IPCC - Seas To Rise Between 28 - 43cm In Next Century

[BRUCE]

Reuters Reports:

More snows could also offset any thaw of the vast Antarctic ice cap and the smaller cap on Greenland. If both melted over thousands of years world sea levels would be about 65 metres (around 215 ft) higher than today

“In a warmer climate, models suggest that the ice sheets could accumulate more snowfall, tending to lower sea level,” the draft says. But it adds that rapid thawing at the fringes has probably outweighed any such trend in recent years.

“In the interior of Greenland, the ice has been thickening,” said Catherine Myrmehl, of the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center in Norway, based upon satellite readings. Many scientists reckon Greenland is losing ice overall.

The IPCC is likely to predict a “best estimate” of a temperature rise of 3 Celsius (5.4 Fahrenheit) by 2100 over pre-industrial times. And it is set to predict sea level rises this century of between 28 and 43 cms (11-17 inches), a lower band than forecast in the 2001 report.

So where is this '60-100 metre rise' we're being doom-forecasted?

Oh, and some interesting news on Greenland and Antarctica, right?

[240 is Back]

Bruce, I thought you were campaigning on the belief that the water would be shrinking due to the thickening ice caps? 

At this point, is your argument "Yes, the water is rising, but not too fast"?

[BRUCE]

Bruce, I thought you were campaigning on the belief that the water would be shrinking due to the thickening ice caps? 

At this point, is your argument "Yes, the water is rising, but not too fast"?

Really, I said that the water is 'shrinking', as you put it? Please direct me to where I made that claim, otherwise apologise for making the remark.  I'm sure you'll do neither.

At this point, my argument it, the evidence is suggesting strongly that your claims of a '60 metre rise' are greatly exaggerated.  I, on the other hand, refuse to make wide-sweeping predictions on the incredibly complex environment.

So, having said that, do you actually refute any of my post, or shall I assume you have lost the debate?

[240 is Back]

Really, I said that the water is 'shrinking', as you put it? Please direct me to where I made that claim, otherwise apologise for making the remark.  I'm sure you'll do neither.

At this point, my argument it, the evidence is suggesting strongly that your claims of a '60 metre rise' are greatly exaggerated.  I, on the other hand, refuse to make wide-sweeping predictions on the incredibly complex environment.

So, having said that, do you actually refute any of my post, or shall I assume you have lost the debate?

i dont really give a shit about winning or losing, i am just here to learn. 

where are you on global warming? 

not shrinking- dropping.  you mentioned the thickening of the ice caps - that would mean less water in the sea, and dropping water levels, right?

are you now saying yes, it's rising, but not that fast?

[BRUCE]

i dont really give a shit about winning or losing, i am just here to learn. 

where are you on global warming? 

not shrinking- dropping.  you mentioned the thickening of the ice caps - that would mean less water in the sea, and dropping water levels, right?

are you now saying yes, it's rising, but not that fast?

'Shrinking' was your choice of words, not mine.  And I see you have chosen to do neither of my options, as I predicted of you.

Anyway, here's where I stand, for your benefit:

I tend to think the environment is an incredibly difficult system to predict, beyond even our best scientists’ level of prediction at this stage.  However, I point this report out because of your double standard to buy into the worst (i.e. your best) forecasts, and ignore the best (i.e. above).

As you may have noticed, I am conservative - not neo-conservative as others may allege - and yes there is a difference.  I don't rule out man-made global warming entirely, but I have a healthy level of scepticism towards it, based on the evidence laid out before us.

You, on the other hand, dive head first right into those rising sea-levels you like to imagine, so to speak.  I find it hard to believe you can look at information like I have given you above, and not concede you are behaving with a degree of hysteria on this issue.  Calm down and look at the facts, then use a cool dose of reason, and moderate your view a little.  Stop making outlandish claims and doomsday predictions, and you'll find I have less opportunity to point out where you're wrong.

[ieffinhatecardio]

'Shrinking' was your choice of words, not mine.  And I see you have chosen to do neither of my options, as I predicted of you.

Anyway, here's where I stand, for your benefit:

I tend to think the environment is an incredibly difficult system to predict, beyond even our best scientists’ level of prediction at this stage.  However, I point this report out because of your double standard to buy into the worst (i.e. your best) forecasts, and ignore the best (i.e. above).

As you may have noticed, I am conservative - not neo-conservative as others may allege - and yes there is a difference.  I don't rule out man-made global warming entirely, but I have a healthy level of scepticism towards it, based on the evidence laid out before us.

You, on the other hand, dive head first right into those rising sea-levels you like to imagine, so to speak.  I find it hard to believe you can look at information like I have given you above, and not concede you are behaving with a degree of hysteria on this issue.  Calm down and look at the facts, then use a cool dose of reason, and moderate your view a little.  Stop making outlandish claims and doomsday predictions, and you'll find I have less opportunity to point out where you're wrong.

Wow, a rationale post from a Conservative. Any chance you can have a little influence on Mr. I?

By the way, I tend to be a bit skeptical myself because of the hysteria certain factions use although from a strictly gut level way of thinking it's pretty hard to dismiss that the amount of pollutants we produce don't have at least some kind of negative effect on the atmosphere.

[BRUCE]

Wow, a rationale post from a Conservative. Any chance you can have a little influence on Mr. I?

By the way, I tend to be a bit skeptical myself because of the hysteria certain factions use although from a strictly gut level way of thinking it's pretty hard to dismiss that the amount of pollutants we produce don't have at least some kind of negative effect on the atmosphere.

True conservatives have always taken such a position on complex and debated matters.  To draw definite conclusions from such conjecture is called belief, and is based on faith rather than facts.  Genuine conservatives never indulge in such things.

[240 is Back]

Good points, bruce! I applaud you.

and is based on faith rather than facts.  Genuine conservatives never indulge in such things.

Bush talked to God before invading Iraq.

But not Rumsfeld or bush Sr.

[ieffinhatecardio]

True conservatives have always taken such a position on complex and debated matters.  To draw definite conclusions from such conjecture is called belief, and is based on faith rather than facts.  Genuine conservatives never indulge in such things.

Any chance you can define exactly what a "true conservative" is because I've seen, heard and read a lot of what I thought were "true conservatives" and not many of them were as you stated. Not that this board is a bastion of "true conservatives" but nearly all of the conservatives here don't debate that way. They seem to do nothing more than spew party line rhetoric.

Not that many of the liberals here do anything different.

[240 is Back]

there are no "true conservatives" because the party is split.

Neocons and Moderates.  The two current types of Republicans.

Neocons = support bush 100% on everything.
Moderates = support bush on less than 100%.

Just because one doesn't believe a 92k troop swell over 5 years will work, DOES NOT make them a liberal.

[ieffinhatecardio]

there are no "true conservatives" because the party is split.

Neocons and Moderates.  The two current types of Republicans.

Neocons = support bush 100% on everything.
Moderates = support bush on less than 100%.

Just because one doesn't believe a 92k troop swell over 5 years will work, DOES NOT make them a liberal.

Did you see this post?

True conservatives have always taken such a position on complex and debated matters.  To draw definite conclusions from such conjecture is called belief, and is based on faith rather than facts.  Genuine conservatives never indulge in such things.

[BRUCE]

there are no "true conservatives" because the party is split.

Neocons and Moderates.  The two current types of Republicans.

Neocons = support bush 100% on everything.
Moderates = support bush on less than 100%.

Just because one doesn't believe a 92k troop swell over 5 years will work, DOES NOT make them a liberal.

What an awful generalisation.  What does being conservative have to do with the Republican party being split?

[BRUCE]

Any chance you can define exactly what a "true conservative" is because I've seen, heard and read a lot of what I thought were "true conservatives" and not many of them were as you stated. Not that this board is a bastion of "true conservatives" but nearly all of the conservatives here don't debate that way. They seem to do nothing more than spew party line rhetoric.

Not that many of the liberals here do anything different.

Thanks for your post, I think it's interesting that many of the people defined on here as 'conservative' are actually not so by its definition.  Here's a good excerpt I was able to find that I think covers it quite well.  The article is written by Michael Gove and the comments therein are by Andrew Bolt:

The durability of Conservatism has depended, to a great extent, on it being a disposition rather than a philosophy. What marks Conservatives out, across the generations, and whatever the environment they operate in, is an attitude of mind rather than an adherence to dogma. And that disposition — sceptical, cautious, pragmatic, sensitive to the local and the particular — has been politically successful because it has been in tune with human nature.

Neo-conservatism, on the other hand, is more of a philosophy than a disposition, and with the dangers that brings. That’s why, of course, it appeals more to former Leftists than does conservatism of the old kind.

Read on for Gove’s welcoming of a split from the mainstream Left of people of principle:

This week sees the publication of one of the most powerful denunciations of the manner in which the Left has lost its way. Nick Cohen’s What’s Left? scrupulously anatomises the way in which anti-Americanism, and the doctrine that my enemy’s enemy is my friend, has driven people whose political inspiration was a belief in progress to make excuses for forces that are trying to use murder to propel us back into the Dark Ages…

The positions taken by Hitchens, Cohen and others in the press have, more recently, been reinforced by the bravery of other writers who have risked placing themselves outside literary London’s comfort zone by being brave enough to reject the moral relativism of so many on the left. Ian McEwan, Martin Amis and, of course, Salman Rushdie have all argued, in different ways, that
Islamism is a totalitarian ideology, like fascism and communism before it, which seeks to deny human freedom. McEwan has denounced the way in which the Left is ‘morally selective’ in its outrage, denouncing America with greater fervour than it can ever muster for criticising the record of Saddam or the Taleban. Amis has been typically fearless in attacking those ‘people of
liberal sympathies, stupefied by relativism, who have become the apologists for a creedal wave that is racist, misogynist, homophobic, imperialist and genocidal’.

[Hedgehog]

The very fact that the oceans will rise, and the temperature will rise by 3 degrees isn't very uplifting.

And that's the best case scenario.

This is, if we react, and do something about it.

-Hedge

[240 is Back]

The very fact that the oceans will rise, and the temperature will rise by 3 degrees isn't very uplifting.

And that's the best case scenario.

This is, if we react, and do something about it.

-Hedge

Do you think the new research group, composed of the top 9 industrial firms and approved by Bush, will be able to solve the problem?

[Hedgehog]

Do you think the new research group, composed of the top 9 industrial firms and approved by Bush, will be able to solve the problem?

There will be a new person in office in only a little while, and regardless if it is a Republican or a Democrat, he/she is bound to take the Climate problem seriously.

Bush is in the hands of the oil lobby. There are several Republicans who represents the farming lobby and farming states, those will push very hard for an increase of alternative fuels.

Just because you believe the Bush Aristocracy and the oil lobby got to go, doesn't mean you're not a Republican.

-Hedge

[240 is Back]

Just because you believe the Bush Aristocracy and the oil lobby got to go, doesn't mean you're not a Republican.

But does attacking Bush's oil policy embolden the terrorists?

Does attacking the $40B profits of Exxon Mobil in 2006 make one a liberal?

Is it possible to disagree with Bush on something and still be a Republican?

If yo're anti Exxon, are you a traitor?

[Hedgehog]

But does attacking Bush's oil policy embolden the terrorists?

Does attacking the $40B profits of Exxon Mobil in 2006 make one a liberal?

Is it possible to disagree with Bush on something and still be a Republican?

If yo're anti Exxon, are you a traitor?

Rhetorical questions.

I think you sometimes push that rhetoric a bit too far, but this time it puts a perspective on things IMO, just my opinion of course.

Party politics are different in the USA from over here in Europe. Here, a politician is synonymous with his party, ie Angela Merkel will only push the agenda that she has support for in her party (CDU/CSU), the same with Tony Blair. In the USA a politician is much more free in his role, and will have an obligation to those voting in his district first and foremost, his supporters.

In Europe, the Prime Minister is often also the Party Leader.

This is never the case in the USA.

This is an interesting difference, and also why there is hope for a Republican President despite the bad run Bush has had the last couple of years in office.

-Hedge

[240 is Back]

yeah, the positions here are almost parodies of real positions at this point.

many republicans (and many here) won't even defend Bush's policies or decisions anymore.  THey will bash liberals, and clinton is a favorite topic.

I think it's akin to bailing your own kid out of jail.  You just want the day to pass, you don't want to talk about it, you're embarassed and let down, and if the neighbor asks about it, your response will be "well look at what YOUR kid did 9 years ago!"



The neocons are pathetic and the smart ones are leaving govt to work for the defense contractors they've hooked up for the last 6 years.  Pilferage is coming to a close. 

[Camel Jockey]

Does this mean more beachfront property? 

[ieffinhatecardio]

According to this story by the AP there's a 90% certainty that global warming is caused by humans.


By SETH BORENSTEIN

(AP) Dr Rajendra K Pachauri, of India, chairs the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change conference...
Full Image

PARIS (AP) - The most authoritative report on climate change is using the strongest wording ever on the source of global warming, saying it is "very likely" caused by humans and already is leading to killer heat waves and stronger hurricanes, delegates who have seen the report said Thursday.

Dozens of scientists and bureaucrats from 113 countries are editing the new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in closed-door meetings in Paris. Their report, which must be unanimously approved, is to be released Friday and is considered an authoritative document that could influence government and industrial policy worldwide.

Three participants said the group approved the term "very likely" in Thursday's sessions. That means they agree that there is a 90 percent chance that global warming is caused by humans.

"That is a big move. I hope it is a powerful statement," said Jan Pretel, head of the department of climate change at the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute.

"I hope that policymakers will be quite convinced by this message," said Riibeta Abeta, a delegate from the island nation Kiribati, which is worried about overrun by rising seas. "The purpose is to get them moving."

The last report, in 2001, said global warming was "likely" caused by human activity. There had been speculation that the participants might try to change the wording this time to "virtually certain," which means a 99 percent chance.

The U.S. government delegation was not one of the more vocal groups in the debate over the "very likely" statement for man-made warming, said other countries' officials. However, several officials credited the head of the panel session, Susan Solomon, a top U.S. government climate scientist, with pushing through the agreement in just 90 minutes.

The Bush administration acknowledges that global warming is man-made and a problem that must be dealt with, Bush science adviser Jack Marburger told The Associated Press late last year.

The Chinese delegation was resistant to strong wording on global warming, said Barbados delegate Leonard Fields and Zimbabwe delegate Washington Zhakata.

(AP) Greenpeace activists display banners, one showing a thermometer, on the Eiffel Tower in Paris,...
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China has increasingly turned to fossil fuels, which emit the greenhouse gases blamed for boosting the Earth's temperature, to feed its huge and growing energy needs. The Chinese also asked the panel to remove the official definition of "very likely" from the text.

The report will also say that global warming has made stronger hurricanes, including those on the Atlantic Ocean such as 2005's Katrina, according to Fields and other delegates.

They said the panel approved language saying an increase in hurricane and tropical cyclone strength since 1970 "more likely than not" can be attributed to man-made global warming.

The panel did note that the increase in stronger storms differs in various parts of the globe, but that the storms that strike the Americas are global warming-influenced.

In 2001, the same panel had said there was not enough evidence to make such a conclusion.

(AP) Greenpeace activists display a banner on the Eiffel Tower as scientists from around the world...
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This week's report will also mark departure from a November 2006 statement by the World Meteorological Organization, which helped found the IPCC. The meteorological organization, after contentious debate, said it could not link past stronger storms to global warming.

Fields - of Barbados, a country in the path of many hurricanes - said the new wording was "very important. ... Insurance companies watch the language too."

The delegates, staring at a countdown clock showing how little time they have left before Friday's deadline, went into Thursday's talks well behind schedule and planned a late-night session.

A draft of the report predicts a temperature increase of between 2.5 to 10.4 degrees by the year 2100, although that could be adjusted.

Another contentious issue is predictions of sea level rise. Scientists are trying to incorporate concerns that their early drafts underestimate how much the sea level will rise by 2100 because they cannot predict how much ice will melt from Greenland and Antarctica.

(AP) Greenpeace activists display a banner on the Eiffel Tower as scientists from around the world...
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In early drafts, scientists predicted a sea level rise of no more than 23 inches by 2100, but that does not include the ice sheet melts.

The report is being edited in English, then must be translated into five other languages. It will be a 12-15 page summary for policymakers in most of the world's countries.

As the delegates hold their evening session, the Eiffel Tower, other Paris monuments and concerned citizens in several European countries were expected to switch off their lights for five minutes to call attention to energy conservation, heeding a call by French environmental campaigners.

Some experts said that while well-intentioned, turning the lights out could actually consume more energy than it would conserve by requiring a power spike when the lights turn back on - possibly causing brownouts or even blackouts.

[240 is Back]

Ya want to know what's weird?  Generally...

Scientists with nothing to gain say global warming is caused by man.

Scientists commissioned by large corporations say it's NOT caused by man.

Hello, motivation?

[OzmO]

Ya want to know what's weird?  Generally...

Scientists with nothing to gain say global warming is caused by man.

Scientists commissioned by large corporations say it's NOT caused by man.

Hello, motivation?

This is a no-brainer to me. 

Why isn't it to others?

Why has it beocme a politcal issue?

It's a scientific issue!

The question is not "if" the quesiton is "when"

We cannot continue to increasingly blow shit into our atmoshpere as our population increases and not have anything happen. 

[OzmO]

and can someone answer this question for me:

In the ealry 70's when i was a kid i never ever used sun block....ever  and i never ever got burned.

But now, geez,  if i'm out more than a couple of hours in the sun i get burned. 

[a_joker10]

and can someone answer this question for me:

In the ealry 70's when i was a kid i never ever used sun block....ever  and i never ever got burned.

But now, geez,  if i'm out more than a couple of hours in the sun i get burned. 

Global Warming and sunburns are unrelated. You would want to look at Ozone depletion for your answer.