@MGSB

Yes the earth has very recently settled into a 180-280 zone for CO2, and very very recently settled into a 400 zone, however, using only the past few thousand years is lying by omission when talking about the history of earth as a whole.

https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/06/co2_temperature_historical.png

*cough* it doesn't look like a very high spike now does it?

You are taking data from eons ago and comparing it to times which are much more sensitive to small fluctuations. You need to consider the state of the earth through the end of the Precambrian, Cambrian, etc, and understand that if you walked on the earth, it would look, feel, and be very different then the one we stand on today.

Also we should remember that not all climate change is bad; there can be change that is beneficial to human society. A greened Sahara for example.

That isn't going to happen, it seems. Rather, dry areas have been getting dryer, and wet areas wetter, seems to be the current trend.

Edited 2/24/2017 23:15:00

@Bonsai

Unfortunately, politicians with an agenda don't give a shit about facts and evidence, but as John Oliver once said "You can't bring feelings to a fact fight!"

Agree totally. Just ramming facts down others throats won't stop them from believing their own thing (or stop them from taking money from lobbyists.) The solution to this question is not a simple one: how do you stop oil-backed politicians from pushing anti-climate change on their agendas? Perhaps if we could eliminate bribery, but I don't see how that can happen in a corrupted system.

Edited 2/24/2017 22:59:05

@knyte-

Just because nyc is underwater does not mean the human race can survive such a shift. It may cause extreme issues, however, the true range of temperatures that humans can exist comfortably should not be taken at "nyc underwater". You also assume that humans would not be able to come up with something innovative to counter the sea level rise. I would say, however, that NYC is not the only place underwater if it goes underwater... and there would definitely be major problems in such a scenario.

Edited 2/24/2017 22:56:48

@Zephyrum

There are many temperature/weather fenomenae that we cannot predict, and don't understand, such as the El Niño and the La Niña. Given the world has proven to us it can just randomly heat or cool whenever it feels like it (whatever causes it is yet unknown), I wouldn't be surprised if the main factor of the heating is something we're disconsidering or unaware of rather than pollution itself.

This is going into a bit off topic, but as a meteorology major, I cannot resist mentioning that we do know more about the ENSO oscillation than you think. El Niño is caused when the normal ocean currents stop dragging cold water up the Peruvian coast. This consequently results in an eastward drift of warm seawater from the Central Pacific to invade the area. The fish all die or swim away, due to the lack of nutrients in the water, and the unusually warm area of the sea results in significant weather pattern changes observed globally. El Niño has been going on ever since South America Split from Africa, and does not account for the significant increase in global mean temperature.

The opposite is La Niña. This phenomenon occurs when the ocean currents are stronger than normal, pushing cold water deep into the Central Pacific. As you can imagine, this also has significant affects on the weather (not opposite to that of La Niña, though, contray to popular belif), which are globally significant. Once again, La Niña, like El Niño, has been going on ever since South America Split from Africa, and does not account for the significant increase in global mean temperate.

I also noticed this statement:

Given we had a colder point when population was booming and industry being born (Little Ice Age), it's pretty hard to predict the weather's patterns, no matter how hard we try.

The climate change debate should not directly involve weather. It should involve climate. Although we are starting to see increased instances where we get unexplained massive storms out of nowhere, or crazy snowstorms or heat waves, etc, the baseline will always remain the same: climate =/= weather. Climate is your average atmospheric phenomena over a long period of times, and weather is the atmospheric phenomena that you observe within a single day. As you may have heard "climate is what you expect, weather is what you get".

Edited 2/24/2017 23:12:53

That isn't going to happen, it seems. Rather, dry areas have been getting dryer, and wet areas wetter, seems to be the current trend.

Well honestly I didn't mean greening the Sahara through CO2 emissions in some climate sorcery, just start fighting back at the expansion of the desert and then start pushing back on it.

You are taking data from eons ago and comparing it to times which are much more sensitive to small fluctuations. You need to consider the state of the earth through the end of the Precambrian, Cambrian, etc, and understand that if you walked on the earth, it would look, feel, and be very different then the one we stand on today.

I understand that the earth from before mammals and lizards was very different, tsh, I just dislike lying through omission which is what showing only the past 1000 years is when you're talking about such a timescale.

Well honestly I didn't mean greening the Sahara through CO2 emissions in some climate sorcery, just start fighting back at the expansion of the desert and then start pushing back on it.

But this is ecosystem destruction in a different sense. Desert, whether it seems useful or not, is a vital ecosystem in and of itself. The desert sands of sahara are actually what allows the Amazon Rainforest to be so green and lush, believe it or not.

understand that the earth from before mammals and lizards was very different, tsh, I just dislike lying through omission which is what showing only the past 1000 years is when you're talking about such a timescale

This is an interesting point, worthy of making note of in my research. Thank you.

I believe climate change is a natural issue not caused by humans originally, However I believe that humans have subtly sped this up over the years. But not enough for me to give a shit.

Edited 2/25/2017 18:09:21

^ you don't have to click on his profile to know that he's from a southern state

Edited 2/25/2017 20:23:06

@Knyte: thx for the paper, I started reading it and it looks like a good one so I most definitely will read it in full.
This is a very nice and funny chart: https://xkcd.com/1732/

As to the "debate" (ain't a debate when 99% of scientists agree on a scientific phenomenon) well i really don't understand why people would not accept what scientists from all over the world are saying. Especially when the consequences could be huge to our way of living.
I get why a the oil and coal industry denies it, but apart from that, why do regular people think they should have an opinion on whether or not they should "believe" it? That's beyond me

Please explain to me how and why the scientists from all over the world are gathering together once in a while in order to engage in a massive plot to spread misinformation about the supposed fact that humans are affecting the climate...sigh

As to the "debate" (ain't a debate when 99% of scientists agree on a scientific phenomenon) well i really don't understand why people would not accept what scientists from all over the world are saying. Especially when the consequences could be huge to our way of living.
I get why a the oil and coal industry denies it, but apart from that, why do regular people think they should have an opinion on whether or not they should "believe" it? That's beyond me

This issue has to deal with something called the deficit model. Scientists are inclined to believe that all of the worlds problem's can be solved by simply providing the facts. However, there are a few problems with this:

1. People need reasons to learn facts, and that reason is (usually) not different facts, but rather an emotional connection to a subject.

2. People tend to already have general, basic understandings of knowledge, known as "lay expertise"

3. People can quickly learn information when the need, and are motivated, to.

This largely explains the dissonance between the Public and Scientists on this debate. So although scientists may agree 99%, they are a small group of people who are struggling to convince the other 99% of the world, especially those people who like oil-backed politicians, to be just about as certain as them. In fact, many conservatives trust their politicians more than they do scientists, simply because they believe scientists have more of an agenda than politicians do.

If it were 1300, and all the scientists were church funded, would you trust the scientists right off if they told you to give money to the church?

Please explain to me how and why the scientists from all over the world are gathering together once in a while in order to engage in a massive plot to spread misinformation about the supposed fact that humans are affecting the climate...sigh

If you can't get why people would get together to show a fake problem, then ask for money to fix the fake problem, then you should ask for adult supervision when checking your email or you might give away your bank account to a Nigerian Prince.

I'm not saying it's fake, but it's a clear motive if they're lying.

If you can't get why people would get together to show a fake problem, then ask for money to fix the fake problem, then you should ask for adult supervision when checking your email or you might give away your bank account to a Nigerian Prince.

It's not that hard of meteorology to read through for meteo/chemistry students, and you'd be assuming a 99% world conspiracy of scientists of every kind by and by the teaching of chemistry, meteorology, and ecology in all and of the students; and all this to no profit to most of these folk.

However there are suppression of sciences in almost all countries to this day for various reasons. But this is not one of those cases.

Tsh, no, just a bunch of scientists in a few western countries pressuring each other to shut up so they can get funding, and making up stuff about how 99% or some other ridiculous number agree

The climate change debate should not directly involve weather. It should involve climate. Although we are starting to see increased instances where we get unexplained massive storms out of nowhere, or crazy snowstorms or heat waves, etc, the baseline will always remain the same: climate =/= weather. Climate is your average atmospheric phenomena over a long period of times, and weather is the atmospheric phenomena that you observe within a single day. As you may have heard "climate is what you expect, weather is what you get".

Weather is oftentimes just a small part of climate. You'll not see snowy weather in equatorial regions, nor will you see long days in any pole. The weather in it's essence is just the current state of a region based on it's climate + momentaneous effects. Given we can't predict weather properly, predicting climate should not be an easy job.

El Niño is caused when the normal ocean currents stop dragging cold water up the Peruvian coast. This consequently results in an eastward drift of warm seawater from the Central Pacific to invade the area.

(...)

The opposite is La Niña. This phenomenon occurs when the ocean currents are stronger than normal, pushing cold water deep into the Central Pacific.

What I meant is: is it known what actually causes the shift in ocean currents which causes the El Niño/La Niña? From what I've heard (you're the major, so illuminate me please :P) the causes are not quite known.

Given we can't predict weather properly, predicting climate should not be an easy job.

On the contrary, its actually much easier to predict climate, persay, than weather. Weather has a tendency to become surprisingly consistent over a long duration. Its like atoms and objects. The motion of atoms themselves are random and hard to predict, but given an entire object, we in general can know what direction they go in (quantum theory).

What I meant is: is it known what actually causes the shift in ocean currents which causes the El Niño/La Niña? From what I've heard (you're the major, so illuminate me please :P) the causes are not quite known.

Mainly, a long consistent shift in the the wind patterns that drive the ocean currents. Problem is, those are rather unpredictable in of themselves.

knyte spreading lies again

There has always been climate change on earth and there will always be, as long as this planet exists. Most of the time earth climate was set in interglacial eras. right now we have a glacial era, where even both poles are covered with ice.
It rather sounds ridiculous, when you refer climate change to anthropogenic CO2-emmission. while there are so many more other factors, like sea streams, natural weather barriers and geo-morphologies, albedo effect, milankovic cycles, tectonics and several greenhouse gases, where CO2 plays a rather minor role. the most influential greenhouse gas btw is H2O with 60% influence on the greenhouse effect.

So there is another topic, which might be much more important: natural catastrophes. which indeed are often caused by human wrongdoing and not the climate change. nevertheless is the CO2-emission debate very useful, but for completely different reasons. As everyone knows provide fossil fuels the main energy source. and a strict monitoring for those transitory resources is very much needed to maintain smart and reasonable use and management.

The Earth is heating up because Reptillians are trying to drown most of our population!

Climate change causes Famines. I believe there's one happening in Africa In South Sudan?

But it's alright , Americans and any developed economies with a religious fundemantal institutions in schools and in society in general will pray for these people while their governments withdraw or failure to keep up with the Kyato Agreement. E.g America

It's slowly improving but not fast enough and even the slow improvement is under risk from Trump because he's not interested in Trees unless they give jobs and the only way for trees to give jobs is by cutting them.