I’m just winging it now…I’ve gotta go do the laundry and buy the groceries, etc….so I can’t double check anything…But, a list of the above would be a potent argument against AGW.

The hockey stick graphs (that don’t list Michael Mann among the authors…to avoid that discussion) don’t show any such events…in the past 1000 years.

There is a medieval warm period in those graphs…but it doesn’t match current warming.

The global warming portion of the hockey stick graph would be that after about 1975…note how steep the slope is.

Geological time on this would probably start when South America butted up against North America…in order to get similar continental layouts…whenever that was. And periods of mass extinctions would be inappropriate.

No doubt my skepticism (in the general sense) shows thru this exposition. But I have encountered a number of such historical/glacial/geological arguments…are there any that are any good?

Ron de Haan (13:30:25) re: CURRENT COOLING ?

Local weather is pretty simple here: heating season and air conditioning season, separated by nice weather. I only pay attention to outside temperatures mid-month, when last month’s global average becomes available.

From the Summary of the April, 2008; Fawcett & Jones paper: Waiting for Global Cooling. (This is Aussie–I like the accent.)

There is very little justification for asserting that global warming has gone away over the past ten years, not least because the linear trend in globally-averaged annual mean temperatures (the standard yardstick) over the period 1998-2007 remains upward. While 1998 was the world’s warmest year in the surface-based instrumental record up to that point in time, 2005 was equally warm and in some data sets surpassed 1998. A substantial contribution to the record warmth of 1998 came from the very strong El Nino of 1997/1998 and, when the annual data are adjusted for this short-term effect (to take out El Nino’s warming influence) the warming trend is even more obvious.

Because of the year- to-year variations in globally-averaged mean temperatures, about ten years are required for an underlying trend to emerge from the “noise” of those year-to-year fluctuations. Hence, the fact that 2006 and 2007 were cooler than 2005, is nowhere near enough data to clearly establish a cooling trend.

And of course this most recent La Nina continued, thru 2008, until it ended last month.
I would hope for some standard weather for a while…so we can keep score without the down and up adjustments”.

Francis,

The point is that there is no reason at all for any of the warming alarmism.
Everything that happens today, has happened hundreds of times in the past.
We have had much higher temperatures and much higher CO2 and never experienced scary things like dangerous run away warming and all the other fear mongering the AGW scare mongers are dishing up only to serve a political agenda.

To reduce our CO2 emissions by 80% based on 1990 levels by 2050 as demanded by the UN is a joke and it will never happen.

It’s a matter of time before the shoe will drop and heads will role.

Is there any reason why the “major person” cannot be named?

Local weather is pretty simple here: heating season and air conditioning season, separated by nice weather. I only pay attention to outside temperatures mid-month, when last month’s global average becomes available.

From the Summary of the April, 2008; Fawcett & Jones paper: Waiting for Global Cooling. (This is Aussie–I like the accent.)

There is very little justification for asserting that global warming has gone away over the past ten years, not least because the linear trend in globally-averaged annual mean temperatures (the standard yardstick) over the period 1998-2007 remains upward. While 1998 was the world’s warmest year in the surface-based instrumental record up to that point in time, 2005 was equally warm and in some data sets surpassed 1998. A substantial contribution to the record warmth of 1998 came from the very strong El Nino of 1997/1998 and, when the annual data are adjusted for this short-term effect (to take out El Nino’s warming influence) the warming trend is even more obvious.

Because of the year- to-year variations in globally-averaged mean temperatures, about ten years are required for an underlying trend to emerge from the “noise” of those year-to-year fluctuations. Hence, the fact that 2006 and 2007 were cooler than 2005, is nowhere near enough data to clearly establish a cooling trend.

And of course this most recent La Nina continued, thru 2008, until it ended last month.
I would hope for some standard weather for a while…so we can keep score without the down and up adjustments.

I’m glad I produced a piece that people found interesting. I don’t believe we yet have a good or thorough understanding of the Earth’s climate system.

“Re my 14:22:27 comment, how can this re-evaluation of the sea level rise be accurate? Isn’t the science settled? (settled: verb, past-tense of “settle;” meaning no longer in doubt). Yet, here we have a new study (doesn’t sound settled to me; why conduct a new study, if the science is settled)?”

Roger,

Why don’t you send your comments to FT and Mr. Bamber and a claim for fraudulant science to the University of Bristol.
I am sure that Monckton will give you a helping hand.

Also, this article states that “until now, scientists have generally assumed that…” and sea level would rise “five to six meters;” none of which satisfies the concept of “settled science.” [bolding mine] So, is settled science based on assumptions? And estimates with a range of 20 percent (six is 20 percent more than five)? If the engineers used such “settled” results for engineering calculations, the first woodpecker that came along would destroy civilization.

Ah well. Perhaps with all that extra Antarctic ice these days, one could expect the sea level rise to be less…. oh wait…wouldn’t MORE ice equate to MORE sea level rise? Never mind…I am sure that this is also part of the science that is settled.

Last point, I wonder if Mr. Bamber has consulted lately with the sea level rise charts
, and considers the fact that the sea off the west coast of North America is in fact falling, not rising. One must then wonder exactly how the Antarctic ice melt will all rush over to Baja California, and up the coast to Monterrey, and hang out there. I would appreciate a lucid explanation for this phenomenon.

Carlos (08:49:19) said:
One could also argue: Shouldn’t we try to put the missing CO2 back where it belongs whenever/however possible?”

I think that Carlos meant put it back in the atmosphere!

DaveE

“One of the most alarming consequences of rapid global warming would be a collapse of the west Antarctic ice sheet. Until now scientists have generally assumed that it would raise the global sea level by five to six metres, but a more detailed analysis, published in the journal Science, shows this is an overestimate.

The study, led by Jonathan Bamber, of Bristol University, found that a complete collapse would raise the sea level by an average of 3.3 metres – though the rise would not be distributed evenly around the world. The biggest impact would be along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of north America, where levels would rise 25 per cent more than the global average.

The regional variations result from the uneven redistribution of ice from Antarctica into the oceans. With less mass around the South Pole, Earth’s gravitational field would become slightly weaker in the southern and stronger in the northern hemispheres, causing water to pile up in the north. The redistribution of mass would also affect the planet’s rotation, accentuating the sea level rise in the western hemisphere.”

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5e6810a2-4098-11de-8f18-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1

“A warning, about not heeding a warning; seems out of place here, somehow.

When I sat in a geology classroom, Continental Drift was only a theory. There were many good arguments for it. But it hadn’t been proven yet.

Milankovitch, a Serbian school teacher, proved (using logarithms!) that the small orbital changes could explain the ice ages.

Francis,
Last I heard, we will have another 16,000 years in our interglacial. And that’s easily extended, with just a little global warming.”

You must have been in the local pub with the heating up and doors and windows closed when you heard so, because I haven’t noticed any global warming lately.

I am watching the developing events of this volcano since it’s unexpected eruption the second of may 2008 via the Chaitén Airport web cam looking North and the assessment reports published at several web sites.

I think this volcano is going to cause a major eruption in the near future, shooting a lot of material into the troposphere with a lot of potential “cooling” in the process, despite it’s geographic location on the Southern part of Chili.

Dome building takes place at an incredible speed, lava has risen to the rim of the dome which is very unstable.
Quakes up to magnitude 4.2 are registered between 0.5 and 12 km directly under the volcano. Smaller quakes that mark the outer boundaries of the caldera show it’s huge. The separate vents now have grown together to form a wide vent reducing the pressure build up and limiting the plume to altitudes around 2 to 2.5 km.

This can change abruptly in case of a major dome collapse.
The town of Chaitén, still habited by a small group of about sixty people, persistent to “save their hometown”, will be wiped from the face of the earth.

This volcano represents the equivalent of a nuclear reactor in a cart box.