Re: Tough time to sell Global Warming theory....

hhc314@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
On Jan 23, 6:28 pm, Fred Kasner <fkas...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
BradGuth wrote:
Fred Kasner wrote:
hhc...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090115/ap_on_re_us/winter_weather
Harry C.
Almost certainly there is a component of some global warming that is
anthropogenic. However my opinion is that natural agencies over which
mankind has no control will be the major source of climatic variation as
it has been for a very long time.
Note that in a period of about 100 years the eastern third of the USA
was essentially denuded of trees when it was heavily forested before the
Europeans arrived. Since then this region has become covered by trees
and other plants in amounts that even exceed the amount found there at
European first incursion. The major contribution has been from burning
of coal which appears to be fossilized plant material. A very small
fractional change of insolation would swamp the contribution from
anthropogenic sources. Note that we were crying polar disaster for
several years starting in 1979 because of several years of very cold and
extended winter and snows.
FK
I'd have no problems with 10% AGW, and possibly even accepting as
great as 25% AGW, with the remainder and vast bulk of GW contributed
as to our moon, sun and a few minor cosmic considerations. In either
case, we are not equipped for as little as a one degree shift in
average temperature per decade, and many plants are equally unable to
adjust in such a short span of time.
What's needed is full access to public funded science, with few if any
exceptions. We simply can't have our federal executive office in
charge of excluding evidence or involved with any kind of infowar
diversion tactics in order to benefit politically selective special
interest groups.
Dirty or clean, we need a whole lot more affordable and reliable
energy that's home grown, so to speak, and there certainly are viable
alternatives. Federal mandates, public matching funds and if need be
nationalizing are essential options if this nation is to survive as
intended.
~ BG
Maybe. But it was clear that Bush and his minions were actively engaged
in masking scientific data for political purposes in the last 8 years.
It was scandalous.
FK- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Fred. let me first redirect you to an earlier post you made in this
tread, this quote in particular:

"Note that in a period of about 100 years the eastern third of the
USA
was essentially denuded of trees when it was heavily forested before
the
Europeans arrived. Since then this region has become covered by trees
and other plants in amounts that even exceed the amount found there
at
European first incursion."

Fred, I have no idea what leads you to this belief, but it in fact is
contrary to the facts. I've lived in several regions of the northeast,
including New Jersey, New England, and western NY (Rochester). While
your first statement is true, your second statement is false. While it
is true that western New York State was originally heavily forested
with hardwoods (mostly sugar maples and oaks), the process of clearing
the land for agriculture was generally accomplished girdling and
burning, a process that poisoned the land to such an extent with
alkaline ash that it hasn't recovered the ability to grow hardwood
trees up to this very day. In fact, the only heavily forested regions
in New York State are the Northern Adirondacks, which were never
cleared for agriculture.

Monroe County, NY, is such an area. In the Town of Henrietta, the
local joke is that on Arbor Day, people in the area flock to Henrietta
to actually see the Town Tree! Throught the region, a home with a
"treed yard" is a property with one freshly planted nursery pine (pine
will grow slowly if planted, however, most hardwoods won't.)

Now where I live today (New England), the situation is very different.
Because of the rocky glacial nature of the soil, the land was cleared
by hand, and everything reomoved from the earth was put to practical
use. The stones where use the build the familiar stond wall marking
property lines, and the cleared trees were cut and employed as fuel to
heat the homes of early settlers. Perhaps because of its difficulty to
clear, the soil was never poisoned, and what little there is is very
rich. So rich that young oaks and maples spring up and grow so quickly
that you have to cut them back each year.

The regrowth potential of once forested land evidently has a great
deal to to with the way that man has treated the land. At any rate,
you are very mistaken about the current forestry situation in the
eastern third of the US, partularly the northeast.

Now, returning to Global Warming -- From the scientific viewpoint

Right up to this week, based on my readings in peer reviewed
professional jounals covering various specialies in the physical
sciences (including climatology and some of the earth sciences, I come
to the following conclusions:

From a purely scientific perspective and extremely accurate
measurements, no significant increase in the rate of global warming
increase since precise measurements began (roughly 150 years).

This warming rate, when extrapolated backwards in time, appears to
linearly extend to a date that is within 15% of the geological date
associated with the end of the last ice age, when global perturbations
(including both terrestrial and astronomical events) are considered.

The is no evidence that the man or his activities, with the sole
exception of deforestation, have had any significant impact on the
rate of global warming.

Most physical scientists realize that although only limited evidence
exists, the commonly accepted belief is that the earth has experienced
a number of extended duration heating and cooling periods throughout
its history, as supported by the geological and biological evidence.
Many believe that a point of inflection will occur in the slope of GW,
but few are willing to speculate as to when this will take place.
Still, many scientists tend to believe that the earth will go through
another tropical era before this will occur, largely based on observed
history of the earth's climate cycles.

The explanation for these rather long cycles is commonly based on
astronomical observations and orbital perturbation concepts.

Now, returning to Global Warming -- From the political viewpoint

I observe that the strongest believers in the reality of GW, and also
that man is the cause are (1) non-scientists [non-physical scientists]
and (2) politicians.

It is unclear where either of these groups obtain their information,
because it certainly does not originate with anything even
approximating actual research studies performed by competent
scientific professionals.

Laymen appear to embrace GW beliefs to the same extent that they
embrace a belief in UFOs, paranormal experiences, homeopathic
medications, cult religious beliefs and other subjects that critical
trained minds would consider to be irrational nonsense and reject.
There is a very good reason why some laymen embrace these wacky
concepts...and a psychologist can explain why. I'm no psychologist,
but as explained to me it is a mechanism through which people who have
absolutely no idea of what is going on, can obtain some degree of
comfort and cope with reality, by believing that they can somehow
mystically control their fate. With GW, for example, it is
unacceptable for them to believe that eventually much of the present
land surface of the earth will eventually be covered by water, and
what dry land remains will be tropical, just as it once was. The
don't want to believe that earths climate is cyclic, even through they
are aware of bit of history, they don't want to become part of it,
even though this is how the earth is resculpted and renewed over
millions of years.

Politician, on the other hand, embrace GW for entirely different
reasons. Politician employ GW simply as a device to secure votes from
the many who are totally convinced that GW exists, and that it is
caused by man. It's simply good politics to propose solutions to GW,
although on critical examination, most of the politically proposed
solutions are silly. Silly, even if GW were caused by man. Solutions
are easy to propose for non-existing problems, even if they fly in the
face of themodynamic principles, the conservation of energy, and other
basic principles of the hard sciences.

Of course none of the currently proposed GW solutions have any chance
of working, but when someone claims that the signs of GW are becoming
less, then like the purveyers classical medical quckery devices, the
politicians like the quack will stand up and claimed to have healed
the patient, even though the patient was never really ill.

It's silly, but it does get votes, and to the politician, that's all
that matters!

Nuff said, besides I have to back and fix that damn Ozone Layer Hole
again . Darn this is still there, even after a billion-dollars was
expended for replacements for CFCs, and skin cancer rates have not
decreased.

Harry C.



Harry,
The increase in tree cover in the Eastern US is because the process that was employed to build towns was not so much to clear forested areas as to start a town in a meadow (a natural clearing produced by a cyclical death of trees whose climax left it open as well as the clearing of parts of forests by natural forest fire production. The surroundings were cleared of trees by later building of towns. However food crops were placed there as in those days people in small towns grew much of their own food. As population increased and more dwellings were installed less land was used for agriculture and more was used for decorative purposes and grasses and trees were planted to absorb slowly absorbing ground moisture from rains and snows. Muddy streets are never popular. As large cities grew less and less of surface was needed to house the very big populations. A big thing in late 19th century USA was the building of parks and planting of trees in "back yards" as some kind of back to nature idea was thought to be beneficial. As roads (both for surface transportation [e.g., interurban street cars] proliferated trees were found useful to keep moisture down to keep such roads from washing out after every rain. So inter-town areas were populated with trees in great numbers. Within the towns a big notion was to plant trees along very street that was wide enough to tolerate them. Every private residence was led to believe that English grasses (not native grasses) were the thing to decorate their "front" area. I've noted that even "factory towns" in Pennsylvania and Ohio succumbed to this notion of planting the public way. As worn out land in the eastern states were abandoned from agriculture poor quality trees sprung up on the unused land even if hardwoods no longer could tolerate the poor soil and the air pollution from coal burning. This is no place for a monograph on the reforestation of the eastern USA but it did happen. Many areas the were never forested became mini-forests as marginal trees were placed to hold back bare soil since we never have come close to paving over the whole country (even if the tree huggers would have us believe so.)

As for your diatribe against the politicians it is not so much that they are as evil as you make them appear. It is just that they are frequently so stupid that they will believe almost any crackpot theory are embrace it because they haven't the intelligence to see the faults in the theory. Actually the political class of our country is on average more stupid than the rest of the population. Most of the population does not wish to have to think about complex issues because they understand their own shortcomings. Never was a politician fazed by his inabilities to understand an issue. And never let it be said the Thomas Jefferson was ever one to reserve an opinion on an issue because of lack of understanding of the details in question.

He was a critical and sometimes clever thinker. However he was no polymath.

FK

.

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