Hansen says CO2 is NOT the prime driver in this paper

[flacaltenn]

It was cute for awhile.. But I'm startin' to see "queer porn" at the grocery check-out lane and trying to avoid calling the bagger a fucktard.. We gotta stop humoring this human compost pile..

 

[westwall]

You're so full of crap! If you knew how to read an encyclopedia entry it is quite clear you moron. Gosh you're stupid. Can you wipe your own ass without help?

Have you ever seen anyone as stupid as him? I thought rocks was the quintecential AGW idiot, but bobo makes rocks look like a rhodes scholar.

No, I havn't. At least after olfraud has been bitchslapped with facts he runs away and hides. This moron just comes back for more and is so stupid he can't understand a damned thing. Public schools at their finest.

 

[wirebender]

Just like water vapor, CO2 is gonna keep you warm at nightime. (Except that GW science can't confirm that fact).

No. Water vapor keeps you warm at night because water actually has the capacity to absorb and retain energy. CO2 and the other so called greenhouse gasses absorb and emit with no actual energy retention.

The bottom line is that radiation accounts for such a small bit of the energy transfer from the surface to space until you reach the outer edges of the atmosphere that it really doesn't matter anyway. Radiation across the whole spectrum amounts to about 8% of the total energy transfer into the upper atmosphere. Now look at the bands in which CO2 can absorb and relate that to 8% of the total energy movement from the surface to space and you have to see that CO2 is meaningless even before you apply the laws of physics to the so called greenhouse effect.

 

[code1211]

The last half million years is current geologic history, the mere blink of a geologically referenced eye. Given the age of Geo, a half a million years is about one ten thousandth of geological existence. That barely takes us back over the last few interglacials. In recent geological history would probably stretch back at least fifty million years (roughly one percent of Geo's existence). Which puts us within approximation to the PETM.

So are you joining in the PETM is proof positive in a happened 3 times in 4.5 billion years kind of a way that CO2 causes warming instead of the other way around?

Physics (specifically radiation transfer mechanics) provides the compellingly supported understanding that CO2 is capable of acting like a "greenhouse" gas, the PETM is nothing more than a recent geological example of what happens when you rapidly (over the period of ~ 10k years) flood the Earth's atmosphere with climatically significant volumes of such greenhouse gases. We are currently adding CO2 to the atmosphere at ~10x the rate that occurred during the PETM and our rate of emissions is still increasing.

What is the measuring device that shows beyond any question that the CO2 rose before the Temperature rose?

What caused the temperature to drop again to the levels prevalent right before the dramatic increase and then what caused the temperature to continue the slow rise to the same peak that the PETM rose to?

If the content of GHG in the air is the driving factor and the increase in temperature continues driven by the GHG and the feedback effect of increasing GHG's is more GHG's, how does the temperature EVER reduce from a peak?

Since the PETM was about 14 degrees C warmer than now, is this an appropriate parallel to the world we now live in? There wasn't a glacier on the planet at that time near sea level.

File:65 Myr Climate Change Rev.png - Global Warming Art

 

[code1211]

So are you joining in the PETM is proof positive in a happened 3 times in 4.5 billion years kind of a way that CO2 causes warming instead of the other way around?

Physics (specifically radiation transfer mechanics) provides the compellingly supported understanding that CO2 is capable of acting like a "greenhouse" gas, the PETM is nothing more than a recent geological example of what happens when you rapidly (over the period of ~ 10k years) flood the Earth's atmosphere with climatically significant volumes of such greenhouse gases. We are currently adding CO2 to the atmosphere at ~10x the rate that occurred during the PETM and our rate of emissions is still increasing.

And what happened during the PETM? I'll let wiki explain it....


"Life

The PETM is accompanied by a mass extinction of 35-50% of benthic foraminifera (especially in deeper waters) over the course of ~1,000 years - the group suffering more than during the dinosaur-slaying K-T extinction. Contrarily, planktonic foraminifera diversified, and dinoflagellates bloomed. Success was also enjoyed by the mammals, who radiated profusely around this time.

The deep-sea extinctions are difficult to explain, as many were regional in extent. General hypotheses such as a temperature-related reduction in oxygen availability, or increased corrosion due to carbonate undersaturated deep waters, are insufficient as explanations. The only factor global in extent was an increase in temperature. Regional extinctions in the North Atlantic can be attributed to increased deep-sea anoxia, which could be due to the slowdown of overturning ocean currents,[12] or the release and rapid oxidation of large amounts of methane.[20][verification needed]

In shallower waters, it's undeniable that increased CO2 levels result in a decreased oceanic pH, which has a profound negative effect on corals.[21] Experiments suggest it is also very harmful to calcifying plankton.[22] However, the strong acids used to simulate the natural increase in acidity which would result from elevated CO2 concentrations may have given misleading results, and the most recent evidence is that coccolithophores (E. huxleyi at least) become more, not less, calcified and abundant in acidic waters.[23] Interestingly, no change in the distribution of calcareous nanoplankton such as the coccolithophores can be attributed to acidification during the PETM.[23] Acidification did lead to an abundance of heavily calcified algae[24] and weakly calcified forams.[25]

The increase in mammalian abundance is intriguing. There is no evidence of any increased extinction rate among the terrestrial biota. Increased CO2 levels may have promoted dwarfing[26] – which may have encouraged speciation. Many major mammalian orders – including the Artiodactyla, horses, and primates – appeared and spread across the globe 13,000 to 22,000 years after the initiation of the PETM.[26]"


So, in a nutshell, certain species of forams suffered very high extinction rates. Different species on the other hand did very well. Mammals did exceptionally well and contrary to the incessant nonsense about heat killing the opposite is true. Warmth allowed plants to grow well and that allowed fauna to do well.

How do you explain that?


Paleocene

Sounds like warm weather is favorable to mammals.

 

[wirebender]

Sounds like warm weather is favorable to mammals.

And non mammals alike as most of them evolved during a time that was far warmer than the present.

 

[bobgnote]

Mammals which could migrate or proliferate away from the equator did relatively well, during PETM. Given human emissions, defoliation, and stupidity, 7 billion is too many humans, to survive MEE6. And our rate of CO2 emissions is 10x PETM and accelerating.

The CO2/temperature took 200,000 years to reduce from peak; look that up, since I'm not looking shit up, today. Unless humans aggressively re-green, humans will go on the endangered list, sooner, not later.

So did anybody completely model all absorption, refraction, reflection, diffusion, deflection, emission, and heating coefficients? No? Looks like Wiener needs to go back over all this, watch some more queer porn, with Wally, and explain the quantum physics of Earth's atmosphere and surface, in one post.

Wally, I don't know why an asshole like you even posts. A retard on meth, like suckasbil can't control himself. But I guess right-wingpunk fucktards have compulsions, so heeeere's Wally, no graphs, no live links, except for soft-core queer porn.

 

[IanC]

Its not a simple matter of being tuned to a specific frequency.. The absorption/emissions spectra consists of MULTIPLE "lines" at which the matter is free to accept/discharge (in this case) IR as RF energy. All this has nothing to do with heat transfer and thermo either. Only the radiative balance (input/output) of the material due to IR (electromagnetic) transmission.

But hey... Whatever predicts the right answer --- Right?

This was about ian's own ideas about how CO2 causes warming. He, and some other luke warmers believe that CO2 somehow keeps IR in the atmosphere for a longer time by bouncing the IR around from one CO2 molecule to another, thus causing a build up of energy somehow.

That, however, is not possible because one CO2 molecule can not absorb the emission of another CO2 molecule. CO2 has a very narrow absorption wavelength and even the small change in wavelength that a "packet" of IR realises between absorption and emission precludes it being absorbed by another CO2 molecule.

Here is the paper I referenced to ian and while he can grasp that the wavelength emitted is different than the wavelength absorbed, he seems to think that either no energy is lost or that somehow the CO2 molecule, by emitting multiple "photons" from the original absorbed "photon" can somehow regain that lost energy. Here, have a look at the explanation as to why ian's description of the mechanism by which CO2 causes warming is not possible.

Jennifer Marohasy » Recycling of Heat in the Atmosphere is Impossible: A Note from Nasif S. Nahle

interesting presentation there.. Here's the simple deal.. This discussion always sounds to me like the "ThermoDynamics" class notes got mixed and shuffled with the "Fields and Waves" class notes. HEAT -- is transferred by agitation of molecules. Conduction, Convection, whatever. IR is transported by photons. It's an EM phenomenom. Different college classes --- different rules. But -- they are tied together because IR absorption/emission CHANGES the heat content of the matter. Air actually IS a heat conductor and various gases have different heat capacity and conduction properties. That's the Thermo part.

Also your reference is hung up on whether CO2 can re-radiate IR.. That's not even the Greenhouse.. All incident wavelengths contribute to surface heating. So energy that passed cleanly thru CO2 on the way in (like even UV) contributes. The SURFACE is the "wavelength convertor" to IR going skyward. Just like water vapor, CO2 is gonna keep you warm at nightime. (Except that GW science can't confirm that fact).

It all comes out right because the IR absorptive props of CO2 are largely filtered by water vapor. and thus it doesn't matter as much as AGW types want us to believe.

Peace out...

This discussion always sounds to me like the "ThermoDynamics" class notes got mixed and shuffled with the "Fields and Waves" class notes.

I agree that wirebender has mixed up and misremembered many things from his education.

 

[flacaltenn]

Just like water vapor, CO2 is gonna keep you warm at nightime. (Except that GW science can't confirm that fact).

No. Water vapor keeps you warm at night because water actually has the capacity to absorb and retain energy. CO2 and the other so called greenhouse gasses absorb and emit with no actual energy retention.

The bottom line is that radiation accounts for such a small bit of the energy transfer from the surface to space until you reach the outer edges of the atmosphere that it really doesn't matter anyway. Radiation across the whole spectrum amounts to about 8% of the total energy transfer into the upper atmosphere. Now look at the bands in which CO2 can absorb and relate that to 8% of the total energy movement from the surface to space and you have to see that CO2 is meaningless even before you apply the laws of physics to the so called greenhouse effect.

Yup -- and that's why I'm not gonna feud with you about how much heat is retained by the CO2 fraction...

 

[westwall]

Mammals which could migrate or proliferate away from the equator did relatively well, during PETM. Given human emissions, defoliation, and stupidity, 7 billion is too many humans, to survive MEE6. And our rate of CO2 emissions is 10x PETM and accelerating.

The CO2/temperature took 200,000 years to reduce from peak; look that up, since I'm not looking shit up, today. Unless humans aggressively re-green, humans will go on the endangered list, sooner, not later.

So did anybody completely model all absorption, refraction, reflection, diffusion, deflection, emission, and heating coefficients? No? Looks like Wiener needs to go back over all this, watch some more queer porn, with Wally, and explain the quantum physics of Earth's atmosphere and surface, in one post.

Wally, I don't know why an asshole like you even posts. A retard on meth, like suckasbil can't control himself. But I guess right-wingpunk fucktards have compulsions, so heeeere's Wally, no graphs, no live links, except for soft-core queer porn.

ALL animals everywhere did well babaganoosh. There are no fossil assembleges predominant in any geomorphic region. Try reading a book sometime.

 

[Trakar]

So are you joining in the PETM is proof positive in a happened 3 times in 4.5 billion years kind of a way that CO2 causes warming instead of the other way around?

Physics (specifically radiation transfer mechanics) provides the compellingly supported understanding that CO2 is capable of acting like a "greenhouse" gas, the PETM is nothing more than a recent geological example of what happens when you rapidly (over the period of ~ 10k years) flood the Earth's atmosphere with climatically significant volumes of such greenhouse gases. We are currently adding CO2 to the atmosphere at ~10x the rate that occurred during the PETM and our rate of emissions is still increasing.

And what happened during the PETM? I'll let wiki explain it....

A bit of topic stray, but definitely relevent and even essential to the proper understanding of why AGW topics are more than just a political debate in disguise. Wiki is problematic in itself, not that it is not handy for messageboard reference, but as a primary source it is never any better than the 10s to 100s of often "non" and "un"qualified contributors that happen to shape the information on its pages. It's a good place to start searches when you are looking at a topic, but it is a very poor place to end a search when looking at any topic. That said, we can look at what it says...

"Life

The PETM is accompanied by a mass extinction of 35-50% of benthic foraminifera (especially in deeper waters) over the course of ~1,000 years - the group suffering more than during the dinosaur-slaying K-T extinction. Contrarily, planktonic foraminifera diversified, and dinoflagellates bloomed. Success was also enjoyed by the mammals, who radiated profusely around this time.

Technically, these radiations occurred as climate change killed off, or back, the dominant species successfuly competing and managing within the existent ecosystems. As these dominant species are unable to demonstrate the same dominant success in the changing environments. Species that can more rapidly adapt gradually replace those that can't and variate to fill vacated niches. Any time you see points of rapid evolutionary radiation, you are looking at periods of time where some force or factor is stressing the environment. Mild, temperate, stable, some might even use the term "comfortable," environments are rare in the geologic history of our planet.

The deep-sea extinctions are difficult to explain, as many were regional in extent. General hypotheses such as a temperature-related reduction in oxygen availability, or increased corrosion due to carbonate undersaturated deep waters, are insufficient as explanations. The only factor global in extent was an increase in temperature. Regional extinctions in the North Atlantic can be attributed to increased deep-sea anoxia, which could be due to the slowdown of overturning ocean currents,[12] or the release and rapid oxidation of large amounts of methane.[20][verification needed]

In shallower waters, it's undeniable that increased CO2 levels result in a decreased oceanic pH, which has a profound negative effect on corals.[21] Experiments suggest it is also very harmful to calcifying plankton.[22] However, the strong acids used to simulate the natural increase in acidity which would result from elevated CO2 concentrations may have given misleading results, and the most recent evidence is that coccolithophores (E. huxleyi at least) become more, not less, calcified and abundant in acidic waters.[23] Interestingly, no change in the distribution of calcareous nanoplankton such as the coccolithophores can be attributed to acidification during the PETM.[23] Acidification did lead to an abundance of heavily calcified algae[24] and weakly calcified forams.[25]

The increase in mammalian abundance is intriguing. There is no evidence of any increased extinction rate among the terrestrial biota. Increased CO2 levels may have promoted dwarfing[26] – which may have encouraged speciation. Many major mammalian orders – including the Artiodactyla, horses, and primates – appeared and spread across the globe 13,000 to 22,000 years after the initiation of the PETM.[26]"

This section is extremely shaky and filled with much weakly supported speculation rather than the more general and compelling mainstream understandings. Broad and general "die-backs" need only a few significant extinctions at the base of foodchains to make major changes in existant biosystems. Unfortunately, many people tend to perceive "extinction events" as only occurring when there are huge net losses of species; this understanding excludes most natural extinction events where the actual net loss of species is low as you have high losses of species being offset by high levels of radiation in other species.

This is more common in natural climate change events which are gradual enough that mobility and natural variation can filter specie traits enough to encourage adaptation and evolution. Fortunately, neither adaptation nor evolution will allow a lobster to accomodate the cook-pot.

So, in a nutshell, certain species of forams suffered very high extinction rates. Different species on the other hand did very well. Mammals did exceptionally well and contrary to the incessant nonsense about heat killing the opposite is true. Warmth allowed plants to grow well and that allowed fauna to do well.

How do you explain that?

Paleocene

The issue isn't so much "how", but rather, "what" it is you expect me to explain? I don't know where you get the idea that I or anyone else here (with possibly one or two apparent exceptions) is arguing that AGW is going to turn the planet into Arrakis, though spice sounds rather nice! What we are saying is that in an era where humanity has already had dramatic ecosystem impact and instituted planet-wide die-backs and die-offs, the additional environmental stressors brought on by AGW climate change should not be ignored nor discounted. Likewise adaptation and motility advantages are more likely benefit species we consider pests and nuisances than species we prefer for pleasure and profit. If viable open-air agricultural lands decrease significantly our own species may well be one of the ones in die-back, but frankly, I'm more concerned about the long term economic impacts to our society and culture, than I am the reversal of our specie's population explosion.

 

[Trakar]

I really wish you would keep your outlandish ideas to yourself rather than spam them to other people as fact. I am not saying that all the radiation from excited CO2 molecules is absorbed in turn by another CO2 molecule but I am saying that the absorption spectra is exactly the same as the radiative spectra for CO2 or any other simple molecule.

ian, you acknowledged yourself that you could grasp that the IR exits a CO2 molecule at a different wavelength than that which it entered. I gave you a formal paper on the topic which gave you exactly the wavelength at which IR exits a CO2 molecule. I asked you which absorption band the IR exiting from one CO2 molecule might be absorbed by another CO2 molecule but alas, there were none so you simply didn't answer.

Face it ian, you are wrong. Your personal idea of how warming occurs is no more plausible than the official greenhouse effect as voiced by the IPCC.

Mainstream scientific consideration acknowledges the following basics which are consistent with mainstream AGW understandings:
http://www.heliosat3.de/e-learning/remote-sensing/Lec7.pdf

If your understandings are significantly at variance with any of this information, please indicate specifically what you disagree with and what you feel is more representative of your understandings with regard to that particular and specific issue.

 

[Trakar]

This was about ian's own ideas about how CO2 causes warming. He, and some other luke warmers believe that CO2 somehow keeps IR in the atmosphere for a longer time by bouncing the IR around from one CO2 molecule to another, thus causing a build up of energy somehow.

That, however, is not possible because one CO2 molecule can not absorb the emission of another CO2 molecule. CO2 has a very narrow absorption wavelength and even the small change in wavelength that a "packet" of IR realises between absorption and emission precludes it being absorbed by another CO2 molecule.

Here is the paper I referenced to ian and while he can grasp that the wavelength emitted is different than the wavelength absorbed, he seems to think that either no energy is lost or that somehow the CO2 molecule, by emitting multiple "photons" from the original absorbed "photon" can somehow regain that lost energy. Here, have a look at the explanation as to why ian's description of the mechanism by which CO2 causes warming is not possible.

Jennifer Marohasy » Recycling of Heat in the Atmosphere is Impossible: A Note from Nasif S. Nahle

I won't argue a paper I haven't read, but the concept of long-free pathways vs short-free pathways is not, in itself, dependent upon what re-absorbs the CO2 emitted photons, it is that it alters the shortest mean free-path to exiting the earth's environment for the surface emitted thermal IR. Lengthening the mean free-path extends the persistence of that energy in the system and increases the likelihood of it being absorbed and re-emitted by something else in the environment adding still more length to the mean free-path and increasing the residence of the energy.

 

[bobgnote]

Mammals which could migrate or proliferate away from the equator did relatively well, during PETM. Given human emissions, defoliation, and stupidity, 7 billion is too many humans, to survive MEE6. And our rate of CO2 emissions is 10x PETM and accelerating.

Wally, I don't know why an asshole like you even posts. A retard on meth, like suckasbil can't control himself. But I guess right-wingpunk fucktards have compulsions, so heeeere's Wally, no graphs, no live links, except for soft-core queer porn.

ALL animals everywhere did well babaganoosh. There are no fossil assembleges predominant in any geomorphic region. Try reading a book sometime.

You couldn't have let the Lord Jesus Christ into your life, yet. If you did that, you'd be even stupider, since your folks forgot to cross-breed, and look how you turned out, stupid and completely walled into your stupid, yet yiddish world. The only thing worse than a stupid Jesus freak is . . . YOU.

The PETM is characterized by trauma to species, mainly forams, which you noted, and corals:

Paleocene

The PETM is accompanied by a mass extinction of 35-50% of benthic foraminifera (especially in deeper waters) over the course of ~1,000 years - the group suffering more than during the dinosaur-slaying K-T extinction. Contrarily, planktonic foraminifera diversified, and dinoflagellates bloomed. Success was also enjoyed by the mammals, who radiated profusely around this time.

The deep-sea extinctions are difficult to explain, as many were regional in extent. General hypotheses such as a temperature-related reduction in oxygen availability, or increased corrosion due to carbonate undersaturated deep waters, are insufficient as explanations.

---------------------- just to be fair and balanced:

CO2 Currently Rising Faster Than The PETM Extinction Event

The PETM pulse of CO2 has been linked with acidification of the deep ocean and the extinction of tiny marine life called forams (foraminifera), and proved to be a difficult time for coral reefs. It was also a time of rapid change in land plants and animals, with a quick turnover of species and large migrations, although extinctions were limited.

-----------------------

RealClimate: PETM Weirdness

-----------------------

Oceans in Distress Foreshadow Mass Extinction : Discovery News

These symptoms, moreover, could be the harbinger of wider disruptions in the interlocking web of biological and chemical interactions that scientists now call the Earth system.

All five mass extinctions of life on the planet, reaching back more than 500 million years, were preceded by many of the same conditions now afflicted the ocean environment, they said.

----------------------

I guess if you read, it might be porn, or you don't remember any of it, since any media you have offered in the way of a link, which goes any where was a link to a video, which could be characterized as suspected soft-core queer porn.

 

[wirebender]

I agree that wirebender has mixed up and misremembered many things from his education.

Hell ian, you are in agreement with bob. He said so himself. So much for what you agree with.

 

[wirebender]

If your understandings are significantly at variance with any of this information, please indicate specifically what you disagree with and what you feel is more representative of your understandings with regard to that particular and specific issue.

Absorption and emission are not where climate science and I reach an impass. The problem arises when climate science claims backradiation from the cool atmosphere is causing the warmer surface of the earth to warm further. Or when certain elements of climate science claim that CO2 somehow delays the escape of IR from the atmosphere.

In the first case, the second law of thermodynamics states explicitly that energy can not move from cooler objects (the atmosphere) to warmer objects (the surface of the earth)

In the second case, IR radiating from the surface of the earth is moving at, or very near the speed of light. A single encounter with a CO2 molecule does not appreciably slow down the escape of that IR "packet" into space. The only way CO2 might serve to delay the escape of IR from the atmosphere would be if the IR went from CO2 molecule to CO2 molecule, to CO2 molecule but alas, that can not happen as a CO2 molecule can not absorb the emission from another CO2 molecule.

In short, the described mechanisms by which CO2 is claimed by the various warmist and luke warmist camps to cause warming are simply not physical.

 

[wirebender]

I won't argue a paper I haven't read, but the concept of long-free pathways vs short-free pathways is not, in itself, dependent upon what re-absorbs the CO2 emitted photons, it is that it alters the shortest mean free-path to exiting the earth's environment for the surface emitted thermal IR. Lengthening the mean free-path extends the persistence of that energy in the system and increases the likelihood of it being absorbed and re-emitted by something else in the environment adding still more length to the mean free-path and increasing the residence of the energy.

Here. A formal discussion on the mean free path. I am afraid that argument doesn't hold up as a mechanism for warming either.

Mean Free Path Length of Photons in the Earth's Atmosphere

 

[IanC]

If your understandings are significantly at variance with any of this information, please indicate specifically what you disagree with and what you feel is more representative of your understandings with regard to that particular and specific issue.

Absorption and emission are not where climate science and I reach an impass. The problem arises when climate science claims backradiation from the cool atmosphere is causing the warmer surface of the earth to warm further. Or when certain elements of climate science claim that CO2 somehow delays the escape of IR from the atmosphere.

In the first case, the second law of thermodynamics states explicitly that energy can not move from cooler objects (the atmosphere) to warmer objects (the surface of the earth)

In the second case, IR radiating from the surface of the earth is moving at, or very near the speed of light. A single encounter with a CO2 molecule does not appreciably slow down the escape of that IR "packet" into space. The only way CO2 might serve to delay the escape of IR from the atmosphere would be if the IR went from CO2 molecule to CO2 molecule, to CO2 molecule but alas, that can not happen as a CO2 molecule can not absorb the emission from another CO2 molecule.

In short, the described mechanisms by which CO2 is claimed by the various warmist and luke warmist camps to cause warming are simply not physical.

so you are coming around. you admit CO2 slows down energy loss but 'not appreciably'.

if we could just get you from stating that the second law of thermodynamics stops CO2 molecules from randomly ejecting photons, some towards Earth, then I for one would be happy.

 

[Trakar]

Physics (specifically radiation transfer mechanics) provides the compellingly supported understanding that CO2 is capable of acting like a "greenhouse" gas, the PETM is nothing more than a recent geological example of what happens when you rapidly (over the period of ~ 10k years) flood the Earth's atmosphere with climatically significant volumes of such greenhouse gases. We are currently adding CO2 to the atmosphere at ~10x the rate that occurred during the PETM and our rate of emissions is still increasing.

What is the measuring device that shows beyond any question that the CO2 rose before the Temperature rose?

Radioassay analysis indicates that the initiation of the PETM is marked by an abrupt decrease in the Carbon 13 proportion of marine and terrestrial sedimentary carbon, which is consistent with the rapid addition of >1500 gigatons of Carbon-13 depleted carbon, in the form of carbon dioxide and/or methane, into the hydrosphere and atmosphere. as the basaltic magma eruptions associated with the spreading apart of the north atlantic immediately prior to global thermal effects. These flows occurred primarily in the 10-20k years prior to the beginning of the PETM and the first 10ky or so after the start of PETM conditions. Of course, once the warming began, other sequestered sources of carbon began adding their stores of carbon to the atmosphere as well.

http://seismo.berkeley.edu/~manga/LIPS/storey07.pdf

What caused the temperature to drop again to the levels prevalent right before the dramatic increase and then what caused the temperature to continue the slow rise to the same peak that the PETM rose to?

There are numerous factors that contributed to temperature rises and falls, but CO2 levels are one of the primary agencies in establishing and maintaining surface temperatures on our planet.

If the content of GHG in the air is the driving factor and the increase in temperature continues driven by the GHG and the feedback effect of increasing GHG's is more GHG's, how does the temperature EVER reduce from a peak?

once short term environmental sinks and sources have emitted their stores of carbon, they cease being sources. After temperature equilibrates CO2 levels are slowly lowered through fresh exposures of granite to the atmosphere (mountain building and weathering), in this case, remember the time frame of this earlier discussion, we have the collision of the Indian subcontinent into the belly of Asia pushing up the Himalayans, the intrusion of Africa pushing up the Alps and pinching what will become Greece into the fracturing Asian and European boundaries, and let's not forget the N. American plate riding up the Pacific plate creating the Rockies and coastal ranges west, that's a whole lotta mountain building episodes. And generally, when atmospheric CO2 concentrations drop much below 300ppm and we start getting temperatures cool enough to start building year round icecaps at higher latitudes and altitudes. Much below 250ppm and those latitude and altitude boundaries begin creeping downward; much above 350ppm and the ice at even high latitude and altitude begins disappearing.

Since the PETM was about 14 degrees C warmer than now, is this an appropriate parallel to the world we now live in? There wasn't a glacier on the planet at that time near sea level.

Actually, PETM max is generally considered to have been between 5-7º C warmer than late 20th century average.

 

[Trakar]

Absorption and emission are not where climate science and I reach an impass. The problem arises when climate science claims backradiation from the cool atmosphere is causing the warmer surface of the earth to warm further. Or when certain elements of climate science claim that CO2 somehow delays the escape of IR from the atmosphere.

In the first case, the second law of thermodynamics states explicitly that energy can not move from cooler objects (the atmosphere) to warmer objects (the surface of the earth)

Your understanding of LOTD is flawed. You do not get to arbitrairly allocate "objects;" electrons in low energy states about the atoms in surface material will absorb an appropriate frequency photon regardless of the average energy state of the arbitrarily assigned "surface" object, or the average energy state of the arbitrarily assigned "atmosphere" object that emitted that photon.

In the second case, IR radiating from the surface of the earth is moving at, or very near the speed of light. A single encounter with a CO2 molecule does not appreciably slow down the escape of that IR "packet" into space. The only way CO2 might serve to delay the escape of IR from the atmosphere would be if the IR went from CO2 molecule to CO2 molecule, to CO2 molecule but alas, that can not happen as a CO2 molecule can not absorb the emission from another CO2 molecule.

Again, primarily an issue of flawed understandings. the mean free path (the average distance that photon can travel before interaction with absorptive atmospheric atoms or particles) of a ghg relevent wavelength IR photon, in the lower atmosphere is on the order of meters. That is why most energy transfer in our atmosphere occurs via convection rather than radiation transfer.