Pre-Columbian settlement.

[Digit]

It isn't meaningless Min, other than in the sense that one auto off the road makes liitle difference. Every bit of heat we add can only be lost by radiation into space, but that still results in a temperature gradient with the greatest heat at ground level. What you say about the sun's heat is correct, but that also re- radiates back into space or the planet would have melted some time back.

[Digit]

Too true Charlie. I was also an 'expert' in my profession till I retired, but I tried always to remember two definitions of 'expert' that were quoted to me as a young man.
One was, 'an expert is a man who knows more and more about less and less till eventually he knows everything about nothing!
The second was, an ex is a hasbeen, and a spurt is a large drip!

[Minimalist]

What you say about the sun's heat is correct, but that also re- radiates back into space or the planet would have melted some time back.

I'll stop breaking balls, now. I actually agree with you but the point is that such observations as "heat energy is never lost" are irrelevant to the discussion. Global warming is a fact but it happens in cycles of heating and cooling and only this present edition of the problem can be mankind's doing. One suspects that human activity is simply accelerating what is otherwise a rather natural process.

However, there is no doubt that human activity accounts for increased CO2, deforestation, erosion, etc. etc. However, if we could magically stop all that, I doubt that the ice caps would stabilize any time soon.

[Beagle]

One suspects that human activity is simply accelerating what is otherwise a rather natural process.

I have to agree with that Min.

[Cognito]

if we could magically stop all that, I doubt that the ice caps would stabilize any time soon.

Yup ... the Holocene has been the most stable epoch in the last few hundred thousand years. It is more natural to have consistent fluctuations in climate than what we have experienced in the last ten thousand years. Humankind didn't create the Holocene and we cannot prolong it, so get ready for what comes next ... warming ... cooling ... who knows? Regardless, Mother Nature has a nasty habit of doing whatever she wants!

[Charlie Hatchett]

LMAO!!


Hey, don't get me wrong, guys. I'm all for conservation and good stewardship of our natural resources. Nothing like the brown haze of Mexico City, or L.A. to remind you we do have a responsibility to our descendents to care for this place, our home.

But from the data I'm seeing, Mother Nature sometimes is gonna have her way, no matter what you do. From the data I'm seeing, we're way overdue for a warming...like it or not.

However, there is no doubt that human activity accounts for increased CO2, deforestation, erosion, etc. etc. However, if we could magically stop all that, I doubt that the ice caps would stabilize any time soon.

No doubt. And I'm all for taking care of this place. Deforestation definitely pisses me off. I see development here just mowing down beautiful, 150 year plus pecan and oak trees, like the were nothing!!

[Charlie Hatchett]

One was, 'an expert is a man who knows more and more about less and less till eventually he knows everything about nothing!
The second was, an ex is a hasbeen, and a spurt is a large drip!

Sounds like solid advice to me.

[Digit]

Ditto on all that guys. One of the problems here in the UK is the almost total absence of knowledge of the world around us, particularly amongst the younger generation. They watch TV, know all all about the Serengeti but wouldn't recognise an Oak tree if it fell on 'em. 80% of our population resides in towns and cities and recently voted, through their MPs, to ban Fox hunting because Foxes are nice looking cuddly animals, then they go home and flush spiders down the shower or spray theitr window boxes with poisons. It's an odd world.

[War Arrow]

Ditto on all that guys. One of the problems here in the UK is the almost total absence of knowledge of the world around us, particularly amongst the younger generation. They watch TV, know all all about the Serengeti but wouldn't recognise an Oak tree if it fell on 'em. 80% of our population resides in towns and cities and recently voted, through their MPs, to ban Fox hunting because Foxes are nice looking cuddly animals, then they go home and flush spiders down the shower or spray theitr window boxes with poisons. It's an odd world.

Don't get me started. I used to be the nicest guy in the world until foxes with their noise, pointless destruction and endless supply of turds turned me into the Adolf Hitler of gardening, plus I happen to like spiders.
Of tangential relevance to global warming, at least in terms of our impact upon the environment, I've heard that the current rate of extinction of species is roughly similar to that occuring at the end of the Permian (250 million years back - the most severe extinction event I believe, though I'll happily stand corrected if anyone knows better) and even now I'm still upset that I'll never get to see a live dimetrodon. If nothing else, I think it's a safe bet that the next few million years are going to be pretty interesting.

[Digit]

Tangential relevance?. This is page 16 WA of Pre Col America, we left that subject way back. But I must admit I love these free flowing discussions. Anyway, if GW is a fact and we can halt it do we want a world devoid of wild life? The trouble with do-gooders in this country is they often don't have a clue what they are doing.
Examples.
The release of Mink from fur farms into the wild, look at the damage that's done.
Bribing Blair's crew to stop culling Badgers, for our friends in the states, a large prportion of Badgers in the UK have Bovine TB, which by definition they got from cattle. Cattle with TB are destroyed at a cost of many millions of £s.
The animal rights mob oppose any culling of Badgers and blame the problem on farmers. So the Badgers are left to die drowing in their own blood in the name of animal rights, and of course, before they die they infect other Badgers as well and so keep the whole miserable thing going.
These are the nuts who drive the whole nut cutlet/green/anti-blood sports agenda.
When man placed his first footfall on this island he automatically altered for ever the 'balance of nature', and it now behoves us to administer this land that we may pass on to future generations a land worth living in
My garden is currently alive with wild life in all it varied forms, but I excercise control, Magpies and Grey Squirrels are driven off to give an edge to the song birds, if they don't get the message they get shot!

[War Arrow]

We're singing from the same hymn sheet, my friend - figuratively speaking of course.

[Digit]

Meanwhile, back at the GW front. Today's Daily Exress carries an article on James 'we're all doomed', Lovelock explaining that the world has now passed the point of no return on rising temperatures and that we must all move to the arctic. The article goes on to say that 2006 is on course for the warmest year since records began in 1659.
At the end of the article Piers Corbin of Weather Action Ltd points that the bronze age was 3 degrees C warmer than now and that 8000 out of the last 10000 years have been warmer than is currently the case.

[Cognito]

[Minimalist]

Oh, this will help!

http://money.excite.com/jsp/nw/nwdt_rt_ ... d8lmv8co0&

Supreme Court Takes Up Global Warming

You'll be doing underwater archaeology in Piccadilly if this bunch of fools has anything to say about it.

[Beagle]

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/642 ... okane.html

-- A new archaeological dig shows the Spokane area to be one of the oldest areas of continuous human habitation in the state.

According to evidence verified by radiocarbon dating, people may have lived at the confluence of the Spokane River and Latah Creek for some 8,000 years, said Stanley C. Gough, archaeology director at Eastern Washington University in nearby Cheney.

With a bit more effort they should be able to locate the "winter" camp. That should provide a much clearer picture.