Beam me to Planet Gore !
Posted on 11/23/2008 12:30:43 PM PST by kathsua
Here's another way of looking at things: Global warming is good.
And if there's any bad news at all about global warming, it's that it might be about over.
The debate about global warming will go on forever. But while we may spend the rest of eternity trying to figure out where our weather is headed, one of the best ways of finding out where we're going is to simply look at where we came from.
Some years ago I stumbled onto Charles Perry, with the U.S. Geological Survey in Lawrence, when I was trying to track down some information on climate. In the scientific community, Charles has established himself as a firm believer that the harmonic cycles of solar output have huge cause-and-effect relationships with not only our short-term weather but also our long-term climate.
In his work, Charles has connected events in world history with climate fluctuations - and has correlated those fluctuations with increases or decreases in the amount of total radiant energy reaching the earth.
In brief, there's nothing really constant about the amount of energy being emitted by the sun. It's almost like the sun has a heartbeat - with waves of energy coming in on a roughly 11-year sunspot cycle. Those short-term cycles then make up larger and longer-term cycles. And in those cycles, which have been going on for thousands and thousands of years, Charles has documented alternating periods of warming and cooling.
While global warming has gotten a lot of bad press today, Charles feels events in history show warmer climates have been accompanied by more rain, longer growing seasons, more crops and more land to settle on - times in which civilizations have prospered.
Contrasting that are periods of global cooling - times in which human populations probably declined because of cold, drought and war.
As mentioned, Charles has correlated those alternating periods with events in history. For instance, there was a warming period from 33,000 to 26,000 years ago which may have allowed the Cro-Magnons to migrate northward and populate Europe by blending in with or eradicating the resident Neanderthals.
Another warm period ushered in the Bronze Age, which began about 3,800 years ago. During this favorable climatic period, people migrated northward into Scandinavia and reclaimed farmland with growing seasons that were at that time probably the longest in more than 2,000 years.
The great empires of the Bronze Age came to an end with the Centuries of Darkness chill, but warming returned during the Greco-Roman Age. However, when the climate cooled again, the Roman Empire ceased.
A flourishing Viking culture in Greenland met the same fate during the Little Ice Age. The little ice ages are cooler periods, which last several centuries. They occur about every l,300 years.
By the year l,000, the Vikings had discovered Greenland, where their settlements started producing wheat and livestock. But after l,200, the climate began to cool rapidly. Greenland's frozen harbors didn't open in the summer - thus, trade with Europe sharply declined.
By l400, Europe's contact with Greenland had been lost. A slight warm-up at about l500 allowed ships to make it back to Greenland, but by then the stranded Viking population had starved to death - with their graves becoming shallower and shallower as the permafrost returned.
Many today say our current global warming is because of increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Charles disagrees. He says while we do have global warming, it's still not to the same level as when the Vikings were farming in Greenland.
"Therefore, the magnitude of the modern temperature increase being caused solely by an increase in carbon dioxide appears questionable." On the other hand, solar output variations to climate change may be significant.
So what does all this mean? Let's assume that Charles is right. If so, his projections show the current warm period may be ending and that the earth's climate may cool to conditions similar to the Little Ice Age between the years of 2400 and 2900, following a slight cooling between 2000 and 2l00. Between 2l00 and 2400, cooling picks up steam.
Charles further predicts that l,500 years from now, the climate will again become much warmer, entering altithermal conditions on a global scale - similar to Bronze Age weather. He also predicts the weather then may be warm enough to possibly melt the polar icecaps and flood the world's coastlines.
But don't worry about the ice caps. They'll be back, farther on out when we cycle back into another full-blown Ice Age.
And finally, your words of wisdom for the day come from Dean Bark, former Kansas State University climatologist, when asked if he thought global warming was real: "We'll know l00 years from now."
Ehmke farms in Lane and Scott counties in western Kansas on land the Ehmke family homesteaded in l886.
Just like the song: “Doin’ things a naturally.”
When I was a kid in school, they told us we were heading towards another ice age. So, if there is global warming, maybe it will fend off the ice age???
Last winter was cold as ever in Alaska. Last summer wasn’t a proper summer, too cold. It is -10 now and this is going on two months of colder than normal, like the fourth coldest on record (100 years of data). It could break any day of course and pop right up to 10 or 20. Or drop to -40. All entirely normal.
35.1 °F / 1.7 °C
A warm day in Michigan.
I remember. It was in my Weekly Reader during the 60's.
Thanks for the ping. Good article, except for the sentence: “Between 2l00 and 2400, cooling picks up steam.” That is a very bad metaphor.
Me to. I remember that.
But now the Global Warming fanatics are denying even that happened. Supposedly the scientist were always on the ‘warming’ side.
They even have the ‘scientific’ study to prove it.
Can you say 1984?
We should be bringing up Trofim Denisovich Lysenko any time AGW is mentioned. Soviet Russia nearly starved because his wacko theories were used to dictate agricultural policy. The parallels between Lysenko’s theories and AGW are alarming.
I don’t know who said it first, but the only thing we learn from history is that we don’t learn from history.
Trofim Lysenko - why we should not mix ideology and science
What happens when ideology becomes more important than scientifical critical thinking?
Trofim Lysenko (see picture), quickly became a very prominent "scientist" in the soviet union following an article printed in Pravda (aka "the truth") about this barefooted peasant who "solved problems". Even though he had little education and was barely literate Lysenko progressed rapidly in the soviet system and it did not take many years before he controlled much of the agricultural policy in the soviet union. Lysenko was a practical man who cared about practical issues rather than theoretical nonsense. When something appealed to Lysenko's intuition there was really no need for rigorous testing, consider for instance his citation "In order to obtain a certain result, you must want to obtain precisely that result; if you want to obtain a certain result you will obtain it". When he had achieved a powerful position in the soviet union Lysenko's intuition became so important that criticzing him was associated with grave dangers. Nikolai Vavilov, a Russian biologist who have made important contributions to genetics was one of Lysenko's many victims.
Lysenko did not believe in Darwin's theory of evolution because organisms do not "compete", they co-operate. Based on this belief Lysenko ordered that trees should be planted in groups so that they would co-operate (perhaps he was a well-meaning man after all). The result: only 5% of the trees planted flourished, 15% survived, huge economical costs to the soviet union. Lysenko also believed that environment meant everything. Give a seed a good environment and it will flourish. The result of this: availability of meat and vegetables was no higher in 1953 than in 1900 when Tsar Nicholas II reigned the country, millions of Russians starved. In fact, Lysenko even believed that one could easily change one species into another species by manipulating the environment, and indeed "scientists" began reporting studies in which they changed bacteria into viruses and even a rabbit into a chicken!
This history shows the danger of letting ideals steer science. Though he may have been a well meaning man, Lysenko ignored what was known about agriculture and the Russian people suffered the consequences. As I have previously argues, I think it would be a mistake to ignore what we know about human nature when we design our society. Under what conditions do people tend to co-operate, and when do we not co-operate?, what differences between the sexes should we expect and accept rather than fight against (and which should we fight against)? I think that the most important lesson of the above is that whatever ideological motives we have we should not let these motives affect the way we do scientific research...
Global Warming on Free Republic
It already is, here in SW Virginia.
I've already recommissioned my chainsaw and the misses is dusting off the wood stove.
We cut at dawn!
Thanks so much for the ping! Where were all these voices of reason when we were being force-fed all the global warming garbage?
My pleasure, though my subbing days during xcamel's absence have come to a close.
Where were all these voices of reason when we were being force-fed all the global warming garbage?
In large part they still remain ignored by the MSM, I believe.
Note: this topic was posted 11/23/2008.Thanks kathsua.
...here was a warming period from 33,000 to 26,000 years ago which may have allowed the Cro-Magnons to migrate northward and populate Europe by blending in with or eradicating the resident Neanderthals.
Another warm period ushered in the Bronze Age, which began about 3,800 years ago. During this favorable climatic period, people migrated northward into Scandinavia and reclaimed farmland with growing seasons that were at that time probably the longest in more than 2,000 years.
The great empires of the Bronze Age came to an end with the Centuries of Darkness chill, but warming returned during the Greco-Roman Age. However, when the climate cooled again, the Roman Empire ceased...
By the year l,000, the Vikings had discovered Greenland, where their settlements started producing wheat and livestock. But after l,200, the climate began to cool rapidly. Greenland's frozen harbors didn't open in the summer - thus, trade with Europe sharply declined.
By l400, Europe's contact with Greenland had been lost. A slight warm-up at about l500 allowed ships to make it back to Greenland, but by then the stranded Viking population had starved to death - with their graves becoming shallower and shallower as the permafrost returned.
What everyone needs to understand, and use in every “discussion” with a liberal about this,
is that, to the liberal sheeperals, whether the earth is warming or cooling or turning sideways isn’t really the issue.
The REAL issue is how the sheeperals feel about themselves for caring and seeking to “save the earth”.
So, the earth has to be in danger of imminent doom,
and it has to be caused by something they can advocate for “doing” something about.
Those two conditions are ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL in order for the sheeperal to attain their self-righteousness.
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