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Last Ice Age happened in less than year say scientists



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Published Date: 02 August 2008
By angus howarth
THE last ice age 13,000 years ago took hold in just one year, more than ten times quicker than previously believed, scientists have warned.
Rather than a gradual cooling over a decade, the ice age plunged Europe into the deep freeze, German Research Centre for Geosciences at Potsdam said.

Cold, stormy conditions caused by an abrupt shift in atmospheric circulation froze the continent almost instantly during the Younger Dryas less than 13,000 years ago – a very recent period on a geological scale.

The new findings will add to fears of a serious risk of this happening again in the UK and western Europe – and soon.

Dr Achim Brauer, of the GFZ (GeoForschungs Zentrum) German Research Centre for Geosciences at Potsdam, and colleagues analysed annual layers of sediments, called "varves", from a German crater lake.

Each varve records a single year, allowing annual climate records from the region to be reconstructed.





The full article contains 162 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 01 August 2008 7:25 PM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
 
1

Speedscot,

Galashiels 02/08/2008 00:18:01
Oh Angus Howarth watches Sky documentaries too! Well done. In my day news-gathering was a little more hand on that that mind.
2

Tom in Belmont,

Belmont 02/08/2008 02:07:56
Nigel Calder talked about this theory in the 1980s: "ice blitz" they called it then. Oh, then "global warming" became the fad.
Plus sa change...
3

2dogs in D.C.,

02/08/2008 02:11:17
Insult, or in any way tick off your wife,or significant other, and an Ice Age can happen considerably faster than a year. And possibly last longer.
4

Guga II,

Rockall 02/08/2008 03:19:44
Here was me desperately hoping for some of this global warming - badly needed in this part of the world, and now we're being warned that we may well turn into icicles any day now. I don't know whether to buy sunglasses or a fur coat.

So, which junk scientist should I believe?
5

2dogs in D.C.,

02/08/2008 03:40:47
#4-Hi,Guga. Do what I've done and keep both at hand. Although some day it's going to get really hot, when the sun goes super nova.
6

postmarkfiftyfive,

China, 02/08/2008 06:57:35
The scientists are lying, it took a year and a half, I know, I was there.
7

Country Life,

Edinburgh 02/08/2008 08:35:24
So the 'The Day After Tomorrow' was a documentary?
8

Hugo of Garven,

02/08/2008 08:41:17
Had a quick look at 'ice-age' in Wikipedia.

As expected, interesting reading.
9

Unimpressed one,

02/08/2008 09:09:16
Well that's another nail in the coffin of the climate change 'deniers'. They keep insisting that the present (or should that be recent past?) warming has happened too quickly to be natural. This new research shows how misguided they are. No doubt they'll try to rubbish it because it blasphemes against 'climate catastrophe' theory.
10

Jacqueline Hyde ,

On the shelf 02/08/2008 09:39:51
What exactly does "ten times quicker" mean?
"Eleven times as quickly"?
11

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 02/08/2008 10:16:57
There is a fascinating paper, (published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science in the USA), on the Younger Dryas cooling available here:

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/0706977104v1.pdf

The evidence strongly suggests that a comet hit the north east of the USA towards the end of the last ice age. This caused two main effects:

Firstly a huge disruption to the atmosphere, including a reduction of the ozone layer, massive injection of particulates (from fires caused by the impact) and sulphur and nitrogen compounds, as well as water vapour into the upper atmosphere.
Secondly, the impact destabilised the Laurentide ice sheet releasing huge quantities of ice and fresh water into the North Atlantic causing the thermohaline circulation in the northern Atlantic to weaken. This sustained the cooling for 1,000 years until the feedback mechanisms restored ocean circulation.

This resulted in widespread extinction (particularly of the ice age mega fauna) and profound disruption of the human Clovis culture in North America.
12

pisgah,

Shell City 02/08/2008 10:17:59
Yes, more quick than what? The mis-named "earth" (Which is mostly covered by "water".) is perhaps much more "old" than we theorize, and we've probably have had many an ice age as time goes by, and so what? Citizens have come and gone and whether things go hot or cold or whether we're prepared or not, what does it matter? If it's a condition that's extreme to the most radical extent it will kill people, there's not a damn thing any one can do about it. So, let's not worry so much, eh? Sure, you have to make it "exciting" else, how can you "sell" papers, eh?
13

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 02/08/2008 10:25:51
And I meant to mention ...

This latest evidence, reported in the Scotsman, that the onset of glacial conditions happened abruptly is, of course, consistent with the effects of a comet impact.

However, it is misleading to refer to this as relating to the onset of the "last ice age". 13,000 years ago the last ice age was coming to an end, and warmer conditions prevailed, with the ice sheets melting and sea levels rising. What the comet impact did was to abruptly reverse that process and plunge the Earth back into glacial conditions for another 1,000 years or so because of the disruption to the ocean currents.
14

Rational cynic,

Edinburgh 02/08/2008 10:30:16
Slioch,

Steady on, old man, we can't have facts getting in the way of the usual denials.
15

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 02/08/2008 10:47:47
#9 Unimpressed one

Why not read the PNAS paper and learn something, Unimpressed one, instead of making silly comments about things of which you have no knowledge?
16

Neil,

Glasgow 02/08/2008 10:49:54
Hold on. This may or may not have happened & 13,000 years ago. Lets, having just got over the catastrophic global warming scare & inded the previous ice age scare, immediately jump into another ice age scare.

Any time we are willing to make a slight effort we can have a spacegoing civilisation which means we can build orbital shields (against warming) or orbital mirrors (against cooling) & solar power satellites. The enemy is not the weather. The enemy is the Luddites who would drag us back to the Middle Ages, or earlier.
17

Unimpressed one,

02/08/2008 17:15:18
#15, Don't think I'll take lectures on what to read from someone who gives credence to Al Gore.
18

,

02/08/2008 19:06:20
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
19

Robert Texas Bailey (Tex),

Alpine, Texas 02/08/2008 19:53:29
I say Ice Ages are caused by the Earth's Magnetic field going to zero then reemerging in the opposite direction.
While Earth's Magnetic field is zero, this will cause the Summer side of Earth to get so hot as without the protection of magnetic field, radioactive particles will enter our atmosphere and evaporate so much water, that the winter side of Earth instead of normal amount of snow fall could get as much a 1000 feet of snow!

20

Robert Texas Bailey (Tex),

Alpine, Texas 02/08/2008 20:01:06
Now we know for a fact that Earth's magnetic field has changed direction before as we have got samples of iron lava rock from volcano's lava beds and it is polarized in different direction as when it was liquid the Earth's magnetic field polarized it, and when it solidified it keep that polarization.

That means that their must be a time as Earth's magnetic field is changing from one direction to another, then we had a zero magnetic field!
21

,

02/08/2008 20:01:20
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
22

Prester John,

Pots_n_Pans 02/08/2008 23:54:41
Slioch is being somewhat disingenuous. Well he knows that it wasn't the 'last ice age' at all but the previous glacial phase of an on-going great ice age (the fourth in all probability). That began 40 million years ago. It intensified approximately 16 million years ago and became even more severe 3 million years ago. From initial cycles of approximately 100,000 years for glacial / interglacial periods and the cycles are now in the order of 40,000 years.

I'm surprised MS hasn't surfaced. He has made many a relevant post on this sort of topic. It was his posts which got me reading up on these things.

As for the magnetic field reversals I think you'll find they do not coincide particularly with glacial / interglacial periods. The ferromagnetic banding in ocean floor rocks is actually evidence for plate tectonics.

The best suggestion for the causation of ice ages and their glacial / interglacial periods is the Milankovitch Cycles which are generally accepted as a major cause.
23

goodoldphil,

west central florida 03/08/2008 04:45:57
Well, all of this has been settled, irreproachably really, in Immanual Velikovsky's stones and bones book "Earth In Upheaval". His having been suppressed and ridiculed, and yet proven to be correct on so many particulars subsequently is about the biggest travesty of education, honesty and criminal censorship of our time. Bless your little unread hearts, he even studied in Scotland (My Irish dad was born there in 1907).
Well, I'll persist, Viva Velikovsky. And look for catastrophes about 1500 bpe.
24

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 03/08/2008 10:06:16
#24 Prester John

I wasn't being disingenuous at all, merely trying to avoid undue pedantry whilst correcting the incorrect assertion in the Scotsman article that it was the "last ice age" that was initiated at the Younger Dryas, rather than the last pulse of glaciation.

[The term 'ice age' is used in common parlance (as in the Scotsman article) to refer to the last glaciation, which is one of several in the series of glaciations that is correctly referred to as the last ice age. I know MS gets upset by such usage. I'm more concerned about the actual events rather than worrying about being too precise on what we call them in popular articles such as this.]

Incidentally, you've got the 40,000/100,000 year sequence the wrong way round. It should be, "From initial cycles of approximately 40,000 years for glacial / interglacial periods, the cycles are now in the order of 100,000 years."

I agree with you about the Milankovitch Cycles [these are cycles of changes in solar radiation reaching the Earth caused by cyclical changes in the Earth's orbit.]

25

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 03/08/2008 10:11:24
#25 goodoldphil

Velikovsky's book were all the rage amongst the more drug-enhanced geology students of the 1960s. They were certainly ridiculed, but I don't think it is correct to say that they were suppressed. They are on my "would read sometime if I had the world and time" list.

Perhaps you could summarise thenm for us?
26

opie,

central wisconsin 03/08/2008 15:11:12
I find the speculation of some of the scientific community and some of the "genius" posters on this forum funny. It is as though some here believe that theory is the same as Law. Until a definitive law concerning climate can be achieved many are going to laugh at the outlandish claims made. Some will think that this is a conspiracy to keep the African nations in the dark because of the no more CO2 footprint increase. While some will think that this is a problem GATT and NAFTA and companies moving around the globe. I think it is more a situation where some are trying to gain authority overs others under the cover of a crisis. The REALID and Banking bailout are examples of that in America. Why should the IRS get all credit card transaction in a bill designed to help mortgage holders? Authority transfered under the guise of a supposed crisis. Can all the sheeple say, "Yes Big Brother".
27

Meggy,

Colorado 03/08/2008 15:34:26
AS a teacher of young children, without more interest in wooly mammoths than in dinosaurs, my students and I explored what was available to us re "ice age". (The kids loved the amazing critters of that time!) One theory that made a great deal of sense to us was that warming leads to cooling and ushers in an 'ice age'. Warming = more sea water exposed = more evaporation = more cloud = precipitation/cooling. Evenutally the balance tips toward snow accumulation and we find ourselves swinging toward an 'ice age'. In current times it's clear "ordinary weather dynamics" is too simplistic a description of how we get to an 'ice age' (or even to 'excessive warming'. Being afraid is unhelpful, buying into any theory that is single focused is probably unwise. The best we can do is keep an eye on developments, consider human population potential to trash the planet, shift practices of resource use as best we can, remain pleasant and kind to one another and the rest of the planet, ... and move forward into our uncertain future.
28

Meggy,

Colorado 03/08/2008 15:43:04
Re my post a correction: Should be "As a teacher of young children, WITH more interest in wooly mammoths than in dinosaurs, my students and I ... "
29

jamz,

las vegas 03/08/2008 17:46:28
The ice-ages did not begin until 2.5 million years ago, unless you wish to be difficult and go back a few hundred million years when the earth was a ball of ice 1,500 meters thick--twice. Our present onset coincides exactly with the closing of the isthmus of Panama, radically changing deep-sea currents.
The solution is obvious--make the Panamanians an offer they cannot refuse. Of course, since Northern Europe will be a very unattractive lattitude without the Gulf Stream, it will be necessary to wait for the onslaught of ice to drive these deniers out of Europe (and into the Middle-East?) before blowing up Panama.
Patience, America.
30

LA skierboy,

Los Angeles 03/08/2008 19:19:52
to #29 Meggy ... oh now, there you go ... spouting off about things like love and patience and kindness.

That really messes up he thrill of blogging don't ya know? (Just teasing)

You are too level headed to be on the internet. (Glad to here you are a teacher - God Bless Colorado!)
31

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 03/08/2008 20:48:28
Well, it is good to see a few folk from across the pond picking up on this item. It was after all your National Academy of Science that open-sourced the publication that I referred to in #11 above.

But may I add what I think is the significance of these events 12,900 years ago for us at the present time?

The sudden return to glacial conditions was caused by two factors. The first was the abrupt insult to the Earth's atmosphere caused the impact of the comet and the conflagrations that accompanied it. The second was the disruption to the Atlantic thermohaline circulation that drives what is commonly referred to as the Gulf Stream. It seems to me likely that it was the first factor that caused the sudden catastrophic drop in temperature and the second that maintained it for over one thousand years - but that is speculation.
What is certainly the case is that the sudden change in climate had NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with any changes in the sun.

We are currently confronted by many people who refuse to accept that changes in the atmosphere can cause changes in the climate. They insist that it's the sun that is always responsible. They are wrong, and this is a well documented case from recent history where they are shown to be wrong.

What we are doing to the atmosphere at present is not as sudden and catastrophic as a comet hitting the Earth, but it is having a warming effect, and that warming effect is likewise nothing to do with the sun.

What events 12,900 years ago show us is that the climate and the global system of oceanic currents can be destabilised if we push them too far. And that the results of such destabilisation are likely to be dire.
What we are doing to the atmosphere by dumping tens of billions of tons of carbon dioxide into it every year is just that: we are destabilising the atmosphere.

As oceanographer Wally Broecker puts it, " The climate is a wild beast, and we are poking it with sticks."
32

GlenB,

03/08/2008 21:23:01
#33

"What events 12,900 years ago show us is that the climate and the global system of oceanic currents can be destabilised if we push them too far."

What were the people doing 12,900 years ago that pushed things to far?

33

simian relic,

03/08/2008 23:10:06
I hope the new ice age gets here soon. It is 105 in Texas. Why the heck my ancestors came here from Scotland I do not know.
34

Jacey,

Cali 03/08/2008 23:26:32
Seems no one here has read Robert W. Felix`s fascinating book, a real informative eye-opener
folks..

"Not By Fire But By Ice"

www.iceagenow
35

Conan,

Dalkieth 04/08/2008 02:03:59
When it comes to the antics of the unverse and the subdivision known as planet earth, there is absolutely no point in postulating or bemoaning the climate trends. They will be what they will be and the best that 'man' may do in these circumstances is to make sensible preparations and learn to adapt. Me? A home in both hemispheres and splitting the difference with a part share in a ranch in Costa Rica should do the trick. Climate change? Bring it on!
36

Hammond Hnak,

USA 04/08/2008 02:37:05
We Christians and Jews have known this for thousands of years. Read Genesis chapters 6-11 in the Bible.
37

Intelligence Analyst,

Earth 04/08/2008 05:03:16
Siberian mammoths bleed when they thaw, rigor mortus did not have time to set in when the last ice age began. Global superstorms initiate ice ages in hours, days. There is green grass and flowers frozen between their teeth. Earth magnetic reversal is in process, 30% reduced shield over the past century, magnetic North has moved out of Hudson's Bay, synchronous with a mega solarmax cycle arriving in 2012. The November 4, 2003 X-48 solar flare(the largest explosion ever documented in our solar system) was directed ninty degrees away from Earth. If a direct shot, every satelite in orbit and every electrical grid on Earth would have been fried. During solar minimum December 2007 flare 930 emitted four X class explosions, starting with an X-17. The next four to six years should be "interesting."
38

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 04/08/2008 08:16:54
#34 Glenb asked,

"What were the people doing 12,900 years ago that pushed things to far?"

Nothing at all. As I tried to explain above, there is compelling evidence that these events were caused by a comet hitting the Earth. Nonetheless, signs of human presence (Clovis culture) over most (all?) of north America disappeared after this event.

#39 Intelligence Analyst
The woolly mammoths you correctly describe as having green grass between their teeth were likely killed by this event. It was not the beginning of the last ice age (see #13 above) but the beginning of the Younger Dryas, a reversal into glacial conditions at the end of the last glaciation. There is no evidence that it had anything to do with a magnetic reversal, and compelling evidence that it was caused by a comet. The latest evidence, from varves, shows the abruptness of the change in climate and is consistent with the evidence from mammoths.
39

Research Institute Revalation,

Portugal 04/08/2008 12:43:48
It's even more dramatic as one realises that it's 60 million years ago that there was the huge ice-period.
In that time there was also global warming and acid rains directly before the rapid change-over.
It's this period of rapid changes that creates in cosmos meteorites.
Scientists found also that the sun-activity decreased dramatically since about 2001.
Is it a coincidence that the so clled Orion-gate with its direct connection with the black hole openened june 2000 and that its open until the end of 2021?
On the website of the Research Institute Revelation www.wetenschap-eindtijd.com -unfortunately merely in Dutch - you will find not only some articles about it, but also recent interviews on video.
Siegfried Bok
40

Research Institute Revalation,

Portugal 04/08/2008 12:46:10
For more contact-information please look website www.wetenschap-eindtijd.com
Siegfrid Bok
41

Samboc,

Merimbula 04/08/2008 14:09:27
This article is a bit of a joke. The time scale looks like a typo.

The Last Real Ice Age Ended about 12,000 Years Ago.

On Average the InterGlacatic period lasts 11,500 years.


We are overdue for an Ice Age.

Right now thw Sun is cooling, The planet has cooled every year for the last 8 years.

Start worrying

42

Samboc,

Merimbula 04/08/2008 14:32:33
Slioch commented a short time ago about CO2.

Shows the typical ignorance in the world today.

CO2 is the single gas/substance that substaines life on this planet. Without it all life will cease. Every plant relies on CO2 to survive. Without plants all Animals (Man Kind Included) will Die.

CO2 is life. Its effect as a greenhouse gas is so small as to be zero. Water Vapour is thousands of times more important.

For the last 8 years the worlds temp has dropped. At the same time CO2 levels have increased.

All you who doubt me - check the facts. I will not quote the figures here.

== What is the percentage of CO2 in the Atmosphere

== What is the increase due to Man

== What is the increase due to Natural Causes. Eg Changes in Ocean Temps. ( Most CO2 is desolved in the Ocean and is released with changes in water temps.)

== What is the current corralation between increasing CO2 levels World Temps.

Do some homework.
43

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 04/08/2008 15:36:00
#43&44 Samboc

You appear to be confused.

The time (?scale) is correct. The Younger Dryas started 12,900 years ago. Look at the PNAS paper I referred to in #11 above if you wish to read some genuine peer-reviewed science, instead of the garbage websites that so many people become mislead by.

Glaciations have recurred at about 100,000 year interval for the last c. half million years and were initiated by changes in the Earth's orbit causing variations in the amount of solar radiation being absorbed by the Earth. The interval is not the 11,500 years you imply. The next ice-age (omitting any human induced effects) is not due for another 16,000 - 20,000 years according to those orbital changes.

"The planet has cooled every year for the last 8 years." No it has not. The Hadcru figures are:
Year Anomaly Smoothed
2000, 0.270, 0.371
2001, 0.409, 0.390
2002, 0.464, 0.405
2003, 0.473, 0.416
2004, 0.447, 0.423
2005, 0.482, 0.426
2006, 0.422, 0.426
2007, 0.403, 0.423

Your comments about CO2 being important for life are correct but irrelevant. What is important in the context of global warming is its ability to absorb infra-red radiation. As such the additional CO2 put into the atmosphere due to human actions produces an average warming effect of 1.66 Watts/ sq m over the entire Earth surface, which equates to an overall heating of 845,000 billion Watts. In all CO2 contributes to a raising of the earth's temperature by about 3C, whereas the other greenhouse gases, including water vapour, contribute about 30C. Your statement that "Water Vapour is thousands of times more important" is grossly inaccurate. Besides, the amount of water vapour in the atmosphere is a function of the average temperature of the atmosphere, and therefore it cannot act as a forcing. CO2 on the other hand stays in the atmosphere to a large extent for several decades or centuries and therefore can act as a forcing.

44

henrymanchester,

UK 04/08/2008 19:59:55
Very handy if we get an ice age within a year...think of all the running costs I'll save because I'll be able to turn my freezer off!
45

Samboc,

Merimbula 05/08/2008 00:45:37
Carbon dioxide accounts for just 0.0383% of the atmosphere.

Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere have risen 20.253% since 1960.
From 316 ppm to about 380 ppm. An increase of 0.000064!

Water vapour is the main Greenhouse gas, causing from 36-70% of the Greenhouse effect.
Carbon dioxide only causes 9-26%, methane 4-9% and ozone 3-7%.

Satellites measuring the temperature of the lower atmosphere show a warming of only 0.04°C per decade,


All four major global temperature tracking outlets (Hadley, NASA's GISS, UAH, RSS) have released updated data showing a world temp drop of 0.7 deg in the last year taking us to 1930 temperature levels while CO2 levels continue to rise.

The bleak truth is that, under normal conditions, most of North America and Europe are buried under about 1.5km of ice. This normal climate is interrupted occasionally by brief warm interglacials, typically lasting less than 10,000 years.

The interglacial we have enjoyed throughout recorded human history, called the Holocene, began 11,000 years ago, so the ice is overdue.
46

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 07:40:12
#48 Samboc

Let's look at your seven paragraphs.

1. More or less correct (it's up about 0.0387% by now). Normally expressed as 387ppmv (parts per million by volume). So?

2. Since your initial data is only accurate to 3 significant figures (or less) you should not calculate the answer to greater accuracy. Let's say it's gone up by about 20% in that time. But the important thing is to contrast that rate of increase in CO2 with pre-industrial times. We know the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere for the last 800,000+ years from ice cores. During all that time CO2 concentration NEVER rose by more than 30ppmv in 1000 years. But it has risen by 30ppmv in the last 17 years. That is a rate of increase nearly SIXTY times faster than experienced naturally. (Your data gives 64ppmv in about 46 years.)

3. That looks about correct (haven't checked). So, ummm, water at 36-70% is not "thousands of times more" than CO2 at 9-26%, right?

4. No they don't. You are using old data that has been shown to be incorrect. The satellite and NASA GISS and HADCRU data all give warming of c. 0.18 - 0.19 deg C per decade. See, for example:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/satellite-measurements-warming-troposphere.htm

5. Utter nonsense. Take Hadcru, for example, here:
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcrut3/diagnostics/global/nh%2Bsh/monthly
(it's the first column you want)

The global average temperature anomaly for the first six months of 2008 is +0.256 deg C above the average for 1961-1990.
The corresponding figure for the first six months of 1930 is -0.241 C.

That is, the last six months are about 0.5C (0.497C) above the global average temperature of 1930.

6. Yup. But we are no longer in normal conditions. In ALL of those past times, for the last 800,000+ years, notice two things: 1. CO2 and temperature were well correlated and 2. CO2 levels NEVER rose above 300ppmv.
See, for examlpe:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v453/n7193/fig_tab/453291a_F1.html

7. S
47

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 07:40:52
contd.

7. Simplistic nonsense. There is not a single peer-reviewed paper that predicts an imminent return to glacial conditions (as far as I am aware - show me otherwise if you can). And besides, that would ONLY apply with pre-industrial levels of CO2 (and methane). There is no chance of an imminent glaciation.

You started off complaining of 'ignorance' and lack of 'homework'. What you have produced is a litany of errors and misunderstandings and incorrect deductions.

48

Samboc,

Merimbula 05/08/2008 12:20:15
Slioch,

I hope you are right. I live in Merimbula , NSW , Australia. Possibly the best location in the World.

Information we are receiving is that the Northern Hemisphere is going through one of the worst winters/summers for many years.

Last year we virtually had no summer. This winter has been colder than usual but not out of recorded ranges.

I get the impression that the world is going through a very cold period. A mini ice age has been mentioned in many articles.

The Northern Hemisphere will suffer. Not the southern because of the difference in Ocean quanties.

Hope all is well.


Regards


Paul
49

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 13:04:02
#51 Samboc

Well, thanks for reading what I posted.

What the world has been going through for the last several months is a La Nina episode in which cold waters come to the surface over a huge area of the central Pacific. The thermal capacity of the oceans is enormous and well able to mask any ongoing warming due to increase in CO2 for a few years.
Here are temperature graphs of the Pacific from Feb 2007 and Feb 2008 - you can see the huge difference.
Here are the graphs: (it is the lower graph, showing the anomaly, that is the one to look at)http://www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/research/cmb/sst_analysis/images/archive/weekly_TPAC/tpacv2_20080206.png


Feb. 7th 2007: http://www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/research/cmb/sst_analysis/images/archive/weekly_TPAC/tpacv2_20070207.png

Feb. 6th 2008 http://www.emc.ncep.noaa.gov/research/cmb/sst_analysis/images/archive/weekly_TPAC/tpacv2_20080206.png

But that warming will still be present. What MIGHT, I suppose, just be possible is a sufficient disruption to those ocean currents to cause substantial Northern Hemisphere cooling for some decades or centuries, for example if the Atlantic overturning was disrupted by melting of the Greenland ice-cap. But that would be a largely man-made phenomenon (since we are causing the ice-cap to melt). We are not due another glaciation from purely natural forces.

Where I live, in the Scottish Highlands, we would fare better with the warming, and badly if the Gulf Stream stopped. Where you are it's the other way round. And warming looks more likely!
50

Samboc,

Merimbula 05/08/2008 14:00:21
Very Quick Response.

Had a look at 5. above.

Think I have got it right.

Shows Temps from Jan 1850 to June 2008.


Shows a relative temp of -0.694 in Jan 1850 to 0.314 in June 2008.

Also shows a Min of 0.054 in Jan 2008 and a Max of 0.749 in Feb 1998.

This is equal to a drop of 0.695 between Feb 1998 and Jan 2008. Very close to my first log of 0.7


Temps have risen since then but we are still on a downward trend.

Winter is about to happen in the northern hemisphere.
51

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 14:49:02
#53 Samboc

Oh dear. You actually said 1930 temperature levels, not 1998. But let that go by. Look at a plot of all that data, for example:

http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2007/08/t1975.jpg

that is only from 1975 onwards, but not to worry, and shows both the HADCRU and NASA GISS series. What do you notice?

IT IS VERY NOISY.

In other words the monthly average global temperatures shoot around all over the place. You could just as validly (ie invalidly) chosen, say from

Jan 2000 at 0.206C
to
Jan 2007 at 0.632C

And concluded that there was a wopping WARMING of 0.426C in just seven years.

Jeepers creepers! If it carries on at that rate it will have warmed 0.426 x 100/7 = 6 deg C by the end of the century. Help! We're doomed!

Do I make my point? Picking out odd months and trying to attribute ANY significance to them is nonsense. It is called "cherry picking". There is no more significance in the two months I chose than the two you chose: that is NO significance whatsoever in either.

I know you will find countless denialist websites that will try to persuade you otherwise, but that is because they deal in garbage: they are there to mislead, to deny and to sow doubt in your mind, because they know that if they can mislead enough people they will succeed in slowing necessary action. And if you don't care a damn about the Earth and how people are going to live on it in the future then the best thing you can do is to keep going with the status quo and hope that you are dead before things get too bad. It's stinks. It's disgusting, but there it is. It's common.

I'll try one last time to explain to you what that graph (the HADCRU series) shows. Notice the straight lines? They are the best-fit linear curves based on a mathematical process called the method of least squares. They show the long-term trends (according to HADCRU and NASA GISS). It is +0.019 deg C per year. That is caused by global warming because of the build up of greenhouse gase
52

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 14:50:06
contd.

That is caused by global warming because of the build up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

IN ADDITION TO that relentless slow long-term change, there is a SHORT-TERM natural variability of the climate - like the El Nino and La Nina episodes, volcanic eruptions, changes in the sun, changes in clouds etc.. That short-term variability is + or - about 0.2 deg C per year. That is, it is about TEN TIMES bigger than the long-term trend (0.2 = c. ten times 0.19).

That is why the graph is noisy. That is why countless charlatans and their willing dupes, those who deny global warming, keep saying "Oh the temperature has dropped between month x and month y, global warming must have stopped!"

It's garbage. They simply illustrate their duplicity or inability to understand data.
53

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 05/08/2008 14:51:24
(0.2 = c. ten times 0.19) should have been (0.2 = c. ten times 0.019).

54

Angoos,

Baku, Azerbaijan 06/08/2008 10:59:41
Jeezo, some amount of anoraks on this thread !!!
55

Neil,

Glasgow 06/08/2008 17:01:17
Slioch #33 states, as a fact, that this freezing happened, as claimed & that it was caused by a comet. I may be making a wild guess here but i suspect she wasn't around then & is merely showing the lack of doubt GW believers normally use as a substitute for facts.

To prove how much she knows she shows that she can write "NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with any changes in the sun".

Sorry lots of capital letters prove nothing except a willingness to bluster & lie. Something which she has a looong record of.
56

Slioch,

Scottish Highlands 06/08/2008 17:43:52
#58 Neil,Glasgow

What I was pointing out was the significance of the events, for which there is clear and compelling evidence, for current discussions concerning climate change.

No Neil, you don't have to be actually present at an event to be able to gather evidence about it. Indeed, eye witness reports of sudden events are notoriously unreliable. Perhaps you have heard of the disciplines of geology and archaeology, for example? Perhaps not.

The evidence shows an abrupt, large-scale disruption to the global climate following the impact of a comet. If you or anyone else can find any evidence for any change in the sun being responsible, or think of any conceivable way in which the sun could have been involved in the abrupt change in climate at that time by all means let us hear about it.

Meanwhile, why not read the PNAS paper, look at the aerial photos of the likely comet impact site, and learn something of the techniques used to gain evidence about past events.

As for "lack of doubt", I don't think I need to take any lessons from someone who swallowed whole an hilariously idiotic spoof paper purporting to show that ocean bacteria caused global warming. I was laughing out loud before I was halfway through reading it. Your reaction is recorded here:

http://uk.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUKL0887458220071108

"Blogger skeptic Neil Craig wrote: "This could not be more damaging to manmade global warming theory ... I somehow doubt if this is going to be on the BBC news."

No. I don't think it did make it onto the BBC. Even old aunty has got more sense than that.
57

Shandog,

06/08/2008 20:57:49
Wake me up in another 10,000 years..then I'll stand up, put my head between my legs and kiss my a** goodbye!
58

woollybear,

Middletown, California USA 30/08/2008 19:34:07
There is also an interesting article with graphs re: historical temperature analysis from the Vostok glacial ice core at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Vostok-ice-core-petit.png
which appears to indicate that Ice Ages are typically preceded by an abrupt steep rise in global temperatures, followed by a less sharp but still rapid drop in temperatures.

If the data is accurate, this suggests that the present 'global warming' may in significant part be a function of a normal cyclical event. Replication of similar samplings elsewhere by other researchers could be useful - before such opportunities have melted away.

It may seem counter-intuitive, but dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere at this time may be just what the planetary Dr. ordered to stave off a potentially even more devastating global chilling.

matt.
59

Indiana Jones,

Indiana 11/11/2008 08:48:12
I know for a fact that extreme droughts are driving the warming, the mechanism is through lessened photosynthesis. Study the precip. data in the eastern USA over the 2000's especially 2007.

& please stop arguing over techno-garb. The skies aren't blue because there is no oxygen in them. Follow the trail.

 

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