Global Warming Revisited

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I'd say arguing over hurricanes is a poor argument when it comes to global warming. Better to stick to the argument of rising sea levels, erosion, and general threat to low laying areas

Hurricanes are still highly probabilistic, and will be for some time. When someone suggests more are on the way due to global warming, and less come due to general cycles, you accidentally end up promoting the wrong brand of skepticism

This is a good point, and for one thing, the consequences of warmer ocean waters might not necessarily be more and more hurricanes/cyclones/typhoons - there might actually be less, numerically - but more chance of them being worse when they happen.
 
Is it time to revisit the claims of global warming / climate change?

I think it's time.

President Obama called skeptics (like me) of global climate change as those of believe in a flat earth.

The following is just one of several reports I have seen online. I have seen nothing in the mainstream media reporting on these current studies.

What do you think?]

What do I think? For those who have to deal with it professionally, climate change isn't in dispute. Agriculture experts, epidemiologists, disaster preparedness teams, civil engineers, military planners and the like can no more deny the state of the climate than an astronaut could believe in a Flat Earth. It's a part of their jobs.

I quote Gavin Schmidt (NASA): "gases don’t care whether you are a Republican or a Democrat – left wing, right wing – libertarian, or conservative."

Why aren't the rest of us like the pros?
 
What do I think? For those who have to deal with it professionally, climate change isn't in dispute. Agriculture experts, epidemiologists, disaster preparedness teams, civil engineers, military planners and the like can no more deny the state of the climate than an astronaut could believe in a Flat Earth. It's a part of their jobs.

I quote Gavin Schmidt (NASA): "gases don’t care whether you are a Republican or a Democrat – left wing, right wing – libertarian, or conservative."

Why aren't the rest of us like the pros?

Solar power ends the debate....
 
This is a good point, and for one thing, the consequences of warmer ocean waters might not necessarily be more and more hurricanes/cyclones/typhoons - there might actually be less, numerically - but more chance of them being worse when they happen.
This is what i was trying to get at actually. Not that there will be more hurricanes per say but warmer waters means that the hurricanes we do get could be much stronger. Harvey, Irma and Jose became major hurricanes all in the same season and the waters around the golf of Mexico and areas where Irma and Jose developed are in the 80's temperature wise.! And not just hurricanes but other weather events becomes more extreame with warming temperatures. Whether it be droughts to floods. We may not see more of them, just more extreame.
 
Indeed. More extreme weather is definitely observable, but we should still avoid sensationalizing things.

10 or so years ago, when I was in middle school, I got to see nearly three hurricane eyes (two, at the end of the day). Jeanne and Frances, followed by Wilma a year later.

It was that 2004-2006 part of time where we were literally seeing dozens of storms making landfall across the US. A decade has past since that anomaly, where things went back to normal. People have forgotten two things: 1) the danger of hurricanes and 2) who is prepared.

From a Floridian perspective, I'm not worried about my family and friends back home. That state has been built and rebuilt and rebuilt and rebuilt again and again and again to be stronger and better prepared for hurricanes. The people who will end up dead in Florida during the hurricane likely did something foolish (most of the people who die get struck by a tree in Florida, or refuse to leave their boat homes or something).

However, places like Houston were truly fucked. That city wasn't built for that, and was absolutely flood prone. It's something like in Houston where the city wasn't ready, and the people likely forgot just how dangerous storms can be.

Anyways, back to global warming and trying to convince someone of the science. Hurricanes aren't the way to do that. Trying to scare someone isn't the way to do it, either. Especially someone who doesn't believe you already. There's irrefutable evidence that can be presented with data - of course that's not something that's always in non scientific speak, so not everyone will get it.

But, at the end of the day, I think regardless of what you choose to "believe," there's plenty of beautiful arguments towards a capitalist venture of renewables *anyways*. Queue Elon Musk and SolarCity. When in doubt, target someone's logic by going the positive route. I don't think climate change has time for politic-like arguments.
 
Indeed. More extreme weather is definitely observable, but we should still avoid sensationalizing things.

10 or so years ago, when I was in middle school, I got to see nearly three hurricane eyes (two, at the end of the day). Jeanne and Frances, followed by Wilma a year later.

It was that 2004-2006 part of time where we were literally seeing dozens of storms making landfall across the US. A decade has past since that anomaly, where things went back to normal. People have forgotten two things: 1) the danger of hurricanes and 2) who is prepared.

From a Floridian perspective, I'm not worried about my family and friends back home. That state has been built and rebuilt and rebuilt and rebuilt again and again and again to be stronger and better prepared for hurricanes. The people who will end up dead in Florida during the hurricane likely did something foolish (most of the people who die get struck by a tree in Florida, or refuse to leave their boat homes or something).

However, places like Houston were truly fucked. That city wasn't built for that, and was absolutely flood prone. It's something like in Houston where the city wasn't ready, and the people likely forgot just how dangerous storms can be.

Anyways, back to global warming and trying to convince someone of the science. Hurricanes aren't the way to do that. Trying to scare someone isn't the way to do it, either. Especially someone who doesn't believe you already. There's irrefutable evidence that can be presented with data - of course that's not something that's always in non scientific speak, so not everyone will get it.

But, at the end of the day, I think regardless of what you choose to "believe," there's plenty of beautiful arguments towards a capitalist venture of renewables *anyways*. Queue Elon Musk and SolarCity. When in doubt, target someone's logic by going the positive route. I don't think climate change has time for politic-like arguments.
Well said LN7 there is certainly better arguments and scientific data to support global warming is real and occurring, I guess using hurricanes as the arguments is the easiest argument because it is the most visible as opposed to say seeing an increasing concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. But it is a lazy argument to just use the frequency and severity of hurricanes as the only fact of global warming, I know I fall into this trap sometimes too. There are much better arguments out there. The thing that gets me though is that to some (I don't want to paint every global warming denier with the same brush) but some deniers, you could present a mountian of scientific data to support this and they come up with what ever argument (silly or not) to refute this, much like the moon landing hoax people. Again let me say that only SOME act like that, I am not generalizing every global warming denier as blatantly ignoring the facts.
 
Well all these global warming deniers better get used to the storms like Irma, harvey, sandy etc because if nothing changes, they will become the norm.
I'd say arguing over hurricanes is a poor argument when it comes to global warming. Better to stick to the argument of rising sea levels, erosion, and general threat to low laying areas

Hurricanes are still highly probabilistic, and will be for some time. When someone suggests more are on the way due to global warming, and less come due to general cycles, you accidentally end up promoting the wrong brand of skepticism
Yea to second LN7 here... I'm not a climate change skeptic at all, but I cringe when people toss out storms like Sandy and Harvey as examples, as they end up playing into the hands of the dopes that think that climate change doesn't exist.

The destruction caused by Harvey and Sandy were results of high pressure blocks in the upper atmosphere that didn't allow the storms to escape the way they may have otherwise done. In Harvey's case it kept the storm stationary, and it was able to refuel itself with its own rain. In Sandy's case, the high pushed the storm directly into the NJ coast, and the wrap around winds pushed the waters of the Long Island Sound into the East River, which was too small to hold the amount of water coming in.

Neither was a result of global warming.

Irma? Sure, you could make that argument that the water is warmer in more places around the Caribbean now, which helped fuel the storm.
 
Solar now costs 6¢ per kilowatt-hour, beating government goal by 3 years

On Tuesday, the Department of Energy (DOE) announced that utility-grade solar panels have hit cost targets set for 2020, three years ahead of schedule. Those targets reflect around $1 per watt and 6¢ per kilowatt-hour in Kansas City, the department’s mid-range yardstick for solar panel cost per unit of energy produced (New York is considered the high-cost end, and Phoenix, Arizona, which has much more sunlight than most other major cities in the country, reflects the low-cost end).
 
thatsthejoke.jpg
 
The meteorologists who I've been hearing have said you can't point to a particular storm and say climate change caused it, but you can probably say it is exacerbating the situation.

Yes, I think there are some cc deniers that will continue to willfully ignore blatant evidence.

As pointed out professionals are dealing with it now or planning for soon to be changes esp with rising sea levels. Besides of course low lying areas of the USA - for instance; there is a chain of beautiful islands off the southwestern tip of India called The Republic of Maldives that are are the flattest country on the earth. They average four feet above current sea level. A lot is around three feet or less. This is eventually a totally threatened place.

Another striking comparison are the more historical photos of glacial areas say 50 or more years ago and now. It doesn't even have to be that far back in all cases to see dramatic differences. How someone can "argue" with these two examples... :|

In the zoological and horticultural arenas animals and plants used to more warmer have been moving north bit by bit as the climate changes, as well as the converse those that need cooler climes are heading further north as well.
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LN7 What is wrong with photovoltaics? [unless you were making a counter joke that I didn't get]
Solar energy is mostly based on pvs , right?
 
In space exploration, there's a general irrational fear of nuclear power systems and nuclear propulsion systems. Legitimately irrational.
 
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