View slideshow of all images." data-pin-do="buttonBookmark">
ANTARCTIC ICE MELT: Some of the massive glaciers in Antarctica, such as Marr Ice Piedmont pictured here, are thinning and racing to the sea at a faster rate. Some ice shelves, such as Larsen B, have disintegrated altogether. View slideshow of all images.
Image: © 2007 BY GARY BRAASCH
Glacier National Park in the U.S. may soon lose the reason for its name. Spring comes earlier in the high reaches of the Arctic. And 11 of the last 12 years rank among the warmest since record keeping began in 1850.
Climate change has become not only a problem for future generations but a current event that portends catastrophe. The effects of global warming can be seen in retreating glaciers, threatened animals and plants as well as rising seas. Addressing the problem will require humanity to both cut back on the greenhouse gas emissions that warm our world and adapt to a climate that is already in a state of flux, according to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The need for smart solutions is already evident. It can be seen in the following images, captured largely by photographer Gary Braasch and published in his book Earth Under Fire: How Global Warming Is Changing the World (University of California Press, 2007), which chronicles some of the impacts of climate change around the world:
See what we're tweeting about
22 Comments
Add CommentSlides 4, 5, 7 and 10 do not show the "impact of global warming". That's 4 out of 10. Please substitute them with more evidence for climate change
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this--
Edited by omnologos at 11/29/2007 2:36 AM
This the best you can do? Tuvalu is not sinking; sea level changes with ENSO and ditto the drought in China. European heat was a stationary pressure cell directing warm winds. Penguin numbers expanded at Anvers Is. and then reduced as food ran out. Bangladesh on a titling plate and Greenland will take 1000s of years to melt. Antarctic ice peaked this year but you didn't mention it. Portage Glacier lost 3km in 90 years but when did it start receding?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm afraid your 10 views say nothing much at all.
It seems patently absurd that this is a topic that's worthy of discussion.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThank you all for your skepticism and I will not bore you with a point-by-point refutation. My question for skeptics is simple: What if you are wrong? If I am wrong, then we spent some money on something that might be good for us anyway. If you are wrong, Tuvalu disappears along with the bread basket and many, many, many species (not just penguins). Risk management sound like a good idea to anyone? You do have car or home or life insurance right?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDavid
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPresumably you do take insurance only on the things for which there is evidence they may happen to you? Or do you distribute your money to anybody that comes up with any idea of a possible "danger", however crazy?
Besides, to ask "what if you are wrong?" is like accepting Pascal's argument for believing in God. Are you sure you want to go that way?
Back to my request: there are more than 27,000 reported changes by the IPCC (AR4-WG2, Chapter 1). Please pick any 10 of those. It can't be that hard.
Presumably "all word" (assuming I've translated your Latin-Greek jumble correctly) you have already taken Pascal's wager and opted for a little spiritual insurance. If that works for you, I'm all for it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNow, on to other kinds of insurance, call this Schneider's wager. Gather a group of people and ask them to raise their hands if they have ever experienced a fire in their home. For the sake of the numbers, let's say you've gathered 100. On my experience, somewhere between one to 10 will raise their hands. Now ask them to raise their hands if they have fire insurance. Pretty much everybody does, including me.
Now, gather 100 climatologists and ask them to raise their hand if they think climate change is happening. Again everyone will raise their hand. Ask them if they think it is manmade. Again near unanimity. Finally ask them what the risk of catastrophic warming is. Based on my interviews it's about 10 percent, i.e. about a 10 percent risk that it is going to be much, much more than anyone has predicted.
One percent chance that your house will burn down causes you to invest a significant chunk of change over your lifetime in insuring against that risk. What will you do with the 10 percent risk?
Finally, the slideshow is 10 views of a warming world. So we have glacial retreat, calving ice, flooded lowlands, smoggier/hotter cities, species shift, drought, and some windmills to show it's not all doom and gloom. Note that they are all pulled from Gary Braasch's wonderful book "Earth under Fire." You're right that there are many other options but I thought these pictures were both beautiful and representative. Feel free to post your own best photos with your new Community account!
Dave
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thismy name is in my profile... "omnologos" is about "being interested into everything" B-)
You may note the limits of your analogy. There is a difference in asking [u]people[/u] about past fires in their own homes, and asking [u]experts[/u] about possible present/future problems with the climate.
Thank you for pointing to Gary Braasch's book. Now I understand the choice of slides better. I don't want to start a controversy on each individual picture, but am looking forward for you/SciAm to come up with evidence for _present_ (not _future_...there is too much talk of _future_ IMNSHO) global warming, perhaps in some future issue or blog
--
Edited by omnologos at 11/29/2007 11:44 PM
Happy to take that on mister interested in everything :-) Perhaps if I get to the Arctic in spring as I hope... In the meantime, try this:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this[url http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=blowing-in-the-wind-arctic-plants-move-fast-as-climate-changes]Blowing in the Wind: Arctic Plants Move Fast as Climate Changes[/url]
You can see two photos of plants that have spread further north in that story.
Stages of global warming denial.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this1. Outright denial
2. Doubt
3. Acceptance, but not human caused
4. Human caused, but it won't be so bad. I will get a better tan.
5. Too late now, should have warned us sooner.
6. Call my layer, somebody is going to pay.
my name is Alex Rolich
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thiswell, David, anybody that hates "having to pick a favorite field of science" can call himself an omnologist :-)
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'll wait for your report from the Arctic but please do note there are plenty of less-known areas in the world for which it would be even more interesting to hear in terms of global warming (just check the map in figure TS.1 on the AR4-WG2 Technical Summary - page 30)...
The Arctic, as they say, is "soooo 2007" :^O
If anyone prove that global warming is due to the sun, and the natural evolution of the earth. Then the scienctific circles looses their grants.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo they will never work in that direction.
It is undeniable that global warming is occurring. Has anyone done an honest and thorough appraisal of how much of this warming is due to the decline of the Earths magnetic field and how much to human behavior? I havent seen this kind of appraisal, but would be happy to know of any publication comparing these two factors.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI honestly think that scientists care more about the planet than a grant, that is why they research it. So I am pretty sure that the sun has been investigated and may continue to be investigated.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI wonder why earth isn't a wasteland from the heat during the Holocene Thermal maximum? In that period the average temp was 2 degrees warmer than now, and it lasted 3000 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHello
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI was reading about the methods of collecting solar energy from the January . It mentioned the efficiency was around 15% . Is this due to the collector tube not transferring enough heat into the fluid media ? Or the design of the parabolic collector ? These designs appear to be similar to previous systems from 20 or 30 years ago . Is there a new approach that needs to be looked at ? Also are there any collectors that will transfer energy other then sloar light ? The is a lot of other energy that comes through the sky .
Ben
Can we afford the costs of curbing global warming ? Profiteering and "Western Culture"has given us the possibility of human extinction and we still frame the issue in economic terms...well what can I say.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisKen Panzer Gibsons, BC
I understand that there may be a problem when CO� is released in greater quantities than can be absorbed by natural mechanisms. It will accumulate in the atmosphere, albeit starting from a very low level. This may lead to problems of acid rain, acidification of sea water, but why should CO� trap heat? Absorption rays in in the infrared part of the spectrum CO� are not denser than those of any other component of the atmosphere and its concentration is so small. So why single out CO� as the main culprit?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI just stumbled into this site while cruising and noticed the dialogue was a year old. Are folks no longer concerned about climate change, because the economy has suddenly taken precedence ?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReceding lacier is only the first phase. Next comes atmospheric thinning which is far more critical. The onset of that is that start of our extermination.
Yes, there is a difference between the scenarios in his analogy. The difference is that people buy expensive fire insurance almost universally on much less convincing evidence and far less likelihood that they will need it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisComparisons to Pascal's wager are valid. The difference is that there's absolutely no empirical evidence for the existence of God, while there's substantial evidence for anthropogenic global warming.
Yeah, I know. It's all politics and power grabbing. We're supposed to believe that all of those scientists in the IPCC (and many others who support the theory), who wouldn't walk around the block for political activism of any other kind, suddenly fell prey to an overwhelming urge to dictate the type of car you drive. Do you honestly think you're that important (absent your irresponsible influence on the planet)?
Getting back to Pascal's wager, the heart of the global warming debate is this: if the models and preliminary indications are correct, by the time the signs of global warming become irrefutable, it will be too late. Considering the fact that we have only one planet on which to live at this point, even a marginal gamble that it might become uninhabitable is the height of stupidity.
I know that discourse on this blog is supposed to be civil, but I find it deeply offensive, when a bunch of selfish jerks decide to take stupid chances with my home!
In fact, the climate forcings due to the sun have been included in current models. While solar cycles successfully describe past climate changes, they do not predict recent observations.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNevertheless, right wing talk radio "experts" and global warming deniers continue to bleat about it, just as they continue to note that Antarctic ice sheets have thickened, even though this is a recognized consequence of global warming.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI would like to share my interest as one of the principals of Royal Wind, we have designed an Ocean Temperature Regulatory System using our revolutionary turbines to power cold water pumps. Our system is designed to pump large amounts of cold water to the surface of the ocean to create cold water thermoclines. We believe that widespread use of our system worldwide would result in a much desired global temperature regulation and reduction. The health of our oceans and the increased carbon sequestration are linked to global sustainability. We feel that without intervention the oceans are in danger of collapse. The health of our oceans is crucial to the maintenance of oxygen levels in the atmosphere. If the oceans die, we will struggle to survive. It’s all connected: ocean health, carbon sequestration, and global temperatures. Here’s the plan:
To install our ocean-current powered cold water pumps in strategic locations worldwide, creating cold water thermoclines, increasing the sequestration of anthropogenic carbon dioxide. Our system will also be used to build the polar icecap back to a more acceptable year-round base level which will also ensure the continued function of the thermohaline and of the North Atlantic drift. Our system will also be used to create cold water barriers to hurricanes. We can solve the Earth's problems with the right effort. We must if we plan to continue living on this Earth.