Huge chunk snaps off storied Arctic ice shelf

[Newsjock]

Source: Globe and Mail

A four-square-kilometre chunk has broken off Ward Hunt Ice Shelf - the largest remaining ice shelf in the Arctic - threatening the future of the giant frozen mass that northern explorers have used for years as the starting point for their treks.

Scientists say the break, the largest on record since 2005, is the latest indication that climate change is forcing the drastic reshaping of the Arctic coastline, where 9,000 square kilometres of ice have been whittled down to less than 1,000 over the past century, and are only showing signs of decreasing further.

... Dr. Mueller, whom Dr. Vincent calls the pre-eminent expert on Ward Hunt Ice Shelf, says he's concerned that the ice shelves will disappear completely.

"The take-home message for me is that these ice shelves are not regenerating," he said. "If we're looking at an indicator of whether climate is to blame, it's really the lack of regeneration that convinces me. They're breaking away so rapidly that there's no hope of regeneration," he said, adding that is "pretty strong evidence that suggests this is related to global warming."

Read more: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080729.wice29/BNStory/National/home

[trthnd4jstc]

1. 9000 square kilometers of ice 100 years ago, 1000 sq. km now! n.t.

[defendandprotect]

2. Ever imagine that so many people would be sitting around just watching

our world die .... ?

It's simply amazing what tens of millions of oil propaganda can do to the minds of the public!

[Baby Snooks]

3. 2012

What is alarming is the rate at which all of this is occuring and the time frame. Some of this is literally happening overnight.

You do have to wonder about 2012 and all the other apocalytic predictions including the prophecies of St. Malachi.

Whether we are facing the end of the world or not we are definitely facing the end of the world as we have known it.

[Politicalboi]

5. I too have thought

2012 might have something to do with this. We have never been able to record what happens when all the planets align. This is so sad.

[14thColony]

6. In Mayan and Southwestern Native culture

it was said to be the end of the fifth age of mankind. I think the Mayans called it the end of the Fifth Sun.

[SpiralHawk]

7. End of the Fourth World - Start of the Fifth World

"The Mayan calendars are an object of intense interest for many thousands of people right now, because they focus upon the watershed date of Dec. 21, 2012. Everything changes by then, it is said...

"...From that 1987 date until now, Mr. Barrios says, we have been in a time when the right arm of the materialistic world is disappearing, slowly but inexorably. We are at the cusp of the era when peace begins, and people live in harmony with Mother Earth. We are no longer in the World of the Fourth Sun, but we are not yet in the World of the Fifth Sun. This is the time in-between, the time of transition.

"As we pass through transition there is a colossal, global convergence of environmental destruction, social chaos, war, and ongoing Earth changes. All this, Mr. Barrios says, was foreseen via the simple, spiral mathematics of the Mayan calendars.

""It will change," Mr. Barrios observes. "Everything will change."

(snip)

http://www.chiron-communications.com/communique%207-10.html

[14thColony]

10. Oops...

I remembered there was a fifth in there somewhere...shoudla checked...

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. Please, don't muddy the reality of climate science with magical claims

It really makes it difficult to get people to take it seriously if you start quoting myths and bogus astronomy (hint - the planets won't be remotely aligned in 2012 - someone recently drew a crop circle that shows where they'll be: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=228&topic_id=41987&mesg_id=41987).

If you say this is all some ancient prophecy, then most people will dismiss that as rubbish, ultra-fundy Christians will dismiss it as evil, and believers in that stuff will dismiss is a pre-ordained, and something we can't avoid. In all cases, it's counter-productive.

Climate change is because of humans, and everyone should recognise that, so that we change what we do. Blaming it on astrology is going to make things worse.

[SpiralHawk]

11. One person's myth, is another person's traditional teaching

Knowing many learned indigenous elders, and having come to respect them over time and experience, I find many of their ways & teachings worthy of respectful consideration.

None of the Mayan elders ever talk about a "planetary alignment." That's stuff that Information Imperialists have added to make their books more, ah, um, sexy, or profitable, or whatever.

But traditonal elders of South America (Condor), North America (Eagle) and Central America (Quetzal) are fairly unanimous in their high regard for the calendars -- which, incidentally, are far more mathematically and astronomically accurate than the Gregorian calendars used by Western scientists.

People have been blowing off native teachings for centuries, while appropriating their lands and medicines for commercial profit. That reality is part of the teachings, too. So I am never surprised when people kiss the traditions off without weighing them against WHAT HAS ACTUALLY HAPPENED.

Traditional teachings do, in fact, go into extensive detail about earth changes. So far, in my estimation, they have been spot on correct. The elders say that of course we have free will in these matters, always do, and that we can exercise free will with wisdom to avoid harsh consequences -- like, maybe, stop polluting the waters we must drink, and pumping massive amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. But if we human beings persist in arrogance and greed (not wanting to know), then many more Massive Chunks of the Artic and Antarctic, they say, will be snapping off and...

[defendandprotect]

15. I agree; people of intelligence can hold two thoughts . . ..

without doubt, Global Warming and the coming catastrophe is man-made ---

and no one should avoid knowing or saying that ---


On the other hand, look to the native American wisdom which was given to us from our

earliest days here and simply WISH that it had been understood and not dismissed by

the "discoverers'" arrogance ---


Look to the message of the Elders delivered at the United Nations re the "gourd of ashes."


The patriarchal ignorance and arrogance which got us where we are right now has to be

shunned, set aside ---

and words of wisdom which arise from spiritual connections to nature taken more seriously.

[SpiralHawk]

21. Link to the speeces of the traditional elders at the UN

You have to scroll down a bit...

http://www.8thfire.net/Day_15.html

[defendandprotect]

26. Thank you . . .

After all the harm that was done to the native American, they speak of "forgiveness."

and there are two other expressions I love ---
"The Cry of the Earth" . . . how is it so many cannot hear it?

and this . . .

"The key for all the people in North America is, get to know who you are. Get rid of all your emotional and spiritual garbage -- hate, fear, fire and brimstone, all that junk. Creator is not standing somewhere with a big stick ready to beat you. You can be who you are. You need to be who you are. That's the bottom line."


"Creator is not standing somewhere wit ha big stick ready to beat you. You can be who you are."
◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊


I did at some point see some film on the United Nations visit --

I'll never forget the shock of the day when this nation dropped atomic weapons on Japan!!!

[MorningGlow]

19. Well said, SpiralHawk. Well said.

:applause: :applause: :applause:

[Snazzy]

71. nicely put

Mother will right herself or we can help. If we fail to choose the later, we fail.

[fascisthunter]

63. THANK YOU

[nam78_two]

67. Thank you-an excellent post

Covers pretty much all the points I was thinking of. We really don't need this superstitious bunk muddying an already controversial issue.

[defendandprotect]

14. Well summed up . . .

I'd just point out what I rarely see discussed . . .

Of course, this is going to speed up, over and again ---

There is a 50 year delay in Global Warming --- which means we're only feeling the effects

of the harm we did up to 1958 ---

Needless to say after that, we really began to hit the gas ---

And is 2012 coincidence .... ?

Keep in mind also that "pre-history" presents science of pole shifts ---

[Name removed]

31. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[defendandprotect]

42. I think fast and I type fast ---

and had no idea that was the figure . . .

[Name removed]

48. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[defendandprotect]

51. I think you mean you read them ....

while wearing a straight-jacket ---

[Megahurtz]

30. On THAT note

it sure makes me wonder. :wow:

[lonestarnot]

4. Simply amazing.

[The Croquist]

9. It's really not that amazing

http://www.geo.umass.edu/climate/papers/braunetal2004.pdf
Surface mass balance of the Ward Hunt Ice Rise and Ward Hunt
Ice Shelf, Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada
Published 30 November 2004.

"8. Summary and Conclusions
We have compiled all surface mass balance data for the Ward Hunt Ice Rise and Ward Hunt Ice Shelf and
updated both records through 2003. The surface balance of the ice rise and ice shelf track the mass balance changes of the other monitored High Arctic glaciers, but their surface mass losses over the last 45 years have been comparatively low."

The ice shelf has been melting for at least as long as anyone has been watching it and probably since the peak of the last ice age (18,000 years ago).

The latest Ice data 07/29/2008 shows 7,316,250 sq km compared to 6,479,375 sq km on 07/29/2007 for the arctic has a whole. 2007 was a record low (the record only going back 30 years) but 2008 looks like a better year despite predictions otherwise.
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/seaice/extent/plot.csv

[slackmaster]

13. I know of one man who is doing something about it

Former vice president Al Gore—who for the past three decades has unsuccessfully attempted to warn humanity of the coming destruction of our planet, only to be mocked and derided by the very people he has tried to save—launched his infant son into space Monday in the faint hope that his only child would reach the safety of another world.

"I tried to warn them, but the Elders of this planet would not listen," said Gore, who in 2000 was nearly banished to a featureless realm of nonexistence for promoting his unpopular message. "They called me foolish and laughed at my predictions. Yet even now, the Midwest is flooded, the ice caps are melting, and the cities are rocked with tremors, just as I foretold. Fools! Why didn't they heed me before it was too late?"

Al Gore—or, as he is known in his own language, Gore-Al—placed his son, Kal-Al, gently in the one-passenger rocket ship, his brow furrowed by the great weight he carried in preserving the sole survivor of humanity's hubristic folly.

"There is nothing left now but to ensure that my infant son does not meet the same fate as the rest of my doomed race," Gore said. "I will send him to a new planet, where he will, I hope, be raised by simple but kindly country folk and grow up to be a hero and protector to his adopted home."...

Al Gore Places Infant Son In Rocket To Escape Dying Planet

[defendandprotect]

16. Al Gore was sponsored over his lifelong career by oil company . . .

Run Al Gore past me again when he's talking about nationalizing the oil industry ---

and electric cars ---

light bulbs isn't going to do it ---

[EstimatedProphet]

20. HA! Good one!

[Overseas]

22. Exxon Mobil invested millions in building a posse of Climate Change Deniers

Those millions of dollars have funded a whole "global warming deniers" movement. With 99.9% of scientists understanding the facts of global warming induced by industrialization, Exxon Mobil had to work very hard to place lots of "Gee whiz, is it real?" questioning articles in the press. They used other stories to mock the Green movement as a romantic liberal thing. They have managed to make some people think they are hot shots for denying the facts we can all see and promoting talking points that distort scientific fact. They have used their money well. The PR flacks for tobacco companies did the same thing-- Doubt is our most important product, they used to say.

Here is more detail on the campaign:

WASHINGTON - Energy giant ExxonMobil borrowed tactics from the tobacco industry to raise doubt about climate change, spending US$16 million on groups that question global warming, a science watchdog group said on Wednesday.

"ExxonMobil has manufactured uncertainty about the human causes of global warming just as tobacco companies denied their product caused lung cancer," Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists said at a telephone news conference releasing the report.

An ExxonMobil spokesman dismissed the report as "an attempt to connect unrelated facts, draw inaccurate conclusions and mislead the audience with a fiction about ExxonMobil's true positions."

The union, a nonprofit group based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said ExxonMobil, the world's biggest publicly traded corporation, had succeeded in parlaying a relatively modest investment into unwarranted public doubt on findings that have been overwhelmingly endorsed by mainstream science.

ExxonMobil did this by using the same methods used for decades by the US tobacco industry, the report said, including:

-- raising doubts about even the most undisputed science;

-- funding a variety of front organizations to create the appearance of a broad platform;

-- recruiting a number of vocal climate change contrarians;

-- portraying its opposition to action as a quest for "sound science" rather than business self-interest;

-- using its access to the Bush administration to shape federal communications and policies on global warming.


TOBACCO TACTICS

US tobacco companies used these tactics for decades to hide the hazards of smoking, and were found liable in federal court last year for violating racketeering laws.

Global warming has been blamed for stronger hurricanes, more wildfires and worse droughts. While there have been cycles of warming and cooling throughout Earth's history, the last 30 years have seen a steep warming trend which most scientists say is due to emission of so-called greenhouse gases by the burning of fossil fuels in vehicles, factories and power plants.

ExxonMobil has funded legitimate scientific studies on climate change, the watchdog report said, but noted it has also spent approximately US$16 million between 1998 and 2005 on 43 organizations that have cast doubt on the reality of human-caused global warming.

The report said these have ranged from US$30,000 for the group Africa Fighting Malaria, which argues on its Web site against urgent action on climate change, to US$1.6 million to the American Enterprise Institute, a pro-business think tank in Washington.

James McCarthy, professor of biological oceanography and director of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, noted a 2005 statement issued by the US National Academy of Sciences and 10 science academies from other countries, affirming that "climate change is now sufficiently clear to justify nations taking prompt action."

"This report reveals for the first time the degree to which efforts to exaggerate uncertainty in climate science produce non scientific reports designed to cast doubt on published scientific climate studies have been orchestrated by ExxonMobil," McCarthy said at the news conference.

Company spokesman Dave Gardner said in an e-mail that the company acknowledged the burning of fossil fuels is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions.

He said ExxonMobil supports various public policy groups but said financial support does not mean it has control over the groups' positions.

"We find some of them persuasive and enlightening, and some not. But there is value in the debate they prompt if it can lead to better informed and more optimal public policy decisions," Gardner said.

Story by Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent

Story Date: 4/1/2006 REUTERS

[defendandprotect]

27. Right . . . about a year ago, the Royal Academy of Science called ExxonMobil out on it . . .

saying they had spread propaganda of lies, distortions, misinformation ---

Until about four or five years ago, ExxonMobil wasn't alone in this ---

BP and some others dropped out about then --- but it was pretty much the entire

oil industry!

When we come to understand that we've lost the planet because a few private families

were allowed to control our natural resources, it's pretty sickening.

"Manifest Destiny" . . . "Man's Dominion Over Nature" -- quite suicidal concepts

given to us by patriarchy and organized patriarchal religions --- and their

King-of-the-Hill System of Capitalism.

[crimanimalz]

38. the worlds not going to die; humans might..

look all around you.. were kinda fucked.

meh, maybe the next "intelligent" organisms on this planet will be a bit more ..intelligent.

[defendandprotect]

43. Actually, that's what I originally presumed . . . but no one can be sure

that the planet isn't also going to disappear in this catastrophe of Global Warming

and pollution ---

If there is a pole shift, it's even unclearer --

[crimanimalz]

61. yeah, we had a good run ;-)

[JMackT]

12. Well...

The earth goes through cycles.

Hot and cold.

[wordpix]

17. true but this heating is heavily impacted by man

[superconnected]

32. Not this fast and massive. Do you know how many thousands of years it took to build that ice shelf?

Those cycles weren't FUCKING MELTING the whole thing for the last several thousand years like it's been melting the last decade.

[JMackT]

47. No need to get angry

"Not this fast and massive. Do you know how many thousands of years it took to build that ice shelf?"

No I do not. Do you?

"Those cycles weren't FUCKING MELTING the whole thing for the last several thousand years like it's been melting the last decade."

It has been melting since the end of the last Ice Age.

Was it humans that ended the last Ice Age?

[Swede]

18. The human body is regulated at 96 degrees Fahrenheit,change that by a couple degrees

and you have real problems. The earth too is a regulated system,but it is being interfered with by us.

[crimanimalz]

33. life will adapt; it always does..

[Name removed]

34. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[crimanimalz]

36. adapt, evolve.. does that statement really need explaining?

get outside your little box and think for a second before tossing insults at strangers.. it's quite foolish.

[superconnected]

41. How are the penguins and polar bears going to adapt and evolve.

Do you acknowledge there is global warming?

[crimanimalz]

57. I don't know.. and don't recall mentioning anything re: penguins and polar bears

climate change? um yeah ..why do you ask?

it's kinda funny that you would call me a freeper after (mis)reading one post; this seems like a fairly right leaning forum from my point of view.

[NickB79]

37. Yes, but does that life include humanity?

And if it does, just how many will billions will die as we go through the "adaptation"?

I am always reminded of the George Carlin skit where he says "the planet is fine! It's the people that are fucked!"

[crimanimalz]

39. George Carlin was brilliant!

and probably correct about that.

[defendandprotect]

44. You're reading to adapt to what . . . cyclones, tornadoes, earthquakes . . .

good night, Superman ---

[LanternWaste]

52. And in that adaptation, untold millions will suffer.

And in those adaptations, an untold number of species goes extinct and millions will suffer (an inconvenient truth none on the right appear to acknowledge).

If we can do anything to slow down the accelerated pace of climate change that we have caused at the cost of mere convenience, I think it follows then that we should... :shrug:

[crimanimalz]

56. the scenario you mentioned is most likely unavoidable at this point..

inconvenient ..yes, for us and all the other species that face extinction. it's probably too late to do anything at this point.

meh, i ride a bike everywhere i go; might help, might not.. but it sure beats the hell joining the mindless robots sitting in traffic for a significant portion of their day, eating fast food, and getting cancer from spending too much time on the cell phone.

[LanternWaste]

59. The leading...

The leading climatologists write that we are *not quite yet* at the tipping point of no return.

As an aside, when my carpool pals and I are are sitting in traffic, we're not really mindless robots.

[crimanimalz]

60. we might not be there yet..

but do you really think the millions of ppl driving to cosco in oversized SUVs to pick up a pallet of paper plates shipped from south america are going to change their behavior soon? we live in a land jam packed with blithering idiots; this isn't going to change anytime soon..

[LanternWaste]

62. Call me an optimist, but yes

" but do you really think the millions of ppl driving to cosco in oversized SUVs..."

Call me an optimist, but yes-- I do believe that we are in a rather dramatic shift of our cultural perspectives on the environment and our responsibility toward it.



"we live in a land jam packed with blithering idiots..."

And, in addition to blithering idiots, the land we live in is also jam packed with the self-aware, the environmentally conscious, and a lot of people who are smarter than either you or I.

[The Croquist]

45. If the earth is a regulated system why has it always changed?

The earth didn't used to have any free oxygen in the atmosphere. Then life evolved and started using photosynthesis and converted CO2 and H2O into O2, H2O and C6H12O6 (glucose). Today 21% of the atmosphere is oxygen. Is that a change?

The temperature of the earth has changed and will continue to change. 18,000 years ago New York City was cover in ice and was 100 miles from the ocean. That was because the ocean was 400 feet lower then it is today. Was that because the earth was regulated?
Let' do some math:
Ocean rise 400 feet
Time frame 18,000 years
400/18000 =0.0222 feet per year or 2.22 feet (26.64 inches) a century.

The IPCC predicts that sea level will rise anywhere from 10 to 80 centimeters (3.9 - 31.2 inches) by 2100. First of all what kind of an estimate has a range like that? That's like saying the New England Patriots will win from 2 - 16 games next year. Second of all notice that the 18,000 average falls near the top of this range. If we've survived 2.22 feet for 180 centuries I think we can continue to survive it.

Since 1993 sea level has been rising at about 3.1 mm per year or 12 inches a century. Thats less then half of the 18,000 year average but well within the IPCC "prediction" of 3.9 - 31.2 inches so I guess you can say they are right!

The whole point of this ramble is that the earth has always been and always will change. I don't know how much man has changed it but it looks to me that we are well within the range of natural variability.

[Swede]

46. Of course it's regulated,that doesn't mean it doesn't change,over millenia.

And what we are doing to it will bring that change quicker.

[The Croquist]

55. Sea level isn't rising any faster then usual.

Whether or not temperature is changing faster then usual is debatable. There is only a thirty year history of accurate global temperature measurements (satellites) and the overall trend has been up but thirty years isn't a very long time. 1998 was the highest global temperature of the last 30 years. Do the 9 years since then make a trend? Of course not. But if the last 9 years doesn't make a trend I am not willing to concede that the previous 21 years did either. Especially since the general trend for the earth for the last 18,000 years has been up. Anytime you hear about a temperature record going back to 1880, or further you should question the source.

Please explain how they accurately measured the temperature at the North and South poles in 1880.
Please explain how they accurately measured the temperature in the middle of the ocean in 1880.
Please explain how they accurately measured the temperature in the middle of Asia, Africa, Antarctica, Australia, North America and South America in 1880.

Tree rings don't cut it. I live in Georgia. We are in a drought. The trees aren't growing. This has nothing to do with temperature.

Ice cores don't cut it either. You see study after study talking about ice cores showing the temperature thousands of years ago but if you don't know what the temperature was in the past how can you confirm the correlation?

I do not dispute that CO2 is rising. I do not dispute that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. CO2 is only one of many greenhouse gasses the most important one is water vapor.

I would prefer to cut back on CO2 emissions but I would also prefer not to starve tens of millions of humans and subject billions of humans to live and die in poverty. That is the alternative.

[fascisthunter]

64. Why Is it That If We Do Something about CO2 people will Starve

that is a phony excuse to do nothing. No one is advocating starvation or an economic crisis. Those standing in the way are the ones putting man-kind at the most risk... And I think your prediction is a bit motivated by your own bias against doing something.

In fact, it would go the other way around, but if you are biased, then you would obviously latch onto a negative conclusion like "...would prefer to cut back on CO2 emissions but I would also prefer not to starve tens of millions of humans and subject billions of humans to live and die in poverty. That is the alternative."

Bullshit.. it would help create a new economy. As for people starving... it's happening now due to climate change. Mankind can adapt and we HAVE TO! Fuck your economy for the wealthy, most humans are already dying because of it.

[The Croquist]

69. What I said was not a prediction.

What I said was not a prediction. In case you hadn't noticed billions of people are already living in poverty and near starvation. This is not because of an "economy of the wealthy" but in spite of it.

The industrial revolution has raised living standards around the world from the United States to Kazakhstan. Poverty and starvation in the 3rd world would be much worse today without modern technology and products. In the 18th century 9 out of every 10 Americans were farmers. That means that it took 9 families to grow enough food for just them and 1 other family. Changes in the economy because of the Industrial Revolution were painful to many but I challenge you to argue that we would be better off living in 1790 America then 2008 America.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Revolution
"In the 1960s, rice yields in India were about two tons per hectare; by the mid-1990s, they had risen to six tons per hectare. In the 1970s, rice cost about $550 a ton; in 2001, it cost less than $200 a ton. India became one of the world's most successful rice producers, and is now a major rice exporter, shipping nearly 4.5 million tons in 2006."

That is what modern technology can and has done. India used to suffer famine on a regular basis. Now, with many more people it can feed them and is slowly bringing hundreds of millions of its people out of poverty. I would prefer that they would lower their birth rate but poverty stricken countries don't do that. First world countries do that.

Please explain where people are starving to death because of climate change. While you're at it please tell me when mankind started climate change.

"Most humans are already dying because of it." Sorry but this statement is absurd. If most people on the planet are dying because of climate change why does the population keep increasing?

[Oak2004]

66. I can't speak to your other questions, but mid-ocean measurements in 1880 were good

Every ship recorded weather data at least daily, often multiple times a day, and they carried thermometers which were very accurate (as well as other, amply adequate, weather instruments) for those purposes. Ships had a vested interest in following the weather closely: after all they couldn't just download satellite maps telling them what seas to expect, and a clipper did not fare well when it sailed into the middle of a hurricane.

The 19th century was not an unbelievably primitive time. The 19th century was a technological age, filled with scientists practicing what we'd recognize as fully-developed science and engineers practicing what 21st century engineers would recognize as fully-developed professional engineering. The fundamentals of IT were being founded (thanks to electronic telegraphy), and principles developed then still govern the network we're communicating across right now. Aviation existed in the form of ballooning, and later gliding. Even the politics of today would have made sense to the people of 1880. In fact, if you could pluck an educated adult from the year 1880 and plunk them down in the year 2008, they'd marvel at our development, but they'd see almost nothing that did not have a 19th century precursor.

[The Croquist]

70. I'm not saying that the 19th century was "unbelievably primitive"

In many ways it was very advanced. The fax machine was invented in the 19th century. But accurate ocean temperature measurements simply were not done until recently. This is no fault of the effort but simple practicality. Barometric temperatures have always been considered more important then temperature in determining weather. They weren't worried about climate change and weren't trying to measure it.

Lets look at the Indian Ocean. There is a trade route from Perth Australia to Bombay India. It cuts across about 4,000 miles of open ocean but how many ships really traveled it? Then there are the problems aboard the ship. Sorry but temperature within a tenth of a degree was simply not a priority. Once or several times a day a sailor would go outside (hopefully) to read a thermometer.
Did they always remember?
If it was raining or storming did they estimate it? It wasn't like anybody would know and getting washed off a pitching deck onto a lower deck or into the ocean could mean death.
If they did read the thermometer did they do it at the same time each day? A temperature at noon is different from one at 06:00 AM.
Noon or 06:00 AM where?
Did they know exactly where they were when they read it?
When was the last time the thermometer was calibrated?
Was it a steamship or sailing vessel? Burning coal puts out allot of heat.
If it was coal was the wind blowing from the smokestack to the thermometer or away from it?

We are talking tenths of a degree here. Do you really think they were that accurate? Did they even write it down to a tenth of a degree?

I know you just challenged me on oceans but let me give you a land example. 100 years ago this year there was an explosion over Tunguska, Siberia, Russia. It knocked down 80 million trees over 830 square kilometers and measured 5.0 on the richter scale. It took the Russian / USSR government 13 years to send a scientist to investigate. In 1908 Russia although back wards compared to much of Europe was far more advanced then the average place in the world. Now if it took them that long to investigate it why would you trust the temperature measurements made by this country within a tenth of a degree?

[LanternWaste]

53. Convection currents.

"If the earth is a regulated system why has it always changed"

Convection currents. :shrug:

[Overseas]

23. I believe the breaking up of the Arctic ice shelves is a dangerous stage

to have reached. I believe it signals accelerated warming and more climate disruption.

Here's Al Gore's 2008 Update on his climate change slide show:

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/al_gore_s_new_thinking_on_the_climate_crisis.html

[defendandprotect]

28. Global Warming has a 50 year delay . . . we're only now feeling the effects

of what we've done up to 1958 --- and we sure hit the gas after that --- !!!

So things will be speeding up greatly.

Needless to say, what is to be feared now is catastrophic weather making

"Katrina's" of all of us --- we've seen how much help they got!

And/or drought/floods creating intererruptions in agriculture creating more

starvation and more unrest.

Most of all that this could lead to more war among nations ---

However --- we put this all in motion and presume most of us will see the consequences

of that ---

[Pisces]

24. I see many comments deriding the 2012 date, however, consider that the only people

not to suffer any loss of life during the tsunami were nomadic island indians who followed the wisdom of their ancient lore and the signals sent by the animals. In our arrogance we dismiss these ancient calendars as bogus. Rational people should be able to take all of the information out there and come to a common sense conclusion.

Also those of you posting that the right wingers and christian coalition won't like these analogies, who cares. They are not reading this blog. The DU is for people that want all the info out there. Should we censor our comments on this board for those ignorants????

I would like to know more about the ties of the Mayan calendar and other ancient civilizations and the new age we are entering.

[defendandprotect]

25. In the put down of native wisdom we, of course, see the same put down of native connections

to nature on which the old beliefs were based ---

these are the dangerous "pagans" and "heretics" of the world who were strongly attached to
nature --

Nature has been forced to not only speak in a roar to us now ---

but more than likely to remove us from the planet ---

Patriarchy and organized patriarchal religions and their Capitalistic economic system --

are suicidal ---

"Manifest Destiny" and "Man's Dominion Over Nature" are nothing but exploitive attacks on

nature, natural resources and animal life ---

it is also the license upon which Papal Bulls encouraging genocide against the native

American are based --- as well as the enslavement of Africans in America.


Patriarchal stupidity and arrogance has brought us Global Warming and pollution of the planet ---

it's a system to be disdained, ridiculed ---

These are some of the most DESTRUCTIVE systems ever put in place --- !!!

[Snarkturian Clone]

50. Again with the patriarchy.

Do you stub your toe and say "damn that patriarchy, they caused this!!!!!!!!!" because it seems that almost every post of yours is an attack on the so-called "patriarchy". As if it things were different and society evolved as a matriarchy, the same shit wouldn't be going down.

[muriel_volestrangler]

29. Calendars and mystic predictions based on them have nothing to do with environmental wisdom

It's worth listening to messages that we have to live in proportion to our environment; but waiting for the numbers in a calendar to roll round to 0.0.0.0, and pretending that tells us something, is a waste of time. It wasn't their counting system that told any American Indian society to live in an ecological balance - there are many aspects to any society , and you don't have to embrace all of them unquestioningly just because one makes sense to you. It's quite possible to think their religion and mythology wasn't the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, even if they made envirnonmental sense.

Who cares? Well, I said that this could also mislead people into thinking that this is 'inevitable' because someone claims that climate change fulfils an ancient numerological prophecy - and those are the kind of people who read DU. And claims started here on DU can get repeated elsewhere; and it's not just right-wingers, but people who may not yet have been completely convinced about climate change, but will think it's rubbish if your evidence includes myths.

"the ties of the Mayan calendar and other ancient civilizations and the new age we are entering": there are none. There is no 'new age'. This is the real world, not ruled by prophecies based on counting systems - human actions have caused this climate change, and it's up to us to fix it. There was nothing magical about the change from 1999 to 2000, either.

[nam78_two]

68. kick-again an excellent post.nt

[Snarkturian Clone]

49. So I guess we should all be creationists too?

Since that is some "ancient wisdom"?

BTW, the Mayan calendar isn't ending on 12/21/12, it's starting the 13th baktun, which is a cycle of 144,000 days. So that day, the mayan date will be 13.0.0.0.0

baktun is not the largest unit, it is the 5th largest unit, which means that 2012 DOESN't MEAN SHIT!!!!!

[superconnected]

35. gotta love how threads like this bring the freepers out.

[Uncle Joe]

40. When the ice shelves are gone, the glaciers on land will become increasingly threatened

as heat absorbing dark ocean water replaces heat reflecting white ice. I imagine this dynamic will only increase the rate of overall glacier melting and the severity of global warming climate change negative effects world wide.

"Dr. Mueller, whom Dr. Vincent calls the pre-eminent expert on Ward Hunt Ice Shelf, says he's concerned that the ice shelves will disappear completely.

"The take-home message for me is that these ice shelves are not regenerating," he said. "If we're looking at an indicator of whether climate is to blame, it's really the lack of regeneration that convinces me. They're breaking away so rapidly that there's no hope of regeneration," he said, adding that is "pretty strong evidence that suggests this is related to global warming."

Thanks for the thread, Newsjock.

[dger11]

54. Human ingenuity can solve anything related to this..

but we have to get to work. If we can make outer space livable for astronauts, then we're ready for anything the earth can throw at us.

[The Croquist]

58. Putting 2 men in space for months at a time is easy

compared to modifying the environment of an entire planet.

[fascisthunter]

65. WE HAVE NO OTHER CHOICE THIS TIME

no matter how difficult. Adapt or die