Fraud in scientific papers on the increase

[Dave]

The idea that humanity had a statically significant impact on the climactic changes of the planet is based largely on a failure to realize just how massive the planet's climate truly is. One volcanic eruption, for example, releases more CO2 into the atmosphere than the entire industrial age

Ummm... could you cite a source for that claim, please? If you're talking about "megavolcano" caldera eruptions that are severe enough to black out the whole planet and destroy all human life, you might be correct, but I believe you're quite incorrect if you're referring to the sort of volcanism which is occurring today.

According to the figures I see in this article at Wikipedia (which cites scholarly sources), the actual balance is quite otherwise. "Although the initial carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the young Earth was produced by volcanic activity, modern volcanic activity releases only 130 to 230 megatonnes of carbon dioxide each year, which is less than 1% of the amount released by human activities (at approximately 29,000 megatonnes)."

Actual measurements of atmospheric CO2 levels over the past 50 years or so do demonstrate a sharp increase (measurements in Hawaii climb from about 320 PPM in 1960, to over 380 PPM recently). The rise apparently correlates well with the burning of fossil fuels - about half of the fossil fuel CO2 is accounted for in this rise, and the other half is (presumably) being absorbed by plants and by the ocean.

The ocean's acidity has increased significantly over this same period - another Wikipedia article cites references which indicate that the average ocean pH has decreased from 8.25 to 8.14 over the past 250 years ago, indicating roughly a tripling of H+ ion concentration (acidity) as a result of the generation of carbonic acid from atmospheric CO2. We can't continue to depend on the ocean to buffer the anthropogenic CO2 we are releasing, without serious consequences... increased acidity will overwhelm the carbonate buffering, and make it impossible for many ocean-going species to form skeletons.

We really do have a problem here. Either we deal with it, or our children and grandchildren will have to deal with the consequences.

[shadowinthelight]

People who dismiss human induced climate change try to point to natural phenomena like volcanoes or solar weather but my understanding is the only variable that matches with the increase in temperature over an extended period of time is the carbon produced by humans since the start of the industrial age. Proclaiming the climate is too large, there is no way we can affect it smacks of the same disbelief in science that leads others to say life is too complex, it must have had a directly responsible designer.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

People who dismiss human induced climate change try to point to natural phenomena like volcanoes or solar weather but my understanding is the only variable that matches with the increase in temperature over an extended period of time is the carbon produced by humans since the start of the industrial age. Proclaiming the climate is too large, there is no way we can affect it smacks of the same disbelief in science that leads others to say life is too complex, it must have had a directly responsible designer.

People who support human induced climate change by citing increase in greenhouse gases and a corresponding rise in temperature never bothered studying geology wherin similar rises in temperatures have occurred several times over the geologic history of the planet. All of them occurred before Homos Erectus ever crawled out of the trees.

The climate system is enormous. So enormous that people have a hard time comprehending how truly vast it is. But allow me to try and explain it.

Over the period of geologic history, temperatures have risen and cooled globally many times. Sometimes, the causes are readily apparent... the Yucatan Impact, the Supervolcanic Eruptions which blanketed the earth in a cloud of ash so dense that 90% of all plant life died out from lack of photosynthesis. Other times, it's reacting to more subtle clues. There's been a shocking uprise in sunspot and solar flares lately. Even the smallest solar flare exceeds the force of the entire nuclear inventory of the entire planet, although they are of course 1AU away, so by the time the wave hits us, it's much diminished. Still, that's quite a lot of additional energy heading our way, far more than we are producing. Most of it is absorbed or deflected by our atmosphere, of course, but we're constantly poking holes in the ozone layer and such to reduce its effectiveness at protecting us.

However, the oceans of the hydrosphere are all a part of the climate system, and we're only just now beginning to realize just how it works. Basically, it is rather like this:

As the ambient temperature increases, the caps begin to melt. The melting action from the poles release frigid water into the hydrosphere, which causes the convection currents which drive the planet's climate. This causes an increase in rain patterns, as the overall humidity of the planet increases, the resulting cloud cover and evaporation effect from the water reduces ambient temperature. This reduction in ambient temperature causes water to freeze at the caps.

The temperature of the planet is not and has never been static. It has always been in equilibrium, constantly in flux. There are times when that equilibirum is disturbed, causing Ice Ages or tropical ages. The fact that it is currently rising is still a matter of heated debate since there's been so much massaging and elimination of data at this point. However, even if it is, Humanity's impact upon it is viewed as follows:

Let us look at the hydrosphere, the planet's enormous heat sink which helps regulate the global temperature. Three hundred and twenty one million cubic miles of water in the oceans. Now then, the very definition of the BTU is the amount of energy required to increase the temperature of one cubic *foot* of water one degree F.

So let's do some basic math.

There's 5280 feet in a mile. Which means 147197952000 cubic feet in a cubic mile. Now then, a Therm is 100,000 BTU's. So we slide things over six places, and we end up with 147,197.952 therms per cubic mile. One ccf (one hundred cubic feet) of Natural Gas produces about one Therm. One therm also roughly translates as 30 KwH (29.3 actually).

In other words, the World Energy Consumption for the entire planet for a whole year (approximately 132,000 TwH for the year 2008) is not sufficient to increase the temperature of the oceans by a single degree F.

And you expect that the CO2 released from industry can do better? Maybe we should harness it as a power source and run on 'dirty energy' instead.

[Fairportfan]

According to the figures I see in this article at Wikipedia (which cites scholarly sources), the actual balance is quite otherwise. "Although the initial carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the young Earth was produced by volcanic activity, modern volcanic activity releases only 130 to 230 megatonnes of carbon dioxide each year, which is less than 1% of the amount released by human activities (at approximately 29,000 megatonnes)."

Actual measurements of atmospheric CO2 levels over the past 50 years or so do demonstrate a sharp increase (measurements in Hawaii climb from about 320 PPM in 1960, to over 380 PPM recently). The rise apparently correlates well with the burning of fossil fuels - about half of the fossil fuel CO2 is accounted for in this rise, and the other half is (presumably) being absorbed by plants and by the ocean.

The ocean's acidity has increased significantly over this same period - another Wikipedia article cites references which indicate that the average ocean pH has decreased from 8.25 to 8.14 over the past 250 years ago, indicating roughly a tripling of H+ ion concentration (acidity) as a result of the generation of carbonic acid from atmospheric CO2. We can't continue to depend on the ocean to buffer the anthropogenic CO2 we are releasing, without serious consequences... increased acidity will overwhelm the carbonate buffering, and make it impossible for many ocean-going species to form skeletons.

We really do have a problem here. Either we deal with it, or our children and grandchildren will have to deal with the consequences.

I've got shneeky killfiled over his offensive responses to my posts ... but i'd be willing to bet that he tells you that even mentioning Wikipedia means that you're wrong and, essentially, stupid for thinking it might be valid data.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

I've got shneeky killfiled over his offensive responses to my posts ... but i'd be willing to bet that he tells you that even mentioning Wikipedia means that you're wrong and, essentially, stupid for thinking it might be valid data.

Gee... try and help a fellow debate his point of view better by pointing out how linking wikipedia articles makes you appear less educated and get continual personal attacks over it until doomsday. Ahh well, C'est la Vie.

Also, Dave actually has two points here. The first concerns global warning, the second concerns the Ph of water, which is more in the realm of toxicity.

To be honest, we've got a much bigger problem with toxicity than we do with global warming. We can very rapidly kill ourselves off simply by poisoning our environment and ourselves. Any climate change we might possibly enact would be (heh, LITERALLY, as it seems) glacial in pace.

The point about a higher degree of CO2 being a contributing factor to an increase in carbolic acid and other unpleasant things is certainly valid, and an atmosphere which is higher in CO2 is harder for us to breathe in. And this is a much more valid reason for needing to cut out pumping tons of toxic gases into the atmosphere than global warming. Of course, if the global warming theory has any validity, it will incidentally fix it in the process, but that's really less of a concern from my perspective. About the only real concern about global warming that has any degree of validity to it is the flooding of coastal cities (although even that is significantly over-dramatized) which poses an interesting engineering problem.

Life in general, of course, will continue to live on. This planet has survived far more catastrophic events than what we can manage to muster. Our own personal survival, of course, is a lot more in question. Be it poisoning our own food supply, clogging the air we breathe, or increasing the background radiation to the point of toxicity... we're actually quite a fragile species, when all is said and done.

I suppose that was what was required to develop the spark of intellect... we're physically the weakest and slowest of the primates, we had several competitors for the same niche, so we had to do something or go extinct. What we developed was not claws or size or strength, but intellect. Why we were the first species in geologic record to do so is still a mystery, but if we don't get rid of obsolescing technology, we might not last very long.