[milwguy]

You are welcome...The argument that man understands all the dynamics of climate, not to mention claiming a direct cause and effect between CO2 and tmeperature is crazy. Three years ago we were deluged with Al Gore claiming hurricanes were increasing and more powerful because of GW, and this year in the Atlantic basin figures to be a near record in terms of number of days with active hurricanes. Last year was low by historic standards as well.......you might want to read.......The Cold Truth about Greenland........http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=8285..........where scientists who disagree with the ‘Branch Algorians’...........Data from the United States’ National Climactic Data Center show that temperatures in Greenland for the last decade are hardly unusual when compared to temperatures for the last 100 years. The period from 1915 through 1965 — an entire half–century — was about two degrees warmer than it is today.
..........further they state...........
In 2000, Glen MacDonald and several coauthors published an eye–opening perspective on the climate history of the Eurasian arctic in the highly respected journal Quaternary Research (”quaternary” is the era of recent ice ages, beginning about 1.8 million years ago) in which they examined radiocarbon dates of old trees deposited in the tundra, far north of today’s northernmost trees. In that region, the tree line is generally over 100 miles south of the Arctic Ocean. But for much of the era from 3,000 to 9,000 years ago, the forest extended right to the sea.

Summer temperatures — the same ones that melt Greenland’s ice — are what determine the Northern treeline. MacDonald had to conclude that “Over much of northern Eurasia [during that period], summers may have been 4.5 to 12.6°F warmer than today.”

Moreover, they wrote that the only way this could occur was if there was a massive incursion of warm (Gulf Stream) water into the Arctic Ocean. How does such water get there? By passing between Greenland and Europe. It’s the only way.

So Greenland had to have been much warmer than it is now for six millennia. Again, where are the records of unprecedented rises in sea level? There aren’t any, because there wasn’t any. Sea levels rose to roughly where they are today.

[cogitator]

Two things. One, hurricanes are exciting and noticeable and can be devastating and horrible, and they are also unusual and variable climate phenomena which require a specific set of factors to form and to persist/strengthen. Some of these factors are likely strongly related to global warming, others less so, some not at all. Thus, I find it pointless to evaluate global warming projections on the basis of regional frequencies and intensities. So I don't. I will let you find comfort in short-term variable statistics.

Two, the period you are addressing regarding Greenland is commonly referred to as the "Holocene Climate Optimum", and it is generally considered to have been warmer than present. Feel free to research it. The HCO has intrigued me a bit. Here are a couple of items about it.

Mid-Holocene Warm Period - About 6,000 Years Ago

From the above: "These orbital changes can be easily calculated and predict that the northern hemisphere should have been warmer than today during the mid-Holocene in the summer AND colder in the winter. The paleoclimatic data for the mid-Holocene shows these expected changes, however, there is no evidence to show that the average annual mid-Holocene temperature was warmer than today's temperatures."

But, imporantly, what about the Greeland ice cap? I worked quite a bit on this, but I couldn't find anything directly addressing what happened to the Greenland ice cap during the HCO. But I did find this little item:

Early Holocene Climate Variability and the Timing and Extent of the Holocene Thermal Maximum (HTM): Comparisons From the Northern and Southern Hemispheres I Posters

Poster entitled: Diatoms as Proxies for a Fluctuating Ice Cap Margin, Hvitarvatn, Iceland.

Abstract: There are no complete records of terrestrial environmental change for the Holocene (11,000yrs) in Iceland and the status of Icelandic glaciers in the early Holocene remains unclear. It is not even known whether Iceland's large ice caps disappeared in the early Holocene, and if they did, when they re-grew. Icelandic lakes are particularly well suited to address these uncertainties as: 1) Glacial erosion and soft bedrock result in high lacustrine sedimentation rates, 2) Diagnostic tephras aid the geochronology, 3) Iceland's sensitivity to changes in North Atlantic circulation should produce clear signals in key environmental proxies (diatoms) preserved in lacustrine sequences, and 4) Ice-cap profiles are relatively flat so small changes in the equilibrium line altitude result in large changes in accumulation area. Hence, large changes in ice-sheet margins during the Holocene will impact sedimentation in glacier-dominated lakes and the diatom assemblages at those times. Hvitarvatn is a glacier dominated lake located on the eastern margin of Langjokull Ice Cap in central-western Iceland. The uppermost Hvitarvatn sediments reflect a glacially dominated system with planktonic, silica-demanding diatom taxa that suggest a high dissolved silica and turbid water environment consistent with high fluxes of glacial flour. Below this are Neoglacial sediments deposited when Langjokull was active, but outlet glaciers were not in contact with Hvitarvatn. The diatom assemblage here shows a small increase in abundance, but is still dominated by planktic, silica-demanding taxa. A distinct shift in lake conditions is reflected in the lowermost sediments, composed of predominantly benthic diatoms and deposited in clear water conditions with long growing seasons likely found in an environment with warmer summers than present and with no glacial erosion. Langjokull must have disappeared in the early Holocene for such a diverse, benthic dominated diatom assemblage to flourish.

This map shows where Langjokull is and how big it is, approximately, now:

And finally I found this recent item:

Understanding Greenland Ice Sheet Response To Global Warming

You can read that if you want.