Melting Ice?

No not here in Leeds, no chance of the glaciers receding here, in the
Arctic.

I caught a program couple of night ago with the worthy Attenborough
selling his soul cheap to the Global Warming hysteria crowd.
Chatting to Tallbloke last night we had both observed the sunspot cycle
had been high and over the next few years would be cooling.
We then noted that the hysteria about Arctic ice melting and raising the
ocean seems to ignore the fact that said ice is already displacing its
volume in the ocean. The Antarctic ice seems to be reaching record
thickness away from the coastal region.

OK they might be right about levels rising if the Greenland ice sheet
melts but hold on a minute. When it was first colonised the South was
green and they grew vines. That was AD963 or somesuch.

<fills petrol tanks>

 

I'm getting fed up with the Global Warming Hysteria crowd. The earth warms
up and it cools down all without our intervention. We made be helping it
warm up but I think it would be doing it by itself anyway. It's an excuse
to tax us. What ever steps are taken will likely be ineffective because (I
re-iterate) the earth was warming anyway or it 's too late to stop it.

 

A regular poster ('funkraum') on rsre (x-posted) commented on this at
some length recently message-id:
<>. In this post, which I
won't quote here, he talks about the current trend amongst
"eco-marxists" to find environmental causes on which to ride the
bandwagon and 'punish' those whose wealth and lifestyle they despise
so much, but are now no longer able to justify on pure political
grounds since the fall from grace of marxist economic ideas.

Interesting stuff, with more than a grain of truth to it. See also his
posted link to an article on this subject:
http://www.businessandmedia.org/specialreports/2006/fireandice/fireandice.asp

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Much as I love funkraum, I think he might have been hyperventilating a
little there. I'm sure I'd qualify as an "eco-marxist" in his book (being a
bit concerned about global warming) but I can't identify with much of the
rant.

Oh, OK, I do admit to feeling a bit nostalgic for the era when I could
slaughter class-enemies. Apart from that, I mean....

Ah, x-posting noted. Hi, funkraum!

 

Source please. Are you denying glacier retreat?

A 'blip'.
An interesting thought. Where did the Greenland ice-water go?

The point being though IIRC that 90% of the world's ice is held in the
Antarctic ice cap (most of which is over terra firma).

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/enviro/EnviroRepublish_1351195.htm

Oh well even if global warming is a result of human activity it should
be balanced out by the inevitabe next ice age with luck anyway. Might
come a bit late though.

 

Nah, you're OK. Vesuvius will blow in the next couple of years and the dust
cloud will cool things nicely.

Ali

 

Not just sun spots causing cooling. The whole system is cyclic and is
balanced by a number of feedback scenarios, in particular the effect
of CO2 as a driver of climate change. The sunspots are a pretty
short-term blip compared to the predominant orbital cycles of
eccentricity , obliquity and precession (Milankovich cycles) that are
believed to be responsible for the episodic nature of glaciations (and
interglacials) throughout the last 2.7 Ma.

Kind of. The thing with meltwater from the Arctic is that although
the ice is displacing its volume, once it enters the oceanic system it
decreases the salinity of the sea water making it less dense which in
turn causes sea levels to rise.

Apart from the increase in density and warmth of the oceans, the
'freshening' effect caused by freshwater influx results in a reduction
in the formation of North Atlantic Deep Water (the cold, heavy stuff
that drives the oceanic conveyor system) (1). As a result it is
likely that the Gulf Stream may either shut down or move further south
(2), causing much of Europe to lose the befit of the heat delivered by
the Gulf Stream, potentially initiating a mini ice age. The
freshening of the oceans also encourages the formation of sea ice
which results in a positive feedback as the albedo effect of the
growing ice sheets reflects more sunlight back into space.

So now we have a glaciation scenario (but at least sea levels will
drop).

If we carry on as we are, the build up of CO2 (and other greenhouse
gases) is almost certainly going to result in a period of accelerated
global warming. However, the checks and balances that have managed to
control the fluctuations in Earth's climate in the past will
undoubtedly prevail - unlike the human race. I guess your viewpoint
on this really depend on how bothered you are about trying to hang on
to our present climate for a little bit longer.

Have a gander at this if you're interested, just a little something I
knocked up last month for one of my final year modules at uni.

http://www.garagepixies.co.uk/UoN.htm

(click on the 'Something in the air?' link)


(1) Nature, vol 438, p655 - a study by the National Oceanography
Centre in Southampton has shown that returning NADW (the cold mass
that moves southwards) has reduced by 30%, and have postulated that
the northward flow is likely to have slowed too.

(2) New Scientist, 15th April 2006, p42


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http://www.garagepixies.co.uk
elly at garagepixies dot co dot uk

 

Yes, well that's logically (and possibly even morally) consistent. In
practice, though, you may have to go snowboarding in different places and
less frequently, or in one possible scenario more frequently, but ride the
bike a lot less.

The scale of the issue is such that it's difficult to see the point as an
individual in changing your behaviour - if anything will make a difference,
it's going to have to be change (legislated or through other incentives) to
everyone's behaviour. Personally I suspect that at the individual level,
over the likely timescale necessary to implement major cuts in CO2
emissions, we'd get used to whatever was required.

I do have another angle - climate change is unfortunately likely to result
in a lot more work, sooner rather than later, in the field I work in.

 

Bringing in the thought police will help there. And they *will* as soon as
they can.

Personally I suspect that at the individual level,

The gov will just tax "probable causes" so those with enough wedge will be
able to carry on as before.

What, undertaking or flogging boats?



--
Beav

VN 750
Zed 1000
OMF# 19

 

Cheers! it's nice to get an educated opinion and to have it confirmed
(I think) that things are not as simple as the current hysteria
suggests (no surprise).

I'm not against reducing CO2, far from it. I just know that screwing
with the tax system and family cars and holidays here in the UK will
have no effect.
The only real impact will be through widespread (global) adoption of
Nuclear power with a full Fast Breeder cycle (1). Mandating
*manufacturers* to come up with more energy efficient cars and
electrical products and housing. Mass re-plantation/forestation.
Population control, reduction in fact. Etc Etc.

(1) it seems obvious to me that fuel production and reprocessing should
be centralised in a few stable countries though.

 

Jeremy wrote

Hard to put this in a single sentence but yes individuals can and will
make the difference. The idea of one person turning off a single
unwanted light bulb would save enough energy to put half dozen
capitalist scum power generators straight out of business.

The trouble with collective action though is that people are cunts and
selfish ones at that so it won't happen and you will all die choking for
air like a fish on the beach.

 

Nah, you're OK. Vesuvius will blow in the next couple of years and the dust
cloud will cool things nicely.
[/QUOTE]

I'm waiting for Yellowstone to blow, should be, er, interesting.

 

Ah, yes, that one. The super caldera thingie. I presume you saw the telly
prog on that a year or so back?

Ali

 

Just because when the big flood comes, all you have to do is push down a
little lever and your bike is lifted above the tides

"Think of the Kawasakis"

 

Given the BBC's current ability to predict next weeks weather do they really
expect people to take their predictions for 2080 seriously?

 

On Horizon, downloaded from uknova some time ago. Apparently, everything
is hunky dory, nothing to worry about. I'm a bit disappointed.
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/yvo/new.html

 

Indeed. Ta for that.

 

Fair comment. I don't. Some suckers do.

 

Grimley_Feindish wrote

Snot the Beeb wot predicts the weather, it is the weatherbeing wot does
that. All the Beeb do is give the lying cunts air time. And never a
mention of alternative weather predicting is there? How often do you
see some bloke with a bunch of seaweed telling you it is going to be
cold and wet in the Trossaks or an ole burd with predictive bunions that
knows when there is going to be a nasty draught coming round the door or
a ferret that can read minds or anything? Who knows what unassailable
truths lie behind a high pressure area over developing over rock all and
you never see the little wooden bloke and the little wooden burd come
out of the house together do you, so what is going on there then that we
don't know about? A blatant establishment conspiracy to keep the truth
from us proles it is and I wouldn't mind betting that umbrella makers
have paid huge wedge to Nu Labor to keep it that way.

 

.... making english wine ... insurance assessor ... extreme meteorologist ..

There's a clue in my email address.