As the earth COOLS, the tropics is the place to be

[aprild]

How was he SELF-deprecating, Kapohocat? It sounded more april-deprecating. Self-deprecating humor is usually directed at oneself.

But if I'm being too sensitive, I apologize to Mark, who I don't have the benefit of knowing personally.

Perhaps Mark can reply and let us know his intent.

april

[Jon]

well... way back in the 60s times were tough and everybody wanted to move to Hawaii... in the 70's when we were told of the coming ice age, everybody wanted to move to Hawaii.... in the 80's again times were tough and everybody wanted to move to Hawaii, in the 90's it was we were told of Global Warming and ... everybody wanted to move to Hawaii... I see a pattern here...


Well I made here, and all these problems need to back off...


Transplanted Texan

[mgeary]

quote:

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Originally posted by aprild

Tell you what: I won't reprimand you on this message board, if you don't reprimand me.

---

Fair enough, and my apologies for lacking aloha.

I hope that those people who are sounding the alarms are at least open to the idea that none of this is well understood, or at least not to the level of scientific certainty. If our understanding grows about the various complicated mechanisms of climate change, then we should rejoice when we hear good news, I believe. We should also not stick our head in the sand, either, by denying that there is a problem. That was the point I was (clumsily) trying to make.

I get pretty serious sometimes, too, April. It's a good thing for me to lighten up. Life is a lot more enjoyable when I'm not always so serious.

Aloha! ;-)

[Guest]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jon

....
Well I made here, and all these problems need to back off...

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Isn't it funny how once you get here...you see the problems first hand []

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Rally For the Plan

[Carey]

Interesting that the start of noticing the signs of this global change were initially around Puna... at the NOAA Mauna Loa atmospheric station... so being in Hawaii is not escaping anything, & the global change can/will have a potential of changing things here..

Fred MacKenzie taught the 'Global Change' course at UH-Hilo 2 years ago.... (having one of the world's leading experts on global change teaching a 200 level course.... can not get much better!)... There are many world wide impacts & Pacific region and local impacts that happen with global change... have in the past & will in the future. Nothing is off the table, and worrying about who owns the property may not be high on the list when these things happen...

Should have added.... Global changes have changed where "the rainy side" is in the past... some indications on the atmospheric conditions over the last few decades indicate that is currently happening again.... add to this, if the ocean circulation changes, as it has in the past, the coastal temperatures also change... islands are not immune to these effects.

This is the first documented global change that has being done by anthropogenic actions as it is happening.... (& it is a really lousy scientific experiment, as there is no control group... without a control... there is no definitive proof positive for those who will only change their actions with such... and there is no way of getting back to the conditions that were, for those who wish we could...)

[JWFITZ]

"And I will say, if you don't understand or except the fact that the sun controls the climate, you are a fool. The sun controls everything."

Well, I take "exception" to that statement, I'm afraid.

I'm sure there are scientists you can find that will suggest, still, that the science concerning cigarettes in poorly understood, and that because there is yet doubt, there's no reason why you shouldn't hand one to a 5 year old kid.

I'm sure as well there are scientists who doubt the link between overeating and obesity, as there's doubt about where the natural healthy state of the human body should be--why not carry 60% body fat? It's just a value judgment anyway.

It's very fashionable at the moment, and marketable, to publish semi-scientific documents contesting global heating in general. In fact, of best sellers on the topic, certainly the contrary voices get more readership at the moment.

I wonder why? Perhaps because the truth can get bent a long ways without breaking by the gentle pressure of wishes. As well, the complexity of the theory and the ramifications of the global heating that is now unquestionably occurring is simply beyond Newsweek magazine, or other popular bumper sticker interpretations.

Pertinent fact 1:

The last time there was(yes, it has happened before) the cumulative sum amalgam of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, and especially the last time CO2 levels were as high are they are today, surface levels of the ocean were 100 meters higher, and tropical palms and alligators lived at the poles. In this, the Cretaceous period of 100 million years ago. Ocean surface temperatures in the Gulf Stream may have been as high a 105 degrees and were by and large dead zones.

Pertinent fact 2: Of course, massive extinctions were coincidental with this period. Even in spite of the fact that the earth in this period had perhaps 4 times the amount of tree cover it does to day, still 10s of millions of years were necessary to re-regulate the earth back to its normal cooler state.

Pertinent fact 3: This period of extreme heat was not triggered by solar radiation, but by greenhouse gas in totality. The sun was perhaps 2 percent cooler in the period. The cause of the event appears to be a magmatic eruption in the central Atlantic that flowed into a large reserve of methyl cathrates. Once this methane was released, the run-away events that we see in action today followed, and as well a rapid change to a much higher equilibrium state of temperature. These run-away events are identical today: rapid melting of ice at the poles, the melting and rapid decomposition of permafrost, with spoilage and still increased emmission of C02 and methane, and as we're just now starting to see, destabilization of cathrate deposits due to abnormally high ocean temperatures.

There is really no sensible argument with this data. The above is well documented, and is simple geological history.

So, what for today?

Certainly, the consensus of opinion has been for at least the last 40 years that global warming was the issue. The "new ice age" counter talk stems mostly not from peer reviewed data, but from an article in Popular Science magazine. A recent audit of peer reviewed articles concerning global warming vs global cooling revealed that global warming has been the consensus opinion among climate scientists by a factor of 10 to 1 during that period.

Certainly as well, in the Northern Hemisphere at least, for the last 60 years, global temperatures have been inexplicably cool, by nearly 2 degrees, due to the large amount of particulate matter from coal, diesel and other burning in the atmosphere. Pan evaporation studies from all over the world document this "global dimming" phenomenon almost beyond reasonable doubt. Once we start cleaning up our act, and our emissions, we will see a sudden spike in temperatures throughout the N. Hemisphere.

The current large climate models that run today are capable of retrocasting world climate for at least a 1000 years with near 100 percent accuracy at a 1km resolution. There is good reason to suspect that if you run them forwards, their results are pretty fair guesses.

I would suggest that it is worth while to put a solid deeper read into the issue than aping what one or another expert interprets from the data. Of course, I am not dogmatic nor deliberately ill informed. Still, it is utterly unfair to suggest that there isn't a major consensus of opinion concerning the current state of affairs in climate science or that there isn't overwhelming supporting data strongly suggesting that A) the earth is warming rapidly and B) human activity is the primary causal element.

Reference available to any and all assertions, if you want. Honestly, I've been restraining myself from commenting, because it's arguing about old old news, and as I really feel a complete waste of my time. My goal here is to meet and bring together informed, well-read people who are capable of studying data and making judgments on that data for themselves.

Personally, I haven't read nor care what Al Gore thinks, and by and large feel that he's a poor spokesman for the cause anyhow.

As well, please let's not be insulting in insinuating that some of us or all of us require spoon feeding by the popular media to form our ideas about reality and the world. Some of us are capable of doing, and indeed do that work for ourselves.

[Jon]

Well, as an old guy that got it beat into his head that the world was going to be frozen 20 years ago, I am not to worried ether way.

I do know this.... if it gets hot, or it gets cold, at least I am having a good time while Rome burns....


Transplanted Texan

[rbakker]

If I had to choose a climatic catastrophe, I'd pick global warming any day. Imagine a big freeze, with ice sheets advancing across the Northern Hemisphere, slowly displacing literally billions of people.

Maybe we'll get both at the same time and they can cancel each other out.

[JWFITZ]

And that is the point, the displacement of billions of people.

So, back to Hawaii?

My prediction. The Big Island being one of the only places in the the world in the tropics(the areas least effected by warming) with sensibly stable politics, agricultural potential, relatively low population density, and more or less free of disease--the Big Island is going to become one large gated community for the rich and famous--as they will be ecological refugees like everyone else. They will simply be able to cherry pick and displace where every they go.

This, I predict is less than 20 years out.

[aprild]

mgeary,

Apology accepted.

Not certain we are hearing good news. See no reason for rejoicing.

My point, precisely, that no one knows what will happen.

Open-minded, reads and listens a lot. Am appropriately serious-minded when discussing serious things.

Ice-thawing; extreme weather; literally thousands of lightening strikes followed by hundreds of fires in my County.

Something's happening here, but we don't know what it is, do we Mr. Jones?



april