FreeWilly
Who are you responding to? I mean, you quote me;
Never before have billions of tons of stored CO2 been released into the atmosphere in such a short space of time.
And what you say is;
Actually our atmosphere is CO2 impoverished.
Does this mean you have no comment on how billions of tons of stored CO2 have been released in such a short space of time?
Your argument seems to be;
In a time period where known forcing (orbit, solar variation, etc.) does not explain sudden average temperature rise, and masses of CO2 has been released by man (let alone agricultural inputs of greenhouse gasses), saying that in the past CO2 levels were higher means we can doubt the role of CO2 in the current temperature rise.
Please let me know if I mis-state your case. If I am right, what were the forcings at those points? Where was the Earth in its orbital cycles? Where was the sun in its variation?
If you want to make the argument I think you are making, you need to show that known forcings in those periods and the level of CO2 cannot explain the temperatures we believe were prevalent. Over to you.
No one disagrees with the amplifying effect of CO2 in previous warmings when CO2 increase was not a primary cause of climate change. What this approach ignores is the fact in previous episodes CO2 was changing in response to climatic trends, not as a result of agriculture and fossil fuel use. So, we have whatever amplifying effect the levels of CO2 that would be here anyway PLUS those of the additional CO2.
Of the 186 billion tons of CO2 that enter earth's atmosphere each year from all sources, only 6 billion tons are from human activity. Approximately 90 billion tons come from biologic activity in earth's oceans and another 90 billion tons from such sources as volcanoes and decaying land plants.
It would seem you are confusing CO2 cycles with CO2 increase. No one disputes the large amounts of CO2 in cycles; they are called cycles because they cause no overall increase over time, at least not the 200 years we are actually discussing. Again, you go straight to a point which means you can avoid discussing the real issue, the extra CO2 in the atmosphere because of man, Human CO2 release is not a cycle! Your point is simply not relevant to the discussion, it is a red herring.
I "beg" to differ :) The question of "how much" and "to what extent" CO2 affects the atmosphere is central to the issue.
Yes, but if water vapour (which you bought up) is NOT changing (which means you bringing it up was another way to avoid the actual issue), and CO2 is, the effect of the extra CO2 is what is important, not the fact water vapour plays a larger role.
You seem to think that because the absolute proportions of CO2 in the atmosphere have only changed a little, the effect cannot be important. That's like saying the level of a toxin in a system going from 3.3% to 3.6% isn't important as it's a tiny change, when at 3.5% the level of the toxin becomes high enough to cause damage. Or that the 2.3% active component of a pill is insignificant compared to the 97.7% of filler.
Just as it was easy to get hornswoggled by those nice people tobacco companies employed to deny links between tobacco and cancer, due to their skillful dissembling, so to it is easy to get distracted by the disingenuous arguments by their modern-day equivalents, the climate change skeptics. There is no real big deal in being fooled by mislead or dishonest experts who are out to mislead you or fool you; they're "experts", after all, and it is easy for experts to pull the wool over the eyes of a lay-person. N.B.; If you're annoyed about this they are the people to be annoyed with...
All of the arguments you have so far advanced do very well at distracting from the issue of man releasing masses of CO2 by making CO2's role seem unimportant; this does not change the fact that; I don't think you do this deliberately or out of evil intent, you have simply had a number worked on you by people who are very good at what they do; they try to distract people from the real evidence and issues of climate change with exactly the sort of points you've bought out (you've studied their arguments well).
It really is simple, just like sucking burning leaves into your lungs being bad for you is very simple (it is worth recalling the example of the tobacco industry's disinformation and collusion again);
- There is far more CO2 in the atmosphere not due to cyclic processes or responses to general climatic trends but as a result of human activity.
- The increase in temperature that we have seen unrelated to any known forcing occurs at the same time as this increase in CO2 levels due to man.
You seem to be stuck on the smoke and mirrors,
OK, but I'm not following it... http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2006/12/01/are-humans-involved-in-global-
LOL So these two guys claim that their adiabatic model of heat transfer in the atmosphere shows humans could heat the atmosphere by no more than 0.01°C.
You're falling for it again; this is smoke and mirrors. No one serious is saying global warming is due to direct heating of the atmosphere (which is what that claim actually means).
They also compare total anthropogenic carbon dioxide emission of 1.003 × 10~18 g with hypothesized total mass of CO2 degassed from the mantle of 4.63 × 10~23 g.
This is used to declare that human CO2 release is only 0.00022% of the total CO2 amount naturally degassed from the mantle. Very impressive, and just the sort of claim climate change skeptics love.
Do they also love these two guys are comparing 4.5 billion years with 200 years? Not really a fair comparison, but as you only get into the fairness of the comparison if you go PAST the smoke and mirrors... did you notice how they do not seem to consider how much of the 4.63 × 10~23 g CO2 released by outgassing is still in the atmosphere? Kind of sloppy considering this figure is 150,000 times the amount of CO2 than is currently in the atmosphere
Total human-released CO2 of 1 x 10~18 g of CO2 in 200 years IS significant in light there is less than 3 × 10~18 g of CO2 in the atmosphere
There are more faults in the paper;
The paper of Khilyuk and Chilingar (2006) contains several more unconventional theories, e.g., the twice repeated hypothesis that in 0.6 Gyr “endogenic oxygen” will degas from the Earth’s core, increase the atmospheric pressure to 40 atm and the global temperature to over 80°C, or the hypothesis that the main internal heat source of the Earth is not radioactivity but “gravitational matter differentiation”. All these hypotheses are not well substantiated either by original arguments or by credible references. One of the weaknesses of the paper is that much of the cited literature is in Russian, thus not easily accessible, or refers to websites, some of them as dubious as http://www.junkscience.com. If the authors think that theories of anthropogenic global warming are junk science, they should themselves adhere to higher scientific standards, e.g., by citing the relevant literature in the fields they cover, but they fail to do so. Some of their major conclusions are simply unsupported allegations, e.g., when they claim that “the major causes of currently observed global warming are: rising solar irradiation and increasing tectonic activity”.
Another example for the failure of Khilyuk and Chilingar (2006) to substantiate their claims and to refer to the state-of-the-art literature is their Fig. 11, showing a simplified picture of the global temperature curve of the past 1,000 years. Based on an article in the Bulletin of the American Association of Petroleum Geology, this figure shows the medieval warm period at +2°C and the little ice age at -1°C relative to the present. It certainly is not a fair representation of the intense recent debate about the global (or rather: northern hemisphere) temperature evolution over the past millennium. One might expect that the authors would refer to the famous “hockey stick” curve of Mann et al. (1998), which has been a major target of the criticism of climate change skeptics in recent years. Or to the latest attempt to reconstruct such a curve presented by Moberg et al. (2005), or other studies as summarized by Briffa and Osborn (2002). None of all these important papers are cited by Khilyuk and Chilingar (2006), instead it is claimed that “the global average temperature dropped about 2°C over the last millennium”, which is squarely at odds with the findings of all these studies.
It is astonishing that the paper of Khilyuk and Chilingar (2006) (as well as Khilyuk and Chilingar 2004, for that matter) could pass the review process of a seemingly serious journal such as Environmental Geology. Such failures of this process, which is supposed to guarantee the quality of published literature, are likely to damage the reputation of this journal.
http://schwinger.harvard.edu/~motrebuttal.htmll/usc-
,,, but you have illustrated very nicely the quality of science typically practised or embraced by climate change skeptics, thank you. Another interesting quote;
Here's why Khilyuk and Chilingar is the gift that that keeps giving: their mistake is so large and so obvious that anyone who cites them either has no clue about climate science or doesn't care whether what they write is true or not. But because there are so few peer-reviewed papers that support the global warming skeptic's position, it is almost irresistible for them to cite them
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2007/01/khilyuk_and_chilingar_the_gift.php
..." in interview for Discover magazine, Oct 1989
Our knowledge of climate change has grown by such bounds in the (almost) 2 decades since that quote that you are doing exactly what Creationists do when they quote Darwin. Why not use a quote that is a little more up-to-date?
So, let us review;
1/ You consistently point out (I do understand you're passing on the skeptical arguments such as they are and may not be aware of how trasparent such arguments are as they are largely designed to convince laypersons, so don't take this personally, you've been taken-in) things which have nothing to do with the increase in CO2 levels due to human activity, pointing to water vapour's large role (which has precisely nothing to do with human-related CO2 increase), and pointing out CO2's small percentage increase (which doesn't mean this small increase can't have a large enough effect), quoting papers which claim man has not directly heated the atmosphere by more than 0.01 C (which has again nothing to do with CO2 increase due to human activity) and using twenty-year old quotes from the global warming lobby to try and build a case which will allow attention to be drawn away from all the evidence pointing to the current warming trend being a result of human activity.
2/ You cite a paper which is becoming infamous on account of the spectacularly bad science and misleading argumentation it displays, yet one which will be quoted by global warming cynics for sometime to come as it is one of the only papers cynical to global warming to pass a peer-review process. This is similar to another "skeptics vs.a establishment" debate, that of ID/Creationism vs. Evolution, here (although un peer-reviewed) Behe's "irreducible complexity" claims will be aired for years to come, despite the fact they've already beent comprehensively rebutted. Oh, another similarity to the Crea/ID vs. Evo debate is the authors of a paper on CLIMATE CHANGE is by two people from USC's civil engineering faculty; Creao/ID is famous for papers by people working out of their specialism...
I don't say this to suggest you are a Creationist or ID-ot, but to highlight the similarity of bad science and misleading claims that both ID/Creationism and globtal warming cynicism rely upon.
I also don't say that Khilyuk and Chilingar themselves were funded by the petroleum industry or anything similar, but even with the P-o-S they HAVE authored, they NOW could get funding enough to be very comfortable, either as convenient idiot savants (they might actually be sincere) or knowing constructors of misleading arguments for the skeptical lobby.
As for how their rubbish got published; according to ISI Web of Knowledge, based on citations/article, Environmental Geology ranks 143 out of 149 Environmental/Ecology journals. EG is not listed as a Geology journal, but if it were it would rank 172 out of 186.
So, again, over to you; will you be annoyed at me for pointing out the mistake you've inadvertently made, or annoyed at the people who have actually mislead you? Will you accept K&C's article is utter bunk? Will you post something which shows recent warming is not linked to recent CO2 rises?