[NT] Why I think that the world as we know it is doomed.

[Virtual ghost]

I am a well aware of the fact that this thread doesn't actually belong to this section of the forum but I am going to place it here anyway.
Which is because I need a quiet and private place to unload my mind when it comes to environmental isuess. (since I want to get some things out of my head)

Also I want to say that I am not really after a feedback and if I see "political" post I will just ignore it. So don't bother posting those here. Especially since we have plenty of threads to disscus matters of policy.
(btw I tend to think that Al Gore is nothing more than a political opportunist, just to be clear about this)

The thing is simply that as a man of science I want of offer the most objective view possibe to other forum members when it comes to environmental topics. (and unload my mind in the process)


Also I don't have the time to create a one huge argument (that no one will read in the end) So I will just post this as number of smaller posts. I mean just give me time and I will cover pretty much everything.

Ok this is enough for the intro.

 

[Virtual ghost]

I will start with controversial topic number one today: Global warming.


When it comes to this topic the media as sreving such a amount of nonsense that it is hard that something like this can happen in 21. century. (both environmental and nonenvironmental)

The problem is that carbon-dioxide is a green-house by it's nature what means that increasing the amount of it in atmosphere will rise global temperatures slightly. Personally I have seen that some people say that it is it's green-house effect is too weak too matter.
But to me personally this argument is "foolish".

Since this is not different then amount of soup and salt in it. The volume of salt in the soup is quite small but I think that well can all agree that soup without salt sucks. (and soup with too much salt sucks even more)

Same is with carbon dioxide and atmosphere.


However the actual problem is not that the temperature will rise a little bit.
That is not a problem at all. The problem is that "small" changes in temperature will have a major effect on how some other systems on the Earth operate.

Example

For glacier to be stabile you need some water to join and exactly same amount to melt away. If you don’t have balance that means that glacier is growing or it is getting smaller.
If it is getting larger it will eventually merge with other glaciers and form new ice cap that will spread itself across continent. If it is getting smaller it will melt away.


Around the planet glaciers exist in places where you have balance and that is usually in cold mountain areas. I mean take a look at some maps and you will realize that all large rivers are basicly coming out of mountain ranges.

But the thing is that wven if the amount of incoming material is 0.5% lower than amount that melts away glacier is doomed to melting process.
Also the more ice you lost the remaining one will melt faster.


Here is how glacier "works".
Clouds come above the mountains where is much colder and they are dropping cold rain near glacier or on glacier.
When that cold water comes in contact with glacier it freezes and glacier becomes larger, and when clouds pass glacier slowly melts creating a fresh water. What is the way how large rivers and being created. (generally speaking)


But as glaciers melt the huge problem appears. Which is that their natural melt during warm and dry season(s) of the year is what maintains rivers that are vital for crop production. Which feed the world. (aka 6.8 billion people)

However if glaciers are "removed" there will be no mechanism to able the "survival" of crops in a dry period. (that lasts usually for a few months)
Plus in this case the rain just comes down the mountain fast creating a flood instead of coming down from mountains "step by step".


Making it impossible to grow as much crops/food as we need on a global scale.



Ok, this is a good place to stop.

 

[Virtual ghost]

Most environmentalists claim if we don't do something about our carbon emissions we as a species will suffer later in the century. (and then they give you what you need to do lower your carbon footprint)
What from scientific point of view this is pointless. (by this I mean completly pointless)


Which is because the carbon dioxide that is melting glaciers is already "pumped" out. And it is not going anywhere.
Plus we can't remove it because of number of reasons.


To do that, we would have to destroy all crops and cities and slaughter billions of people around the world to create space to grow the trees and animals in which that carbon was once stored. People believe that tree can absorb huge amount of carbon dioxide with time so that it no longer a threat to us.
But that would mean that the mass of the trees would be huge. (and it isn't)
The fact is that forest is not destroying carbon atoms it is just using them to increase its mass.

In the scenario in which we destroy huge parts of the civilization just to get the things as they were and place carbon atoms where they were. There would be no major difference.

In that case you would find that the entire biomass is restored but you still have a way too much carbon dioxide in the environment. And that carbon dioxide is the one that was created by burning of the fossil fuels

Also we can’t just pump that gas back into the oil wells because we are talking about gas which has much larger volume then liquid or sold from which it came. Plus that would require huge amount of energy. First you need to suck it from the atmosphere and then to pump it deep below the ground.



Now some people say "well we will find a way with time, we always do".
I mean this is a logic of a typical modern cizizen. (throughtout the world)

But if you objectivly take a look at what is going on in nature it is easy to conclude that things are already pretty much out of control and that global changes are already underway.


So here are some pictures that you will never see or very rarely see in public media.

Note* I just want to warn people that the "hills" in the backround of every picture are actaully a thousand meters high mountains. (this is just to get the scale)

I could post more but I think this is enough to get the point.


And the worst thing is that the melting rates are increasing. Which is because of two reasons
1. Higher green house gasses concentration
2. The glaciers have a problem maintaining it's mass after a certain point. (this is simplified)

So if you judge by how things are going the calculations say that by 2025 most of the worlds glaciers will be completly gone or gone for the most part.
(some are already gone)

It is true that climate fluctuates and you can say the same for the Sun but this is not natural variation since changes are too big they are coming too fast and we know from quantum physics which gases are green house gases.
(but I will get to that later)


Now I will give you an example of what all of that actually means.


Here is one video from Amazon basin where you can nicely see what happens when glaciers are not providing enough water during a dry season. (since they no longer exists)
Basicly you see everything what you need to see in first 60 seconds and later is just simply talk.


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-ZXuDVyUwU"]Amazon drought[/YOUTUBE]


Why is this a bigger problem then it looks like I will say some other time.

 

[forzen]

Too bad its not because of a zombie apocalyse, it would have been alot more exiting and alot more people would actually care.

 

[Intricate Mystic]

To OP: The global warming issue is interesting.... looking forward to hearing more of your thoughts about it.

 

[JHBowden]

Doomage! Oh noes!

Forget about the world -- in about 100 years, *we* will all be skeletons.

 

[Virtual ghost]

I will continue.


Why is this drought probleem bigger problem than it looks like ?


Because forests countain alot of carbon. So when a drought hits a forest starts to dry up and when it gets to a certain point it will be consumed by fire. Since deficit of water/moisture and fairly high temperatures have that effect on a forest(s).

But as a fair amount of the worlds rives will cease to function properly huge amout of green house gases will be released into the atmosphere. Boosting global warming to phase when it becomes quite observable.

Also this is one of the main reasons why I tend not to go into the countles debates about climate models. I means climate models simpy do don't have this variable in them what makes them I will dare to say "uselss". Uncertanties always exist but in this case it is obvious what the trend is.


The problem with this scerario is that in this case the efects of global warming are boosting global warming even further. What means carbon dioxide will allow melting of glaciers higher up the mountains and in higher latitudes. What will allow further melting of glaciers higher up the mountains and in higher latitudes. Etc.


But the only thing that is showing sings of a radical change are glaciers around the world and frozen Arctic sea. While Greenland and Antartic ice sheet are without major changes. (even if many claim otherwise)

However as glaciers are disappearing and forests burning that will no longer be the case.



Now I will turn to the place where melting actually occures and that is Arctic sea at the North pole. So I will try to explain why there is not much contradictory data coming out in media.


Here how this works.

Every year for the last coouple of millions of years there is large melting and freezing at Arctic sea. As you can see from the graph the differances between minimun and maximum are quite large. Which is because noth pole is expossed to the Sun during a summer.


Here is the picture how this looks like.

Since the Earth is inclined towards it's plane of moving the north pole comes under the sunlight every summer, what starts a huge melt. That is completly natural. While during a winter is in complete darkness for months, what replaces the ice for another cycle.


However as we pumperd out a huge ammount of green house gases the melting seasons are becoming "too strong". What decreases the surface of ice in the Arctic sea too much.

So why there is no capital difference between the extend of ice at winter before and now?


The reason why this mechanism doesn't work during the winter times is becuse the pole is in darkness. I mean carbon dioxide is not creating heat/warmth it only traps it. So if there is no sun-light there is no above average temperatures crerated by green house gases. (and global warming seems to stop)

Until the pole again comes at the sunlight. What then multiplys with factor of higher green house gases in the atmosphere. What then reduces the extend of ice during summers.

However things are not that simple. The ice reflects alot of energy back into the space. While dark sea surface is absorbing it. What creates a further feedback in ice melt. What means that the planet recives more energy then it used to during a summer time. What can create unusually high temperatures during a summer. Especially since Arctic sea it turned towards the Sun.


What returns us at the beginning of the story.

Why are glaciers melting ?

Because planet recives more energy than it used too. Since green-house gases are trapping it. And as they are melting the droughts are(will be) getting stronger. What creates equation : preindustrial greenhouse gases +
greenhouse gases that are a byproduct of human activity + greenhouse gases that will come out of plant life because of droughts + Arctic sea warms the planet now since it will have very little or no ice during summer(s) = different world.


However I must say that things are not linear as they are described.


If you are not sure that you get the idea try reading some of my previous posts since this is "closed story". Since it is story about a closed cycle that is created/started by human activity


Ok I will stop here.

 

[Virtual ghost]

The reason why I have opened this thread is because I needed a place where to place my views on environemental issues. Especially global warming. Since I have professional intrests in this controversial topic.


However I have found on you tube a series of really good videos about this topic. To me it was nothing new but the persentation is really good.
So instead of posting walls of text I will post videos.

Especially since they cover the social and political aspects of the problem that are not really my area of expertise. However I do think that videos contain a few minor incorrect facts. What does not change anything technically.

The only thing that really lack here is a summary that would be a conclusion and creation of all connections. (What I will do in some other post)
But as the it says in the videos this topic can't be explained in a simple way. Basicly it can be much more simple than this and be something that you can call an explanation.


I trully hope that this will explain some things to people on this forum.


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3dYhC_AlYw&feature=related"]Polar ice update[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0JsdSDa_bM&feature=related"]Weather and climate[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWJeqgG3Tl8&feature=related"]Temperature leads carbon[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFGU6qvkmTI&feature=related"]About concentrations[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kffsux-ifKk&feature=related"]Sea level rise[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9SGw75pVas&feature=related"]Evidence in nature[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Sf_UIQYc20&feature=related"]Sun and GW[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSXgiml5UwM&feature=related"]GW on other planets[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPA-8A4zf2c&feature=related"]Emissions of CO2[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6Un69RMNSw&feature=related"]Climate models[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAtD9aZYXAs&feature=related"]Water vapour[/YOUTUBE]



And here are videos that are more of a political nature.


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boj9ccV9htk&feature=related"]The great global warming swindle[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khikoh3sJg8&feature=related"]Climate crock[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P70SlEqX7oY&feature=related"]Climate gate 1[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJFZ88EH6i4&feature=related"]Climate gate 2[/YOUTUBE]

[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NJEouqefis&feature=related"]Wars and food[/YOUTUBE]


However I will leave conclusions to other forum members for now.

 

[Virtual ghost]

Well I think I coved up the question of Global warmingg pretty nicely. However this thread is about all environmental issues instead of being just another global warming.

So I will move foward to something else.

The next stop : The destruction of Aral sea

This is the story that is usually completely unknown to global public and it is a sort of a taboo topic in political and scientific circles. Since the consensus is among the lines "Lets pretend that it did not happen"


The Aral sea was situated in central Asia and it was once the fourth largest lake in the world. However because of human influences on the rivers that feed the lake nothing remained of it.
The sea started to lose its volume rapidly in mid 80's so today it is almost completly gone.

Here how this looks visually.

Basicly even 2008 picture is out of date.


Howwever the strory would not be so big that the dimensions of the lake were not in hundreds of kilometers/miles and max depth was about 40 m (about 120 feet). Which means that it got ports , ships and fishing industry.


But today things look like this.

And this used to be a port.

Also here are two videos about this and why this has a impact on a global scale. Of course videos are obsolete in some elements since the change is sudden.



[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSEdGusF3qA&feature=related"]Aral sea 1[/YOUTUBE]


[YOUTUBE="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC5UIEx83fo&feature=related"]Aral sea 2[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Geno]

Why the world is doomed?


Want the short answer?


Humans are stupid. Well most of us anyway....

 

[AOA]

The world is certainly doomed as we know it - because there are no good people left in it. Instead, it's all the good people whom we thought of that bring doom to the world as we know it.

 

[Virtual ghost]

Why the world is doomed?


Want the short answer?


Humans are stupid. Well most of us anyway....

I am sorry but there is no simple answer. You will just have to go through the thread. Basicly people don't go into this is too deep exactly because the compexity of the issus is a turn off for the. BUt the basicly idea is that the changes in environment and geochemical parameters will do/cause this.

 

[LeafAndSky]

Thank you. I'm just today considering starting an environmental-themed website, so I'll take a closer look at this thread when I get time (I've bookmarked it).

 

[Geno]

I am sorry but there is no simple answer. You will just have to go through the thread. Basicly people don't go into this is too deep exactly because the compexity of the issus is a turn off for the. BUt the basicly idea is that the changes in environment and geochemical parameters will do/cause this.

Yes they do. But humans being idiotic are simply speeding up the process that should be taking longer amount of times. And if it took longer amount of time. Then it would be easier for us to adapt and prepare. The human species are basically commit suicide,.

 

[yvonne]

what was your objective in making this thread? maybe i missed the point?

what does it matter, if the world is doomed? i think it matters what we do today.

 

[eagleseven]

CO2 heats the globe, yes.

Aerosols cool the globe.
Ozone layer depletion also has a net cooling effect.

Focusing on just one (politically profitable) gas is naively short-sighted, and below is partially why:

---

It is quite clear that global temperatures depend upon the pirate population:

We need legislation to increase the number of pirates, ASAP.

---

Also, there's that annoying set of 3000 leaked documents showing that the average global temperatures over the past 100 years were doctored by the East Angling CRU and NASA GISS:

The Tip of the Climategate Iceberg - WSJ.com

And they accidentally deleted the source data. Oops! That wouldn't fly in any other scientific discipline.

YouTube - ClimateGate Who's Who

---

Also there's that annoying admission by the director of the IPCC that they doctored glacier melting data:

DAWN.COM | Sci-Tech | The glacier controversy

IPCC's Himalayan Glacier 'Mistake' No Accident - US News and World Report

But your pictures look so dramatic! Glaciers move over time. While they are receding in your pictures, turns out they are growing at an equivalent rate elsewhere (as glaciers are quite large).

---

Don't forget that Michael Mann admitted his hockey-stick graph based upon tree ring studies was inherently flawed.

---

Your tipping-point theory makes sense, and is something to be concerned about.

Unfortunately, the datasets gathered by the East Anglia CRU and NASA GISS, which have formed the basis of every climate model since the mid-1990s, have been compromised beyond salvage (and partially eliminated), setting the field back nearly a decade.

I agree, climatology is a field worth studying, and holds the potential to predict our future. The field needs to purge itself of corrupt scientist-politicians hunting their Moby Dick, such as Phil Jones and the leaders of the IPCC, and return to the honesty of politically-and-corporate-unaffiliated research. No more carbon-credit get-rich-quick schemes for the politically connected.

How can Climatology advance, when entire nations do not trust the datasets provided by IPCC-affiliated scientists?

YouTube - Hot 'Climategate' debate: Scientists clash LIVE on RT


***

Given how you are convinced that we are doomed, I suspect you are foaming at the mouth. All I want is to see more unadultered data supporting your theory, before we enact civilization-changing legislation to prevent your hypothetical doomsday.

PS: I happen to be educated in the hard sciences, so don't waste your breath calling me an uneducated fundamentalist ape.

 

[Virtual ghost]

PS: I happen to be educated in the hard sciences, so don't waste your breath calling me an uneducated fundamentalist ape.

OK, but wich field of hard science ?


Are you from USA ? (I am truly curious since I am not)

 

[Virtual ghost]

what was your objective in making this thread? maybe i missed the point?

what does it matter, if the world is doomed? i think it matters what we do today.

1. Well I am simply making the case that future my not be what people are expecting it to be.


2, Then do what you think that it should be done. However it seems that changes will have a impact bofore you grow old. Global warming is just one of the variables in this puzzle. The others are deforestation , desertification, over population , political instability , crash of food chains. etc.


I mean this thread is far from over. It is just that I started with global warming.