Re: Climate:Cool&Warm

From: Charles Hixson (charleshixsn@earthlink.net)
Date: Tue Apr 08 2003 - 11:43:06 MDT

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    spike66 wrote:

    > Spudboy100@aol.com wrote:
    >
    >> ... In contrast, said Prof Stott, severe famines and economic
    >> collapse followed the onset of the Little Ice Age around 1300. He
    >> said: "When the temperature started to drop, harvests failed and
    >> England's vine industry died. It makes one wonder why there is so
    >> much fear of warmth."...
    >
    > Spud this is something that has puzzled me. Why is there
    > fear of warmth? Is it the images of flooded coastline
    > from melting icecaps? Is there genuine concern that
    > mankind couldn't deal with a rising sea, given
    > hundreds or thousands of years notice? Or is there
    > something else Im not seeing? Is there concern about
    > wild species? Do we not have an inexhaustible supply
    > of species preadapted to warmer climates? What is
    > the big deal if this planet gets warmer?
    > spike

    There is reasonable fear of warmth because it is likely to cause the sea
    levels to rise, and we tend to build our cities along waterfronts.
    (Check out the recent Scientific American article on New Orleans for
    something already a bit shocking.) There is unreasonable fear of warmth
    because people are afraid of changes.
    There is reasonable dislike of warmth because it will drive many species
    to extinction (because we have them walled into immobile enclosures).
    There is unreasonable dislike of warmth because people are accustomed to
    the weather as it is.

    The is unreasonable acceptance of warmth, because people don't
    understand that after the oceans get warm, we will enter an ice age.
    (The lag time between warming air and earth, and warming oceans leads to
    some rather spectacular instabilities in the climate.) Time frame?
    Sorry. I don't know. I've seen and been convince by a popularization
    of the climate model made decades ago (so I can't even point you to a
    reference). The basic idea is that warm oceans => increased evaporation
    => increased percipitation => (some event) => massive blizzards =>
    glaciers => ice age? => cold oceans => decreased evaporation =>
    decreased percipitation => (some event) => snowfields melting => warmth
    => warm oceans => ...
    This loop is supposed to break when the tectonic plates shift to a new
    location.

    -- 
    -- Charles Hixson
    Gnu software that is free,
    The best is yet to be.
    


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