Alaska, No Longer So Frigid, Starts to Crack, Burn and Sag Sun Jun 16, 9:15 AM ET

By TIMOTHY EGAN The New York Times

ANCHOR POINT, Alaska, June 13 To live in Alaska when the average temperature has risen about seven degrees over the last 30 years means learning to cope with a landscape that can sink, catch fire or break apart in the turn of a season.

In the village of Shishmaref, on the Chukchi Sea just south of the Arctic Circle, it means high water eating away so many houses and buildings that people will vote next month on moving the entire village inland.

In Barrow, the northernmost city in North America, it means coping with mosquitoes in a place where they once were nonexistent, and rescuing hunters trapped on breakaway ice at a time of year when such things once were unheard of.

From Fairbanks to the north, where wildfires have been burning off and on since mid-May, it means living with hydraulic jacks to keep houses from slouching and buckling on foundations that used to be frozen all year. Permafrost, they say, is no longer permanent.

Here on the Kenai Peninsula, a recreation wonderland a few hours' drive from Anchorage, it means living in a four-million-acre spruce forest that has been killed by beetles, the largest loss of trees to insects ever recorded in North America, federal officials say. Government scientists tied the event to rising temperatures, which allow the beetles to reproduce at twice their normal rate.

In Alaska, rising temperatures, whether caused by greenhouse gas emissions or nature in a prolonged mood swing, are not a topic of debate or an abstraction. Mean temperatures have risen by 5 degrees in summer and 10 degrees in winter since the 1970's, federal officials say.

While President Bush ( news - web sites) was dismissive of a report the government recently released on how global warming ( news - web sites) will affect the nation, the leading Republican in this state, Senator Ted Stevens, says that no place is experiencing more startling change from rising temperatures than Alaska.

Among the consequences, Senator Stevens says, are sagging roads, crumbling villages, dead forests, catastrophic fires and possible disruption of marine wildlife.

These problems will cost Alaska hundreds of millions of dollars, he said.

"Alaska is harder hit by global climate change than any place in the world," Senator Stevens said.

Scientists have been charting shrinking glaciers and warming seas in Alaska for some time. But only recently have experts started to focus on what the warming means to the people who live in Alaska.

The social costs of higher temperatures have been mostly negative, people here say. The Bush administration report, which was drafted by the Environmental Protection Agency ( news - web sites), also found few positives to Alaska's thermal rise. But it said climate change would bring a longer growing season and open ice-free seas in the Arctic for shipping.

"There can no longer be any doubt that major changes in the climate have occurred in recent decades in the region, with visible and measurable consequences," the government concluded in the report to the United Nations ( news - web sites) last month.

It does not take much to find those consequences in a state with 40 percent of the nation's surface water and 63 percent of its wetlands.

Here on the Kenai Peninsula, a forest nearly twice the size of Yellowstone National Park is in the last phases of a graphic death. Century-old spruce trees stand silvered and cinnamon-colored as they bleed sap.

A sign at Anchor River Recreation Area near this little town poses a question many tourists have been asking, "What's up with all the dead spruce trees on the Kenai Peninsula?" The population of spruce bark beetles, which have long fed on these evergreen trees, exploded as temperatures rose, foresters now say.

Throughout the Kenai, people are clearing some of the 38 million dead trees, answering the call from officials to create a "defensible space" around houses for fire protection. Last year, two major fires occurred on this peninsula, and this year, with temperatures in the 80's in mid-May, officials say fire is imminent. "It's just a matter of time before we have a very large, possibly catastrophic forest fire," said Ed Holsten, a scientist with the Forest Service.

Joe Perletti, who lives in Kasilof in the Kenai Peninsula, has rented a bulldozer to clear dead trees from the 10 acres where he lives.

"It's scary what's going on," Mr. Perletti said. "I never realized the extent of global warming, but we're living it now. I worry about how it will affect my children."

Mr. Perletti, an insurance agent, said some insurers no longer sold fire policies to Kenai Peninsula homeowners in some areas surrounded by dead spruce.

Another homeowner, Larry Rude, has cut down a few trees but has decided to take his chances at the house he owns near Anchor Point. Mr. Rude says he no longer recognizes Alaska weather.

"This year, we had a real quick melt of the snow, and it seemed like it was just one week between snowmobiling in the mountains and riding around in the boat in shirt-sleeve weather," Mr. Rude said.

Other forests, farther north, appear to be sinking or drowning as melting permafrost forces water up. Alaskans have taken to calling the phenomenon "drunken trees."

For villages that hug the shores of the Bering, Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, melting ice is the enemy. Sea ice off the Alaskan coast has retreated by 14 percent since 1978, and thinned by 40 percent since the mid-1960's, the federal report says. Climate models predict that Alaska temperatures will continue to rise over this century, by up to 18 degrees.

Kivalina, a town battered by sea storms that erode the ground beneath houses, will have to move soon, residents say. Senator Stevens said it would cost $102 million, or $250,000 for each of the 400 residents.

The communities of Shishmaref, Point Hope and Barrow face a similar fate. Scientists say the melting ice brings more wave action, which gnaws away at ground that used to be frozen for most of the year.

Shishmaref, on a barrier island near the Bering Strait, is fast losing the battle to rising seas and crumbling ground. As the July 19 vote on whether to move approaches, residents say they have no choice.

"I'm pretty sure the vote is going to be to move," Lucy Eningowuk of Shishmaref said. "There's hardly any land left here anymore."

Barrow, the biggest of the far northern native villages with 4,600 people, has not only had beach erosion, but early ice breakup. Hunters have been stranded at sea, and others have been forced to go far beyond the usual hunting grounds to find seals, walruses and other animals.

"To us living on the Arctic coastline, sea ice is our lifeline," Caleb Pungowigi testified recently before a Senate committee. "The long-term trend is very scary."

A 20-year resident of Barrow, Glenn Sheehan, says it seems to be on a fast-forward course of climate change.

"Mosquitoes, erosion, breakup of the sea ice, and our sewage and clean-water system, which is threatened by erosion as well," he said. "We could be going from a $28 million dollar sewage system that was considered an engineering model to honey buckets your basic portable outhouses."

The people who manage the state's largest piece of infrastructure the 800-mile-long Trans-Alaska Pipeline have also had to adjust to rising temperatures. Engineers responsible for the pipeline, which carries about a million barrels of oil a day and generates 17 percent of the nation's oil production, have grown increasingly concerned that melting permafrost could make unstable the 400 or so miles of pipeline above ground. As a result, new supports have been put in, some moored more than 70-feet underground.

"We're not going to let global warming sneak up on us," said Curtis Thomas, a spokesman for the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company, which runs the pipeline. "If we see leaning and sagging, we move on it."

North of Fairbanks, roads have buckled, telephone poles have started to tilt, and homeowners have learned to live in houses that are more than a few bubbles off plumb. Everyone, it seems, has a story.

"We've had so many strange events, things are so different than they used to be, that I think most Alaskans now believe something profound is going on," said Dr. Glenn Juday, an authority on climate change at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks. "We're experiencing indisputable climate warming. The positive changes from this take a long time, but the negative changes are happening real fast."

-- doom and destruction (coming soon @ to. your neighborhood), June 16, 2002

Answers

Maybe this will cause Bush to wake up, though I fear it won't. We'll probably get the same old blab.

-- Peter Errington (petere7@starpower.net), June 16, 2002.

Peter:

It is not my habit to agree with this administration, but they are closer to the truth in one way; at least with the last report [when we sift out all of the people with an agenda].

I am not an expert in this area, but I was invited to a meeting on the subject in Maryland last fall. This was a small discussion group. The consensus wasn't that emissions had no effect on global warming. The consensus was that if we dropped emissions to zero "now" that it would have little or no effect on climate change for one or two centuries. The choices for consideration were:

1. Decrease emissions now. That will cost an enormous amount of money but have little effect on climate change for a very long time; or

2. Spend that same amount of money to change our food production systems, infrastructure, coastlines, transportation, etc. to adapt to the changes which, will occur, no matter what we do about emissions.

I think that those conclusions were buried in that report.

Best Wishes,,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), June 16, 2002.

"The consensus was that if we dropped emissions to zero "now" that it would have little or no effect on climate change for one or two centuries."

LOL!! I suppose you actually believe that the "small discussion group" who came up with this brilliant deduction have absolutely no agenda whatsoever!

-- hee haaaw! (you better stick to @ watching. your grass grow), June 16, 2002.

"Maybe this will cause Bush to wake up, though I fear it won't."

You got THAT right. The only thing about Alaska that Dumbya gives a rat's ass about is the oil, and global warming won't cause it to evaporate, at least not until he's dead and gone.

-- (Dumbya@not.real.bright), June 16, 2002.

Nice try Rolo, Dumbya hopes the polar ice caps melt so that it will take the focus off of his Al Quieda buddies who then will be free to strike again.

-- (Dumbya@manchild.traitor), June 16, 2002.

A rise in sea level of a mere 4-5 feet or so will give me oceanfront property. I encourage you all to take a Sunday night drive tonight. Hell, take two.

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeeD@yahoo.com), June 16, 2002.

We seem to skip rather merrily over a whole sequence of questions to get to the desired political results here. There is some question as to whether global temperatures are actually rising on average. Sure, without question they are rising in some places. Equally without question they are falling in other places. Whether or not the *average* is changing is close enough to be demonstrably an artifact of our measurement methodology.

The calculations saying if we stopped all unnatural emissions into the air it would take centuries to achieve a new equilibrium, are based on another raft of assumptions -- key among them being that we understand atmospheric dynamics well enough to make such calculations meaningful. But we do not. These are based on "currently considered most likely" assumptions underlying computer models. But we predict the weather with those same models, and we can't get it right even for tomorrow, much less centuries in advance. Atmospheric dynamics are the poster child for chaotic complexity.

Finally, I would be utterly amazed if we could raise the average Alaskan temperatur by these amounts if we dedicated the entire world's economic output into the effort. Blaming our meager influence for such a massive change is nothing more than hubris on a gigantic scale. I doubt all the hot air being belched out by those grinding the global warming axe, taken together, could raise Alaska's temperature measurably. We are giving ourselves credit we don't deserve, and the outcome of the political battle is almost certainly environmentally irrelevant.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 16, 2002.

Heck Unk, if it'll inncrease your property value, I'll take 3.

-- dr. pibb (drpibb@new.formula), June 16, 2002.

Yeah, oceanfront property is cool Unk, until the hurricanes come.

-- (indoor@swimming.pool), June 16, 2002.

"I would be utterly amazed if we could raise the average Alaskan temperatur by these amounts if we dedicated the entire world's economic output into the effort."

You seem to be overlooking the fact that we have been engaging in heavy industrial activity and heavy fossil fuel transportation for well over 50 years now, and much of the industrial activity became fairly heavy well back into the 1800's. All of this activity has been gradually warming up the oceans to the point where there is now a greater differential between the extremes of the warmest and coolest areas of the planet. In an open system (as the planet Earth is), this type of differential always struggles to reach equilibrium. Alaska is warming up because the entire system is struggling to "balance out" the cooler areas of the planet with the warmer areas.

-- (this has been building for @ loooooong. time), June 16, 2002.

this:

I guess I should have been more explicit about the sequence, since you go right ahead and assume it, using your conclusions as your axioms.

First, we must establish that something unusual is really happening. This isn't as trivial as you seem to prefer to believe. Our historical records aren't exactly complete, nor are our data collection methods comparable over that time. So our historical baseline for climatic change (or variation) isn't very solid or reliable. We may be looking more at artifacts of our measurements than at the changes themselves.

Second, we need some way of at least correlating our activities with observed climatic changes. In other words, even if we accept that these changes are occurring to the degree we think they are, in the directions we think they are, how can we establish HOW MUCH human activities are influence these changes? We plain flat do not have any observational, evidential base to support your claim that "All of this activity has been gradually warming up the oceans..."

Let's summarize. We don't know if the oceans have been gradually warming. If they have, we don't know if human activity contributes. If it does, we don't know how much or in what ways. We do have LOTS of evidence of serious climatic changes, in all directions, before people even existed, or could have contributed. And what stands out prominently in this evidence is that these changes were *sudden* -- ice ages descended in decades at most, and retreated as quickly. But the mechanism(s) are still in the realm of speculation.

From my reading, it seems the single most urgent reason to believe people are causing these changes is, if we are *therefore* we can "uncause" them and through proper husbandry of our planet, we can fine-tune the global environment to be as ideally suitable for human habitation and activities as possible. Whereas if our activities are irrelevant and these changes are part of a natural cycle, we suffer two distinct insults. First, we aren't as all-powerful as we tell ourselves we are and this bruises our collective ego. And second, we can only adapt to circumstances beyond our control, even if they are deleterious.

Personally, I doubt human activities have had much effect one way or another. We are WAY overestimating ourselves. Global climate has never been entirely stable, and lately (over the last few million years) it has varied constantly and wildly. I'm willing to bet that if our measurements were indicating global cooling, we would find a way to take credit for that as well, using *exactly the same data*! And be equally incorrect.

I do wish we had this kind of power, though...

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 17, 2002.

If you fully understood how greenhouse works you'd know that humans don't need to produce massive amounts of heat. All it takes is a very thin layer of gases (in our case this is mostly CO2)in the atmosphere, and it has certainly been established that we have produced this. Then, it is the energy of the Sun that it is being trapped, not heat from humans. If you're going to try to tell me that there isn't enough energy in the Sun to heat up our planet, don't even bother!

-- lol (get @ clue. professor plum), June 17, 2002.

Flint, please read up on the carbon cycle and its correlation with climate change. It's a process that has been around for several billion years already. Nothing new there.

And there's nothing mysterious about the effect of human industrial processes on climate. We are simply giving the carbon cycle a steady boost by burning carbon-based fuels that had been fixed in non-gaseous forms, such as coal, oil, or rain forest vegetation.

Don't underestimate our ability to mine, pump, slash and burn carbon. Granted, a volcano can do the same thing in a more spectacular fashion in amuch shorter time, but it's a case of the tortise and the hare. Slow and steady will get you just as far. Six billion humans working at it every hour of the day and night can accomplish quite a bit.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), June 17, 2002.

lol:

I don't think anything I said was wrong. The computer models that say human activity is warming the earth are the same models that say it would take centuries to restore equilibrium if we stopped today. You can't have it both ways. Your statement that "All it takes is a very thin layer of gases (in our case this is mostly CO2) in the atmosphere" is an *assumption* plugged into that model. By all indications there are complex, interacting reactions producing both positive and negative feedback, some operating to preserve stability, others operating to create "cliffs" of sudden phase change.

Nipper:

Are you suggesting our understanding of atmospheric dynamics is sufficient to explan all we're seeing -- drastic warming some places, cooling in other places, and an average rate of change well within the normal range of variation over a couple of million years? I'm not underestimating our ability to chuff carbon into the atmosphere (in various forms). I'm saying you are OVERestimating our understanding of what we are doing to ourselves. It might be much worse than you think! We do not know. Serious (and knowledgeable) observers have suggested perhaps human activity is postponing an ice age (for which we are a bit overdue).

I think you might wish to question your confidence in what amounts to a political program of vast influence and expense, on the basis of a single-factor analysis of something far beyond adequate understanding. To the best of my knowledge (if you know better, please cite it) this rather drastic Alaskan warming does not fit any of our models at all; rather, we are trying to use this regional warming to improve our knowledge of the operation of oceanic currents, the jet stream, salinity gradients, sunspot cycles, and a hundred other things. We really don't even *know* all the factors, much less how to weight them. We DO know weather is chaotic.

I'm all in favor of reducing pollution, and I think great strides can be taken along those lines fairly inexpensively. But as far as I can see, our desire NOT to see the world warmed is the most pressing factor in the quest to blame ourselves for what we don't have a very good handle on. And the fact is, we don't have a good handle on this. Neither of us needs to be an atmospheric expert (such as they are) to see that there are SEVERAL competing "global warming" models, each drawing opposing conclusions, and each constructed by those to whom their models' conclusions are congenial. And I think we should all regard that situation as cautionary.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 17, 2002.

Flint, I was responding to your statement:

Personally, I doubt human activities have had much effect one way or another. We are WAY overestimating ourselves.

I believe you are incorrect about the ability of humans to affect the global climate through our activities.

Carbon is carbon is carbon. The earth is supplied with a certain amount of it. In the past, moving large amounts of carbon from the interior of the earth into the atmosphere has warmed the climate. Taking large amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere and fixing it in the form of plant material has cooled the climate. No humans involved.

For the past 200 years, the total amount of carbon-based fuels burned by humans has increased by many orders of magnitude, due to the huge increase of human population and the equally large increase in per capita fuel consumption. Even the huge increase in the number of cattle to feed us has an affect. You may not believe it, but what we do matters. We are not something apart from the system. We are part of it. We affect it from within.

As for your statements about my support for any particualr global warming model or political agenda, please read what I wrote one more time. You will find nothing there to support any of your assumptions. You heard a voice in your own head and attributed it to me. Sorry. That was your imagination, not me.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), June 17, 2002.

Serious (and knowledgeable) observers have suggested perhaps human activity is postponing an ice age (for which we are a bit overdue).

I'm glad you brought that up Flint. Most of the reactionaries don't speak of such past global climate changes when they are warning about the sky falling. As you stated, those past wild swings in global climate happened quickly, and long before man drove SUVs. And since we are in fact, historically speaking, overdue for an ice age, I hereby extend an invitation...

When the ice age comes, you Yanqui types can stay in tents in my backyard, rent will be cheap...well, cheap considering the alternative.

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeeD@yahoo.com), June 18, 2002.

Just a coincidence, is it, that the current extreme shift in climate coincides exactly with our heavy pouring of these gases into the atmosphere.

-- Peter Errington (petere7@starpower.net), June 18, 2002.

"the average temperature has risen about seven degrees over the last 30 years" A blantantly false statement. It has only risen 3 degrees; so that in winter the average temperature isn't -40, it's -37. Don't you think the residents would appreciate that increase?

The most recent ice age, the coldest known, lasted 2 million years. It's warmed up only a mere 30,000 years ago and that's why some animals went extinct. The currently warming trend (if you could actually call it that (less than a degree in one hundred years) still doesn't match the earth's warmest temperature.

John Stossle (spell?) had a pretty good report on Friday night. When only 1700 scientists believe in this envirnmental trend, the other 90% of scientists (17,000) don't. The scientific community leans towards Bush's view of the world, not the extreme greenies. Please.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), June 18, 2002.

Nipper:

[Carbon is carbon is carbon.]

Good analysis. I agree 100%!

[The earth is supplied with a certain amount of it. In the past, moving large amounts of carbon from the interior of the earth into the atmosphere has warmed the climate. Taking large amounts of carbon out of the atmosphere and fixing it in the form of plant material has cooled the climate. No humans involved.]

OK, you can believe atmospheric dynamics is explainable and predictable through observation of a single variable. I can't stop you. My understanding is somewhat different. [For the past 200 years, the total amount of carbon-based fuels burned by humans has increased by many orders of magnitude, due to the huge increase of human population and the equally large increase in per capita fuel consumption. Even the huge increase in the number of cattle to feed us has an affect. You may not believe it, but what we do matters. We are not something apart from the system. We are part of it. We affect it from within.]

OK, again, I don't think we know enough to calibrate our influence. As I also wrote, it might be even worse than you think. But I believe we are guessing. Certainly this is something to keep an eye on. I notice you did not comment on the genuinely competing models, arriving at the conclusions the modelers in each case desired to see going in. I guess your single-variable model tells you all you feel you need to know, which is that humans are largely responsible for any climatic change over the last 200 years.

[As for your statements about my support for any particualr global warming model or political agenda, please read what I wrote one more time. You will find nothing there to support any of your assumptions. You heard a voice in your own head and attributed it to me. Sorry. That was your imagination, not me.]

Uh, right. You disagree that our activities are mostly irrelevant, you consider them important contributors. You have a simple model that tells you this. However, I accept that you either don't believe global warming itself is important, or that you don't believe we should do anything about it. Because being concerned about our influence usually implies some desire to modify it.

Please understand that MOST people who are convinced the world is warming up and that we are doing it ALSO believe this warming is a bad thing and we should stop doing it. I hadn't realized you were so indifferent. My mistake. I accept that your efforts here have been intended only to lead me toward a more properly simplistic understanding of a complex system. Thanks, I guess.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 18, 2002.

I was waiting for someone to table the ‘animal flatulence’ scenario and Flint almost went there. The global warming community has produced no end of experts who can make a case for their concepts. The disastrous side effects of ‘cow farts’ have been discussed by many and you can add this to your list of things we must eliminate in order to survive.

God help us if the Muslim world ever embraces hair spray.

-- Send (mo@money.please), June 18, 2002.

Flint:

The calculations saying if we stopped all unnatural emissions into the air it would take centuries to achieve a new equilibrium, are based on another raft of assumptions

Now you know that I seldom disagree with you ;<))), but it isn't based on models, it is based on extrapolation from historical records and studies of ice trapped gasses. No real models here.

Hey, I could scan-in the 250 p report but that would kill the site. It may or not be publically available. I don't know. Some of these things just go to the government and everyone else ignores them.

Best Wishes,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), June 18, 2002.

Flint, you are trying to have it both ways.

Your earlier statements Personally, I doubt human activities have had much effect one way or another. We are WAY overestimating ourselves. is in direct conflict with your later statements It might be much worse than you think! We do not know.

Which of these two positions would you care to retract? The one you started with? Or the one you shifted to in order to pretend you were right all along?

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), June 18, 2002.

Talk about nit-picking. I don't see those statements as being at odds, both clearly (in my mind) denote that the "science" of global warming is inexact at best.

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeeD@yahoo.com), June 18, 2002.

Nipper:

You are trying much too hard here. Those statements are not mutually exclusive as you imply. I personally believe human activity to be a contributing factor, but that natural factors play a much more important role. I believe that if the globe is in fact generally warming (or *whatever* it is doing), most such changes would have happened without us.

However, I recognize that my belief is only that -- we really DO have models saying both that human activity is not much of a factor, and models saying it is overriding. How can I possibly know which is more nearly correct?

So what I am doing is recognizing that my belief represents a *preference*, not a scientific analysis. I therefore recognize that I might be completely wrong, and my belief might turn out to be false -- even dangerously so. I certainly think we should continue collecting and analyzing all the data we can. If the big picture clarifies, I'm perfectly willing to change my mind. Currently, I find your single- villain thumbnail sketch unpersuasive.

Meanwhile, you continue to search for flaws in my statements, while simultaneously disclaiming any preference of your own. Like a fan in the stands, professing disinterest in the outcome while waving the colors of one team and criticizing the other. I suspect every fan surrounding you would also mistakenly assume you were a partisan.

Z:

[Now you know that I seldom disagree with you ;<))), but it isn't based on models, it is based on extrapolation from historical records and studies of ice trapped gasses. No real models here.]

Maybe we have a semantic problem here? Are you really saying we make no assumptions about what ice trapped gases mean? Surely you're aware that we use such gases as a key indicator of past climatic conditions to begin with. It's not quite valid to say "We deduce a warm climate from the carbon in these gases, therefore carbon means a warm climate!"

And as I wrote earlier, our historical records are spotty, not particularly long term, and themselves taken during the Age of Depredation. We have few control factors. I'm really surprised to hear you take the position that such calculatons. Even simple extrapolations assume curve shapes.

But since you seem to want to contribute, what do you think we have done to cause Alaska to experience such a drastic temperature change over such a short period of time (and apparently no such change before that)? Why is Alaska more carbonated than anywhere else?

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 18, 2002.

Flint:

The answer to your first question is "yes".

But since you seem to want to contribute, what do you think we have done to cause Alaska to experience such a drastic temperature change over such a short period of time (and apparently no such change before that)? Why is Alaska more carbonated than anywhere else?

Now you are into models. One of the models explains that, although on a very simple level. For me, I don't totally trust the models. They can't differentiate between tidal and land-based glaciers. They should be able to do that; but they can't. Regardless, the climate is changing and it is pure hubris to claim that we can do anything about it in the next few generations; even if we caused it.

Best Wishes,,,,,,

Z

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), June 18, 2002.

Z:

You seem to be saying that either our effects on global climate are relative minor (what I suspect right now), or that our effects are one-way, and nothing we can do would *reverse* those effects. After all, those calculations assumed we would discontinue rearranging carbon so as to put more into the atmosphere. But how about a concerted effect to accomplish just the opposite? Are you agreeing with my implicit position that we couldn't do much along those lines either?

Personally, I see hubris in every direction.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 18, 2002.

Those statements are not mutually exclusive as you imply.

Maybe you're right and all those assertions can be true at the same time: You positively know we do overestimate the effect and that we don't know anything about the effect and that at least one of us might be underestimating the effect.

They look incompatible to me. But what do I know? You're the logician around here.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), June 18, 2002.

Haysues Christos LN!

If that's the best you can do we're in a world of hurt.

Taken in context Flint's words make sense. You, and the dialog, would be better served if you would debate whether or not his underlying assertion is correct, ie, do we REALLY understand, in a scientific way, what the data indicates?

-- Uncle Deedah (unkeeD@yahoo.com), June 18, 2002.

Nipper:

I wonder about your motivations, I really do. You seem grimly determined to misunderstand my statements, but you are equally determined not to permit the slightest assumption about why you make so much effort to do so.

So I'll repeat, even though nobody else is experiencing the same difficulty you are. We have models that say we are warming up the globe with our emissions. We have models saying we are not responsible. We have models saying the globe is not warming. All are sophisticated models, built on reasonable assumptions. Which is right? More importantly, how certain can we be of ANY analysis, given such different results? *Especially* when those who build the models, *in each case*, "discover" that their model ratifies their preferences?

My preference is for the model that says the globe is warming, but that our influence is minor. However, in light of these very different outputs, I know better than to believe it's more than a preference. Whether you like it or not, I'm going to assume your determination to find nonexistent "faults" with this position implies that you actually care about what we might be doing, and furthermore that you prefer a different model.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 18, 2002.

Flint, although you would never admit to such, you have effectively retracted your earlier unequivocal statement that we are WAY overestimating the effect of humans on the climate. You have now added enough equivocation to have robbed that assertion of both its force and meaning. Fine with me. I thought it was a reckless thing to say in the first place.

It appears what you meant to convey was that because any belief about the cause and extent of global warming amounts to a baseless prejudice, your own belief that we are WAY overestimating the effect of humans on climate change is yet another baseless prejudice and not worth a plugged nickel. I am certain I could not have drawn that meaning from what you said originally, but I am gratedful for the clarification.

-- Little Nipper (canis@minor.net), June 18, 2002.