Re: [asa] The Global Warming Fat Lady has sung :)

The article has some good points "weather is not climate", a common
confusion amongst Global warming deniers who look at the weather in
let's say Alaska and point out that a particular year was the coolest
in decades. Hence global warming is wrong.

However, Dunn's article is mostly wishful thinking. As actual research
has shown most people accept that global warming is caused by humans,
and although still reluctant to give up their 'god given' right to
drive a gas guzzling beast, people are warming up to the risks of
unmitigated global warming.

As such, the recent release of the ICPP report (as well as the leak of
the AR4 draft) show how thousands of scientists have combined the
vaste amounts of research on this topic and have come to a consensus
conclusion which should help us formulate a public policy response.

Janice and Dunn make much of Svenmark's ideas that cosmic radiation
affects the global warming, and indeed there may be a small component
but so far the science behind these claims have revealed little more
than a hypothesis. And in fact, Woods Hole has some interesting data
showing that

http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/viewArticle.do?id=18371

As is the case with the cooling of the oceans, the story behind cosmic
radiation seems a little bit more complex and far less supportive of
global warming as some wish it to be.

By analyzing beryllium 10 and radiocarbong in the atmosphere (caused
by cosmic rays), as well as the oceans and ice cores, an interesting
picture emerges.

The data showed a near perfect correlation between Be 10 and radio carbon data.

<quote>
We were trying to correlate the timing of abrupt shifts seen in the
Cariaco marine records with climate shifts on land that were detected
by other researchers using 10Be in ice cores and 14C in tree rings. We
got a near-perfect match of events.
</quote>

But this is not what would be expected

<quote>The marine and terrestrial records of radiocarbon should not be
a one-to-one match. Because the oceans draw down a portion of
dissolved radiocarbon into the depths, there should be less
radiocarbon in surface waters (and in fossil shells) than in the
atmosphere. </quote?

So now we come to an alternative interpretation which fits the data much better

<quote>
So if radiocarbon levels in the atmosphere increased solely because of
changes in solar activity, then beryllium and radiocarbon deposits on
land would have increased; seafloor deposits would have increased,
too, but not as much. On the other hand, if the radiocarbon changes
were caused by a shift in ocean circulation, marine sediments and
terrestrial tree rings should agree—as they seem to—but then beryllium
levels should not have increased.</quote>

Janice also continues to make the flawed argument (as I have already
pointed out) about the release of latent heat during precipitation or
the cooling effect during evaporation. While this certainly would
affect local temperatures, it's global balance is zero since what goes
up must eventually come down. In fact, the latent heat and evaporative
heat are quite well understood, as they are governed by
straightforward physics.

Contrary to what the author and Janice seem to believe, precipitation
is taken into consideration when modeling global climate, in fact, it
is a significant contributor to the heat and water balance.

Precipitation may be 'the least' understood but it is hardly ignored
in climate modeling. Before we rely on the statements of a few
scientists, especially when we do not even understand the science
behind global warming, we should remain skeptical. To embrace
Spencer's arguments without understanding the level of veracity, and
given the level of contradiction, seems quite unfortunate.

Roy Spencer used to also argue that space based temperature records
actually showed a cooling, although one the corrections were applied,
the data fell mostly in line with other data sources.

http://mustelid.blogspot.com/2005/07/more-satellite-stuff-including.html

While the public seems to be quite receptive to the global warming
issues, it may be helpful to continue to debunk the flawed science
behind the arguments of global warming deniers.

It's a fun project surely and with enough source materials.

On 3/7/07, Janice Matchett <janmatch@earthlink.net> wrote:
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Received on Wed Mar 7 13:08:15 2007