Al Gore, where are you?
Feb. 20 (Bloomberg) — A glitch in satellite sensors caused scientists to underestimate the extent of Arctic sea ice by 500,000 square kilometers (193,000 square miles), a California- size area, the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center said.
The error, due to a problem called “sensor drift,” began in early January and caused a slowly growing underestimation of sea ice extent until mid-February. That’s when “puzzled readers” alerted the NSIDC about data showing ice-covered areas as stretches of open ocean, the Boulder, Colorado-based group said on its Web site.
“Sensor drift, although infrequent, does occasionally occur and it is one of the things that we account for during quality- control measures prior to archiving the data,” the center said. “Although we believe that data prior to early January are reliable, we will conduct a full quality check.’’
By Mick Gregory
Update: Feb. 16, 2009
Former astronaut Harrison Schmitt, who walked on the moon and was elected to the U.S. Senate, doesn’t believe that humans are causing global warming.
“I don’t think the human effect is significant compared to the natural effect,” said Schmitt, who is among 70 skeptics scheduled to speak next month at the International Conference on Climate Change in New York.
Schmitt contends that scientists “are being intimidated” if they disagree with the idea that burning fossil fuels has increased carbon dioxide levels, temperatures and sea levels.
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“They’ve seen too many of their colleagues lose grant funding when they haven’t gone along with the so-called political consensus that we’re in a human-caused global warming,” Schmitt said. |
Dan Williams, publisher with the Chicago-based Heartland Institute, which is hosting the climate change conference, said he invited Schmitt after reading about his resignation from The Planetary Society, a nonprofit dedicated to space exploration.
Schmitt resigned after the group blamed global warming on human activity. In his resignation letter, the 74-year-old geologist argued that the “global warming scare is being used as a political tool to increase government control over American lives, incomes and decision making.”
Update: Feb. 4, 2009
The Weather Channel reports that 90 percent of the U.S. will reach freezing temeratures tonight.
Update: Feb. 2, 2009
The groundhog says six more weeks of winter.
England has biggest snow cover in more than 20 years.
The heaviest snowfall in 20 years has closed thousands of schools and caused transport chaos up the eastern side of Britain, with London and the surrounding areas the hardest hit.
Six million bus passengers were left in the lurch as all London’s bus services were halted because of dangerous driving conditions, and every Tube line except the Victoria line was at least partially suspended.
Update: Dec. 13-17, 2008, Snow coverage in Malibu, Seattle, Las Vegas, Houston Texas!
Feb. 25, 2008: Snow cover over North America and much of Russia, Mongolia and China is greater than at any time since 1966.
The U.S. National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) reported that many American cities recorded record cold temperatures in January and early February. According to the NCDC, the average temperature in January “was -0.3 F cooler than the 1901-2000 (20th century) average.”
China is experiencing its most brutal winter in a century. Temperatures in the normally balmy south were so low for so long that some middle-sized cities went days and even weeks without electricity because once power lines had toppled it was too cold or too icy to repair them.
NPR fans along with Al Gore and Hillary must be wondering why they called the “crisis” climate change, rather than global warming. Words matter.
No Mr. Gore, the debate is not over.
The end of elite liberal media empires and rise of citizen journalism 
I have a friend who has been telling me for 7 years that there is going to be a crash of the stock market, the housing bubble is going to burst, and we’ll be in a recession. I’ve been telling him for 7 years now that one of these days he’s going to be right. That’s the great thing about predictions, if you wait long enough eventually anybody can look like a genius. In Al’s case,all he has to do is wait for one warm winter and say, “AHAH! I told you it was global warming.” It will eventually happen. In fact, the sun is getter hotter all the time and in a few billion years we’ll all be toast. Too bad Al won’t be around to gloat.
Al Gore may be the dumbest (almost President) in history. He has a 10-year-olds’s grasp of science and history. He did flunk out of two different colleges.
Mick, you may recall that we’ve already agreed that the case against man-made global warming has not been proven. You are certainly more of a skeptic than I am. But I have to admit, I am becoming more convinced of its truth given the completely bogus arguments, from a scientific standpoint, that I see being made by my right-wing brethren on the other side.
Let’s elevate the debate, can we? Really, this isn’t a political argument that will be won by those who can put out the most press releases or make the best political case. It is a scientific debate that will be won or lost by the best scientific evidence.
Telling me that its cold outside, even freezing or snowing somewhere unusual, isn’t a scientific argument. It’s an argument made by someone who doesn’t understand the difference between climate and weather. That’s hardly a good scientific argument by anyone who knows the first thing about science.
Citing the Heartland Institute as a source for anything, as we have previously discussed, is not an argument for anything but wing-nuttery. They are the Rod Blagojevich of “pay to play” science. They have been heavily funded by the usual coterie of people whose business is denying the science of global warming, like the oil companies and the fossil fuel industry. Their jobs are dependent on poking holes in global warming theory and they haven’t even done a good job, from a scientific standpoint.
Oddly, at their upcoming conference, you may see that global warming denial takes center stage. It’s not because global warming denial is the leading theory of scientists, its because the purpose of their conference, according to their own web site, is simply to highlight global warming denial. Most real scientific conferences have a debate about issues; this one is simply to take a political position, by their own admission. This is political theater, not science, but unfortunately many in the media will likely fall for it.
It’s also illuminating that Harrison “Jack” Schmitt is the latest “evidence” that global warming does not exist. After all, he is a former astronaut, which kinda sounds all sciencey and everything. Unfortunately, when you check his resume, you find he is a geologist, not a climatologist. If you forgive the pun, that means he knows Jack Schmitt about climate science.
So let’s summarize. The opponents to global warming theory are making their case politically, through stacked-deck “scientific” conferences, through the media, through those unfamiliar with climate science and through political arguments.
Those who adhere to the theory make their case in scientific journals that are peer-reviewed by the foremost experts in their field. Not so sexy as the other side, to be sure, but persuasive to those who understand science.
In short, if I was trying to make the case against anthropogenic global warming, I could not make much more of a scientific fool of myself than those already on the case.
To those like me who still have sincere doubts about the science — and who happen to understand and respect science — these folks need to do a much better job if they want to convince anyone.
How does snow precipitation refute global warming ?
It doesn’t.
Snow is precipitation. Snow often arrives on a warm moist air mass colliding with a cold front.
A cold front alone is bone dry air.
More snow falls 30 degress F, than at 0 degrees F.
Look it up.
And cut the typical dumb shit.
Heard on the Net…The global government can’t convince you to pay a carbon tax unless they can sell you on the myth of human-caused global warming. The Kyoto Treaty is just a means to industrialize the west and move the means of production to 3rd world nations, which need not follow the regulations (and it means more pollution as a result). But why think through an issue? Just trust your criminal government.