Earth Day 1970 Predictions

[Guest]

In 1970 I was already a teeny greeny at less than ten years old. I'd pick up trash, turn off lights, adjust the temperature of the house and bring home injured or lost animals. I didn't even think about how accurate the global cooling scare was, but I jumped on that bandwagon too. We were taught about it in school in both science and current affairs classes and I never questioned it. Most of my science projects for quite a few years revolved around what was being reported as the truth. Whether the current predictions are true or not I don't know, ya know fool me once... but my habits won't change.

I do get terribly offended when people say if you don't fall for this new trend hook, line and sinker that you care nothing for the environment. First, you know nothing about how those people live and second, if you think insults are the way to influence people you are sadly mistaken.

Not talking to anyone in particular...it was just a general statement.

Its important to be at least slightly well informed of both sides of the argument before making declarative statements. Most skeptics here are not and it is painfully obvious that where they get their information - and its not scientists.

I started out in the same way as Doug, I read the Oregan petition and set out to convince myself that Global warming was a fraud and conspiracy. I was a skeptic for at least two years until the cracks started to show. It cured my of my tendency to believe CT's at face value and made me a bit militant about confronting the lies which I had fallen for myself. It helped to go through a scientific degree which equipped me with the skills to assess the likelihood of scientific theories.

Br Cornelius

Edited April 23, 2013 by Guest

[Michelle]

I similarly grew up in the 1970's and only remember one report from the TV about Global Cooling. It was a spoof news program for April fools day which also had a slot about Life on Mars (moles, grass, trees, etc). I remember it vividly because it really convinced me until I realized it was an April Fools joke. I don't remember any other report of Global Cooling from my years living through the seventies.

Br Cornelius

Different countries or maybe you just weren't paying attention? I can still watch reruns of old TV shows, that make references to it, if they were known to make poignant political statements mixed in with the comedy.

[Michelle]

Its important to be at least slightly well informed of both sides of the argument before making declarative statements. Most skeptics here are not and it is painfully obvious that where they get their information - and its not scientists.

I started out in the same way as Doug, I read the Oregan petition and set out to convince myself that Global warming was a fraud and conspiracy. I was a skeptic for at least two years until the cracks started to show. It cured my of my tendency to believe CT's at face value and made me a bit militant about confronting the lies which I had fallen for myself. It helped to go through a scientific degree which equipped me with the skills to assess the likelihood of scientific theories.

Br Cornelius

To people that don't have a science degree, which most of us do not, one looks as credible as the other. That is, I believe, who you are trying to convice. To us, it is a theory that has yet to be proven or seen.

[Doug1029]

Different countries or maybe you just weren't paying attention? I can still watch reruns of old TV shows, that make references to it, if they were known to make poignant political statements mixed in with the comedy.

I recall reading about an "impending ice age" back in the 60s. As I recall, it reported that there had been a recent downturn in temps and asked "Is this the beginning of a new ice age?" It said that full development of an ice sheet would take around 3000 years, so I decided not to lose any sleep over it. But even then, I realized that temperatures go up and temperatures go down and that this wasn't anything to worry about.

And I don't recall anybody getting upset about it, or making any predictions that such a thing would actually happen.

Doug

[Guest]

Different countries or maybe you just weren't paying attention? I can still watch reruns of old TV shows, that make references to it, if they were known to make poignant political statements mixed in with the comedy.

I think the reality is that there were a couple of paleogeologists who succumbed to an over zealous interpretation of the milankovich cycles based on some flawed calculation (the theory was still been tested and refined) . It was a sensational story which caught the media's attention - until more sober minds brought in the other factors at play which they had largely ignored. In a sense they were right because the milankovich cycles definitely do predict a new ice age, but current best thinking says that it would have been arriving in about 20K years if the current warming event hadn't have intervened.

Br Cornelius

Edited April 23, 2013 by Guest

[Guest]

To people that don't have a science degree, which most of us do not, one looks as credible as the other. That is, I believe, who you are trying to convice. To us, it is a theory that has yet to be proven or seen.

Only if you willfully ignore and deform the evidence. It doesn't take a degree to read scientific papers (but it certainly helps) but most people simply prefer to receive their knowledge predigested for them - which leaves them wide open to fraud.

Br Cornelius

[Michelle]

I recall reading about an "impending ice age" back in the 60s. As I recall, it reported that there had been a recent downturn in temps and asked "Is this the beginning of a new ice age?" It said that full development of an ice sheet would take around 3000 years, so I decided not to lose any sleep over it. But even then, I realized that temperatures go up and temperatures go down and that this wasn't anything to worry about.

And I don't recall anybody getting upset about it, or making any predictions that such a thing would actually happen.

Doug

I take it with a grain of salt like I did then. We can only do what we can do...the rest is up to Mother Nature.

[Doug1029]

I do get terribly offended when people say if you don't fall for this new trend hook, line and sinker that you care nothing for the environment. First, you know nothing about how those people live and second, if you think insults are the way to influence people you are sadly mistaken.

On the subject of insults: for some reason, these threads seem to attract a lot of that.

Might I remind everybody that ridiculing a person's opinion, then pretending to be offended when they refer to you as "a right-wing lunatic" or some other pejorative term, is extremely hypocritical. If you don't want to attract such insults, don't go fishing for them.

I will do my best to avoid such offenses in the future, but this is a difficult place to do so.

Doug

[Michelle]

Only if you willfully ignore and deform the evidence. It doesn't take a degree to read scientific papers (but it certainly helps) but most people simply prefer to receive their knowledge predigested for them - which leaves them wide open to fraud.

Br Cornelius

Thank you...

[Guest]

A survey of the scientific literature has found that between 1965 and 1979, 44 scientific papers predicted warming, 20 were neutral and just 7 predicted cooling. So while predictions of cooling got more media attention, the majority of scientists were predicting warming even then.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11643-climate-myths-they-predicted-global-cooling-in-the-1970s.html

Br Cornelius

[Merc14]

Merc you've shown yourself to be grossly ignorant of even the basics of climate science so I hardly think you are qualified to comment in any meaningful way about climate science.

Here is a summary of what the scientists really believed about the climate back in the 1970's;

http://www.skeptical...al-cooling.html

And a scientific paper (prepublication published) performing a complete literary review of the myth of global cooling concensus;

http://ams.confex.co...pers/131047.pdf

Br Cornelius

Thanks for your opinion. As usual it will be ignored but I thought I'd respond since you spent sooo much time replying to this thread and bringing up everything and anything accept how silly the gurus of your culture were back in 1970. Guess I hit a nerve here but don't let being wrong stop you, it never has before.

Edited April 24, 2013 by Merc14

[Guest]

Thanks for your opinion. As usual it will be ignored but I thought I'd respond since you spent sooo much time replying to this thread and bringing up everything and anything accept how silly the gurus of your culture were back in 1970. Guess I hit a nerve here but don't let being wrong stop you, it never has before.

I supplied you with some information, not just opinion - are you going to ignore that to ?

Let the science lead you - not the guru's

Br Cornelius

Edited April 24, 2013 by Guest

[Doug1029]

Thanks for your opinion. As usual it will be ignored but I thought I'd respond since you spent sooo much time replying to this thread and bringing up everything and anything accept how silly the gurus of your culture were back in 1970. Guess I hit a nerve here but don't let being wrong stop you, it never has before.

Post # 33:

Might I remind everybody that ridiculing a person's opinion, then pretending to be offended when they refer to you as "a right-wing lunatic" or some other pejorative term, is extremely hypocritical. If you don't want to attract such insults, don't go fishing for them.

Merc: Go easy on the flamebaiting. If you don't want to collect backlash and insults, quit handing them out.

Doug

[jbondo]

Although these men are typically wrong, based on their predictions, it would seem they will only need to be right once for total devastation.

[Guest]

Although these men are typically wrong, based on their predictions, it would seem they will only need to be right once for total devastation.

the science was very primitive back then and the proportion of people who predicted the correct course of events within the scientific community were five times more common than those who got it wrong.

However those who got it wrong were at least partially correct;

-they knew that the milankovich cycles were predicting a return to ice age, but the calculations were not accurate enough at that stage to say when. Milankovich cycles are an aspect of astronomy and those working in that field at that time were not expected to know about the influence of greenhouse gases on the overall climate cycle - they made their predictions in relative isolation.

-there was, and still is, a cooling influence of particulates. This had a very significant effect through the first half of the 20th century as dirty industry dominated. The balance of warming from greenhouse gases vs cooling from particulates was as yet unquantified and allowed for people to take a position either way. The issue was only resolved as more data was collected and applied to quantifying the net effect.

It is only from the 1990's onwards where all of these different fields of research were brough together to resolve the issue of what the climate was likely to do in the future.

Br Cornelius

[Doug1029]

Although these men are typically wrong, based on their predictions, it would seem they will only need to be right once for total devastation.

Back in the 70s we knew a lot less about climate than we know now. Predictions made in the 70s and 80s are pretty much irrelevant now.

What is of concern is that we might be approaching a threshold, perhaps one we don't even know about. The difference in global mean temperatures between the 1950s and now is only about 0.3 degrees C. But that is enough to keep Lake Erie from freezing over. And that means the lake's surface is absorbing a lot more sunlight (heat) than it was in the 1940s. The same is happening to the Arctic Ocean on a larger scale. That same 0.3 degrees was enough to get us over the threshold. We have now entrained the melt-off of Arctic sea ice, something we cannot stop.

Many people think of climate change as a slow, incremental thing, and so far, that's what it has been - this time. But as a threshold is crossed, change can be rapid and devastating. At the end of the Younger Dryas (10,660 yBP) the climate went from full glacial conditions to warm, balmy Holocene in four years. In Greenland, snowfall levels made the change in just two years; the entire process took about 40 years. When it comes, it is likely to be sudden.

Past climate shifts have been accompanied by a "flickering" of weather patterns as the threshold was crossed. Several years of drought, followed by several years of heavy rains, followed by several years of drought again, the cycle repeating until the climate system settled into its new "normal." That "flickering" appears to be what we're seeing with the "wild weather" that has been happening since 2008. And that appears to be the result of reduced ice levels in the Arctic.

Many of the earth's natural systems exist in a precarious balance. Most trees world-wide live under a permanent moisture stress condition. A little bit dryer and whole forests die. Example: the loss of 200,000 acres of pinyons in the Four Corners area is only a small part of a four-state dieoff and the mountain pine beetle epidemic in British Columbia is killing billions of dollars of ponderosa pine.

The Great Lakes have a precarious water balance. The water that flows over Niagara Falls is the difference between what fell in the Upper Lakes as rain and what evaporated. Lake St. Clair actually went dry during the Altithermal and Lake Erie was reduced to two large puddles (Lakes Ypsilanti). Beneath the Mackinaw Bridge is an underwater canyon eroded during the Altithermal when Lakes Michigan and Huron were a couple hundred feet lower. It wouldn't take a big change in average rainfall to tip them past the point of no return. 2007 set new record low-water levels for the lakes and the situation is still serious.

Another big concern is that a slight increase in ocean temperatures, or a shift in ocean circulation could result in warming of methane deposits in the ocean deeps. Additional methane release means more carbon in the atmosphere, means more warming, means warmer sea water, means more methane release, etc. At that point, warming becomes self-sustaining.

Will this happen? The most we can say is that it could. But with all the uncertainties, we just don't know.

Doug

Edited April 24, 2013 by Doug1029

[jbondo]

Back in the 70s we knew a lot less about climate than we know now. Predictions made in the 70s and 80s are pretty much irrelevant now.

What is of concern is that we might be approaching a threshold, perhaps one we don't even know about. The difference in global mean temperatures between the 1950s and now is only about 0.3 degrees C. But that is enough to keep Lake Erie from freezing over. And that means the lake's surface is absorbing a lot more sunlight (heat) than it was in the 1940s. The same is happening to the Arctic Ocean on a larger scale. That same 0.3 degrees was enough to get us over the threshold. We have now entrained the melt-off of Arctic sea ice, something we cannot stop.

Past climate shifts have been accompanied by a "flickering" of weather patterns as the threshold was crossed. Several years of drought, followed by several years of heavy rains, followed by several years of drought again, the cycle repeating until the climate system settled into its new "normal." That "flickering" appears to be what we're seeing with the "wild weather" that has been happening since 2008. And that appears to be the result of reduced ice levels in the Arctic.

Many of the earth's natural systems exist in a precarious balance. Most trees world-wide live under a permanent moisture stress condition. A little bit dryer and whole forests die. Example: the loss of 200,000 acres of pinyons in the Four Corners area is only a small part of a four-state dieoff and the mountain pine beetle epidemic in British Columbia is killing billions of dollars of ponderosa pine.

The Great Lakes have a precarious water balance. The water that flows over Niagara Falls is the difference between what fell in the Upper Lakes as rain and what evaporated. Lake St. Clair actually went dry during the Altithermal and Lake Erie was reduced to two large puddles (Lakes Ypsilanti). Beneath the Mackinaw Bridge is an underwater canyon eroded during the Altithermal when Lakes Michigan and Huron were a couple hundred feet lower. It wouldn't take a big change in average rainfall to tip them past the point of no return. 2007 set new record low-water levels for the lakes and the situation is still serious.

Another big concern is that a slight increase in ocean temperatures, or a shift in ocean circulation could result in warming of methane deposits in the ocean deeps. Additional methane release means more carbon in the atmosphere, means more warming, means warmer sea water, means more methane release, etc. At that point, warming becomes self-sustaining.

Will this happen? The most we can say is that it could. But with all the uncertainties, we just don't know.

Doug

Doug, you are absolutely correct and I have spent many hours studying climate change from an independent perspective. My findings indicate the same result every time. Frankly, I'm getting tired of laying it all out for everyone. What I will say is this:

1. The planet is warming

2. It is warming at breakneck speed and getting faster

3. We are likely not going to be able to stop the negative ramifications

4. We are the reason for this accelerated effect

It may take another generation before it all hits the critical point (actually, I'd call it critical right now) and the scary part is that the Sht might hit the fan so fast and hard that most will be blind sided by it. Especially those who are still in denial.

By the way, I'm a pretty conservative person, but anyone with a sense of logic can easily see this is happening just by taking their blinders off and using their God given senses.

[Merc14]

Oh good lord, this thread is still going? I knew I shouldn't have brought up the '70's. Br Cornelius, the answer is yes.

[Merc14]

Doug, you are absolutely correct and I have spent many hours studying climate change from an independent perspective. My findings indicate the same result every time. Frankly, I'm getting tired of laying it all out for everyone. What I will say is this:

1. The planet is warming

2. It is warming at breakneck speed and getting faster

3. We are likely not going to be able to stop the negative ramifications

4. We are the reason for this accelerated effect

It may take another generation before it all hits the critical point (actually, I'd call it critical right now) and the scary part is that the Sht might hit the fan so fast and hard that most will be blind sided by it. Especially those who are still in denial.

By the way, I'm a pretty conservative person, but anyone with a sense of logic can easily see this is happening just by taking their blinders off and using their God given senses.

What about this, from your independent perspective

http://www.thegwpf.org/russian-scientists-we-face-cooling-period-200-250-years/

[Guest]

What about this, from your independent perspective

http://www.thegwpf.o...-200-250-years/

Yuri Nagovitsy who's quote this op-ed is based on is not a climate skeptic and accepts the reality of AGW caused by greenhouse gases. To place the global cooling meme into context this is what he says about it and the use of his science to bolster belief in it;

"Solar activity is one of the most complicated scientific issues. And suddenly someone, who has never studied climate before, starts making statements. I want to stress that this theory is neither the official theory of the Pulkovo observatory nor of the Commission on Climate Changes Studies at St. Petersburg Research Center."

-Yuri Nagovitsy

Thats a fairly explicit distancing himself from the myth that we are about to enter a new ice age brough on by solar activity and the use of his science to support such a myth.

He then goes on to estimate the total contribution of solar activity to climate change;

"The share of solar activity in climate change is only 20%"

-- Yuri Nagovitsy

You should make more of an effort to avoid using biased sources who actively distort what the scientists are saying about their work.

Br Cornelius

[Merc14]

THE AGW meme seems to be "Everyone but us is an idiot." Anyways, let's put the whole of his statement here rather than your cherry-picked few lines

“Journalists say the entire process is very simple: once solar activity declines, the temperature drops. But besides solar activity, the climate is influenced by other factors, including the lithosphere, the atmosphere, the ocean, the glaciers. The share of solar activity in climate change is only 20%. This means that sun’s activity could trigger certain changes whereas the actual climate changing process takes place on the Earth”.

Solar activity follows different cycles, including an 11-year cycle, a 90-year cycle and a 200-year cycle. Yuri Nagovitsyn comments.

“Evidently, solar activity is on the decrease. The 11-year cycle doesn’t bring about considerable climate change – only 1-2%. The impact of the 200-year cycle is greater – up to 50%. In this respect, we could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250 years. The period of low solar activity could start in 2030-2040 but it won’t be as pervasive as in the late 17th century”.

Why did you leave those vital few words out Br?

[Doug1029]

What about this, from your independent perspective

http://www.thegwpf.o...-200-250-years/

Solar observations began on December 8, 1610 with Galileo's first sunspot count.. They were hit-or-miss for the next 150 years and the observational system was not standardized until 1848. That leaves us 164 years of direct, accurate observations. Before 1848, sunspot counts do not match up with estimates based on proxies; thus, there is reason to be suspicious of the earlier counts.

The Fourier model is one of the hardest to fit, yet that's the one we must rely on in determining any sort of period. We have plenty of data to check out that "11-year" period. We have almost two complete 90-year cycles. But that 250-year cycle sounds suspicious to me. We don't have enough data to measure that accurately.

Another thought: I noticed some discrepancies in tree-ring data between actual periods and that "11-year period." So I checked the sunspot counts for autocorrelation. That maximized for a 9-year period - exactly what the tree-rings were predicting. The tree rings also show an unexplained 16-year cycle. There is clearly something wrong with that "11-year period," but at this point, I don't know what it is.

I submit that solar cycles are a lot less well-known than anybody would like and that there is plenty of room for doubt in predictions about what the sun is going to do.

Doug

[Guest]

THE AGW meme seems to be "Everyone but us is an idiot." Anyways, let's put the whole of his statement here rather than your cherry-picked few lines

“Journalists say the entire process is very simple: once solar activity declines, the temperature drops. But besides solar activity, the climate is influenced by other factors, including the lithosphere, the atmosphere, the ocean, the glaciers. The share of solar activity in climate change is only 20%. This means that sun’s activity could trigger certain changes whereas the actual climate changing process takes place on the Earth”.

Solar activity follows different cycles, including an 11-year cycle, a 90-year cycle and a 200-year cycle. Yuri Nagovitsyn comments.

“Evidently, solar activity is on the decrease. The 11-year cycle doesn’t bring about considerable climate change – only 1-2%. The impact of the 200-year cycle is greater – up to 50%. In this respect, we could be in for a cooling period that lasts 200-250 years. The period of low solar activity could start in 2030-2040 but it won’t be as pervasive as in the late 17th century”.

Why did you leave those vital few words out Br?

I quoted the scientist - you quoted the journalist interpreting the scientist.

There's a big difference in credibility there.

Its only stupid to fall for lies and misrepresentations, its not stupid to have a well argued position which differs from your own. Until you start to use credible primary sources you will appear an idiot more times than not.

Br Cornelius

[Merc14]

SI submit that solar cycles are a lot less well-known than anybody would like and that there is plenty of room for doubt in predictions about what the sun is going to do.

Doug

Just as there is a lot less lknown about many of the other factors affecting our atmosphere that are built into models. Be careful of tree ring data as well, remember there that it was discovered, during climatgate, that they were using very specific tree rings that fit their models and rejected the rest that didn't.

[Merc14]

I quoted the scientist - you quoted the journalist interpreting the scientist.

There's a big difference in credibility there.

Its only stupid to fall for lies and misrepresentations, its not stupid to have a well argued position which differs from your own. Until you start to use credible primary sources you will appear an idiot more times than not.

Br Cornelius

Do a reread, those are his words (note the quoatation marks). You're a cheerry picker, sorry.

BTW, it's fun reading all the nasty names you are calling me, must mean I am infuriating you. Keep up the anger and the dripping with hubris replies, it proves my point regarding he sanctimony of the AGW crowd wonderfully.