FOREST FIRE: Heat waves are getting stronger as the climate changes, with devastating consequences for people and forests, like the one in Greece pictured here that ignited when temperatures climbed above 110 degrees Fahrenheit.
Image: JOSHUA WOLFE
Climate change can be hard to picture. Invisible atmospheric gases trap the sun's heat radiating back from Earth's surface. Subtle shifts in average temperature increase both downpours and droughts while glaciers slowly recede.
And then there's the science: Vast computer models simulate the complex global climate in an effort to predict future changes while researchers log countless hours tallying shifts in species abundance as the world warms.
Climatologist Gavin Schmidt and photographer Joshua Wolfe in their new book Climate Change: Picturing the Science offer an inside look at all these seemingly abstract phenomena. Their goal: to convey the causes and effects of climate change as well as attempts to mitigate and adapt to it.
Slide Show: Picturing Climate Change
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13 Comments
Add CommentHow does this picture the science of climate change? Climate change is something that happens over time and the science of climate is the study of that occurrence. These pictures have little to do with the science. I am disappointed.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNo science here. But given SCIAM's editor's proclivities for publishing their advertiser's talking points and attempting to pass them off as science as I'm not surprised.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHow much ad revenue does SCIAM take in from environmental activist groups anyway?
Why is it when scientists show the science of climate change, of course it's too complex for the laymen and the naysayers have a field day rallying against it. "there's no hockey stick, glaciers are not retreating, Hackinsack NJ was actually colder last year, the little ice age...., etc. etc." None of this matches against the body of knowledge that goes into the theory of climate change across numerous fields of study. Yet when someone puts out a book of photos showing incidences of where climate change is having a real impact and, God forbid, someone is actually doing something to counteract energy dependency if not combat climate change, then they're criticised because "that's not science".
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell if naysayers can rely upon "my granny said it was really warm in 1933 or, we'll all be out of work living in caves if we do anything" statements, with no basis in fact or bearing on the discussion, I'd say a book of photos is absolutely fair game.
We'll all be out of work living in caves.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJapanese knotweed rarely
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisproduces viable seeds. In the
UK the plant is mainly spread
through rhizome fragments or cut
stems. Greenhouse trials have
shown that as little as 0.7 gram
of rhizome material (10 mm in
length) can produce a new plant
within 10 days. Cut fresh stems
have also been shown to produce
shoots and roots from nodes
when buried in soil or immersed
in water. Once cut stem material
has been allowed to dry out
thoroughly and has reached the
orange/brown woody stage,
there is no further regeneration.
Rhizome material may take much
longer to die and may remain
dormant for long periods, possibly
as long as 20 years.
This a quote from the UK Enviroment Agency Kudzu code of practice. No mention of climate change
I'd give some validity to your statement on advertisers if there wasn't a Conoco Phillips ad currently being shown. Because as we all know they are a huge environmental activist group.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'd give some validity to your statement on advertisers if there wasn't a Conoco Phillips ad currently being shown. Because as we all know they are a huge environmental activist group.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisG.E. is sponcering many skewed documentries to validate GW. I have spent time in a desert that was over 135F and I did not catch fire. This was 40 years ago (that was before GW). Carbon c must be a good bet for the pres of G.E.. Follow the money.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCaves of darkness may just be a paradigm construct to prevent illumination. Oh yeah-it's the corporations and advertisers that are against us. Reminds me of the skeptics regarding DDT toxicity 30 years ago.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCheck out the third photo of the Mendenhall Glacier in 1894 and again in 2004. Perhaps it's to satisfy the cruise ship lines that might also advertise in SCIAM.
The picture that seems to imply that the temperature in NY is now what the temperature in North Georgia was shortly after WWII is one of the things that hurts the credibility of global warming. The fact that glaciers have been creeping backwards (not making up for their melting with new ice flow down the valley) for over 100 years does not do much good either. There are lots of good pictures to demonstrate the logic without ones that are so probably not related to the problem.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisClimate is changing all the time. It changes daily, weekly, monthly, annually, and within each lifetime it changes many times. It even changes over hundreds, thousands and millions of years. So "climate change" is a valid name for the process of a changing climate!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHowever, how you interpret it as bad or good depends directly on how it affects you. A person on the coast who 'may' lose his/her beach front or home with the rising oceans (if it ever happens) will consider it bad. A person in Canada or Alaska who suddenly enjoys another two or three weeks of warm weather 'may' consider climate change as good.
These pictures of 'climate change' are nothing more than that - pictures of a point in time. Come back a year or five or ten years from now and take a picture at the same spot and you will see a completely different picture with a completely different interpretation of what it means.
The so called "cause" of climate pollution by advocates of CO2 reduction are hiding a bigger problem.
We are wasting to much time, money and worry on climate change when in fact we should be more concerned with environmental pollution! The steps required to accomplish the clean-up of our home environment are more easily understood, probably more acceptable to more people, much easier to measure and will accomplish the same thing as asking people to reduce CO2 emissions. It will certainly accomplish more then carbon credits trading. That is nothing more than a scam perpetrated by the biggest polluters to divert attention away from the REAL problem - pollution of our air, water and environment.
This is what climate change science looks like:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/06/the-global-warming-hypothesis-and-ocean-heat/
GISS model is busted. AGW is a political imagining. Apocalypse called due to reality check.
Why do they call these photos "Climate Change", when what they really depict is "Global Warming". Another politically correct, distraction, from the real problems besetting the globe. As it stands "Global Cooling" would fit "Climate Change" criteria, as the globe hasn't warmed for a decade.
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