Quote:
Originally Posted by AstralTraveller
Global warming was of course hypothesised in the late 19th century after the radiative forcing properties of CO2 and the fact that atmospheric CO2 concentrations are increasing was recognised. On that theme Isaac Asimov wrote an essay in 1959 entitled 'No More Ice Ages?'. However in 1922 it was impossible to say that AGW was occurring - even if they had had the supercomputers required to run Global Circulation Models (GCMs).
When numerous iterations of many different GCM are given the conditions in 1900 and told about changes in solar output, volcanism etc and run for 100 years up until 1950 there is no statistical difference between iterations which account for increasing CO2, those that don't and the actual climate record. After 1950, however, instances of the GCMs that don't allow for increasing CO2 concentrations show a downward trend while those that do allow for the increase and the actual climate record both show an upward trend. Having this situation carefully explained to me (with supporting data presented) is what tipped me from believing AGW is theoretically possible but as yet unproven to believing that it has been observed.
We are indeed fortunate that we now have much more reliable, robust, and spatially and temporally complete data than a few fishermens' stories.  |
This deffinitely NOT what our older more conservative folk are hearing on talk back radio 24/7
