Ten years on.. according to the Dr, there ain't any snow.

Well at least that is what the good Dr David Viner said ten years ago,
Dr Viner a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, "within a few years winter snowfall will become a very rare and exciting event”.

source, The Independant.

www.independent.co.uk...

Of course there is now a scramble on to say that AGW is causing more snow as addressed by George Monbiot, who would have us do all this to combat AGW...maybe he calls it climate change now too.

Monbiot believes that drastic action coupled with strong political will is needed to combat global warming. Monbiot has written that climate change is the "moral question of the 21st century" and that there is an urgent need for a raft of emergency actions he believes will stop climate change, including: setting targets on greenhouse emissions using the latest science; issuing every citizen with a 'personal carbon ration'; new building regulations with houses built to German passivhaus standards; banning incandescent lightbulbs, patio heaters, garden floodlights, and other inefficient technologies and wasteful applications; constructing large offshore wind farms; replacing the national gas grid with a hydrogen pipe network; a new national coach network to make journeys using public transport faster than using a car; all petrol stations to supply leasable electric car batteries with stations equipped with a crane service to replace depleted batteries; scrap road-building and road-widening programmes, redirecting their budgets to tackle climate change; reduce UK airport capacity by 90%; closing down all out-of-town superstores and replacing them with warehouses and a delivery system.

source, Wiki,

wapedia.mobi...

More on George Monbiot here,

www.guardian.co.uk...


Now here's a "cake and eat it statement" also from The Guardian,

The short answer is we don't know. Freezing winters should become less common, but whether short spells of heavy snow or low temperatures are on the rise is yet to be determined. The warming of climate change combines with cycles of natural variation in the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic, as well as solar cycles, making year-to-year predictions of regional weather very difficult. Over coming decades, the predictions are clearer: it's getting warmer.

Found here,

www.guardian.co.uk...

Do these current statements bear any resemblance to what Dr Viner, of the prestigious UEA said a decade ago? I dont think so.



Mod Note: IMPORTANT: Using Content From Other Websites on ATS - Please Review This Link.

Mod Edit: External Source Tags – Please Review This Link.

reply to post by smurfy


Starred and flagged. How many people here remember the old "Club of Rome" predictions in the early seventies, which said that by the turn of the century we'd have almost 12 billion people on earth, and mass starvation would happen?

Well, it is rather exciting and a bit unusual. And he didn't say there wouldn't be any snow.

However, these threads are actually quite common. Think this is the third on Viner's comments in the last week or so, lol.

Originally posted by melatonin
Well, it is rather exciting and a bit unusual. And he didn't say there wouldn't be any snow.

However, these threads are actually quite common. Think this is the third on Viner's comments in the last week or so, lol.

edit on 24-12-2010 by melatonin because: (no reason given)

Must be something in the air then!

reply to post by mydarkpassenger


Obviously, many programs were put into place, both in public awareness, and those hidden from public view.

Originally posted by smurfy
Must be something in the air then!

*sniff* *sniff*

Uh-huh. Smells a bit like a mouldy strawman.

Originally posted by unityemissions
reply to post by mydarkpassenger

 

Obviously, many programs were put into place, both in public awareness, and those hidden from public view.

Nothing obvious at all. Unless you count the fact that the COR was simply wrong.

Originally posted by mydarkpassenger
reply to post by smurfy

 

Starred and flagged. How many people here remember the old "Club of Rome" predictions in the early seventies, which said that by the turn of the century we'd have almost 12 billion people on earth, and mass starvation would happen?

Yeah, Oddly enough we are only half that population (6,889,887,904) Yet there is still massive starvation going on. About 1/6 of the world is not getting enough food to eat.

earthsky.org...

Not even sure why I posted this... But it's true... I would consider 1/6 of the worlds population massive starvation... and we are only at half the predicted population level.

That said, I like the point the OP makes.... A case of Climate changers ( I am not a changer or denier) trying to have it both ways... Well, I am sorry. In this case you can't have it both ways. it either is or is not. Simple as that.

Originally posted by gimme_some_truth

Originally posted by mydarkpassenger
reply to post by smurfy

 

Starred and flagged. How many people here remember the old "Club of Rome" predictions in the early seventies, which said that by the turn of the century we'd have almost 12 billion people on earth, and mass starvation would happen?

Yeah, Oddly enough we are only half that population (6,889,887,904) Yet there is still massive starvation going on. About 1/6 of the world is not getting enough food to eat.

earthsky.org...

Not even sure why I posted this... But it's true... I would consider 1/6 of the worlds population massive starvation... and we are only at half the predicted population level.

That said, I like the point the OP makes.... A case of Climate changers ( I am not a changer or denier) trying to have it both ways... Well, I am sorry. In this case you can't have it both ways. it either is or is not. Simple as that.

Thanks for your post, which does really highlight much more important, and immediate needs which have been going along for years and years, and takes in the whole gamut of our short time in this world, and short time science and also how those issues you speak of, are so demeaned by some areas of science and perhaps even philosophy when it comes to the money trail. Governments need to be seriously engaged in issues like hunger and also issues like possible climate change, but they are so short termed that they have little time to distinguish from waffle and vested interest. By vested interest, I mean who gets the money, and why do they get it? that may not be so simple.

Originally posted by melatonin

Originally posted by smurfy
Must be something in the air then!

*sniff* *sniff*

Uh-huh. Smells a bit like a mouldy strawman.

edit on 24-12-2010 by melatonin because: (no reason given)

Hi Mel,
The strawman theme is not considered here, there is no false premise. Gimme-truth has made the proper assessment.

reply to post by smurfy


So you think posing the thread as "ten years on...according to the Dr, there isn't any snow" is an honest representation of what Viner said?

Don't think so. Pure strawman.

He said that snow would become a rare and exciting event. It has become rarer and it has been pretty exciting. Indeed, this is why we have been so unprepared for the snowfalls over this last 12 months (late winter 09/10 and early 10/11)

For instance, this Met office page gives an easy comparison between the average days of snowfall in the UK between 1961-1990 and 1971-2000, and just eyeballing shows that it fell between those two periods across large areas of the UK.

You see, there is a difference between something not existing and something being rare.

Now, will we get more or less snowfall in future? Well, this is an interesting issue, and it is entirely possible for us in the UK to get more snowfall and for the earth's climate to be warming. While we have been covered in snow at times this year, large areas of the arctic are being relatively 'toasted'.



So who is right Viner or this new analysis? Only time will tell - this last 12 months might be the rare event or the beginnings of a longer term change in our seasonal weather. But you and Gimme might be surprised to hear that neither would be inconsistent with a global long-term warming trend.

This is a regional issue, and one that even Call-me-Dave has noted is important for the Met Office to examine in more detail. As we might then be prepared in future, rather than get so excited by what is currently viewed as a rare event (which is why we were so unprepared).

reply to post by melatonin


Notwithstanding the title of the thread, (although the good Dr did actually refer to the possibility of disruptive snow in 20 years not ten or any other number) Snow is really incidental, where I am there has been snow yearly to some degree or another. These last two years however, are more important in the prolonged low temperatures, and beginning at an early stage, (it's actually -8 where I am tonight) and I am near the coast. I think you know rightly the thrust of this thread, which is to point out the ambiguity of the statements that our experts make year in and year out, in that they always have to qualify everything they say, at end of their statements, often in a miniscule paragraph. I post two links of published experts opinions which end up in gobblydegook for our salivation,

www.dailymail.co.uk...

www.independent.co.uk...

It's up to you to make what you want of these ideas, maybe trying to read between the lines is as good as anything else, but that's my opinon.

Yes of course, don't you know? down is now up and up is the new down. And global warming causes record snowfalls

It's hillarious watching the faithfull make excuses.

Originally posted by smurfy
reply to post by melatonin

 

Notwithstanding the title of the thread, (although the good Dr did actually refer to the possibility of disruptive snow in 20 years not ten or any other number) Snow is really incidental, where I am there has been snow yearly to some degree or another.

So I guess you see where the strawman comment of mine came from.

These last two years however, are more important in the prolonged low temperatures, and beginning at an early stage, (it's actually -8 where I am tonight) and I am near the coast. I think you know rightly the thrust of this thread, which is to point out the ambiguity of the statements that our experts make year in and year out, in that they always have to qualify everything they say, at end of their statements, often in a miniscule paragraph.

Science is uncertain, or ambiguous, at its forefront. That's the norm. It would be pretty easy if we could perform a single study and discover unerring truth.

I post two links of published experts opinions which end up in gobblydegook for our salivation,

www.dailymail.co.uk...

The problem there is David Rose. He is not a reliable source of climate science. Indeed, most of the media is quite crap. Even Monbiot.

Rose misrepresented the findings of Mojab Latif; who was somewhat peeved about it:

The Mail on Sunday article said that Latif's research showed that the current cold weather heralds such "a global trend towards cooler weather".

It said: "The BBC assured viewers that the big chill was was merely short-term 'weather' that had nothing to do with 'climate', which was still warming. The work of Prof Latif and the other scientists refutes that view."

Not according to Latif. "They are not related at all," he said. "What we are experiencing now is a weather phenomenon, while we talked about the mean temperature over the next 10 years. You can't compare the two."

dinky-link

www.independent.co.uk...

This is based on a recent new study from a pair of russian scientists. It might be a prescient study (as the study was completed in 2009) or perhaps not. New studies like this need time to be digested by the scientific community.

It's up to you to make what you want of these ideas, maybe trying to read between the lines is as good as anything else, but that's my opinon.

I essentially wait and see. In science, shiny new studies are viewed as highly provisional. But the media cares little for how science works - they are more concerned with controversial heads. Much like your own, lol.

So, again, snowy regional winters are not inconsistent with long-term global warming. Indeed, perhaps you already know that some scientists suggest that alterations in the gulfstream due to climate change will eventually disrupt the normal climate of northern Europe long-term (so these type of ideas are not unusual in this field and have been around for a while).

However, we are having a pretty cold winter - but parts of the Arctic are several degrees above their norm, and we are on course for the warmest year on record in the GISS data (and close in others). So global warming hasn't disappeared.

I think it was Holdren who was recently scorned by certain peeps for suggesting the term 'climate disruption' was more informative than climate change. Perhaps it is.

"Climate disruption" is good as an analogy since it impliies intervention, and that can come from any source, and so is not definitive, in that we are in agreement. As for the MSM, haven't bought a paper in years, did I miss something?