Monday, March 31, 2014

An alternative point of view on climate change


Some of you may think I'm a denier. To some extent, they're correct in that assumption. If you try to do any research you find info so contradictory to each other that it makes me wonder if we're looking at the same planet. Powerfull images make a case for calamity. Visually impressive, but if you don't read both sides and just looked at these pictures you'd be a believer in climate disaster too.
I guess you could call me a climate "skepticalier".

Jim Wagner


UN Panel: Warming worsens food, hunger problems

Mar. 31, 2014 5:25 AM EDT

YOKOHAMA, Japan (AP) — Global warming makes feeding the world harder and more expensive, a United Nations scientific panel said.

A warmer world will push food prices higher, trigger "hotspots of hunger" among the world's poorest people, and put the crunch on Western delights like fine wine and robust coffee, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded in a 32-volume report issued Monday.

"We're facing the specter of reduced yields in some of the key crops that feed humanity," panel chairman Rajendra Pachauri said in press conference releasing the report.

Even though heat and carbon dioxide are often considered good for plants, the overall effect of various aspects of man-made warming is that it will reduce food production compared to a world without global warming, the report said.

The last time the panel reported on the effects of warming in 2007, it said it was too early to tell whether climate change would increase or decrease food production, and many skeptics talked of a greening world. But in the past several years the scientific literature has been overwhelming in showing that climate change hurts food production, said Chris Field of the Carnegie Institution of Science and lead author of the climate report.

Read more...

29 comments:

Anonymous said...

“You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us. And the world will live as one.” John Lennon

ian butler said...

Jim,
The fact that there are two sides to the issue is besides the point. One one side you have the scientific community that is actually trained in climate science, and on the other side you have the most powerful industry in the history of earth, the pundits and politicians that they have bought and paid for, and a gullible public that is easily fooled. Yes, the Koch brothers have a very expensive and loud bullhorn, but that doesn't make what comes out of it true, no matter how much we might wish it were so.

Professor Peabody said...

Ian, you have quite the liberal lexicon. You forgot oligarch, though. That seems to be the new moniker that libs are slapping conservative rich people. What are the conservatives to call Soros or Gore? What about that hedge fund guy who has pledged to spend a fortune on the liberal climate change agenda? There's plenty of money and pundits to spread around. Oh, as if you didn't know, there are scientists on both sides of this issue eminently qualified to argue with each other.

Anonymous said...

John Lennon, was a hippie.

Now that we have two of the brightest and smartest working on this, we can all focus on something else.

Hutch said...

In the 70's scientists, the media and environmentalists were saying we were going into an ice age because of aerosols destroying the ozone.

While our climate is changing as it always has, how it will exactly change is still unknown except in computer models. Scientists are still trying to figure our how things like sun spots affect climate. A couple of large volcanic eruptions would throw all estimates off.

We in tiny little Pacifica can not follow some plan that could destroy what's left of our economy just because some are believing the worse case scenarios. Neither can we delay projects because of "sea level rise" as a certain council person and others have said.

Al Gore said...

You know how much money I made off global warming.

ian butler said...

"Oh, as if you didn't know, there are scientists on both sides of this issue eminently qualified to argue with each other."

Yes, there are a few outliers, just like in any field (Bigfoot researchers for example). But 97% of the world's climate scientists agree that climate change is real, dangerous and primarily caused by humans.

But it's actually more lopsided than that, a review of the more than 10,000 peer-reviewed scientific papers on the topic in 2013 showed that only 2 disagree with man made global warming:

http://www.jamespowell.org/index.html

As the study's author puts it, "Very few of the most vocal global warming deniers, those who write op-eds and blogs and testify to congressional committees, have ever written a peer-reviewed article in which they say explicitly that anthropogenic global warming is false. Why? Because then they would have to provide the evidence and, evidently, they don't have it."

Anonymous said...

"Because then they would have to provide the evidence, and, evidently, they don't have it."

Maybe they do, maybe they don't. I don't want to bet the farm and the future on reassurances paid for by those who profit from the current course of action.

Anonymous said...

Al Gore was wrong. Al Gore is fricken rich.

Anonymous said...

Big bucks when he sold his Current TV cable channel to AlJazeera last year for $500 million. He got about a $100 million of that. And, if you haven't watched AlJazeera (AJAM on COMCAST)it's worth a look. Big role in covering the Arab Spring and it's building a great roster of familiar and respected broadcast journalists. Owned by the government of Qatar. Coverage is even-handed and interesting. In-depth regional not found elsewhere. Nice addition, so far, to the BBC and CNN.

Peabody said...

"Yes, there are a few outliers, just like in any field (Bigfoot researchers for example). But 97% of the world's climate scientists agree that climate change is real, dangerous and primarily caused by humans."

Outliers! There you go again Ian. Bigfoot researchers, how quaint. Another zinger. You just can't help yourself. 97%? Where did that number come from? Ian, my friend, is the climate changing? Of course it's changing. It's been changing since the earth cooled. Hot, cold, in between. It's always changing. I think you argument is that man is changing it faster. I guess you can devise computer models that will probe that just as you could design models that will disprove it. By placing stinging labels on people or groups you delegitimize your argument. Neener neener is not scientific adult conversation.

Anonymous said...

From time to time, on certain issues, with certain people, scientific adult conversation is impossible. Flat out not happening.

ian butler said...

Peabody,

The 97% number is the result of several surveys of climate scientists. It is, as the pocket protector set like to say, a "robust result". It is easy for the public to be fooled about something this complicated, but a lot harder to dupe the experts!


http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus

http://www.skepticalscience.com/debunking-climate-consensus-denial.html

Anonymous said...

There is so much scientists still don't understand Ian. Maybe we were heading towards an ice age and the greenhouse gasses stopped it. They just don't know.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/11/science/earth/what-to-make-of-a-climate-change-plateau.html

"The rise in the surface temperature of earth has been markedly slower over the last 15 years than in the 20 years before that. And that lull in warming has occurred even as greenhouse gases have accumulated in the atmosphere at a record pace."

P.U. said...

I just want the cows to stop farting. Can someone do something about that?

Anonymous said...

Around 1400 TV meteorologists were asked about their views on climate change.

When asked if climate change is happening 25% indicated it isn’t, and 21% say they don’t know yet.

About one-third (31%) reported that global warming is caused mostly by human activities, while almost two-thirds (63%) reported it is caused mostly by natural changes in the environment.

http://www.climatechangecommunication.org/images/files/TV_Meteorologists_Survey_Findings_(March_2010).pdf

Anonymous said...

Next they should ask 1400 TV sportscasters about their views on climate change.

Anonymous said...

Weather is not climate change.

Anonymous said...

They see that computer models can't even predict tomorrows weather let alone a theory playing out over 100+ years.

You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows, but evidently Obama did this week.

Anonymous said...

That study is one reason Obama met with TV meteorologists this week. http://www.today.com/allday/obama-al-roker-climate-change-2D79627268

Anonymous said...

Next they should ask 1400 TV sportscasters about their views on climate change.

May 7, 2014 at 4:48 PM

They are too busy working on the mock drafts!

Anonymous said...

A study commissioned by people that have an agenda that includes climate change(ne global warming).
That agenda made gore filthy rich and created a windfall (yes,play on words) for all those invested in wind, solar, and any other kind of peripheal power generator.
These are the people that will skim millions (solydra) off the top of government grants and loans. Loans that never seem to get paid back.
What a scam.

Kathy Meeh said...

709 glad Al Gore had good fortune after being bumped from the Presidency. He invested well.

About climate change, Science Daily doesn't agree with your opinion, nor does NASA, nor does the United Nations, (governments science all over the world).

Good USA related article from Mother Jones, 5/6/14: "Climate change has moved from distant threat to present-day danger, and no American will be left unscathed, according to a landmark report due to be unveiled Tuesday. The National Climate Assessment, a 1,300-page report compiled by 300 leading scientists and experts, is meant to be the definitive account of the effects of climate change on the United States. It will be formally released at a White House event and is expected to drive the remaining two years of President Obama's environmental agenda."

Anonymous said...

709 Nothing happens in a vacuum. Science and business have always been linked, often very closely. Look at industries like pharma, weapons, food. Making money off of a discovery doesn't prove or disprove the underlying science.
Al Gore joined the mogul-class when he sold CurrentTV. I like people to get rich. They and their rich friends can buy more stuff. Hey, maybe even a presidency?

Robert Hutchinson said...

Or the quarry

Anonymous said...

Apparently not, Bob.

Anonymous said...

The City of Pacifica joined the US Mayors Accord on Climate Change.

The future is a planet without a breathable atmosphere.

What's very strange is that the everyday person seems not to understand that this is happening now, it is planetary in size, and it is unfixable if we don't do everything we can now. Not tomorrow, today.

Not to stop it. Just to stop the worst effects.

What are those effects? no air. no water. no food.

It's happening MUCH Faster than scientists expected.

A few early signs of that change:

1 - Lake trout cannot adapt today. http://www.nrdc.org/globalwarming/trout/trout.pdf

2 - Fires in California and the western U.S. are increasing in number, size and duration due to global warming. http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/impacts/infographic-wildfires-climate-change.html

3 - Water in California. 'Nuff said.
http://blogs.plos.org/everyone/2014/01/31/dried-modeling-effects-climate-change-californias-river-basins/

Anonymous said...

It's funny how some hippies or earth people are so big on science but ignore the facts. Yes climate change is real and mostly caused by humans. There is no scientific proof showing we will have no air/food/water.

Case in point, whooping cough. Marin has the highest amount of new cases even though this virus was pretty much eradicated in the 60's. Why? Because Marin hippies refuse to believe 99.999% of scientists that refusing the vaccine for their children is far more dangerous than getting it. The hip[pies believe the vaccine is causing all kinds of maladies even though science says it's not so.

Same with GMO's. The hippies love to hate them even though science says there is no proof there has ever been a human harmed, but there is proof of their many benefits.

Anonymous said...

Yes, I'm convinced our natural resources air/food/water will last forever or at least long enough for me to get my share.