bored of education

Worldwide Glacier Retreat

At realclimate they have an article on Worldwide glacier retreat. There is a really cool graph showing how dramatically most glaciers have shrunk in the past century. (If I can figure out how, I will post a copy here.) There is also a link to photos of a shrinking glacier.

This is a very visual example of climate change and Global Warming. Does it prove mankind's involvement? Not definitively. Does it help us know what to do about it? Not really. Does this mean we should all move into the mountains and live on berries? Probably not, I think that would be worse for the environment.

The more scientific part of the article describes how the glacial measurements support other "proxy" measurements of historical temperatures. Since we don't have real temperature data going back more than a few hundred years scientists have found substitute methods. These methods involve things such as measuring tree rings. (Don't ask. I have no idea.) The only problem is that these methods are less exact and it is helpful to find other proxy measurements that support previous ones.

In other words the glacier data makes the graphs of temperature reconstructions more believable. (If I can I'll post a copy here.)

Anyway, I thought it was interesting and nobody in the blogosphere seems to have noticed.

Edit: The graphs are present but fuzzy. I don't know what causes that or how to fix it. Click on the graphs for large unfuzzy copies.

First Comment, First Link?

Bob Whitson at Howling at a Waning Moon posted a comment thanking me for my link and offering to return the favor... So I was exploring his site and discovered his really cool links page.

He has well over a hundred environmentally friendly sites organized into 17 different categories. (I keep discovering more sites about global warming...This is going to take me forever...) The following sites caught my interest:

The People’s Ratification
of the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty

Scientists and Engineers for Change

M O B J E C T I V I S T

http://www.worldviewofglobalwarming.org/

As I have time I'll visit these sights and post my humble opinions here.

(Anyway, I enjoyed getting my first comment... Now I need to figure out how the trackbacks thing works...)

Ask and ye shall receive

I found the perfect Blog for info showing whether mankind causes Global Warming. It is www.realclimate.org. It is written by a climate scientist, Professor Michael Mann, and eight other scientists. They answer questions raised by the media, skeptics, or the concerned curious (such as myself).

The good thing is that the answers are written by the scientists and are unfiltered by the Media. Nor did I see any references to the not-yet-convinced (such as myself) as irrational idiots.

Thank you Professor Mann. I look forward to reading your entire site...

Global Warming News

I found an excellent site which posts up to date news about Global Warming. It is called Howling at the Moon.

The article I read only had one quote which offended my skeptical mind. Dr. Tim Barnett was quoted as saying "The debate about whether or not there is a global warming signal here and now is over at least for rational people." Just because I'm curious and would like to know more facts does not mean I'm irrational...

I found another site which holds the opposite view (about Global Warming...not about whether I'm rational.) It is EnviroSpin Watch. In the most recent post Professor Emeritus Philip Stott compares the media's constant worry about the environment with hypochondriacs. It is a very funny article but left me unconvinced about his position...

Anyway, I'm still unsure about the global warming issue...I'll have to dig a little deeper.

Global Warming

I've become increasingly interested in the controversy over global warming. The politically correct view is that mankind causes (or at least contributes to) the current warming trend. However, many scientists believe natural forces are warming our planet and that humans have very little to do with it. I want to find out which view has the most support from science.

Unfortunately, most arguments sound something like:

"The media is biased and is not reporting the more important details..." (That's probably true, but it doesn't prove your point. What details should they be reporting?)

Or,

"Every rational scientist believes global warming is due to mankind's influence therefore it must be true." (I'm only convinced by their reasons, not their credentials.)

I'm not interested in the rhetoric, I'm interested in the data and the conclusions that can be made from the data. And so I begin my search.

As I find items of interest I will post them here.