Melting permafrost in the Arctic is unlocking diseases and warping the landscape
Last August, an outbreak of anthrax in Siberia sickened 72 people and took the life of a 12-year-old boy. Health officials pinpointed the outbreak to an unusual source.
Abnormally high temperatures had thawed the corpses of long-dead reindeer and other animals. Some of these bodies may have been infected with anthrax, and as Wired explained , the soil in Siberia is normally much too cold to dig deep graves. “The disease from thawing human and animal remains can get into groundwater that people then drink,” Wired reported.
Scientists are worried that as more permafrost thaws, especially in Siberia, there may be more outbreaks of long-dormant anthrax as burial grounds thaw.
That’s because the deep freeze of the permafrost doesn’t just keep carbon from escaping — it keeps microbes intact as well.
Permafrost is the place to preserve bacteria and viruses for hundreds of thousands — if not a million — years, explains Jean-Michel Claverie, a genomics researcher who studies ancient viruses and bacteria. “It is dark, it is cold, and it is also without oxygen. … There is no [ultraviolet] light.” All the bacteria need is a thaw to wake back up. “If you take a yogurt and put it in permafrost [that remains frozen], I’m sure in 10,000 years from now it still will be good to eat,” he said.
Claverie is part of a scientific team that recently determined it’s possible to revive 30,000-year-old viruses trapped in the permafrost. His work is centered on viruses that infect amoebas, not humans. But there’s no reason why a flu virus, smallpox, or some long-lost human infection couldn’t be revived the same way. These microbes are like time travelers — and they could thrive waking up in an age when humans have lost an immune defense against them.
I asked Claverie if there’s an upper limit to how long viruses and (certain types of) bacteria could survive in the permafrost.
“The limit is the limit given by the permafrost,” he explained, meaning he sees no limit. Permafrost is 1,000 meters deep in places, “which make it about a million, 1.5 million year old,” he said.
The danger here, he emphasized, is not from the slow thawing of the permafrost itself. That is, if the permafrost melts, and we leave the land alone, we’re unlikely to come into contact with ancient deadly diseases. The fear is that the thawing will encourage greater excavation in the Arctic. Mining and other excavation projects will become more appealing as the region grows warmer. And these projects can put workers into contact with some very, very old bugs.
The threat is tiny. But it exists. The big lesson is that even viruses thought to be eradicated from Earth — like smallpox — may still lurk frozen, somewhere.
“We could actually catch a disease from a Neanderthal’s remains,” Claverie says. “Which is amazing.”
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There are several reasons why melting permafrost presents huge obstacles to civilization. Read the whole article for more.
The Earth has been a dynamic system of climate change, in near constant flux for billions of years. No matter how much money the government steals from its citizens, that will stay the same.
WHEN Ernest Shackleton and his men marched towards the South Pole in December 1908, they came across something entirely unexpected. After scaling the vast Beardmore glacier on the edge of the polar plateau, they found seams of coal amid the snow and ice. They also found impressions of leaves in sandstone boulders nearby and even fossilised wood from a coniferous tree.
The conclusion was extraordinary but inescapable: Antarctica was once warm and forested, conditions that could hardly be more different to the far-below-freezing midsummer weather that forced Shackleton’s team to turn back before reaching the pole. How was this possible?
Four years later, Alfred Wegener put forward his theory of continental drift which, it was later realised, could explain the balmy climate: Antarctica had been warmer because it was once much closer to the equator. Even today, some schoolchildren are taught that continental drift accounts for all the evidence for a warmer Antarctica.
However, the fossil trees Shackleton’s team discovered grew around 250 million years ago, when Antarctica was barely closer to the equator than it is today. What’s more, the continent reached its current position roughly 100 million years ago, and an ever-growing list of fossil finds date from 100 to 40 million years ago. During this time, when dinosaurs roamed the almost subtropical forests of an ice-free Antarctic, conditions on the other side of the planet were even more remarkable: the Arctic Ocean was a gigantic freshwater lake infested with crocodile-like reptiles.
As the modern world warms, there has been a surge of interest in this “hothouse” period. What sustained such high temperatures for tens of millions....
These ubiquitous end of the world scenarios, best belong shouted out at passing cars, by disheveled street prophets smelling of a hard life of constant intoxications with a wild look in their eyes.
Also from your source:
Americans are already feeling the effect of climate change, according to a leaked US report.
Since 1980, the average temperature in the US has risen significantly, with the past few decades the warmest for 1500 years.
The report, written by scientists from 13 federal agencies, is still awaiting approval from the Trump administration before it can be officially published, but a draft copy was obtained by The New York Times.
“Evidence for a changing climate abounds, from the top of the atmosphere to the depths of the oceans,” say the authors in the draft report, with thousands of studies contributing to an irrefutable body of evidence.
“Many lines of evidence demonstrate that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse (heat-trapping) gases , are primarily responsible for recent observed climate change,” they say.
The report points out that the ability to attribute some extreme weather events to climate change is improving. It says there is relatively strong evidence that humans contributed to the European heatwave in 2003 and the record temperatures in Australia in 2013. Globally, it is extremely likely that humans are responsible for over half the mean temperature increase since 1951, the authors say.
The leak comes as it was reported by The Guardian yesterday that senior officials at the US Department of Agriculture are now instructing staff to speak about “weather extremes” instead of climate change.
“It is disturbing that scientists had to leak a draft of a new government report warning of dire climate change impacts because they fear the Trump administration will try to suppress it,” says Michael Mann , professor of atmospheric science at Pennsylvania State University. “Orwell’s Ministry of Truth has arrived.”
Since 1980, the average temperature in the US has risen significantly, with the past few decades the warmest for 1500 years
Medieval Warm Period (Europe) -- Summary
Was there really a Medieval Warm Period in Europe? To cut to the end of the story, there certainly was. But let's take a little time in getting there and review some of the evidence for that contention.
Based on analyses of subfossil wood samples from the Khibiny mountains on the Kola Peninsula of Russia, Hiller et al . (2001) were able to reconstruct a 1500-year history of alpine tree-line elevation. This record indicates that between AD 1000 and 1300, the tree-line there was located at least 100 to 140 meters above its current location. The researchers state that this fact implies a mean summer temperature that was "at least 0.8°C higher than today."
Moving from land to water, in a study of a well-dated sediment core from the Bornholm Basin in the southwestern Baltic Sea, Andren et al . (2000) found evidence for a period of high primary production at approximately AD 1050. Many of the diatoms of that period were warm water species that the scientists say "cannot be found in the present Baltic Sea." This balmy period, they report, "corresponds to the time when the Vikings succeeded in colonizing Iceland and Greenland." The warmth ended rather abruptly, however, at about AD 1200, when they note there was "a major decrease in warm water taxa in the diatom assemblage and an increase in cold water taxa," which latter diatoms are characteristic of what they call the Recent Baltic Sea Stage that prevails to this day.
In another marine study, Voronina et al . (2001) analyzed dinoflagellate cyst assemblages in two sediment cores retrieved from the southeastern Barents Sea, one spanning a period of 8300 years and one spanning a period of 4400 years. The longer of the two cores indicated a warm interval from about 8000 to 3000 years before present, followed by cooling pulses coincident with lowered salinity and extended ice cover in the vicinity of 5000, 3500 and 2500 years ago. The shorter core additionally revealed cooling pulses at tentative dates of 1400, 300 and 100 years before present. For the bulk of the past 4400 years, however, ice cover lasted only two to three months per year, as opposed to the modern mean of 4.3 months per year . In addition, August temperatures ranged between 6 and 8°C, significantly warmer than the present mean of 4.6°C .
Moving back towards land, Mikalsen et al . (2001) made detailed measurements of a number of properties of sedimentary material extracted from the bottom of a fjord on the west coast of Norway, deriving a relative temperature history of the region that spanned the last five millennia. This record revealed the existence of a period stretching from A.D. 1330 to 1600 that, in their words, "had the highest bottom-water temperatures in Sulafjorden during the last 5000 years."
In eastern Norway, Nesje et al . (2001) analyzed a sediment core obtained from Lake Atnsjoen, deriving a 4500-year record of river flooding. They observed "a period of little flood activity around the Medieval period (AD 1000-1400)," which was followed by "a period of the most extensive flood activity in the Atnsjoen catchment." This flooding, in their words, resulted from the "post-Medieval climate deterioration characterized by lower air temperature, thicker and more long-lasting snow cover, and more frequent storms associated with the 'Little Ice Age'."
Working in both Norway and Scotland, Brooks and Birks (2001) studied midges, the larval-stage head capsules of which are well preserved in lake sediments and are, in their words, "widely recognized as powerful biological proxies for inferring past climate change." Applying this technique to sediments derived from a lake in the Cairngorms region of the Scottish Highlands, they determined that temperatures there peaked at about 11°C during what they refer to as the "Little Climatic Optimum" -- which we typically call the Medieval Warm Period -- "before cooling by about 1.5°C which may coincide with the 'Little Ice Age'."
These results, according to Brooks and Birks, "are in good agreement with a chironomid stratigraphy from Finse, western Norway (Velle, 1998)," where summer temperatures were "about 0.4°C warmer than the present day" during the Medieval Warm Period. This latter observation also appears to hold for the Scottish site, since the upper sample of the lake sediment core from that region, which was collected in 1993, "reconstructs the modern temperature at about 10.5°C," which is 0.5°C less than the 11°C value the authors found for the Medieval Warm Period.
Moving to Switzerland, Filippi et al . (1999) analyzed a sediment core extracted from Lake Neuchatel in the western Swiss Lowlands. During this same transition from the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) to the Little Ice Age (LIA), they detected a drop of approximately 1.5°C in mean annual air temperature. To give some context to this finding, they say that "the warming during the 20th century does not seem to have fully compensated the cooling at the MWP-LIA transition." And to make the message even more clear, they add that during the Medieval Warm Period, the mean annual air temperature was "on average higher than at present."
It is disturbing that scientists had to leak a draft of a new government report warning of dire climate change impacts because they fear the Trump administration will try to suppress it,”
kpr,
Yes, we all know about the leak.
There are loads of other scientists who were not part of this project that have come to similar conclusions.
It's a damn shame that this became the focal point of the discussion. One group of bad apples.
Bottom line... we just don't know and given that we don't have another home, the question is quite simple.
Shouldn't we be taking proper precautions in case it is us that is making this worse or are you proposing that we throw more fuel on the fire, pun intended?
There is a presumption that acting to minimize man made global warming will inconvenience a LOT of people and harm financial profits of totally ingrained business interests like oil companies , the travel industry, and most sectors that depend on the use of non renewable energy to make their companies go. In effect, the mode becomes "live for today" and let tomorrow take care of itself. That does not sound like a conservative philosophy, but we live in a world of contradictions.
kpr, my point was that you are using a source that is littered with articles that contradict your position ... yet you're comfortable equating the overwhelming majority of climate scientists with religious end times proselytizers.
You're courageous to launch yet another AGW seed, Hal.
I'd lend a hand, but I'm busy with the "antifa are destroying America" cr@p...
Good luck.
I spent 15 years teaching bio and earth science.
Here is what we know.
The earth has had warming and cooling periods. That is a fact.
What it never had before, is humans making greenhouse gasses.
At the present moment, there is no way to prove if we are or are not causing this warming trend.
There is no way that anyone can prove we not causing the problem, just as they point to the fact that there is no way to prove that we are, using the scientific method.
But a prudent person would say, well maybe we should try to cut down on some of our activities that warm the earth, in the absence of proof either way.
darkening the sky it's bound to heat up the earth. Just like putting black plastic over anything outside in the sun does.
Actually Steve, that only applies to when we had a lot of coal usage. The fogs in London that I would run into from time to time as a kid was an example of that. It just makes the air unbreathable.
It's what we don't see that does the most damage.
BTW, in 2030, the sun goes into a cooling period. Maybe that should help things out, but again no one knows
I thought the world was still burning lots of coal.
Not by the same method as we used to with the exception of China.
Good
Perhaps mankind is smarter than we look to be most of the time.
(personally I think that's still up for debate though)
(personally I think that's still up for debate though)
I tend to agree with you.
@ Perrie
Not so fast, Louie.
Yes. We are close to another ice age. This is definitely something we've known for quite a while. Will it be a minor ice age like the one Europe went through during fairly recently in our history or a full scale one? Probably the latter from what I understand.
No pun intended, but we're looking at the perfect storm of events. Natural warming trends combined with man-made global warming are demonstrably presently with the increase in volume and strength of every storm presently due to warmer waters which in turn are caused by said global warming, which is becoming more and more devastating and more and more unrelenting. Then, after all that goes down, we enter into an ice age.
Good times.
... or we speed things up and annihilate the planet with nuclear weapons.
What it never had before, is humans making greenhouse gasses.
But the earth has alway had Volcanos releasing greenhouse gases.
Sorry, I could not find the scientific article I wanted (from MIT), this one will have to do.
Since our planet emerged from the debris which formed the solar system, some four and a half billion years ago, a lifetime supply of primordial carbon has been locked away in the mantle — against its will. Partnering with oxygen and smuggled as a dissolved gas in liquid rock, it breaches the surface at our planet's volcanic airways: CO 2 , then, has been seeping into the planet's atmosphere for as long as there has been one.
Until the end of the 20 th century, the academic consensus was that this volcanic output was tiny — a fiery speck against the colossal anthropogenic footprint. Recently, though, volcanologists have begun to reveal a hidden side to our leaking planet.Exactly how much CO 2 passes through the magmatic vents in our crust might be one of the most important questions that Earth science can answer. Volcanoes may have been overtaken in the carbon stakes, but in order to properly assess the consequences of human pollution, we need the reference point of the natural background. And we're getting there; the last twenty years have seen huge steps in our understanding of how, and how much CO 2 leaves the deep Earth. But at the same time, a disturbing pattern has been emerging.
In 1992, it was thought that volcanic degassing released something like 100 million tons of CO 2 each year. Around the turn of the millennium, this figure was getting closer to 200. The most recent estimate, released this February, comes from a team led by Mike Burton, of the Italian National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology – and it’s just shy of 600 million tons. It caps a staggering trend: A six-fold increase in just two decades.
These inflating figures, I hasten to add, don't mean that our planet is suddenly venting more CO 2 .
Humanity certainly is; but any changes to the volcanic background level would occur over generations, not years. The rise we’re seeing now, therefore, must have been there all along: As scientific progress is widening our perspective, the daunting outline of how little we really know about volcanoes is beginning to loom large.
The exploding hills really give the game away: We've always known the Earth is a smoker. The true extent of its habit, though, is only just beginning to surface.
Before the human species found its talent for pyromania, atmospheric levels of the Earth's greenhouse superstar, carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), were controlled, for the most part, by volcanoes.
Since our planet emerged from the debris which formed the solar system, some four and a half billion years ago, a lifetime supply of primordial carbon has been locked away in the mantle — against its will. Partnering with oxygen and smuggled as a dissolved gas in liquid rock, it breaches the surface at our planet's volcanic airways: CO 2 , then, has been seeping into the planet's atmosphere for as long as there has been one.
Until the end of the 20 th century, the academic consensus was that this volcanic output was tiny — a fiery speck against the colossal anthropogenic footprint. Recently, though, volcanologists have begun to reveal a hidden side to our leaking planet.
Exactly how much CO 2 passes through the magmatic vents in our crust might be one of the most important questions that Earth science can answer. Volcanoes may have been overtaken in the carbon stakes, but in order to properly assess the consequences of human pollution, we need the reference point of the natural background. And we're getting there; the last twenty years have seen huge steps in our understanding of how, and how much CO 2 leaves the deep Earth. But at the same time, a disturbing pattern has been emerging.
In 1992, it was thought that volcanic degassing released something like 100 million tons of CO 2 each year. Around the turn of the millennium, this figure was getting closer to 200. The most recent estimate, released this February, comes from a team led by Mike Burton, of the Italian National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology – and it’s just shy of 600 million tons. It caps a staggering trend: A six-fold increase in just two decades.
These inflating figures, I hasten to add, don't mean that our planet is suddenly venting more CO 2 .
Humanity certainly is; but any changes to the volcanic background level would occur over generations, not years. The rise we’re seeing now, therefore, must have been there all along: As scientific progress is widening our perspective, the daunting outline of how little we really know about volcanoes is beginning to loom large.
Quiet monsters
The exhalations of our planet can be spectacularly obvious . The fireworks, though, are only part of the picture. We now know that the CO 2 released during volcanic eruptions is almost insignificant compared with what happens after the camera crews get bored. The emissions that really matter are concealed. The silent, silvery plumes which are currently winding their way skyward above the 150 or so active volcanoes on our planet also carry with them the bulk of its carbon dioxide. Their coughing fits might catch the eye — but in between tantrums, the steady breathing of volcanoes quietly sheds upwards of a quarter of a billion tons of CO 2 every year.
We think. Scientists' best estimates, however, are based on an assumption. It might surprise you to learn that, well into the new century, of the 150 smokers I mentioned, almost 80 percent are still as mysterious, in terms of the quantity of CO 2 they emit, as they were a generation ago: We've only actually measured 33.
If the 117 unsampled peaks follow a similar trend, then the research community's current projection might stand. But looking through such a small window, there's no way of knowing if what we have seen until now is typical or not. It's like shining a light on a darkened globe: randomly, you might hit Australia, and think you’d seen it all – while on the edge of your beam, unnoticed, would be Asia. Our planet's isolated volcanic frontiers could easily be hiding a monster or two; and with a bit of exploration, our estimate of volcanic CO 2 output could rise even higher.
You'd think that would be enough. That might be my fault — I tend to save the weird stuff until the end. Recently, an enigmatic source of volcanic carbon has come to light that isn't involved with lava — or even craters. It now seems that not only is there CO 2 we can't get to, there's some we can't even see.
Carbon dioxide is always invisible, but its presence can be inferred in volcanic plumes — betrayed by the billowing clouds of water vapour released alongside it. Without the water, though, it's a different story. The new poster-child of planetary degassing is diffuse CO 2 — invisible emanations which can occur across vast areas surrounding the main vents of a volcano, rising through the bulk of the mountains. This transparent haze is only just beginning to receive proper attention, and as such we have very little idea of how much it might contribute to the global output.
Even more incredibly, it even seems that some volcanoes which are considered inactive, in terms of their potential to ooze new land, can still make some serious additions to the atmosphere through diffuse CO 2 release . Residual magma beneath dormant craters, though it might never reach the surface, can still 'erupt' gases from a distance. Amazingly, from what little scientists have measured, it looks like this process might give off as much as half the CO 2 put out by fully active volcanoes.If these additional 'carbon-active' volcanoes are included, the number of degassing peaks skyrockets to more than 500. Of which we've measured a grand total of nine percent. You can probably fill it in by now — we need to climb more mountains.
Kpr,
Yes we have always had active volcanos, which means in scientific terms, that they are a constant, so they are not a variable. And while I think that this is a very interesting article about volcanos, it is not relevant to this discussion.
--Charles A. Leone, " Lysenko versus Mendel ," Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science , 1952
Sorry about the length of this, but it is a complicated subject. Please read the entire paper. I, myself was a "believer" until I met Mr. Lindzen in 96. or 97 at a dinner for a retiring professor. He was seated across the table from me. I put that right up there with meeting Dr. Charles Jacobs, as they were the two smartest humans I've ever met.
In many fields, governments have a monopoly on the support of scientific research.Ideally, they support the science because they believe objective research to be valuable. Unfortunately, as anticipated by Eisenhower in his farewell speech from 17 January 1961 (the one that also warned of the military–industrial complex), ‘Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.’ Under these circumstances, when the government wants a particular scientific outcome the ideal arrangement is vulnerable. H owever, as I hope to show, the problem is not simply bias. Rather, the powers that be invent the narrative independently of the views of even cooperating scientists. It is in this sense that the science becomes irrelevant. This was certainly the case in the first half of the twentieth century, where we just have to look at Lysenkoism in the former Soviet Union,
Pope Francis, President Hollande, and virtually all state leaders have chimed in with similar proclamations. And yet, the whole proposition is largely without basis and highly implausible. The association with asthma that is regularly made by both Obama and Hillary Clinton is a good example of nonsense driven by focus groups who find this to be an effective scare theme.
Pope Francis, President Hollande, and virtually all state leaders have chimed in with similar proclamations. And yet, the whole proposition is largely without basis and highly implausible. The association with asthma that is regularly made by both Obama and Hillary Clinton is a good example of nonsense driven by focus groups who find this to be an effective scare theme. The other claims are no better.
In the 1970s the scientific community regularly designated warm periods as ‘climate optima’. That carbon dioxide was essential to plants and effectively a fertiliser was also widely understood. Thus, it was not surprising that the early environmental movement chose to promote fear of global cooling, which, not surprisingly, was attributed to industrial emissions (most notably sul- phates). 4 However, in the late 1970s it was recognised that sulphates could be scrubbed, that the irreducible product of industrial emissions was carbon dioxide, that carbon dioxide emissions were likely to warm rather than cool, and that there was an hy- pothetical process whereby this warming could be amplified (by what came to be known as the water vapour feedback). 5 A t this point the whole narrative was turned on its head. The hitherto optimal warming was now put forth as a consequence to be feared. President Carter’s science adviser, Frank Press, had the National Research Council investigate the matter, leading to the famous Charney Report from 1979. 6
This report summarised the results of the primitive climate models of that period, and found that they had a range of sensitivities to a doubling of carbon dioxide concentrations of 1.5–4.5 ◦ C. 7 The report regarded such results as possible but attached little credibility to the models, noting the need to better understand why the models behaved as they did. The report nonetheless provided a measure of credibility to the warming hypothesis. The whole situation was eerily reminiscent of Orwell’s Animal Farm , when ‘four legs good, two legs bad’ became ‘four legs good, two legs better’.
Repetition was the mechanism used to convince. So was the claim, already made by 1988 in Newsweek , that ‘all scientists agreed.’ The larger public thus had no reason to actually dig into the science. Indeed, the actual science had already become irrel-evant. This new narrative depended not only on the allegation of consensus, but also on lineage. I t was always pointed out that the greenhouse effect had already been identified in the early 19th Century by Tyndall, 8 lat er by Arrhenius, 9 and still later by Callendar. 10 W hile this was true, it was also the case that the effect was generally held to be of much less importance than changes in the general circulation related to transport. For example, in an important collection of papers from 1955 11 with contri- butions from the leading climate scientists of the period – Charney, Phillips, Lorenz, Eliassen, Smagorinsky, etc. – increasing carbon dioxide was barely mentioned, and the greenhouse effect was not mentioned at all. The model favored for global cool- ing alarm was the Budyko–Sellers model, 12 which also focused on meridional heat transport. Only with the decision to push global warming alarm did the greenhouse effect become central to the discussion of climate. Needless to add, consensus and lineage are not generally regarded as the backbones of science.
The implausibility or even outright silliness through which global warming be- came global warming catastrophism is so extensive that one hardly knows where to begin. It is crucial to emphasise catastrophism because the situation is made even more incoherent by the intentional conflation of simple basic results that are widely agreed upon, but which have no catastrophic implications, with catastrophism itself. Currently, there really is quite a lot of basic agreement within the climate science world: • climate change exists • there has been warming since the Little Ice Age ended around the beginning of the 19th century (well before emissions are regarded as contributing signifi- cantly) • human emissions can contribute to climate change • levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have been increasing. None of this is controversial and none of this actually implies alarm. However, in the policy world, as emerges from virtually any reading of the current political discourse
and its attendant media coverage, the innocuous agreement is taken to be equivalent (with essentially no support from observations, theory or even models) to rampant catastrophism. There are numerous examples of the issuance of unalarming claims, regardless of their validity or lack thereof, that are interpreted as demanding imme- diate action. Perhaps the most striking example involves the iconic statement of the IPCC: Most of the warming over the past 50 years is due to man. I s this statement actually alarming? First, we are speaking of small changes. 0.25 ◦ C would be about 51% of the recent warming. Given the uncertainties in both the data and its analysis, this is barely distinguishable from zero . Evidence of this uncertainty is shown by the common adjustments of this magnitude that are made to the record.
He told me, how to spot a lie about climate. He said anyone claiming to be an expert on the subject was a liar. The entire subject was far too complacated for any single human to truely understand.
He said that he recognized that there was far more that he did not understand, than what he did, in his lifelong study of earth sciences.
Coincidence!
Besides, BOTH SIDES DO IT! ... NO WAY TO DECIDE!
Well... We could listen to the people who have spent their lives studying the subject... but nah!
BOTH SIDES DO IT! ... NO WAY TO DECIDE!
Gee Bob,
One couldn't tell that global warming is going on. I needed to look at your chart, not.
What I am looking for is hard science, and that can't be had. You can't stick the earth into a controlled test and see if our activity is doing this or not. There have been other times in our past that produced very similar looking charts. I can find them for you. Our ice cores clearly show it.
Besides, BOTH SIDES DO IT! ... NO WAY TO DECIDE!
You have this truly obnoxious habit of sticking words into other people's mouths. This is what I actually said:
The earth has had warming and cooling periods. That is a fact.
What it never had before, is humans making greenhouse gasses.
At the present moment, there is no way to prove if we are or are not causing this warming trend.
There is no way that anyone can prove we not causing the problem, just as they point to the fact that there is no way to prove that we are, using the scientific method.
But a prudent person would say, well maybe we should try to cut down on some of our activities that warm the earth, in the absence of proof either way.
So I will repeat, since you seem to skim my comment:
A prudent person would say, well maybe we should try to cut down on some of our activities that warm the earth, in the absence of proof either way.
And by proof, I mean by the scientific method. Not charts or trends. Yet, I advocate for being prudent since we only have on planet.
At the present moment, there is no way to prove if we are or are not causing this warming trend.
But there is common sense. Mother nature did her best to lock away major sources of greenhouse gases, and humans decided to not only dig them up, which in itself contributes to the greenhouse effect, but to burn them at an enormous scale. Now we know that what we started actually has a compounding effect, and we are so addicted to it that we can't even collectively admit that there is a problem.
Besides, BOTH SIDES DO IT! ... NO WAY TO DECIDE!
You have this truly obnoxious habit of sticking words into other people's mouths.
My post was not a citation. No "words in your mouth". It was indeed a reference to your eternal fence-sitting.
At the present moment, there is no way to prove if we are or are not causing this warming trend.
You taught science. You understand the notion of "proof", different from law. There is no way to prove any scientific theory in the legal sense of the word. Scientific proof is a question of probability. And by the scientific definition, AGW is proven.
Except for deniers and fence-sitting ex-science-teachers.
And by the scientific definition, AGW is proven .
Except for deniers and fence-sitting ex-science-teachers.
See highlighted section.
For an Irish pagan you see, I've always known that any set of shared beliefs that are widely held and can not be readily supported by multiple independent sources are faith-based delusions . Religions, all of them, are faith-based delusions. That's why they are called faiths and not facts.
I recognize this faith-based delusion in myself. I have the imaginary friend (G*d) delusion. Recognizing that I have little to no supporting evidence. I am forced to take it on faith that I am correct. To insist time and time again, that I'm right, just because I think I'm right, would be more delusional than absolutely necessary . I am the only one who must believe my delusion. I don't care what you believe. The god of political correctness, unfortunately, rejects free will or matters of conscience in public discourse, and demands I believe as instructed.
It's a personal faith based decision I have made, in rejecting this false god of political correctness
My post was not a citation. No "words in your mouth". It was indeed a reference to your eternal fence-sitting.
Oh I got that loud and clear. I would much rather fence sit than say something that isn't true, or measured.
At the present moment, there is no way to prove if we are or are not causing this warming trend.
You taught science. You understand the notion of "proof", different from law. There is no way to prove any scientific theory in the legal sense of the word. Scientific proof is a question of probability. And by the scientific definition, AGW is proven .
Wrong. There is proof and there are theories. Proof is generally accepted concepts, like gravity, which can be proved by math. Theories are not written in stone and the better theories require the below which is the scientific method.
See that green box that says "Test with an experiment" that is something we can't do. What the scientist have done till in regards to climate change is called meta studies, where they gather information from various places and make an educated guess. Do you see that anywhere here? No you don't. That isn't considered the best methodology, scientifically speaking.
For more read this:
Except for deniers and fence-sitting ex-science-teachers.
Or people who think they know what they are talking about when they don't and then throw in a insult for good measure.
Don't need no logic girl, don't need no methodology either.
You just need to SAY it is, and that is good proof for some.....
Some charts from the weather page of the Boston Globe of 12 March 2013 – any other date would serve as well illustrate how small the changes really are. In the attached figure we see the high and low temperatures for each day in the preceding month (black), the average high and low temperature for each date (dark grey) and the record high and low temperature for each date (light grey). The width of the black horizontal line corresponds to the change in the global mean temperature anomaly over the past 150 years
High and low temperatures result from the advection of air roughly along the path of the jet stream. This path changes from day to day and year to year. Record breaking temperatures, regardless of the year that they occurred, correspond roughly to the warmest and coldest temperatures on the temperature map for 11 March. Second, the recent warming episode is not at all unprecedented. The almost iden- tical episode from about 1919–1940 cannot be attributed to man.
Third, the observed warming is completely consistent with low climate sensitivity. Alarm requires, for starters (and only for starters), high sensitivity. By sensitivity, we mean how much warming we expect for each doubling of carbon dioxide con- centrations . High sensitivity is generally regarded as 3 ◦ C or more. If we were to assume that all warming over the past 50 years were due to added greenhouse gases, we would conclude that the sensitivity was about 1 ◦ C. How do models with much higher sensitivity manage to replicate the past 50 years? They do so by subtracting from the greenhouse warming essentially unknown aerosols, which they then include as due to human emissions. However, in a recent paper from the Max Planck Institute, Stevens (2015) finds that aerosols are limited and unable to compensate for the higher sensitivities. 13 If man accounts for only 51% of the recent warming, then even modest future warming becomes implausible.
Although it has become commonplace to fear warming, it is worth noting that the approximately 1 ◦ C warming since the 19th century has been accompanied by the improvement of all indices of human welfare, including environmental quality. Indeed, the very notion that climate is described by a single number that is forced by another single number, is itself a bit strange. For example, the force on a piston acting on a gas in a cylinder certainly does determine the pressure. However, as Budyko and Izrael noted long ago, 14 climat e change is characterised by relatively stable tropics and changes in the equator-to-pole temperature difference. This, crudely speaking, has to do with heat transport. Pursuing the analogy with the piston, would we really expect the flow through a pipe to depend on the mean pressure in the pipe rather than the gradient of pressure along the pipe? Why then do scientists go along with this? The situation has been described by me earlier as consisting of an iron triangle. 15 A to never tex are the scientists who make meaningless or ambiguous statements. The scientific assessment of Working Group I of the IPCC is full of such statements. Then there is the second vertex: that of the advocates and media who ‘translate’ the statements into alarmist declarations. The advocates also include the IPCC’s Working Groups II and III, which deal with impacts and mitigation by assuming worst case scenarios from Working Group I. Politicians also are often part of the advocacy efforts. T he third vertex consists of the politicians who respond to alarm by feeding more money to the scientists in the first vertex. As far as the scientists are concerned, what’s not to like? Should the scientist ever feel any guilt over the matter, it is assuaged by two irresistible factors:
1. The advocates define public virtue.
2. His administrators are delighted with the grant overhead. Of course, scientists are hardly the main beneficiaries. The current issue of global warming/climate change is extreme in terms of the number of special interests that opportunistically have strong motivations for believing in the claims of catastrophe despite the lack of evidence.
In no particular order, there are: 4
leftist economists for whom global warming represents a supreme example of market failure, as well as a wonderful opportunity to suggest correctives • UN apparatchiks for whom global warming is the route to global governance
• Third World dictators, who see guilt over global warming as providing a conve- nient claim on aid, in other words the transfer of wealth from the poor in rich countries to the wealthy in poor countries
• environmental activists, who love any issue that has the capacity to frighten the gullible into making hefty contributions to their NGOs
• crony capitalists, who see the immense sums being made available for ‘sustainable’ energy • government regulators, for whom the control of a natural product of breathing is a dream come true
• newly minted billionaires, who find the issue of ‘saving the planet’ appropriately suitable to their grandiose pretensions • politicians, who can fasten on to CAGW as a signature issue where they can act as demagogues without fear of contradiction from reality or complaint from the purported beneficiaries of their actions (the wildly successful London run of ‘Yes, Prime Minister’ dealt with this )etc., etc
There is a reason why the Green Revolution is rejected by so many. It involves the use of a large increase in crop production in developing countries achieved by the use of fertilizers, pesticides, and high-yield crop varieties.
Can you say Monsanto?
Do you want to eat crops that are resistant to pesticides so that we can eat toxins?
a large increase in crop production in developing countries achieved by the use of fertilizers, pesticides, and high-yield crop varieties.
Yes, it's called progress, they have the same right to it, as we do.
About Organic Produce
Organic produce has become increasingly popular in recent years, as consumers have grown more health conscious and environmentally aware. Many stores and supermarkets now have large sections devoted to organic fruits and vegetables.
WHAT MAKES PRODUCE "ORGANIC"?
Contrary to what most people believe, "organic" does not automatically mean "pesticide-free" or "chemical-free". In fact, under the laws of most states, organic farmers are allowed to use a wide variety of chemical sprays and powders on their crops.
So what does organic mean? It means that these pesticides, if used, must be derived from natural sources, not synthetically manufactured. Also, these pesticides must be applied using equipment that has not been used to apply any synthetic materials for the past three years, and the land being planted cannot have been treated with synthetic materials for that period either.
Most organic farmers (and even some conventional farmers, too) employ mechanical and cultural tools to help control pests. These include insect traps, careful crop selection (there are a growing number of disease-resistant varieties), and biological controls (such as predator insects and beneficial microorganisms).
ORGANIC PRODUCE AND PERSONAL HEALTH
When you test synthetic chemicals for their ability to cause cancer, you find that about half of them are carcinogenic.
Until recently, nobody bothered to look at natural chemicals (such as organic pesticides), because it was assumed that they posed little risk. But when the studies were done, the results were somewhat shocking: you find that about half of the natural chemicals studied are carcinogenic as well.
This is a case where everyone (consumers, farmers, researchers) made the same, dangerous mistake. We assumed that "natural" chemicals were automatically better and safer than synthetic materials, and we were wrong. It's important that we be more prudent in our acceptance of "natural" as being innocuous and harmless.
ORGANIC PESTICIDES VERSUS SYNTHETIC PESTICIDES
Clearly, the less we impact our environment, the better off we all are. Organic farming practices have greatly advanced the use of non-chemical means to control pests, as mentioned earlier.
Unfortunately, these non-chemical methods do not always provide enough protection, and it's necessary to use chemical pesticides. How do organic pesticides compare with conventional pesticides?
A recent study compared the effectiveness of a rotenone-pyrethrin mixture versus a synthetic pesticide, imidan. Rotenone and pyrethrin are two common organic pesticides; imidan is considered a "soft" synthetic pesticide (i.e., designed to have a brief lifetime after application, and other traits that minimize unwanted effects). It was found that up to 7 applications of the rotenone- pyrethrin mixture were required to obtain the level of protection provided by 2 applications of imidan.
It seems unlikely that 7 applications of rotenone and pyrethrin are really better for the environment than 2 applications of imidan , especially when rotenone is extremely toxic to fish and other aquatic life.
It should be noted, however, that we don't know for certain which system is more harmful. This is because we do not look at organic pesticides the same way that we look at conventional pesticides. We don't know how long these organic pesticides persist in the environment, or the full extent of their effects.
When you look at lists of pesticides allowed in organic agriculture, you find warnings such as, "Use with caution. The toxicological effects of [organic pesticide X] are largely unknown," or "Its persistence in the soil is unknown." Again, researchers haven't bothered to study the effects of organic pesticides because it is assumed that "natural" chemicals are automatically safe.
WHY HAVEN'T WE HEARD THIS BEFORE?
For obvious reasons, organic farmers have done little, if anything, to dispel the myth that "organic = chemical/pesticide-free". They would only stand to lose business by making such a disclosure.
Pesticide manufacturers have little concern in the matter. To them, "synthetic pesticides sold" and "organic pesticides sold" are both "pesticides sold".
Yes, organics is a $29 billion industry and still growing. Something is pulling us toward those organic veggies that are grown without synthetic pesticides or fertilizers.
But if you're thinking that organic produce will help you stay healthier, a new finding may come as a surprise. A new study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine finds scant evidence of health benefits from organic foods.
"There's a definite lack of evidence," says researcher Crystal Smith-Spangler at Stanford University School of Medicine, especially when it comes to studies of people.
She and her colleagues collected 200 peer-reviewed studies that examined differences between organic and conventional food, or the people who eat it.
A few of these studies followed people who were eating either organic or conventional food and looked for evidence that the choice made a difference in their health.
One study, for instance, looked at whether eating organic food while pregnant would influence the likelihood of eczema and other allergic conditions among children, and another looked at whether eating organic meat would influence the risk of a Campylobacter infection, a bacterial food-borne illness. When the researchers looked at the body of evidence, they found no clear benefits. But they say more research is needed.
A new large-scale study from Stanford University finds that when it comes to nutrition, organic foods, such as meat, dairy, and produce, may not be worth the extra cash. While organics come at a premium, researchers say they are no healthier and not significantly safer than conventional foods and produce grown with pesticides.
Organic foods can cost as much as a third more than conventional alternatives, with consumers shelling out the extra cash with the hopes of purchasing healthier, more nutrient-dense food.
"There isn't much difference between organic and conventional foods, if you're an adult and making a decision based solely on your health," stated researcher Dena Bravata.
In a review of thousands of papers, the researchers found that there was also no guarantee organic food would be pesticide-free, though it did have 30 percent lower levels compared to conventional products. Yet despite this, the review yielded scant evidence that conventional foods posed greater health risks than organic products. In addition, the researchers found that the pesticide levels of all foods generally fell within the allowable safety limits. Two studies of children consuming organic and conventional diets did find lower levels of pesticide residues in the urine of children on organic diets, though the significance of these findings on child health is unclear, noted the researchers.
The results of the study -- the largest review of its kind comparing organic to conventional foods -- were published September 4 in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.
" Some believe that organic food is always healthier and more nutritious," states co-researcher Crystal Smith-Spangler at Stanford's School of Medicine. "We were a little surprised that we didn't find that.
The question isn't whether or not organic food is better for you, the question is if food covered in pesticides causes cancer and the studies so far done says yes.
To me, it's not that it is more nutritious, it's that it is pesticide free. Using only natural substances doesn't mean doodley squat to me. After all, arsenic, mercury, and asbestos are natural substances. To me, it's all the chemicals that have yet to be tested that worries me.
The EPA has the budget to test about 56,000 new chemicals each year-- and there are about 260,000 new chemicals developed each year as pesticides. No way can they keep up. And you're right, there is a lot of "organic" stuff that isn't all that safe. The caution signs on these products are not warning that if you touch it, you die, but long term, heavy dosage exposure can have adverse effects on your health.
Then, the FDA, in their rush to get new medications out and about to the public, don't always do their due diligence, either. I remember when Yaz, etc., came out a few years ago. Best form of birth control ever. Now, all you see are advertisements for class action suits... A lot of "toxic" substances have medicinal value, if taken in tiny doses...
Just think, now we have neutered male mosquitos running around. From the company that gave us killer bees, we now have mosquitos that can't breed. That's a good thing, I guess. But what about the bats and birds that eat them? I personally feel we need to stop messing with the natural order of things and leave them be. Even noticed that azaleas don't have any odor these days? They've been genetically modified to be pretty, not smell fabulous... And all these new tomato types? They don't taste good. I could go on and on...
I grew organic tomatoes once. The deer ate all but one, and it fit into the palm of my hand, with fingers left over. It did taste good, and the deer thought so, too!!!
Hal
This was an interesting article. Thanks for posting.
Good article Hal.
You know that, a few years ago, an old ice cave/igloo melted that had a family in it-- and they had all died from the 1918 flu. It was a great find, because the virus was still alive and could still be studied.
Whatever diseases that somehow manage to survive the freezing and melting-- we're still here. We lived, as a species before and will continue to do so.
I'm not sure how the melting permafrost is warping the landscape, though. Through mass-wasting? Is it causing the soils and slip and slide over the ice? Just a hint: Mass wasting is everywhere. I have it in my front yard-- my front lawn is slowly sliding down the hill...
I'm not sure how the melting permafrost is warping the landscape, though.
This is one of the links in the article. Permafrost is largely composed of H2O. When it melts, it drains away.
‘The permafrost is dying’: Bethel sees increased shifting of roads and buildings
Yup. That's mass-wasting. (a geology term) Looks to me like a bit of soil creep...