Global Warming

[BK-201]

I would like to make a topic dedicated to global warming. I would like to hear the views and discuss about a topic that has been debated by many despite what Al Gore says in his movie/book. I'm sure everyone has heard about global warming and it's association with the decline of glaciers and polar bear population. I am also curious as to where would be the best place to find good information on global warming.

Edited January 21, 2010 by BlackKnight

[Fayt Zelpher]

I think this is the graph that you are looking for?

[BK-201]

Thanks. I'll put it up.

[Blademaster!]

It doesn't really exist. It's just Al Gore going around saying stuff so he can get money. Also, Al Gore was recently cited as being wrong about a lot of his findings, and findings in general about global warming.

For what evidence there is of what could be called global warming(climate change), it's all natural and occurs because of some spacial reason. I don't remember it exactly, but my uncle once told me what the reason behind it was, and he is in the field of space study and things like that.

Also, I once read an article stating that apparently the earth would be better of if global warming actual does happen.

Finally, it doesn't matter in the end anyway. The Earth is in a sense "half way through its life span" and will "die" eventually anyway.

Whatever happens though, humanity will be able to adapt around it.

[BK-201]

It doesn't really exist. It's just Al Gore going around saying stuff so he can get money. Also, Al Gore was recently cited as being wrong about a lot of his findings, and findings in general about global warming.

For what evidence there is of what could be called global warming(climate change), it's all natural and occurs because of some spacial reason. I don't remember it exactly, but my uncle once told me what the reason behind it was, and he is in the field of space study and things like that.

Also, I once read an article stating that apparently the earth would be better of if global warming actual does happen.

Finally, it doesn't matter in the end anyway. The Earth is in a sense "half way through its life span" and will "die" eventually anyway.

Whatever happens though, humanity will be able to adapt around it.

Global Warming that Al Gore is talking about is far different. His is the man made one. The global warming that naturally occurs in the world is essential to life. It keeps the temperature at a good point.

[Fayt Zelpher]

It doesn't really exist. It's just Al Gore going around saying stuff so he can get money. Also, Al Gore was recently cited as being wrong about a lot of his findings, and findings in general about global warming.

For what evidence there is of what could be called global warming(climate change), it's all natural and occurs because of some spacial reason. I don't remember it exactly, but my uncle once told me what the reason behind it was, and he is in the field of space study and things like that.

Also, I once read an article stating that apparently the earth would be better of if global warming actual does happen.

Finally, it doesn't matter in the end anyway. The Earth is in a sense "half way through its life span" and will "die" eventually anyway.

Whatever happens though, humanity will be able to adapt around it.

Global Warming that Al Gore is talking about is far different. His is the man made one. The global warming that naturally occurs in the world is essential to life. It keeps the temperature at a good point.

Well, as an economics major, I'm not qualified to go into great scientific detail, but the greenhouse effect is caused when certain molecules in the Earth's atmosphere (primarily water vapor, but also CO2, Methane, and others) absorb heat. If it weren't for these molecules, most of the heat the planet gets from the Sun would bounce right off the Earth's surface and be radiated back into space. The greenhouse effect refers to the trapping of this heat near the Earth by these greenhouse gases (analogous to how an actual greenhouse works - light and heat comes from the sun, but the glass traps a portion of the heat).

However, the Global Warming that Gore and others refer to is the greenhouse effect on overdrive. Due to fossil fuel burning, large amounts of greenhouses gases once trapped underground (in the form of coal, oil, and other hydrocarbons) are released into the atmosphere, where the resulting CO2 (the general form for hydrocarbon combustion is C_nH_2n+2 + O₂ ---> energy + H₂O + CO₂) adds to the already existing greenhouse gases, warming the planet beyond the normal range in which temperature would fluctuate. I hope this serves as a decent enough explanation for this discussion.

Edited January 21, 2010 by Randomly Predictable

[shroudening]

There's not that much that we can do about Global Warming. We'll go through a time of harsh heat, and then we'll probably have to survive another ice age.

Reducing Greenhouse gases is just our way of trying not to make the process worse.

Edited January 21, 2010 by Isaac55

[Defeatist Elitist]

It doesn't really exist. It's just Al Gore going around saying stuff so he can get money. Also, Al Gore was recently cited as being wrong about a lot of his findings, and findings in general about global warming.

For what evidence there is of what could be called global warming(climate change), it's all natural and occurs because of some spacial reason. I don't remember it exactly, but my uncle once told me what the reason behind it was, and he is in the field of space study and things like that.

Also, I once read an article stating that apparently the earth would be better of if global warming actual does happen.

Finally, it doesn't matter in the end anyway. The Earth is in a sense "half way through its life span" and will "die" eventually anyway.

Whatever happens though, humanity will be able to adapt around it.

Al Gore is wrong =/= Global Warming is wrong.

There is a great deal of evidence suggesting that Global Warming is caused by human activity. Yes, the world naturally experiences increases and decreases in temperature, and Carbon Dioxide levels, but human actions have been shown to be increasing both.

If we do not curb our actions somewhat, we could actually land ourselves in significant trouble. No, I'm not saying we're all fucked in 50 years, but if we continue to increase our emissions, it eventually will come back to bite us.

Besides, even if it somehow is false, we'll only have cleaner air, less pollution, less reliance on crazy desert tribes, less need to destroy our own environment to get at resources, renewable energy sources, and a variety of other things.

Edited January 21, 2010 by ZXValaRevan

[Fayt Zelpher]

Besides, even if it somehow is false, we'll only have cleaner air, less pollution, less reliance on crazy desert tribes, less need to destroy our own environment to get at resources, renewable energy sources, and a variety of other things.

Nothing in the quote could possibly be closer to the truth. Even if the worst case scenarios are horribly exaggerated, restricting our use of fossil fuels will necessarily lead to all of the above things occurring.

As someone wise once said, "It's very hard to get someone to believe something when his salary depends on him not believing it". Why else do you see Big Tobacco continually denying the proven harmful effects of cigarettes? And what other reason would Big Oil have to continue to plant seeds of doubt about global warming. I realize that several people are questioning the motives of Gore here. Go ahead, but question the motives of Big Oil and their politicians in office as well.

[BK-201]

Oh it definitely exists, but the fact is, much is OVEREXAGERATED. The Antartica has been near record high thickness, and it is I believe, the biggest ice mass in the world.

The frequency is definitely increasing....

Guess what? Off the charts!/sarcasm

Edited January 21, 2010 by BlackKnight

[quanta]

Honestly... it's really hard to tell who has any clue what they are talking about with Global Warming. You get to see all these nice graphs and charts, but having done research on a relatively simple system (compared to global warming) I have difficulty believing that the predictions are as meaningful or accurate as alarmists would make them out to be. I really don't feel terribly qualified to guess the extent to which this sort of thing matters to humans. Especially given that predictions of the future 50 years from now often turn out to be so horribly wrong.

Besides, it might be cheaper to cool the earth directly (at least, this is the claim of Nathan Myhrvold... and it seems unlikely he's totally full of it) than to cut current greenhouse gas emissions to attempt to cool it or slow warming(in fact, the latter method is so seriously doomed from what I understand that it's hilarious anyone contemplates it as an actual solution). Of course, it doesn't help that a large chunk of the modern environmental movement in the U.S. has taken way too many hits from the metaphorical peace pipe. Environmentalism is like a religion to them. God help you if you suggest nuclear as a relatively clean, safe, effective power source (which it damn well is; it's just really expensive to start up). Or if you point out that the Earth is not some sort of temple and modifying the environment around you can be a perfectly valid solution to a problem (how easy or practical that is is a different question).

And what other reason would Big Oil have to continue to plant seeds of doubt about global warming. I realize that several people are questioning the motives of Gore here. Go ahead, but question the motives of Big Oil and their politicians in office as well.

Seriously? Big oil doesn't even have to try. People just plain aren't willing to make insane sacrifices for something not only far off, but also so horribly imprecise. Do you need to just convert everything to solar? Sequester carbon underground? Live like a Neanderthal? Will there be a 6 in. rise in the oceans in the next 50 years? 12 in.? 18 in.? Precision and accuracy matter.

Edited January 21, 2010 by quanta

[Defeatist Elitist]

1) Honestly... it's really hard to tell who has any clue what they are talking about with Global Warming. You get to see all these nice graphs and charts, but having done research on a relatively simple system (compared to global warming) I have difficulty believing that the predictions are as meaningful or accurate as alarmists would make them out to be. I really don't feel terribly qualified to guess the extent to which this sort of thing matters to humans. Especially given that predictions of the future 50 years from now often turn out to be so horribly wrong.

2) Besides, it might be cheaper to cool the earth directly (at least, this is the claim of Nathan Myhrvold... and it seems unlikely he's totally full of it) than to cut current greenhouse gas emissions to attempt to cool it or slow warming(in fact, the latter method is so seriously doomed from what I understand that it's hilarious anyone contemplates it as an actual solution). Of course, it doesn't help that a large chunk of the modern environmental movement in the U.S. has taken way too many hits from the metaphorical peace pipe. Environmentalism is like a religion to them. God help you if you suggest nuclear as a relatively clean, safe, effective power source (which it damn well is; it's just really expensive to start up). Or if you point out that the Earth is not some sort of temple and modifying the environment around you can be a perfectly valid solution to a problem (how easy or practical that is is a different question).

And what other reason would Big Oil have to continue to plant seeds of doubt about global warming. I realize that several people are questioning the motives of Gore here. Go ahead, but question the motives of Big Oil and their politicians in office as well.

3) Seriously? Big oil doesn't even have to try. People just plain aren't willing to make insane sacrifices for something not only far off, but also so horribly imprecise. Do you need to just convert everything to solar? Sequester carbon underground? Live like a Neanderthal? Will there be a 6 in. rise in the oceans in the next 50 years? 12 in.? 18 in.? Precision and accuracy matter.

1) I agree with you somewhat here. The alarmists are certainly making a bigger deal out of it than needs to be made, but according to most more current research it will likely reach a point where we would no longer be able to cope with the situation, if we continue at our current rate. How long this will be, and whether we will be able to cope in different ways by that time however, are indeed unsure, and I guess kind of mitigate that.

2) I don't think cutting greenhouse emissions really is as seriously doomed as people have been led to believe. Their is little political will to do so in North America, since the United States is one of the worst total producers of Greenhouse gasses, and Canada one of the worst per person producers, with little reduction planning in sight, but it is certainly very plausible, and not ridiculously expensive.

I completely agree on the environmentalism to an almost religious degree though. In some cases it is quite an obstacle, although what I have noticed is that generally it follows the trends of religion as well, with a small minority of incredibly loud, outspoken radicals within a majority of more moderate and quite people.

As for Nuclear Power, while I realize it is highly effective, and efficient, and produces relatively little waste, and may even end up being absolutely necessary, I still have qualms about switching to it in entirety. Nuclear Waste is nearly permanent and incredibly difficult to get rid of. The policy of burying it works in the short term, but eventually it may outlast its container, and will have to be dug up and recontained. If it piles up, then it could very easily become a greater problem than Global Warming itself.

However, in theory, most people only propose it for use until solar or wind energy become efficient enough to provide for more of our power needs. My fear however is that nuclear power will become what fossil fuels are now. I fear that people won't want to switch off of them. But really, my fears probably aren't great enough for me to raise too much of a fuss.

3) I don't quite think that people need to make insane sacrifices. As long as we can control and lower our emissions, we should be fine. There is (theoretically, although I believe that is theoretically as in "we definitely know it exists, we just don't know the exact level yet") a level of emission that will not continue to cause the problem to worsen, and anything lower than that will actually allow it to begin to revert.

EDIT: In reviewing my post, I realized that I was pretty much doing exactly what you were pointing out in your first paragraph, given how many times I used words such as "theoretically" "probably" and whatnot, so I guess disregard that I suck cocks? I dunno.

Edited January 22, 2010 by ZXValaRevan

[BK-201]

The alarmist will say anything to get people to support their movement. They can even say the slope on the tornado graph is positive.

[General Spoon]

I don't give a crap. And even if I did give a crap, the truth is that I wouldn't make a difference. At all.

[Zeldaicflame]

I don't give a crap. And even if I did give a crap, the truth is that I wouldn't make a difference. At all.

That's not entirely true.

Whilst only making the slightest of differences, its that more than one person thinks that way, and may therefore not try to help reduce CO2.

Lets say hypothetically there are 2 billion people in the world, exactly.

Now lets say the everyone in the world produces 400 grams of CO2 a day. (actual average is around 600, from memory).

So that's 800 Billion grams of CO2 a day. Which is 800 Million Kilograms a day. Which is 800,000 Metric Tons a day.

Now, say in a years time, only half the amount of people born, die. Lets say for every Hundred people, there are 20 babies.

That's an increase of 0.4 billion. now only half that amount, in the world, die. (less disease)

So an increase of only 0.2 billion.

Now there is 880,000 Metric tons produced.

Next year, same thing happens.

but now there is an extra 0.2 billion people in the world, so now you have an increase of 0.44 billion people.

Only half of them die, an increase of 0.22.

That means a population of 2.42 billion people, which means 968,000 metric tons produced.

First increase was 80,000

second increase was 88,000

that means it is increasing by more and more each year.

(using degrees centigrade)

so say the first year the worlds average temperature rose by 0.1, not much huh?

well next year it rises AGAIN by 0.12, still not much.

however in say 20 years it could start going up in increments of 1 degree.

give in another 30 years and the worlds average temperature would increase by AT LEAST 30 degrees.

at a guess that's 72 fahrenheit, but thats a guess.

ok well how about we predict this and start stopping it.

And say that there are a three major opinions about a certain statement, e.g. global warming exists.

Lets call these opinions, AGREE, DISAGREE, and UNCERTAIN.

so 40% agree, 40% disagree and 20% are uncertain. so its fairly even.

so all that agree halve their emissions.

all that disagree don't do a thing.

and those Uncertain average a drop by 10%

So, 800 million, halve their emissions, so only 200 grams each, thats 160,000

The other 800 million still emit 400 grams, so that's 320,000

the other 400 million emit 320grams, so that's 128, 000

A combined total of 608,000.

Still a drop. but it could be better, it could be 400,000, which is much better.

So not just you, more than just you think that, so a large group of people that think that way will make the same decisions.

If something can change one persons way of think, it can change hundreds, thousands of people who think the same.

So one person deciding to cut their emissions wont be the only one, if people hear their friends do it they may be inclined to do the same.

Therefore one single person can make a big difference in carbon emissions.

I'd also like to ask how you'd live, if the temperature was to increase 5 degrees, it might not snow in some places, it might dry places that are already hot enough.

say on a chilly 2 or 3 degree day, if that then became 7 or 8 degrees, it wouldn't snow.

Honestly... it's really hard to tell who has any clue what they are talking about with Global Warming. You get to see all these nice graphs and charts, but having done research on a relatively simple system (compared to global warming) I have difficulty believing that the predictions are as meaningful or accurate as alarmists would make them out to be. I really don't feel terribly qualified to guess the extent to which this sort of thing matters to humans. Especially given that predictions of the future 50 years from now often turn out to be so horribly wrong.

On what do you base this on?

I'd have trouble believing you if you said you traveled 50 years into the future and know for certain they are wrong.

Edited January 25, 2010 by Zeldaicflame

[Defeatist Elitist]

Honestly... it's really hard to tell who has any clue what they are talking about with Global Warming. You get to see all these nice graphs and charts, but having done research on a relatively simple system (compared to global warming) I have difficulty believing that the predictions are as meaningful or accurate as alarmists would make them out to be. I really don't feel terribly qualified to guess the extent to which this sort of thing matters to humans. Especially given that predictions of the future 50 years from now often turn out to be so horribly wrong.

On what do you base this on?

I'd have trouble believing you if you said you traveled 50 years into the future and know for certain they are wrong.

Past examples I would assume. People have assumed before that we would be dead, out of oil, out of other resources, etc, by now, and we still aren't. Peoples predictions, especially about things like this, often aren't too reliable.

Even technologically, things people never even thought of have already been created, and things people thought would be created haven't. I mean, hell, look at some of the stuff in original Star Trek. We have MORE advanced technology than a lot of that stuff, and that's supposed to be super cutting edge way beyond where we are now.

[Zeldaicflame]

Yes i suppose, but technology is getting better, so i am lead to presume that slowly are predictions will get better and better.

At least the weatherman is getting right more often. (where i live anyway).

Whether star trek is an example of predictions or not is arguable, but I'm not one to know those things.

And whoever posted that image about severe tornado's in th U.S. i have some qualms about.

Namely, the fact that higher temperatures actually decrease the amount anyway as tornado's form from clouds above ground (or water, but not sea).

So if an area has higher temperatures, then a lot of the moisture dries out. lack of moisture in the ground/lakes/rivers etc = lack of clouds.

The only exception is along coastline, where there is plenty of moisture, however, it is sea water.

So, i think your graph supports global warming.

(however that is just what i know, and am guessing at, its not actual data, but its what i think.)

Tropical cyclones are formed over sea or ocean.

If the ocean temperature rises, there is more evaporation over a large area of water.

Tropical cyclones are fueled by such evaporation of water.

Measurements of global water surface temperature indicate increases over the past few years, albeit minor <0.1 degrees Celsius.

So not much but what do global Tropical cyclone numbers say?

I don't know about you, but that's a definite increase in my books.

[GKSB]

I think the most famous scare which caused as much reform as the current scare was the Global Cooling crisis that was in the 70s and 80s.

Statistics 101; Correlation does not signify causation. The fact that temperature has been significantly rising since the 1850s ONLY means that it has been rising since the 1850s. It says nothing about previous trends, it says nothing about the cause. The correlation people draw is between industrialization and global warming, yes? However, since there are no direct measurements until well into the industrial age, this is not a fair assumption based on that data which you presented (since hurricanes are a measure of water temperature)

For any and all data about climate change before direct measurement occurred, we run into the problem of how representative of a sample we are taking. If we look at carbon levels in air bubbles in Antarctic ice, we are only looking at data from a small section of the earth's atmosphere - and it would be extremely foolish to assume the planet is homogeneous. Probably the next best measurement of global temperature patterns in the past would be glacial movement. Now, we need only look at the planet surface to know that about 12000 years ago, glaciers started receding from the past ice age (notably these glaciers probably covered at least half of the globe at the coldest point). Their extent suggests that the planet was very cold. Since glaciers have been sequestered in the northern and southern latitudes (there were no glaciers in Germany in written history, for example), it is very easy to say the planet has been warming ever since the last ice age. Significant temperature increases, mind you, enough to move glaciers back thousands of miles over a comparatively short period (12000 years is not long geologically).

Also significant is warming trends that lead to glaciation, and visa versa. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_glaciation#Quaternary_glacial_cycles I can't say it better than Wikipedia can, but the caveat is that, again, samples are representative of a small area so small changes can often be attributed to local fluctuations. However, the greater the increase or decrease in temperature projected by the measured phenomenon (in this graph's case, core samples of carbon dioxide), the more likely it is a global trend.

Humanity does spit tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and is a contributor - we are changing the speed of the glacial cycle, this I concur. We may even knock it out of its current loop and into the larger warming/cooling cycles of the Earth's past. However, the idea that we fundamentally change the outcome of an already set process of nature - the build up of carbon dioxide which will most likely cause a trend reversal as the earth's albedo to heat both traps heat and prevents it from entering (also see changes in amount of heat we receive from the sun http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles ) is a little silly.

Finally, we have two further questions, what will global warming's impact on humanity be and how much effort should be expended to 'slow' it down (if such a thing is possible). First, consider the beneficial effects of global warming. Huge swathes of land are going to become increasingly arable due to warmer climates and longer growing seasons; our prime examples are in counties like Russia and Canada, and areas like southern Argentina. Furthermore there will be a reduction of some dangers even as others increase; for example, it's highly underreported but statistically, thousands more people die from cold exposure than heat exposure each year in countries like the United States and the United Kingdom.

Second, there are major costs with few benefits for reducing global warming. This fact must be accepted; attempts to slow global warming will only occur in developed countries with a 'well-informed' demographic. It serves no nations interest primarily to cut carbon emissions or 'go green', except when the voters coerce their representatives to (I exclude other government types because they really never are developed countries). Since developing nations, such as China and India, are coming close to surpassing the United States with no signs of slowing in their carbon dioxide, the effect is questionable, since global warming, as I have shown, is a cycle that will continue, only with humanity speeding it along its way. Then, the effect of this is disproportionatly devastating. It only takes a bit of logic to realize that if, say, half of American consumers stopped buying gasoline-run cars next year, the American automobile industry would most likely crash. That's a huge segment of our industry, with economic ramifications both in areas such as banking, which suddenly shortchanged billions of dollars, and the millions of employees. This simple event has a long series of effects that, in the end, make people's lives much worse than being forced to relocate from their expensive waterfront condo. I can go on with examples, such as the carbon tax which, in order to have a noticeable effect on carbon output would severely cramp commercial growth and drive up prices to the point where most Americans would buy foreign - promoting carbon production in other countries and completely removing the reason for the carbon tax in the first place.

As a side note, it also is telling to compare the cost of reducing global warming to solve a given problem - lets say coastline recession - and conventional fixes. Given the economic effects describe above (and also the fact that waterfront properties are hilariously disproportional in price to their actual worth), relocating properties from waterfronts is an extremely cost effective solution that ALSO helps reduce risk from problems that will never go away, such as hurricanes, storms, and flooding.

I'm kind of bored of writing this, so I'll stop here. However, the book "Cool It" by Bjorn Lomborg link is an excellent, well-researched skeptical take on the effects of global warming. Note, he never denies that humanity is affecting global warming, he denies the value in attempting as we are currently proposing to slow it down.

Edited January 27, 2010 by Crepe Knight

[Zeldaicflame]

So your saying if the history of the earths average temperatures, and glacial cycles were represented on a sine wave,

What we are doing now is increasing the amplitude and possibly decreasing the angular frequency of said wave?

Sorry if that's not what you meant, but i can accept that argument.

I also doubt that anyone has the appropriate technology to properly and definitively say anything.

And that could be why some governments are backing a "better be safe than sorry" approach. I think we are all just gonna have to find out when the time comes.

Edited January 27, 2010 by Zeldaicflame

[quanta]

On what do you base this on?

I'd have trouble believing you if you said you traveled 50 years into the future and know for certain they are wrong.

Like ZXValaRevan said, partially past experience. People are notoriously bad at predicting over long time horizons. They'll neglect all sorts of possibilities, they tend to fail to comprehend just how rapidly technological growth and progress happen, and simultaneously make the foolish mistake of thinking standards of morality will progress in some sort of predictable way that they like.

Furthermore, the data from something like global warming is extremely complex, as is the system. I simply don't buy that current climate models can extrapolate anything particularly precise(currently, many models ignore cloud formation, which is rather important given that water vapor is a crucial greenhouse gas). I believe that yes, the earth is getting warmer, but that's because the data is convincing enough. I'm not particularly impressed with any sort of extrapolation. Especially when extrapolation ignores economic calculations.

[catastrophe_2]

Oh it definitely exists, but the fact is, much is OVEREXAGERATED. The Antartica has been near record high thickness, and it is I believe, the biggest ice mass in the world.

The frequency is definitely increasing....

Guess what? Off the charts!/sarcasm

On the other hand, a warmer planet means warmer oceans, which leads to more Hurricanes (hurricanes need warm water to draw all their kinetic energy from).

I do agree that it's exaggerated too. However, even if the Antarctica ice cap is thicker and thicker, the ones around Greenland aren't. All that extra water isn't looking too good if you're living in a coastal town. And a lot of the Glaciers that are sources of rivers (like the ones in the Himalayas that are the water source of a big chunk, population-wise of Asia) are melting faster than they can be renewed. So those populations are going to start lacking water soon.

Granted, there probably won't be a The-Day-After-Tomorrow-esque catastrophe (awesome movie, btw), but a big bunch of people might still die, just more slowly.

[BK-201]

Cold waves also kill people. I think someone in my class did research on the Greenland issue and discovered one side is growing thicker or something and that untrustworthy sources said it like Gore.

[RUSH]

I think this is the graph that you are looking for?

I don't have much to say aside from this: I highly question that graph and desire to know the source.

[Glenn Magus Harvey]

Cocytus: Well, as an economics major, I'm not qualified to go into great scientific detail, but the greenhouse effect is caused when certain molecules in the Earth's atmosphere (primarily water vapor, but also CO2, Methane, and others) absorb heat. If it weren't for these molecules, most of the heat the planet gets from the Sun would bounce right off the Earth's surface and be radiated back into space. The greenhouse effect refers to the trapping of this heat near the Earth by these greenhouse gases (analogous to how an actual greenhouse works - light and heat comes from the sun, but the glass traps a portion of the heat).

Actually, not quite. A real greenhouse works mostly by trapping the warm air as opposed to letting it run away. There's a little bit of this "greenhouse effect", but it's a lot less; glass and plastic aren't the sort of heat-trappers that greenhouse gases are.

quanta: Honestly... it's really hard to tell who has any clue what they are talking about with Global Warming. You get to see all these nice graphs and charts, but having done research on a relatively simple system (compared to global warming) I have difficulty believing that the predictions are as meaningful or accurate as alarmists would make them out to be. I really don't feel terribly qualified to guess the extent to which this sort of thing matters to humans. Especially given that predictions of the future 50 years from now often turn out to be so horribly wrong.

Well, it matters what you're predicting. How fast does what you're predicting change? If we're talking about which videogame companies are going to be at the top 50 years from now, that's practically impossible (other than perhaps saying Nintendo will still be around). On the other hand, the Earth will probably still be around, barring visits from planet-destroying aliens.

Now, the climate system as a whole varies on several timescales. We've got the seasons every year, and then we've got patterns like the El Niño Southern Oscillation, which varies many parts of the world between things like drought and plentiful rainfall, every few years. But these patterns all revolve around a long-term average, which is controlled mainly by how the system absorbs heat from the sun.

Now, changes to the way the climate system absorbs heat from the sun occur pretty slowly. We're talking about changes to things like ice or tree cover, which affects the "albedo" (how much the Earth surface reflects sunlight), as well as changes to the way the system absorbs "blackbody" heat that comes back out from a sun-warmed Earth.

See, heat is transmitted by radiation--usually infrared, unless an object gets hot enough (y'know, like a red-hot iron poker). The reason we see sunlight as this brilliant white light is because (1) the sun's hot enough to emit at visible wavelengths, and (2) nothing in the atmosphere blocks us from seeing it. However, the Earth is of course a lot cooler than the sun, and thus emits at infrared wavelengths. However, we've got lots of gases in the atmosphere that do absorb at these infrared wavelengths--meaning they get warmer, and then release some heat back to us down here. There's your temperature control.

This should be pretty intuitive: If you put more of those gases into the atmosphere, that traps more of the heat, and makes us warmer. It's like getting a thicker blanket.

As you say later in your post, accuracy matters. However, how much accuracy do you need? It depends on what you want to know. Is the Earth on average warming? Yes, we already know that. Thing is, what's the result of all this? Can we know how it'll affect your town? My town? That country over there? That city? This wildlife refuge? That bunch of farms that forms the backbone of their local economy?

See, there are a lot of places that depends on specific climates. Such as seeds that require a frost period before they break open, and pests that die out in colder temperatures, and people who depend on snow accumulating on mountaintops for their drinking water. THIS is where the uncertainty is.

I'll propose this to you: Fill a bowl with water and oil (such that they don't mix). Heat it while spinning it around. Now ask some fluid mechanics student these questions:

1. Will it get warmer? Well, obviously, it will.

2. How exactly will the fluid heat? Where exactly will hot portions go? Cold portions?

Now, stand back and allow said fluid mech student some room before he ragequits on you and explodes. Because that second question is very difficult to answer.

quanta: Besides, it might be cheaper to cool the earth directly (at least, this is the claim of Nathan Myhrvold... and it seems unlikely he's totally full of it) than to cut current greenhouse gas emissions to attempt to cool it or slow warming(in fact, the latter method is so seriously doomed from what I understand that it's hilarious anyone contemplates it as an actual solution). Of course, it doesn't help that a large chunk of the modern environmental movement in the U.S. has taken way too many hits from the metaphorical peace pipe. Environmentalism is like a religion to them. God help you if you suggest nuclear as a relatively clean, safe, effective power source (which it damn well is; it's just really expensive to start up). Or if you point out that the Earth is not some sort of temple and modifying the environment around you can be a perfectly valid solution to a problem (how easy or practical that is is a different question).

I've never heard of Nathan Myhrvold; how does he propose cooling the Earth directly?

And remember what I said up there about all those local effects? Well, good luck finding a way of cooling the Earth that has the same local specificity as the warming. Oh wait, we don't even yet know how the warming is going to affect places? Crap...

As for nuclear, I'm totally in favor of that. The real reasons why nuclear hasn't become more widespread is not so much pure environmentalism as it is (1) a very strong NIMBY ("not in my backyard") push from people, for both nuclear power plant operation AND waste disposal, and (2) difficult national security concerns, because the same kinds of technology that give you power plants can also give you explosives.

However, nuclear is nice because it has an insanely high energy density. I'd say the only long-term problem is storage, but even the waste has far less physical scope of consequences than belching carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

As for the Earth not being "some sort of temple", I totally agree. We gotta live on it somehow, right? That's why I'm most interested in real and practical solutions, not just side-of-the-street sign-waving and chanting. I'm interested in things like, how can farmers use land profitably without clear-cutting the place and increasing their own landslide risk, for example.

And these sorts of questions are far, far easier than that second fluid mech question I proposed above.

quanta: Do you need to just convert everything to solar? Sequester carbon underground?

Actually, between switching to lots of alternative energy sources, and carbon sequestration (with actual sequestration, not just the handful of experimental carbon capture plants that are still being run on an experimental basis), we should be good to go. However, our problem right now is that we're going way too freakin' slowly; the longer we wait the more problems we'll have down the road even if we do try to right wrongs.

I don't give a crap. And even if I did give a crap' date=' the truth is that I wouldn't make a difference. At all. [/quote']

Well, every election cycle, there are a number of races decided by less than a thousand votes. One Alaska state house race in 2008 really took the case with one winner having 5000 votes to the opponent having 4999.

Drops in a bucket add up to a bucket.

Crepe Knight: I think the most famous scare which caused as much reform as the current scare was the Global Cooling crisis that was in the 70s and 80s.

Well, it's because the climate really was cooling before we messed with the thermostat. Albeit, cooling way more slowly than we've been ramping up the heat.

Crepe Knight: Finally, we have two further questions, what will global warming's impact on humanity be and how much effort should be expended to 'slow' it down (if such a thing is possible). First, consider the beneficial effects of global warming. Huge swathes of land are going to become increasingly arable due to warmer climates and longer growing seasons; our prime examples are in counties like Russia and Canada, and areas like southern Argentina. Furthermore there will be a reduction of some dangers even as others increase; for example, it's highly underreported but statistically, thousands more people die from cold exposure than heat exposure each year in countries like the United States and the United Kingdom.

Just because too much cold is bad doesn't mean that too much heat is better. And we have more deaths from cold exposure because the U.S. is primarily in a temperate climate rather than a tropical one.

As for which countries will benefit or suffer, what about all those countries in the tropics? I mentioned earlier in this post a point about pests that depend on temperature for their survival--a very important example is mosquitoes. They can't survive in the cold. Now what spreads malaria again?

And that's not even getting to the many low-lying countries--including many island nations--which will have major trouble in the case of sea level rise. Bangladesh/India war, anyone?

Now, you could say, sure, we live in the U.S., we can go to or even take over Canada if we need to. Cool. Does that give us the right to be jackasses to the rest of the world?

Crepe Knight: Since developing nations, such as China and India, are coming close to surpassing the United States with no signs of slowing in their carbon dioxide, the effect is questionable, since global warming, as I have shown, is a cycle that will continue, only with humanity speeding it along its way.

What about the fact that the Chinese are on track to be far ahead of us in solar panel technology? Is that okay with you?

Crepe Knight: Then, the effect of this is disproportionatly devastating. It only takes a bit of logic to realize that if, say, half of American consumers stopped buying gasoline-run cars next year, the American automobile industry would most likely crash. That's a huge segment of our industry, with economic ramifications both in areas such as banking, which suddenly shortchanged billions of dollars, and the millions of employees.

You're assuming that the industry will continue mindlessly producing their same product lines. Well, if that's what they do, and all those car companies are controlled by dull, mindless machines for boards of directores, then they deserve to be eaten alive by capitalism. (Which, incidentally, is quite brutal in its purest form.)

However, what makes you think that they won't try to adapt? Even as we discuss this issue here, we've got Michigan's governor, Jen Granholm, working with the big three automakers to help transition them to electric cars. I got a friend who lives near Dearborn and tells me that at least this one plant for electric vehicles is a bright spot in an area hit hard by unemployment and by the ghosts of economic activity past.

Crepe Knight: As a side note, it also is telling to compare the cost of reducing global warming to solve a given problem - lets say coastline recession - and conventional fixes. Given the economic effects describe above (and also the fact that waterfront properties are hilariously disproportional in price to their actual worth), relocating properties from waterfronts is an extremely cost effective solution that ALSO helps reduce risk from problems that will never go away, such as hurricanes, storms, and flooding.

Okay, so what do you do if people refuse to relocate?

Crepe Knight: I can go on with examples, such as the carbon tax which, in order to have a noticeable effect on carbon output would severely cramp commercial growth and drive up prices to the point where most Americans would buy foreign - promoting carbon production in other countries and completely removing the reason for the carbon tax in the first place.

So, what about alternative energy technology industries, or the energy efficiency industry? And what exactly convinces you that there's no way to reduce carbon emissions without driving up cost?

In reality there's a lot of waste in industry and the private sector that results from "ehh, that's too small a problem, not worth the time and money to fix it". Well, guess what, some carbon crimping would encourage companies to reduce their own waste, save money, and help the planet. It'd be a win-win situation, honestly.

Edited September 13, 2010 by Glenn Magus Harvey

[Strawman]

i don't feel like reading what everyone else said but...

It shouldn't be called "global warming" but instead "unnatural global climate change" or something because that is what it is. Because I know where I live the weather is getting crazy. Like one day(especially in spring or fall) it can be freezing(32 F) and the next it could be in the 60s or 70s. While in winter it is getting colder and snowing more often. Last year we had like 5 snow days off school. The year before that we had maybe 1. And The year before that we had none. But also in the summers it is getting hotter and drier. So it isnt just the heat that is increasing, the weather is getting over-all more extreme.