12 degrees = half planet abandoned?

[Strange]

The description of that graph says:

 

Because of the limitations of data sampling, each curve in the main plot was smoothed (see methods below) and consequently, this figure can not resolve temperature fluctuations faster than approximately 300 years. Further, while 2004 appears warmer than any other time in the long-term average, and hence might be a sign of global warming, it should also be noted that the 2004 measurement is from a single year (actually the fourth highest on record, see Image:Short Instrumental Temperature Record.png for comparison). It is impossible to know whether similarly large short-term temperature fluctuations may have occurred at other times, but are unresolved by the available resolution.

 

So, although it isn't clear that current temperatures are higher than in the past, it is also impossible to say that there have been periods in the past warmer than current.

 

 

The next 150 years will determine whether the long-term average centered on the present appears anomalous with respect to this plot.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png

[Wild Cobra]

Yep.

 

Because of the proxy averaging times, we cannot compare them to temperatures of the last few decades and say today is hotter.

[Strange]

Because of the proxy averaging times, we cannot compare them to temperatures of the last few decades and say today is hotter.

 

Nor that the past was hotter, which was the claim I was curious about.

[Wild Cobra]

 

Nor that the past was hotter, which was the claim I was curious about.

That is not known with absolute certainty.

 

What would today’s temperatures look like 1000 years from now using a 300 year average proxy, or even 100 year average proxy?

 

The problem is mixing thermometer and proxy data. I doubt this is done with any good reliability.

[Tim the plumber]

Some of the proxies are sediment based. Are any of them using the species which lived as a guide for temperature?

 

If so then that would be quite a decent comparison tool.

[Wild Cobra]

I'd like to go back to the graph I inserted in post #6 and explained in post #21.

 

I didn't see any feedback as to if any of you believe Ch4 is a stronger or weaker greenhouse gas than CO2 like I contend. Am I correct to assume nobody can point out errors of say over +/- 20%?

 

Based on my explanation of the IPCC material and graph, do any of you think the premise of the OP is plausible? From a 4-5 degree increase, can we really expect methane will take us to the 12 degrees? Are you going to take at face value, what a philosopher says?

 

I guess it goes to asking: does anyone think my graph is far enough off for methane to add that much forcing? I don't like to point out lack of credentials here like many of you seem to enjoy, because so many times, people learn fields very well without the degrees or formal schooling. However... The credentials I looked at puts him at a staff writer, and his secondary education is philosophy. I will assume what he says is based on linear projections of RE and/or GWP elements of the climate science material rather than log curve projections. Right or wrong, that is my assumption, and why I have stated before I believe the IPCC created these terms to induce such implied results.

 

http://grist.org/author/david-roberts/

 

http://grist.org/about/staff-bios/

 

He refers to the International Energy Agency statement made by a chief economist. Again not an expert.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/world-on-track-for-nearly-11-degree-temperature-rise-energy-expert-says/2011/11/28/gIQAi0lM6N_story.html

 

I will contend the IPCC is real good at influencing policy makers and others without a science background by their use of RE and GWP numbers. It is easy for people to assume CH4 is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 just because of its instantaneous slope on the curve.

 

Also, can anyone explain this to me: I don't think I have express the thermal lag from the sun much, if any, in any thread here, but for more than a decade, every time I expressed the thermal inertia of the oceans cause by solar changes, I was laughed at. Now, starting this year, I'm seeing scientists are starting to use this 50 to 100 lag that David Roberts claimed for greenhouse gasses. OK, why not solar as well?

 

I would like to elaborate more, but due to the stringent standards of sourcing here, I don’t have the proper time to do such quality.

 

I will ask that if anyone thinks I am in error, or that I may have misstated something, please ask me to elaborate rather than attack. Can we keep this a discussion rather than attacking the message, material, etc?

Edited October 29, 2014 by Wild Cobra

[swansont]

 

Based on my explanation of the IPCC material and graph, do any of you think the premise of the OP is plausible? From a 4-5 degree increase, can we really expect methane will take us to the 12 degrees? Are you going to take at face value, what a philosopher says?

 

 

That's not the premise presented in the OP, so this is moot, is it not? Methane is listed as one of the feedbacks, not the only one.

 

"if we get to 4 or 5 degrees, natural feedbacks (like the 'methane bomb') could take us to 12"

[Wild Cobra]

 

That's not the premise presented in the OP, so this is moot, is it not? Methane is listed as one of the feedbacks, not the only one.

 

"if we get to 4 or 5 degrees, natural feedbacks (like the 'methane bomb') could take us to 12"

I'm going by what was written, not your inaccurate paraphrasing:

 

 

Could the methane feedbacks take us from 4 or 5 degrees to 12 and then dump our great grandchildren with half the planet being uninhabitable?

 

No mention of the other feedback.

 

Granted, the link said otherwise, but I was resonding to what was written in the original post.

[swansont]

I'm going by what was written, not your inaccurate paraphrasing:

 

 

Inaccurate paraphrase? That's a direct quote from the OP, easily verifiable. (hence the quotation marks) Also, that line is itself a paraphrase of the original material in question, which is the video. Each step along the way, detail was lost. You simply chose to look at one line, which is not what the original claim actually was.

 

From what I can tell, the unsurprising answer to the poorly rephrased/straw man question is no.

 

No mention of the other feedback.

 

Other than feedback was plural, and methane was initially listed as an example "like the 'methane bomb'".

[Tim the plumber]

 

That's not the premise presented in the OP, so this is moot, is it not? Methane is listed as one of the feedbacks, not the only one.

 

"if we get to 4 or 5 degrees, natural feedbacks (like the 'methane bomb') could take us to 12"

 

OK, I had not taken that in as well.

 

What other feedbacks do you consider likely to add 8 degrees of warming?

[swansont]

 

OK, I had not taken that in as well.

 

What other feedbacks do you consider likely to add 8 degrees of warming?

 

In his writeup he only mentions polar feedbacks. Ice/snow melt and methane release are two that I know.

 

His quote (apparently from a Hansen and Sato paper) says "Augmentation of peak Holocene temperature by even 1°C would be sufficient to trigger powerful amplifying polar feedbacks, leading to a planet at least as warm as in the Eemian and Holsteinian periods, making ice sheet disintegration and large sea level rise inevitable." (emphasis in the quote I grabbed) which means that he is very specifically talking about temperatures higher than human civilization has seen.

[Tim the plumber]

His quote (apparently from a Hansen and Sato paper) says "Augmentation of peak Holocene temperature by even 1°C would be sufficient to trigger powerful amplifying polar feedbacks, leading to a planet at least as warm as in the Eemian and Holsteinian periods, making ice sheet disintegration and large sea level rise inevitable." (emphasis in the quote I grabbed) which means that he is very specifically talking about temperatures higher than human civilization has seen.

 

Isn't that one of your logical falsies?

 

Just because he is talking about a 1 degree temperature and then he talks about ice sheet disintegration does not mean that he has actual evidence that this would be a higher temperature than humanity has ever seen.

 

I would like to see the proper boring explanation of which ice is actually vulnerable to melting from a 1 degree temperature rise. Would it be the Antarctic ice sheets where the summer temperature manages to get to -20 degrees c or the Greenland ice sheet which sits at high altitude 2000m+ above permanent ice on the edges of Greenland? Lines projected on a graph just don't cut it for me. Even when the great and good of science have said it's right.

[swansont]

Isn't that one of your logical falsies?

 

Just because he is talking about a 1 degree temperature and then he talks about ice sheet disintegration does not mean that he has actual evidence that this would be a higher temperature than humanity has ever seen.

Since the Holocene is basically the period of human civilization, a temperature of 1 ºC above the peak Holocene temperature is indeed a higher temperature than civilized humans have ever seen, by the transitive property of inequalities in math.

[Tim the plumber]

 

In his writeup he only mentions polar feedbacks. Ice/snow melt and methane release are two that I know.

 

So do you think that these or other feedbacks are at all capable of causing a 12 degree c temperature rise?

[swansont]

 

So do you think that these or other feedbacks are at all capable of causing a 12 degree c temperature rise?

 

Capable under the conditions of that paper, sure. You've looked at the paper, right?

[Tim the plumber]

Since the Holocene is basically the period of human civilization, a temperature of 1 ºC above the peak Holocene temperature is indeed a higher temperature than civilized humans have ever seen, by the transitive property of inequalities in math.

Even if that is true how is it evidence that it will cause the ice sheets of Antarctica to disintergrate? Logical falisy?

 

Capable under the conditions of that paper, sure. You've looked at the paper, right?

What paper?

 

The OP has links to talks.

 

Can you link to the paper if that's what we are talking about.

[swansont]

Even if that is true how is it evidence that it will cause the ice sheets of Antarctica to disintergrate? Logical falisy?

Yes, you have engaged in a logical fallacy, known as a straw man — nobody in this thread has mentioned Antarctica until you brought it up. There are other ice sheets in the world. You have changed the original argument, since nobody has claimed that a 1º rise will directly cause this. (one might classify this as an appeal to ridicule, which is a kind of straw man). Further, the cavalier accusation of a fallacy without any explanation of why you might think it is or supporting documentation is a red herring, since now I have to defend that instead of discussing anything else.

 

As for the authors and the paper, well…

 

 

What paper?

I take that as a no. Which raises the question of how you came to accuse them of a logical fallacy when you haven't read the science behind the prediction.

 

The OP has links to talks.

 

Can you link to the paper if that's what we are talking about.

Yes, the OP links to a talk, and I linked to the speaker's web page that describes the talk, and in that they mention the papers. They don't link to it, unfortunately, but I'll dig up the reference.

[swansont]

The 12 degree paper is http://www.pnas.org/content/107/21/9552.full

The Hansen and Sato abstract is http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abs/ha05510d.html

[Wild Cobra]

The 12 degree paper is http://www.pnas.org/content/107/21/9552.full

The Hansen and Sato abstract is http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abs/ha05510d.html

 

Here is the full Hansen/Sato paper.

 

http://www.springer.com/cda/content/document/cda_downloaddocument/9783709109724-c1.pdf?SGWID=0-0-45-1328875-p174243184

 

And I read the first link as assessing the results if we see a 12 degree increase.

add...

 

LOL...

 

I saved the Hansen/Sato paper to my HD, I already have a copy of it save date of 8/17/14.

 

Thought I saw it before!

Edited November 7, 2014 by Wild Cobra

[Essay]

 

And I read the first link as assessing the results if we see a 12 degree increase.

Hence the topic: [if] 12 degrees, [then] = half planet abandoned?

 

...and the explanation about how "... if we get to 4 or 5 degrees, natural feedbacks (like the 'methane bomb') could take us to 12."

and the OP question posed: "Could the methane feedbacks take us from 4 or 5 degrees to 12 and then dump our great grandchildren with half the planet being uninhabitable?"

 

~

[swansont]

emphasis added

Recent studies have highlighted the possibility of large global warmings in the absence of strong mitigation measures, for example the possibility of over 7 °C of warming this century alone (1). Warming will not stop in 2100 if emissions continue. Each doubling of carbon dioxide is expected to produce 1.9–4.5 °C of warming at equilibrium, but this is poorly constrained on the high side (2, 3) and according to one new estimate has a 5% chance of exceeding 7.1 °C per doubling (4). Because combustion of all available fossil fuels could produce 2.75 doublings of CO2 by 2300 (5), even a 4.5 °C sensitivity could eventually produce 12 °C of warming. Degassing of various natural stores of methane and/or CO2 in a warmer climate (6, 7, 8) could increase warming further. Thus while central estimates of business-as-usual warming by 2100 are 3–4 °C, eventual warmings of 10 °C are quite feasible and even 20 °C is theoretically possible (9).

 

One must also remember the question that was asked, the answer that was given, and to not move the goalposts in subsequent discussion.

[Tim the plumber]

Yes, you have engaged in a logical fallacy, known as a straw man — nobody in this thread has mentioned Antarctica until you brought it up. There are other ice sheets in the world. You have changed the original argument, since nobody has claimed that a 1º rise will directly cause this. (one might classify this as an appeal to ridicule, which is a kind of straw man). Further, the cavalier accusation of a fallacy without any explanation of why you might think it is or supporting documentation is a red herring, since now I have to defend that instead of discussing anything else.

 

As for the authors and the paper, well…

 

 

I take that as a no. Which raises the question of how you came to accuse them of a logical fallacy when you haven't read the science behind the prediction.

 

Yes, the OP links to a talk, and I linked to the speaker's web page that describes the talk, and in that they mention the papers. They don't link to it, unfortunately, but I'll dig up the reference.

Swanson in post 36;

 

In his writeup he only mentions polar feedbacks. Ice/snow melt and methane release are two that I know.

 

His quote (apparently from a Hansen and Sato paper) says "Augmentation of peak Holocene temperature by even 1°C would be sufficient to trigger powerful amplifying polar feedbacks, leading to a planet at least as warm as in the Eemian and Holsteinian periods, making ice sheet disintegration and large sea level rise inevitable." (emphasis in the quote I grabbed) which means that he is very specifically talking about temperatures higher than human civilization has seen.

 

You have just managed to demonstrate that you have accused me of using a logical falisy, that of talking about ice sheet disintegration first, whilst being clearly the one who brought up this logical falisy.

 

You have then gone on the say that I'm out of order for not reading the paper. The paper which has not been cited.

 

Well done!

 

I strongly suggest you read your own rules.

Edited November 14, 2014 by Tim the plumber

[imatfaal]

!

Moderator Note

 

Tim the Plummer

 

There is an interesting and enlightening debate to be had on this question as posed by the OP.

 

 

... Could the methane feedbacks take us from 4 or 5 degrees to 12 and then dump our great grandchildren with half the planet being uninhabitable?...

 

It is a simple question, both to pose and understand, although fraught with difficulty to answer - you seem to have decided to distract and mock rather than make any substantive answer. The logical fallacies and rhetorical legerdemain have been yours - no one else's. If you want to discuss the OP's question or seek clarification on it then please continue to post; if you intend to continue with misdirection, straw-men, and off-topic debate then please reconsider.

 

Do not respond to this moderation within the thread.

 

[swansont]

Swanson in post 36;

 

In his writeup he only mentions polar feedbacks. Ice/snow melt and methane release are two that I know.

 

His quote (apparently from a Hansen and Sato paper) says "Augmentation of peak Holocene temperature by even 1°C would be sufficient to trigger powerful amplifying polar feedbacks, leading to a planet at least as warm as in the Eemian and Holsteinian periods, making ice sheet disintegration and large sea level rise inevitable." (emphasis in the quote I grabbed) which means that he is very specifically talking about temperatures higher than human civilization has seen.

 

You have just managed to demonstrate that you have accused me of using a logical falisy, that of talking about ice sheet disintegration first, whilst being clearly the one who brought up this logical falisy.

No. If you will actually read what I wrote, you will see that I said the fallacy was in citing Antarctica, which had not been mentioned. All the quote said was ice sheets. There are ice sheets elsewhere in the world, and any of them disintegrating would fulfill the prediction. Your response was indeed an error of logic.

 

 

You have then gone on the say that I'm out of order for not reading the paper. The paper which has not been cited.

 

Well done!

 

I strongly suggest you read your own rules.

 

I was pointing out that you decided to criticize the paper while not having read it. That was how you were out of order: implying the paper was in error without reading it. I took the time to find the paper. It wasn't particularly hard to do.

 

What rule in particular did you have in mind here?

[Johnny Electriglide]

I see "Tim the Troll" is here. It has been backed at skeptical science.com that the trajectory humanity and the biosphere is on will result in a worse than Permian extinction and worse than the 30 million year recovery and after effects of PETM.

The temperature and CO2 rise is 10 to 40 times that of PETM 55 mya. There is also a substantial amount more sequestered CH4.

The main problem is human inertia and ignorance to what is happening and the needed 90+% emissions reduction by 2024.

There is the possibility of an early population crash fostered by economic meltdown, if not brought on by stupid financial practices, one of the three due geologic disasters could hit (Cascadia, La Palma, or Katla).

The only solution to save the biosphere from possible Venus Effect is by forcing a super volcanic eruption, after the tipping point of Arctic Tundra methane self release is totally passed in the late 2020s. When the point of hitting the beginning of the tipping point was reached in 2009, the Arctic Methane Emergency Group was formed. It is on facebook and youtube.

What triggered this methane turnover effect in the past was Arctic warming of 5*C, and last April in Siberia we had 2 to 9*C higher than the 1989 record temperatures. 16 methane blowholes formed and spiked the CH4 measurements briefly. Most only know of 3. The rate of change and the added ocean acidification are beyond anything seen on Earth in geologic time after the cyanobacteria explosion with oxygen atmosphere formed and stabilized. That was the last time a single species changed the biosphere. Now, it is the human species, far into overshoot and pollution at thousands of times the absorption rate. Nothing is changing for the better, unfortunately.

The denialists have effectively used human selfishness and ignorance to thwart efforts to go green on a planetary scale in time to stop the worst (unless you think this 90+% reduction will really come by Jan2024). Extinction of us, and millions of other species, our friends. If for some reason, CAGW does not proceed to 80%+ CH4 release, perhaps the extremophobes at oceanic thermal vents could seed new life, so that in around 50 million years it could be similar to what it was like at the beginning of this interglacial epoch, but no 'intelligent' life.

Edited December 25, 2014 by Johnny Electriglide