Via Eurekalert – New study debunks myths about Amazon rain forests – They may be more tolerant of droughts than previously thought
(Boston) — A new NASA-funded study has concluded that Amazon rain forests were remarkably unaffected in the face of once-in-a-century drought in 2005, neither dying nor thriving, contrary to a previously published report and claims by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
“We found no big differences in the greenness level of these forests between drought and non-drought years, which suggests that these forests may be more tolerant of droughts than we previously thought,” said Arindam Samanta, the study’s lead author from Boston University.
The comprehensive study published in the current issue of the scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters used the latest version of the NASA MODIS satellite data to measure the greenness of these vast pristine forests over the past decade.
A study published in the journal Science in 2007 claimed that these forests actually thrive from drought because of more sunshine under cloud-less skies typical of drought conditions. The new study found that those results were flawed and not reproducible.
“This new study brings some clarity to our muddled understanding of how these forests, with their rich source of biodiversity, would fare in the future in the face of twin pressures from logging and changing climate,” said Boston University Prof. Ranga Myneni, senior author of the new study.
The IPCC is under scrutiny for various data inaccuracies, including its claim – based on a flawed World Wildlife Fund study — that up to 40% of the Amazonian forests could react drastically and be replaced by savannas from even a slight reduction in rainfall.
“Our results certainly do not indicate such extreme sensitivity to reductions in rainfall,” said Sangram Ganguly, an author on the new study, from the Bay Area Environmental Research Institute affiliated with NASA Ames Research Center in California.
“The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong, while [the new] calculations are by far more reliable and correct,” said Dr. Jose Marengo, a Brazilian National Institute for Space Research climate scientist and member of the IPCC.
Founded in 1839, Boston University is an internationally recognized private research university with more than 30,000 students participating in undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs. BU consists of 17 colleges and schools along with a number of multi-disciplinary centers and institutes which are central to the school’s research and teaching mission.
Geophysical Research Letters article citation: Samanta, A., S. Ganguly, H. Hashimoto, S. Devadiga, E. Vermote, Y. Knyazikhin, R. R. Nemani, and R. B. Myneni (2010), Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought, Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L05401, doi:10.1029/2009GL042154.
ABSTRACT: Amazon forests did not green-up during the 2005 drought
Paper available here (PDF)
The sensitivity of Amazon rainforests to dry-season droughts is still poorly understood, with reports of enhanced tree mortality and forest fires on one hand, and excessive forest greening on the other. Here, we report that the previous results of large-scale greening of the Amazon, obtained from an earlier version of satellite-derived vegetation greenness data – Collection 4 (C4) Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), are irreproducible, with both this earlier version as well as the improved, current version (C5), owing to inclusion of atmosphere-corrupted data in those results. We find no evidence of large-scale greening of intact Amazon forests during the 2005 drought – approximately 11%–12% of these drought-stricken forests display greening, while, 28%–29% show browning or no-change, and for the rest, the data are not of sufficient quality to characterize any changes. These changes are also not unique – approximately similar changes are observed in non-drought years as well. Changes in surface solar irradiance are contrary to the speculation in the previously published report of enhanced sunlight availability during the 2005 drought. There was no co-relation between drought severity and greenness changes, which is contrary to the idea of drought-induced greening. Thus, we conclude that Amazon forests did not green-up during the 2005 drought.
h/t to Dr. Leif Svalgaard
Sponsored IT training links:
Join pass4sure for absolute JN0-342 exam solution and get guaranteed success using F50-531 dumps and 642-359 study guide.
“A new NASA-funded study has concluded that Amazon rain forests were remarkably unaffected in the face of once-in-a-century drought in 2005, neither dying nor thriving, contrary to a previously published report and claims by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change”
Surprise? Of course not!
Read “The Meteorology and Climate of Tropical Africa”, by Marcel Leroux, Springer Verlag, Springer-Praxis books in Environmental Sciences, London, NY, 548 pp + CD: 300 pp, 250 charts, 2001, ISBN: 978-3-540-42636-3
Follow-up: just in case someone suggests my geography is left to be desired, I wish to point out the analogy between Africa and the Amazon forest is their equatorial position and their influence over weather parameters.
It is funny, because history shows that ALL vital organisms (if they are going to survive) adapt to extremes….as their quest for life is the driving force.
Rain forests are no exception.
More WWF crap to get behind us. It is a shame because I think these organizations like the WWF and Greenpeace and others, were started with good intentions.
But now they are the new “Establishment.”
They were hijacked. And now we need to start over.
No worries….us starting over or not….the trees will be there….doing their thing.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Patterns of tornado production related to 18.6 year lunar declinational patterns understood well enough to forecast using new method. Resultant cycles of interactions due to harmonic interactions of Solar and planetary cycles coupled through the moon’s declinational tides show up when plotted.
http://research.aerology.com/severe-weather/lunar-declinational-affects-tornado-production/
It is important to remember that we are talking about a natural drought. The devastation caused by fires and the clearing of forests for such artificial constructs as Brasilia have cause enormous damage, although there does seem to be some mitigation over time. In other words, junk science does not obliterate the real problem of environmental destruction.
Awesome picture of the Amazon!
We find no evidence of large-scale greening of intact Amazon forests during the 2005 drought – approximately 11%–12% of these drought-stricken forests display greening, while, 28%–29% show browning or no-change, and for the rest, the data are not of sufficient quality to characterize any changes.
You have to love the way they parse this. What percentage of browning
and what percentage of no change?
Fantasy is easy; science is hard, especially when you are called upon to leave preconceived notions and belief systems at the lab door.
What’s that sound I hear? Fragile egos chipping and cracking?
There’s been a lot of “once-in-a-century” weather recently, not just the drought in the Amazon in 2005:
Once-in-a-century storm hits Melbourne
March 7, 2010
Snowstorm of the Century hits Dallas
Feb 13, 2010
flood of the century hits St. George, Southwest Queensland
Feb 13, 2010
Once in a century iceberg set to hit Australia
Dec 11, 2009
Once in a century downpour kills 20 in Turkey
Sept 9, 2009
etc.
Maybe “once-in-a-century” doesn’t mean what it used to mean, anymore.
Now didn’t it occur to the paleo people that they could check the sensitivity of trees to drought by ring widths? I am sure they could correlate reduced sedimentation to growth by way of a bit of statistical coercion.
It would appear that it is only the ego’s of leading climate scientists that are more sensitive than we first thought. The probability of a few emotional melt downs are worse than the models are predicting!
Another declaration /reguritation from CSIRO – Australian government body – they don’t give up easily.
http://www.cmar.csiro.au/e-print/open/image/Image49.gif
hughb
well we are just 9.2 years into this new century short enough period to be having the first of a lot of things…..
This false WWF warning is yet another example of ‘Conservation Biologists’ at work. They begin with the doomsday premise and assemble the chosen research to fit. Glad to see another one of their scary stories exposed.
Lest we forget the ‘endangered’ polar bear, the poster child of the AGW cause.
Isn’t it pretty obvious? All growing things adapt to the circumstances they face.
Some animals hibernate in winter, others move to somewhere warmer and some put on a woolly cardigan and throw another log on the fire.
My cousin moved to Spain from England. It’s hotter by several degrees centigrade all year long. He stopped wearing a thick coat and now wears a thin coat.
Plants do the same. When the winter is long and hard a plant that might usually be expected to sprout in March does so in April instead. Rhododendrons in their native Orient grow at different rates and flower at different times than those that have been imported to England.
Animals and plants have an instinct to stay alive and do the best they can in the conditions they face. Those conditions always change and have always changed. Any suggestion that huge swathes of forest are endangered by a change of average temperature of a few degrees or a change in rainfall of a few centimeters (or even inches) a year is purely fanciful. Of course temperature and rainfall affect how plants grow from one year to the next, but they don’t give up growing until the circumstances are beyond their wide capacity for adaptation.
Why do we spend loads of taxpayers’ finest on projects researching into the bleeding obvious?
What many people think of as “pristine” Amazon rainforest has actually been occupied by humanity for thousands of years. The residents burned the “jungle” in order to induce savanna conditions which were far more amenable to human survival.
From SB Hecht. 2009. Kayapó Savanna Management: Fire, Soils, and Forest Islands in a Threatened Biome. Chapter 7 IN Amazonian Dark Earths: Wim Sombroek’s Vision, William Woods et al (eds), Springer.
The Cerrado, the complex of wooded savannas ranging from almost open grasslands to the mostly closed canopy Cerradão and semi deciduous tropical forests was far more extensive in New World landscapes until about 5,000 years ago when the warmer and moister Holocene climate contributed to the extension of tropical forests into these more open woodland formations (Mayle et al. 2000, 2007). Human occupation within Brazil is thought to be at least 11,000 years old and burning profiles suggest that people have affected this biome since their advent (Miranda et al. 2002). Cerrado vegetation is thought to embrace close to 10,000 species (Ratter et al. 1997; Ratter and Bridgewater 2006) and is composed of very complex patch ecologies and matrices with other forest types (for example, riparian, tropical semi deciduous forests, palm formations, as well as the floras of regional biogeographies) that reflect fire histories, edaphic factors, successions, biogeographies, animal and human interventions, as well as larger scale macro climatic change and disequilibria.
The modern myth of an untouched land subject to vagaries of Ma Nature belie the real truth — that human beings have been caretakers and key vegetation manipulators of Amazonia for millennia, during far greater swings in climate than we are experiencing today. Amazonia is not a fragile ecological web. It is human homeland of great antiquity and resilient to disturbance.
It’s very good news to hear about the resilience of the rainforest against droughts. This is good science meeting UNIPCC + WWF lies.
It will take a while to weed out all the UNIPCC misinformation but science will survive this corruption.
While this is interesting and helpful I don’t think it answers questions about climate change. The short span of time ought to make this a weather issue, not climate. In what is posted here we do not learn what a once-in-a-century drought involves but what if this continued for half of a century? I suspect that some tree species would fare better than others. I agree the IPCC claim doesn’t hold up so we have another instance when they found an item that fit their agenda and then stopped looking. No surprise there.
Also from Brazil, from the the “you couldn’t make this one up” department:
Rio de Janeiro had a violent storm last weekend. An agreement with a medium/spirit (see english site at: http://www.fccc.org.br/en/) had expired late February. They blamed the storm on the fact that the agreement had expired. Rio de Janeiro’s Mayor had to rush to renew the agreement this week! The medium states (from their site): “The Fccc is guided by Cacique Cobra Coral a spirit believed to have been Galileo Galilei and Abraham Lincoln.”
Translation from Brazil’s biggest Media group:
http://translate.google.pt/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Foglobo.globo.com%2Frio%2Fmat%2F2010%2F03%2F09%2Fapos-temporal-paes-renova-convenio-com-medium-da-fundacao-cacique-cobra-coral-916021225.asp&sl=pt&tl=en&hl=&ie=UTF-8
One can imagine what the weather will be for Rio de Janeiro’s Olympic Games 😉
Ecotretas
http://ecotretas.blogspot.com/2010/03/magia-do-tempo.html
Anu (22:20:15) :
“There’s been a lot of “once-in-a-century” weather recently, not just the drought in the Amazon in 2005:”
Uhmm, I live in an area that has a flood about every 30-40 yrs, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t flood anywhere else. It snowed(heavy) on Christmas day when I lived in El Paso, 1975 or there about (I don’t think it had before or since), but that doesn’t mean it didn’t snow in Tempe on a Christmas last century.
Interesting
The WWF report cited a peer reviewed study by Nepstad et al. Nepstad and others have written several studies before and since supporting the general thrust of the WWF study – the WWF’s crime was if anything, citing the least relevent of the Nepstad studies.
So now another study contests Nepstad. Good. That’s how science works. contesting views and data being sorted through.
But this quote “The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong” from one of the authors supposedly. WWF didn’t calculate it, they reported it. Nepstad et al calculated it. So why is this author, supposedly’ gunning for the WWF.
It couldn’t possibly be that his comment has been taken out of context could it. Or may be he has some sort of axe to grind.
Consider; an IPCC report uses multiple peer reviewed science but commits the minor faux pas of doing it indirectly via a non peer-reviewed source and its a MYTH. Another single bit of peer-reviewed science has a differeing opinion and it has DEBUNKED the MYTH.
Ah, humanity is saved, balanced and unbiased journalism has finally returned.
The study was titled …..
Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought
But the report on the study was titled …..
Another WWF assisted IPCC claim debunked: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
Why ?
Anu (22:20:15) :
“There’s been a lot of “once-in-a-century” weather recently, not just the drought in the Amazon in 2005:”
Nothing new here, freak weather events are normal, with many documented events happening over the past centuries. Our climate is driven by deterministic chaos and boundary effects cause turbulence which is expressed as short term local phenomena – extreme weather events.
However, as climate is defined, in our reference frame, as long-term changes to weather these events, energetic though they are, have no measurable effect of climate and provide no indication of change.
Good article here about using Captains Logs to examine the past:-
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article4449527.ece
“The IPCC is under scrutiny for various data inaccuracies, including its claim – based on a flawed World Wildlife Fund study — that up to 40% of the Amazonian forests could react drastically and be replaced by savannas from even a slight reduction in rainfall.”
The IPCC assertion was really irritation for it’s deliberate backwards logic. There is always a dry season in the Amazon, but it is a reduction in rain forest that can bring about, and has brought about reductions and disruption to rainfall.
Anu (22:20:15) :
An event that happened in 1999 was LAST century – so if it happens again in THIS century, then it’s “once in a century” (so far).
..really irritating…
I think there is (yet another) real issue. How can the World WildLies Fund (and Fiends if the Earth and Greenpiss and the rest) be held to account for the damage they are doing to the global economy, for the people being thrown into fuel poverty, for the people in the third world who are being denied hope of a better tomorrow, for the school kids fed lies and terrified with their shroudwaving antics?
At least in theory you can vote politicians out. (Difficult in the UK where all the major parties vie with each other to be more stupid than the others. See:-
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/03/germany-warning.html
How do you get rid of these pernicious advocacy groups (who in the EU are being paid big money from taxpayers?)
There must be a day of reckoning.
I saw a slide show about 30 years ago of a crew trying to grow soybeans in the rain forest. The task of clearing was monunental. Then after clearing and planting the soybean crop the trees came back from the roots. I still remember laughing at the site of small combines dodging 2month old 20 foot tall trees. Plus they had to have men cleaning the field of brush so the smaller brush wouldn’t damage the equipment. After all this they found the yield to low and abndoned the ground to allow the forest to return. Here nature won.
“The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong, while [the new] calculations are by far more reliable and correct”
The paper discussed here does not address this issue. It is mainly focused on the curious results of Saleska et al. (2007) which reported greening during the drought. This result was unexpected, and its not too surprising that further work has corrected it. Such are the ways of science.
This paper also fails to find significantly enhanced browning during the 2005 drought. Should that reassure us that the forest is more drought tolerant than previously thought? Work by Nepstad is useful here. His group created an artificial drought in Amazonian forest by preventing much of the rainfall from reaching the forest floor with a series of gutters. After several years of artificial drought, there is a large drop in leaf area index, and an increase in mortality, especially amongst the canopy trees. But after the first year year of drought, there is little evidence of water stress (fig 2) – there is still sufficient water within reach of the roots.
This would suggest that one year droughts are unlikely to cause severe change by themselves, except perhaps in areas where the soil retains little water, or if fire risk increases. Nepstad’s work suggests that multiyear droughts will strongly affect the forest. This new paper by Samanta et al does not change this conclusion.
Who is to say these tropical rainforests will last for ever. As I understand it from the likes of Prof Philip Stott (sceptic), they are only between 12,000-15,000 years old, which would tie in pretty well with an ice-age/inter-glacial driven growth spurt of vegetation as the whole planet warmed up! Or is my reasoning so wrong? However, from the paleo-geological record, it appears that CO2 levels remained pretty much consistent throughout that time frame. So are the RFs much older, or was there another mechanism, such as oceanic absorbtion balancing these events out with CO2? Or are the RFs not so competent at sequestering CO2 & releasing it as we think, & that perhaps oceanic absorbtion is far more critical?
If we had time to adapt because of nature it would be one thing but we don’t. We are cutting down the amazon rain forest which causes dought condition. The Maya civilation
collapsed because of all the forest they cut down. WE in the 70’s had 3 billion people and today we have almost 7 billion people. WE are not like Easter Island and have another island to go to when we destroy the planet. WE have areas in the Pacific and Alantic oceans that is twice the size of the continental US that is full of tons of floating plastics which is killing marine life, birds and plankton and 70% of our oxygen comes from plankton. When we kill the plankton we kill ourselves. WE have used pesticides for decades which are causing people and animals to be sterile, causing many diseases like cancer. WE have bees disappearing at an extreme rate and if we lose the bees who pollinate our plants we don’t have any food. WE are losing large population of bats who eat their body weigh in mosquitos daily and if we lose the bats WE increase malaria world wide (WE ARE A GLOBAL WORLD). WE are losing a 150 species daily to extinction and we have no idea the impact that will have the the ecosystem. It is time WE step up to the table and be good stewarts to this little planet WE live on before it is too late. I really don’t want to hear 20 years from now why didn’t someone do something to save us. Many of us tried.
Hey owl. Can you name 5 of the those species that went extinct in 2009?
Anu 22:20:15
I think it means “so far this century” 🙂
Excellent piece of work which leaves more egg on the already bespattered face of the IPCC. Sad when political quasi-socialist dogma blinds people to science, and the cargo cult science of Climatology is allowed to thrive.
I’m not surprised that the Amazon rainforest has been shown to be a robust system, It was born 10m years ago and despite the vagaries of drought, ice-ages, 130m increases in sea levels, e.t.c., it is still thriving today. It is not the delicate beast the CAGW alarmists would have you believe, it is a vibrant, ever-changing, adaptable ecosystem and it will still be here long after the passing of mankind.
Anu,
Your story about the iceberg set to hit Australia is a good one. The article states that the iceberg is 1,700km off the coast of SYDNEY. Then it says that the iceberg is off the coast of Western Australia. LOL. Sydney is on the opposite side of the country! That would be like saying that an iceberg spotted off the coast of California was approaching New York.
As for the “once-in-a-century” events, perhaps you have some explanation of what caused these same types of events over 100 years ago, when carbon dioxide levels were lower than they are today.
BTW, did the iceberg crash into Sydney and damage the opera house? I must have missed that report on the news.
@Anu
Sorry i’m confused what are you trying to show? Is it links to articles of irrelevance? because i can do that.
Real scientist do real science
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8562998.stm
Re savethesharks,
“… I think these organizations like the WWF and Greenpeace and others, were started with good intentions.”
That’s the problem. “I think” is not a substitute for “I have evidence for”.
You must be a lot younger than I am. We know a lot about Greenpeace in particular by the early 80s and what we saw was not so nice. I knew one good guy from the WWF though.
Increased atmospheric CO2 concentration improved the health of plants considerably, and enables them to tolerate drier conditions. Quite apart from the fact that historical levels of CO2 have been barely above suffocation levels for C3 photosynthesizers (such as trees), so that plants are stressed and inefficient in their use of resources (including water), the increase in CO2 enables plants to close up their stomata somewhat, thus reducing the loss of the plant’s water from the leaves through transpiration that had been drawn through the roots. I have done some posts on this:
http://buythetruth.wordpress.com/2009/06/02/world-food-supplies-and-carbon-emissions/
http://buythetruth.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/photosynthesis-and-co2-enrichment/
http://buythetruth.wordpress.com/2009/08/15/co2-enrichment-and-plant-nutrition/
http://buythetruth.wordpress.com/2009/07/11/growth-of-crops-weeds-co2-and-lies/
Anu, it’s because only recently have we been able to actually hear these things. Think about it… 20 years ago a weather event in Australia was never heard about in North America.
Only in the last two decades has the world been obsessed with weather and climate, and the media dutifully reports what they think people want to hear. Flood, fire, tornado, hurricane, snow, heat, it’s all news now.
despite the obvious faults of the IPCC, the primary interest should be, if the WWF frauded donors and the public via tax benefits by producing this and many other manipulated papers.
Are there any IPCC claims that are not exaggerated? Any that are not made with the intention of having us believe that climate change is a catastrophe?
The IPCC exaggerations should be givien the widest publicity. Because in the end, it will take overwhelming public resistance to change the direction of our own politicians and stop the nonsense. We need at least 90% of the public mobilised against AGW. Sadly, we are still a long way from that yet:
http://www.herkinderkin.com/2010/03/public-opinion-about-global-warming/
Mike D. (23:16:30) :
“…..The modern myth of an untouched land subject to vagaries of Ma Nature belie the real truth — that human beings have been caretakers and key vegetation manipulators of Amazonia for millennia, during far greater swings in climate than we are experiencing today. Amazonia is not a fragile ecological web. It is human homeland of great antiquity and resilient to disturbance.”
About 20 years ago I was at a talk where the eco-nuts were trying to restrict the use of a local state park by closing the park to any use except restricted hiking on a vastly reduced number of trails. The state biologist spiked their guns when he stated horse traffic actually reduced erosion by roughing up the trails with hoof marks, thereby slowing water drainage and allowing it to soak in. He also stated clearings, that is trails allowed MORE bio diversity since the margin areas between cleared and forested areas supported many more species as well as providing more cover for small animals.
Anyone who has ever tried to go from a grassy field or cropland into a nearby woods has run into this and probably wishes they were armed with gloves and a machete.
owl (01:36:38) :
“WE are losing large population of bats who eat their body weigh in mosquitos daily and if we lose the bats WE increase malaria world wide”
That’s what DDT is for.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124303288779048569.html
People like you are dangerously uninformed.
owl (01:36:38) :
These are fair concerns. So why the hell has the focus been on CO2 then? You mentioned Easter Island and it is not difficult to imagine that they thought what they were doing at the time was the right thing to do, but obviously it wasn’t. I don’t think their culture allowed them to see the predicament they were in. I think the fact many people have made CO2 the one big single issue facing humankind not dissimilar and perhaps it is the default way we deal with crisis, perceived or real. The focus on CO2 could be a dreadful distraction.
re Hughb of Sydney,
I know that this is slightly OT, but thanks for the reference to the CSIRO diagram illustrating CH4-CO2-T-time relationships as determined from the Vostok ice core data. BUT there appears to be a problem in the time series as represented in the CSIRO diagram – it appears to indicate that individual CO2 concentration maxima COINCIDE with T maxima over the time span illustrated. However, in the real data, CO2 concentrations reach maxima approximately 400- 800 years after T’s reach their maxima; and the CO2 maxima persist for 1000 years or more after T’s reach their minima during the ensuing glaciation. In this sense the CSIRO diagram is potentially misleading in that it shows that the T and CO2 maxima coincide in time- I would hope that this was not intended – and it may well be an artefact of the presentation.
The data on CO2, CH4, delta T, and time relations in the real ice core data are compelling refutations of the implied direct or indirect major forcing role that “anthropogenic” CO2 increase plays in elevating global mean surface temperatures- based as they are on light stable isotope ratios, cosmogenic isotope ratios, included dust, and gas compositions – ice cores, together with the very interesting recent studies of zoning in pelecypod shells, represent robust windows on past climate. And these data indicate that CO2 concentration spikes FOLLOW mean surface temperature maxima. Note that ~ 1000 year time lag in the drop in CO2 concentrations after T decrease is a characteristic feature of the ice core data
As I have noted before, a summary of the ice core data is presented, together with primary data sources at :
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/climate.html
These data are well worth a study for those of you who query the robustness of ice core data! Ferdinand Engelbeen also presents reasoned refutations of the criticisms of the robustness of the data.
@ owl
You got some good points there. There are a lot more immediate concerns for humanity than increasing CO2 and a couple of degrees of warming over the next century; general pollution, better land-use practices, etc. Just because someone doesn’t believe in AGW doesn’t mean they don’t care about the planet we live on. Cap and trade schemes and trading carbon credits aren’t going to solve any of the issues you raise.
Richard Telford (01:17:13) :”Nepstad’s work suggests that multiyear droughts will strongly affect the forest.”
To have multiyear drought in parts of Amazonia, there had to be several El Nino’s followed. Impossible.
mcfarmer (01:12:12) :
“I saw a slide show about 30 years ago of a crew trying to grow soybeans in the rain forest…”
Thanks for that.
Anyone who farms will tell you of this type of never ending battle. That is why pesticides, herbicides, herbicide resistant GMOs and all the rest were invented and make Monsanto, DuPont and Dow the big bucks. The city folk need to spend a bit of time on an organic farm trying to keep mother nature from gobbling up the crop and from reclaiming the land. Turn your back for a minute and she wins! They might also develop some appreciation for where their next dinner comes from instead of making the farmers life harder by throwing up more and more road blocks in the way of new regulations.
Once the big corporations win and get their regulations passed, the regs will drive the independent farmers off the land. Then the city folk are going to find out corporations are not going to put up with farming for slave wages. CAGW is a way to control and profit from ordinary peoples use of energy. The World Trade Organizations Agreement on Agriculture and its implementation here in the USA through Food Safety scares, is a way to control and profit from the production of food. The USA produces 25% of the world food supply. The EU, Canada, Australia and most recently NZ have already caved into many of the WTO demands.
“instead of making roughly $50 a head, the ranch lost as much as $135 on every head of cattle sold..” http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1489401/cattle_industry_experiencing_hard_times/
“Financial reports show 20 straight months of cattle being sold at a loss in 2008.” http://www.avma.org/onlnews/javma/apr09/090415a.asp
“In summary, we have record low grain inventories globally as we move into a new crop year. We have demand growing strongly. Which means that going forward even small crop failures are going to drive grain prices to record levels. As an investor, we continue to find these long term trends..very attractive.” Food shortfalls predicted: 2008 http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/dancy/2008/0104.html
In the USA “…The current food animal production system is highly concentrated and exhibits conditions that suggest monopsony, in which there are very few buyers for a large number of suppliers. Under monopsonistic conditions, fewer goods are sold, prices are higher in output markets and lower for sellers of inputs, and wealth is transferred from the party without market power to the party with market power….
The grower does not own the animals and frequently does not grow the crops to feed them. The integrator (company) controls all phases of production… Today, the swine and poultry industries are the most vertically integrated, with a small number of companies overseeing most of the chicken meat and egg production in the United States….
The economic disparity between industrial farms and those that retain locally owned and controlled farms may be due in part, to the degree in which money stays in the community. Locally owned and controlled farms tend to buy their supplies and services locally, thus supporting a variety of local businesses. This phenomenon is known as the economic “multiplier” effect, estimated at approximately seven dollars per dollar earned by the locally owned farm…
Quality of life in rural communities has also declined, partly because of the entrenched poverty and lack of economic opportunity, but also because the linkages that once bound locally owned farms with the community have dissolved in many places and the social fabric of many communities has begun to fray. These changes are evident in negative attitudes about trust, neighborliness, community division, networks of acquaintanceship, democratic values, and community involvement, as well as increased crime and teen pregnancy rates, civil suits, and stress.” And this is just talking of the USA!
http://www.pewtrusts.org/uploadedFiles/wwwpewtrustsorg/Reports/Industrial_Agriculture/PCIFAP_FINAL.pdf
owl (01:36:38) :
“[…] WE are losing a 150 species daily to extinction and we have no idea the impact that will have the the ecosystem. […]”
What is your source for the 150 number? Is 150 typical, higher tahn in the past, or lower than in the past? Is there a cause assigned to the 150 number?
Inquiring minds want to know.
CO2 is a concern and has caused many of the problems I talked about. We are not like a gnat when they finish a banana they can find another to eat. WE are using all the natural resources on this planet to extremes. Bottom line I doubt if we will survive to the end of the century. If every spider on this planet died tomorrow we would all be dead in 8 days.
List of extinct species in 2009
New Zealand Owlet-nightjar
Great Elephantbird
Mauritius Blue Pigeon
Rodrigues Pigeon
Matinique Amazon
Guadeloupe Amazon
Kusaie Island Starling
Ratas Island lizard
Santo Stefano lizard
Here are some links:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/extremeice/program.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/7298781/AAAS-Coral-reefs-could-disappear-by-the-end-of-the-century.html
http://www.blog.thesietch.org/2010/03/04/the-methane-bomb-is-about-to-explode/
http://www.blog.thesietch.org/2010/03/04/the-methane-bomb-is-about-to-explode/
I recently had a WWF donation request sent to me in the mail. I thought about sending it back empty saying I only support organizations who care about the earth and people. I don’t support radical, lying, deceptive organizations who push an idea that is devoid of facts.
As I suspected, the green trees are way smarter and far more adaptable to changing conditions than the greenpeeps.
D MacKenzie (03:57:22) :
@ owl
You got some good points there. There are a lot more immediate concerns for humanity than increasing CO2 and a couple of degrees of warming over the next century; general pollution, better land-use practices, etc. Just because someone doesn’t believe in AGW doesn’t mean they don’t care about the planet we live on.
True, but I’m not very sanguine about the probability of living long enough to see a litter-free world. One of my acquaintances on the -x side of the Law axis once told me the reason organized crimesters invest in funeral parlors and sanitation companies:
“People are always gonna do two things — they’re always gonna die and they’re always gonna make a mess.”
“The sensitivity of Amazon rainforests to dry-season droughts is still poorly understood,..”
———–
So true!
I think it’s time to make these words a universal fill-in-the-blank statement of fact:
“THE ________________________ IS STILL POORLY UNDERSTOOD.”
Human vanity and stupidity know no bounds. Pretend you are the human species (the whole sheebang) and look in the mirror for a brief moment. Take a good long look. Need I say more…?
Let’s STOP trying to save the planet. Let’s just do the best we can to live today doing the best we know how. The Amazon, the weather, the wildlife, the icecaps will do just fine if we don’t try to FIX them.
The next person to stand up on a soapbox in Hyde Park or Central Park or downtown at the local courthouse, needs to be totally ignored by everyone, especially the idiot media.
The only thing mankind needs to save is MANKIND –from itself.
owl (04:41:58) :
You list several “extinct species in 2009” – but when did they go extinct?
I realise that Wikipedia isn’t definitive, but its entry on one of your examples says:
“it can be concluded that the Mauritius Blue Pigeon became extinct in the 1830s.”
And a quick look at Wiki’s ‘extinct birds’ page suggests that extinctions in the late 20th century do not seem to be more frequent than at earlier times.
Blaming everything on CO2 is (as others have pointed out) a dangerous distraction from the real environmental problems that we face.
Is anyone keeping tabs with an IPCC summary checksheet summarizing all the claims and when they are refuted and a link to the study(ies),as well as the claims that aren’t refuted yet? I think this could be a nice reference for people.
owl (04:41:58),
I have a feeling you wouldn’t know a Kusaie Island Starling or a Ratas Island lizard if they bit you on the butt. And how do you prove a negative? “Extinct” species are routinely rediscovered.
Species go extinct All. The. Time. It’s nature’s way. But connecting that with CO2 or a fraction of a degree warming over a century is crazy talk, and you’ll get called on it here.
I suggest you go back to the realclimate or tamino or climateprogress echo chambers, where they’ll treat you like the prodigal son for nutty assumptions like that.
@owl (04:41:58) :
C’mon, Owl.
You were talking about 150 Species extinctions DAILY.
Most of your list of species becoming extinct in 2009 have (allegedly) been extinct for many years and climate change wasn’t the cause of any of them.
And your links are just the usual discredited alarmist crap.
Interesting to see that the PBS Nova site is funded by Exxon Mobile, Pacific Life & Merrill Lynch.
But I thought it was supposed to be us nasty ‘deniers’ who were the very well financed shills for Big Oil?
You’ll have to do very much better than that, my friend.
Owl, for your data of extinctions to make scientific sense, please statistically compare the 2009 extinction rate to the extinction rate prior to humans being on the planet.
From Bishop Hill,
http://www.inters.org/disf/sites/default/files/Onestà_nella_Scienza.pdf
Here are a few relevant NASA studies which find the Amazon goes green during the dry season!!!
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/view.php?id=29754
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/AmazonEVI/
And another study here:
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/12/4820.full
owl
The Mauritius Blue Pigeon went extinct in 1790 and the Great Elephant bird in the 17th century–I didn’t look up the others–maybe you or someone else will.
@owl (04:41:58) :
I believe the 1 degree warming relates only to the urban environment.
Yet another IPCC error that worked in their favor. Still waiting to hear of an error in an IPCC report that underestimates the negative effects of global warming…
owl, here is a hint for your own assessment. This science oriented website works very hard to present interesting topics presented in posts geared towards a broad range of readers, including those without science backgrounds. The average range of intelligences can grasp most of what is said here and can make reasoned critiques about the veracity of said articles. If we can do it here, we are certainly capable of applying that same degree of critique to places like Wiki. To wit: Finding a list of the names of birds that “are” extinct during a certain time period would, to most of us here, simply mean these birds are extinct and remain so, not that they “went” extinct, during the period given.
OT but well worth reading the following brilliant speech from Vaclav Klaus:-
http://www.klaus.cz/clanky/2529
Owl,
Both of these issues have already been discussed and debunked:
Statistician debunks Gore’s climate linkage to the collapse of the Mayan civilisation
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/11/29/statistician-debunks-gores-climate-linkage-of-the-collapse-of-the-mayan-civilisation/
Land based bird and mammal extinctions: Where Are The Corpses?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/01/04/where-are-the-corpses/
“owl (04:41:58) :
CO2 is a concern and has caused many of the problems I talked about. We are […]
List of extinct species in 2009”
owl, i share your concern for threatened species.
To help them survive, we need resources. Right about now the environmental movement concentrates on the polar bear (far from threatened) as a symbol for climate change. The polar bear is at the top of the WWF list of threatened species. This is silly. The polar bears are fine. They are thriving.
CO2 didn’t kill any pigeon and will IMHO not seriously threaten the polar bear. The environmental movement is misguided. All the resources wasted with, for instance, carbon sequestration projects or the giant amount of subsidies used for wind turbine and PV projects – imagine what you could do with that money to, for instance, improve conservation of the unique Madagascar flora and fauna. That would help a much more pressing need than trying to fight the fictitious nightmare scenarios by Hansen and Ehrlich.
The way the money is spent ATM i must say: It’s no use, it’s no use.
jeez (02:54:19) :
“Hey owl. Can you name 5 of the those species that went extinct in 2009?”
I was hoping for a list of the 150 that went extinct yesterday. Ah, well. (sigh…)
Do they know when it rains in the amazon basin, Do they know why does it rain on the amazon basin and not on the sahara desert?, they don´t care about it! and to argue if they are right or not it is a naive excercise because they do not know anything about it, and they do not want to know anything about it just because their objectives are ideological, political, and the climate issue it has been and it is just the convenient “script” of an imaginary scary “movie”.
The real question now is what are they doing now to achieve the same ideological/ political goals they were supposed to achieve with the climate tale.
Then, and OFF TOPIC, rains are OK on the amazon basin, as true as the earth rotates from west to east at the current velocity and as long as there is a high mountain bariier called the Andes at the west. And it rains on the andes from november to march every year, filling up the amazonian rivers. Begin to worry about the amazon basin when LOD lengthens or the andes sank in the pacific, but not to worry either because in such a case the Sahara would be the amazon basin replacement, so it has been and it will be.
A forest fire isn’t necessarily a catastrophe, the indigenous people of the Amazon used various slash-and-burn and slash-and-char agriculture which supported massive populations in pre-de Orellana times. Terra preta do indios, or black Earth of the Indian’s is fantastically fertile compared to surrounding soils. We probably will not hear much of it other than a few spotty articles like “Special Report: Inspired by Ancient Amazonians, a Plan to Convert Trash into Environmental Treasure” because it has some potential to actually solve many problems, real or imagined, caused by CO2 accumulation without eliminated man and civilization as we know it.
@ Bill Tuttle: LOL, agreed!
New Zealand Owlet: “Despite a small number of reports of small owls being found in the 19th century that may have been New Zealand Owlet-nightjars, the species is thought to have become extinct around 1200 AD.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Owlet-nightjar
Hardly 2009, but then we all know how relaible wikipedia is… 😉
owl (04:41:58) :
CO2 is a concern and has caused many of the problems I talked about. We are not like a gnat when they finish a banana they can find another to eat. WE are using all the natural resources on this planet to extremes. Bottom line I doubt if we will survive to the end of the century. If every spider on this planet died tomorrow we would all be dead in 8 days.
List of extinct species in 2009
New Zealand Owlet-nightjar
Great Elephantbird
Mauritius Blue Pigeon
Rodrigues Pigeon
Matinique Amazon
Guadeloupe Amazon
Kusaie Island Starling
Ratas Island lizard
Santo Stefano lizard
Oi! What about the Norwegian Blue Parrot then, or is that just restin?
@owl ‘CO2 is a concern and has caused many of the problems I talked about.’
And apparently your proof is that everyone has to take your word for it.
Geez, you fail to prove it by yourself, or by reference, or by simple logic.
It’s never been co2 that’s been the problem, it’s the particles that’ve always been the problem, but of course the particles of all sizes tend to block out sun light and make the world a tad bit colder so they don’t count any more and hasn’t for about twenty years and counting. It’s the particles that screw with peoples respiratory system, with smell, with animals respiratory system, with water pollution, with plant life and acidity even. CO2 is frakking bone, that’s why it’s so heavily used as an additive in green houses.
But sure fear you the melting ice, I mean it’s only been melting for some 10 to 12 thousand years, and will, unless the recent, what, 10 year cold spell keeps on going, for another few thousand years. I mean run for the hills dude and never mind from where some two to three billion people get their fresh water from.
Ref – owl (04:41:58) :
“CO2 is……….”
____________________________
What the heck, evertbody else is talking to the PuddyCat’s friend..
Owl:
I ask that you think about this l……o…..n…..g and h…..a…..r…..d and get in a couple days and tell us what you think the answer is —
When you boil all the AGW stuff down to it’s lowest common denominator, what one surefire method will answer all the issues (some say ‘problems’) that humans have generated?
PS: There is ONLY one correct answer.
From http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/species/index.html?action=SpcHTMDetails.asp&sid=30083&m=0
” Martinique Amazon Amazona martinicana
Amazona martinicana was described from Martinique (to France) by Labat in 1742, and by Buffon in 1779, and named by Clark [1905] based on these descriptions. Labat wrote that “the parrot is too common a bird for me to stop to give a description of it”, and so the species must have declined very rapidly to extinction in the latter half of the 18th century.
…
Threats: Hunting is likely to have caused its extinction. ”
Not 2009, not CO2.
paul jackson (06:48:42) :
“A forest fire isn’t necessarily a catastrophe,…. or black Earth of the Indian’s is fantastically fertile compared to surrounding soils.”
I have used commercial fertilizer on my kitchen garden and then switched to wood ash from my wood stove. The difference was fantastic. Wood ash plus animal manure makes a great fertilizer but commercial fertilizer makes Monsanto (owned by the financiers) wealthy.
Glenn Tamblyn (00:14:37) :
You obviously haven’t read the Nepstad et al papers as I did, the 40% was created by the IPCC.
Nepstad et al quoted an area of Brazillian Rainforest which actually equated to approx. 11% of the Amazon Rainforest.
The 40% appears to have been conjured up from another paper talking about Burning & Logging in the Brazillian rainforest, but hey that is pretty close to a Drought so that will do for the IPCC.
owl (01:36:38) :
owl (04:41:58) :
What proof do you have that they are extinct and if they are what did CO2 have to do with it?
As to your link to Coral Reefs http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/7298781/AAAS-Coral-reefs-could-disappear-by-the-end-of-the-century.html
has been completely disproved by other studies see these links
http://www.physorg.com/news185465333.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100109002310.htm
http://www.theresilientearth.com/?q=content/heat-resistant-corals-ignore-climate-change-threats
It is Cold that has killed Coarl this year, see this link
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-cold-coral31-2010jan31,0,6453643.story
Dear Mike D. (above),
Amzonian Dark Earths are a subject of study one of the members of my department (Dr. E. Arroyo), who is collecting geo-morphophological and archaeological evidence of their anthropogenic formation. He would agree with your post. Thank you for the post and reference (I will look it up as I am in the Durham library now, and I was just visiting this site for fun, I think these places are good for the Democratization of science).
Bruce M. Albert
It Should Be Obvious™
What depth is the water table? How far down are the aquifers?
You don’t get vegetation to grow that tall and that dense without very deep roots. It seems very likely they extend downward at least as far as a reliably-producing hand-dug well would go.
The dang trees can fetch their own water. Little shortages in the rainfall don’t matter, unless going on for a very long time, which certainly does not look to be happening anytime soon.
@Gail Combs
You do know that when people fail with the commercial fertilizer is usually because people seem to think that more the merrier. People usually don’t over fertilize their garden and grass with the home made stuff because it’s har to burn enough wood to do that. Commercial fertilizers are the distilled burning of woods from hundred and thousands of people, i.e. you really don’t need all that much as long as you use it properly.
All you have to do is look to the closest hydro pond system or the present day intelligent farmer who calculates how much to use in the amount of water used for irrigation and such (like pending on how much nutrients the soil already contain and how much it rains, etc.)
Some plants actually need a forest fire, or rather the heat, to survive and propagate.
While rain forest resistance to drought is a bit of a no brainer, I am at a loss as to why this is relevant.
It has been empirically established, by Wentz et al, that:
“And as the air, earth and sea warms with climate change the atmospheric water vapor load increases by as much as 6.5 percent per degree Celsius, according to satellite data from the past 20 years. As the water vapor increases, so, too, will rainfall, argues physicist Frank Wentz, director of Remote Sensing Systems (RSS) in Santa Rosa, Calif., a provider of climate data records contracted by NASA. ”
So the only way drought will increase, will be via a global cooling scenario. When we see polar ice growing, we will know more water is being removed from the atmosphere, and absolute humidity is dropping. It will then be time to worry about drought and increased desertification.
Btw, both poles are now nominal, in regards to sea ice extent. GK
Let’s not forget that WWF and many other ‘green’ orgs are funded by various agencies set up by the master manipulators–rockefeller. I hate OILs contribution to our totalitarian gov.
OIL, and google, and MS etc., are investors in Petrobras, just like soros, bhos master… the argument that OIL is somehow against ‘green’ (the green illusion) is sick. Oil is industry and has investors which only care about MONEY/PROFIT.
Industry invests wherever money will be made, unfortunately, but that is what public ownership has done for us… the few make millions and the puny, pawn investors with a few thousand shares… well, it makes them feel like they are part of the economy and are ‘smart’ investors.
WWF and Greenpeace are funded by oil.
I’ll try to find a letter and post it… it isn’t too long and apparently is genuine… BTW: I got my investor info from Petrobras itself, no other source.
Cont… can’t find the original source, but here is something:
Greenpeace’s factsheets cannot disguise which side Exxon is really on. Their factsheet on Stanford University reads :
On November 20, 2002 Exxon Mobil announced it would give $100 million to a groundbreaking Stanford University project dedicated to researching new options for commercially viable, technological systems for energy supply and use which have the capability to substantially reduce greenhouse emissions.” Other corporate sponsors to The Global Climate and Energy Project included General Electric and Schlumberger…..The project is not intended to further explore climate science, instead focusing on development of new energy technology and carbon sequestration technology(5)
The same ruse was used in 1913 to get Congress and the public behind the plan for the Federal Reserve System. Unknown to the public, the Federal Reserve Act was drawn up in secret by Wall Street in 1910. Rockefeller and friends knew that there was great public mistrust of Wall Street ‘s involvement with the Glass-Owen Bill placed before Congress. The only way to swing public opinion in favour of the Bill was for Wall Street to come out in the press vehemently against it. And so anti-establishment feeling helped to win the day for Wall Street.(6). This is a warning from history that Rockefellers deny with their lips what they are doing with their hands.
So what are they doing with their hands, or more importantly with their wallets? Besides the Stanford University example, under the umbrella of Rockefeller Family Fund 136 foundations formed the Environmental Grant makers Association (EGA) in 1987 which has grown to over 200 by the end of the twentieth century. It donates hundreds of millions of dollars annually to environmental groups. In a dazzling display of raw power, foundations with interlocking directorates funded the Nature Conservancy in 1996 to the tune of $203,886,056, or 60 percent of its annual revenue. The Earth Charter, written by Stephen Rockefeller is the Ten Commandments for the Green Religion. It was a development of an earlier Rockefeller initiative, the 1972 Rockefeller Brothers Fund report entitled Use of Land: A Citizen’s Policy Guide to Urban Growth. This was a bench-mark publication on subjecting property rights to government censure.(7)
Dear owl,
You are very good at regurgitating left-wing talking points that have been refuted by science time and time again; however, it was fun to read your wildly innaccurate post nonetheless, just for the giggles.
Ann said,
“It is important to remember that we are talking about a natural drought. The devastation caused by fires and the clearing of forests for such artificial constructs as Brasilia have cause enormous damage, although there does seem to be some mitigation over time. In other words, junk science does not obliterate the real problem of environmental destruction.”
Well Ann, I don’t think anyone here would advocate for wanton environmental destruction, and the fact that there has been some mitigation over time is further evidence of the resilience of the rainforest.
Certainly I don’t personally think that over-logging and/or clearing huge areas of rainforest in order to build a city are the best ideas on the planet, but over-logging and over-clearing of the forest are not caused by excessive levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, they are (unlike global warming) ACTUALLY caused by human choices and activities.
While everyone else is working with owl on the science I would like to set a reality check point.
@owl
In your first post try replacing ‘WE’ with ‘I’. Then turn off your PC, pull the main power breaker, shut off the gas and water, and walk to your front door. Now comes the fun part. Strip completely naked, open the door and walk to the nearest woods. I’d say you have about 3 days to figure out how you’re going to stay alive. NOTHING else will matter… At this point in your life reality really sucks and the messes humanity has and will make are completely irrelevant. Just think, when that protected brown bear comes out of nowhere, YOU are now the endangered species. To the bear you’re just dinner for the family. Welcome to the real world.
I’ve had this conversation with my tree hugging kids – no takers and I cannot figure out why. Time for another cup of warm coffee.
In reply to Gail Combs,
FINALLY someone who actually understands. Regulations are NOT written to control large corporations. Regulations are written BY the large corporations, then passed by our “government” to the detriment of small businesses and the people in general.
Bank regulations do NOT make big banks smaller. Bank regulations make mega-banks even bigger, and destroy community banks. Farming regulations do not make big farms become smaller and more local and manageable. Farming regulations benefit the mega-farms and destroy small family-owned community-based farming.
Look at any instance of government “regulation” and you will see exactly the same phenomenon. This is not by accident, this is by design.
owl (04:41:58) :
There must be a good idea buried in that collection of ideas you have. But now you have a problem. Namely, as others have shown in their response to your comments, you can’t be trusted to tell the truth. Now if you want to be taken seriously you will have to be completely honest in your comments for about a dozen straight. Can you do that?
If you change your name and post the same flim-flam I’ll know you will never be trustworthy. I’m an optimist, though, so if you comment again using the same name I will look through it just to check how you are doing. Being an optimist is sometimes hard and dirty work – look up the story of the Pony in the Dung Heap for an understanding of this statement.
PeterB in Indainapolis (08:48:43) :
“In reply to Gail Combs,
FINALLY someone who actually understands. Regulations are NOT written to control large corporations. Regulations are written BY the large corporations, then passed by our “government” to the detriment of small businesses and the people in general.”
Yes I finally figured that out. At another site “Sancho” remarked about his brother who works for EPA. The brother was ordered to leave Mobil and Exxon alone and go after the small Mom and Pop businesses. Regulations are there to raise the bar so new comers can not become business owners and challenge the profits of the mega corporations. Think about it For the average Joe trying to make a living in a one man shop the following businesses have been regulated out of existence by the US government or insurance companies.
Maid/laundry service
child care
petting zoos
mechanic shops
home baked goodies
even “consultant”
Just to name a few. We are being herded into working for the big corporations. New tax reg now make it almost impossible for a single person to be a consultant. One technical writer found she was paid $10 while the big temp firm charged over $100 for her work. Companies will no longer hire you unless you are from a multi-person consulting firm thanks to the change in tax regs that was “supposed to protect workers from exploitation”
The USA is now Government by the megacorporations for the megacorporation…
and this from a capitalist!
B.M. Albert, Ph.D., PDRA (07:52:48) :
Dear Mike D. (above),
Amzonian Dark Earths are a subject of study one of the members of my department (Dr. E. Arroyo), who is collecting geo-morphophological and archaeological evidence of their anthropogenic formation. He would agree with your post….
Perhaps you or he could do a popular type article and post it here.
1DandyTroll (08:05:18) : I sample and have my fields analyzed on a yearly basis so I can apply the correct lime and fertilizer without waste per the USDA’s recommendations. My words still stand. I was amazed at the response I got from the wood ash from my stove.
I made the comment because people seem to equate burning with evil when it is a natural part of the earth’s cycles.
Gail Combs (09:49:43) :I made the comment because people seem to equate burning with evil when it is a natural part of the earth’s cycles
If it’s natural then: “Save the jungles, burn global warmers instead of trees!”
Gail Combs (09:49:43): Perhaps you or he could do a popular type article and post it here.
Gail, I direct an online institute with a dozen subsites. We post lots of popular articles on a variety of topics, including Amazon dark earths. Click on my name. It is, however, less than ideal web etiquette to fish for visitors at other’s websites, so I tone down the self promotion when visiting here.
Anthony posts what interests him. He doesn’t need me or anyone else to tell him what to post. He has been successful following his own drummer. No reason to change that strategy.
owl (01:36:38), and Stephen Skinner (03:29:54), the “eco-suicide” of the Easter Islanders is probably just another eco-myth:
http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/EE%2016-34_Peiser.pdf
http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/rethinking-the-fall-of-easter-island
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19125621.100-easter-island-a-monumental-collapse.html?full=true
Because this is a partisan (or committed or engaged or risen-consciouness) site and the IPCC is one of its punching bags. So what?
jeez (02:54:19) : said
Hey owl. Can you name 5 of the those species that went extinct in 2009?
owl (04:41:58) : said
List of extinct species in 2009
New Zealand Owlet-nightjar
Owl. .As you can see the below the NZ owlet-nightjar has been long gone – like since 1200 AD. This was just the first on your list of 5. Why should I believe anything you say.
Despite a small number of reports of small owls being found in the 19th century that may have been New Zealand Owlet-nightjars, the species is thought to have become extinct around 1200 AD.
The New Zealand Owlet-nightjar was the largest species of owlet-nightjar, weighing an estimated 150-200 g. The species was also either flightless, as suggested by its small wings, or a very poor flier (the species has a strong keel). The diet probably consisted of invertebrates, as well as frogs and lizards.
The species rapidly became extinct after the introduction of Pacific Rats to New Zealand. Their remains have never been found in association with Māori middens, and are unlikely to have been hunted due to their small size and nocturnal habits.
Doug
bunny (02:08:55) :
Anu,
Your story about the iceberg set to hit Australia is a good one. The article states that the iceberg is 1,700km off the coast of SYDNEY. Then it says that the iceberg is off the coast of Western Australia. LOL. Sydney is on the opposite side of the country! That would be like saying that an iceberg spotted off the coast of California was approaching New York.
———
Yes, it’s funny when journalists don’t know the details of their story. That’s why they call “news” the “first, rough draft of history”.
Perhaps Anna Pollit of Sky News was confused with the comparison of the size of the iceberg to the size of Sydney Harbor:
http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/western-australia/giant-19km-iceberg-heading-for-wa/story-e6frg13u-1225808618141
The implication of my post was that if “once-in-a-century” events begin to happen more quickly, something is affecting the statistics used previously. For example, if you start finding four-leaf clovers all over the place, look for a radiation leak at the nearby nuclear power plant.
As for the “once-in-a-century” events, perhaps you have some explanation of what caused these same types of events over 100 years ago, when carbon dioxide levels were lower than they are today.
Provide me a link to information on an actual siting of such a large iceberg from a 19th century Clipper ship, and I’ll do my best.
Perhaps they were bad at estimating iceberg size.
Tenuc (00:24:09) :
However, as climate is defined, in our reference frame, as long-term changes to weather these events, energetic though they are, have no measurable effect of climate and provide no indication of change.
———–
Sorry, no.
If what used to be a “once-in-a-century drought” starts happening every 10 years in a place like the American Southwest, then by definition, the climate for that region has changed.
My links above do not attempt to prove that this is the case in the locations mentioned – but it brings up the topic. The point is, “once-in-a-century” weather events for a particular place is not an eternal, unchanging measurement.
If the Amazon rain forest starts to have “once-in-a-century” droughts every 10 years, that is significant. And also shows “once-in-a-century drought” needs to be updated.
A note about “once in a 100 year” events. In statistics it doesn’t mean what the average layman might interpret it to mean. It actually means a 50% chance of happening in 69 years.
A 1/100 probability *IN ANY GIVEN YEAR* means a
1 – 1/100 = 99/100
probability of *NOT HAPPENING IN ANY GIVEN YEAR*. The probability of if it not happening for 69 consecutive years is
(99/100)^69 = 0.4998
Statistics is not intuitive, e.g. the “birthday paradox”.
The warm-mongers remind me of the Black Knight in Monty Python. Their predictable reaction will be… “So you’ve destroyed one of our major claims? No big deal; it’s only a flesh wound to our credibility. The Black Knight is still robust”. For those of you who haven’t seen the Black Knight scene, here it is on YouTube…
Timothy Nesbitt (08:47:26) :
@owl
Now comes the fun part. Strip completely naked, open the door and walk to the nearest woods. I’d say you have about 3 days to figure out how you’re going to stay alive.
This time of the year? I figure he’ll have until about four hours after sunset…
D. King (22:16:33) :
We find no evidence of large-scale greening of intact Amazon forests during the 2005 drought – approximately 11%–12% of these drought-stricken forests display greening, while, 28%–29% show browning or no-change, and for the rest, the data are not of sufficient quality to characterize any changes.
You have to love the way they parse this. What percentage of browning
and what percentage of no change?
Of course, 1% browning and 27-28% no-change… DOH!
Mike D. (23:16:30) wrote:
“What many people think of as “pristine” Amazon rainforest has actually been occupied by humanity for thousands of years.”
Thank you. I visit your site regularly. Ignoring the existence and impacts of humans in the ‘pristine wilderness’ is the first false premise of the alarmist pseudoscience called ‘Conservation Biology.’
Would also recommend the book ‘1491’ by Charles Mann as a nice primer on this topic. That would also shed light on the comment by
Ruth (07:12:52) about this bird “Amazona martinicana was described from Martinique (to France) by Labat in 1742, and by Buffon in 1779… Labat wrote that “the parrot is too common a bird for me to stop to give a description of it”, and so the species must have declined very rapidly to extinction in the latter half of the 18th century… Hunting is likely to have caused its extinction.”
This probably parallels the passenger pigeon story in North America. That bird’s population exploded only after the Native populations were decimated by smallpox, and the same thing happened in South America.
All those parrots and pigeons would have been a pest (and an occasional meal) to the farming people who once lived in both areas.
————-
owl (01:36:38) wrote :
“We are cutting down the amazon rain forest which causes dought condition. The Maya civilation collapsed because of all the forest they cut down.”
Funny, and such a convenient rationale. Actually it was the dreaded climate change, on a larger scale, which somehow occurred in the pre-SUV era!!!
Climate change and population history in the Pacific Lowlands of Southern Mesoamerica
Neff, Pearsall, Jones, Pieters and Freidel 2006.Quaternary Research
Volume 65, Issue 3, May 2006, Pages 390-400
Core MAN015 from Pacific coastal Guatemala contains sediments accumulated in a mangrove setting over the past 6500 yr. Chemical, pollen, and phytolith data, which indicate conditions of estuarine deposition and terrigenous inputs from adjacent dry land, document Holocene climate variability that parallels the Maya lowlands and other New World tropical locations. Human population history in this region may be driven partly by climate variation: sedentary human populations spread rapidly through the estuarine zone of the lower coast during a dry and variable 4th millennium B.P. Population growth and cultural florescence during a long, relatively moist period (2800–1200 B.P.) ended around 1200 B.P., a drying event that coincided with the Classic Maya collapse.
———-
owl hoots: ” WE are losing a 150 species daily to extinction…”
Funny. You actually believe anything the WWF invents, just like the IPCC.
Bjorn Lomborg expalined this fraudulent statistic in his book ‘The Skeptical Environmentalist.’
I believe that book is on the WWF’s banned reading list.
The WWF statement re: the IPCC Amazon claim follows:
“Another contested statement in the IPCC report is this claim: “Up to 40% of the Amazonian forests could react drastically to even a slight reduction in precipitation.” As its source, the IPCC cites a joint report by WWF and International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) entitled, “Global Review of Forest Fires [PDF],” published in 2000.
The WWF/IUCN study said: “Up to 40% of the Brazilian forest is extremely sensitive to small reductions in the amount of rainfall,” but failed to include the correct citation – a 1999 report titled “Fire in the Amazon,” by the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM). That report said: “Probably 30 to 40% of the forests of the Brazilian Amazon are sensitive to small reductions in the amount of rainfall.” Absent the reference to the IPAM report, readers assumed incorrectly that the source was a 1999 Nature article cited two sentences later.
However, unlike the statement about Himalayan glaciers, the reference was drawn from an authoritative source, was factually correct and is supported by the peer-reviewed literature. ”
We could not locate any 1999 report or study titled “Fire in the Amazon” at the IPAM site. But it seems reasonable to request IPCC to dismiss statements with broad subjective qualifiers such as “probably,” or at least note the qualifier in citations. Language like this should be picked up by peer review prior to publication.
Has NASA finally gotten their act together or are they trying to distance themselves from the IPCC?
owl> WE in the 70’s had 3 billion people and today we have almost 7 billion people.
owl> WE have used pesticides for decades which are causing people and animals to be sterile,
I wonder how those sterile people are multiplying to 7 billion?
KDK (08:31:17) :
I’d like to note that not all the activities of these foundations or the Environmental Grantmakers Assoc. are wrongheaded. Much of the funding unrelated to climate is perfectly sound and produces good conservation science or policy positions. I am not opposed to conservation either of resources or wildlife. It is a shame to watch sensitive wildlife habitat fall to development – but that is to be expected as population and standards of living increase.
Where the foundations and government have sorely mis-stepped is in shoving sound conservation under the global warming blanket. When finally the harsh reality that CAGW is false sinks in – many good conservation efforts will be tarnished by “climate change.” That doubles the tragedy as good efforts to preserve habitat and wildlife will be set back 20-30 years.
Someone wrote: “Exaggeration leads the coalition of disbelief.”
More giggles courtesy of Owl: (Guadeloupe Amazon)
“Two extinct species have been postulated, based on limited evidence.[6][7] They are the †Martinique Amazon (Amazona martinica)[8][9] and the †GUADELOUPE AMAZON (Amazona violacea).[6][10][11] Amazon parrots were described living on Guadeloupe by Jean-Baptiste Du Tertre in 1667 and by Jean-Baptiste Labat in 1742, and they were called Psittacus violaceus at that time. Labat also described Amazon parrots living on Martinique. There are no specimens or remains of either island population, so their taxonomy may never be fully elucidated. Their status as separate species is unproven and they are regarded as hypothetical extinct species.”
(Source, Wikipedia – requires verification)
So now CO2 caused the extinction of a HYPOTHETICAL species sometime in the last 260+ years?? So, yeah, there’s the proof – need to ban CO2!
OWL: If you don’t do some basic research (assuming you are capable), then you best not wade into this group preaching.
Also, something I didn’t see scanning the comments re the 100 year events: those are LOCAL events, right? A 100 year flooding event in BoringGore, Hebejebees, means it is a 100 year record for that particular location. Now, how many specific locations are there world wide. Thousands? Statistically, we should average 1% of those places having a 1 in a 100 year event, EACH YEAR. That’s a lot of 100-year events, worldwide, each year.
Glenn Tamblyn,
That quote,
“The IPCC is under scrutiny for various data inaccuracies, including its claim – based on a flawed World Wildlife Fund study — that up to 40% of the Amazonian forests could react drastically and be replaced by savannas from even a slight reduction in rainfall.”
Seems to be a tad out of context. The fellow who wrote it emailed Tim Lambert today:
Dear Tim
I did not know that Sangram would pass my comments for a blog.
I have exchanged few emails with him, and I agree with him about
his position on the greening of Amazonia as shown by Saleska et
al (1007). However, I have questioned him few times about his
conclusions on the IPCC 40% value. In his paper he does not show
anything that go against the 40%, and he did not mention IPCC at
all. So this comparison is out of of context considering the
finding of this high quality paper.
What I said is that the 40% was obtained qualitatively from a
map from Nepstad et al (2004), comparing the area burn during the
El Nino 1998 and the mean area. Nepstad considered the El Nino 1998
situation as an analogue of what the future could be, which may
not be entirely realistic. I said that between an eye calculation
to get the 40% reported by the WWF document and the calculations
from Samanta et al (2010), even though they refer to different things,
Samanta et al did more correct and raliable work.
Yes, I believe that the Amazon forests are vulnerable to rainfall
reduction, and high temperatures, and this would lead to what some
studies call the Amazon die back. However, the die back is still
somewhat uncertain, but without reaching a level in which the forest
would replaced by savanna, the forest is highly vulnerable to drought.
Sincerely
Jose marengo
Ack, pasted the wrong part. I meant:
“The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong, while [the new] calculations are by far more reliable and correct,” said Dr. Jose Marengo, a Brazilian National Institute for Space Research climate scientist and member of the IPCC.
Zeke Hausfather (15:32:48):
“The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong, while [the new] calculations are by far more reliable and correct…”
Replace ‘the WWF’ with “the Mickey Mouse Club” and the credibility would be the same.
The purpose of the paper was to refute another paper which claimed that the forest had increased during the drought of 2005. Here are the actual conclusions:
[we try] “to reconcile contradictory reports of increased tree
mortality [Phillips et al., 2009] and extensive biomass burning
[Aragao et al., 2007] with anomalous greening of Amazon forests
(SDHR07) during the 2005 drought. ”
“we conclude that there is no evidence of large-scale greening of the
Amazon forests during the 2005 drought in regions for which valid EVI
data exist.”
“we conclude that the speculation of light driven greening of Amazon
forests during the drought of 2005 by SDHR07 is without basis.”
“we conclude that there is no evidence of large-scale greening of the
Amazon forests during the 2005 drought in regions for which valid EVI
data exist.”
“we conclude that there was no co-variation between the severity of
drought and the spatial extent and magnitude of greenness changes of
Amazon forests in 2005.”
“our overall conclusion is that the Amazon forests did not green-up
during the 2005 drought.”
How this constitutes evidence of resilience escapes me.
As for whether it reflects badly on IPCC WGII; the “up to 40%” of the Amazon subject to relatively rapid decline was based on peer reviewed literature available at the time of compilation of the report. Nothing in the case of the current publication addresses that directly, although Dr. Marengo is quoted, correctly, as saying the present methodology is more precise and may yield better estimates in the future.
In other words, perfectly ordinary science and drastically vicious spin. So what else is new?
One last comment re 1 in 100 year events to add to my earlier remarks. Every locale can have more than one, 100 year event – 100 year snowstorm, 100 year flood, 100 year drought….
So globally, 1 in 100 year events should be extremely common each year. I guess that’s a great way to scare unsuspecting people.
BIODIVERSITY IN CRISIS
http://www.undp.org/biodiversity/biodiversitycd/bioCrisis.htm
Current World Population
http://geography.about.com/od/obtainpopulationdata/a/worldpopulation.htm
Environmental Causes of Infertility
http://www.chem-tox.com/infertility/
@Walter Dnes ‘0.4998’
That’s actaully very close to what most ordinary people assume with once in a hundred years, i.e. from the first time it is fifty years before to fifty years into the future to one hundred years into the future or to one hundred years into the past.
Simple folks keeps things simple like that.
Of course, had you been spot on it had actually been .5. But practice makes perfect. :p
Owl, you really are a hoot! I hope you’re not spotted.
From the ‘Biodiversity in Crisis’ link you posted – from the UN no less! LOL.
“Since the total number of species on earth can only be estimated, the exact rate of current species loss is difficult to gauge. The figure probably stands at between 50 and 150 extinctions per day.”
You stated “” WE are losing a 150 species daily to extinction…”
This states, for what this “difficult to gauge” statistic is actually worth, “probably… between 50 and 150.”
Of course, they never do provide details on these numbers, do they? So why not 50, or 150, or, go for it, 250? Choose your fiction.
And the UN goes on to this speculative extrapolation based on their allegedly “conservative estimate” backed by no evidence whatsoever:
“Working from the conservative estimate that earth is home to 10 million species in all, this means that between 0.2 and 0.6 percent of species are being lost every year. This rate is at least 10,000 times greater than the ‘background’ or natural rate of species extinction, as estimated using the fossil record.”
Wow, that sure sounds bad… like some kind of a crisis!!!
Now for the Big Lie:
“The World Conservation Union (IUCN) has estimated that over 5,500 species of animals… are currently threatened with extinction, together with 6,700 species of higher plants.”
Extinction!!! Or is it?
“Those considered vulnerable, threatened, or critically endangered include:
>> Close to 1,100 species of mammals… Over 1,100 birds… Over 750 species of fish… Around 290 species of reptiles… An estimated 157 species of amphibians…”
That adds up to 3397 species. I guess the other 2103+ are insects, molluscs, etc.
But here’s the problem. The vast majority of them are listed as “vulnerable” or “threatened.” The only ones actually “threatened with extinction” are the “endangered” ones.
Vulnerable species are threatened with becoming threatened; threatened species are threatened with becoming endangered; and endangered species are threatened with extinction.
All these national and international listing systems use this same basic system of different risk levels (with slight variations in terminology) and the whole eco-crisis industry uses the same Big Lie that they are all actually facing extinction.
And the Conservation Biologists who are an integral part of the eco-crisis industry are the people who come up with these lists!
In the US and Canada, once a species is listed as Threatened or worse, some Conservation Biologists have full time jobs ‘monitoring’ or ‘saving’ them.
Do you think that those looking at species might have a vested interest in finding that they are Threatened at least?
And did I mention that this same ‘science’ is then used to protect large areas or impose more regulations to protect the ‘critical habitat’ they say is needed to save their client species?
Or that some of these “species,” in fact most of them in the US and Canada, are not real species at all? They are often fuzzily determined “subspecies,” or even “distinct geographical populations” invented by the Conservation Biologists.
Unlike the ‘climate crisis,’ there are very real problems for the conservation of biodiversity and some species in some areas. But this whole ‘mass extinction’ scare is as wildly exaggerated as our planetary fever and the new pseudioscience of Conservation Biology as as bogus and self-serving as IPCC climatology.
“I’d like to note that not all the activities of these foundations or the Environmental Grantmakers Assoc. are wrongheaded.”… I totally agree.
This planet is awesome and we should, as the supposed most intelligent beings–deemed so by ourselves ;)–take care of it in any way possible.
Humans are the most destructive beings on this planet in my observation and it is mostly for this thing (fictional creation) called ‘money’; not the good of, or advancement of all species, including humans.
I do my part by composting, throwing out ‘organics’ that won’t compost for other species around, and all that type stuff that can be done on an individual level (not to mention I don’t buy my children every POS from china they see on TV, when they do watch it–haven’t had ‘programming (perfect description) for 2 yrs and no one in my family has died over it, not even my children :).
As for the original sentence above… yes, it is usually the peons and the manipulated that are in the front lines taking fire for some cause that is unknown, unreal (perhaps) and they’ve been suckered into it–we all have and we still probably still are because the hidden data isn’t just found in AGW, we are totally manipulated by MSM/GOV/EDU to believe/think in a certain manner (homogenized) for purposes largely unknown to us all.
It is a dream… what would the world be like if all the findings, facts, truths etc., were given to us all and we were all allowed to make our own conclusions? No telling how many myths are passed off as fact… no telling.
@ Owl…
Owl, I am with you on the toxins issue. I will never let any amount of HG be shot into my system bypassing ALL safeguards humans have against letting contaminants into it. Vaccines aren’t what they appear to be and are a waste in large part. A few vaccines may serve a purpose but I am leery of those few as well.
The UN loves vaccines and fear, just like any controlling entity, not to mention the amount of $$$$$ involved. Again, something so very NEEDED should not be so profitable for the ones promoting fear.
Just like AGW it is the independent researcher/scientist that must point out what the industry sponsored studies do not find, and just like the agw, they are harassed and belittled, when their concern is truth. Not saying there aren’t fear mongers in every field promoting their own beliefs over facts, but….
Steveta_uk (00:55:23) :
Anu (22:20:15) :
An event that happened in 1999 was LAST century – so if it happens again in THIS century, then it’s “once in a century” (so far).
——-
I guess that explains Alan Greenspan’s overlooking of the Great Depression:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/14/news/economy/greenspan/
September 14, 2008: 1:08 PM EDT
Greenspan: Economy in ‘once-in-a-century’ crisis
Of course, it’s pretty optimistic about the next 90 years…
CodeTech (02:28:47) :
Anu, it’s because only recently have we been able to actually hear these things. Think about it… 20 years ago a weather event in Australia was never heard about in North America.
Only in the last two decades has the world been obsessed with weather and climate, and the media dutifully reports what they think people want to hear. Flood, fire, tornado, hurricane, snow, heat, it’s all news now.
———-
That’s a good point.
The Internet, and 24 hour news channels on cable, have certainly changed the “news” landscape.
But I’m pretty sure people in Great Britain have talked about the weather for millennia, even when others weren’t:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6911576.stm
PM warns over ‘weather extremes’
The siting of infrastructure needs to be reviewed in the wake of flooding across England over the past few weeks, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said.
Mr Brown said: “This has been, if you like, a one in 150 years set of incidents that has taken place in both Yorkshire and Humberside and now in Gloucestershire and the Severn.”
Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said the scientific consensus was that the climate was changing, adding: “The world is going to have to come to terms, so the scientists are telling us, with more extreme weather events and that’s why we need to anticipate them and try and plan for them.”
Two years later:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34058376/ns/weather/
Britain sees record rain, ‘biblical’ flooding
Environment Secretary Hilary Benn told the BBC that flood defenses were meant to withstand a one-in-100-years flood — but could not cope with the volume of water.
“What we dealt with last night was probably more like one-in-a-1,000, so even the very best defenses, if you have such quantities of rain in such a short space of time, can be over-topped,”
Once-in-150-year flooding, then once-in-1000-year flooding.
On a small island. Not including sections like Scotland, or Wales.
Nothing to see here.
Roger Knights (11:21:37) :
Wren (00:16:08) :
The study was titled …..
Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought
But the report on the study was titled …..
Another WWF assisted IPCC claim debunked: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
Why ?
Because this is a partisan (or committed or engaged or risen-consciouness) site and the IPCC is one of its punching bags. So what?
====
So why does it say it’s a science site?
It is ironic isn’t it. Sceptics are spending hours struggling to find examples of where the IPCC misrepresented the underlying research, and then comes a press release that completely misrepresents the paper, and almost nobody notices. Samanta et al 2010 is a good paper, but it does not mention IPCC, WWF, or 40%. The authors may or may not agree with the IPCC conclusions, but nothing in their paper addresses them.
When is Watts going to change the headline to reflect reality?
Richard Telford (02:53:20) :
It is ironic isn’t it. Sceptics are spending hours struggling to find examples of where the IPCC misrepresented the underlying research, and then comes a press release that completely misrepresents the paper, and almost nobody notices. Samanta et al 2010 is a good paper, but it does not mention IPCC, WWF, or 40%. The authors may or may not agree with the IPCC conclusions, but nothing in their paper addresses them.
When is Watts going to change the headline to reflect reality?
Richard, the paper does not say those things, these are quotes from the authors
“We found no big differences in the greenness level of these forests between drought and non-drought years, which suggests that these forests may be more tolerant of droughts than we previously thought,” said Arindam Samanta, the study’s lead author from Boston University.”
“Our results certainly do not indicate such extreme sensitivity to reductions in rainfall,” said Sangram Ganguly, an author on the new study, from the Bay Area Environmental Research Institute affiliated with NASA Ames Research Center in California. ”
And this one
“”The way that the WWF report calculated this 40% was totally wrong, while [the new] calculations are by far more reliable and correct,” said Dr. Jose Marengo, a Brazilian National Institute for Space Research climate scientist and member of the IPCC.”
That last quote was from an actual member of the IPCC.
Unfortunately we have an administration that wants to believe the WWF over real science. The result of this can be seen in presentations given by Secy Chu. We have an administration that is intentially choking off the US energy supply that is critical to our economic future on the false hope that we can survive on expensive, unreliable, unproven, green fuels based on false claims from the WWF and other advocacy groups.
See Chu’s suicidal policy here: http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=527216
“With an economy struggling to regain sound footing, Chu advocated a starvation diet devoid of additional fossil fuels that are to remain under the ground and seabed. Instead, he supports 53% more funding for wind research and a 22% jump for solar research.”
“Subsidizing alternative energy fits the classic definition of insanity. Despite huge subsidies, it has proved to be neither cost-effective nor a reliable, significant contributor to our national power grid. Yet we keep subsidizing it, expecting a different result.”
Also.
“Interior Secretary Ken Salazar quietly told reporters on Friday that the administration’s six-month delay in approving new offshore drilling leases in federal waters will morph into a three-year total ban. We are forbidden from finding more oil and gas even though a December 2009 Rasmussen poll showed as many Americans want offshore drilling — roughly two-thirds — as oppose administration plans for health care.”
Any doubt the negative impact this will have on our enonomy both short term and long term as it will increase our dependence on foreign oil and natural gas?
It doesn’t — others do. (I.e., the awards.) This site claims to provide “commentary” and (in the About section) states that it is a forum for discussion of weather related issues. The curator states there that he is a skeptic. If this site listed itself in its own blogroll, it would be under the heading “Skeptical Views.”
Given its stance, there’s nothing improper about providing interpretive headlines. (Any more than it’s improper for ClimateProgress, etc. to do the same.) It’s not as though it’s pretending to be a strictly neutral, nothing-but-the-facts science-news provider — where explicit interpretation of the news would be a no-no. It provides interpretive commentary on various science-related issues. On CAGW, its stance is contrarian.
Anu (11:54:46) :
‘Tenuc (00:24:09) :
However, as climate is defined, in our reference frame, as long-term changes to weather these events, energetic though they are, have no measurable effect of climate and provide no indication of change.’
———–
“Sorry, no.
If what used to be a “once-in-a-century drought” starts happening every 10 years in a place like the American Southwest, then by definition, the climate for that region has changed.”
If you mean by that, natural climate, then at local level I would agree with you that change has indeed happened. Unfortunately, because we only have a poor understanding of how Earth’s climate operates, it is not usually possible to attribute cause to the observed effect.
However, regional climate change is a different topic to global climate change. Rainfall in a specific region varies seasonally, with some areas vulnerable to long periods of flooding or drought. These local effects tend to average out when global climate is considered,
Roger Knights (07:04:19) :
Wren (21:16:18) :
Roger Knights (11:21:37) :
Wren (00:16:08) :
The study was titled …..
Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought
But the report on the study was titled …..
Another WWF assisted IPCC claim debunked: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
Why ?
Because this is a partisan (or committed or engaged or risen-consciousness) site and the IPCC is one of its punching bags. So what?
====
So why does it say it’s a science site?
It doesn’t — others do. (I.e., the awards.) This site claims to provide “commentary” and (in the About section) states that it is a forum for discussion of weather related issues. The curator states there that he is a skeptic. If this site listed itself in its own blogroll, it would be under the heading “Skeptical Views.”
Given its stance, there’s nothing improper about providing interpretive headlines. (Any more than it’s improper for ClimateProgress, etc. to do the same.) It’s not as though it’s pretending to be a strictly neutral, nothing-but-the-facts science-news provider — where explicit interpretation of the news would be a no-no. It provides interpretive commentary on various science-related issues. On CAGW, its stance is contrarian.
========
You are right. It doesn’t say it’s a science site. It says it’s a “science news site,” which I misread as “science site.”
It takes more than “Skeptical Views” to be a skeptic. A skeptic is even-handed. “Contrarian” seems more accurate
Wren (01:09:31) :
You are right. It doesn’t say it’s a science site. It says it’s a “science news site,” which I misread as “science site.”
It takes more than “Skeptical Views” to be a skeptic. A skeptic is even-handed. “Contrarian” seems more accurate.
It’s a *commentary* site. In order to comment, the commenter must first read the article on which said commentary is sought.
Mr. Watts posts items he deems worthy of comment — or just of general interest — re the subtitle: “Commentary on puzzling things in life, nature, science, weather, climate change, technology, and recent news…” and even you have to admit that the *comments* are handled in an even-handed manner. *All* viewpoints are expressed, with the caveat that you play nice (hit the message and not the messenger) and don’t take excessive advantage of the moderators’ usual benevolent nature.
Unlike, say, RC, where commenters have been banned merely for pointing out a logical inconsistency in one of Mr. Schmidt’s pontifications.
WUWT is hardly “contrarian” — the majority of the commenters *will* wave the b.s. flag when they see it, and can back up the flagwaving with facts, rather than talking points.
Awesome newspeak:
WUWT: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
SCIENTISTS: Thus, we conclude that Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought.
I agree — we’re not mere doubters, we’re critics. I’ve suggested earlier that we call ourselves “climate contrarians,” and I’ve seen a few uses of that term in the press. RC is using the term “dissident,” which would work. Similar D-words that would also be accurate (and that I’ve suggested here) are “dissenter” and “deviationist” (my favorite). But it looks as though we’re stuck with “skeptic.”
I don’t think that “contrarian” implies mindless partisanship or shallowness. Googling define contrarian brings up definitions like “one who takes an opposing view.”
Bill Tuttle (03:31:55) :
Wren (01:09:31) :
You are right. It doesn’t say it’s a science site. It says it’s a “science news site,” which I misread as “science site.”
It takes more than “Skeptical Views” to be a skeptic. A skeptic is even-handed. “Contrarian” seems more accurate.
It’s a *commentary* site. In order to comment, the commenter must first read the article on which said commentary is sought.
Mr. Watts posts items he deems worthy of comment — or just of general interest — re the subtitle: “Commentary on puzzling things in life, nature, science, weather, climate change, technology, and recent news…” and even you have to admit that the *comments* are handled in an even-handed manner. *All* viewpoints are expressed, with the caveat that you play nice (hit the message and not the messenger) and don’t take excessive advantage of the moderators’ usual benevolent nature.
Unlike, say, RC, where commenters have been banned merely for pointing out a logical inconsistency in one of Mr. Schmidt’s pontifications.
WUWT is hardly “contrarian” — the majority of the commenters *will* wave the b.s. flag when they see it, and can back up the flagwaving with facts, rather than talking points.
=========
Based on my brief experience with WUWT, I would agree that comments are handled in an even-handed manner. I don’t know about RC’s record.
But WUWT says it’s a “science news site,” and the news in this instance was a study shows “Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drough,” rather than a study shows “Another WWF assisted IPCC claim debunked: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed.”
Previously you said “On CAGW, its stance is contrarian.” Now you say it is hardly “contrarian.”
That seems contradictory, but perhaps it wouldn’t if you explained what you mean.
Wren (09:04:55) :
ginckgo (03:45:17) :
From El Reg, March 12 2010, emphasis added:
As confirmed by a second source, the WUWT post title accurately reflects the contents of the study and the views of the study’s authors.
So, what is your point?
Wren (09:04:55) :
Bill Tuttle (03:31:55) :
Previously you said “On CAGW, its stance is contrarian.” Now you say it is hardly “contrarian.”
That seems contradictory, but perhaps it wouldn’t if you explained what you mean.
It probably seems contradictory because I have never *said* “On CAGW, its stance is contrarian.” I use the word “contrarian” in it’s broadest meaning == to describe someone who takes an opposite stance merely for the sake of taking an opposite stance, and I usually use it in a humorous manner.
The first time I’ve ever used “contrarian” on WUWT was at (03:31:55), when I stated that I don’t consider it a “contrarian” site because the commenters *do* produce reasoned contra-CAGW arguments.
ginckgo (03:45:17) :
Awesome newspeak:
WUWT: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
SCIENTISTS: Thus, we conclude that Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought.
From El Reg, March 12 2010, emphasis added:
IPCC Rainforest eco-tastrophe claim confirmed as bunk
Official UN website still shows it as fact, though
More bad news today for the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), as another of its extravangant ecopocalypse predictions, sourced from green campaigners, has been confirmed as bunk by scientists.
The UN body came under attack earlier this year for suggesting that 40 per cent of the Amazonian rainforests – dubbed the “lungs of the planet” by some for their ability to turn CO2 into oxygen, and also seen as vital on biodiversity grounds – might disappear imminently. This disaster would be triggered, according to the IPCC’s assessment, by a relatively slight drop in rainfall of the sort to be expected in a warming world.
Unfortunately it now appears that just such conditions have already occurred, and in fact the Amazonian jungles were unaffected.
(…)
NASA-funded scientists analysing the past decades of satellite imagery of the Amazon basin say that in fact the rainforests are remarkably resilient to droughts. Even during the hundred-year-peak dry season of 2005 the jungles were basically unaffected.
(…)
“We found no big differences in the greenness level of these forests between drought and non-drought years,” says Arindam Samanta of Boston university, lead author of the new study based on NASA’s MODIS sat data.
“Our results certainly do not indicate such extreme sensitivity to reductions in rainfall,” adds Sangram Ganguly of the NASA-affiliated Bay Area Environmental Research Institute, another study author.
(…)
As confirmed by a second source, the WUWT post title accurately reflects the contents of the study and the views of the study’s authors.
So, what is your point?
=====
The same point I made at the beginning.
The study was titled …..
Amazon forests did not green‐up during the 2005 drought
But the report on the study was titled …..
Another WWF assisted IPCC claim debunked: Amazon more drought resistant than claimed
Why did the title of the report say the study debunked an IPCC claim that wasn’t mentioned in the study?
From the report I do not know the context of the quoted comments by Sangram Ganguly and Dr. Jose Marengo, so I am skeptical.
@ Wren (22:28:09) :
Why are you wasting valuable electrons by reposting my entire post minus only your earlier comment? Do you want to wear out the scroll wheel on my mouse?
(…)
Why did the title of the report say the study debunked an IPCC claim that wasn’t mentioned in the study?
(…)
Simple, that is a presentation the readership will respond to. Both WUWT and The Register are mass media, free and open for anyone to read, and mass media supplies eye-catching headlines to encourage reading the articles. The study does debunk the IPCC claim whether it explicitly says so or not, an IPCC claim being debunked would be of great interest to their readerships, thus both sources used that in their headlines.
Both sites, while they are accessible to all, also cater to those somewhat technically-minded. EurekAlert! caters to those who want to know about scientific papers and will likely read them, and tailors their headlines accordingly, thus they had the blander-sounding but still interest-piquing “New study debunks myths about Amazon rain forests.” Yet right in the first paragraph, which shows up with the headline, they too made quick mention of the IPCC connection.
So that is three different sources right there that found the IPCC connection highly relevant and worthy of being quickly pointed out.
(…)
From the report I do not know the context of the quoted comments by Sangram Ganguly and Dr. Jose Marengo, so I am skeptical.
The El Reg quotes are as found in the EurekAlert! piece reproduced above, which looks like a press release. Click the link, EurekAlert! included the contact info, you can ask that directly. But if they followed standard procedure, the researchers were questioned and their answers were then quoted, and the PR people (with possible input from legal counsel) checked that the release was truthful and honestly represented the paper and the authors, to avoid possibly expensive litigation over claims of misrepresentation if nothing else.
Of course, your “larger question” is why is it said this debunks the IPCC claim when the paper itself will not state such. That’s the assorted politics at play. The work was funded by NASA, which is supporting AGW claims. Likely the funding request said nothing about doing the work to debunk any IPCC claims. The paper’s title then reflects what the funding request was about, checking on the reported Amazon greening during drought conditions. That the paper does debunk the IPCC claim is something that “just happened.”
Amazon drought least of their worries!
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/03/amazon-drought-least-of-their-worries.html
Ok, so this report says there is little net change in the forest from one dry year. Surely the effect of year on year drought, or even just more frequent drought that may occur due to climate change, would have a cumulative effect on the trees. Once the water starts to become a limiting facotr to plant growth, the increased greening from reduced cloud cover (and CO2 increases) may be countered.
I don’t think this study debunks anything. Show me a long term experiment and I might be persuaded.
@ R. Smith (16:08:16) :
You waited five days to chime in with a pro-IPCC “last word”? Were you confined to a hospital? Did you get stuck with jury duty and were denied internet access?
Doesn’t matter. This paper says they are more tolerant of drought than previously stated, as in as stated by the IPCC. It counters a 2007 paper that said the previous drought actually greened-up the Amazon, which runs counter to the IPCC claim. Thus that’s two papers against the claim, neither agreeing with it.
Why yes, if there were continuous drought conditions for long enough that the water table significantly dropped and the trees had insignificant water to maintain even their current levels of foliage, it would affect the trees. Congratulations, you have stated that if the trees are starved of water for years on end then they will suffer. However the IPCC claimed a far greater sensitivity to drought than what has been found, thus they are still debunked.
What sort of long-term experiment do you want? Do you want to see if an originally-healthy tree will suffer when subjected to years on end of insufficient water? That seems pretty much a given. Although for truly trustworthy results, you’d better start with a rainforest very similar to the Amazon, with the same trees, soil, interconnected ecosystems, etc. Due to certain exhibited properties of the Amazon rainforest, such as the ability to generate weather, it would have to be a considerable fraction of the size of the real one, say at least one-tenth of the area. Once set up, then you’d have to carefully and accurately limit how much water it received, by keeping unwanted rainfall from occurring, for example.
Well, best of luck with the mini-Amazon experiment. Let us know when the funding comes through and where it’ll be set up. Should yield results worthy of a Nobel Prize!
@kadaka
Your correct about the impracticability of a long term, large scale experiment. This means that we should be cautious about short term observational studies and accept their uncertainties. Conclutions should be made from more than one line of evidence, especially when the evidence is based on short term observations.
Maybe there is evidence that the IPCC report is not entirely correct in terms of the sensitivity of the rainforest, I’ll accept that and I’m sure the next IPCC report will take this into account.
However the main point I was making is that the IPCC suggest that rainforest will suffer, their sensitivity really just affects the rate at which they will suffer. The end result of ecosytem change will still come about.
P.s You were also correct about the hospital visit! Don’t worry I didn’t injure my head…
I can’t understand why that article was published in the first place.
Read this instead.
http://www.whrc.org/assets/scientists_amazon_response.pdf