Heating up down under

[Tuur]

And they're doing it again without much thought to hurricanes. So let's say the AGW alarmists are right, and hurricanes are going to become, on average, stronger and more numerous. There will be a lot of property and infrastructure damage that must be repaired, over and above whatever emergency and short term aid is provided. Hurricane damage is already costing us 150 billion per year and the curve is said to be rising rapidly. That's a lot of money. Diverting it from more productive use slows the economy; just a little, but then there are the wildfires out west to think of--how many billions is that going to cost us? Yes they were foolish to build there may be but the bill is due, and in the end it will come out of our pockets. Sea level rise a little bit? No big thing? But every year the wave damage comes a little farther inland. I don't know if you saw on the news the last hurricane that came close to us in NC, but there was lurid footage of beach houses being swept into the sea. The thing is, those houses were already abandoned due to the waves gradually coming farther up the beach. More money for remediation. AGW is going to start costing us more money than we can afford. For us, that's the armageddan

There's a place on the East coast known as the Millionaire's Village. It's a small settlement of grand vacation homes that belonged to some of the wealthiest families in America at the time. It's on Jekyll Island. The interesting thing is that it's on the side of the island facing the mainland, not on the beach. It's more protected. As a consequence, the homes still exist today, even though some are over a century old. Had they been on the Atlantic side, it would probably be a different story. There's erosion on the beach side. Apparently there was erosion when the millionaires built their vacation homes. Over on St. Simon's Island, part of the fortifications of Fort Frederica, also on the mainland side of the island, are gone, eroded away long ago. Even on Jekyll, the millionaire's homes aren't built on the very edge of the island. Further north, have seen photos of period homes on barrier island up on huge sledges, pulled by teams of horses or mules as they were dragged back from eroding beaches.

That's the thing about barrier islands: they move back and forth. Have seen photos of places on the East Coast where barrier islands have rolled back, exposing the remains of forests. Further inland there are barrier island sequences of what was beachfront property. If it was possible to look under the silt toward the continentals shelf, there very well may be the remains of forests, courtesy of the last glaciation period.

People used to know that. People used to realize that building on a sandy beach was short-term at best, unless you could move the house back. Have often wondered about how someone could think that this was a good idea. Whether a house is on a beach or the banks of a river, it's subject to get washed away. That was the case before AGW was considered a thing, and will be the case after all of us here are long gone.

Now, since you brought up hurricane damage, look at this: It's a track of recorded tropical systems. It only dates to the latter part of the 19th Century.

Historical Hurricane Tracks

Go there and enter "North Atlantic Basin." Look a the storm tracks, and know that hurricanes like the one Aaron Burr rode out on St. Simons aren't listed because there were no official records. Look and ponder. Then reflect that houses today are a far cry from houses of an earlier time, filled with expensive do-dads, and the effects of inflation.

Whether there is warming and whether it's caused by humans is one thing; blaming every event on it is quite another.

 

[Fervent]

Yes, I understand your question. But it's basically hypothetical. Because there hasn't been any preventable harm. There's just been minor changes that would have occurred anyways. Name any significant harm that's taken place that could have been prevented, and how it could have been prevented. An actual starting point needs to be established, before a threshold can be determined.

It's not hypothetical, it's tactical. So what's with the reluctance to answer? What is your tolerance for repercussions from a lack of action? We don't need to know what kind of harm there is to say what is acceptable, so why aren't you willing to give some kind of benchmark instead of working in vague subjective qualifiers?

 

[BCP1928]

There's a place on the East coast known as the Millionaire's Village. It's a small settlement of grand vacation homes that belonged to some of the wealthiest families in America at the time. It's on Jekyll Island. The interesting thing is that it's on the side of the island facing the mainland, not on the beach. It's more protected. As a consequence, the homes still exist today, even though some are over a century old. Had they been on the Atlantic side, it would probably be a different story. There's erosion on the beach side. Apparently there was erosion when the millionaires built their vacation homes. Over on St. Simon's Island, part of the fortifications of Fort Frederica, also on the mainland side of the island, are gone, eroded away long ago. Even on Jekyll, the millionaire's homes aren't built on the very edge of the island. Further north, have seen photos of period homes on barrier island up on huge sledges, pulled by teams of horses or mules as they were dragged back from eroding beaches.

That's the thing about barrier islands: they move back and forth. Have seen photos of places on the East Coast where barrier islands have rolled back, exposing the remains of forests. Further inland there are barrier island sequences of what was beachfront property. If it was possible to look under the silt toward the continentals shelf, there very well may be the remains of forests, courtesy of the last glaciation period.

People used to know that. People used to realize that building on a sandy beach was short-term at best, unless you could move the house back. Have often wondered about how someone could think that this was a good idea. Whether a house is on a beach or the banks of a river, it's subject to get washed away. That was the case before AGW was considered a thing, and will be the case after all of us here are long gone.

Now, since you brought up hurricane damage, look at this: It's a track of recorded tropical systems. It only dates to the latter part of the 19th Century.

Historical Hurricane Tracks

Go there and enter "North Atlantic Basin." Look a the storm tracks, and know that hurricanes like the one Aaron Burr rode out on St. Simons aren't listed because there were no official records. Look and ponder. Then reflect that houses today are a far cry from houses of an earlier time, filled with expensive do-dads, and the effects of inflation.

Whether there is warming and whether it's caused by humans is one thing; blaming every event on it is quite another.

Nobody does that. But, OK, sure, nothing out of the ordinary is happening. What's at stake? We reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Is that a bad thing? It certainly gives us strategic advantages--that's why China is working towards so fast. What else? A modernized electrical grid? That wouldn't be a bad thing. Some of our electrical grid is a century old and more. What about it?

 

[Servus]

It's not hypothetical, it's tactical. So what's with the reluctance to answer? What is your tolerance for repercussions from a lack of action? We don't need to know what kind of harm there is to say what is acceptable, so why aren't you willing to give some kind of benchmark instead of working in vague subjective qualifiers?

Okay, the threshold, the benchmark, is the starting point I mentioned.

 

[Fervent]

Okay, the threshold, the benchmark, is the starting point I mentioned.

Still evading an identifiable target to begin discussing the impacts. You wonder why you are presented with "gish gallops", as if there is such a thing as too much evidentiary support, when you refuse to engage with attempts to convert your protests into some measurable form and compare it to what is currently happening.

 

[eclipsenow]

How long have these records been kept?

Let's see...NSW...New South Wales... Yamba Pilot Station data goes back to 1922. I found a year of 1889 but not where in New South Wales or any specifics. Also found where Sydney, New South Wales, hit 39.1 C (that's 102.4 F for us Americans). On October 25, 2019, it hit 38.2 C (100.8 F), It hit 38.2 C on October 4, 1942. Sydney, New South Wales, hit 38 C on October 21, 2025. That's 100.4 F.

We're talking about record breaking for ocean wind swept places like Sydney at this time of year. Not Bourke - our in central NSW close to the desert.

Although even these places are starting to break records.
CO2 traps heat.
Backyard science shows this.
Even Mythbusters ran some garage science to demonstrate it.
There is not a National Academy of Science on the planet that disagrees with the consensus IPCC view.
The planet is cooking. As is my back veranda right now (with dangerously high winds! One spark and we're talking mega-fire.)

Global warming is happening.​

As the Dothraki might say, "This is known."​

 

[eclipsenow]

Yes, I understand your question. But it's basically hypothetical. Because there hasn't been any preventable harm.

Let me guess? Some people somewhere said something about some harm sometime, somewhere, not being that bad to some people?

Sign me up! That completely undoes the solid scientific data from the IPCC!

Meanwhile we have over a century of climate modelling being born out before our eyes over the last decades of temperature records.

It's just happening.

And the consequences are now so obvious, there are even statistical attribution sciences that can start to see the global warming fingerprint through the noise of natural weather events.

You just haven't been paying attention.

Because you're listening to someone, somewhere over a rainbow....

 

[Servus]

Still evading an identifiable target to begin discussing the impacts. You wonder why you are presented with "gish gallops", as if there is such a thing as too much evidentiary support, when you refuse to engage with attempts to convert your protests into some measurable form and compare it to what is currently happening.

This sort of tactic is worse than gish gallops.

Person A askes a question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

 

[Fervent]

This sort of tactic is worse than gish gallops.

Person A askes a question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.q

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Uh huh. I've made clear what it would take to give a satisfactory answer, if you want me to drop the repetition all it would take is clarity. Instead you dance and complain, refusing to bite and provide some sort of identifiable target to aim at. What is it you're afraid of, that prevents you from providing clarity on what you think is tolerable and at what point some kind of solution is preferable to doing nothing?

 

[Servus]

Uh huh. I've made clear what it would take to give a satisfactory answer, if you want me to drop the repetition all it would take is clarity. Instead you dance and complain, refusing to bite and provide some sort of identifiable target to aim at. What is it you're afraid of, that prevents you from providing clarity on what you think is tolerable and at what point some kind of solution is preferable to doing nothing?

I'm not going to play this trollish game any loner. You didn't used to be the sort of poster who acted this way. I'm starting to wonder if the account was hijacked. We're done.

 

[Fervent]

I'm not going to play this trollish game any loner. You didn't used to be the sort of poster who acted this way. I'm starting to wonder if the account was hijacked. We're done.

Trollish? I'm not playing games, I'm trying to have a productive discussion but that requires clear objectives. And the only way we're going to have clear objectives is if we have some kind of explicit criteria.

 

[Servus]

Trollish? I'm not playing games, I'm trying to have a productive discussion but that requires clear objectives. And the only way we're going to have clear objectives is if we have some kind of explicit criteria.

Yes, the usual trollish accusations mixed with going in circles. Now you can either dispence with the accusations ie I'm dancing, I'm afraid et al and the going in circles... and instead conclude that you're not being as clear to me as you think you are, and be clearer. Or you can keep doing the same thing, which will result in me not seeing your posts any longer. If you want "some kind of explicit criteria", then establish it, instead of the inane I'm supposed to read your mind game. Last chance.

 

[eclipsenow]

This sort of tactic is worse than gish gallops.

Person A askes a question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

You don't answer - you assert someone somewhere said something to answer for you, somehow.

 

[Ophiolite]

This sort of tactic is worse than gish gallops.

Person A askes a question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

Person B answers.

Person A says the answer is unsatisfactory and asks same question.

As long as Person B deliberately, or through intellectual incompetence, declines to give an engaging answer, refuses to recognise the deficiency of their answer, and persists in stonewalling, then the dowsing stick of troll detection will point in their direction. Are you afraid an honest answer will reveal that your position has no foundation?

 

[Servus]

You don't answer - you assert someone somewhere said something to answer for you, somehow.

As long as Person B deliberately, or through intellectual incompetence, declines to give an engaging answer, refuses to recognise the deficiency of their answer, and persists in stonewalling, then the dowsing stick of troll detection will point in their direction. Are you afraid an honest answer will reveal that your position has no foundation?

I seriously doubt either one of you could supply the supposed correct answer.

 

[Ophiolite]

I seriously doubt either one of you could supply the supposed correct answer.

Which do you consider the best rendition of the question?

 

[eclipsenow]

I seriously doubt either one of you could supply the supposed correct answer.

I never claimed to be a scientist, let alone a climatologist.
But unlike you - I try to read and respect the peer-reviewed answers.

You "seriously doubt either one of us could supply the supposed correct answer" because someone somewhere said something you liked better. Correct?

But here's NASA's projections for the USA

• Northeast. Heat waves, heavy downpours, and sea level rise pose increasing challenges to many aspects of life in the Northeast. Infrastructure, agriculture, fisheries, and ecosystems will be increasingly compromised. Farmers can explore new crop options, but these adaptations are not cost- or risk-free. Moreover, adaptive capacity, which varies throughout the region, could be overwhelmed by a changing climate. Many states and cities are beginning to incorporate climate change into their planning.
• Northwest. Changes in the timing of peak flows in rivers and streams are reducing water supplies and worsening competing demands for water. Sea level rise, erosion, flooding, risks to infrastructure, and increasing ocean acidity pose major threats. Increasing wildfire incidence and severity, heat waves, insect outbreaks, and tree diseases are causing widespread forest die-off.
• Southeast. Sea level rise poses widespread and continuing threats to the region’s economy and environment. Extreme heat will affect health, energy, agriculture, and more. Decreased water availability will have economic and environmental impacts.
• Midwest. Extreme heat, heavy downpours, and flooding will affect infrastructure, health, agriculture, forestry, transportation, air and water quality, and more. Climate change will also worsen a range of risks to the Great Lakes.
• Southwest. Climate change has caused increased heat, drought, and insect outbreaks. In turn, these changes have made wildfires more numerous and severe. The warming climate has also caused a decline in water supplies, reduced agricultural yields, and triggered heat-related health impacts in cities. In coastal areas, flooding and erosion are additional concerns.

Effects - NASA Science

Global climate change is not a future problem. Changes to Earth’s climate driven by increased human emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases are already

science.nasa.gov

 

[Tuur]

I just hope the anti-science MAGA movement dies across the next decade as the USA starts to experience more and more climate impacts.
Then the whole world can galvanize around the important mitigation and adaption and climate RESTORATION work we’ll need to do to sequester CO2 in trees and biochar and the oceans!

Ah, the love the rest of the world has for the US. Pretty much what we've come to expect. Just as US weather seems not to be what the world expects. Like the tornado that hit the British camp while they were trying to burn DC. British soldier asked a local was this the infernal weather they usually had. Kind of like the time when a policeman from London visiting in the US breathlessly told us of the tornado he's just experienced. We didn't have the heart to tell him it was a run-of-the-mill thunderstorm.

If you do want to go there, will observe that while local snowfalls are rare, have seen more measurable accumulations in the last half of my life than the first. Then there's the period of mild winters that led to the widespread planting of lupine as a cover crop and locals not buying heaters as an option on vehicles. Then back-to-back hard winters practically wiped out the seed stock in the US, and that ended that.

Blame that on AGW, too, if you like.

Noticed that such ill wishes weren't extended to a major producer of green house gases in the Australia region. That big country northwest of Australia, the one that's gone through rapid industrialization and produces a lot of CO2.

What you termed "RESTORATION work" raises a significant question:. Restore it to what point? 1950s? 1850's? 1750's? 1650's? To the last glaciation period? To the Medieval Warm Period? Hate to tell you, but "restoration" is a goal as elusive as attempting to braid ropes from sand without first making glass fiber out of it, all because climate is in flux, even before humans.

 

[Tuur]

Nobody does that. But, OK, sure, nothing out of the ordinary is happening. What's at stake? We reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Is that a bad thing? It certainly gives us strategic advantages--that's why China is working towards so fast. What else? A modernized electrical grid? That wouldn't be a bad thing. Some of our electrical grid is a century old and more. What about it?

How bad do you want it? Bad enough for people to freeze in the dark? A "modernized" electric grid: that consists of what? I can pretty much guarantee that the grid in 2025 is not the grid that existed in 1925. What exactly is this "modernization" that you want?

 

[sjastro]

What you termed "RESTORATION work" raises a significant question:. Restore it to what point? 1950s? 1850's? 1750's? 1650's? To the last glaciation period? To the Medieval Warm Period? Hate to tell you, but "restoration" is a goal as elusive as attempting to braid ropes from sand without first making glass fiber out of it, all because climate is in flux, even before humans.

The key is to avoid a temperature tipping point where the climate behaves like the physics of balancing a chair on one leg.