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Revealed: Antarctic ice growing, not shrinking

Discussion in 'Science & Technology' started by maynard, Apr 18, 2009.

  1. maynard

    maynard Who, whom?

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    will someone please tell me whats going on here? lol. every month one story say one thing and then a month later another story says the opposite. are we purposely being confused or is this evidence that climatology is mostly guesswork?

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25349683-601,00.html

    ICE is expanding in much of Antarctica, contrary to the widespread public belief that global warming is melting the continental ice cap.

    The results of ice-core drilling and sea ice monitoring indicate there is no large-scale melting of ice over most of Antarctica, although experts are concerned at ice losses on the continent's western coast.

    Antarctica has 90 per cent of the Earth's ice and 80 per cent of its fresh water. Extensive melting of Antarctic ice sheets would be required to raise sea levels substantially, and ice is melting in parts of west Antarctica. The destabilisation of the Wilkins ice shelf generated international headlines this month.

    However, the picture is very different in east Antarctica, which includes the territory claimed by Australia.

    East Antarctica is four times the size of west Antarctica and parts of it are cooling. The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research report prepared for last week's meeting of Antarctic Treaty nations in Washington noted the South Pole had shown "significant cooling in recent decades".
     
  2. Boik14

    Boik14 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    Its possible the Northern ice caps could be melting while the antarctic ice caps are expanding. Actually it would make perfect sense since the poles are technically opposites and it wouldn't be unprecedented.
     
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  3. RickyNeverInhaled

    RickyNeverInhaled Well-Known Member

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    There's a reason that they changed it from global warming to climate change. The reason is that they don't want to admit they were wrong.
     
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  4. Muck

    Muck Throwback Uniform Crusader Retired Administrator

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    Al Gore is going to be so pissed at you maynard.
     
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  5. BuckeyeKing

    BuckeyeKing Wolves DYNASTY!!!!

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    Climate change is a natural occurrence on Earth. Really not surprised.
     
  6. FINintheMOON

    FINintheMOON Moderator Luxury Box

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    The reason that the Artic is melting and the Antartic is growing is due to the angle of the earth's axis. The northern hemisphere has been slowly tilting more towards the sun due to the angle on this axis and the completion of the wobble of the earth on that axis.

    Global warming has always been a farse... We are however experiencing climate changes due to the above sequence of events...
     
  7. Celtkin

    Celtkin <B>Webmaster</b> Luxury Box

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    No brother, that believe is a farce. The cause of global warming is subject to debate but the average rise in global temperature is not subject to debate -- it has been documented and recorded as observed temperatures and not subject to opinion.
     
  8. FINintheMOON

    FINintheMOON Moderator Luxury Box

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    Well when you say "Global Warming", that would indicate that the temperatures in the whole world has increased. However, based on this article and several others of the past, there are actually areas of the world cooling..., which would indicate that the Climates of various areas are changing. Some are getting warmer and some are getting cooler. The whole globe is not warming though... :up::wink2:
     
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  9. Celtkin

    Celtkin <B>Webmaster</b> Luxury Box

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    Global mean temperatures have been rising. That doesn't mean that there aren't small pockets that are cooling.

    If 90% of you house was on fire, would it be a fair assessment that your house was on fire?
     
  10. Agua

    Agua Reality: Try It!

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  11. cnc66

    cnc66 wiley veteran, bad spelur Luxury Box

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    I have to ask.. what would you consider "substantial?" I ask because is doesn't take much at all to significantly affect millions of people.

    There are really only two players and Antarctica IS the big dog but Greenland is capable of raising world sea levels 6 meters.. and Greenland is losing ice at rates that are increasing every year, AND with the arctic on the whole getter warmer as it loses reflective ice this isn't good.

    On some of your questions.. what needs to remembered in this arena is that the sampling size is so small given the complexity of the issues that almost anything can be shown with numbers to be true. There are some pretty good indicators that give us "limited" direction in how to interprete all these numbers but it is still so ambiguous that IMO, the smart person needs to evaluate the source, and what agenda that source may have to embrace their "own" version of whats going on.

    You younger guys and dolls will see an improvement in weather and climate forecasting that will IMO, be able to suss out the truths, but a lot of money driven agenda's, soap box preachin' and finger pointing will be going on in between.

    I personally fall in the "we are warming" camp. It isn't all that important to me how much humanity is responsible at the moment, we will figure that out. I'm not sure how much we should lay at our own feet yet so I don't want to get all wrapped up in the blame game that is being used to obscure the rising water issue, but it doesn't look good.

    It may be that the "arctic" ice loss that we are seeing may have a major player in the ash and soot being dropped on the surface, but the jury is still out. who would have thunk it.

    Winter solstice is December 28. Every day after that the sunlight is longer by nearly a minute, AND the angle of incidence with the energy improves too.. not just longer energy, but stronger energy...yet it keeps getting colder for another month or more anyway. It doesn't just get all warm when it does happen either, it happens sporadically with cold fronts, and then warm fronts, record hot over here, record wet over there ad infinitum.

    So, I think the big picture is a lot like the little one. Cause and effect can be separated by enough time and confusion with the "anomalies" that it's difficult to say hardly anything with "certainty". That means all camps and agenda's have a chance to be right.

    And our comparative sample needs time to grow, but time takes time.

    All that matters to me is I am convinced that global warming is currently going on, and I'm not looking for blame sake, I'm looking for cause sake, I wish to learn.


    On Antarctica being cooler, with growing ice;

    Antarctic cooling, global warming?
    Filed under: Arctic and Antarctic Climate modelling Greenhouse gases Climate Science— gavin @ 9:17 PM - ()
    by Eric Steig and Gavin Schmidt

    This article ^^ is from 2004, here is a map of the cooling to that date;

    [​IMG]

    Antarctic surface temperatures as observed via AHVRR satellite measurements between 1982 and 2004. Much of Antarctica cooled during this period. Image credit: IPCC The Physical Science Basis, Figure 3.32.

    here is the current map adding the last five years;

    [​IMG]

    Antarctic surface temperatures as observed via AHVRR satellite measurements between 1981 and 2007. Note that the cooling trend observed from 1982-2004 reversed, thanks to warming from 2004-2007. Image credit: NASA



    Averaging together antarctic and arctic sea ice hides an important truth
    Posted by: JeffMasters, 9:37 AM EST on January 15, 2009 Please credit the above photos to Dr. Masters blog.


    Here is how it starts, and I recommend that you read the article but I want to cherry pick some relevant explanations for Maynard's questions after the opening statement.

    Having said all that, both articles stress the uncertainty of all the numbers;

    .

     
  12. jason8er

    jason8er Luxury Box Luxury Box

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    All four major world temperature tracking outlets, Hadley, GISS, UAH, and RSS, all reckognize the current cooling trend.

    I challenge anyone to show me a GCM that predicted any cooling BEFORE the cooling started. The only ones who did predict it were the few prominent solar physicists that are the only guys who have successfully predicted long range climate change by studying solar cycles. These guys are now predicting the cooling thru at least 2030, with possible Dalton or even Maunder type minimum temps. If this is the case, then you can kiss the sensitive crops of the higher latitudes goodbye. Including Canadian grain production, the second largest exporters of wheat next to the US.

    So who should you believe? The guys who get it right nearly all the time, or the guys who have lied to you for the last 20 years and have stretched the little truth they actually had.

    [​IMG]

    This chart is actually kind to the IPCC, as it just shows their predictions from 2002. If we go back to 1990 (the ones that politicians, the media, and some here still use), their predictions go way off the top of the chart.

    I can't wait for Copenhagen this December. The back tracking and excuses will be staggering to say the least.
     
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  13. Section126

    Section126 We are better than you. Luxury Box

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  14. cnc66

    cnc66 wiley veteran, bad spelur Luxury Box

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    Personally Jason, I think you will be disappointed.

    I think maybe your post, and this one one I am writing are drifting off topic, which is Antarctic ice. I do involve polar ice, but at the wrong end of the planet. We might want to make a new thread.. input from the gallery would be welcome here.


    Like I said earlier, everyone can be made to look right by the proper selection of numbers. "If" I understand you, you are contending the globe is NOT warming, and used graphics to make to support that contention.

    Are we on the same page Jason.. is that your position? Of it is not, please forgive the assumption.

    On the site link Aqua provided;

    I found this opening statement for the "site" to be interesting;



    If I understand Christopher Monckton correctly he is attacking the reliability of "one" of the models used to reach a conclusion on "what the hell is going on out there" by the IPCC

    The IPCC has recently been in trouble for cooked numbers and political agenda, I don't think you will find many, and certainly not me defending them very much. "They" had nothing to do with "my" personal conclusions, and I don't recall them being used in any discourse here.

    He is contending that those numbers need to be re-evaluated, and makes a good case for "that". I have no argument with him, or his paper.

    It does not, IMO, support your contention of global cooling well at all.

    Jason, I like very much your mention of solar energy levels and would love to discuss that and what it might mean sometime, even if this might not be the right thread for it. It is frightening to me to think the planet has been receiving less solar energy and is still getting warm.. later on that.

    I have some questions for you relating to your post and contention, then I shall offer some rebuttals to it.

    ...explain the melting arctic ice.. it cannot be ignored, and it is unprecedented in historic times.. I have offered an explanation for the temperature and ice anomalies in the Antarctic, how about you offer me an explanation as to why the arctic ice cap is melting.. if we are cooling why are losing the ice?


    Here are some thoughts from my favorite weather source Dr. Jeff Masters about studies, the bold is mine;

    Weather Underground

    the eight year link is worth following.

    Jason, I look forward to our exchanges on this. Every time I nose around I learn something new. On a personal level, I would rather have cooling than warming ten out of ten times. Florida, which I deeply love, does not fare well when the water comes up. I mention this because I hope you will believe me when I say to you that although I am personally convinced we are warming, I reconsider that with every new item I learn. With a convincing enough argument, I could be swayed into the other camp. It would take some serious convincing, I think their is a preponderance of evidence but my mind IS open to new thoughts and ideas. I have no agenda I am aware of so I "think" I am examining what is before me fairly.
     
  15. jdang307

    jdang307 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    That site was just reprinting a response by Monckton. Here is the official response to the Energy Committee

    http://republicans.energycommerce.house.gov/Media/file/News/Lord_Monckton_Testimony.pdf

    Couldn't be more clear than that. That's his position. Goes on to say we will only warm about .5 F this century, and we should just adjust because the mitigating procedures we are undertaking are causing food prices to double, and is causing hunger and riots which are not being reported in the west.

    Stuff like this doesn't get reported often:
    We hear about the losses, the fractures, etc. but never about the positive side, the offsets.

    I'm a skeptic/cynic by trade. Its my job at work to identify and minimize conflicts of interests. There is a lot of money to be made with global warming. Is there a similar motive on the non-global warming side for scientists?

    I'm not declaring them wrong, its still in dispute, but thats what I see.

    EDITED to take out stupid comment.
     
  16. maynard

    maynard Who, whom?

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    great stuff guys. thanks
     
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  17. cnc66

    cnc66 wiley veteran, bad spelur Luxury Box

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    wow.. that's rather insulting

    sure it does, follow some of the antarctic ice links I provided

    good, but you don't have to talk down to me because you ARE a cynic. I didn't provide the link that you felt needed explaining, but I am no stranger to his Lordship, I have read several of his papers and it's a safe bet that I spend more time nosing around this stuff than most.
     
  18. jason8er

    jason8er Luxury Box Luxury Box

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    Me too. :cry:

    The only thing keeping that sinking ship afloat is politics of the worst sort. It won’t surprise me at all to see politics prevail again.

    That graph was in response to the study that Aqua posted, and is the MSU/UAH global satellite data set. So, no selective use of data on my part.

    Do I think it has cooled over the last 7 years? Yes, because that’s what the official record says. Do I think that by itself (7 years) is anything of significance? No I don't. I don't think the last 30 years is sufficient enough to draw conclusions, nor the last 100. I was a geophysics student way back in the day, and we don't relax until we have seen at least 1000 years of data. Millions of years, and we’re in our element. :wink2:

    What I do think is significant are the prominent solar physicists who have an amazing track record of nailing future climate trends. They have been calling for a cooling period thru at least 2030, and possibly thru 2050 when we will have an estimated 3 billion more mouths to feed. Unfortunately, their temperature predictions will cause many crop failures world wide and that will have a far more devestating effect on humanity than a slight increase in temperatures and or ACO2. Especially when there are a ton of studies showing the benefits of those increases. Some of which we have already reaped during the warming of the last century.

    So, we can follow the modelers who get it wrong a frightening % of the time (if not all the time), or we can follow the guys who yet again nailed the current cooling trend years ago, and who say there is more to come.

    I have maintained all along that we may be exhausting our efforts in the wrong place.

    Yes, I was actually in agreement with much of what you said in your post. I loved your candor in saying that you cared not for the reason of the warming/melting, but that it was going on. What pains me, and you've posted it many time before, is your worry about rising sea levels and what will happen to your area as a result. I never get sick of reading about your family history, and I understand your concern because if it.

    It pains me because your a friend, and I don't like the fact that someone I love (calm down boys) and respect, is having something like this eating away at them unnecessarily. That senario, if it ever even comes to pass, is many many milenia away. Please forgive me if I'm overreacting in interpreting your thoughts on this, but one of my goals (beside turning Mal into a skeptic :lol:) is to ease your worry about it.

    For some reason, I can't get that site to come up. But I will say that most, if not all of the AGW argument is down to computer modeling now. He may have been talking about one for that article, but the 20 or so they use (IPCC)are always under attack by skeptics (and even other modelers!) for good reasons. Those reasons would also make for a great thread.

    Yeah, but Marty, they cooked those numbers not recently, but from the very beginning over 20 years ago. They started this whole mess, and still run it. They have backed off their doom and gloom fear-mongering with each subsequent report, but no one else seems to have followed (fringe scientists, media, and politicians). Certainly not the Jim Hansens or Gavin Schmidts of the world. These guys are furious with the IPCC now for no longer being extreme enough.

    Thanks Marty. It's amazing what these guys are doing, and I'll gladly share that info with you. However, it will have to wait alittle. I am currently working a golf tourney in Savannah this weekend (Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf) then its off to St. Louis for some CE. I will try to pick up where I left off here between now and then, or when I get back. :hi5:
     
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  19. jdang307

    jdang307 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    Dude, Marty, I didn't mean to talk down to you or anything like that whatsoever. I was taken aback by your response, then I re-read my response and yes, it came off as insulting, and I did not intend that whatsoever, I apologize (and edit).

    Bad bad choice of words on my part. Again, Did not mean how it came off at all.
     
  20. cnc66

    cnc66 wiley veteran, bad spelur Luxury Box

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    Humbly accepted, it was seriously out of character and literally had me shaking my head.
     
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  21. jdang307

    jdang307 Season Ticket Holder Club Member

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    Yeah definitely not my style unless we're talking Obama :lol:

    I usually spot language like that before it goes out and I edit because in the head sounds different than reading it on the internet. I usually re-read my posts to catch those things, but didn't this time.

    Ok back to the topic!
     
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  22. Celtkin

    Celtkin <B>Webmaster</b> Luxury Box

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    Guys, NOAA and the equivalent agencies in European countries show a steady upward climb in observed temperatures. Marty, I and others have posted the graphs and raw data many times so I won't do it again since we are still the same bunch debating this.
     
  23. Celtkin

    Celtkin <B>Webmaster</b> Luxury Box

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    I am sure that you have seen this and I wouldn't normally post it but it is fairly strong evidence that past warming is outpacing isolated cooling and while I realize that it takes longer for the oceans to catch up with air temperatures, it is fairly strong evidence that isolated addition of Antarctic ice is an anomaly and not yet the norm.:

    Antarctic Ice Shelf Collapse

    http://www.usnews.com/articles/science/2009/04/29/antarctic-ice-shelf-collapse.html

    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/apr2009/pers-a08.shtml

    This picture was taken yesterday

    [​IMG]
     
  24. DeDolfan

    DeDolfan Premium Member Luxury Box

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    It also said in the paper the other day, about the west coast ice shelf, that it was breaking off and not part of the land mass. Therefore it would cause no rise in sea level.
     

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