Last week, it hit 65 degrees in New York January 13, 2008 Jill And seven of the eight warmest years on record have occurred since 2001. But yeah, global warming is just a myth.
re post title: anti-AGW blogs love to post about how cold the weather is somewhere, and how there’s unseasonal snow somewhere else. Atoms of data don’t prove anything, only long term trends and causal analysis do.
And seven of the eight warmest years on record have occurred since 2001. *cough* Not true. According to NASA’s temperature data, the warmest ten years on record are: 1934, 1998, 2006, 1921, 1931, 1999, 1953, 1938, 1939, 2007, 1954. (Well, eleven, but the last couple are all the same value.) However, the five year mean does seem to be climbing in recent years, so recent years, on average are warmer. But it does not behoove those of us who are concerned about climate change to report unattributed, incorrect data when talking about it.
Hmmm, I forgot that my computer doesn’t play nicely with the WaPo website—I couldn’t get the link to load until just now, and I’ll defer to the NASA and NOAA data reported in that article. It appears that I am wrong. As compensation for my hasty post, I offer this awesome plot showing the inference of temperatures over the last millennium, using data from tree rings and ice core sample. More disturbing is this plot, showing the increase of certain gases in the atmosphere over the last millennium.
Ataralas, it’s not “unattributed” when I have a link to the article where it came from: Data collected from around the globe indicate that 2007 ranks as the second-warmest year on record, according to a new analysis from climatologists at NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. A second team of scientists, at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has come up with slightly different results using the same raw data — suggesting that last year was the fifth-warmest on record — but the groups reached the same conclusion on where Earth’s climate has been headed for the past quarter-century. Taking into account the new data, they said, seven of the eight warmest years on record have occurred since 2001. You can take issue with how correct the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists are, but the data is certainly not unattributed.
A January thaw is not uncommon (that’s why it’s called a “January thaw”), but this has really gone on much longer than usual.
anti-AGW blogs love to post about how cold the weather is somewhere, and how there’s unseasonal snow somewhere else. Atoms of data don’t prove anything, only long term trends and causal analysis do. Very true. I’m no climate expert, but from what I understand, the overall warming trend doesn’t just mean the Earth gets warmer. It also means that one sees more extreme weather patterns: more storms, stronger storms, unseasonably warm (or cold) weather, etc.
Here are the data from Nature Magazine, certainly not an industry shill. Go visit this site. Google also “Little Ice Age.” If you really want to know, most good climatic scientists assume were are in an “interglacial” period of unpredicable length. Just remember about 10-15,000 years ago Mammoths still roamed the continent. Up until about 1800 or so, the Thames froze every year. To think that an increase of Carbon Dioxide from 280ppm to 360ppm spells doom for the planet requires a certain amount of credulity (1% to 1.5%). The m does stand for million after all. Of course, however, conservation is never a bad idea. The less energy one expends to achieve any end, the more efficient the operation is. The Greenhouse effect is real. It can be really bad (see Venus) or the lack there of can be bad (see Mars). Nonetheless, the sky is not falling.
Well, Magis, I can certainly agree that the Science is uncertain – there are so many synergies interacting in weather forecasting (and historical analysis) that a straight-line extrapolation is difficult. Science is, after all, a series of reasonable guesses based on observed data, and there is always room for challenge. I think the problem I have with the, to make a hackneyed phrase, anti-Global Warming crowd is that many (I point to the Wall Street Journal in particular) take an aggressive approach, i.e. “there’s no such thing as Global Warming, so DO NOT EVER TRY TO REGULATE THE CONSUMPTION OF OIL AND PRODUCTION OF GREENHOUSE GASSES, YOU HIPPY COMMUNISTS – EVERYONE BUY SUVS AND DRIVE, DRIVE, DRIVE!!!” I find very few on the “anti-Global Warming” side who are willing to take a more reasoned approach, i.e. “there may be something to the research, there may not, but let’s see what we can do to reduce the amount of carbon emissions just in case.” It’s interesting how many see Global Warming as a wedge issue and panic when anyone makes overtures towards even modest reductions in oil consumption which might just level the amount produced annually, much less reduce it.
It was a lovely thaw while it lasted (64 in the backyard!!), but I now have over 15″ of fresh powdery snow and it’s still going nuts. Didn’t start snowing here in central Maine until 8am! And while this is an especially snowy winter this year (3rd snowiest December in Bangor on record), it’s an exception. The past decade has marked much warmer winters; MSNBC did a story last week regarding winter warmups in the Northeast.