I'm guessing that mercury thermometers were accurate enough to give people the measurements they needed. Secondary to that is that with enough sample sites and enough collected data points, you're going to get a statistical mean or median that is accurate enough (small enough standard error) that you can compare it to modern measurements. But fuck it, let's stop measuring and analyzing the world we live in because it's all just done with magic and parlor tricks. Right?
They've been publishing temperatures in newspapers since colonial times, if not before that. They're extrapolating temperature data from tree rings and core samples and the like. But how do you actually calculate a statistical mean for the planet? Is it average of temperature samples taken every 10 seconds? High/low temperature of the day? Of the top of the atmosphere? At sea level? http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/decadaltemp.php Here NASA says they use thermometer readings all over the world. They also say that prior to 1880, they did not have sufficient global coverage. Additionally, they say temperatures have increased .8 degrees centigrade since 1880. More specifically, I quote: To conduct its analysis, GISS uses publicly available data from 6,300 meteorological stations around the world; ship-based and satellite observations of sea surface temperature; and Antarctic research station measurements. These three data sets are loaded into a computer analysis program—available for public download from the GISS web site—that calculates trends in temperature anomalies relative to the average temperature for the same month during 1951-1980. The objective, according to GISS scientists, is to provide an estimate of temperature change that could be compared with predictions of global climate change in response to atmospheric carbon dioxide, aerosols, and changes in solar activity. As the maps show, global warming doesn’t mean temperatures rose everywhere at every time by one degree. Temperatures in a given year or decade might rise 5 degrees in one region and drop 2 degrees in another. Exceptionally cold winters in one region might be followed by exceptionally warm summers. Or a cold winter in one area might be balanced by an extremely warm winter in another part of the globe.
A curious mind is naturally skeptical. Others just gobble up whatever bullshit they are fed without thinking critically about it.
Wait, so you deny the billions of government money being given as grants for this 'research' that doesn't provide results that prove the hypothesis? There is a reason to keep pushing the bogus AGW theory, and it has everything to do with money and control over the populace. Drive up energy costs, and keep the proletariat dependent on their masters. Yeah, what a "crazy" theory.
You have got to be kidding me. You're describing the entire energy industry as it stands today. You look like someone who salutes to the flag of big oil and thinks solar paneled oppression is coming their way. If it has to do with energy consumption, then it has to do with money and control over the populace. That's not the issue. The issue is moving to renewable energy.
wow, way to flip out. I was saying not to do anything. Geez. I think the Earth IS getting warmer. Ok?
My stance is warming is happening. The question is to what degree we are contributing to it. I'm not seeing that we are doing it through carbon emissions. Clear cutting the amazon rain forest removed a significant amount of vegetation that converts CO2 to O2 via photosynthesis. Let's not clear cut rain forest anymore, I'm sold. We pave roads with asphalt which absorbs heat from the sun more efficiently than solar panels. As we've increased urban sprawl, there's a lot more surface area that's not reflecting much heat back to space. Maybe we could use something less efficient, so thermometer readings nearby won't reflect the radiated heat from the asphalt. Glaciers have been receding for the last 10,000 years. Less white surface means less heat reflected back to space. Nothing we can do about that. I have no interest in coal or oil or solar panels. My interest is in not having to spend my time gathering energy or sitting near a candle to read at night. Or spending way more for energy than is reasonable. There's a reason we use oil and coal - it's cheap and many times more efficient than alternatives. After seeing alternative energy subsidized and govt. investing huge sums in businesses that fail, there isn't the win expressed in the hype.
You support an equally greedy and evil industry that is taking $billions in cash payments from the taxpayer only to go bankrupt or underperform the alternatives. We are all paying more for food (an obvious example) due to the extra money needed to subsidize the money losing proposition.
The difference is that the current energy industry is about creating the cheapest energy possible, regardless of pollution. The people, through the government, then puts limits on their ability to pollute. The "green" energy folks put the idea about carbon output and its deleterious effects front and center to eliminate a cheaper alternative, so they can dominate the market. To get it even close to competitive, they pay politicians to have us subsidize them. If it diminishes future economic growth or the ability for people to afford the same lifestyle, well then that's just tough. In other words, with one side, it's business trying to deliver the cheapest possible energy source with the people putting limitations on them via pollution regulations. On the other, it's business buying public officials to legislate the elimination of their cheaper competition to try to take over the market. I prefer when government is working for the people rather than working for crony capitalists. I am a fan of the market. When those alternative energies are far enough along, they'll bury carbon-based fuels. Right now, they're not ready for prime time.
You make some good points in here. I guess I just don't see the problem. There is no magic fix to the energy situation we are in. If we ever make a transition to renewable energy, there will a lifestyle change for the majority of those living in "The first world." We live in excess. It is unsustainable. It's not going to last. The question for me is if we allow the global oil industry to "run its course" or do we enact change while there is still time? When we eventually make the transition away from fossil fuels (and it is inevitable), it will be much more uncomfortable than if we force a change now. I don't think, and you may disagree with me here, that the captains of industry are going to willingly shift to a more environmentally friendly (and less efficient) energy resource when there is still a drop of oil to sell. And they're going to do all they can to hinder the progress of renewable energy research to maximize their profits. Besides, I don't think that we are going to willingly lower our standard of living in order to make the shift either. Such is the short-sightedness of humans. For me, the whole global warming debate is a side show distraction. It is infected with money and politics from both sides and has become stagnant and vitriolic. It has replaced the conversation we should be having about renewable energy and pollution, much to the delight of the current energy industry.
In short, if, though political finagling, we make the move from a corrupt oil industry to a corrupt renewable energy industry, I'm fine with that. Small victories.
I'm not sure you need to be running around like your hair is on fire over this. There are no new coal or gas power plants scheduled to be built in California, but there are lots of rewnewable boondoggles approved and being built. In other words, the corrupt renewable energy industry is winning here. The big difference is that this industry sucks money out of the govt. treasuries. What kind of magic wand is there that makes us stop using our abundant energy source this instant and use something that doesn't exist yet?
There isn't. Spending our time jerking ourselves off over which scientists gave more accurate predictions of temperatures is going in the opposite direction, however.
Spending our time preventing an agenda that would cost 10s of $trillions for no gain is absolutely worthwhile.
