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It seems the economic form of Malthusianism is having a revival lately.
Fortunately the food and water arguments hinge on the belief that we cannot increase areas or increase efficiency of the areas used for food production in an economically sustainable way (it is not even close to that point in most countries!) and undrinkable water cannot be treated to drinkable condition relatively efficiently (all water can be cleaned, but reverse osmosis or distillation is slightly too expensive to be competitive in most places, yet! Since water is generally cheaper to produce in the needed quantities than food it should not be a problem either.).
Add to that the demographic problems in western countries and the problems of overpopulation are likely not as bad as it has been made out to be. Helping countries develop seems to be a solution to the overpopulation problem.
The only catch with the overcrowding is the climate change potential if the growth is build on oil and coal consumption. This "extra cost of sustainable growth" argument is actually among the biggest problems on reaching a global deal on reduction of greenhouse gasses. That and the punishments for not reaching the goals. Fortunately these debates are completely void of scientific questioning of climate change.
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On August 24 2013 18:26 legor wrote:
We have two choices:
1. We spend 1 billion to reduce the temperature by x%
2. we do not spend 1 billion to reduce the temperature by x%, but rather invest it
From the point of view of risk management, number 1 and 2 are actually the same thing and many high profile businesses do this. It would be the smart thing to do, which is why the government doesn't do it.
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On August 26 2013 05:50 radiatoren wrote:
Fortunately the food and water arguments hinge on the belief that we cannot increase areas or increase efficiency of the areas used for food production in an economically sustainable way (it is not even close to that point in most countries!) and undrinkable water cannot be treated to drinkable condition relatively efficiently (all water can be cleaned, but reverse osmosis or distillation is slightly too expensive to be competitive in most places, yet! Since water is generally cheaper to produce in the needed quantities than food it should not be a problem either.).
...
I don't think concern about water supplies ends when there's enough to drink. Producing fresh water on the scale of, say the flow of the river Ganges, is not economically feasible, if such a feat is even within the capabilities of our engineers and scientists. And yet, if the glaciers of the Tibetan plateau that feed the river continue to retreat, the reduced flows will threaten water supplies throughout the river basin. Drinking water is one concern, but so much more depends on the river: agriculture, power generation, tourism, religious practices, even transportation. It may take decades for the problems to become apparent to a majority of folks, but by then there will be a LOT of people in serious trouble.
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On August 26 2013 12:58 nanoscorp wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2013 05:50 radiatoren wrote:
Fortunately the food and water arguments hinge on the belief that we cannot increase areas or increase efficiency of the areas used for food production in an economically sustainable way (it is not even close to that point in most countries!) and undrinkable water cannot be treated to drinkable condition relatively efficiently (all water can be cleaned, but reverse osmosis or distillation is slightly too expensive to be competitive in most places, yet! Since water is generally cheaper to produce in the needed quantities than food it should not be a problem either.).
... I don't think concern about water supplies ends when there's enough to drink. Producing fresh water on the scale of, say the flow of the river Ganges, is not economically feasible, if such a feat is even within the capabilities of our engineers and scientists. And yet, if the glaciers of the Tibetan plateau that feed the river continue to retreat, the reduced flows will threaten water supplies throughout the river basin. Drinking water is one concern, but so much more depends on the river: agriculture, power generation, tourism, religious practices, even transportation. It may take decades for the problems to become apparent to a majority of folks, but by then there will be a LOT of people in serious trouble.
Freshwater production is dependant on supply of water to clean of course.
You have a valid concern, but valid describes all the concerns about depletion of resources, like metals, oil, rain forest etc.
The only real population limiting effect you mention (power and transport can be achieved by other means!) is the agricultural effect and the water availabilty. In some parts of mountains with insufficient rain, that is a real concern. Then we can talk about the general sustainability of relying so heavily on a glacier to survive... If sustainability of life is a real concern, desertification is among the worst problems. There will always be some countermeasures and countering desertification is getting a little more positive with the experiments of very low evaporation systems from planting flora.
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i believe in the big freeze. it already happens; it has started already.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-or-the-new-ice-age-fear-of-the-big-freeze/30336
As NASA notes:
Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715. Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the “Little Ice Age” when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past.
............................
According to the NSO:
Penn and Livingston observed that the average field strength declined about 50 gauss per year during Cycle 23 and now in Cycle 24. They also observed that spot temperatures have risen exactly as expected for such changes in the magnetic field. If the trend continues, the field strength will drop below the 1,500 gauss threshold and spots will largely disappear as the magnetic field is no longer strong enough to overcome convective forces on the solar surface.
(and so on)
still, reducing pollution is not bad overall.
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Is there any possibility of scientists one day being able to siphon this "carbon" out of the atmosphere and make something useful with it? Maybe the UN could make charcoal with it and host a giant barbecue with all the world leaders in attendance!
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United States24513 Posts
Could you edit into your post a brief summary and/or some thoughts? I'm worried many people will just skim the title and then make inappropriate replies.
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On August 31 2013 03:28 micronesia wrote:Could you edit into your post a brief summary and/or some thoughts? I'm worried many people will just skim the title and then make inappropriate replies.
Here's what wikipedia has to say on the fellow.
According to an April 30, 2012 New York Times article,[61] "Dr. Lindzen accepts the elementary tenets of climate science. He agrees that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, calling people who dispute that point "nutty." He agrees that the level of it is rising because of human activity and that this should warm the climate." However, he believes that decreasing tropical cirrus clouds in a warmer world will allow more longwave radiation to escape the atmosphere, counteracting the warming.[61] Lindzen first published this "iris" theory in 2001,[7] and offered more support in a 2009 paper,[46] but today "most mainstream researchers consider Dr. Lindzen’s theory discredited" according to the Times article.[61] Dr. Lindzen acknowledged that the 2009 paper contained "some stupid mistakes" in his handling of the satellite data. "It was just embarrassing," he said in the Times interview. "The technical details of satellite measurements are really sort of grotesque."
The April 30, 2012 New York Times article included the comments of several other experts. Christopher S. Bretherton, an atmospheric researcher at the University of Washington, said Lindzen is "feeding upon an audience that wants to hear a certain message, and wants to hear it put forth by people with enough scientific reputation that it can be sustained for a while, even if it’s wrong science. I don’t think it’s intellectually honest at all." Kerry A. Emanuel, another M.I.T. scientist, said of Lindzen's views "Even if there were no political implications, it just seems deeply unprofessional and irresponsible to look at this and say, ‘We’re sure it’s not a problem.’ It’s a special kind of risk, because it’s a risk to the collective civilization."[61]
A 1996 New York Times article included the comments of several other experts. Jerry Mahlman, director of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, did not accept Lindzen's assessment of the science, and said that Lindzen had "sacrificed his luminosity by taking a stand that most of us feel is scientifically unsound." Mahlman did, however, admit that Lindzen was a "formidable opponent." William Gray of Colorado State University basically agreed with Lindzen, describing him as "courageous." He said, "A lot of my older colleagues are very skeptical on the global warming thing." He added that whilst he regarded some of Lindzen's views as flawed, he said that, "across the board he's generally very good." John Wallace of the University of Washington agreed with Lindzen that progress in climate change science had been exaggerated, but said there are "relatively few scientists who are as skeptical of the whole thing as Dick [Lindzen] is."[43]
Richard Lindzen
An outlier among the scientific community to be sure.
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he talks a lot about charts and graphs and models and simulations saying that they are not what we think they are, then he finishes off with a speech/rant.
In contrast to Lysenkoism, Global Warming has a global constituency, and has successfully coopted almost all of institutional science. However, the cracks in the scientific claims for catastrophic warming are, I think, becoming much harder for the supporters to defend. Despite official whitewashes, the Climategate scandal was a clear manifestation of pathology. Opposition to alarm is having some impact among certain groups including physicists. Official reports from several countries (including Norway and India) have taken distinctly un-alarming positions. And even Ralph Cicerone, president of America’s National Academy of Sciences, has publically eschewed climate catastrophism. Human society, like the climate system, has many degrees of freedom. The previous cases lasted from 20 to 30 years. The global warming issue is approaching 30 years since its American roll-out in 1988 (though the issue did begin earlier). Perhaps such issues have a natural lifetime, and come to an end with whatever degrees of freedom society affords. This is not to diminish the importance of the efforts of some scientists to point out the internal inconsistencies. However, this is a polarized world where people are permitted to believe whatever they wish to believe. The mechanisms whereby such belief structures are altered are not well understood, but the evidence from previous cases offers hope that such peculiar belief structures do collapse.Indeed, we are currently seeing what may be one such possible route whereby the mutual support illustrated in Figure 1 may be breaking down. The scientific community is clearly becoming less ambiguous in separating views on warming from totally unreasonable fears for both the planet and mankind. Environmental advocates are responding by making increasingly extreme claims. Politicians are recognizing that these claims are implausible, and are backing away from both the issue and support for climate science. The incentive is then for scientists to look elsewhere for support. Regardless of whether this will be sufficient, one can only hope that some path will emerge that will end the present irrational obsession with climate and carbon footprints.
sounds a bit bitter and with a grudge ...
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Let us delineate it a bit more, before the discussion goes wild. Lindzen is a respected atmospheric scientist with good credentials. He is not a crackhead denialist and he was part of IPCC work in 2001. He is, however, acting from a political viewpoint according to several of his peers and his 2009 scientific theories has been shot completely dead by even himself. Also, note this from wikipedia:
Dr. Lindzen accepts the elementary tenets of climate science. He agrees that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, calling people who dispute that point "nutty." He agrees that the level of it is rising because of human activity and that this should warm the climate."
This article starts of as a fact-free philosophical rant on scientists and how they are used as political tools by the hand that feeds them. He brings forth a few examples of very obscure sciences far from climate science getting part of the cake.
Then he brings a somewhat valid point of average global temperature not being the say-all end-all metric it is believed among politicians. Mostly he contests the notion that the forcing is homogenous, the average temperature change being too small and he ends up with some more political argumentation about how climate science is political and how it is religious, while suggesting similarities to eugenics and other very unfortunate past science. He also admits that he believe that climate science should start to decline now since that is the history for the other similar effects.
Unfortunately he doesn't have any true scientific input except for suggesting a need for calculating independent "equilibrium response" meaning how much a doubling in CO2 concentration would increase temperature. That sounds reasonable on the surface, but since climate change is more than the global warming he knows from 10 years ago it is not really a good measurement when more extreme weather and potential current-changes in the oceans will have an effect!
Btw. he had a bet in 2004 about temperature not being higher in 2034. That seems like a really good offer to me. Unfortunately I am sure he will cop out either by dieing before or ad hoc qualify his statement.
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On August 26 2013 05:50 radiatoren wrote:It seems the economic form of Malthusianism is having a revival lately. Fortunately the food and water arguments hinge on the belief that we cannot increase areas or increase efficiency of the areas used for food production in an economically sustainable way (it is not even close to that point in most countries!) and undrinkable water cannot be treated to drinkable condition relatively efficiently (all water can be cleaned, but reverse osmosis or distillation is slightly too expensive to be competitive in most places, yet! Since water is generally cheaper to produce in the needed quantities than food it should not be a problem either.). Add to that the demographic problems in western countries and the problems of overpopulation are likely not as bad as it has been made out to be. Helping countries develop seems to be a solution to the overpopulation problem. The only catch with the overcrowding is the climate change potential if the growth is build on oil and coal consumption. This "extra cost of sustainable growth" argument is actually among the biggest problems on reaching a global deal on reduction of greenhouse gasses. That and the punishments for not reaching the goals. Fortunately these debates are completely void of scientific questioning of climate change. It also makes the ridiculous claim that population levels wont drop off naturally in a gradual response to diminishing quality of living, which is flatly proven false by a cursory glance at demographics. Overpopulation is just a specter that authoritarians use to demand control.
edit: An increase in population is actually a good thing for fixing the global warming issue, as more people= more vibrant economy, technological innovation, etc. Greater chance we will find a solution. Regardless, most of the global warming problem isnt coal or oil, but animals-- and with, potentially, the economic plausibility of just using cloned meat in the future, that problem will be solved.
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On August 26 2013 21:46 xM(Z wrote:i believe in the big freeze. it already happens; it has started already. http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-or-the-new-ice-age-fear-of-the-big-freeze/30336Show nested quote +As NASA notes:
Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715. Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the “Little Ice Age” when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past.
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According to the NSO:
Penn and Livingston observed that the average field strength declined about 50 gauss per year during Cycle 23 and now in Cycle 24. They also observed that spot temperatures have risen exactly as expected for such changes in the magnetic field. If the trend continues, the field strength will drop below the 1,500 gauss threshold and spots will largely disappear as the magnetic field is no longer strong enough to overcome convective forces on the solar surface. (and so on) still, reducing pollution is not bad overall.
Solar output has almost nothing to do with global average temperatures. The contribution of solar activity within observed variances to global temperatures is between one and two orders of magnitude less than the contribution of greenhouse gases.
There is no impending ice age.
+ Show Spoiler +
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On August 31 2013 04:21 caradoc wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2013 21:46 xM(Z wrote:i believe in the big freeze. it already happens; it has started already. http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-or-the-new-ice-age-fear-of-the-big-freeze/30336As NASA notes:
Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715. Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the “Little Ice Age” when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past.
............................
According to the NSO:
Penn and Livingston observed that the average field strength declined about 50 gauss per year during Cycle 23 and now in Cycle 24. They also observed that spot temperatures have risen exactly as expected for such changes in the magnetic field. If the trend continues, the field strength will drop below the 1,500 gauss threshold and spots will largely disappear as the magnetic field is no longer strong enough to overcome convective forces on the solar surface. (and so on) still, reducing pollution is not bad overall. Solar output has almost nothing to do with global average temperatures. The contribution of solar activity within observed variances to global temperatures is between one and two orders of magnitude less than the contribution of greenhouse gases. There is no impending ice age. + Show Spoiler +
historically speaking you are wrong.
![[image loading]](http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/Solar_Attribution.png)
also
In the last 35 years of global warming, the sun has shown a slight cooling trend. Sun and climate have been going in opposite directions.
Foster and Rahmstorf (2011) used multiple linear regression to quantify and remove the effects of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and solar and volcanic activity from the surface and lower troposphere temperature data. They found that since 1979, solar activity has had a very slight cooling effect of between -0.014 and -0.023°C per decade, depending on the data set (Table 1, Figure 3).
it stands to reason that the vast increase in greenhouse gases heating the earth would more then counter the effects of a cooling sun (for now at least) but just give it time.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-activity-sunspots-global-warming-advanced.htm
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On August 31 2013 18:55 xM(Z wrote:Show nested quote +On August 31 2013 04:21 caradoc wrote:On August 26 2013 21:46 xM(Z wrote:i believe in the big freeze. it already happens; it has started already. http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-warming-or-the-new-ice-age-fear-of-the-big-freeze/30336As NASA notes:
Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715. Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the “Little Ice Age” when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past.
............................
According to the NSO:
Penn and Livingston observed that the average field strength declined about 50 gauss per year during Cycle 23 and now in Cycle 24. They also observed that spot temperatures have risen exactly as expected for such changes in the magnetic field. If the trend continues, the field strength will drop below the 1,500 gauss threshold and spots will largely disappear as the magnetic field is no longer strong enough to overcome convective forces on the solar surface. (and so on) still, reducing pollution is not bad overall. Solar output has almost nothing to do with global average temperatures. The contribution of solar activity within observed variances to global temperatures is between one and two orders of magnitude less than the contribution of greenhouse gases. There is no impending ice age. + Show Spoiler + historically speaking you are wrong. also Show nested quote +In the last 35 years of global warming, the sun has shown a slight cooling trend. Sun and climate have been going in opposite directions. Show nested quote +Foster and Rahmstorf (2011) used multiple linear regression to quantify and remove the effects of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and solar and volcanic activity from the surface and lower troposphere temperature data. They found that since 1979, solar activity has had a very slight cooling effect of between -0.014 and -0.023°C per decade, depending on the data set (Table 1, Figure 3). it stands to reason that the vast increase in greenhouse gases heating the earth would more then counter the effects of a cooling sun (for now at least) but just give it time. http://www.skepticalscience.com/solar-activity-sunspots-global-warming-advanced.htm
Obviously 100-150 years ago as a period will exhibit comparatively larger solar contribution to temperatures than ghgs. The solar activity change in that period was comparatively vast with respect to the later 15 year period, but the ghg change was almost nonexistent. The PER YEAR change in greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere NOW, for example, is greater than the per DECADE change 150 years ago.
Also look--- you are comparing a 50 year period to a 15 year period. o_O
As a comparison, the co2 concentration change from 1850 - 1900 was approximately 288ppm - 294ppm, or an increase of 6ppm over 50 years. 1.2 ppm per decade.
from 1950 to 1965 it went from approximately 310 to 320, or 10 ppm over 15 years = 7ppm per decade.
If you compare that with now, it went from approx 372 to 392 from 2002-2012, or 20ppm per decade.
Obviously the relative contribution of solar activity will be higher in the past when co2 levels (and temperatures) were more stable on a year-to-year basis.
The studies you cite, they're either just data manipulation in the hopes that they shed doubt on anthropogenic climate change for people that read them uncritically or without the necessary background knowledge to question them, or they are cherry picking valid findings (i.e. sun will have a slight cooling effect) in the hopes that people put aside valid concerns about global warming.
Also, in your own link you provide at the bottom, it has this to say about solar radiation:
...neither direct nor indirect solar influences can explain a significant amount of the global warming over the past century, and certainly not over the past 30 years. As Ray Pierrehumbert said about solar warming,
“That’s a coffin with so many nails in it already that the hard part is finding a place to hammer in a new one.”
I'm glad that we agree on the point that solar fluctuation has a completely trivial effect on global temperatures compared with greenhouse gases 
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United States24513 Posts
It doesn't seem to mean much one way or the other.
First of all 2013 isn't even over yet so comparisons are less than ideal. Second of all they mention some analysis within the article you linked which argues this is not necessarily good news.
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Dear Bigtony,
I think the article is actually quite balanced for a Fox News piece, they quote correctly that "Noting the growth in ice, the Snow and Ice Data Center said that coverage was still well below the 30-year average. And the year over year growth in ice is “largely irrelevant,” argued The Guardian, noting that more ice is to be expected after the record low a year ago.
“We should not often expect to observe records in consecutive years. 2012 shattered the previous record low sea ice extent; hence 'regression towards the mean' told us that 2013 would likely have a higher minimum extent,” wrote Dana Nuccitelli."
see also:
![[image loading]](http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2013/09/Figure2.png)
funny are however the comments that anybody seriously expected the arctic to be summer ice free in 2013, this is clearly at least not the view of the scientific community. The IPCC said in the last report that we dont expect summer sea ice free conditions before 2080, and while there are arguments that it might happen faster (observations decrease faster than models), this is also not such a major event: if there is less summer sea ice, winter ice tends to grow faster, so we will most likely even have years with summer sea ice after a year of nearly zero ice. From all I have seen in observations and models, we should not expect an arctic ocean free of summer sea ice before the 2030s/40s, but again: natural variability is high in the Arctic, a couple of years with high winds and warm temperatures might lead to a freak decrease, and a couple of years with different winds and clouds might lead to an increase again.
Sea ice extent is a highly variable function of temperature increase, which we cannot constrain right now. We jsut expect that given global increasing temperatures, the intrinsic variability of the Arctic will at one point lead to ice free conditions.
so, for now, the 2013 sea ice extent is neither good or bad news, it is just expected behaviour of the system.
W
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EPT![[image loading]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/Temp-sunspot-co2.svg)
![[image loading]](http://iwantsomeproof.com/extimg/sie_annual_polar_graph.png)
