WatchYou're going to be seeing headlines on this in about two weeks. That's when I'm guessing the arctic ice melt will reach an all time record and most of the arctic ocean will be free of ice and navigable.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/arctic.sea.ice.interactive.html
The blue starts in 1979. The more red the line, the more recent the year. (dark red is 2011) Each horizontal line is 1 million sq. kilometers. When the graph reaches the bottom, the north pole is completely melted. x-axis is day of the year.
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xrpb11a says
Nominated. This wins for the most absurd comment I've heard this month if not this year.
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Absurd to you because you are TOO DUMB to understand it.
How polar ice thickness is measured: ( with microwave pulses from satellites )
http://gizmodo.com/5904607/the-most-detailed-images-of-polar-ice-cap-thickness-yet
Negative effect of solar flares/wind on space based microwaves:
http://www.ehow.com/list_6637796_effects-solar-showers-radio-waves_.html
Aurora Borealis: collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere (thermosphere). The charged particles originate in the magnetosphere and solar wind.
Summary: An unusually active Aurora in the northern hemisphere is indicative of an abundance of charged particles from solar flares/wind, which by their nature will disrupt satellite based microwave imagery data.
Once again, as usual, you scream "FIRE!" when someone only farted...
iwog says
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I was discussing this very subject with an old pain-in-the-ass I know who had the gall to suggest to me that we are, if anything, speeding up what was going to happen anyway, and that this is all just cyclical, and that we gotta do whatever we gotta do to survive and propagate, even if it means chewing threw this planet, and that that is what SETI and Mars mssions are for, to find a back up plan. Essentially, "Throw it away and get a NEW one, Jody!"
He's my masseuse so I couldn't be too mean to him.
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JodyChunder says
In that case don't let your masseur know that you have been calling him a masseuse.
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marcus says
Yes, in a crisis the indomitable human spirit pulls us together and prompts us to action, whether the danger be from a natural disaster, war, etc.
However, we have never faced a challenge such as this. The big problem being that humans only seem to pull together when the danger is clear and we can agree on a solution. Currently we are far from any solution to climate change, and the danger is not yet "clear" to most people.
Why is this a problem? Because there is a delay between the CO2 we are currently putting into the air and when we see the consequences of that CO2, and that delay may be in the neighborhood of 40ish years. That means that the changes in climate we are seeing today (see iwogs sea ice chart) are because of the CO2 from the 1970s; not from anything we are putting into the air today.
Humans are at best built to think a year or two into the future. Most people, who actually plan at all, plan only a season or two -- or a business quarter -- into the future. When the danger is not obvious it is nigh impossible to get humans to rally around a cause trying to stop something from happening 40 years into the future. Even if that cause is trying to stop their own destruction.
When people wake up and see that the climate around them has changed drastically and they realize we urgently need to address the issue, it is going to be too late. We will have entered the stage where the current climate is just fucking us over a little bit, but we will have already laid down the groundwork -- or perhaps atmospherework -- to totally fuck us in a couple of decades. By that point all the electric cars and alternative/sustainable energy sources in the world will not save us from a planet that has already been terraformed.
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FAIL.
Your pictorial exhibit is contaminated with erroneous data due to solar wind's impact on microwave mapping of arctic ice..
Figure 4a shows the differences between the SOAR CASERTZ and the gridded ice-shelf thickness. The mean difference in the entire region is 27.3 33.5 m, reducing to 21.9 32.4 m when considering a zone within 10 km of the
grounding line. While the differences are, in general, low, a distinct spatial pattern exists. In some areas close to the grounding line, where the assumption of hydrostatic equilibrium breaks down, differences are larger (up to and over 100 m) and negative, indicating that the airborne observations are lower than the satellite estimates. The mean difference within 2 km of the grounding line is –13.0 52.1 m.
iwog says
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leoj707 says
I agree. And it's true that it isn't in our nature to collectively plan way beyond our lifespan.
I was thinking of measures such as building a thousand tidal powered energy stations which have one purpose, that is refrigeration of the ocean near the north pole. Probably a crazy idea, but that or other measures to address saving the oceans, might be undertaken, not to prevent devastation due to us waiting too long on global warming, but to prevent extinction when it gets to the really dire stage.
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marcus says
Yes it is. Do you have any idea how much energy it takes to cool water by one degree? There are only a few locations with geographical flukes where tidal power stations are even viable.
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iwog says
Yes, the Republican base is full of shit with their outright denial. Rush Limbaugh just says "there's no way we're changing any of this...I mean look at the moon up there and how beautiful it is." He has actually made "arguments" like that.
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xrpb11a says
You've devoted three entire posts to this idiotic blind assertion.
Does anyone believe this nonsense besides you? Would you happen to have any support or do you expect these insane rantings to stand on their own?
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You want to talk about 'blind assertions'??
if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck....
iwog says
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xrpb11a says
Running away from my question again? What a surprise.
You have apparently found a fatal flaw in the way the NOAA and NASA measure ice concentrations on the North and South poles. You've been quite arrogant and adamant about it, and have repeatedly accused the NOAA and NASA of publishing "fail" information.
Have you written them yet so they can correct their satellite photos? Or were your posts just another example of you pulling facts out of your ass and being a troll?
Again......is there any support for this childish crap you're posting or did you just make it all up?
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I'd think NASA, of all people, would be aware of sources of error in their remote sensing techniques. Given the constant bombardment of radiation from the sun, you'd think NASA engineers/scientists would take it into consideration when designing their sensors and satellites.
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They are aware of it. That's why Iwogs data is not exact, and has a wide margin of error, thus earning the infamous "FAIL" moniker.
http://www.igsoc.org:8080/journal/57/203/j10j103.pdf
freak80 says
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Summary:
. Comparison of
the derived ice-shelf thicknesses with independent airborne
estimates of ice thickness shows good agreement on the
large ice shelves. Differences of >20% are seen in some
areas, but these can be explained by areas of missing data
and the breakdown of the assumption of hydrostatic
equilibrium close to the grounding line. Known errors
can be combined and an error estimate on the order of
50 m is produced for Larsen C (Griggs and Bamber, 2009a).
This may be a significant underestimate in areas of
unknown marine ice density and thickness, data gaps and
close to the grounding line, which makes the production of
an error estimate for the entire dataset problematic as
shown by the larger differences seen in the validation in the
Pine Island and Thwaites areas.
iwog says
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xrpb11a says
I really don't have a dog (or a duck) in this fight.
But where does that article say anything about measurements being wrong outright? All measurements have error and uncertainty. That doesn't mean we can't measure stuff. Sure, previous ice measurements might have margin of error +/- 10% (or whatever it actually is), but that doesn't mean that the ice is, on average, being underestimated.
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It doesn't. But it concludes that the error margin can be up to 20%, which is significant when the data is being used to paint doomsday scenarios by the Iwoggian...
freak80 says
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xrpb11a says
Up to 20% in *some* areas. That *does not* mean the overall ice mass was underestimated by 20%.
Even if the entire ice mass is *constantly* underestimated by 20%, it doesn't really matter. What matters is the trend. A negative slope is a negative slope, regardless of where the slope intersects the "y axis."
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xrpb11a says
*ah-hem*
freak80 says
+/- 10% is very different than saying it can be off 20% -- it can't. It may be off as much as 10%, either making the painted by iwog doomsday scenario either much worse or not as bad.
Either way it does not really matter, the ice thickness is but one small part of the evidence for our DOOM!
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So how does magnetic polar shifting factor into all this?
Re post 201,,,,,
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errc says
A pole shift can take thousands of years, so I don't think that it factors in at all.
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leoj707 says
Can it? How do you know?
Many of y'all seem fairly certain that man utilizing fossil fuels has us on a doomsday path (and seem to insist that it is a "problem", which would mean it has a "solution", hence you humanoids claim that the Earths climate is something we have control over).
But when it comes to the shifting of the magnetic poles, we're going to just go with you 'think' it doesn't have any effect? Doesn't sound like a very evidenced based, scientific conclusion to me
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xrpb11a says
It is totally irrelevant and wouldn't make one shred of difference. You really think an error in some areas up to +/- 10% would change the graph? Would change my views? Would indicate that the earth isn't warming at a dangerous rate?
Of course not. The average amount of polar ice for August 20th is 5.11 million square miles. There is currently 2.84 million square miles of sea ice in the north pole. Do you even know what 10% is?
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The other thing that is totally fucking stupid here is that you're talking about 2007 during the old record. What about August 2012? The entire point of this thread? How dishonest can you get?
http://www.gi.alaska.edu/AuroraForecast
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errc says
And the non-humanoids on this board are not certain about this?
errc says
Perhaps I should rephrase and say that I don't think that it factors in at all in our current climate change worries. Our burning of CO2 is going to drastically terraform the planet in the next 100-200 years. Any climate effect from a pole shift could be 1000 years off from now.
Yes, evidence based science requires, well... evidence. I have not seen a lot of evidence that we need to worry about the pole shift.
On that topic here is some reading for you:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/02/09/no-a-pole-shift-wont-cause-global-superstorms/
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http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/earth/geophysics/question782.htm
I don't know what effect it would have, that's why I'm asking.
I am not certain that climate is something that we can control, nor that AGW is a problem that contains a workable solution, no.
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errc says
None. No effect. Polar shifts have happened many times and don't seem to correspond to changes in climate. In fact the last complete polar shift occurred when early humans were wandering around Africa.
There might be an increase in skin cancer rates but that's about it.
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iwog says
Yes, this is my understanding as well.
The pole shift ='s disaster idea seems to have gotten the required quorum of 3 crackpots to agree on it, thus officially entrenching it in the realm of pseudoscience.
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Oh, that's genius...give a one day example not related whatsoever to when the data mapping took place....
why don't you post the data for the timeframe the mapping took place?
You won't, as it would discredit your entire theory of the destruction of humanity.
iwog says
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So i take it your not a big fan of air conditioning....
leoj707 says
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Not with technology breathing down the neck of co2 emissions...We will adapt. We always have.
http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2012-01/new-material-can-pull-carbon-dioxide-right-out-air-unprecedented-rates
leoj707 says
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well, as of this date...
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ja2100005
you are just a doomsday mofo....bent on performing a daily public pants piss...
iwog says
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xrpb11a says
Neat article. Is the new technology economical? I hope so.
But that seems to be an admission on your part that CO2 emmisions *are* a problem.
At the end of the day it's not about "winning an argument" but getting closer to something that resembles truth.
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I never stated or implied CO2 emissions were or were not a problem.
I was performing my civic duty in pointing out factual inaccuracies in Iwog's post.
Plain and simple.
freak80 says
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freak80 says
Yes, and is it more economical to put them into the air, then try and clean the air. Or, just not let them get into the air in the first place.
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Is this unborn generations we are worried about? "Science" doesn't care at all you know. As far as "Science" is concerned, we can all just die off. The earth will be fine and "life" will go on.
The earth has been warming? Yep. CO2 is a greenhouse gas. Sure, ok. Humans make alot of it? I suppose so, yes. Is it "alot" compared to its percentage in the atmosphere? Not so much. Has the earth been warmer before? Oh yes, no question. In fact, antarctica has been a lush rain forest. Did life survive it? Yes, again. It thrived in fact. Has it been warmer in recorded history? Yes, again. Unquestionably for the northern hemisphere and very likely for the Southern. Was this Medieval Warming Period suppressed a bit by propagandist scientists in the Global Warming Movement? Oh yes, definitely.
There is a lovely picture of the the USS Skate Navy Submarine running on the surface of an entirely ice free North Pole back in 1958. It was a fairly nice day..with all of the sailors standing on deck for the pictures. Wearing coats though. Not baseball weather, but still...
Should we panic over the current warming? Oooo, a very difficult question. Worthy of continued debate - especially if massive changes in global human behavior is required.
All of this sounds like an engineering problem to me. People in inhospitable areas need to find a way to not be in those, and we should engineer our society so as to have as few of those as possible. The climate will change. There will be nasty storms, earthquakes and worse environmental disasters. Worth panicing about now? Nope, not really. Aside from the engineering issues i just mentioned, that is. Just like with all life, we'll have to adapt to all of these things. The chances of our avoiding the need to adapt is zero. It comes back to population again doesn't it? Future generations? How many people is that? Is it moral for there to be more or less of them? Is it immoral to have children? To answer that question, do you need to consider where you live? When you live?
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deepcgi says
Wow, you make it sound like the entire Arctic Ocean was ice free!
You can piss off those climate scientists and read the whole sorted story here:
http://www.navalhistory.org/2011/08/11/uss-skate-ssn-578-becomes-the-first-submarine-to-surface-at-the-north-pole/
Another interesting thing is that in 1958 submarines started using sonar to measure the ice thickness in the Arctic Ocean. You can see that data here:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009GL039035.shtml
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xrpb11a says
Data mapping takes place every single day. The picture at the beginning of the thread, and the corresponding graph data is from 8/20/2012. Yesterday.
xrpb11a says
I did. You obviously didn't follow the links or read the giant 8/20/12 that was so cleverly disguised in yellow in a large font at the top.
xrpb11a says
I don't know how you keep setting a new standard for being wrong, but you're good at it.
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deepcgi says
From another thread but relevant here.
In fact, CO2 has increased from about 300 ppm to 370 ppm over the past 100 years. That's a 23% increase in a single century.
To put that in perspective, if we followed the trend backwards assuming that this change is purely due to nature, then there must have been no CO2 in the atmosphere in the 1500s. Clearly this isn't true. Similarly, if we followed the trend forward assuming this is a natural, linear phenomenon, then in 1.4 million years, a blink of the eye in evolutionary terms, 100% of the atmosphere will be CO2. This is an equally ridiculous scenario.
As such, the 23% increase in CO2 in the past 100 years is either the mother of all coincidences and nature right now is really acting in an extreme manner never before witnessed, or these emissions are largely man-made. It's not hard to do the math.
100 years may seem like a long time to a human, but it's a fraction of a moment in geographical and ecological processes. There simply is no way short of a cataclysmic event that nature can produce a 23% increase in CO2 in such a miniscule amount of time. Man is responsible.
23% over a 100 year period is "a lot" by any account.
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Dan8267 says
It's more than that, and the rate is accelerating. The feedback loops of a hot earth releasing more CO2 and methane aren't well understood and almost impossible to model.
Current data:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/