quote:

Originally posted by NeoPhono Here...throw this onto the pile. Bottom line...as much a we'd like to, there is no way to conclusively prove the "what" and "why" of current global climate change...much less say "it's all our fault." The field of climatology on the long-term scale is just too limited as of now. That being said, should would be as smart as possible with the environment? Hell yeah. But this chicken little bull is ridiculous.

I believe we covered some of those paid-off, quote-mining global warming skeptics here:

http://www.tranceaddict.com/forums/...d=&pagenumber=4

But I seem to have overlooked Tim Ball. It's not terribly impressive, especially the lying about the credentials part:

quote:

Ball and the oil industry Ball is listed as a "consultant" of a Calgary-based global warming skeptic organization called the "Friends of Science" (FOS). In a January 28, 2007 article in the Toronto Star, the President of the FOS admitted that about one-third of the funding for the FOS is provided by the oil industry. In an August, '06 Globe and Mail feature, the FOS was exposed as being funded in part by the oil and gas sector and hiding the fact that they were. According to the Globe and Mail, the oil industry money was funnelled through the Calgary Foundation charity, to the University of Calgary and then put into an education trust for the FOS. Ball inflates credentials Ball and organizations he is affiliated with have repeatedly made the claim that he is the "first Canadian PhD in climatology." Even further, Ball once claimed he was "one of the first climatology PhD's in the world." As many people have pointed out, there have been many PhD's in the field prior to Ball. Ball and the NRSP Ball is listed as an "Executive" for a Canadian group called the "Natural Resource Stewardship Project," (NRSP) a lobby organization that refuses to disclose it's funding sources. The NRSP is led by executive director Tom Harris and Dr. Tim Ball. An Oct. 16, 2006 CanWest Global news article on who funds the NRSP, it states that "a confidentiality agreement doesn't allow him [Tom Harris] to say whether energy companies are funding his group." Ball's research history Ball retired from the University of Winnipeg in 1996 and a search of 22,000 academic journals shows that, over the course of his career, Ball has published 4 pieces of original research in a peer-reviewed journal on the subject of climate change Ball has not published any new research in the last 11 years. Ball sues researcher and Calgary Herald newspaper On Sept. 1, Ball, launched a libel suit against Dr. Dan Johnson, a current Professor of Environmental Science at the University of Lethbridge and a Tier 1 Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Grassland Ecosystems. Here are the original Statements of Claim and Defence. http://www.desmogblog.com/timothy-f-ball-tim-ball

And yes, despite his denials, he is a paid mouthpiece of the oil industry. Truly shocking, I'm sure.

More on these folks here:

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/175673

More here as well:

quote:

Dr. Tim Ball: The Lie that Just Won't Die 5 Feb 07 The deathless and - in many specific respects - completely fictional meanderings of Dr. Tim Ball have begun appearing again on right-wing blogs all over the net. At City Troll, at Convenient Untruth and at New Orleans Lady, the same tired and retreaded old climate rant paints Dr. Ball as the courageous victim of a plot to silence a well-meaning skeptic. But Ball can't even tell the truth about his own resume. His claim to be the first Climatology Ph.D. in Canada is a total falsehood; his degree was in historical geography - not climatology - and it was nowhere near the first ever granted to someone writing vaguely in the field. It also was can by the university as a doctor of philosophy, not the more prestigious "doctor of science" tht Ball claims in these articles. He claims as well to have been a professor (again of climatology) at the University of Winnipeg for 32 years, while he confirmed in his own Statement of Claim in a pending lawsuit (look here ) that he was a professor (of geography, never climatology) for just eight years. Dr. Ball claims never to have been paid by oil and gas interests, but if you look here , you'll find a Globe and Mail story in which Dr. Barry Cooper, the man behind Ball's former industry front group, the Friends of Science , offers this clumsy admission: "[The money's] not exclusively from the oil and gas industry," says Prof. Cooper. "It's also from foundations and individuals. I can't tell you the names of those companies, or the foundations for that matter, or the individuals." Here you'll find a podcast of Dr. Ball talking to the Ottawa Citizen , saying that he goes out of his way to ignore who might be paying his bills, but crediting the energy industry lobby firm, the High Park Group . And here, you'll find High Park Group veteran Tom Harris, telling the Toronto Star that his new industry front group, the Natural Resources Stewardship Project , was created at the suggestion of High Park Group president Timothy Egan. Tom Harris, executive director of the NRSP, is credited by New Orleans Lady for passing along this version of the Ball tirade, also printed Monday on the right-wingy website, Canada Free Press. Yet all of these factual inconsistencies have been brought to Harris's attention on previous occasions. It is inevitable that this post will be criticized as an ad hominem attack on dear Dr. Ball (and perhaps on Harris, as well). But how can you argue science with someone who doesn't feel bound by the limits of truth? The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has just endured an unprecedented process of vetting and peer-review to produce a document, the veracity of which has been double-checked and endorsed by thousands of the best scientists in the world. It must be soul-destroying to see a long-retired geographer who rarely published during his colourless academic career and who never conducted any research in atmospheric science dismiss that effort without a shred of evidence or a hint of good conscience. http://www.desmogblog.com/dr-tim-ba...t-just-wont-die

IPCC author, Dr. Andrew Weaver has a few things to say about Ball and crew:

http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Columni...10/2735576.html

including:

quote:

"these adversaries of scientific knowledge haven't had a peer-reviewed paper published in memory.....I've never seen Tim Ball at any climate meeting ... I don't why people go to him..." "I'd say to him: 'why don't you publish your science?'"

And here:

quote:

Undistorted records in hand, Ball is promoted by the National Center for Public Policy Research ($225,000 from Exxon Mobil), and Tech Central Station (which also receives support from General Motors). He's a hot topic on the Coalblog web site, sponsored by the coal companies. In the past year, he's given policy briefings to the Fraser Institute and the Frontier Centre for Public Policy in Winnipeg. You could have found him and Baliunas at a conference in Ottawa in November 2002, just days before parliament ratified the Kyoto Protocol. That conference, urging the government not to proceed with ratification, was paid for by Imperial Oil (Exxon Mobil's Canadian subsidiary) and Talisman Energy and put together by public relations firm APCO Worldwide. APCO's assignment for Imperial Oil was to bring together a roster of climate change skeptics to reveal Kyoto's "science and technology fatal flaws." An APCO specialty is supporting rogue scientists who are financed by industry and purport to challenge established scientific thinking. APCO organized The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, which was originally funded by the Philip Morris Company, to attack epidemiological studies which implicated environmental tobacco smoke in slightly increased rates of lung cancer in non-smokers. Such studies could not be allowed to stand, given the tobacco industry's claim that harm from smoking was regrettable but due to individual choice, not second-hand smoke. This work was essential in Philip Morris' efforts to limit the impact of passive smoking regulations. APCO then widened the financial catchment to include other companies with poisoning or polluting problems. The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition was so successful that it was assigned a lead role in opposing Kyoto. http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2006/0...yGlobalWarming/

These are the new creationists of the 21st century. Intelligent Design died like a fart in a windstorm, now the unpublished paid oil-consultant naysayers have taken the grounds.

___________________
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with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

quote:

Originally posted by Sunsnail An unnaturally fast rate of climate change would do harm to those species even in the areas we do protect.

Life adapts. There was a time on Earth, millions of years ago, when temperatures were much greater. This also resulted in diversification of life, the large amounts of carbon dioxide encouraged explosion of plant life, and accordingly animal life, bacteria, etc. - plants which in turn converted to oxygen which once made up as much as 35% content of atmosphere. Life was very diverse - just imagine this - entire Earth was a rainforest .... there was so much life, so many species (rainforests have half of all life). Today carbon dioxide is at low levels ... only 0.4% of atmospheric content!!! Without CO2 life will cease to exist ... what will the trees, plants use to convert to oxygen, make food for us? Plants have stored most of CO2 in the ground as coal, fossil fuels ... We need to fire up the cycle ... life will adapt. How do you think plants, animals, life species felt when glaciers took over half of the world's northern hemisphere? You think many species didnt die because of these advancing glaciers?

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quote:

Originally posted by Magnetonium Actually, the species of life are actually at a much higher risk of extermination from human destruction of their habitat, by, for example, destruction of rainforests where half of life resides. Global warming will not save them, because destruction will continue if you just concentrate on stopping emissions. Halt of emissions will only give greater excuse for greater deforestation campaign because companies will assume we release less through smokestacks. Why is the environmental protection always secondary?

Why don't you just admit that your resentful that this is taking priority over other things? That seems to be the only consistent point through all your posts. Now notice this image:



It's from ice core data from the Vostok are in Antartica. This was published in the journal nature in '99, it's a shame i couldn't find more recent data. Notice in the temperature graph how in contrast to all other pre-iceage peaks the temperature has stayed inordinately warm for a longer period of time, and im sure if you blow this image up you could notice and upward trend. Now, if this were just another part of the 'natural cycle' don't you think it would comform to other such parts of the cycle and have the temperature drop faster? How can you explain the unusually long elevated temperature period?

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quote:

Orbax At that point you kind of crossed the rubicon and you might as well lay siege to Rome

quote:

Originally posted by venomX Why don't you just admit that your resentful that this is taking priority over other things? That seems to be the only consistent point through all your posts. Now notice this image: It's from ice core data from the Vostok are in Antartica. This was published in the journal nature in '99, it's a shame i couldn't find more recent data. Notice in the temperature graph how in contrast to all other pre-iceage peaks the temperature has stayed inordinately warm for a longer period of time, and im sure if you blow this image up you could notice and upward trend. Now, if this were just another part of the 'natural cycle' don't you think it would comform to other such parts of the cycle and have the temperature drop faster? How can you explain the unusually long elevated temperature period?

What are you implying here? This graph proves my point - climate change. Its a pattern, and global warming of nowadays is expected, will level off soon, and slowly decrease eventually into the next ice age. Little Ice Age is coming this century ;-)

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quote:

Originally posted by Magnetonium Why dont you claim that global cooling periods like the Little Ice Age of medieval times is caused by humans? How about looking into ice core samples, and history? Huh? What about the constant patterns of glaciation, and current trends according to ecological history? Its not just the solar energy that's a factor. Its the spin of the earth - the equinoxes, called the Milankovitch cycles: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles And they match the climate change ;-) Only time will tell, when in the middle of this century people will start whining about global cooling ... LOL

You really should pay more attention to the sources you cite. From the Wikipedia page you gave:

quote:

Because the observed periodicities of climate fit so well with the orbital periods, the orbital theory has overwhelming support. Nonetheless, there are several difficulties in reconciling theory with observations. [edit] 100 ky problem The 100,000 year problem is that the eccentricity variations have a significantly smaller impact on solar forcing than precession or obliquity and hence might be expected to produce the weakest effects. However, observations show that during the last 1 million years, the strongest climate signal is the 100,000 year cycle. In addition, despite the relatively large 100,000 year cycle, some have argued that the length of the climate record is insufficient to establish a statistically significant relationship between climate and eccentricity variations.[3] Some models can however reproduce the 100,000 year cycles as a result of non-linear interactions between small changes in the Earth's orbit and internal oscillations of the climate system.[4][5] [edit] 400 ky problem The 400,000 year problem is that the eccentricity variations have a strong 400,000 year cycle. That cycle is only clearly present in climate records older than the last million years. If the 100ky variations are having such a strong effect, the 400ky variations might also be expected to be apparent. This is also known as the stage 11 problem, after the interglacial in marine isotopic stage 11 which would be unexpected if the 400,000 year cycle has an impact on climate. The relative absence of this periodicity in the marine isotopic record may be due, at least in part, to the response times of the climate system components involved - in particular, the carbon cycle. [edit] Stage 5 problem The stage 5 problem refers to the timing of the penultimate interglacial (in marine isotopic stage 5) which appears to have begun 10 thousand years in advance of the solar forcing hypothesized to have been causing it. This is also referred to as the causality problem. Effect exceeds cause The effects of these variations are primarily believed to be due to variations in the intensity of solar radiation upon various parts of the globe. Observations show climate behaviour is much more intense than the calculated variations. Various internal characteristics of climate systems are believed to be sensitive to the insolation changes, causing amplification (positive feedback) and damping responses (negative feedback). [edit] The unsplit peak problem The unsplit peak problem refers to the fact that eccentricity has cleanly resolved variations at both 95 and 125 ky frequencies. A sufficiently long, well-dated record of climate change should be able to resolve both frequencies, but some researchers interpret climate records of the last million years as showing only a single spectral peak at 100 kyr periodicity. It is debatable whether the quality of existing data ought to be sufficient to resolve both frequencies over the last million years. [edit] The transition problem The transition problem refers to the change in the frequency of climate variations 1 million years ago. From 1-3 million years, climate had a dominant mode matching the 41 ky cycle in obliquity. After 1 million years ago, this changed to a 100 ky variation matching eccentricity. No reason for this change has been

These are not small problems with the hypothesis. They are quite vast. These problems, especially the ~100kyr (95kyr+120kyr+400kyr) eccentricity problem are big enough to be disproven by the lack of their own merit. Furthermore, this paper by Muller and Macdonald:

http://muller.lbl.gov/papers/nature.html

demonstrates that there is little to no evidence of a 95kyr, 120kyr or a 400kyr frequency in the climate data. There is, however, a very narrow 100kyr frequency. Putting this together with the fact that the eccentricity cycle is the weakest of the Milankovitch cycles seemingly points rather convincingly that Milankovitch was not a cause of the ice ages.

The 100kyr frequency, however, does point to another source, the sun's magnetic cycles:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/release...20607073439.htm

You'll notice in that paper that a correlation between Be10 and O18 in that above paper improves when it is corrected for geomagnetic variation, which gives more credence against a fallacious correlation.

(most info. here ripped from www.realclimate.org)

___________________
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with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

quote:

Originally posted by Magnetonium What are you implying here? This graph proves my point - climate change. Its a pattern, and global warming of nowadays is expected, will level off soon, and slowly decrease eventually into the next ice age. Little Ice Age is coming this century ;-)

You say that yet all models indicate that it will continue to rise for hundreds of years due to the fact that carbon dioxide doesnt faze out of the atmosphere that quickly. What explanation do you have for the warming then, or more importantly the change in pattern? Sadly there is only one reasonable explanation, increase in the amount of atmospheric CO2, and the only organisms that have increased their CO2 emissions have been us humans. Now if this were just that pattern you talked about, then we would already be in a 'little ice age' now wouldnt we? Your just making up your own conjectures, as renegade already pointed out, not ONE climate model that has been studied indicates the leveling off of CO2 in the atmosphere or a cooling period unless we decrease our CO2 emissions significantly.

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quote:

Orbax At that point you kind of crossed the rubicon and you might as well lay siege to Rome

quote:

Originally posted by Corvus Unlike the article he does feel that Man is a major contributor to global warming. And he does believe going off the use of fossil fuels.

Which makes me wonder - why the hell is this discussion still going on? Is there any scientist who has ever claimed that there are no problems whatsoever? Just stop polluting the goddamn atmosphere already!

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I was thinking you'd get picky on that long-term climate history. So I shall concentrate on recently recorded history. The history of the last 20,000 years. Did humans 10,000 years ago caused the end of Ice Age? Little Ice Age? Why why is it everytime that when global cooling happens, its natural, and when warming happens, its blamed on humans? There's little evidence. There's still less than 0.5% greenhouse gases in total despite all the massive emissions in the last 200 years - the composition of CO2 had largely remained the same, even though Asian developing countries are releasing lots of it into atmosphere. That shows how really weak our efforts are at global warming ... it took plants hundreds of millions years to deposit most of atmospsheric CO2 into atmosphere ... and you expect humans can release it all back in 200 years?

The whole global warming crisis is a big thing now not because of concern for environment, as I have stated above previously. Its a concern of lazy, ignorant people who are worried about their lifestyles, so they want to stop it while at the same time OK'ing the continuing damage to the environment in destruction of it, the real cause and threat to "global warming". Studies were done to show that trees can intake much more CO2 than previously thought. I read it in the best book ever by Thom Hartmann, "Last Hours Of Ancient Sunlight" - another book on global warming issues, which has swayed me over on the damage side of things. I watched Al Gore's movie too. But common sense still prevailed for me ;-) There no way emission cuts will stop the environmental damage, it will only starve trees and plants of the CO2 they want. But wait - cutting down trees will disbalance the carbon cycle causing massive environmental damage - but nothing's being done about it.

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quote:

Originally posted by Magnetonium What are you implying here? This graph proves my point - climate change. Its a pattern, and global warming of nowadays is expected, will level off soon, and slowly decrease eventually into the next ice age. Little Ice Age is coming this century ;-)

Well I think we can take a very simple concept of the feedback loop between greenhouse gases and climate. The climate influences greenhouse gases (through ocean + biospheric interactions), and greenhouse in turn influences climate (atmospheric effect). Okay?

Well if you take a look at that graph he posted, what's the highest level of CO2 gases reached? About 290 ppm, right?

Guess how much CO2 we have today?:

~381 ppm:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4803460.stm

That immediate and drastic rise in CO2 levels is simply unprecedented, and nothing else can shy of human interaction can pinpoint this historical difference.

Granted, ice core levels show a bit lower, about 323 ppm:

ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/pa...law/law_co2.txt

But that's also higher than anything seen in the past 650k years.

Finally, I'd like to point you to an article that explains a bit better than I could about human interaction and the drastic rise in CO2 levels:

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=87

___________________
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I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

quote:

Originally posted by venomX You say that yet all models indicate that it will continue to rise for hundreds of years due to the fact that carbon dioxide doesnt faze out of the atmosphere that quickly. What explanation do you have for the warming then, or more importantly the change in pattern? Sadly there is only one reasonable explanation, increase in the amount of atmospheric CO2, and the only organisms that have increased their CO2 emissions have been us humans. Now if this were just that pattern you talked about, then we would already be in a 'little ice age' now wouldnt we? Your just making up your own conjectures, as renegade already pointed out, not ONE climate model that has been studied indicates the leveling off of CO2 in the atmosphere or a cooling period unless we decrease our CO2 emissions significantly.

Burning, destruction of trees is the real global warming killer, not the smokestacks emissions (which the trees can work on - I am not tallking here about pollution though, thats very bad). Why trees are so important? Well, when you cut down the tree, burn it, you release carbon dioxide, lots of it. Then, the carbon cycle is broken, and that tree that was there is no longer converting CO2 to oxygen. So you end up having many times more CO2 because of cutting down the tree (one portion tree intakes, another one part of the tree, another one - the cycle). And humans have cut down so many trees in the last 2 thousand years ... How is cutting down emissions going to stop this? STOP ENVIRONMENTAL DAMAGE! Emissions are not the problem. Pollution and damage to env. is.

There's other causes of CO2 releases, the whole glacier retreat caused massive releases of trapped CO2 for crying out loud ... altogether, judging by the overwhelming information, the amounts of CO2 emissions we do is nothing compared to the carbon emissions naturally, as part of the carbon cycle. Anyhow, I have a very important test tomorrow, so I am done for the day.

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Whenever you go and buy something, you are affecting someone somewhere, be it environment, a person, or a community - you're making a statement with what you buy. So make it a smart choice ... Its a big picture

quote:

Originally posted by Magnetonium I was thinking you'd get picky on that long-term climate history. So I shall concentrate on recently recorded history. The history of the last 20,000 years. Did humans 10,000 years ago caused the end of Ice Age? Little Ice Age?

Nope:

quote:

Several conditions now are far different than those during the last ice advance. The earth receives a different pattern of solar energy now because the shape of the earth's orbit is not the same as it was 20,000 years ago. The tilt of the earth's axis toward the sun and the position of northern hemisphere summer on the orbit are both different now than during the last glacial advance. There is also significantly more CO2 in the atmosphere now than during the Ice Age and atmospheric carbon dioxide continues to rise, making the earth's average temperature much warmer. These conditions combine to make it unlikely for near future changes in ocean circulation to cause the large scale cooling seen during an Ice Age .....The causes of the Little Ice Age are still unclear, but may have been triggered by changes in the amount of solar energy received by the earth from the Sun. The coldest interval of The Little Ice Age occurred during a period of reduced solar activity call the Maunder Minimum, when the Sun was observed to have fewer sunspots. Climate models suggest that changes in the Sun's energy output may have caused a small cooling at that time, but it is still unclear how these small changes in solar activity may have triggered such a widespread cooling. http://www.whoi.edu/institutes/occi...d=10149#ocean_7

Your point?

quote:

Why why is it everytime that when global cooling happens, its natural, and when warming happens, its blamed on humans?

I believe I and venomX covered that point. The extreme sharp rise is unprecedented and cannot be attributed to any natural phenomena.

quote:

There's little evidence.

Incorrect. Plenty of evidence has been provided. You, however, have not given any verifiable evidence to the contrary. Please do so.

quote:

There's still less than 0.5% greenhouse gases in total despite all the massive emissions in the last 200 years - the composition of CO2 had largely remained the same even though Asian developing countries are releasing lots of it into atmosphere.

I haven't heard this argument before. You have a source to verify?

Again, I think it's important to understand the concentrations of greenhouse gases have actually risen quite drastically, especially CO2 as I depicted earlier. You have any sources that demonstrate otherwise?

quote:

That shows how really weak our efforts are at global warming ... it took plants hundreds of millions years to deposit most of atmospsheric CO2 into atmosphere ... and you expect humans can release it all back in 200 years? The whole global warming crisis is a big thing now not because of concern for environment, as I have stated above previously. Its a concern of lazy, ignorant people who are worried about their lifestyles, so they want to stop it while at the same time OK'ing the continuing damage to the environment in destruction of it, the real cause and threat to "global warming". Studies were done to show that trees can intake much more CO2 than previously thought. I read it in the best book ever by Thom Hartmann, "Last Hours Of Ancient Sunlight" - another book on global warming issues, which has swayed me over on the damage side of things. I watched Al Gore's movie too. But common sense still prevailed for me ;-) There no way emission cuts will stop the environmental damage, it will only starve trees and plants of the CO2 they want. But wait - cutting down trees will disbalance the carbon cycle causing massive environmental damage - but nothing's being done about it.

You make quite a lot of unsupported assertions. Can you perhaps verify any of your claims with some peer-reviewed or evidence-backed literature?

___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

My personal belief is that we should attempt to stop global warming where it is not a large problem on the economy. Things like regulating freon and other anti-ozone gases in particular and increasing emission standards slowly for industry to gradually adapt and reducing costs.

I think instead of this climate change scare (if we are doing it, there is not much we can do at this point really) we should focus on more immediate environmental concerns: deforestation, local pollution, agricultural environmental side effects, pollution of our oceans, and preservation of natural and tranquil habitats.

I'd much rather a factory stopped having sewage run-off into a nearby water source poising both humans with cancer and whole ecosystems with eradication then that same factory regulated on putting a little less CO2 up their smoke stakes.


Just my .02$

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