From the University of Maryland: Looking to the past to predict the future of climate change
FROSTBURG, MD (August 5, 2013)—Climate changes how species interact with one another—and not just today. Scientists are studying trends from fossil records to understand how climate change impacted the world in the ancient past and to identify ways to predict how things may change in the future, according to a new study by University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science researcher Matt Fitzpatrick and colleagues published in the August 2 issue of Science.
Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth’s history, but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer. Knowing how climate change altered the interactions between plants and animals in the past may help us understand whether there are identifiable patterns that could give us clues into what will happen in the future.
“Looking to the past is one of the few ways ecologist have for understanding how natural systems respond to climate change,” said Fitzpatrick of the Center’s Appalachian Laboratory. “When we look to the fossil record, from hundreds of millions of years ago to near present day, we see episodes of climatic change and biological upheaval, and we see similar patterns.”
For example, changes in temperatures may force certain animals to move to different territories and new predatory-prey interactions my result. Some may go extinct. Changes in carbon dioxide levels may make it easier for new plants to take over the landscape, such as more shrubs growing in the Arctic. All of these changes shake up how the ecosystem and food webs work.
“Because these patterns emerge repeatedly and largely regardless of place and time,” Fitzpatrick says. “It suggests that similar underlying processes drive how natural systems respond to climate change and provides a glimpse of what could be in store for the future.”
The worry is that the rate of current and future climate change is more than species can handle naturally. “People are comfortable with the way things are now – we know where to plant crops, where to get water,” said lead author Jessica Blois of the University of California, Merced. “We want to know how to respond to the changes that are happening, but if the future is highly novel, then it’s also hard to predict.”
“Climate Change and the Past, Present and Future of Biotic Interactions” is published in the August 2 issue of Science. Authors include Jessica Blois of the University of California, Merced, Phoebe Zarnetske of Yale University, Matt Fitzpatrick of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science and Seth Finnegan of the University of California, Berkley.
UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
The University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science unleashes the power of science to transform the way society understands and manages the environment. By conducting cutting-edge research into today’s most pressing environmental problems, we are developing new ideas to help guide our state, nation, and world toward a more environmentally sustainable future through five research centers—the Appalachian Laboratory in Frostburg, the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory in Solomons, the Horn Point Laboratory in Cambridge, the Institute of Marine and Environmental Technology in Baltimore, and the Maryland Sea Grant College in College Park. www.umces.edu
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When viewing reconstructed temperature timelines, the slope of the current increase of 1 C. over the last 130 years is not greater than that leading up to the MWP, Roman WP, etc. It would be marvelous if these researchers would properly substantiate claims they make which become the basis of the entire article. Eventually, someone is going to start looking closely where our money goes.
“Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth’s history, but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer.”
Prove it! Show me the “Climate Record” that you used! If you are a scientist, you should be ashamed making statements like that! “10,000 years or longer” goes back at least 4.5 billion years. This is more drivel…
How about how natural events caused warming and cooling? Not just altered the climate!!!
Published in Science and their 1st reference is S. A. Marcott, et al.
Will this paper have and maintain credibility?
I’m really struggling to see how those claims of “faster than the last xxx years” can be substantiated.
Even accepting that past temperature reconstructions are accurate, what temporal resolution is possible from before the instrumental record? Seeing as current warming has consisted of about a decade or so of rapid increase followed by just as long a plateau (for every year of which the “smoothed” rate of recent change decreases) unless they can say honestly that the paleo record has a resolution of better than 10 years I don’t see how such claims can possibly be supported?
“Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth’s history, but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer. ”
That’s false. Why didn’t the reviewer notice?
The default state of the earth for the last 2.6 million years has been a glaciated state for more than 85% of the time. This interglacial period we now live in is the exception and not the rule. When the earth arises from a glaciated state to an interglacial, the global temperatures will rise by 12 degrees C within a century. The future episode of the earth is to return to a glaciated state and mankind’s meagre annual contribution to greenhouse that by itself has minimal effect on the world’s climate, is not going to change anything. Where are the real scientists who know about earth’s past?
Didn’t we just see an article similar to this in another thread? Too lazy to look, but I’ll debunk this one the same way I debunked the last one:
http://www.greenworldtrust.org.uk/Science/Images/ice-HS/noaa_gisp2_icecore_anim_adj.gif
“We want to know how to respond to the changes that are happening, but if the future is highly novel, then it’s also hard to predict.” So in other words, it’s difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. And especially when you base your predictions on misinformation and playstation models based on wrong assumptions.
Funny, that still doesn’t stop them from making them though.
I read till the first obvious lie and quit. 2nd paragraph, first line. But this dreck will satisfy their publishing requirements and keep them in good standing at their university for another year, I have no doubt.
And of course, it’s “Science” Magazine doing the aiding and abetting. They should post their new motto openly: “Helping academic hacks ride the gravy train for years and years now!”
“… but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer.”
How many times are they going to repeat this lie? There is ample data in the Greenland ice cores that shows remarkable changes in temperature over a few decades time far exceeding what we’ve seen in the last few hundred years. It must be easy conducting “science” when you get to choose to ignore inconvenient data, would have made a masters thesis easy.
Here’s the real reason for all the climate change focus, straight from a top-level UN IPCC Official, a person named Edenhofer: ‘We Redistribute World’s Wealth By Climate Policy’. If you have issue with this idea, take it up with Edenhofer: edenhofer@pik-potsdam.de. The writers of pieces like this, and the researchers being highlighted here, are just falling into line with orthodoxy.
No true fossil record is capable of distinguishing biological 10000 year intervals, even if ‘instantaneous’ events withinnthe horizon can be identified. Witness the remaining controversy over the Alvarez hypothesis from the irridium layer discontinuity about dinosaur extinction and the Chixilub event. So understanding consequences of ‘rapid’ AGW climate change over such ‘brief’ time intervals using paleontology methods is ruled out from first principles. Which only shows how low Science has sunk, a level their new self described SEAL trained UDT scuba diving editor in chief is apparently accustomed to. This new editorial FAIL amply demonstrates the point.
A gem:
“if the future is highly novel, then it’s also hard to predict”
Scientists are studying trends from fossil records..
Which is not going to tell them one dang thing, nothing is the same now.
….Why don’t they put half this time, effort, and money into getting hormones out of our water……….
Well I asked this question before. What is the accepted unit of climate change, that allows one to quantify the rate at which climate changes ?
And what of evolution. Supposedly, species change (by natural selection) in response to their environment; which is not to say, the climatic conditions of their environment, which is just one factor, but every aspect of their survival success.
So does the fossil record, meter climate change, or evolutionary change ?
If an animal or plant (species) moves its center of living, up to some higher, or wetter, or dryer etc place, does that mean that place has changed, or did the species, just discover that it was unoccupied space, they could take advantage of.
Climate changes; species adapt, either deliberately or by selection. How does the record distinguish between them ?
but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode….
That’s because the default position is a lot colder you morons…
…I’m caffeinated up
Most spieces on Earth was not able to adapt to the sudden climate change 65 million years ago and this was far from a unique situation. Aprox. 98% of all ever existing spieces are extinct and not due to man …
And regarding the “recent rate”, the ice core samples show something not so different …
The University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science unleashes the power of science to transform the way society understands and manages the environment. By conducting cutting-edge research into today’s most pressing environmental problems, we are developing new ideas to help guide our state, nation, and world toward a more environmentally sustainable future….
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
and so forth; what they really do is unleash the power of hype, but neither are they any too swift at that. This sort of approach culls out the intelligent and attracts the other types.
“””””…..For example, changes in temperatures may force certain animals to move to different territories and new predatory-prey interactions my result. Some may go extinct. Changes in carbon dioxide levels may make it easier for new plants to take over the landscape, such as more shrubs growing in the Arctic. All of these changes shake up how the ecosystem and food webs work……”””””
OR !! some species may become more (or less) successful, by adapting to a climate, that others find less habitable so it may be less crowded living space. So how do you prove whether climate or species changed, and what is the definition of the unit measure of climate change, that lets one even define what a rate of change is ?
“Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth’s history, but the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer.”
That propaganda only works on a target audience which has never seen the likes of http://s7.postimg.org/s59zem9pn/temphistory.gif (which is a version of http://iceagenow.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Easterbrook-Natural_global_warming.jpg except correcting a minor error of misplaced
labels on the right); the multiple degrees/century natural change (far faster than now) seen repeatedly on the left is of note, from a plot by Easterbrook using Cluffy and Clow 1997 from ice core temperature reconstruction.
Recent temperature, sea level, humidity, cloud cover, and ice extent history fit the pattern and prime cause in http://s23.postimg.org/qldgno07f/edited4.gif as illustrated there.
I know a medical researcher who had to let go two of his researchers (Ph. D) who had been with him many years due to lack of funds. How does money get funneled to pay for this type of study?
“Climate change has occurred repeatedly throughout Earth’s history, but the recent rate … ”
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“Repeatedly”?
The lack of precision in climate “science” has been noted before. But here we go again.
“Repeatedly” implies regular intervals. Or it may mean the same thing happening with unspecified breaks in between. But it refers to the same thing happening more than once.
It might seem like nit-picking, but to me illustrates that they have not even bothered to define the terms that are so freely thrown around subsequently.
I wonder if they publish this stuff to see how much of a response [how high we jump] they can get.
I didn’t even make it to this gem: “Changes in carbon dioxide levels may make it easier for new plants to take over the landscape, such as more shrubs growing in the Arctic.” Correct use of the word “may” so that there can be no rebuttal!
It really appears that “magic CO2” can do just about anything, but make scientists more intelligent…
Is this sarcasm?
Technologically competent science has discovered:
Any credible change to the level of non-condensing greenhouse gases doesn’t have, has never had and will never have significant effect on average global temperature.
GW ended before 2001. http://endofgw.blogspot.com/
AGW never was. http://climatechange90.blogspot.com/2013/05/natural-climate-change-has-been.html
Average global temperature is extremely sensitive to low altitude cloud area change http://lowaltitudeclouds.blogspot.com/
What the IPCC won’t tell you http://consensusmistakes.blogspot.com/
the recent rate of global warming far exceeds that of any previous episode in the past 10,000 years or longer
I assume that they are -deliberately- clouding the issue by conflating projections with actual data. Because otherwise the article appears as though written by someone with brain damage.