Ok, I misunderstood what an ice shelf is. I didn't realize that it was already floating on water. I was curious to see how the enormous chunk that broke off of Ellesmere Island late this summer might have skewed the results.

I was watching an interesting programme on TV the other day. It was explaining that the amount of Arctic ice isn't dependent on how cool the winters are but on how warm the summers are.

What subman seems to be not accepting is that human activity is accelerating global warming. No one is denying that the earth does warm up and cool down but that we are exacerbating it. And just like one swallow doesn't make a summer, one season of arctic ice increase does not disprove the climate change theory.

All articles I have read have said that even if there is a seasonal increase in sea ice the overall trend, is that it is reducing, so that even with the seasonal increase there is still less ice overall.

Just googled a bit. The earliest hints that I found on the fly for scientists pointing at that global wamring would cause a temporary grow of ice (and other paradoxical effects), may it be in area covered, may it be in thickness of ice, dated back to 1997. However, I googled very short only, the first three pages of results only, and then lost interest. I know that I read about seasonal growing of ice due to warming when I started to study. and that was autmun 1989. :lol:

The information is all out there, since quite long. One just needs to want to see it, instead of stucking one's head in the sand, or playing "see nothing, hear nothing, say nothing" with those three chimps. The effects this thread is about, are no surprise. they are no contradiction to global warming. they have been predicted roughly twenty years in advance.

They are evidence for global warming at the poles taking place. Unfortunately they do not have a lobby spending hundreds of millions and even billions to promote them in public and push them in political decision making. That's the decisive difference to climate sceptics, who are in unlimited supply of money.

Oh... I saw it on tv - it must be true....

And its amazing to me that I point out how EASY reversing global warming would be (were it a real occurance) and everyone wants to still argue over it like its a problem. You take some sulpher microdust and release it in the proper part of the atmosphere - we have the technology right now to do this - and it will actually form a mostly permanent (and non-harmful) barrier that will reflect about 1% of the sunlight the earth recieves. Current mathematical models - even the ones used by the wacko's that sell you global warming cool-aid - say that a mere 1% decrease in the sunlight hitting the earth would be more than sufficient to reverse what they see as global warming.

Yet you never hear about ideas like this - because the whole "global warming" ithing s not about saving the planet - its about making you change YOUR behavior. Stop driving gas based cars, stop taking nice long hot showers, start recycling your own waste into compost, grow your own food and "get back to nature", put an end to "big business" (and small business too while we are at it - aw heck - get rid of ALL business - its evil anyway) because "business" means someone has something and you need it and its the governments job to give you all your supposed to have anyway - this "free market" stuff might get you off the government breast - and we can't have that. But if government can restrict your freedom of movement, control your ability to communicate and conduct business, it can make you utterly dependant on IT - meaning its assured a permanent place of dominance in your life. Which is the goal.

When I was growing up - the fear was a new ice age - now its the opposite. But every scientist admits that "nuclear winter" is a real thing that could happen. The planet will survive with or without us, but it is our job to be good stewards. Unfortunately - because there are so many countries that do their own thing - aka CHINA - each nationality alone can do little real change in modifying the environment. Even a united continent - Europe, Africa, North or South America alone would do little. So stop telling me not to drive an SUV - and instead talk to the biggest air polluters in the world - again - CHINA. Oh wait - they are communist, keep their people repressed, perform human rights violations out the wazoo - but its ok because they actually are what all the wacko's on the left want to emulate - a government they can control that has total control of their "subjects".

Stop arguing about if its real - find reasonable solutions (like mentioned above) that will solve the issue WITHOUT forcing everyone to change their lives. Do that - and it doesnt matter if its real or not because it can be handled. The fact people dont do that shows that its NOT about saving the environment.

Yes, that is the holy grail of sceptics, isn't it: WE SHALL NOT CHANGE OUR HABITS WE GREW FOND OF. We shall not change our business by which we make our profit this day. We shall not look beyond the most imminent moment. The reality of climate chnage is only an issue if we must not change.

Everybody wants to party, but nobody accepts to do the cleaning.

Or as I wrote less charming some posts above:

Climate scepticism - in plain English: f#ck off, I do not want to change my way of life, it does not matter what happens when I'm gone.

See Skybird - you prove my point - you would rather change MY life - whether by convincing me of some fallacy, or by regulating my life - than actually discuss SOLUTIONS.

You see - this discussion shows the difference in mindset between us Americans and the rest of the world. We value our personal freedom to the extent that we are willing to consider ideas, but we are NOT willing to let others dictate what we will and won't do. Many, like Skybird (who obviously does not dwell in the US) have grown comfortable with the idea that because "government" or some other group says we should all do something - its ok for it to require changes in his life.

The issue of global warming is one that is very contentious - there are "experts" and truly genuine, reputable scientists on each side. Thats why I, though I don't believe in it myself, accept that its a possibility.

But note what my response was - even though I don't believe the "sky is falling" over the issue - I am willing to look into truly viable solutions. The things that most push for however, are not realistic solutions. Its not that I couldn't implement them on a personal level if I chose, its because even if everyone in the whole "Evil US" did - it wouldn't make a real difference.

Let me give two examples. First you have China - who pollutes worse than every single motorist in the US combined. Even if we were to stop driving our cars immediately and forever, the "man made" carbon introduced into the environment would not decrease to pre-manmade levels. Second - and this is where things like "stop driving petro vehicles" really kills me - all the cows in the US give of more environmentally harmful gas than all the cars in the US combined. So ok - we stop driving - now what - the lefties who want to have total control are going to insist we kill all our cows next?

Skybird - IF it is real - your major concern would not be trying to convince me or trying to tell me how to live - but rather finding ways that YOU could fix the issue without my assistance. Realists know that not everyone is going to agree with them - just like when the first guy said the earth was round. Instead of talking solutions and real fixes, you want to convince me so that I live my life by some arbitrary set of rules (can you say another facet of socialism?) that in reality have no effect other than to grant others a portion of control over my life.

Instead of arguing - why are we not talking solutions? They are there - they can be implimented without everyone - Skybird included - having to change their life. They can be done without causing any harm. They can be done in ways that could even create things like JOBS and people with pride and indepencence. Oh wait - that would be evil wouldn't it?????

Seriously though - lets take this in the direction of solutions. I mentioned one - there are others. Anyone care enough about the issue to find them and post about the pro's and cons to discuss the subject rationally?

So... because you are American, you would only consider solutions that do
not involve combined effort and sacrifice?
No wonder your nation was late in both world wars!

You take yourself far too important with all that "we do not something just we're being told to do it", and the carussell of "discussing solutions" I see going round and round since yaears and decades now. Both is your arguemnt to deny any chnage in yourself.

But you see, when 1.3 billion Chinese and 1 billion Indians now are on their way to claim the right to live in the same materialistic excesses like less than one billion westerners (480 million EU-citizens and 330 million US Americans), then that means that the level of pollution and planetary exploitation would increase by a factor of three, although those less than 1 billion europeans already were enough to push the planet over the peak and getting us ending up where we currently are. And when less than 5% of the globe's population consumes 40-55% of the global ressources for the american way of life and industry, and creates as much pollution than 3-4 times as many chinese, and both together produce two thirds of the globe's emissions or more, than there is a problem and it means that you have to change indeed. And wether you like that or not, simply is not important, becasue sooner or later you either give in to the growing ecological pressure, or you break.

Obama has studied especially germany very closely, which in many fields of eco-tech is world market leader, and especially he was interested in the jobs that were created by going ecological. This is a great chance for the US, although at germany's massive cost, and I have little doubt that he will try to set the US economy on fresh rails by focussing on creating jobs in the long run in the ecological field. And we talk of several
hundred thousand if not millions of jobs. with the potantial capacity of the US, the US could become world leader in climate protection and producing acording ecological high tech - and creating jobs and have a profutable business of it at the same time. Again, this would be at germany's costs, but since the planetary and clmatic benefit ranks higher in importance, I am willing to accept that as an unavoidable consequence. However, all that hightech does not relieve us from the fact that man and especially americans consumes way too much of eqarth'S ressources, depleting the planet becasue we take more than it can afford, and can replace. Our way of living, our consuming behavior, has to chnage. It is imperative, and espeically formamericans: for nobody else consumes as huge ammounts per heads and wastes ressources as carelessly as the US society.

Our excessive consuming in the West we need to reduce, and reduce drastically. It needs to be reduced to a level where we could say that if all people on the planet would live by our own living standard, the biosphere and the planet still could afford that, and could repklace what we take from it, without reducing it's basis. And china and India and Brazil need to understand that they cannot industrilaise at the cost of making the same mistakes like we did, and moving on on the same 100+ years old ways like our industrialisation did. 'they must put their effort on modern technology from the beginning on, instead of going through 100 years of fossile engines before reaching there. If they don't understand that, our problems will multiply within one generation.

Precisely! There is controversy in the scientific community about this. With the evidence being clear that global warming or cooling is due to natural cycles, one can only think that some "scientist" support Al Gore in order to get more hoax money to do more hokey "research".

Well, evolution is still controversial, so Creation must be true...:roll:

ofcourse im being sold crap, since im an atheist and im a "commie"...im bound to fail:rotfl:

Not to mention that you're danish:stare: :lol: ;)

Mendel's law is the only practical answer to the theory of evolution...:know:

At no point did I ever state that the US should not make changes - what I said was that if your expecting us ALL to do so at the whim of some theory called global warming - your smoking crack. I have no problem with being involved in a solution, and if someone wants to bring up the world wars - in WW2 we were heavily involved well before 1942 thank you. Oh but of course us being the "evil USA" lets just concentrate on the negative - and totally disregard that we bailed europe's A$$ out of the fire not once but twice - with the blood of American men. And you people claim that it is WE who are "self-absorbed" and self-righteous.

Skybird, you actually do well proving my point - the billions of people in the far east are not willing to change their patterns of behavior. Yet you seem intent on making us Americans the "bad guys" for not changing our own habits. Somehow its "ok" to give them a pass, but definitely can't give it to those dastardly Americans!

Now - I again turn to point out solutions. The sulpher-oxide option is but one - and no one has brought up any others. So tell me - who would be the first to fund and work on such an effort? Probably us "EVIL AMERICANS". Who in the world would be willing and able to devote the manufacturing base needed to make such a thing a reality? China wouldn't - Russia wouldn't - the EU can't (hell you all can't even agree on being one entity half the time, much less work together on something that will require manufacturing teamwork.). So who are you gonna call on when your little half measures do nothing more than inconvienence your lives, yet solve nothing? That's right, you will look to the World Leader - the one you have sat here and badmouthed so much, and want help. We will give it - and be vilified still. That is simply the way it is when your the "top dog" - everyone is jealous and since they can't pass you fairly, they want to drag you down. Well - sorry, but many of us Americans just ain't having it.

So I have challenged you 3 times now Skybird, to talk solutions. You want me to change my way of living - yet you can show NO proof that doing so will actually make a difference. Actually, you proved in your last post that it would NOT change anything. So show me why I should make changes - show me how those changes will make a diffence - or stop trying to make it out like I am some selfish person because I don't want to act in a way "you" approve of when it won't matter anyway. Also - either step up and talk solutions - or can you not do so? After all - solving problems is alot harder than pointing fingers.....

And for the record - I have 2 children that I work my tail off to provide for - not only the necessities but a superior education - so that they can truly appreciate and continue to conserve a wonderful planet. I hope to see them enjoy it - so I look for real workable answers - not feel good fairy foo foo claptrap that does nothing but give ignorant people a sense of self-importance.

Or - to put it the challenge of talking real solutions in the terms of an old American saying - "Put up, or (hush) up.".

I'm sceptical of the global warming/climate change/whatever is next crowd, but I think my reasons are sound. bear with me if you please, while I attempt to explain my thoughts and position as clearly as I can.

The earth is essentially a living thing. the core moves, it is not solid. The plates on which land sits move around and grind into each other, sending some plates down to the core where they melt, and forcing others up, into new mountain ranges. relatively soon in a geological scale, Oz will be smack bang across the equator and joined to PNG! My point here is that it is a constantly changing environment.

This changing environment can be shown, for example, by looking to central oz - the arid, desert, 'red centre' of oz was a vast inland sea. Now it is among the most inhospitable places we can find. At some point in history, that sea retreated to the current coastline, leaving dry land in its place and (as best we can tell) permanently altering the type of landscape there.

Now, the climate is not immune to these changes. We have ice ages, it is logical to assume we have the opposite. Cyclical. Up and down. We obviously have no data as to how warm the earth can get, however there are tantalising little hints that emerge from time to time. For example, near where I live is fairly dry bushland. However, there is evidence that around 60,000 years ago or so, the region more closely resembled a sub-tropical rainforest. Another example is scientists drilling ice cores in a glacier in greenland found evidence that at one point Greenland was quite heavily wooded with your average north american pines. Most interesting point? The glacier was still there! it survived to some extent or other at a time when greenland was a heavily wooded location. Obviously we don't know to what extent, but it did exist.

We have no idea how long it took to become that, nor how long it took for the earth to enter (or leave) the last ice age. There simply isn't the data. We're flooded with reports about how quickly the world is warming up, and within a hundred years it might have risen by a whole degree celsius. For all we know, this could be the slowest temperature rise on record. For all we know, temperatures in the past rose 5 or 10 degrees celsius. My point here is we just don't know.

Now, before people jump on my back, I'm all for green change. I see no point in senselessly wasting limited resources. Show me a viable hybrid (or all electric) option for a car, within a reasonable price range, and you better believe i'll buy it. However I am completely opposed to the amount of rubbish being rammed down our throats. Stop logging? What shall we write on, sleep on, build with, eat from, sit on..... Stop eating cows?!? Humans are omnivorous creatures I'm afraid, neither our teeth nor our gastrointestinal tract are designed for a diet of rabbit food.

Promoting cleaner energy is in my opinion a good thing, wind power especially - believe it or not, making solar panels leaves an awful mess in the earth.. When my home is complete, it will have a 4000l water tank hooked up to the toilets and laundry, there will be a solar panel on the roof for hot water (standard with the home) and I shall be installing a small wind turbine similar to the one subman posted a while back. Partly these measures are for selfish reasons - I hate the rising costs, but the cleaner benefits overall are doing no harm to myself nor the environment.

What it comes down to in my opinion, is this: ramming guesswork down our throats is wrong. Enacting new laws and taxes, which will drastically affect peoples lives, based on guesswork is very wrong. The earth has remained through enormous impacts, countless meteorites, nuclear explosions, plagues, volcanic eruptions, solar flares.... almost anything that can be thrown at it. The earth will remain regardless of how we treat it, regardless of how long we stay on it, and pretty much the only thing that will destroy it is the death throes of our sun.

Amen brother! I have no problem going "green" when there is a valid reason, but I won't make changes just to allow my freedoms to be slowly restricted.

:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

It's SUBMAN. Originality has never been part of his modus operandi:shifty:.

Don't you just love the logic?

1. I think it was Jason who stole the cookie from my cookie jar.
2. I'm not exactly sure how he did it.
3. Therefore, it must've been God!

:D

You think that's gonna do no harm? How about acid rain?

How often must I repeat that excessive spending of limited natural ressources is they main problem and that any technical reduction of emissions alone will not be sufficient, before you understand it? You are fixated on exclusively those ways to see the problem that would leave you without need to change that excessive spending. And exactly that is the problem. with America. with the EU. And with the asian economies as well. Right now the US hides behind India and china, while China and India hide behind the US' stubborness not to change. Since the US pollutes roughly as much as 3-4 times as many Chinese, and consumes the relative greatest share of global ressources although just coming up with 5% of global population, it is up to America to do the first step and set an example. As a nation, China may have taken first position in total emissions recently. But in "pollution per head", America still is record holder, before the EU and before China both of which have much more population. It is no secret that major parts of the american industry are hopelessly outdated, and can survive in global competiton only by help of very massive subsidies and trade protection (wait, what is the US' official position on regulated trade...). Subsidies that still are not used for modernising. Some years ago, it seemed that China would eventually move, which was a threat for Washington, they lobbied heavily with the chinese and took a tough stand on climate themselves, as a result, any hope that China would move had come to an end, they used Washingtons position to claim they will not change their economy as long as Washington does not, and Washington's mission to prevent adressing emission control was successfully acchieved.

Hell, Washington even forbid federal states to establish rules for CO2 regulation! That says it all.

And just for the record, do not compare your country'S climate goals to that of the EU. If the EUs estimations on what could be acchieved are correct, is somethign different, but the goals that were formulated, simply outclasses any American evvrionmental awareness and poltical goals there are. While I am not happy with the EU approach as well and criticise is as not sufficient, it nevertheless is lightyears ahead of America.