Greenland is now melting at a potentially catastrophic pace

a reply to: Grimpachi

I am refering to the same ice sheet as the OP and so is my source, so I don't know what you are on about.

a reply to: lostbook

You are absolutely right friend. My point. Worrisome? Yes.Disconcerting? Sure is. But, you know....if we left the planet and came back in 1,000 years....it would look different. Changes will have carved out a new Earth. Its what it does.

Can we change or stop it? No. Not by much that would make any difference as a whole. Is some our fault? Surely.

The one thing that troubles us...is we are down here to witness it. Thats all. The older I get, the more I realize the inevitable is mostly out of our hands.

My friend by the river will keep losing everything each flood season...and rebuild in the exact same spot....and not even finish rebuilding before that next season gets here...and he could lose again all he had left from the last time.

Comes a time to cut our losses and move on to a better locale. And even then? We just can't change mother nature....it's what it will always do: change.

Thank you for your response...MS

Boy, glass half full no?

I think the planet and the people will be just fine. Stop with the b.s. the scientists have NO clue about climate. Look up the younger-dryas episode in our recent past.
Ice sheets returned, from a minimum into canada, to new york in under 300 years or so.
I mention this because ole planet earth will do what it will, man or not.
a reply to: Rapha

How is this even an argument? Who cares whether we caused it or not?

The truth is we are looking at big changes, particularly at the shoreline, where 70% of the world population lives (for all kinds of super obvious reasons). Some (most) of these people are going to have to move in the next 60-100 years, no matter what we do or don't do. The real question is: what are the potential costs? And how much are we willing to pay to mitigate the fallout?

Also -- possibly -- would it be cheaper to pour our resources into genetic manipulation instead? I'm thinking humans, adapted to living in or near contaminated oceans, is a huge growth industry, going forward.

originally posted by: 0zzymand0s
How is this even an argument? Who cares whether we caused it or not?

The truth is we are looking at big changes, particularly at the shoreline, where 70% of the world population lives (for all kinds of super obvious reasons). Some (most) of these people are going to have to move in the next 60-100 years, no matter what we do or don't do. The real question is: what are the potential costs? And how much are we willing to pay to mitigate the fallout?

Also -- possibly -- would it be cheaper to pour our resources into genetic manipulation instead? I'm thinking humans, adapted to living in or near contaminated oceans, is a huge growth industry, going forward.

Changes yes, how big depends for a variety of reasons. first off, and all according to where you are, a perceived rise in sea level, (like making a water level mark on a beach cliff) can actually be quite the opposite, where it is really the land mass that is tipping down. That's called amongst other names, Isostatic Rebound from the last glacial period, where the land can rise in one place and maybe falls elsewhere on that mass due to the retreat of ice over the land mass for thousands of years, and sure as hell, nothing to do with puny so called AGW for instance, but you could call it climate change in a sort of way. I doubt Al Gorey would make much mention of that, his tack is somewhere else..hmm, maybe he should.
It is being noticed directly now in Southern Ireland, where Connemara beaches have water ingressing, while Northern Ireland is rising at it's most northeastern front.
People living near the sea may have to move at some time, again for no particular reason, like in England, they've been doing that for a long time when seacliffs collapse...simply because they have a habit of collapsing anyway, that's called erosion, and is patently obvious.
As for manipulation, it doesn't have to be genetic, spinning a yarn works much better.

5 nights ago we had a freezing night bad frost.
its 2 am now and its 13'c out side. inside 24'c
inside I am melting. computer fan is on full blast!
in UK we did not get a winter.

Its not climate change but its is pollution from china.

Pollution particles from china spreads across the northern hemisphere to land on the ice of the arctic. Darker ice more melt.

This is why you see less ice lost in the antarctic and a lot more in the northern hemisphere.
weather.com...
climate.nasa.gov...
www.sciencemag.org...
wattsupwiththat.com...

Its always interesting to remember.

You know those fluffy things in the sky, and that wet stuff that falls from them?

That ALL comes from the Oceans and Seas of the World.

Watch some timelapse photography of Earth from satellites, you will see the clouds form From the Oceans, the moist air creates rain and clouds as it hist cooler air near mountains on land....but that moist air Still all comes from the Oceans.

So ALL the fresh water on land on Earth, is recycled from the Oceans......Imagine how much rain actually occurs in the oceans too, tho land does help condensation.

So will the warming of the land, which will have little ice supposedly, and the warming of the oceans, actually cause more clouds and more rain on Earth, therefore less water in the oceans, and the white clouds reflect the Sunlight, causing a cooler Earth? And the cycle repeats itself....Ice age, Warming, Floods, dryness, then wetness, Ice age etc etc.??

Then there is all the water UNDER the Earth's surface.....thought to be almost as much as the surface oceans.....

All I can say is, we all better drink more water........

a reply to: Mianeye

Sooo.. The animals are safer from hunters? =p

Forgeting for a moment,the debate of global warming itself... Even if the earth gets a little warmer and the co2 levels are higher, there is little reason to think that will cause the doom predicted. The earth periodically gets much warmer than it is now. And sometimes colder too. Increased co2 levels also increase plant growth, and oxygen production.

All the while there is actual global scale eco-doom ongoing. Fukushima, fertilzer and glyphosate ocean runoff, the garbage island, fracking and polluting our drinking water...the real list of doom is lengthy.

To be sure Im all for clean renewable energy in everything. They push global warming hard though as a political idea because they want to use it to create a world currency based on carbon taxes. Thats what its about. Which is not to say there is no effect on the climate, but that the doom is greatly exaggerated.

I am as prone to the human goldfish phenomenon as anyone else so the inevitable devastating changes caused by rising oceans doesn't panic me because I will be dead when it really shows.

But, I am all for the US switching to renewable energy sources immediately because relying on petroleum fuels effects me now.

Why do we spend trillions on the ME literally wasting money on bullets and bombs as well as the resources and lives to deliver them there?

It is because they have oil that corporations want. There are plenty of atrocities going on all over the world, but we stay out of it because they don't have resources we want. Let's become self-sufficient and let the ME sort out their own problems on their own dime. We have plenty of our own oil that can fill the needs of plastics and other petroleum products and if our energy and fuel was derived from other sources those petroleum products would be cheaper our military budget would be smaller as well as the fear factor from terrorism because if we stay out of their countries and business they will have no reason to focus on us.

originally posted by: 0zzymand0s
How is this even an argument? Who cares whether we caused it or not?

The truth is we are looking at big changes, particularly at the shoreline, where 70% of the world population lives (for all kinds of super obvious reasons). Some (most) of these people are going to have to move in the next 60-100 years, no matter what we do or don't do. The real question is: what are the potential costs? And how much are we willing to pay to mitigate the fallout?

Also -- possibly -- would it be cheaper to pour our resources into genetic manipulation instead? I'm thinking humans, adapted to living in or near contaminated oceans, is a huge growth industry, going forward.

theres a solution for nuclea rplants on coast. building huge dams around them to keep them from being destroyed by rising waters UNTIL they can be properly shut off or move the cores. Also Some shoreline is different heights than others. take england for example at dover if i remember correctly. Sea walls would also be good as well along coastlines.

a reply to: LSU0408

Then it will be green like it's supposed to be and people go on with their everyday normal lives like always.

The majority of the worlds population lives on or near an ocean. And you think a 20 foot sea level rise would have no impact and people can "live their normal lives" there?

originally posted by: Cancerwarrior
a reply to: LSU0408

Then it will be green like it's supposed to be and people go on with their everyday normal lives like always.

The majority of the worlds population lives on or near an ocean. And you think a 20 foot sea level rise would have no impact and people can "live their normal lives" there?

Umm it wont b einstant like in thos edisaster movies either. gradually rising which gives you time to relocate further inland to the new beahcfront property. OR make coastal cities LIKE VENICE and make houses able to float.

Well, 'they' seem to be doing there job of getting rid of coal and oil, Peabody energy has filled for chapter eleven, a huge coal mining operation, one of the 'big five' in that industry.

a reply to: pikestaff

Yes. Natural gas is rapidly pricing coal out of the energy market.

a reply to: yuppa

Umm it wont b einstant like in thos edisaster movies either.

You sure of that?

OR make coastal cities LIKE VENICE and make houses able to float.

Yeah, because poor people along the coasts of africa and SE asia can afford just to build their own houseboats.

ask anyone here in Canada...we all hope that global warming is real. We hope it speeds up too. Cuz it's freezing up here.

originally posted by: Cancerwarrior
a reply to: yuppa

Umm it wont b einstant like in thos edisaster movies either.

You sure of that?

OR make coastal cities LIKE VENICE and make houses able to float.

Yeah, because poor people along the coasts of africa and SE asia can afford just to build their own houseboats.

hey each country for itself pal. If they are destined to drown they will.

originally posted by: LSU0408
FWIW:

The oldest ever recovered DNA samples have been collected from under more than a mile of Greenland ice, and their analysis suggests the island was much warmer during the last Ice Age than previously thought.

The DNA is proof that sometime between 450,000 and 800,000 years ago, much of Greenland was especially green and covered in a boreal forest that was home to alder, spruce and pine trees, as well as insects such as butterflies and beetles.

From the genetic material of these organisms, the researchers infer that Greenland’s temperature once varied from 50 degrees Fahrenheit in summer to 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit in winter—the temperature range that the tree species prefer.

In other words, this won't hurt anyone and is the same changes the Earth has been going through for million and billions of years. I highly doubt factories and V8 engines and electricity and buying appliances in excessive packaging was a part of the warming trend 450,000 years ago. Worst case scenario, people move a little further inland, and residence can be taken in more parts of Greenland again.

You don't say? Last I checked humans have only been on the planet some 200,000 years, human civilization has only existed for some 6000 years, and modern society for about 100 years. So I'd say that while the EARTH will go on, pretending like it will be business as usual for humans is naive. Heck this also applies to life forms that AREN'T human as well. Changes like this don't occur without MASSIVE die offs.

But hey, let's not get TOO apocalyptic here. I'm sure human civilization can survive the Earth's changes no matter how much we alter the climate. I cannot deny that humans aren't resourceful; we'll adapt. It's the resultant depletion of natural resources and available land to live on that will become a HUGE problem going forward. If humans can't learn to share better between countries then we will likely tear ourselves apart with war. Which is doubtful considering all the isolationist groups that have popped up throughout the US and Europe. As far as adapting goes though, I'd rather try to work together rather than kill off MORE humans because we want to keep hogging more than we need.

Food for thought: All things considered, capitalism may end up being too destructive for humans to practice much more. At least not until we can start securing resources and space to live off the planet. Once we can do that, capitalism will have near unlimited resources to plunder (plus no need to worry about polluting the environment if there isn't anything alive on the surface).

But in any case, to pretend like this is nothing to worry about is laughable. You have probably already started experiencing the altered climate patterns where you live. It may not be much now, but things like record snow falls covering parts of the country that snow rarely touches or crazy huge hurricanes start to add up. Plus they will become more frequent