Global Climate Change (the discussion)

I believe at some stage Trump said of AMS that weather men could not get the forecasts right on the day so how could their predictions be right. I always find such ignorance refreshing, it tells me exactly who is who and most of the ones like Trump appear to have investment in petrochemical industries, agrochemical industries, pharmaceuticals, development and construction and that level of high profit making areas that almost all depend on those things that are most environmentally, particularly climatically, damaging. Sun Tzu's famous words 'Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles, a thousand victories.' speak for how the 97% need to approach the powerful deniers.

I believe the 70% consensus was from about 15 years ago. The consensus is much higher now. Here's links to all of the different studies via NASA - http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

Hello John,

I inadvertently put my post in response to your request to me in Brian Milne's discussion wherein I saw your request to me. This was as follows:

Hello John,

No need for any apology to me!

As you have requested a look at my global warming paper (written, by the way, in 2008 when global warming was the devil and the more realistic expression "climate change" had not yet become so commonplace) I am uploading it, together with a much shorter paper highlighting a possibly much worse scenario.

Best wishes,

Melvyn

Attachments:
Anyway, Brian asked me to repost it on your discussion which I originally had difficulty in finding, but I have now found it (I hope). I deleted my attachments as clearly he is a little offended by me entering his discussion, which I quite understand, and I have no wish to offend anyone, nor to encroach on anyone's space, discussion, etc.
In any event, I realised that in my haste to respond to you I had attached a draft of my paper and not the finished item.
So I now attach the correct version of my paper + the shorter paper relating to another possible disaster scenario.
Cordially,
Melvyn ANTHONY

The Third Chimpanzee man, yes I know his work. The World Until Yesterday is a very interesting read. I think he asks questions throughout Collapse, but leaves the answers open, however he never dismisses any possibility which climate change deniers refuse to accept particularly.

Jared Diamond is v interesting on why societies fail.

I too have been to a few of such meetings but the rubbish I heard spouted by people claiming to be 'Greens' irritated so much I would be very reluctant ever to bother again. Indeed at one of them some geeky twerp came up with a theory about human beings defecations over the millennia polluting the surface of the planet and how processing plants should be a priority. Something in the region of just over 90% of the world still do not have access to sewage systems. In a couple of African countries I learned to carry a sturdy spoon. One digs a little hole then fills it back in. I obtain a similar waste from a local cattle farmer to use for compost, had it been the case then I might have asked the total plonker if he had plans for sanitation for cattle, then perhaps giraffes, beavers...

Good point John. Aztecs and Incas were slightly different times and a few thousand kilometres apart. The Aztecs were in Mexico and basically wiped out by Cortés and his armies. Incaic communities in Peru down into what is now Bolivia and Chile stored water in a very few places as they did in Machu Picchu when surplus mountain snow melted water was directed into vast stone and brick reservoirs to be stored, thus channelling water down lower to their cities that were basically religious centres when rivers were low. Most of the population lived lower down where there was only occasional water shortage. In the high Andes it is cool, thus little loss of the stored water but also a good ice capped ridge that feeds rivers all year round most of the time. At first archaeologists did not want to have it but hydrologists did studies and showed that the water storage was as the Radio 4 programme said. However Machu Picchu was never a major population centre, more a religious, ritual centre for the rulers complete with places to read astrology, make sacrifices to the gods and such things. A very short time before the conquistadores discovered the city, the emperor at the time died of what was probably smallpox that came with the invaders (along with much of the population) hence the city was abandoned. Anyway, only a couple of other small cities far lower down had any kind of comparable storage whatsoever, all related to temples according to the archaeologists; anyway newly imported diseases killed off a large part of the population rather than lack of water.

As for the Amazon droughts, the Asháninka people in Satipo province in Peru tell stories of when the forest dried up because of the droughts in the Andes. Water flows east off the mountains into the Amazon Basin, El Niño affects the area cyclically as the folk history in the mountain area I worked in recall, which is the other side of the high ridge on the seaward side to the west from where the rain comes but feeds the Amazon sources anyway. All of that was pre industrial influence so we cannot blame human beings. Nonetheless, it is still not something that can be used to justify not acting.

Well I hope that the new version of SFN will have posts in chronological order!

Don't leave out Global cooling theories either, They are based on the earths history and not scientific conjecture.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/global-cooling-is-here/10783

Of course, there are place that have a name that includes 'port' or to that effect that are now a long way from navigable water but were once prosperous from water-borne trade. I lived close enough to the Fens for a long time where history still relates communities on 'remote' islands, Ely is still really known as the Isle of Ely, which it was in medieval times. The list is long. Things change. Certainly we must take natural cycles into account and there are far too many people blaming human activity and not accepting nature plays a massive role. Nonetheless, industry has changed the world a lot in terms of what it has taken from nature that is irreplaceable but that turns into something we would rather not have set free. Mercury is plentiful within the Earth's crust but since we have exploited it and then disposed of it, including into water particularly, that has done a lot of damage albeit to something less than 0.2% of the world. It tends to happen where there are high population concentrations, thus affects many people. The same for other things that pollute although most of the planet and atmosphere are quite reasonable. 71% of this planet is covered in water with only about 3% inhabited, but approaching 2% is urban and in something of a mess. Not doing anything about the mess in those places is where most people ranting are looking, so very quickly using words such as 'destroying our environment' and 'world overpopulated'. Both are extremely narrow sighted but they also contain some bitter truths about the rate at which we are polluting, forcing species into extinction and creating population problems. If the world is heating up, which nobody really denies, simply the means by which it is occurring, then the population changes will exacerbate human problems, possibly leading us into major wars. If CO2 is building up and both making that happen faster and also contributing to air quality deteriorating then using faux science either way rather than acting to not have to say 'Oops' later seems at the very least prudent. I don't really understand most of the arguments either way but I have seen or am informed about negative things happening to fellow human beings around the world that say to me we must do something - what it substantively is I have no idea.

I’m not an expert on South and Central America and their history but I did hear an interesting programme on Radio 4 a few years ago. I’m sure there are plenty of people out there who can fill in the missing details in my knowledge and memory but the basic story was this;

A rich American decide to spend his time and money looking into why the population of a Aztec/Inca city had deserted it at the peak of their power. The city was not supplied by a natural water source but, being in an Equitorial region had a high annual rainfall. The city’s water supply was stored in cisterns which collected and stored the rainwater. He research led him to believe that the population had been forced to leave the city through drought. Scientists and academics rubbished his findings until he presented data collected from many sources including naval log books which proved that there had been an unexpected lack of rain in the area for a number of years. The unexpected had happened, the rain forest had had no rain.

The Earth has numerous ecological cycles that, in general, maintain a pretty constant balance. External factors can and will have an effect on the environment and range in their source from sunspot activity to dust clouds blocking off our sunlight caused by rock strikes from space. In modern times we have had another factor big enough to affect the Earth’s wellbeing, man. With our rapidly increasing population and technological developments we are now able to polute the atmosphere like never before. I personally believe that the human population cannot be blamed for all af the Earth’s climatic woes but feel that our negative influences need to be identified and to be brought under control as soon as possible.

Brian your first paragraph, displacement has already taken place, whether solid or liquid the same displacement has already happened its down to the density of what's floating.

The earth spins on an axis and that only needs to shift very slightly to cause mayhem where people live especially in low lying areas and it was mentioned years ago that the earths axis does vary somewhat as we get closer to other objects and our orbit which is a spiral vortex and not as we were told as children an ellipse so things do change.

I too have been out in Asia and the choking fumes do bring home the message that we are poisoning ourselves with our abuse. There is more than one El.... that was meant as an example and I would like to see some evidence that the hole in the ozone isn't causing the jet stream to get superheated at times and that can lead to more tornadoes etc and changes of weather.

So long as the meetings are not just a lunch club for the privileged, One of my friends attended a climate meeting and was so incensed at the rubbish he had to listen to he wrote a scathing email to the speaker and the result was HE became the next speaker and was able to get some of his points over.

In My village the Chateau has some high water marks scratched into the walls, the Chateau dates from the 12th century and the highest water marks were mid 14th century a long time before any industrial revolution.

An area in the UK where I used to go for a walk is described as once being under water which is why they found fossils of sea creatures where land has existed for a long time, is it just a glitch in time that something similar may re occur?

The good news Veronique is that the dinosaurs lived for around 165 million years and if it's true an ice age wiped them out. Feeding the population is what should limit it's size but I am all for stopping the unnecessary destruction and wanton abuse of the planet so a few people can exploit the rest to show off their bank balance

The things I referred to have other links, in fact displacement will not be in our lifetimes to the level that there will be any major measurable affects but low lying island nations have already had a few centimetres that has seen saline water flowing into the bits of agriculture they do have, so rice crops have been lost and other produce such as yams that need fairly wet ground are being lost. When one reads about the present effects on many tens and soon hundreds of thousands of people on Pacific atoll groups then it makes one think. Historically we have records back a very long time, certainly Phaoronic Egyptian records can be translated to within three or four years of events, China has several thousand years that can be almost precisely timed and so on. The Industrial Revolution marks a turning point that is just turning critical. As much as anything, the fact that China has acknowledged the fact their part of the atmosphere is foul (I had several months based in Beijing alone, eight years ago, it was disgusting then) speaks more than a lot of science.

Anyway, I am able to see that science is divided on the topic. That it is 70% saying that there is an environmental problem with the rest saying there is not or hedging their bets directs me toward thinking there are issues. What I do know from that science is that El Niño and the 'hole' in the ozone layer are not interrelated. I also not the fact that large parts of southern Greenland are now ice free all year round, the Alps have had changes many times but the Himalayas and Andes are suffering not only from ice, thus water, loss but droughts at high altitude which has never been told of historically as far as it is recorded or in folk traditions. I am a not a raving greenie but I am aware that we need to take it seriously and the fact that 195 nations take part in these summits with number 21 about to take place in Paris says other people at high level are too.

I suppose that we are geed up about climate change because of how it affects us now and in the short-term - previous extreme climate cycles happened but we weren't around. As we are naturally anthropocentric we are looking at how these changes affect us and to an extent other species in that they are either the canary in the mine or sources of food (or both) - but it's really all about us, as usual, isn't it.

I don't think we can really comprehend planetary scale geological and climate cycles because they are too huge and that while we should do what we can, all of us, to stop being so destructive, it won't stop us going the way of the dinosaurs.

Brian as you are a social scientist I will be fascinated to see how many people read and post on this thread as if its not as important as an issue compared to some of the mundane things posted about which can go on and on for pages.

I do believe that any climate condition need to be related to the Sun's activity to understand where the reality actually is. The earth I believe can warm up as there is a hole in the Ozone layer which can allow solar radiation to enter creating hot spots which as you said can give rise to El whats its. From an Co2 perspective the oceans being the largest masses have been Co2 sinks for a long while but the abuse we give them means we could kill ourselves in the process but things do evolve.

The melting of the glaciers/ice fields I fail to see how that will cause floods as it's displacement, they are already floating on the sea so won't cause any rise. Land based melts might.

Thank you for this thread John. I am not a scientist as such although as a social scientist my work is described as being that. Work has seen me in many countries but to narrow it down I really only have a decent insight into a small handful of countries. However, what I have seen since about 1970 when I first began real field based work is how certain conditions have changed. I worked in the Andean region for about 18 years and saw the effects of El Niño changing. That meteorological condition, especially the hot air and warm sea movements, have been around for a long time, the traditional names are too many for me ever to have known. However, whilst the 19 century saw famines what is happening now is very different and folk memory back to pre-Colombian times do not relate it. Viet Nam, is suffering climatic changes in ways that are seldom reported. These things appear not to be so well known because they are affecting remote rural areas with small, already depleted populations. Their agriculture is failing, water is getting very scarce but above all the climatic extremes are outside their experience. Like other people with my background, whatever I have done day to day I stay very much in touch with my discipline and there I can say that anthropology has recently woken up to the fact that a lot of people are saying similar things, what they are seeing is not particularly directly comparable, nor could a desert region and rainforest ever be, but the outcomes go in the most comparable direction. Things are happening that are affecting those people's lives. In some cases, no matter what the hardships have been in the past, after millennia of hardships this time round it is too hard and now people are leaving where they have always lived. People in low lying areas and island inhabitants are particularly giving up and trying to go elsewhere. So I see it from the perspective of human beings and therefore have tried to read a bit of the science from both perspectives. CO2 science is well and truly above my level but I understand that next year the highest recorded levels are expected. When I read that X thousands of years ago the levels were much higher and see that life as we know it did not exist at the time, then I wonder what is going on. Now is not then, so what is the relevance? I see detrimental things happening to human beings, that is enough for me.