According to a classified Pentagon report from 2004, by 2020 the climate of Britain would be as cold as that of Siberia, the Netherlands would become uninhabitable, Japan, South Korea, Germany, and Egypt would have nuclear weapons, Israel, Pakistan, India, and Chine would use theirs, Bangladesh would become uninhabitable because of rising sea levels and so on...
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2004/feb/22/usnews.theobserver1
Keep this in mind when you read the next report about the imminent climate doom, etc.
@bontchev strange that someone with history in technology would be so naive about occasional predictions of local consequences of events that have been globally reaffirmed on multiple levels. The temperature spiral is going to unprecedented territory, wildfires are reaching new highs, ocean life is being wiped and you complain that Europe got scientists off-guard by not being such an extreme outlier as some thought. This could be the new definition of whataboutism.
@mapto Ha-ha. The last time somebody touted this chart it was debunked as having measured *surface* temperatures (which are much higher than actual air temperatures) and comparing them to a *model* prediction instead of to the reality.
We'll probably have a stronger El Nino soon, leading to (locally) higher temperatures. Expect more bullshit like this when it happens.
@bontchev first part sounds convincing. Second part really makes me think we should talk about how each of us think human knowledge emerges (epistemology) and not climate or data. I don't even know where to start. Clearly oversimplifying, if we have a bunch of numbers, why can't we take their average?
@mapto We can, but the results will make even less sense that the results that are currently pushed as "global temperatures".
Temperatures in Sahara can reach 60 C and those in the Antarctic can reach -60C, so I guess we live in a pretty cold climate (around 0C) on average, eh?
@mapto But clearly I need to explain why "global temperature" does not exist.
You see, we can't really stick a thermometer in the plant's ass and take its temperature. So, instead, we take the temperature from hundreds, maybe thousands *points* on it and extrapolate from that.
No, the result is nothing as simple as averaging the raw data - you really need to read up on that. The "global temperature" is extrapolated based on "models".
But, wait, it gets worse.
@mapto The thing is, the climate doesn't change overnight. It takes decades, centuries, millennia. So, you can't just take the temperatures from a couple of thousands places and make conclusions based on that. You need a history of such temperatures over very long time periods.
You with me so far?
@mapto But the problem is, what was a station for measuring temperatures a century ago in a rural area is nowadays within the limits of a sizable city.
And cities, believe it or not, emit heath locally, making this station report higher temperatures than if the city wasn't there.
So, the raw data that was collected over a long time period is "massaged" according to models *again* to try to account for urbanization.
The result is not "the global temperature" - it is the output of a bunch of models and reflects that these models *believe* the global temperature ought to be.
@mapto Now, this doesn't mean that the global temperatures aren't increasing. They clearly have, since the Little Ice Age ended, as can be seen from the receding glaciers and a few other things.
The point is, we don't really know how much exactly and any predictions of impeding doom based on our guesses are just bollocks that need to be dismissed out of hand. As shown by the fact that they have been wrong every single fucking time in the past.
@mapto So, before the religious fanatics I call "warmists" (a portmanteau of "warming" and "alarmists") call me a "climate denier", let me set the record straight:
1) Do I believe that the climate exists? I certainly do and I'm not denying it.
2) Do I believe in climate change? I certainly do - the climate has been changing for millions of years before Home Sapience came up with the idea to bong his neighbor on the head with a club, in order to steal his meat - and will keep changing long after we're gone.
3) Do I believe that the plant is warming? I certainly do believe that it has been warming, in fits and starts, since the Little Ice Age ended.
4) Do I believe that human activity impacts the global temperature? I certainly do - pissing in the ocean impacts its temperature. The question is - how much.
5) Do I believe that human activity is what has caused the majority if global warming? I do not.
6) Do I believe that the temperatures will keep increasing? I do not believe that we can reliably predict it either way. Maybe they will, maybe they won't.
7) Do I believe that CO2 is a "pollutant"? No, it is plant food. Without it we'll be all dead.
8) Do I believe that economy-destroying policies will stop global warming? I most adamantly do not. We don't have the ability to control the climate.
I think before making such a far fetching statement like “global temperature does not exist” you should first research a bit of thermodynamics, such as enthalpy, and how thermodynamics operates in general (what classic vs statistical thermodynamics describe). The concept of “global temperature” and “temperature anomaly”, as used by IPCC, is based specifically on deep understanding of these concepts.
@kravietz @mapto It is based on models and guesses. This would be acceptable, if the predictions based on them reliably came true (it's called "the scientific method" for the ignoramuses at the back benches) - but this, sadly, hasn't been the case.
So, until they come up with better ones, I am going to ignore their bullshit.
@bontchev @kravietz let's be clear: the models have been verified and that's why there are daily short-term forecasts on pretty much any news program in the world. Precision falls for longer-term, but they are still surprisingly accurate for the month-ahead.
Anyway, what you're putting in question not predictive models, but past measurements. Then talking of models is just whataboutism, as I said before
@mapto I claim that long-term predictions of various kinds of doom (including climate-related one) are complete bollocks and cannot be trusted, because they have been wrong every single fucking time in the past.
Also, there is no such thing as "average temperatures". Do I need to explain why?