The hallmark of science is the ability to make verifiable predictions. The hallmark of good science is to make accurate verifiable predictions. Gentlemen, behold:
Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past (from March 2000)
According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”. “Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said.
But then…
UK snow: Passengers turned away as Heathrow flights are grounded
And then…
Wintry weather brings snow to Australia in midsummer
Rather than being odd anomalies, these are some fairly big events, worthy of notice. Now, do they mean that the world isn’t getting warmer? Nope. The evidence largely suggests that it is, and humans have some hand in that. What these events do mean is that the “science” of global warming global climate change is so vague and handwavy, with such minimally useful predictive ability, that massive global governance resulting from it is almost wholly ill-advised.
9 Responses to “Snow Is A Thing Of The Past”
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Then there’s this from 2003:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/sci/tech/3266833.stm
And you combine that with this from 2002:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk/2259698.stm
…and you end up with snow.
“…a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia…”
The University of East Anglia… now *where* have I heard that university’s name before… oh, I know!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_controversy
That’s more or less what’s always bothered me about this whole subject. The idea of man-made climate change is plausible, but then the claimed effect turns out to be less than the noise and everyone supporting it seems to act like the UFO or ESP people.
It may also be that global warming/climate change means different things for different people. A 2 degree C rise in average temperature might not be so bad if you live in Siberia and can extend your meager growing season. I certainly have been enjoying the less snowy winters in the Northeast US.
Well, were making up for the less snowy ones over there with the more snowy ones over here in North Dakota, for the past three years, with this one starting to look like a doozy in that regard also.
I’m in Virginia, and I have seen no changes in snowfall between now and the 60s. Weather here remains just as unpredictable as ever.
A friend in Pittsburgh has told me about what caused an improvement there: the collapse of the steel industry. It seems that the air got better and the winters colder after the mills started closing. Did putting all the exhaust-processing stuff on cars change the local climate outside California?
Climate change has a upside and downside wherever you are; up here in North Dakota it means that farmers don’t need to worry about having moist soil to plant in come spring, because if it got any more moist up here when the snow melts, it might be time to consider changing the main crop from wheat to rice. We also don’t have weeks in winter where the max daytime temperature doesn’t get above zero degrees Fahrenheit, or summer days where it maxes out at around one hundred and ten degrees, like when I was kid.
It’s also noticably decreased the incidence of severe thunderstorms with damaging hail.
If you want to know how much things have incrementally changed over the decades, take a look at “The Venice Of The North” that is the city of Devils Lake on the shore of the lake of the same name:
http://www.emporia.edu/earthsci/student/jones2/devils_lake.html
Devils Lake completely dried up and vanished in the year 1934 during the great dust-bowl drought.
Nowadays, it’s steadily growing year-by-year, and seems ready to turn the city into a new Atlantis.
People can adjust to this fairly easily, and in fact crop yields per acre can increase if the advantages of the changing climate are understood and exploited to good advantage.
It’s not so easy for the natural wildlife though; they are used to a particular climate in a particular area, and climate change can force them to them to expand into a new area at the edge of their former range with heavy mortality, or go extinct.
The total number of bird species commonly spotted around Jamestown has vastly decreased since I was a kid, and now seems to be dominated by crows, which were fairly rare to see when I was young. Even our most formerly common bird – the English Sparrow – is now somewhat rare to see in any numbers.
What is fun to consider in regards to global warming is that the higher average global temperatures will lead to higher evaporation rates from the surfaces of the oceans and seas; this will lead to an increase in overall global cloud cover, which will lead to more solar radiation getting reflected back into space rather than hitting and heating the Earth’s surface.
So to some extent, the system is self-regulating.
On the other hand, the clouds are a two-edged sword – just like they reflect the Sun’s heat back into space, they also reflect the radiating heat of the Earth’s surface back down onto it on nights that aren’t clear of clouds.
Something I’m sure Scott knows all about from living in a desert area and observing the wild swing from daytime highs to night lows during clear summer nights.
I have visited the Army Guard Base at Devil’s Lake and seen the pictures of the old Enlisted Club being moved because of the rising lake.