural or anthropogenic--it is quite likely that any such effort will prove wrong in ways that cannot be predicted; and that the expense of such measures today might prove wasteful, even counter productive, when...the day (and the ocean water) arrives. Thus, a more balanced approached might ultimately make more sense: one that encompasses both the notion of taking preventive steps today--to the degree that they be determined to "do no harm" in the future; and another that accepts that certain eventual outcomes of warming (if they happen) might be inevitable--and begin accessing preparedness, technological capabilities, research directions, etc, today, in order to meet any challenges that will be presented in the future. But such thinking does not seem to have much traction so long as people simply disputate about what cannot be known for sure. In fact I have posted "scenarios" and potential solutions for a warmer world (submerging cites and crop lands, for example), using resources and technologies we already have...but the offer of discussion went nowhere...only more harangues about politicians, conspiracies, and such. What do you think? Ought not people today (engineers especially) be preparing today for the worst that might happen tomorrow? To be looking for opportunity in an alternative environment, rather than catastrophe...catastrophe that cannot be averted so long as its only seen as catastrophe, and not something to be overcome, as and when it comes to pass?

I think if we spent as much money on developing fusion as is spent on uses of carbon nanotubes, the problem would be well on its way to being fixed in 20 years.

global warming may be fact, but the cause of it is only theory. If the earth is warming as you say, the idea that we have any control over it is only a theory. So don't get so argumentative about something that is easily debatable

Anything is easily debatable if you ignore enough facts. What you are suggesting is the equivalent of a man holding a smoking gun standing over a dead man with a bullet in him.

When accused, the man responds "Men die all the time, prove that it was the bullet that killed him."

My point here is that the popular argument now that suggests this is a natural climate change ignores the smoking gun of 150 years of greenhouse gases being poured into the environment resulting in atmospheric levels of these gases not seen for millions of years. It also ignores the glaring fact that such climate changes in the past took thousands of years, not the 150 years that this climate shift (which is accelerating, I might add) has taken.

Sorry Roger, I think, based on the evidence that you apparently are not aware, that global climate change is mostly a farce created by professor types who need funding and are not at all concerned with any sort of truth. It is well known that there three types of lies; Lies, damn lies and statistics. We are seeing the result of special interest science and the results are hurting us, developing countries as well as distracting us from much more important problems.

First off, there is evidence of "global warming" in the 15^th century. The data is available on line from a UK source. This global warming was comparable in degree to what is being seen today. This data was censored from the hockey stick graphs that have been widely distributed and scientists have questioned the validity of the conclusions reached. Subsequently the climate cooled down and went below the zero line. The people involved knew this and intentionally deleted the offending data. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/11/12/nclim12.xml&page=5

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/graphics/2006/11/05/warm-refs.pdf;jsessionid=Y1JC2GZUB0NIBQFIQMFCFFWAVCBQYIV0

Secondly, the Bristlecone pine data, upon which much of the conclusions were based, has been noted as being unreliable. It appears that the effect of carbon dioxide is confounded with other factors (light and temperature and rain fall) and as a result cannot be relied upon as a measure indicating the effect of temperature alone. Indeed, this unreliable data was given 397 times more weight in the conclusions of the commission although they knew that the data was questionable.

Lastly, around 1972 climate scientists thought we were going into a mini ice age. We weren't and things went back to normal over a couple of decades.

It has been suggested that solar activity can effect the temperature of the earth and sun spots can be linked directly to the apparent warming. This warming may well be just a part of a cycle that we do not as yet understand. We certainly do not understand enough to write policy on the matter as of now.

You Wrote "Sorry Roger, I think, based on the evidence that you apparently are not aware, that global climate change is mostly a farce created by professor types who need funding and are not at all concerned with any sort of truth."

No, unfortunately your wrong. Global Warming is absolutely real, it is due to excessive greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The greenhouse gases trap heat close to the surface of the Earth, which is then absorbed by ice and water.

The moon, which is the same distance from the sun as us, has daytime high temperatures of 242 F (116 C) and nightime low temperatures of -279 F (-173 C) at the moons equator. So if the Earth had no water or atmosphere, it would have about the same highs and lows at its equator. That's how much the oceans and atmosphere moderate temperature. So all the excess heat right now is being absorbed by glaciers and oceans, with the later slowly rising in temperature, and over time will significantly alter our weather patterns and average temperatures.

Your the one who is unaware. Your the one who have fallen for lies and marketing that makes you believe that significantly changing the make up of the atmospheric green house gases will result in little to no change. The problem isn't with the science, its with you. I've done a three part serious on Global Warming here on CR4. If you feel I'm wrong, I invite you to read it, check the stories and links listed and then comment. I strongly recommend you read part two, which explains how global warming works and how it isn't really "Global" at all but rather just effecting the small portion of the planet where we reside.

Here is part II of the story: http://cr4.globalspec.com/blogentry/179/Global-Warming-Part-2-of-3