busy spending entire careers up to their waist in peat bogs with magnifying glasses looking for beetle carcasses
Russell Coope... legend. 
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Global warming! the mystery deepens
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Posted 2 years ago #
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Russell Coope... legend
yep
Posted 2 years ago # -
Just googled Russell Coope
Found a paper he wrote and thought I would quote the first 2 lines of the abstract. Might help epicyclo and a few others to understand why there are no easy one sentence answers for them.
More than 30 fossil coleopteran (beetle) assemblages have been recorded from oxygen isotope stage 3 in northern Europe, comprising several hundred identified species. Using the mutual climatic range method for quantifying palaeotemperatures, these assemblages show that the climates of the times can be divided into two distinct interstadial types.
And of course the main point is that this stuff is NOT b@ll@x. You may not fully understand it, and I won't pretend that I do either, but I think it does demonstrate the CHASM of understanding between the likes of James Dellingpole (gosh, I've found an e-mail by a scientist that is a bit offhand) and people who have a lifetime's study behind them.
Posted 2 years ago # -
rightplacerighttime - Member
I have to ask, are you a goldfish?Because you asked, and I tried to answer, this very question 2 weeks ago.
The answer could be natural climate variation.
I'm perfectly prepared to admit that there are fluctuations in temperature...If you have an argument with people on here, fine. But at the moment it just seems like you can't be arsed to go and google a few things.
Actually I can be arsed. This is a subject I've had an interest in for years - from back when you could only read about it in books. Google and you also get the full gamut of anti Global Warming fanaticism.I may be a goldfish, because I was hoping for a simple and reasonable answer to my questions that a simple but reasonable person would accept.
Assertions, consensus, complicated graphs etc don't do that job, they just confuse. It reminds me of the great religious debates of the 16/17th century, wading through treacle chasing the elusive end only accessible to the illuminati.
Posted 2 years ago # -
I was hoping for a simple and reasonable answer to my questions that a simple but reasonable person would accept.
Assertions, consensus, complicated graphs etc don't do that job, they just confuse
Then science is not your thing leave it to people who are not confused by these things and trust what they say when they have had a look.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Junkyard - Member
Then science is not your thing leave it to people who are not confused by these things and trust what they say when they have had a look.
Ah, the old Papal authority gambit. Yes, master, we commoners must not question the metaphysical.Posted 2 years ago # -
Ah, the old Papal authority gambit. Yes, master, we commoners must not question the metaphysical.
Unfortunately complicated things like global climate trends can't be explained easily and simply - if you can't be bothered to look at 'assertions, consensus, complicated graphs etc' that's your choice.
Posted 2 years ago # -
No those who dont understand it should not question it...you openly admit you are confused by it.
Posted 2 years ago # -
I'm confused by the entire Earth too.
Posted 2 years ago # -
"Assertions, consensus, complicated graphs etc don't do that job, they just confuse. "
They do if you take the time to study them and the underlying data.
And if you don't make the effort and spend the time, then you should trust the people who do.What you seem to be saying is, show me the evidence but without the actual evidence; a cop-out.
Posted 2 years ago # -
More than 30 fossil coleopteran (beetle) assemblages have been recorded from oxygen isotope stage 3 in northern Europe, comprising several hundred identified species. Using the mutual climatic range method for quantifying palaeotemperatures, these assemblages show that the climates of the times can be divided into two distinct interstadial types
Coope went through layers and layers of peat bogs collecting the bodies of beetles that were entombed in the mire. He then catalogued their species. Each layer of peat bog is younger than the layer underneath, and different varieties of beetles were found in different layers. beetles are quite sensitive to temperatures, different beetle species are found at different temperatures. By figuring out which kinds of beetle bodies were in which particular peat layer he could deduce the approximate temperature of the air when that peat layer was laid down.
He discovered working back through the layers (of lots of peat bogs, and after looking at a lot of dead beetles) that in the UK & NW Europe the relatively warm periods in between ice ages (interstadials) had actually been punctuated by very brief intensely cold episodes, with a rapid onset over the space of perhaps as little as 10 years.
By looking at dead beetles in peat bogs he had discovered the North Atlantic Thermohaline instability, which is known as "Gulf stream collapse" in popular journals of this parish.
Proxy temperature data is the work of Coope and hundreds of scientists like him scattered throughout the world looking at things like tree rings, lake sediments, ice cores, coral deposits, oxygen isotope ratios in sea shells. This painstaking and mostly unseen work goes on in isolation, but is stitched together by climatologists to produce a coherent picture of past conditions before the time of thermometers. Everyone knows it's not perfect, but it's pretty good and the techniques are constantly refined, and crucially, the results from different disciplines reinforce work done in unrelated fields by unrelated teams.
These guys rock.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Nicely put.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Ian Munro
I must take issue with your pirates v temperature graph below
The graph is now several years out of date and has not taken into account the rise of piracy and pirate numbers in the Indian Ocean. The temperature rise is correct so therefore the graph throws doubt on global warming theories
I love the climate, personally I'm all for it......
Posted 2 years ago # -
It's nice to see another pastafarian showing the pirates/global warming data, which is further backed by a non existant (but as equally valid as jesus using intelligent design theory)deity. Long live the church of the flying spaghetti monster
Posted 2 years ago # -
tazzy
We're of the more radical/cynical Shia Free Pastafarian Church of the Latter day Santa Clauses.......
Posted 2 years ago # -
tankslapper- I shall be racing next year dressed in the "holy garb" as a pirate ....................yarrrrrghh
Posted 2 years ago # -
Perhaps bringing back Eugenics as a method might help.
This way we can cull or limit the world's Human population growth & ensure the survival & subsequent procreation of only the most deserving.
Plus Pirates - obviously.Posted 2 years ago # -
Yaaaaar!
Posted 2 years ago # -
Epiccyclo,
Hope you're still following this thread.
This is why no one is going to explain climate change to you in one sentence (takes 4 minutes)
Posted 2 years ago # -
OK then, fantasy government time...
You're the leader of an industrialised country which is responsible for around a sixth of the historic man-made greenhouse gas emissions since around 1850, although your current emissions are now lower than some much larger developing countries.
Globally, every major scientific body and your scientific advisors are warning that their best knowledge indicates that the observed increases in greenhouse gases are due to human activities and that, even the increase in emissions stops in around 2020 the world is tied into a 2C average increase by the end of 2100 which means increases of up to 5C in the Arctic, parts of Africa etc. This is expected to result in a global decrease in food production, sea-level rise, changes in distribution of diseases etc. The science also indicates that with no action the average increase could be between 4 and 6C with local increases significantly higher increasing the risk of non-linear changes.
Do you:
A) Follow the scientific advice and work towards an international agreement on reducing emissions to what is currently considered the safe level of greenhouse gases. Reduce the risk to the national economy by taking early steps to reduce emissions rather than plan for a sharp increase in future years.
B) Wait until everyone agrees on the science and then do something.
C) Wait until a temperature increase of 1 to 2C is measured to 'prove' the science is correct and then do something.
D) Not do anything because of what you are hearing from other sources (blogs, sceptics etc) or you don't believe your scientific advisors, in the expectation that your country will have an economic advantage in continuing energy and resouce intensive growth when it is shown that the science is wrong?Posted 2 years ago # -
E) Although it looks like man made climate change could be bull, we will get our advisors to fiddle the figures and tax everyone till they squeak to pay of our huge national debt.
Look even the weatherman at the BBC smells a rat
Face it Jones and the boys have been lying! icebergs ,pirates whatever crap you want to spout,the bullshit smells bad in the manmade climate change camp.
Its just like the wmd's these people will tell you anything to do what they want.
Posted 2 years ago # -
PMSL! Paul Hudson, climate expert. Perhaps you can ask Ulrika Johnson too
Posted 2 years ago # -
rightplacerighttime - Member
Epiccyclo,Hope you're still following this thread.
This is why no one is going to explain climate change to you in one sentence
I watched it and read the comments. Interesting to see Gerry Halliwell is one of the 35,000 scientists - surely that can't be true?
I thought this comment by John Boyce summed up why many people still have questions
My general difficulty with the climate change drumbeat is this: Since the 1990's there have been cohorts of very bright mathematicians and scientist using squads of computers, reams of very accurate, precise data, doing research for masters with very deep pockets in a pretty circumscribed field, the stock market derivatives market. They were using the Black-Scholes equation and all its children, derived from the heat transfer equation from very well established physics.
And they got it disastrously wrong, as recent history bears out. When asked, they say 'Oh, there were a few parameters we had to assume values for, and our assumptions turned out to be wrong.' Hmmmm. Climate science is vastly more complicated, chaotic, and we have vastly fewer data points and understanding relative to its size. I think all conclusions should be taken with a grain of salt..If you cannot explain the problem simply then you are never going to convince the majority of the public who don't believe. Most of what I read reminds me of dissertations on the number of angels on a pinhead.
It also suggests you do not understand what you are proposing.
BTW Seeing as I have been accused of being lazy, stupid,and a goldfish, I've done some Googling to try to fit in -
This looks like a reputable source - there's lots of interesting information here written by real scientists too. Loads of amazing revelations I think global warming is actually being caused by the extra CO2 emitted by burning climate change heretics at the stake.
Posted 2 years ago # -
This painstaking and mostly unseen work goes on in isolation
Excellent post, Gwaelod. Well said.
Posted 2 years ago # -
epicyclo/ bone-idle, your most recent convincing evidence against the science has come from a regional weather forecaster quoted through the Daily Malice and a website which claims that the universe is around 4,000 years old. WTF!
I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you're either trolling, willfully ignorant or deluded. Take your pick
Posted 2 years ago # -
epicyclo,
Did you not take anything from the video then?
OK, so I've gone and found out what Black-Scholes is.
And let me just remind you that not so long ago you said.
Assertions, consensus, complicated graphs etc don't do that job, [explain climate change] they just confuse.
But now you are saying that climate scientists can't be right when they make predictions, because some other smart people created a model for predicting and pricing equities in a stock market and that was shown not to work very well?
I have got that right haven't I?
That is what you just said?
Posted 2 years ago # -
Most of what I read reminds me of dissertations on the number of angels on a pinhead.
WTF is it with the need for some kind of religous point in every post?
The only pin dancing I can see is yours.
I am not sure whether you are dancing in ignorance or with a troll either way divergent data /evidence is not going to change your mind.Posted 2 years ago # -
Anyone under the impression that the author of that article knows his stuff needs to have a read of the 9 October entry on here. It would be funny if the bloke didn't have a column in a national newspaper, as a result of which he is probably taken ever so seriously by other chinless toffs.
But what really bothers me about climate change sceptics is that they offer f--k all in the way of solutions, other than denying that there's a problem. Even setting aside long-term problems like global warming, we live in a country where most buildings have woeful energy efficiency, we're dependent on private transport, we buy stuff that is landfill days later, and the cost of living steadily increases as we become more dependent on other countries to supply us the goods we consume and the energy we use. What's James Delingpole's answer to that?
Posted 2 years ago # -
They have none.
They still believe in brute force engineering as the solution for everything.Posted 2 years ago # -
Grumm said-
Even if we do come up with some amazing big technological solutions for climate change etc - is there any reason why we shouldn't try to radically reduce waste and consumption? Is the 'progress' you envisage for the third world that they will become as wasteful as the western world?
I'm all for increasing efficiency, but in order to 'radically' reduce consumption and what is perceived as waste, it would inevitably mean a step backwards technologically and probably economically. Our lives are enormously better for all the trappings of western life, calories are plentiful, we are living for longer than ever before, travelling further, and being entertained better than we have ever been. All these advances take energy to supply them, and I would not deny that to my fellow human beings anywhere in the world.
Posted 2 years ago # -
calories are plentiful, we are living for longer than ever before
We're living for longer because of better medical treatment, not because we eat more food. I don't see any carbon reduction plan which advocates denying people the basic things they need to have an enjoyable life, and if you consider getting on a plane essential for travel, or a PS3 to be the pinnacle of entertainment, sorry to sound like my parents here, but you need to broaden your horizons. Lots of the measures that reduce CO2 emissions could also increase standards of living - for example, decent public transport systems, cleaner air, local food production, and more.
Posted 2 years ago # -
Kramer,
I'm sorry to have to tell you that calories are only plentiful because of oil, and we're using that up fast.
Without oil based fertilisers and pesticides the planet could (I believe although I can't quote the source from mmemory) only support around 2 billion population - i.e pre-WWII levels. But we currently have a population of 6.7 billion and rising.
That's another ticking time bomb that politicians aren't addressing.
And just how do you quantify "being entertained better" ????
Posted 2 years ago # -
We're living for longer because of better medical treatment, not because we eat more food. I don't see any carbon reduction plan which advocates denying people the basic things they need to have an enjoyable life, and if you consider getting on a plane essential for travel, or a PS3 to be the pinnacle of entertainment, sorry to sound like my parents here, but you need to broaden your horizons. Lots of the measures that reduce CO2 emissions could also increase standards of living - for example, decent public transport systems, cleaner air, local food production, and more.
I wasn't claiming we lived longer because we had more food, it is partly because of better medical treatment, but mostly due to public health initiatives - clean water, vaccination programmes and the like.
I don't consider a PS3 to be the pinnacle of entertainment, but it does give many people entertainment options that they didn't have before. It may not be your cup of tea, but the level of entertainment for the price is something that would have been jaw dropping only ten years ago. Similarly, I'm a fan of going on holiday in the UK, but cheap air travel gives me many options that I haven't had in the past. It's fun to spend a weekend in Oslo/Amsterdam/Paris, and until fairly recently it was something that only the very rich could afford to do. People don't have to do any of these things, but to have the choice to is a wonderful thing. Similarly the 'simpler life' becomes much less attractive when one has no choice about living it.
Posted 2 years ago # -
but to have the choice to is a wonderful thing. Similarly the 'simpler life' becomes much less attractive when one has no choice about living it
Unfortunatley a lot of our "choice" denies other people in the world even the option of a "simpler life"
Posted 2 years ago # -
How so?
Posted 2 years ago #
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