“Statisticians say that in sizing up climate change, it’s important to look at moving averages of about 10 years. They compare the average of 1999-2008 to the average of 2000-2009. In all data sets, 10-year moving averages have been higher in the last five years than in any previous years.”
Anyways, again, is it unproven that, say, CO2 has a greenhourse effect?
Do you mean that as a question having no implication beyond the specific thing asked?
On your quote: it doesn’t prove continuing warming, let alone that it is man-made.
Is there a reason you are skipping over the matter that with regard to these patterns of CO2 and temperature, all this has happened before, many times, without man?
And therefore seeing the same pattern of temperature and CO2 and saying it must be from man, and saying that man must do differently and that will change whether it continues or the extent of it, does not follow?
All this has happened before and all this will happen again, even if man disappears from existence.
Do you believe CO2 to be a greenhouse gas?
I’ll be glad to answer your question but I did ask you whether you will accept it as being an answer ONLY to that specific thing or whether you will read further implication into it (such as cause and effect.) You didn’t reply.
(previous post hasn’t appeared so can’t edit.)
I also notice you haven’t replied to the fact that all this has happened before WITHOUT man.
And as something I didn’t mention, but which is worth mentioning: It’s been shown that CO2 rise lags temperature change, rather than CO2 rise preceding temperature change.
Kind of problematic for the man-caused warming theory, isn’t it?
Because you see, warming (from any cause) drives up CO2 for the reason I mentioned before.
I’m asking you, as I’m hoping you can inform me of something I’m not aware of. That being the claim that CO2 is a greenhouse gass. Is this something testable? Falsifiable? Can it be said with scientific certainty? Is it something you accept as a proven?
A greenhouse gas is defined as an atmospheric gas which reduces transmission of infrared radiation back into space, thus reducing radiant cooling of the Earth’s surface.
This is a physical property which is measurable and falsifiable (as you know, but for anyone else: demonstrable as being untrue if it were untrue.)
CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
Since I can’t tell whether you may take the answer as meaning anything more than I literally said, I feel like I need to add that a thing being a greenhouse gas does not mean that increase in that gas must be the cause of observed warming, or that man’s adding some given amount of that gas will change outcomes.
It’s too bad I don’t know the webpage (or one of many) that has the Russian graph on temperatures and CO2 over geologic time. The pattern of Ice Ages with low CO2, followed by interglacial warming period with increasing CO2 – which indeed before, without man, reached levels just as today – followed inevitably by another Ice Age again is pretty compelling. It’s what the Earth does.
Judging from the past, the Earth would be warming today (using “today” in the very broad sense, not necessarily one decade versus another) and CO2 rising, with the CO2 rise lagging the temperature increase, without man. Because this is what has happened before over and over again.
Then undoubtedly we free up CO2 from what would otherwise be CO2 sinks. I’m not sure if that’s an accurate way to say it. But, it would be locked away below our feet, I suppose. So inarguably, we do contribute to the amount of greenhouse gass(es) present in the atmosphere. Thus, we must have SOME impact on the climate. Not even including ph balances of bodies of water, or other enviromental concerns.
Now, I’m sure there a whole host of other factors. So much so that you could see cooling while also seing natural increases in CO2 in the record. Or CO2 increases and warming, but obviously without man’s impact in the past.
I guess plenty of things could offset CO2 contribution to warming. But, for how long? And what happens if it now continues to rise, and rise, and rise? Is their any reason to believe we’ll be contributing less anytime in the not so distant future?
I don’t think anyone who is a scientist who disputes the anthropegenic claims says that there is zero effect from man-made CO2.
The questions are as to whether this is the major cause or a minor addition, with levels inevitably being quite similar to what they are now no matter whether man existed or not due to warming releasing CO2 from the oceans; and as to whether man’s reducing emissions can be expected to change outcomes.
The reason why CO2 rises to levels just as is occurring now even when man does not exist is because the oceans hold vast, vast, vast amounts of CO2, but cannot hold as much as they warm.
With various factors being involved in this long-term cyclic pattern, but orbital dynamics being a key part. (The Earth’s orbit changes very slowly over geologic time in a complex but recurring pattern.)
Or to put it a lot shorter: The anthropogenic crowd claims that increasing CO2 is the cause of warming, and warming is caused by man. However, the evidence is much better that warming (which from long-term data we know does not require man but is part of a very long term and repeated pattern) is the cause of increasing CO2, though there is additional CO2 added by man.
As to what happens: Almost undoubtedly, just as happens without man, not long after reaching the point we have already reached, another 100K year (approximately) Ice Age begins. Fortunately, “not long” in geologic time is still what we would call a long time: aside from it being unknown how many years before the transition, the transition itself is one of many thousands of years.
Climate change emissions from meat production are far higher than currently estimated, according to a controversial new study that will fuel the debate on whether people should eat fewer animal products to help the environment.
In a paper published by a respected US thinktank, the Worldwatch Institute, two World Bank environmental advisers claim that instead of 18 per cent of global emissions being caused by meat, the true figure is 51 per cent.
They claim that United Nation’s figures have severely underestimated the greenhouse gases caused by tens of billions of cattle, sheep, pigs, poultry and other animals in three main areas: methane, land use and respiration.
Their findings â?? which are likely to prompt fierce debate among academics â?? come amid increasing from climate change experts calls for people to eat less meat.
In the 19-page report, Robert Goodland, a former lead environmental adviser to the World Bank, and Jeff Anhang, a current adviser, suggest that domesticated animals cause 32 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e), more than the combined impact of industry and energy. The accepted figure is 18 per cent, taken from a landmark UN report in 2006, Livestock’s Long Shadow.
“If this argument is right,” write Goodland and Anhang, "it implies that replacing livestock products with better alternatives would be the best strategy for reversing climate change.
“In fact, this approach would have far more rapid effects on greenhouse gas emissions and their atmospheric concentrations than actions to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy.”
Their call to move to meat substitutes accords with the views of the chairman of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, who has described eating less meat as “the most attractive opportunity” for making immediate changes to climate change.
Lord Stern of Brentford, author of the 2006 review into the economic consequences of global warming, added his name to the call last week, telling a newspaper interviewer: “Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world’s resources.”
Scientists are concerned about livestock’s exhalation of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Cows and other ruminants emit 37 per cent of the world’s methane. A study by Nasa scientists published in Science on Friday found that methane has significantly more effect on climate change than previously thought: 33 times more than carbon dioxide, compared with a previous factor of 25.
According to Goodland and Anhang’s paper, which has not been peer-reviewed, scientists have significantly underestimated emissions of methane expelled by livestock. They argue that the gas’s impact should be calculated over 20 years, in line with its rapid effect â?? and the latest recommendation from the UN â?? rather than the 100 years favoured by Livestock’s Long Shadow. This, they say, would add a further 5bn tons of CO2e to livestock emissions â?? 7.9 per cent of global emissions from all sources.
Similarly, they claim that official figures are wrong to ignore CO2 emitted by breathing animals on the basis that it is offset by carbon photosynthesised by their food, arguing the existence of this unnecessary animal-based CO2 amounts to 8.7bn tons of CO2e, 3.7 per cent of total emissions.
On land use, they calculate that returning the land currently used for livestock to natural vegetation and forests would remove 2.6bn tons of CO2e from the atmosphere, 4.2 per cent of greenhouse gas. They also complain that the UN underestimated the amount of livestock, putting it at 21.7bn against NGO estimates of 50bn, adding that numbers have since risen by 12 per cent.
Eating meat rather than plants also requires extra refrigeration and cooking and “expensive” treatment of human diseases arising from livestock such as swine flu, they say.
One leading expert on climate change and food, Tara Garnett, welcomed Goodland and Anhang’s calculations on methane, which she said had credibility, but she questioned other aspects of their work, saying she had no reason to dispute the UN’s position on CO2 caused by breathing. She also pointed out that they had changed scientific assumptions for livestock but not for other sources of methane, skewing the figures.
She said: "We are increasingly becoming aware that livestock farming at current scales is a major problem, and that they contribute significantly to greenhouse gases. But livestock farming also yields benefits â?? there are some areas of land that canâ??t be used for food crop production. Livestock manure can also contribute to soil fertility, and farm animals provide us with non food goods, such as leather and wool, which would need to be produced by another means, if it wasnâ??t a byproduct from animal farming.â??
While looking into the paper’s findings, Friends of the Earth said the report strengthened calls for the Government to act on emissions from meat production. “We already know that the meat and dairy industry causes more climate-changing emissions than all the world’s transport,” said Clare Oxborrow, senior food campaigner.
“These new figures need further scrutiny but, if they stack up, they provide yet more evidence of the urgent need to fix the food chain. The more damaging elements of the meat and dairy industry are effectively government-sponsored: millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money is spent propping up factory farms and subsidising the import of animal feed that’s been grown at the expense of forests.”
Justin Kerswell, campaign manager for the vegetarian group Viva!, said: "The case for reducing consumption of meat and dairy products was already imperative based on previous UN findings. Now it appears to have been proven that the environmental devastation from livestock production is in fact staggeringly more significant â?? and dwarfs the contribution from the transport sector by an even greater margin.
“It is essential that attention is fully focused on the impact of livestock production by all global organisations with the power to affect policy.”
So which sky is falling wack job is going to put down the steak?
Gore looks like a soybean boy to me anyway.
[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Gore looks like a soybean boy to me anyway.[/quote]
Actually he was asked if he would stop eating meat and he said no.
Oh.
Well, he’s estrogeny looking, but I suppose that doesn’t have to come from soy.
Since he does eat meat though, as he won’t give up having his SUV motorcades wait with the engines running, or using more electricity for his house per month than most use in several years, or his jet-setting in Gulfstreams, it’s no wonder he won’t give up meat to help save the planet.
By the way, isn’t it odd that these so-called pro-animal folks don’t want all these 20 billion animals alive AT ALL?
They’d rather they not exist than be alive grazing grass and so forth.
Though that is a different subject.
Except in that the thinking seems to be,
“Save the planet! Allow far fewer breathing things to live!”
But I have news for them. If it’s not breathing things they’re concerned for but the planet, the planet is going to survive no matter what.
And as for the plants, they like CO2.
[quote]pushharder wrote:
John S. wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
Gore looks like a soybean boy to me anyway.
Actually he was asked if he would stop eating meat and he said no.
Even when flying on his Gulfstream?[/quote]
What are you a savage, how can you expect him to give up essentials like a Gulfstream. If you where an Ivy League grad you would understand.
First video in a good collection of videos on the subject.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
I’m asking you, as I’m hoping you can inform me of something I’m not aware of. That being the claim that CO2 is a greenhouse gass. Is this something testable? Falsifiable? Can it be said with scientific certainty? Is it something you accept as a proven?[/quote]
Periods of Higher CO2 concentration coincide with high global average temperatures in the last 400,000 years. Today’s CO2 ppm is higher than it has been in the last 400,000 years. I was under the impression that it was not a question of ‘if’ but of ‘when’.