Flood, Fire, and Famine
in the History of Civilization
by Richard Firestone,
Allen West, and
Simon Warwick-Smith
Posted on 12/20/2019 8:35:20 PM PST by TexasKamaAina
Off hand, the biggest event I can think of that occurred about 200 years ago was the series of major earthquakes occurring during 1811 and 1812 around the New Madrid, MO area. During that time Caracas, Venezuela also had a major quake that killed around 20,000. Also the Tambora volcano of 1815 caused the “year with no summer” in New England and climate troubles in Europe and elsewhere.
Kinda hard to get a solar furnace repairman in the stellar neighborhood.
Union issues.
Forget GloBULL(SHIT) “warming”-—we’re headed for a “little ice age”.
These events were most likely triggered by the Dalton Minimum 1790-1830 It will be interesting to see what the current minimum will trigger. On top of it, it will run concurrent with the 3600 years cycle, with both working together all we can hope for is that he damage will be minimal.
Volcano, scholcano. :^) A microscopic pimple on the face of the Earth.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3802745/posts
If in fact we are heading into a major cooling cycle, then it is even more important that we not use our carbon energy resources recklessly. We should be using all the solar and wind energy that we can efficiently develop, to have the carbon sources available where solar and wind are not so helpful. In other words we should continue to improve the efficiency of our vehicles and buildings to preserve our vital carbon energy resources.
Glee, that MAY be the case, but we really just don’t know when would be the best time to spit “extra”(?) CO2 into the atmosphere to reduce or forestall a cooling cycle or period, IF that would even work.
In many of these natural cycles there is a sort of time lag from cause to effect.
Maybe a large CO2 “dump” well before the cooling starts is most effective. But OTOH, there is considerable evidence that increased atmospheric CO2 FOLLOWS the beginning of warming. What are we to make of that? Maybe nothing we can do in terms of CO2 emissions will affect a cool-down much...?
Computer models... Heck, I use them a LOT. Fairly sophisticated ones, in fact. But they are of physical systems that can actually be built (and are built in myriads of ways) to confirm the models are reliable. When it comes to “climate change” as it is presently thrown in our faces, not only is there not much way to verify the model results, confirm the weights of various feedback sources, and so on, the scientists are trying to model a situation that has NEVER BEFORE OCCURRED.
What’s that, you say?
The truth is, humans’ activities ARE emitting significant amounts of CO2 into earth’s atmosphere. Quite a few FReepers deny that, either because they are dishonest, lazy, or just can’t do the relatively simple math and chemistry. Yet all one has to do is look up typical global volcanic output noted from well before any of this AGW was tooted as a threat, through the present (hint - it hasn’t changed much overall), and then look up how much carbon based fuel (oil, nat. gas, coal, etc.) is burned each year — from which the amount of CO2 produced is fairly easily calculated: We humans in total ARE cranking out more CO2 than Earth’s volcanos, on average.
BUT, there is no comparable precedent. Past large scale volcanic activity at certain times does “measure up”, or more so, but such activity is different in several important ways from human emissions. And there are many unknowns and pieces of conflicting information. The Deccan Traps, for example, are believed to have caused a 2 deg. C global temperature DROP — largely because in addition to CO2 they ALSO spit out huge volumes of SO2. Not to mention particulates. You mention a smaller but still significant event: Tambora. Again I will say, there is NO comparable precedent to current human activities, and we can venture hazy guesses at best as to how Earth’s feedback mechanisms, etc., may respond to those activities, and interact with other factors such as the Sun, orbital forcing, and so on.
What I think CAN be said is that a maximally wealthy and capable industrial society is best suited toward dealing with climate change, as it WILL happen, with or without us, maybe worse, maybe not. (Actually, I fail to see what humans could do, with two exceptions*, to even approach the effect of a major (every 110,000 years or so) cycle of glaciation. And we are sort of due for one, it seems.)
*1) Set off ALL our nukes at once. 2) Make a mistake and “overshade” or “overcook” the Earth from space. See below.
The way we maximalize that society as described, especially in light of the fact that present reserves of fossil fuels look to be good for 200 years or more, is to push ahead vigorously on all fronts: Ever more cost efficient LED lights with good spectral quality and reliability are a winner, IMO - just don’t force them down people’s throats. Ditto for new fracking or coal extraction techniques. (Around here, a lot of the old coal mines are now nice (and sometimes big) parks.) And, always, always, press for strong industrial / economic growth, so as to be able to pay for whatever tools are necessary to deal with whatever is to come.
I am pretty big on the idea of either shading the Earth or reflecting sunlight to it, as needed. We pretty much have the tech, and Elon Musk is making the launch costs look increasingly practical, IF we are on top of our economic game. A dreary socialist USA likely falls short, but a vigorous and free USA can pull it off, IMO.
You mention the hundred plus thousand year cycle of glaciation. We don’t know specifically what starts those cycles, but if you look at the most recent, there is a clearly visible drop in temperature at 74,000 kya when Toba blew and left a crater 18 miles by 65 miles. There is a lesser drop around 22 kya when Sakarujima (sp?) blew and left a crater around 11 miles in diameter. On the other hand maybe the big 100+ kyas are something else like meteors such as the one(s) that appears to have cause the Younger Dryas. I continue to search for possibilities and also avoid wasting energy. Besides, I need the money I save.
Flood, Fire, and Famine
in the History of Civilization
by Richard Firestone,
Allen West, and
Simon Warwick-Smith
Those “big” 100+ kya periods are too regular to be meteors, unless there is something going on we don’t know about with regard to asteroid or comet impacts. That’s certainly possible, but, orbital forcing looks like a better “fit”, except that then one gets to explain why the pattern changed from ~41 kyas to 100+kyas, and why the overall cooling leveled off (although the largest of the negative peaks are nastier than ever.) The change of period “can” be explained by orbital forcing too, but, the argument is not particularly convincing. My own sense of it is that the Earth got cool enough overall / on average to alter the cycle in ways we don’t really have a handle on. There is, indeed, a great deal that is uncertain.
As for saving energy, and money, I’m with you, just so long as “solutions” are not forced on people in contrived “emergency” situations. I happen to rather like LED light bulbs for most uses, applied properly. :-)
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