Re: Global warming: Climate change and evolution
"nicholas a. evans" <[email protected]>
| Newsgroups | gmane.music.dadl.ot |
|---|---|
| Message-ID | <[email protected]> |
On Tue, Jan 25, 2011 at 12:29 PM, Bruce Geerdes <[email protected]> wrote: >> temperatures >> across a broad swathe of northern Canada have been 20° C higher than >> normal for the past month, the record temperatures are coming despite >> the lowest levels of solar activity in a century and a La Nina effect >> that should be making Canada colder rather than warmer, and so on. > > This is not overall warming per se, as it is just cold air being > replaced with warm. Yep. When comparing a global increase of 0.5°C over 40 years to a local increase of 20°C over two years, clearly local factors are overriding the equation. The question is whether those local factors have global warming as their root cause. Also from the NY Times article: > The deeper issue is whether this pattern is linked to the rapid > changes that global warming is causing in the Arctic, particularly the > drastic loss of sea ice. At least two prominent climate scientists > have offered theories suggesting that it is. But others are doubtful, > saying the recent events are unexceptional, or that more evidence over > a longer period would be needed to establish a link. You can certainly count me in the "more evidence over a longer period is needed" camp for this particular instance. I'm guessing you can also count those "two prominent scientists" in that camp as well (climate scientists always seem to have a hunger for more data). However, given the sheer quantity of extreme weather changes across the globe, it's not unreasonable to assume that some of it is an example of what a mere 0.5°C of global warming can effect. The next question is whether or not the global climate change is anthropogenic. IMHO, anyone who claims otherwise needs to put forth some testable hypotheses that can stand up to as much scrutiny and peer review as the anthropogenic CO2-caused-warming hypothesis. That's what I liked the most about this article: it emphasises that both theories (anthropogenic climate change and common descent of life via evolution) have been established via the scientific method (hypotheses that are tested, refined, peer reviewed, and found to have predictive value) and by and large the counter arguments have not. -- Nick (repentant former denialist of both theories) -- dadl-ot mailing list http://mail.thehood.us/mailman/listinfo/dadl-ot_thehood.us http://news.gmane.org/gmane.music.dadl.ot