Snowy U.S. winter, 2010–11: The year before, however, the weaker gradient between the Arctic Oscillation and the North Atlantic Oscillation caused the jet stream to dip deeply across the eastern U.S. and stay there. It also so happened that an El Niño event occurred in the Pacific, which tends to push the jet stream north across the western U.S., such that it bends southward across the Northeast, pulling down cold arctic air with it.
The lesson in all this is that the more that arctic sea ice melts in summer, the more extreme the jet stream's bends will become and the longer they will stay in place, making our winters either colder or warmer than usual. "The arctic climate system is changing so dynamically that the rules of the game are changing," Greene says. "This is not the same Arctic Ocean we've known. The Arctic and North Atlantic oscillations are changing in ways we hadn't anticipated." The interplay, which has always been fairly consistent, he says, has now become "a wild card" affecting our weather.
As a result, Greene says, an "average" winter will become less likely. Brace yourselves for extremely cold or extremely warm winters. Although climate scientists cannot predict in detail how the oscillations will behave beyond two weeks into the future, if arctic sea ice continues to melt extensively each summer, Greene says, "I would be willing to say that we should anticipate more outbreaks of cold arctic air and snow hitting the eastern seaboard [of the U.S.]. You couldn't bet on a specific year being that way, but if you bet over 10 years, you would probably make money."
The odds for a cold Northeast winter beginning this December got even higher on June 7, when the National Weather Service's Climate Prediction Center put the world on an El Niño watch for the season.
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48 Comments
Add Comment"Even if Global Warming is real, it will never be part of my reality."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisObviously, you are adamant in your belief, Decarian, that the vast majority of climate scientists across the planet are somehow all in league with the others, no matter their national loyalties. And further, you clearly believe that they're ALL lying. I get that. Humans tend to believe what they want to believe and seek out information sources that support those beliefs. Just as you have done.
But a statement that, even if it's real, you will refuse to believe in climate change is just daft. In other words, if it turns out that you're wrong, you're going to keep insisting that you're right forever. Do you have any idea how that will affect your credibility with people you know? Normally, people who deny reality end up institutionalized.
But don't worry. Just because you think climate change is a hoax doesn't mean you won't be affected by it; it just means you won't be prepared for it.
The marvelous thing about Mother Nature (Big Mamma to you) is her rather interesting way of turning a shoulder to the likes of biotic life (you for instance). At least six times now, over the past few billions of years, most of what passes for 'living organisms' have been swept clean off the face of the planet. I'm not sure if you believe that; the thing is, it really doesn't matter much what you or anyone else thinks... the key world is sustainable, and quite frankly, humans like yourself just never really got it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDid you, as any good capitalist would, sell your screen name to your opposite number? I seem to recall a Ven.Dec. railing against the warming deniers . . . He had a solid foundation in science, which this writer, as clearly evident, does not.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf you don't believe in science, then why do you read these articles?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisElmorific
Vendicar's tongue was placed very firmly against his cheek people!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGeojelly - yes, explaining an increase in temperature extremes is science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGood grief... how mentally challenged must one be to question if this article about climate SCIENCE research being done by atmospheric SCIENTISTS and reported by SCIENTIFIC American is actually 'SCIENCE'... If you have something worthwhile to add, please feel free geojellyroll.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst off, there NOTHING even close to a "vast majority of climate scientists across the planet" that agree on global warming. It's mostly politically driven (big surprise Al Gore was behind this) by the UN and SOME of their scientists.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReally? Now it's climate change? What'll be the next morph of the current progressive religion? Climate warming/cooling/changing? But, wait, that's always what has been happening...
So why are we alarming everyone and asking to setup HUGE funds for this? Oh, yeah this is the NEW Church for the millenium. Powerful interests getting money from the everyday Joe so we can be more corrupt and wasteful.
Nice. Very progressive indeed.
In the scheme of things, we are ants on this planet. We are, of course, quite the presumptious ants - we feel everything we do affects everyone, and everything. And those politically minded scientists(global warming/climate change supporters) even believe we can change weather patterns when we can't even predict them...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSo if there is weather change, obviously we won't be warned about the specifics of it - cause they can only tell us it will change, not how. Kind of like the stock market scammers who tell you there will be a strong movement, but can't tell you when, how or where. They are just trying to make money off of you.
But power to you if you attend that church. We do have freedom of religion here, though that is being challenged too.
As far as "Mother Nature" is concerned - I hate to burst your bubble, but she is a literary construct. Kind of like assigning a face and features to the moon -it is not real...
Nice Roundup!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJust Remember, these are all theories, and no real results can be promised for doing things that could cost us trillions of dollars. We have had variations in climate before over hundreds if not thousands of years, and just because the climate is a certain way last century, there is not way they can prove that what happened then was caused by any certain effect. Making sensible changes in lifestyles is what should be done, but making wholesale changes on a maybe is probably what most people want to avoid. Europe is on the brink of bankruptcy, and America may not be far behind. I guess if the world goes bankrupt, human activity may decrease significantly to test the theory that it may help the climate.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReally? Decarion's comment was tongue in cheek?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this@nashcitysmitty: How can you tell? S/he sounds just like my neighbor, and also just like a frequent troll on another science-oriented site.
Even if we were mistaken in believing that the first commenter's comment was a serious statement of their beliefs, you don't have to go far to hear the same stated as absolute certainty by some ignoramus.
Such nonsense gives us all an exercise in "fair and balanced" debating. ;-) Isn't it fun?
@bullwhip77: If you look around the interwebs, bull, research has shown the 97% of scientists believe in climate change and that the climate change we are experiencing right now is not 'natural'. I think that qualifies as a "vast majority". It sure would if it were an election!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere's how I figure it:
If you ask scientists all over the planet from various different countries and funded by both states and corporations about something and they all agree on it, it must be true... or at least as true as human beings can understand at this time.
Because:
It is astronomically unlikely that all of the scientists at even one university, let alone all the nations of the world, would be cooperating in any given deception. I mean, let's face it, as far as everyone cooperating goes (take the UN as an example, if you will), those peeps couldn't get together to hold a p*ssup in a brewery, let alone conspire to deceive all the non-scientists in the world.
Besides:
What would their motivation be?
@bullwhip77: If you look around the interwebs, bull, research has shown the 97% of scientists believe in climate change and that the climate change we are experiencing right now is not 'natural'. I think that qualifies as a "vast majority". It sure would if it were an election!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHere's how I figure it:
If you ask scientists all over the planet from various different countries and funded by both states and corporations about something and they all agree on it, it must be true... or at least as true as human beings can understand at this time.
Because:
It is astronomically unlikely that all of the scientists at even one university, let alone all the nations of the world, would be cooperating in any given deception. I mean, let's face it, as far as everyone cooperating goes (take the UN as an example, if you will), those peeps couldn't get together to hold a p*ssup in a brewery, let alone conspire to deceive all the non-scientists in the world.
Besides:
What would their motivation be?
Sorry for repeating myself. There ought to be a Delete option for commenters to delete their own comments.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy would someone be embarrassed for telling the truth? Scientists don't have a Karl Rove or a Grover Norquist telling them what they will believe even when their research proves otherwise. Oh, sure, a few are corrupted by Republican corporate cash, but the vast majority of them keep their jobs and make their mark on history by being factually correct, despite public and corporate pressure.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis article is far too complicated for the average Republican. To any sane reasonably observant person it is common sense and quite obvious when we take an honest look at what is happening with the world's weather the past few decades.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSure weather always changes and extremes were always in the mix, but now; extreme weather is the norm.
This is my weather prediction:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDecember....700% solar output for 7 days
early 2013 ...poison, nuclear war, and heavy rain and flooding
2014 start of the ice age . not sure how long an ice age.
may 2016 looks like a possible asteroid hit date.
Traditionally, Americans ain't that good with irony, OR sarcasm...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI predict next winter my region will be either cooler or warmer than this year. No need to add 'may' 'could be', etc. I'll even go out on a limb and predict the difference will be at least a tenth of one degree celsius.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWhy not go all the way? I even predict some northern regions will be warmer than average and some will be colder.
Elegia- The '97%' figure has debunked over and over:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://icecap.us/images/uploads/NinteySevenpercentnotwhatyouthink1.28.12.pdf
and:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2011/12/28/climate-science-reaches-a-landmark-that-chills-global-warming-alarmists/
Why do the warmingnistas continue to use numbers they know are not true?
Geo is demonstrating that he doesn't understand that a difference in variance is different from a difference in mean (average), but can be just an significant.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRead the linked article. In a nutshell, the lower temperature difference between the polar cell and the mid-latitude cell is causing the border between them to become less stable.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_circulation
"Why do the warmingnistas continue to use numbers they know are not true?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suspect it is because we put more faith it numbers from research papers than we do in numbers from opinion pages.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/306/5702/1686.full
http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf
Why do you believe opinion pages over every scientific body of relevance?
Exactly - it was perfect satire.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisBecause, like they keep saying - it's a religion. Not /just/ a river in Egypt.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne can learn a lot from studying psychology. There is a mechanism known as projection...
To paraphrase our esteemed American sage Karl Rove - they are not from the "reality-based community".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst, retract: 'Filthy lying scientists.' Second, your ignorance proves the veracity of the work of qualified scientists by your denialism. Defensive much?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisChris- It was a rhetorical question, but here's another one: Why do warmingnistas like to post links that don't work?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Why do warmingnistas like to post links that don't work?"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suspect it is because some deniers are too stupid to recognize that two different lines beginning with 'http' are two different URLs.
No response on the research paper versus opinion page question, I see.
First, "normal weather" even back in the 1980's only happens about 20% of the time (Which should call into question why we bother determining the average in the first place: the need for the illusion of control I guess) . By definition we spend 80% of our weather experiences in the extremes. No doubt the melting sea ice is having real effects on the differential between the respective high latitude oscillations. This has happened before. Reid Bryson, the father of modern glaciology used to put it" how else are you going to get another Ice age."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPostman Says: Why do warmingnistas like to post links that don't work?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisChris G Says: I suspect it is because some deniers are too stupid to recognize that two different lines beginning with 'http' are two different URLs.
Trent Says: LOL! We both know he will never ever have have anything substantial to say about the links, but will instead try for distraction about anything else.
And if Jupiter has moons, they must be in Galileo's telescope.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'Hold tight, hold tight, we must insist that the world is what we have always taken it to be.'
- T.S. Eliot, The Family Reunion
Because that was called a setup to get you guys to step up and show his total lack of logic and his ignorance.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell ok guys it been warming up, on average, since the end of the last ice age. There are long and shot cycles if I have read all this correctly. I thought there was only a couple of questions. Was it caused by humans and can we reverse it? The evidence points to no and no. Now, don't get me wrong, we humans pollute and we should stop. But trying to get the worlds leaders who are or either bought by the world most powerful and wealthy, to do something real, like planing for what is to come, may be difficult.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe warmth extended well north of the mythic Canadian border beyond which no weather exists. Witness NOAA maps and most US weather forecasters (those in Buffalo excepted).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf we - they - however you want to look at it - can't even slow down emissions - then how are we, or they, going to deal with the hundreds of millions of refugees? Fifty percent of the world's population lives very close to a coastline. And I haven't even mentioned drought and the near certainty of crop failures, of the sort that we saw in Russia two years ago and in Texas last year...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisB. Free: Was it caused by humans and can we reverse it? The evidence points to no and no.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTrent Says: Clearly you are not familiar with the evidence. May I suggest you go over to the following link and read about the evidence that is published in the peer reviewed literature?
The human fingerprint in global warming:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/its-not-us-advanced.htm
Now take note that page has links to the peer reviewed literature.
RE: the comments of "bullwhip77"and other members of their congregation:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDon't encourage them. Ignore them. They are nothing more than white noise.
I believe you are on the staff of that pathetic site. Anyone looking for truth at that site would be better off consulting Grimms Fairytales
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo doubt Trent is familiar with this: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/30/dana-nuticellis-skeptical-science-ohc-grapple-down-for-the-count/
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere are numerous other examples of bad science at Skeptical Science.
@ Carlyle,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLet me see. Do not like what the empirical peer reviewed data says so resorts to personal attacks and cites a blog post that does not have any real science to it.
Why that must mean the Fake Skeptic does not want to look at the science.
And in regards to ocean heat content. Well, look here:
ftp://ftp.nodc.noaa.gov/pub/data.nodc/woa/PUBLICATIONS/grlheat08.pdf
And their is plenty more. Oh, I forgot you think a blog post that does not cite the science is really science. Got it.
@afrotheria: Will you marry me?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this;-)
There's nothing quite so cool as the deft handling of irony and the dark sense of humor that must accompany it.
It's 60 degrees F today in Western Washington. Is that the new normal? And what is normal? A 10-year average? 30-year? 100-year? 1000 year? Perhaps we ought to spend our energy in adaptation, not whining.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is no mention of global warming in the article. Why people are focusing on this is unclear to me. It says that Arctic ice has melted (even where it has come back for a while it is much thinner than it used to be, and more subject to summer melting -- I used to work in the Arctic drilling holes in 6 foot ice in May that is now virtually gone in summer, and is much thinner in winter). This leads to feedback and more melting, whether or not there is global warming. This in turn leads to the phenomena the article discusses.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe that global warming driven by human activity is happening, based on reading articles and on my past experience in planetary atmospheres and oceanography. But global warming is not relevant in any direct way to this article, and most of the posts are off topic. One might make some guesses why this is so.
Here is an easy experiment. Hold up a bicycle wheel by it's axle with two hands and have someone give it a spin. Now have someone give the spinning wheel a knock to throw it off balance. Observe what happens. This is what happens to weather and climate when you knock it off balance.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLike I said before, this is just common sense. Some have it, some don't.
That was really enlightening ...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd what of those in the South Texas? Nary a cold winter to be had for 3-4 years and unbelievably dry.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this