Climate Change and Civilization

[marduk]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_dimming

[oldarchystudent]

and America's top climate scientist warns we only have a decade to save the planet

But George W. says to keep buying Hummers!

But you will love this. I don't remember the specifics (it was quoted in the book "A Brief History of Progress" - I'll find it around here somewhere). Anyway the US Congress was told by a high ranking official that there wasn't any need to work on these environmental problems because Jesus would be returning before they became severe.

That's when mythology becomes outright dangerous.

I'll post details as soon as I find that book.....

[bandit]

Thanks Marduk..

I should have looked it up myself, but was feeling lazy.

[oldarchystudent]

Found it, and it's A Short History of Progress, by Ronald Wright.

The "official" was President Reagan's secretary of the interior James Watt, who in 1981 told Congress not to bother with the environment because in his words "I don't know how many future generations we can count on until the Lord returns."

Wow......

[Minimalist]

and America's top climate scientist warns we only have a decade to save the planet

But George W. says to keep buying Hummers!

But you will love this. I don't remember the specifics (it was quoted in the book "A Brief History of Progress" - I'll find it around here somewhere). Anyway the US Congress was told by a high ranking official that there wasn't any need to work on these environmental problems because Jesus would be returning before they became severe.

That's when mythology becomes outright dangerous.

I'll post details as soon as I find that book.....

Here, OAS. James Watt, Reagan appointee of "2 Jews, a black a woman and a cripple" fame.

http://hnn.us/roundup/entries/8902.html

Remember James Watt, President Reagan's first secretary of the Interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever-engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he said, "after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back."

Beltway elites snickered. The press corps didn't know what he was talking about. But James Watt was serious. So were his compatriots out across the country. They are the people who believe the bible is literally true – one-third of the American electorate, if a recent Gallup poll is accurate. In this past election several million good and decent citizens went to the polls believing in the rapture index. That's right – the rapture index. Google it and you will find that the best-selling books in America today are the 12 volumes of the left-behind series written by the Christian fundamentalist and religious right warrior, Timothy LaHaye. These true believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the 19th century by a couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and wove them into a narrative that has captivated the imagination of millions of Americans.

[john]

Like global dimming which was discovered subsequent to 9/11 when the aircraft traffic was halted above the US .
.

global dimming???

never heard that term, anyone care to give me a clue?

global dimming is actually a pretty simple phenomenon.
ice and snow reflect sunlight away from the earth.

when ice and snow are darkened by industrial or natural particulates, or the total square miles of ice and snow surface are reduced, the amount of sunlight the earth reflects away is reduced by a geometric, not arithmetic, proportion.

the net result is that the earth absorbs - relatively - a hugely greater amount of heat, which, trapped within the atmosphere, accelerates average global temperatures.

j

[bandit]

Thanks John,

I got a handle on it now. Appreciate your help.

[Beagle]

http://www.stanford.edu/~meehan/donnellyr/summary.html


While I've posted this link before, it seems like a good time to pop it up again.

This article provides an extensive reference to climate changes around the world for the past 100,000 yrs.

There are many links to follow but anyone should find the time and the area that they're interested in.

[Bruce]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/climatewarmingarctic

Another possible migration route?

[Minimalist]

Only by boat!

[stan]

Tonight on NOVA they had aprogram on SUPER VOLCANOES.
It centered around the discovery of the eruption of the Lake Tubo volcano in Indonesia.
Scientests have confirmed the date of 75,000 BP by a number of methods.
Sulphuric acid in ice cores in the Greenland Ice Sheet.
Microscopic comparisons of volcanic ash from all over the world.
Studies of the types of oxygen found in foraminifera in core samples from the ocean floor. The temperature of the oceans dropped 10 degrees farenheit.

They said that this explosion was thousands of times greater than Mt.St Helens and caused a mini-ice age that lasted 1000 years.
They said that the atmosphere was full of sulphuric acid and that virtually all life (including human) was destroyed in the vicinity of the eruption, which was a
4000 mile wide area. I seem to remember some discussion about some cataclysmic event in India that was supposed to have interfered with human migrations...but that must have been before this one.
I've left out a lot of stuff in my description. It's a good program and goes into some detail about each of the scientists involved.
OH YES, and a footnote...the worlde's largest unexploded magma lake now sits under Yellowstone Park...and another is Long Valley, California.
So step lightly, you guys out west!

[Minimalist]

I caught it, Stan. Pretty good detective work.

Even better....it was followed by a two hour tribute to Mozart from Salzburg!

[Beagle]

Geneticists are pointing to the Toba eruption to explain what they believe is a "bottleneck" in human evolution. It's a theory that solves a lot of problems.

They have said that, following Toba, human population of the earth may have fallen to a mere 10,000 individuals.

Without the Toba theory, geneticists have got some problems.

10,000 humans?

[Guest]

The genetic bottleneck was when the global Deluge occurred, which is described by hundreds of ancient tribes from disparate parts of the globe, the offspring of the Deluge survivors.

[Beagle]

Only by boat!

And still, a very cold boat.