Global Warming: Long term observations yield unsurprising results

[Aractus]

Sea level rise is influenced from surface temperatures. As the surface temperatures increase -> more glaciers melt -> sea level rises as summarized in the plot below. Deep oceans do play a role, and so do glaciers.

So where's your graph that shows sea levels receding during the little ice age then?

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That is not what the chart you posted shows. According to your chart sea levels have remained relatively stable for the last 8000 years. If you look at the data at a finer scale…

The graph shows 130m sea level rise of the past 20,000 years. 6.5m per millennia on average. 65cm per century, on average. IPCC projected sea level rise from 2000 to 2100 is 20 - 45cm. That's between 30 - 70% less than the average sea level rise for the past 20,000 years.

Also, glaciers are remnants of the little ice age, of a past climate that was once able to sustain them. With or without 20th century global warming they would be melting.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I have a question though that maybe someone more versed in this topic will know. Aren't we going to run out of fossil fuel to burn somewhat soon?

Pretty much all the catastrophes predicted by politically corrupted science have never happened. Supposedly we should have already run out of fossil fuels by now, as predicted in the early 80's. Oh, and we're all starving to death now because of the 'population bomb', predicted in the 70's. In the 50's the best science predicted another ice age.

Ironically, the proposed solutions to all these problems take the form of hippy-dippy progressive government enforced solutions. Disaster will be averted if we all recycle, install compost toilets, use public transportation, become vegetarians, and lower our standards of living back to before the industrial revolution. And if you don't, you will be made to care by our enlightened socialist masters.

Actually, the population bomb was held in temporary abeyance by the Green Revolution; oil depletion has been partially offset by technologies such as steam extraction and tracking.

That doesn't change the fact the overpopulation is a critical danger, or that oil is a finite resource. It only means that we've delayed the day of reckoning.

[The Grand Nudger]

Pretty much been our thing since day one though, eh? Exploit the environment to put off ones personal or collective "day of reckoning"? Imagine a future dystopia, horrendously overpopulated in the grandest sense. I think we'd find some way of exploiting that body rich environment, you? IDK, we made it through a couple of major fuel crisis (and many, many major environmental changes)..sometimes we did more than just make it. It's difficult to understand the day of reckoning portion, in the context of a creatures whose specialty is and always has been general survival. There is the alternative speculation - that our future fuel changeover (it'll have to happen eventually) will follow the same patterns that previous changeovers have gone. With some areas benefiting greatly and others missing that train.

-Some work in storage and transmission (of energy in municipal grids) would probably forestall that change for centuries. If we didn't have to burn full speed all the time -in case- power was required...and instead produced discrete units with the ability to buffer the whole. Better battery, essentially.

[Surgenator]

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Sea level rise is influenced from surface temperatures. As the surface temperatures increase -> more glaciers melt -> sea level rises as summarized in the plot below. Deep oceans do play a role, and so do glaciers.

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So where's your graph that shows sea levels receding during the little ice age then?

I don't have data for those times. Does that mean this data doesn't show a link between sea level rise and glacier ice melting? The direct link is pretty obvious, more water going from land to sea. Do you have a reason why glacier melting doesn't contribute to sea level rise?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Pretty much been our thing since day one though, eh? Exploit the environment to put off ones personal or collective "day of reckoning"? Imagine a future dystopia, horrendously overpopulated in the grandest sense. I think we'd find some way of exploiting that body rich environment, you? IDK, we made it through a couple of major fuel crisis (and many, many major environmental changes)..sometimes we did more than just make it. It's difficult to understand the day of reckoning portion, in the context of a creatures whose specialty is and always has been general survival. There is the alternative speculation - that our future fuel changeover (it'll have to happen eventually) will follow the same patterns that previous changeovers have gone. With some areas benefiting greatly and others missing that train.

I don't think previous changeovers had to face the corporate intransigence that this one will.

Of course, all of life is about putting off the day of reckoning. The question is, have we selected the right strategy? I'm not sure that "oh, we've managed crises before, let's not worry about this one" cuts much ice.

-Some work in storage and transmission (of energy in municipal grids) would probably forestall that change for centuries. If we didn't have to burn full speed all the time -in case- power was required...and instead produced discrete units with the ability to buffer the whole. Better battery, essentially.

Absolutely Better batteries, and smaller, more efficient transducers, so that more energy can be produced locally from indigenous sources.

[The Grand Nudger]

I don't think previous changeovers had to face the corporate intransigence that this one will.

True, our entrenchment has never been coordinated by such well organized affiliations - even if our reliance has always been just about as complete. Guess we'll have to see how that goes, but with the history there, I'm not holding my breath with regards to dignity or grace coming from that sector.

The question is, have we selected the right strategy? I'm not sure that "oh, we've managed crises before, let's not worry about this one" cuts much ice.

Worrying does nothing. Less worry, more work. In any case, i think, if thats the question..the answer would have to be yes. I don;t think we picked the best -possible- strategy, but fossil fuel exploitation was probably the best practical strategy - I'd even be willing to put that out there as an objective statement, something that can be quantified from multiple angles. We use them because they're good at what they do. We'd have needed something else equally good at what they do, and that something simply didn't exist for most of our use history.

Absolutely Better batteries, and smaller, more efficient transducers, so that more energy can be produced locally from indigenous sources.

Provided those indigenous sources outperform fossil fuels, yes. If not, it makes more sense to ship in refined fuels (and this would always be the case, regardless of the source). That is one thing that fuel has going for it. Easy to move, holds the energy better than a battery. Indigenous sources have to overcome the efficiency of all available and economically transportable alternatives..otherwise their use will rely, perpetually, on subsidy- and that subsidy will be paid for, in part, by the very fuel they wish to replace...as now with alternatives and fossil fuels.

(I'm a big alternative fuels guy, just laying the ground for why oil and coal are at the top of the heap, and what has to be done to replace them, or to replace any credible alternative to either with locally sourced this or thats).