Scientists believe world is at its hottest for 2,000 years

THE SCOTSMAN (Scotland, UK) ^ | 23JUN06 | RUSSELL JACKSON

[familyop]

THE world is hotter than it has been for four centuries - and probably the hottest for 2,000 years - the United States' most prestigious scientific organisation said yesterday.

In a report to the US Congress, the National Academy of Sciences reported that the "recent warmth is unprecedented for at least the last 400 years and potentially the last several millennia".

A panel of top climate scientists told politicians that the Earth is heating up and that "human activities are responsible for much of the recent warming".

Their 155-page report said average global surface temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere rose about 1F during the 20th century.

This is shown in boreholes, retreating glaciers and other evidence found in nature, said Gerald North, a geosciences professor at Texas A&M University who chaired the academy's panel. The report was requested in November by the chairman of the House science committee, Republican Sherwood Boehlert, to address those who question whether global warming is a major threat.

Mr Boehlert said the report shows the value of having scientists advise Congress: "There is nothing in this report that should raise any doubts about the broad scientific consensus on global climate change."

The Bush administration has maintained that the threat is not severe enough to warrant new pollution controls that the White House says would have cost five million Americans their jobs.

Climate scientists Michael Mann, Raymond Bradley and Malcolm Hughes had concluded the Northern Hemisphere was the warmest it has been in 2,000 years.

The National Academy scientists concluded that the Mann-Bradley-Hughes research from the late 1990s was "likely" to be true, said John 'Mike' Wallace, an atmospheric sciences professor at the University of Washington and a panel member. The conclusions from the Nineties research "are very close to being right", and are supported by even more recent data, Mr Wallace said.

Overall, the panel agreed that the warming in the last few decades of the 20th century was unprecedented over the past 1,000 years.

[familyop]

"There were some serious vineyards in England a few centuries ago. Now its too cold to grow good grapes there."

Yes! That was around the time of the Norman invasion (almost 1000 years ago).

[HisKingdomWillAbolishSinDeath]

And you thought the "world is flat crowd" was delusional. This is what happens when everything boils down to the lust for money and power.

Proverbs 27:20 Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied.

[vbmoneyspender]

Morons. How are we going to cool the Sun? Did they even mention this:

They are going to force the Sun to cool down by taxing it.

[Prophet in the wilderness]

I wonder if the " Greenies " and Liberals are going after countries like China and India about Global Warming and holding them to the same standard as they do the USA ?
Opps,,, I forgot, the USA ( according to the MSM and Environmentalist ) causes the most Greenhouse gasses.
All this " Global Warming " propaganda by the commies, liberals , MSM , all have a AGENDA , to degrade, and destroy the USA economy, thus in return, will lower and degrade our military capabilities, thus their agenda is to bring the USA down.

[marron]

Are we farming Greenland yet?

[Not now, Not ever!]

BZZZT! We have a winner.

[Dallas59]

I'm glad it's warmer. To hell with freezing temps!!!

[Seruzawa]

Good link

I especially love the line: "It shows that there is enough happening on the solar front to merit further research."

Cha-ching!

[uptoolate]

"Overall, the panel agreed that the warming in the last few decades of the 20th century was unprecedented over the past 1,000 years."

NEWSFLASH:

Overall, the panel agreed that the warming trend in the last few decades of the 20th century was precedent before the last 1000 years. Er, uh, maybe not, um, it could have been, I mean we think that it, uh, we really can't say for sure but, um, nevermind, we really just make this stuff up to look important so that we can pat each other on the back and say 'Well done, Proffessor".

[mugs99]

How can this be?
In 1974 TIME Magazine reported that climate experts had determined that we were entering another ice age.
"Since the 1940s the mean global temperature has dropped about 2.7° F."...Time Magazine June 24, 1974
.

[mhx]

Heresy.

Last time it was this hot, heresy hadn't been invented yet.

[NaughtiusMaximus]

Earth: flat and getting hotter.

[uptoolate]

Rev 21:5 And He who sits on the throne said, "Behold, I am making all things new " And He said, "Write, for these words are faithful and true."

Really doesn't matter how hot the earth gets, does it.

[freepatriot32]

Rights, farms, environment ping.
Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.
I don't get offended if you want to be removed.

updated List of Ping lists vol.III(Get Your Fresh Hot Pings Here!)

[woofie]

Northern Minnesota Lots for Sale

[ApplegateRanch]

YES! I will walk to work, 10 miles uphill each way.

Yes; I will build my house out of old bottles, to trap the sun's energy, so I do not have to heat it.

Yes! I will build a large cistern, and direct all of my roof runoff into to it, so energy doesn't have to be wasted piping & pumping water to my home.

Yes! I will install a wind generator in my back yard, to disconnect from the grid.

YES! I will erect a semaphore tower on my roof, so we don't have to waste resources on a telephone system.

Oh, wait; except for the first one, the envirowhacks & Libs wouldn't allow me to do it; it would mess up their quietude; their pristine views; upset their sensibilities; deprive them of utility tax revenues....

[familyop]

"I'm glad it's warmer. To hell with freezing temps!!!"

I once lived in that place for over a decade, just a little to the south of you (Corpus). ;-)

[Prophet in the wilderness]

Yes,, you are correct sir, I was just bringing up the reason what's behind the " Global Warming Agenda " and all of forces and political reasons behind it.
If the commies, liberals , anti-America crowd can't defeat the USA militarily, they will try to rot and destroy the USA from within socially, and economically.

[Prophet in the wilderness]

LOL, yes, you are correct, but, not everyone can afford to do those things economically at this point in time.
It's a real hoot to watch the same forces in the Liberal Socialist movement oppose each other in MASS, old Teddy doesn't want his water side view obstructed by those windmills by the seaside.

[burzum]

I've been reading through the report and the most striking thing that I've found so far is that one of the absurd claims by the Mann, et. al. papers in Nature could not be supported in this report, and they explicitly said so. The absurd claims that I'm talking about are that the 1990s were the hottest decade in a millennium and that 1998 was the hottest year in a millennium. This report notes that uncertainties for temperature reconstruction for individual years and decades are larger than that for longer time periods and that the proxy data that they used can't resolve to such short periods of time.

Additionally, I agree with the statement that the earth is the warmest it has been in 400 years. Big deal, the Little Ice Age was from 1500-1850. This report was from 1600-2000. They also explicitly state that they don't have high confidence for the last 1000 years and that they have "very low confidence" for the 1000 years prior.

I haven't gotten to the claims that humans have caused global warming yet so I can't comment much on that. In short though, the report claims that humans have caused recent warming because they were able to calculate the 'expected' values of solar radiation and volcanic activity. I'm not so sure I agree with those assumptions (especially the solar radiation assumption).

Finally, the only proxy data that I really trust is the ice core data (and there are many other types used). But the biggest problem with ice core data is that it is really only accurate for measuring temperatures in a static ice field. This pretty much limits its use to extremely high latitudes. Unfortunately, if you want to measure planetary temperature, you can get a better inference if you measure temperatures near the equator. There are some glaciers near the equator, but snow patterns yield them pretty much useless. For this reason, I think the uncertainties in temperatures recorded near the poles are underestimated.