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Knight of Argenis
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01/17/2007 3:20 PM  
I think I would laugh right now if someone said we were in danger of global warming.  This is the coldest winter I remember already, and it's only mid-January.  Seems to be a pattern across the continental USA.  Cold.

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01/17/2007 3:48 PM  
Those of us on the east coast are having the warmest winter in a long time. However, you can't use this to prove or disprove global warming.

Since I study climate:

This is the biggest misconception of global warming. People think that temperatures everywhere has to get higher. It doesn't. It's just that global averages have to get warmer. Some areas will get hotter and some colder. When you average the two, the total goes up. Many of the numbers wil cancel each other out, which is why climatologists are worried by even an increase of a few degrees in the global temperatures, because this represents a big change in climate patterns.

In fact, with warmer temperatures the mid atlantic current will probably shut down and places like England will get a lot colder.

Don't confuse weather with climate. You can't use any one summer or winter as evidence for global warming. You need longer term measurements. Now, I think it's happening, but that's because of a lot of indirect evidence like the rate of melting icecaps (much quicker than if it was just a function of rebound from an ice age), earlier breeding cycles in animals and plants, a decade of warmer temperatures, a huge increase in the atmospheric CO2, etc. Unfortunately, there is no smoking gun like we had with ozone destruction and CFC. Some of this may be due to decadal cycles, but a lot of it can't be just because of the time frame it is occuring. But it's going to take long term study to be certain.

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yack
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01/17/2007 4:47 PM  
Very funny because this is one of the warmest winters we have ever had! Well except for today -25 but till now it was like spring almost. Warming again in the future also for us.

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01/17/2007 5:14 PM  
Posted By gss_000 on 01/17/2007 3:48 PM
Those of us on the east coast are having the warmest winter in a long time. However, you can't use this to prove or disprove global warming.

Yeah, it's been unusually warm here in CT. Today was bitterly cold but it's only a one day event. It's supposed to start warming up again starting Thursday.


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SLC, UT

01/17/2007 6:40 PM  
Below freezing for two weeks. Utah winters suck

Global cooling! We're all going to die!

Global warming! We're all going to die!

I feel better now. Granted, aside from birth, death is the only constant in human existence....

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01/17/2007 8:39 PM  
Many of the Arborists in my area have been going nuts.  These unusually warm spots we have been getting are tricking trees into budding early.  A cold snap like today's can easily cripple or kill most of the trees buds.  It's even worse if the three has been drawing up groundwater, once it freezes the water can turn into Ice expanding and damaging the tree.  I'd imagine some might even explode.....

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01/17/2007 9:20 PM  
Posted By zenthrus on 01/17/2007 6:40 PM
Below freezing for two weeks. Utah winters suck

tell me about, it is freaking cold out side.

Thanks, realmaster. Let's split up!!!!!

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01/17/2007 9:23 PM  
In DC there are flowers that usually come up in April I believe that have already flowered. The cold weather we got today probably killed them which means they won't bud again this spring.

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Faragdar the Wise
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01/17/2007 11:23 PM  
Ah, global warming. What a fun topic. I find this a useful counterpoint to the popular media, which has latched onto "global warming" as one of those all-important attention-grabbing news topics:

http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/

It gives a nice explanation about what we really do understand when it comes to climate change, which is a lot less than you think. While it seems that there really is a global warming trend, scientists don't really understand the actual root cause(s), but it ain't CO2 (or, at least, CO2 is a bit player in the global warming trend). Makes me mad when I think about all the time, effort and money being wasted trying to control CO2 emission, that infamous "greenhouse gas".

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West Valley City, Utah

01/17/2007 11:59 PM  
I am not really disputing global warming. My disagreement is with the concept that we are 100% to blame, the way that certain people seem to put forth.

I agree very much with the notion that scientists simply do not have enough information to make conclusions in this matter. The world is much more complex.

I was saying that initial comment because I overheard somewhere that it's been really cold in many places in the USA.

We have some facts, like a certain ice shelf in Canada broke off (a very big one), and so on. We don't have really solid methods of measuring the history of climate over the past thousands of years. Only echoes in the soil and vegetation (like trees). However, we really don't have enough history of detailed weather reports that would be needed in order to make solid guesses (I didn't say conclusions, because I still think they would be solid guesses and not solid conclusions even if we had a lot more information) about climate patterns.

I like science and the scientific method is pretty cool. A lot of times, some scientists skip some steps and jump to conclusions that can be very erroneous, and then believe firmly it is the final answer. Or at least a lot closer to the final answer than they really are.

I really like gss_000's comment, "But it's going to take long term study to be certain."

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01/18/2007 3:27 AM  
It's cold this week here in Buffalo NY, but otherwise one of the warmest winters in recent memory.Â

The best part is no snow to deal with.Â

Except for that storm in October that knocked out power for 5+ days ....


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The G Spot

01/18/2007 4:19 AM  
The issue will be solved when the next Ice Age hits. Some scientists think we are due for one.

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I actually love to be swallowed. - Posted By gss_000 on 09/04/2007 2:32 PM
Could somebody explain Snatch to me? I understand the basics, but not how to enter/use it. - Posted by orcmonk220
G's the man. - Posted By greyhaze on 11/11/2008 8:58 AM

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01/18/2007 5:42 AM  
One really good volcano eruption, a good ash coverage to drop global temperatures and climate will be right back on schedule. At least I think that is the conclusion I can draw from all the discovery channel, history channel and National geographics show I only half pay attention while I'm watching.

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01/18/2007 9:16 AM  
Posted By Faragdar the Wise on 01/17/2007 11:23 PM
Ah, global warming. What a fun topic. I find this a useful counterpoint to the popular media, which has latched onto "global warming" as one of those all-important attention-grabbing news topics:

http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/

It gives a nice explanation about what we really do understand when it comes to climate change, which is a lot less than you think. While it seems that there really is a global warming trend, scientists don't really understand the actual root cause(s), but it ain't CO2 (or, at least, CO2 is a bit player in the global warming trend). Makes me mad when I think about all the time, effort and money being wasted trying to control CO2 emission, that infamous "greenhouse gas".

Whoa, wait a minute.  This site has some good information, but there are key pieces he is leaving out.

First, while he is correct that water is the greates greenhouse gas and that adding water to the atmosphere will have no effect, it's not the same as for CO2.  There are bands where it is not saturated and that could have profound effect.  CO2 is not  a bit player in that regard.  In the normal climate, water is the biggest greenhouse gas (and people do dislike the analogy but it's what stuck) and people are honest about that.

The author also downplays what doubling the CO2 would actually do.  The problem is this and what he doesn't account for is: the rate at which we have doubled that number.  It will only have taken us 200 years to do that, when usually it takes thousands and millions of years for the similiar (although not the same) type of changes to occur natuarally.  That type of loading can have enormous effects, more than just what any calculation can show right now. He also failed to mention that the last time we had that much CO2 in the atmosphere the planet was a big tropical forest.  No one has any idea the end effect of what we have done and that is scary.

The biggest problem is that what we have put up there will stay up there for a long time. Even if we stop injecting CO2 today, the levels will still be high through this century.  What I really didn't like is that he extrapolated twentieth century IPCC calculations and made that what the total effect of CO2 would be.  Those same models predict 1-4 degree change over the next 200 years, which can be huge.  While numbers do pertain to the model and predicting what people wil do,  they do predict more of an increase than 0.6 degrees over time.  And with more on the way, (China and India are on the verge and really want to use as much energy per capita as each American) the outlook is worrisome.

Oh, and remember that pesky ozone hole?  Well, if everything stays as it was in the late 90s the hole should repair itself and be at 1975 levels by 2050. You know what can mess that up?  CO2.  While CO2 has a warming effect on the troposphere, where all the weather we see on a daily basis occurs, it cools the stratosphere, the atmospheric layer above the troposphere.  This cooling allows for more polar stratospheric clouds to form which is where the chemical reactions occur that destroys ozone. More clouds, more destruction, and ozone loss could become a problem again.

There is some good information coming out of that site: 1) There is no smoking gun yet.  We have no direct correlation between temperature increase and CO2.  Everyone wishes we had it but temp increases now are still within error bars. 2) Nature is playing a role.  There are natural fluctuations that can't be discounted.  We are still in an interglacial state and some of the temp change may be due to that.  But we should be turning around soon, where soon is a relative term and not to mean next year or even next several decades.  3) Feedbacks are wonky.  Probably the hardest things about models is what you assume and what you approximate. Weather models have vastly improved over the last 20 years, and limate models are having a renaissance as well. Land/sea/air models have gotten very exact, although there is a long way to go.  But there are a lot of factors in climate change that are still poorly understood, the biggest one I can think of is aerosols.  They may have a net cooling or net warming effect because of the uncertainty of the error bars so more study is needed.  Remember, modern and good climate study only started in WWII which sounds like a long time but with decadal cycles we are only just studying there is more we need o figure out.

As a scientist, there is no way to say for certain that global warming exists.  But, most still do because the indirect evidene is there and the potential of human effects are downright scary.  I think it does mean something when a majority of the global warming naysayers are backed by oil companies (not to say the majority is always right).  When you're dealing with a non-linear and chaotic system like climate, any time you change an element in the system by a factor of 2 almost instantaneously on the timescales involved, ignoring that behavior is irresponsible.  That's why we should continue to do more and it's not a waste of money.

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01/18/2007 9:20 AM  
Posted By forkedmoon on 01/18/2007 5:42 AM
One really good volcano eruption, a good ash coverage to drop global temperatures and climate will be right back on schedule. At least I think that is the conclusion I can draw from all the discovery channel, history channel and National geographics show I only half pay attention while I'm watching.


While it does have an effect, the resident times of ash in the atmosphere is not good enough.  If it can reach the stratosphere, ash can stay in the atmosphere for years.  Unfortunately, CO2 can stay for decades so while on a short term aerosols and black carbon will rain out.  The biggest eruptions cooled off the weather, like in the year without summer, caused by Krakatoa.  But I think you need something on the order of what killed the dinosaurs to have an equivalent effect.

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01/18/2007 9:36 AM  
For my part, I sincerely hope we ARE to blame for the warming trend. Because if you are the cause of something, you have a chance to stop it. If global warming is primarily due to increased solar activity or something else, we are well and truly screwed.

So, you wanna hunt, or gather?

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01/19/2007 1:42 AM  
Posted By Corim Danex on 01/17/2007 3:20 PM
I think I would laugh right now if someone said we were in danger of global warming.  This is the coldest winter I remember already, and it's only mid-January.  Seems to be a pattern across the continental USA.  Cold.


This is funny to me because I said the exact opposite thing to one of my employee's about a week ago. I live in CT and except for a couple of cold days the temperatures have been mostly in the forties. It's one of the warmest winters I can recall.

By the way, thank you GSS_000 for the very infomative posts.

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01/19/2007 7:20 AM  
Thanks for the information GSS_000. I was actually reading an article in Science (or I think it was in Science) about the issues you mentioned where previous CO2 levels were high when the earth had a significant amount of forests.

The article detailed carbon sequestering through the ages and how changes to the rainforest/praries (which surprisingly sequester as much carbon as a rainforest per square foot according to the article) effected climate change, as well as tracking major world events (when the Himalayas were pushed up from continental drift a /ton/ of CO2 was removed from the atmosphere causing an anti-greenhouse effect and plunging the climate into an ice age).

I found it an interesting read, I'll see if I can dig up a link on it.


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01/19/2007 4:18 PM  
No prob. When you see way too many lectures some of it actually sticks. But what is certain can change pretty quickly so you have to keep up, which probably means I'm already out of date. New sites and opinions are always good to listen to because they might know something you don't. For instance, that site we were talking about has a lot of information collected together and talks about things I never heard until I got to grad school.

Sequestering is a very cool subject as well. Did the article tackle the sequestering going on in the ocean? Basically, we should have a lot more CO2 in the atmosphere, but the amount going into the ocean is increasing every year, and we don't know the reason why. Essentially the ocean is becoming one big fizzy drink and the CO2 that goes in there can stay in there for a long, long time. I heard a talk where the lecturer mentioned that some oil companies were looking at possibly pumping CO2 into the oceans. That was several years ago so I'm not sure what the current state of affairs is.

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01/19/2007 9:05 PM  
I don't think there's any such thing as an article that will tell the "whole story".  I realize the "junk science" article has an agenda--to debunk the popular view that we need to cut down on CO2 emissions.  But like you said, it has a lot of good points.  I think people ought to know about the arguments and not simply dismiss them as attempts at self-preservation by oil companies and other big business.
Posted By gss_000 on 01/18/2007 9:16 AM
First, while he is correct that water is the greates greenhouse gas and that adding water to the atmosphere will have no effect

I don't think the page says that anywhere.  In fact, it says that small changes in H2O vapor concentration can have the same "greenhouse" effect as large changes in CO2.  But it's not even that simple, since increasing H2O vapor increases cloud formation which decreases the amount of solar energy that gets to the surface in the first place.

There are bands where it is not saturated and that could have profound effect.

Which bands?  From what I've seen, the only CO2 band of significant consequence in the "greenhouse" effect is the one near the Earth's blackbody curve.  CO2 strongly absorbs there--enough that it's already pretty much maxed out.  Increase CO2 and you just widen the absorption band a tad.  Other bands are either too weak to matter much, or the Earth's heat emission in the band is too low to matter much.  No matter how fast CO2 levels have risen as a result of human intervention, it only matters if the effect of that CO2 increase is actually significant.

He also failed to mention that the last time we had that much CO2 in the atmosphere the planet was a big tropical forest.

I've seen the historical data from ice cores, so I realize there seems to be a correlation between CO2 and global mean temp.  And you're right--for completion, the article should have discussed that correlation and what it means (or doesn't mean). (The forest part is no surprise.  Plants like CO2.)

While CO2 has a warming effect on the troposphere, ...it cools the stratosphere...  This cooling allows for more polar stratospheric clouds to form which is where the chemical reactions occur that destroys ozone.

Interesting.  How does that process work?  I'd like to read about it.

That's why we should continue to do more and it's not a waste of money.
I agree that we should sure as heck continue to study climate change and try to puzzle out the cause/effect relationships.  That'll never be a waste of money.  It's things like the Kyoto Protocol that bother me.  We don't have enough evidence to know whether reducing "greenhouse gas" emissions will even help, yet we're spending enormous amounts of money worldwide to try reducing emissions on the principle that it's better than doing nothing.  Except, there are lots of other things we could be doing with the money that would have real, obvious, long-term positive effects on people in the world who desperately could use the help.

Oh, and kyrin, I reject the notion that, if we happen to find out that global warming is a purely natural phenomenon, there's nothing we can do about it.  Maybe there are things we can do to artificially reverse the trend.  (Of course, we have to be careful that we really understand what we're doing if we ever try to go that rout.)  But also, if we happen to find out that there's nothing we can do to reverse climate change, then we just have to face that fact and pour our resources into adapting to climate change.

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01/19/2007 9:32 PM  
Let me reread the page and look at the sections you mention. I'll see if I misunderstood what he said.

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01/19/2007 10:12 PM  
Which bands?


The band I'm looking at in http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/GuideFig1.gif is at ~13 micromenters if I'm reading it correctly. It's about 60% filled right now at ground level according to that chart. That may seem like it's almost filled, but it's very near the peak of the earth's radiation curve. The one at peak radiation is filled, I will give you that.

don't think the page says that anywhere. In fact, it says that small changes in H2O vapor concentration can have the same "greenhouse" effect as large changes in CO2. But it's not even that simple, since increasing H2O vapor increases cloud formation which decreases the amount of solar energy that gets to the surface in the first place.



My fault. Some of that was my own statement not his. It wasn't clear. You are right about adding water increasing the albedo. That is the only way if you look at that chart. Your explanatio is spot on.

As for ozone, here is a very quick and not complete picture. The process that destroys ozone is somewhat complex and takes place over two seasons: polar winter and spring transforming O3 (ozone) into O2. In the winter, you get the formation of clouds high in the atmosphere, in the part called the stratosphere, called polar stratospheric clouds (PSC). The first series of equations can only occur on the water molecules of the clouds where O3 interacts with CFCs. When the sun reappears in the spring time, UV radiation finishes the process by finally creating the O2, and the parts of the CFCs which caused the problem go on their way to continue to destroy ozone the following year. There are actually some processes going on during the same time that increases the O3 in the atmosphere as well, but there is net destruction.

Anyways, the only way to get these PSC is if you have cold temperatures. The warmoer it is, the fewer clouds, and the less destruction of O3 -> O2. When you pump CO2 into the stratosphere, it blocks some of the visible from reaching lower levels of the atmosphere. Lower stratospheric temperatures and you get more PSCs. More PSCs and you have less O3. So a problem we thought we were getting a handle on could get worse.

I have more to say on your Kyoto Accords mention, but I'm going to put it in another post so I don't ramble here and it beomes too long to read.

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01/19/2007 11:41 PM  
It's things like the Kyoto Protocol that bother me. We don't have enough evidence to know whether reducing "greenhouse gas" emissions will even help, yet we're spending enormous amounts of money worldwide to try reducing emissions on the principle that it's better than doing nothing. Except, there are lots of other things we could be doing with the money that would have real, obvious, long-term positive effects on people in the world who desperately could use the help.


What I'm posting is really about US policy and spending. It really doesn't apply to other countries intentionally because I don't know other countries' policies and I don't wnt to speak for them.

I can understand your point, although I don't agree with it for several reasons:

1) Not doing something because of other causes or other areas of need can be used to stop any activity. Now, if we said, we are going to take the money we saved by not doing the Kyoto Protocols and use it to cure cancer/end poverty/feed the world I would get behind it 100%, especially if it was to get the US and others off oil use. But we don't do that. Non military expenditures are relatively small and a lot of it has decreased over the past few years and doesn't look to be rising any time soon. Our foreign aid decreased last year by 4% if you don't include Afghanistan and Iraq and half of that doesn't go to poor countries, NIH had no increase this year with many areas getting less and has pretty level since 2002, and an increase in the budget for other areas of research that doesn't keep up with inflation with many areas getting a decrease in the budget.

2) Why can't we do both? In 2003 we spent 0.14% of our GDP on foreign aid, dead last in the world, and only 10% of what we spent in Iraq that year. We're not even at the levels we were spending in the 60s and we are much richer now then then. To have substantial results, we need to raise our level to 0.7% of GDP. That's it. Not even 1%. And that would be a major step towards achieving universal primary education, halving the number of people living in hunger and on less than the equivalent of one dollar a day; reduce by two thirds the mortality rate of children under five and by three quarters the maternal mortality rate; and halt the spread of HIV/AIDS and the incidence of other deadly diseases, such as malaria and tuberculosis accoding to some estimates. While there are still other problems, that's hardly a large sum and we can afford to take on Kyoto as well. It's not an either/or situation.

3) Our non-involvement causes other that really need to adopt the practices now in the early stages of development to reject them. In order to develop, you need to spend energy. There is no question to that. Many countries that are on the brink of major gains, like China and India, want to use as much as we do to get to where we are. The US can in some ways get away with our energy use because we went through our growing pains already and our population is relatively small for our size. India and China has 2/5ths of the world population and the energy use/pollution they can cause could be orendous. China probably will have to start burning its large coal reserves and from all indications they would not care to do it eficiently or cleanly. These countries don't want to hobble themselves economically in their eye is the richest ountry in the world won't do it.

4) It wouldn't be so bad for us as other countries. The US fought very hard and held up the Protocols for a while to get language in it that would give significant credits to countries like the US that had new forest growth due to farms being abandoned. By countries like the US, I mean mostly just the US. We really haven't changed our policies in a long time as well. For instance, EPA mileage standards for cars has been the same since 1975. It wouldn't be the financial hardship argued by some.

So that's why I think we can make gains in environmental policy as well as help in other areas. Kyoto isn't perfect, but at least it's a start.

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01/23/2007 3:47 PM  
We're all gonna die.



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01/23/2007 4:46 PM  
I take the Sandman approach....

Death is inevitable because we all buy into that myth. I'm going to live forever.

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01/24/2007 4:42 AM  
Posted By Vrecknidj on 01/23/2007 3:47 PM
We're all gonna die.



Dave

Downer dude.

But very true. Anyhoo, just like that, it's now cold here in the Northeast U.S. Forecast for Thursday and Friday

... Dangerously cold wind chills are expected across southern New
England late Thursday night and Friday morning...

A bitter cold airmass... the coldest of the season... will pour into
southern New England Thursday night and Friday on gusty northwest
winds.

Wind chills will drop to 15 to 25 below zero late Thursday night and
Friday morning across the interior... and 10 to 15 below zero along
the South Coast. Actual air temperatures will not get out of the
single numbers on Friday across the higher elevations... with
temperatures struggling into the lower teens in
Hartford... Providence and Boston.

Wind chill advisories will likely be needed for a large portion of
southern New England late Thursday night into Friday.

If you plan on being outdoors on Friday... plan for bitter cold
conditions and dress appropriately.



WotC - making me wish more and more every day for a return to the TSR days. :(

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G's the man. - Posted By greyhaze on 11/11/2008 8:58 AM

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01/24/2007 8:32 AM  
Now that is the New England winter I remember. Nothing sucks more than having to wait for the bus at 6:45 AM to just be dumped at the elementary school playground for the next 30 minutes and try to stay warm. I remember once when I was in Kindergarten the teach yelled at us for not moving around more when we looked so cold. Of course, she was watching us from the heated indoors.

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01/24/2007 8:40 AM  
Posted By gss_000 on 01/24/2007 8:32 AM
Now that is the New England winter I remember. Nothing sucks more than having to wait for the bus at 6:45 AM to just be dumped at the elementary school playground for the next 30 minutes and try to stay warm. I remember once when I was in Kindergarten the teach yelled at us for not moving around more when we looked so cold. Of course, she was watching us from the heated indoors.


I know that over the last few years they've actually cancelled elementary school (Rhode Island) on a few occasions because of severe cold.  This never would have happened when I was a kid, and I had to walk uphill to school (not both ways). Â


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01/24/2007 9:54 AM  
Posted By nyjastul69 on 01/24/2007 8:40 AM
Posted By gss_000 on 01/24/2007 8:32 AM
Now that is the New England winter I remember. Nothing sucks more than having to wait for the bus at 6:45 AM to just be dumped at the elementary school playground for the next 30 minutes and try to stay warm. I remember once when I was in Kindergarten the teach yelled at us for not moving around more when we looked so cold. Of course, she was watching us from the heated indoors.


I know that over the last few years they've actually cancelled elementary school (Rhode Island) on a few occasions because of severe cold.  This never would have happened when I was a kid, and I had to walk uphill to school (not both ways). Â


In the snow
Waste deep snow
With no shoes
And carrying 40 pounds of books


Dagnabbit!!!

Everybody sing!!
We're having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave..........

WotC - making me wish more and more every day for a return to the TSR days. :(

I fought the snark and the snark won. I'm baaaaaaaaaaack!


Some of my favorite Maxminis quotes
I actually love to be swallowed. - Posted By gss_000 on 09/04/2007 2:32 PM
Could somebody explain Snatch to me? I understand the basics, but not how to enter/use it. - Posted by orcmonk220
G's the man. - Posted By greyhaze on 11/11/2008 8:58 AM

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Rhode Island

01/24/2007 10:11 AM  
Posted By Ghendar on 01/24/2007 9:54 AM
Posted By nyjastul69 on 01/24/2007 8:40 AM
Posted By gss_000 on 01/24/2007 8:32 AM
Now that is the New England winter I remember. Nothing sucks more than having to wait for the bus at 6:45 AM to just be dumped at the elementary school playground for the next 30 minutes and try to stay warm. I remember once when I was in Kindergarten the teach yelled at us for not moving around more when we looked so cold. Of course, she was watching us from the heated indoors.


I know that over the last few years they've actually cancelled elementary school (Rhode Island) on a few occasions because of severe cold.  This never would have happened when I was a kid, and I had to walk uphill to school (not both ways). Â


In the snow
Waste deep snow
With no shoes
And carrying 40 pounds of books


Dagnabbit!!!

Everybody sing!!
We're having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave..........
We were poor and couldn't afford shoes.  I had to wear cardboard boxes stuffed with old news papers.  I had to carry 160 lbs. of books no less.  My 2 older brothers made me carry their books.



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Rush

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01/24/2007 11:23 AM  
Posted By nyjastul69 on 01/24/2007 8:40 AM

I know that over the last few years they've actually cancelled elementary school (Rhode Island) on a few occasions because of severe cold.  This never would have happened when I was a kid, and I had to walk uphill to school (not both ways). Â

My school district (Andover, MA-I went to public school), had a crazy superintendant for many years.  He believed that if his 4x4 with chains could get through the snow, then so could buses.  And cold?  Pople could deal.  There were several times when towns all around us were closed and not us.

Things got a lot better and reasonable when he left.

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01/24/2007 4:07 PM  
Yup, I remember elementary school in southern Maine. Had to catch a bus with the wind chill at 40 below 0 one morning. I don't ever remember school being closed on account of the cold, either.

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01/26/2007 10:59 AM  
We were below 0 degrees F for about 10 days. Idaho= Frickin' Cold.

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01/26/2007 2:20 PM  
Don't worry. It'll be better when Steve Jobs remakes the state into...iDaho.

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Québec

01/30/2007 11:23 AM  
I just read today that Canada is warming up twice as fast as the rest of the world !!!
Should we be worried ? I know it is great for Québec winters though, the temperature has been much nicer so far this year.

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Netherlands

01/30/2007 12:33 PM  
Weather report from the Netherlands:

January 2007: hottest January month since they are keeping score (about 160 years), about 7 degrees centigrade hotter than average.

2006: Summer heatwave in Netherlands is 4th in the world ranking list of number of deaths/square mile due to natural phenomena.

Haven't seen temperatures below freezing point for over a year now.

I'm not directly screaming global warming, but it's too hot in our little country.

D.

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Toronto

01/31/2007 10:14 PM  
Well when I left Helsinki just after the New Year the weather had been pretty warm, Snow was no where to be seen.

When I arrived in Toronto, there were days when a winter coat was just too warm to wear, in the last couple of weeks though winter has finally arrived with snow and negative degree weather.

As for Global Climate change, the fact the large sections of ice are melting and piece of ice has broken off in northern Canada bigger then Manhattan, that a Huge crack has appeared in Greenland and that a gigantic portion of the Antarctic is looking to join the ocean, should all be serious indicators of global warming.

Combine these with the threats of Global Dimming and the future can be a truely scary place.

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01/31/2007 11:22 PM  
They are serious indicators of global warming. Unfortunately, I'll say it again, they are indirect. Unless you can show direct correlation between CO2 and temp change , you can't definitaly prove global warming today. I take it as such, becuase I personally feel it is irresponsible not to, but it is scientifically hard to causually realate the two. That rate of change is hard to ignore, IMO, but that is not the same as concrete proof like we had with CFCs and the ozone hole. If we weren't in a glacial rebound it would be a different story. There would be no question whatsoever. However, I think we're going to need another decade of study before we are sure what we are seeing is man-made and not a natural climate cycle.

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Rhode Island

02/01/2007 8:23 AM  
Posted By gss_000 on 01/31/2007 11:22 PM
They are serious indicators of global warming. Unfortunately, I'll say it again, they are indirect. Unless you can show direct correlation between CO2 and temp change , you can't definitaly prove global warming today. I take it as such, becuase I personally feel it is irresponsible not to, but it is scientifically hard to causually realate the two. That rate of change is hard to ignore, IMO, but that is not the same as concrete proof like we had with CFCs and the ozone hole. If we weren't in a glacial rebound it would be a different story. There would be no question whatsoever. However, I think we're going to need another decade of study before we are sure what we are seeing is man-made and not a natural climate cycle.


Every time I try to explain to people that correlation does not necessarily mean cause/effect, I'm greeted with slack jaws and glazed eyes.  


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02/01/2007 10:04 AM  
Correlation might have been a bad word choice on my part. You are right about the two not being he same. As the Physical Oceanographer who was teaching a grad-level statistics class half-joked when he started the sememster: "Statistics: Lies, lies, and more lies."

I find giving candy when explaining it helps.

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