So much for global warming...
 

Looks like there might need to be a "re-evaluation" of the popular beliefs on global warming:

BBC Link

That seems to be the problem with all these experts. 5 years from now everyone will have changed their mind.

Take for example Dr. Spock.

Benjamin McLane Spock (May 2, 1903 – March 15, 1998) was an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the biggest best-sellers of all time. Its revolutionary message to mothers was that "you know more than you think you do." Spock was the first pediatrician to study psychoanalysis to try to understand children's needs and family dynamics. His ideas about childcare influenced several generations of parents to be more flexible and affectionate with their children, and to treat them as individuals, whereas the previous conventional wisdom had been that child rearing should focus on building discipline, and that, e.g., babies should not be "spoiled" by picking them up when they cried.

Years later though many expounded claims that Dr. Spock advocated permissiveness.

Some have seen Spock as the leader in the move toward more permissive parenting in general, and have blamed him for what they saw as the negative results. Norman Vincent Peale claimed in the late 1960's that "the U.S. was paying the price of two generations that followed the Dr. Spock baby plan of instant gratification of needs."[1] Vice President Spiro Agnew denounced him as the "father of permissiveness," claiming that Dr. Spock's child rearing principles encouraged lawlessness among young people in the 1960s. Spock's supporters believed that these criticisms betrayed an ignorance of what Spock had actually written, and/or a political bias against Spock's left-wing political activities. Spock himself, in his autobiography, pointed out that he had never advocated permissiveness; also, that the attacks and claims that he had ruined American youth only arose after his public opposition to the Vietnam war. He regarded these claims as ad hominem attacks, whose political motivation and nature was clear.

A rethink of the impact of global warming, or a rethink on whether there is global warming? The article doesn't appear to be challenging current thinking on global warming. Rather, it talks about the issues of local variability as the climate changes.

Global warming is a natural event which would happen with or without human beings (just takes less time if humans crud up the atmosphere). The planet is a living thing and it has been going through these changes and cycles for millions of trips around the sun. Since humans love scare tactics reports about the climate falling apart are all you see, yet you will rarely hear the scientific reports that the change in ozone and temperature is natural. How exactly do these people think Ice Ages occur? People aren't worried about the Earth, there worried about being able to live on the Earth. :)

George Carlin said it best "the planet isn't in trouble, humans are. Earth could shake the human population off like a bad case of fleas".

I love that line "the planet isn't in trouble, humans are. Earth could shake the human population off like a bad case of fleas." How true.

I noticed on my natural gas bill that July 2006 was, on average, 73 degrees F while it was 76 degrees F last year. Take it FWIW, but I found it interesting.

You really need to watch Al Gore's movie to understand "Global Warming". I put it in quotes because perhaps "global warming" should be called "global climate change".

What is explained in the movie is that basically "global warming" does not mean it gets warmer worldwide. It means there will be drastic changes in the earth's climate patterns. "Patterns" is the key word.

One example that is explained is the "prevailing winds". These wind patterns cause warm air from the equator in the Atlantic Ocean to move weather systems northeast up towards Europe. As a result, much of Europe actually experiences much warmer weather than the what would be normal for a location at that latitude. For example, Madrid is the same distance north of the equator as New York City. But we all know New York has much colder weather than Madrid. London is much further north of the Equator than any place in the United States. But as well all know, there are plenty of places in the Northern United States that are much colder than London.

Back to what I was saying, one of the climate changes that will occur with "Global Warming" is that these prevailing winds in the Atlantic will change. As a result, weather in Europe is more likely to get much much colder and much of Europe will fall into an ice age.

What will cause all this is not "global warming", but a sharp increase in CO2 levels that is occuring worldwide:

http://www.planetforlife.com/images/co2history.gif

http://www.planetforlife.com/images/monthlyCO2.jpg


The example of Europe is not the only one. Basically, climate as we know it on earth will drastically change. Places that are colder could get much warmer, places that are wet could become dry, places that are dry could become flooded, etc.

One change they expect is that Greenland will become significantly warmer causing all the glaciers in Greenland to melt. This alone will cause water levels worldwide to rise 20 feet. So many areas that are at sea level will be under water.

The scarey thing about this is that such changes will not happen gradually over a long period of time as has happened in the past with climate change. Many of the experts are predicting such drastic change over the next 30-50 years.

Yay, more reason to rebuild those levees in NO!! :doh:

One example of such drastic changes is "Lake Chad". If you are not from Africa, it's possible that you have never heard of Lake Chad. It is (was) a large lake on the border of the countries of Chad, Niger, and Nigeria.

To give you an idea of the size of lake chad, think of Lake Erie or Lake Ontario -- anyone from the Northeast or Eastern Canada should be able to have an idea of the size I am talking about. Well, that was the size of Lake Chad about 30 years ago.

What about today? Gone. I mean completely gone. Lake Chad is completely dried up.

http://maps.grida.no/library/files/w..._lake_chad.jpg

The last frame there is 2001, and today even that small section that was still there 5 years ago is now gone.

Why? The climate in this area of Africa has drastically changed over the last 30 years. Temperatures have risen dramatically and the amount of rainfall has dropped.

The disappearance of this lake and the big drought that has gone along with it is the main reason for the starvation problems the people in Niger and Nigeria are experiencing today. Most of the farmable land in these countries has become desert in less than 50 years.

:iagree: :rofl:

Yes indeed. Man is so powerful, he can change an entire planet. BTW - love the CO2 graph. So who was taking samples in AD 1000?

The idea that we can understand climate change is ridiculous. How can we be so arrogant to think we know what's normal and what's not on a global scale over several millenia?