When I'm in a rush, I get careless! Small changes.
- > Obviously, global warming is not refuted by some local temperatures going down. In fact, some "scenarios predict that Britain could get much colder, if melting ice from Greenland diverts the warming gulf stream away from the British Isles."
Also, obviously, global warming is not proven by some local temperatures going UP.
I wrote in 1999:
"The scholars came from across the world to Brown University to discuss the dangers posed by the looming threat of global temperature change. The Danes had measured oxygen isotopic ratios in ice cores taken from Greenland. The scientist from Jerusalem warned that changes in ocean salinity might trigger dire consequences.
Disaster makes good copy. As Newsweek was later to report "ominous signs that the earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically . . . with serious implications for just about every nation on earth . . . '
The conference at Brown took place in 1972. Among much evidence presented at the conference and during the period following, was the increasing pack ice around Iceland that was becoming a hazard to shipping. Baffin Island, that had been seasonally snow-free for a century was banked high with snow. Warm climate animals were heading south.
The amount of sunshine reaching the ground had dropped 1.3% over 8 years. A large increase in snow cover was evident in the Northern Hemisphere in the winter of 1971-72."
So, after 72% of the century had passed, and 72% of the CO2 had been emitted, the fear was of the coming Ice Age. Incidentally, in the last one Canada was mostly covered as the glaciers marched deep into the north central states of the US.
The coastal areas of the US and perhaps Canada were just cold, cold, cold.
So, in thirty years we go from cold to hot. Could it be that in 30 years we might go from hot to cold?
Of course not, for that would remove the goal of saving the world from itself. In any event, the GW advocates would probably say that the cold was just a glitch in the rise of temperature.
They would never say the heat is just a glitch in our progress toward the Ice Age.
It doesn't fit the agenda.
Harry
- Indeed. In "The Ingenuity Gap", Thomas Homer Dixon reviews some of the possible effects that increases in global temperature could have on ocean currents. Diversion of the Gulf Stream is one of these.
- As the following item on this morning's CBC news suggests, the effects of increases in global tempertures are already being felt by some Arctic species:
- Slimmer polar bears could point to global warming
- IQALUIT - One of the long-term effects of global warming may be thinner polar bears, says a northern scientist working in western Hudson Bay.
- Dr. Ian Stirling has been studying bears for the Canadian Wildlife Service in Churchill, Manitoba, for close to 30 years.
- Stirling has been observing the condition of the polar bears and their cubs when they come onto the shores of western Hudson Bay. He says ice is breaking an average of two weeks earlier than in recent years, giving the bears less time to feed on seals.
- "We've been suspecting this for a while, that some of the females, in fact, are running out of fat and they're leaving the denning areas earlier than they used to," said Stirling.
- The smaller window of time has also caused the bears to feed on different types of seals, including harbour seals and bearded seals.
- "I think we're looking at a period in the Arctic where we're going to be seeing a lot of things that are going to be different than things we've seen before," said Stirling.
- He issues a caution, however, by pointing out that much more research is needed before any long-term conclusions can be drawn. Ben Kovic, the chair of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, agrees that additional studies are important.
- "Research still has to continue to answer some of these outstanding questions. The west Hudson Bay polar bear population is more critical because they would be the first ones to be affected if it's a global warming issue," said Kovic.
- Both men do say that study on the polar bears of western Hudson Bay could show what the future holds for bears elsewhere in the Arctic."
Ed Weick
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Harry Pollard
Henry George School of LA
Box 655
Tujunga CA 91042
Tel: (818) 352-4141
Fax: (818) 353-2242
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