Global rain band, Scientific American

[Old Rocks]

An article in the Scientific American maps the historical movements of the tropical rainband, and confirms that it is moving north. Also confirms other tropical studies that the MWP was only about 0.2 above the historical norm, as compared to the 0.7 of today.

A Shifting Band of Rain: Scientific American

 

[Mr. H.]

Multiyear drought conditions in the southwestern U.S. could persist as that area becomes more like the semiarid region of northern Mexico.

Oklahoma farmers, ranchers facing severe drought

 

[editec]

Not to worry.

That's only gonna suck for Southern mid west farmers and the people who count on their harvests.

That will only really effect working people worldwide.

Not to worry, the rich will still be able to buy food.

Phew! what a relief, eh?

 

[Douger]

No worries. Monsanto will conjure up something that uses dust as fertilizer. No . You wont be able to afford to eat it, but it will be good for "bio"fuel. This will allow your masters to go to Bali and Tahiti on their yachts and in their Lear's.

 

[wirebender]

An article in the Scientific American maps the historical movements of the tropical rainband, and confirms that it is moving north. Also confirms other tropical studies that the MWP was only about 0.2 above the historical norm, as compared to the 0.7 of today.

A Shifting Band of Rain: Scientific American

I have already provided you with multiple peer reviewed studies that state quite clearly that the MWP was considerably warmer than the present and global in nature. How many more would you like to see as there are hundreds. Funny that you are willing to disregard the published work of over 900 scientists in favor of one whose study was based on inappropriate proxy data.

 

[konradv]

An article in the Scientific American maps the historical movements of the tropical rainband, and confirms that it is moving north. Also confirms other tropical studies that the MWP was only about 0.2 above the historical norm, as compared to the 0.7 of today.

A Shifting Band of Rain: Scientific American

I have already provided you with multiple peer reviewed studies that state quite clearly that the MWP was considerably warmer than the present and global in nature. How many more would you like to see as there are hundreds. Funny that you are willing to disregard the published work of over 900 scientists in favor of one whose study was based on inappropriate proxy data.

The problem with the MWP is that it's largely irrelevant. You can't take the past as a template for the future, if underlying conditions have changed. Like, the fact that humans put out more CO2 in days than all the volcanoes on earth do in a normal year. The MWP was undoubtedly a natural variation, but the real concern is that CO2 and other GHGs are 30-40% above historical averages. What would happen if energy-trapping molecules in the atmosphere continue to rise? Logic tells us temps WILL go up. After all, statistically only 50% of the energy would be re-emitted into space, leaving the other half to warm the earth.

 

[American Horse]

The first comment from the link:

I hardly know where to start with how bad this article and research is, and how much guts it to took to print it by Scientific American. Julian Sach and his photo-shoot friend Myhrvold try hard to put one over on the scientific community. They think that by using a ten-foot tube to get a six-foot core sample out of an equatorial heat island that their data will not be biased. If you only measure equatorial heat islands, you will only get increased temperature effects, no matter what D/H algae lipid levels are measured. Where's the 3000-foot lake to compare with? The research is biased before it even starts. I commend the authors that they do give some credence to solar activity but their heart isn't in it.

In 1983, Denmark's Willi Dansgaard and Switzerland's Hans Oeschger drilled two Greenland ice cores one mile deep, one mile apart, representing 250,000 years of the Earth's layered climate history. The cores were laid side by side. They found a 2500 year cycle superimposed on the big, ice age, climate swings. Their report in 1984 linked that cycle to the cycles of the Sun. These cycles also noted that it was before CO2 became an issue on this planet. Now, those cores were true research....not the flim-flam 6-foot cores that the authors are trying to promote to get tenure.

 

[wirebender]

The problem with the MWP is that it's largely irrelevant. You can't take the past as a template for the future, if underlying conditions have changed.

I suppose you can't if the past disproves your hypothesis. The fact is that the underlying conditions haven't changed. You think a few parts per million of a gas that has no capacity to trap and retain heat represents changed condtions. The earth has seen atmospheric CO2 concentrations of over 5000ppm and has not experienced anything like runaway global warming and has entered ice ages with higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations than at present. History shows us that CO2 is not a driver of the climate.

The MWP was undoubtedly a natural variation,

The present is a natural variation as well. If you think otherwise, then provide some hard observed evidence that establishes an unequivocal link between the activities of man and the changing global climate.

but the real concern is that CO2 and other GHGs are 30-40% above historical averages.

Which history? The very narrow band you like to reference or earth history in general. If you look at earth history, then the present atmosphere is positively starved for CO2.

What would happen if energy-trapping molecules in the atmosphere continue to rise?

CO2 can not trap energy. I have asked you before to describe the mechanism by which you believe a CO2 molecule to be able to trap energy and you had no answer then and my bet is that you have no answer now nor will you ever have an answer. The absorption and emission spectra happen within nanoseconds of each other and the emission spectra clearly indicates that the exact amount of energy that was absorbed has been emitted. Where is the "trapping" that you claim is happening?

Logic tells us temps WILL go up.

Logic tells us that if a molecule has no mechanism by which to trap energy, then no amount of it is going to trap energy and therefore it can not drive temperature.

After all, statistically only 50% of the energy would be re-emitted into space, leaving the other half to warm the earth.

An object that is heated passively (earth) can not be warmed by a reflection of its own energy without the input of work. Refer to the second law of thermodynamics.

 

[konradv]

CO2 can't trap energy? How about water vapor? If one doesn't have such a mecanism, neither does the other. I think you need to study up on the subject. You're application of the 2nd Law seems a bit goofy, also. I'll raise you Conservation of Energy. If energy gets reflected and trapped by whatever molecule, what happens to it, if not to be re-emitted later? You tell us a lot about the past, but what I'm concerned about is the time course. Proxy data from the distant past can only give you answers that cover thousands of years. It tells you nothing about what happened on a human time scale. That's what I'm concerned about and to say there was no global warming is something you're just stating without anything resembling proof.

 

[Old Rocks]

The first comment from the link:

I hardly know where to start with how bad this article and research is, and how much guts it to took to print it by Scientific American. Julian Sach and his photo-shoot friend Myhrvold try hard to put one over on the scientific community. They think that by using a ten-foot tube to get a six-foot core sample out of an equatorial heat island that their data will not be biased. If you only measure equatorial heat islands, you will only get increased temperature effects, no matter what D/H algae lipid levels are measured. Where's the 3000-foot lake to compare with? The research is biased before it even starts. I commend the authors that they do give some credence to solar activity but their heart isn't in it.

In 1983, Denmark's Willi Dansgaard and Switzerland's Hans Oeschger drilled two Greenland ice cores one mile deep, one mile apart, representing 250,000 years of the Earth's layered climate history. The cores were laid side by side. They found a 2500 year cycle superimposed on the big, ice age, climate swings. Their report in 1984 linked that cycle to the cycles of the Sun. These cycles also noted that it was before CO2 became an issue on this planet. Now, those cores were true research....not the flim-flam 6-foot cores that the authors are trying to promote to get tenure.

The sixth comment from the link

The full print article, with several diagrams and more on their methodology, is missing from this on-line link. Attempts to access the full article on the web from here did not prompt so much as an invitation to subscribe, so I am disappointed.
In print, they reported that the location of the rain band fluctuates between winter and summer. Also in print, the authors made a connection to drier seasonal weather in the coffee-growing countries of Colombia and Ecuador.

They produced a graph of the temperatures by the proxies from the lake sediments on the islands. It looked very much like the graph produced by an earlier group that got their proxies from ocean sediments in the Indian Ocean.