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OT: Home PCs Predict Hotter Earth

T

Terry Pinnell

Jan 1, 1970
0
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66424,00.html

"Global warming may ramp up average temperatures by 20 degrees
Fahrenheit in less than 50 years, according to the first climate
prediction experiment relying on the distributed computer power of
90,000 personal computers. The startling results were published this
week in the journal Nature."

Now that's a source I'd tend to respect...
 
J

Jim Thompson

Jan 1, 1970
0
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66424,00.html

"Global warming may ramp up average temperatures by 20 degrees
Fahrenheit in less than 50 years, according to the first climate
prediction experiment relying on the distributed computer power of
90,000 personal computers. The startling results were published this
week in the journal Nature."

Now that's a source I'd tend to respect...

Warm at last! Warm at last! Thank God Almighty, we are warm at last!

...Jim Thompson
 
R

Rich Grise

Jan 1, 1970
0
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66424,00.html

"Global warming may ramp up average temperatures by 20 degrees
Fahrenheit in less than 50 years, according to the first climate
prediction experiment relying on the distributed computer power of
90,000 personal computers. The startling results were published this
week in the journal Nature."

Now that's a source I'd tend to respect...

Are these the same 90,000 computers that are running the spybots
and stuff? ;-)

Cheers!
Rich
 
A

Active8

Jan 1, 1970
0
Are these the same 90,000 computers that are running the spybots
and stuff? ;-)
That's a new one on me. Any links?

I was happy to learn that, like SETI, there's a few cancer research
outfits using distributed PCs of online voluteers to crunch numbers.
 
C

Chris Carlen

Jan 1, 1970
0
Terry said:
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66424,00.html

"Global warming may ramp up average temperatures by 20 degrees
Fahrenheit in less than 50 years, according to the first climate
prediction experiment relying on the distributed computer power of
90,000 personal computers. The startling results were published this
week in the journal Nature."

Now that's a source I'd tend to respect...


Considering all your PC troubles, I can't imagine why.



--
_______________________________________________________________________
Christopher R. Carlen
Principal Laser/Optical Technologist
Sandia National Laboratories CA USA
[email protected] -- NOTE: Remove "BOGUS" from email address to reply.
 
J

Jonathan Kirwan

Jan 1, 1970
0
That's a new one on me. Any links?

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/environment/story.jsp?story=604955

Global warming is 'twice as bad as previously thought'
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
27 January 2005

Global warming might be twice as catastrophic as previously thought,
flooding settlements on the British coast and turning the interior
into an unrecognisable tropical landscape, the world's biggest study
of climate change shows.

Researchers from some of Britain's leading universities used computer
modelling to predict that under the "worst-case" scenario, London
would be under water and winters banished to history as average
temperatures in the UK soar up to 20C higher than at present.

Globally, average temperatures could reach 11C greater than today,
double the rise predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, the international body set up to investigate global warming.
Such high temperatures would melt most of the polar icecaps and
mountain glaciers, raising sea levels by more than 20ft. A report this
week in The Independent predicted a 2C temperature rise would lead to
irreversible changes in the climate.

The new study, in the journal Nature, was done using the spare
computing time of 95,000 people from 150 countries who downloaded from
the internet the global climate model of the Met Office's Hadley
Centre for Climate Prediction and Research. The program, run as a
screensaver, simulated what would happen if carbon dioxide levels in
the atmosphere were double those of the 18th century, before the
Industrial Revolution, the situation predicted by the middle of this
century.

David Stainforth of Oxford University, the chief scientist of the
latest study, said processing the results showed the Earth's climate
is far more sensitive to increases in man-made greenhouse gases than
previously realised. The findings indicate a doubling of carbon
dioxide from the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million would
increase global average temperatures by between 2C and 11C.

Mr Stainforth said: "An 11C-warmed world would be a dramatically
different world... There would be large areas at higher latitudes that
could be up to 20C warmer than today. The UK would be at the high end
of these changes. It is possible that even present levels of
greenhouse gases maintained for long periods may lead to dangerous
climate change... When you start to look at these temperatures, I get
very worried indeed."

Attempts to control global warming, based on the Kyoto treaty,
concentrated on stabilising the emissions of greenhouse gases at 1990
levels, but the scientists warned that this might not be enough. Mr
Stainforth added: "We need to accept that while greenhouse gas levels
can increase we need to limit them, level them off then bring them
back down again."

Professor Bob Spicer, of the Open University, said average global
temperature rises of 11C are unprecedented in the long geological
record of the Earth. "If we go back to the Cretaceous, which is 100
million years ago, the best estimates of the global mean temperature
was about 6C higher than present," Professor Spicer said. "So 11C is
quite substantial and if this is right we would be going into a realm
that we really don't have much evidence for even in the rock
[geological] record."

Myles Allen, of Oxford University, said: "The danger zone is not
something we're going to reach in the middle of the century; we're in
it now." Each of the hottest 15 years on record have been since 1980.

....

Jon
 
J

John Woodgate

Jan 1, 1970
0
I read in sci.electronics.design that Rich Grise <[email protected]>
wrote (in said:
Are these the same 90,000 computers that are running the spybots
and stuff? ;-)
Their 9 MW power consumption is also what's causing the global warming!
(;-)
 
J

John Woodgate

Jan 1, 1970
0
I read in sci.electronics.design that Jonathan Kirwan
Global warming might be twice as catastrophic as previously thought,
flooding settlements on the British coast and turning the interior into
an unrecognisable tropical landscape,

Unless, of course, the Gulf Stream really does stop and Britain becomes
glaciated.

Maybe, with both effects in operation, we'll stay roughly as we are.
 
W

Winfield Hill

Jan 1, 1970
0
Jonathan Kirwan wrote...
Each of the hottest 15 years on record have been since 1980.

Where can we read more about that, which record, how long?
 
J

James Beck

Jan 1, 1970
0
David Stainforth of Oxford University, the chief scientist of the
latest study, said processing the results showed the Earth's climate
is far more sensitive to increases in man-made greenhouse gases than
previously realised. The findings indicate a doubling of carbon
dioxide from the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million would
increase global average temperatures by between 2C and 11C.

But somehow it (the Earth) is less sensitive to naturally occurring
greenhouse gasses?
 
J

Jim Thompson

Jan 1, 1970
0
Jonathan Kirwan wrote...

Where can we read more about that, which record, how long?

The Boston Metropolitan Area is supposed to sink into the sea first
;-)

...Jim Thompson
 
J

James Meyer

Jan 1, 1970
0
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66424,00.html

"Global warming may ramp up average temperatures by 20 degrees
Fahrenheit in less than 50 years, according to the first climate
prediction experiment relying on the distributed computer power of
90,000 personal computers. The startling results were published this
week in the journal Nature."

Now that's a source I'd tend to respect...

Remember GIGO? If you start with a stupid premise, you get a stupid
answer. How in hell are you going to increase the CO2 by a factor of two?
There are mechanisms built into the ecosystem that will try to maintain a
constant CO2 level despite attempts to change it. I'll bet their model
completely ignores that. GIGO.

Jim
 
J

John Larkin

Jan 1, 1970
0
Globally, average temperatures could reach 11C greater than today,
double the rise predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, the international body set up to investigate global warming.
Such high temperatures would melt most of the polar icecaps and
mountain glaciers, raising sea levels by more than 20ft. A report this
week in The Independent predicted a 2C temperature rise would lead to
irreversible changes in the climate.

*Any* temperature change is, by definition, a change in climate!
David Stainforth of Oxford University, the chief scientist of the
latest study, said processing the results showed the Earth's climate
is far more sensitive to increases in man-made greenhouse gases than
previously realised. The findings indicate a doubling of carbon
dioxide from the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million would
increase global average temperatures by between 2C and 11C.

Seems to me that 2 and 11 are different numbers.

Also seems to me that the parameters of complex nonlinear models can
be tweaked for maximum publicity and political effect.

John
 
J

Jonathan Kirwan

Jan 1, 1970
0
Jonathan Kirwan wrote...

Where can we read more about that, which record, how long?

Actually, that's not from me but from the article. I think it's a bit of a weak
statement, myself. I'm told that measuring devices and records started in
Europe about 1700 and that by 1900 the manual record-keeping had spread
throughout much of Europe and North America. A decade later, sites were dotted
across the Northern Hemisphere and the tropical/temperate parts of the Southern
Hemisphere. By the middle of the century more standard approaches were in place
and many new much more precise instruments were being fielded (for example,
Keeling's CO2 measuring system first fielded in 1957, I think) and more stations
were recording from rural areas to avoid urban interference. In the last
quarter of a century, satellite measurements have supplemented all this.

Do I have any idea what they meant here? No. But my guess would be that this
could only include years for which a global mean could be reasonably estimated,
as a quantity based on objective principles. And that cannot be all that long.

To be honest, asking this question was the very first thing I did after reading
the article a few days ago. And I don't have a good answer, as yet. For now,
I'd make nothing of it. It's meaningless until put into some context. And I
don't know what that is.

Jon
 
J

Jonathan Kirwan

Jan 1, 1970
0
But somehow it (the Earth) is less sensitive to naturally occurring
greenhouse gasses?

I hope no one is suggesting that.

Jon
 
K

keith

Jan 1, 1970
0
*Any* temperature change is, by definition, a change in climate!


Seems to me that 2 and 11 are different numbers.

Also seems to me that the parameters of complex nonlinear models can
be tweaked for maximum publicity and political effect.

Interview Question: What's two plus two

Mathmatition: For sufficiently large values of "two" the answer is four.
Physisct: Ignoring the relativistic affects of "two", the answer is four.
Accountant: What would you like the answer to be?
Climatologist: Global warming.
 
A

Active8

Jan 1, 1970
0
*Any* temperature change is, by definition, a change in climate!

I thought the point was that it would be irreversible, not that it
would be a change in climate, which is obvious. But also,
temperature effects are not the only climate variable that would
change. Agreed?
Seems to me that 2 and 11 are different numbers.

Also seems to me that the parameters of complex nonlinear models can
be tweaked for maximum publicity and political effect.
Yeah. That's something to keep in mind. And ranges like that with no
further explaination make me wonder, too.
 
J

Jonathan Kirwan

Jan 1, 1970
0
Seems to me that 2 and 11 are different numbers.

Yup, they sure are!
Also seems to me that the parameters of complex nonlinear models can
be tweaked for maximum publicity and political effect.

They can be.

Jon
 
A

Active8

Jan 1, 1970
0
But somehow it (the Earth) is less sensitive to naturally occurring
greenhouse gasses?

The statement clearly says it's more sensitive than we thought
previously - not that it's more sesitive to man-made gas than
naturally occuring gas.

The natural stuff should be in equilibrium. Whether or not it's been
reponsible for past temp cycles and how much it contributed to the
cycles, I don't know.
 
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