We The People of the United States have a moral, ethical, and pragmatic right to learn what scientists have learned about this planet's biosphere and climate engine without constant dishonest crossfire. We should not tolerate serious scientists constantly being drown out by amoral, ruthless and frankly ignorant arguments - that an astoundingly ruthless GOP PR factory repeats over and over again, without ever learning a damned thing from the evidence in front of us. {This post last edited at 8:00PM- 2/19/2019}
In "What's Natural?" Steele serves up his advice:
“I urge local planning commissions to wait at least 20 more years for more data before giving up on our coastal cities of the world and moving inland.”
While offering me another opportunity to consider Constructive Learning versus Science by Rhetoric and Slander.
Here you'll find a paragraph by paragraph examination of Jim Steele’s suggestions and claims as they appear in his “What’s Natural?” column, “Changing Sea Levels, Part 1” (2/13/19), published in the Pacifica Tribune.
I’ll admit the following is aimed at rationalists, children of the intellectual enlightenment so to speak, since I’ve found that trying to engage in a constructive debate with Jim Steele is a fool’s errand. He hides. Thus I settle for this informative Virtual Debate format.
There is value in exposing and understanding the tactics of libertarian deception, so I continue to strive to share my discoveries and learning curve with anyone interested in confronting the lies and deceptions being broadcast about our planet’s physical reality.
My reasoning is clearly laid out, as are my supporting links - ready for any challenger to pick up and dispute in a civil constructive manner. First, my short response to Editor Frederick, then Mr. Steele's column, followed by my detailed review.
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(* This letter was written after my first impressions. Closer examination revealed how artfully deceptive many of Steele's sentences actually were. )
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Dear Editor of the Pacifica Tribune,
Jim Steele’s February 13th, Changing Sea Levels column is an example of propaganda rather than informative enlightenment.
43 discombobulated sentences of admittedly (somewhat)* factual tidbits and anecdotes, but with raging omissions. All artfully spun to keep the self-certain GOP crowd within their comfort zone.
Along the way Steele devotes some 7 sentences to maligning Dr. Michael Mann, twice using the term “Mann’s followers” which, me thinks, is a bit of projection considering the Trump phenomena amongst today’s right wing.
Incidentally, Dr. Mann works on paleoclimate and interpreting proxy data, so naturally he doesn’t write about local land movement, but to imply he is unaware of it or ignores it, is ludicrous.
Why does Steele feel the need to destroy Dr. Mann’s reputation in the eyes of his audience? That's not serious constructive dialogue, it’s political theater.
In a talk about changing sea levels, our planet’s cryosphere is mentioned five times, all with a dismissive spin, finishing with “there is still no consensus”.
In reality our planet’s Cryosphere is melting at an accelerating rate, alarmingly beyond what any experts anticipated. Really! Look it up. We’ve already squandered the past 20 irretrievable years yet Steele’s advice is to squander yet another 20. Really?
(* This letter was written after my first impressions. Closer examination revealed how artfully deceptive many of Steele's sentences actually were. )
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REPRINTED UNDER PROTECTION OF FAIR USE COPYRIGHT LAWS.
My intention is a point by point review of libertarian deception in action.
(please click on image for sharp view)
Geophysical reality aside, think about what Steele is saying there - “(urging) local planning commissions not to give up on the coastal cities of the world by moving them inland.” How does that relate to our real world? Who’s realistically urging cities to move inland? How does a city move inland?
It’s typical libertarian alternate universe thinking, which I believe needs to be loudly exposed and confronted.
Local planning commissions have plenty enough to do with their own local jurisdictions and challenges, why would they presume to advise the rest of the world?
To support his plea, Steele writes 42 discombobulated and consistently deceptive sentences which I shall review in detail.
{It would help to open up the image of Steele’s column in a different window so you can follow along as I share my observations.}
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First paragraph begins with Steele stating,
“Local sea levels appear to rise when ocean volumes increase, but also when the land sinks. Scientists increasingly warm that coastal cities are sinking much faster than ocean volumes are rising. …”
Steele goes on to list some of the most extreme examples of land subsidence, creating the implication that these are typical, rather than extreme exceptions. He then suggests that “better water management” will solve the problem of aquifer depletion, thus stopping land subsidence, thus stopping the threats of sea level rise.
Conveniently ignoring that big cities are not going to stop consuming water, better management can incrementally slow down depletion, but given human populations and consumption lust, nothing is going to “solve” current aquifer depletion rates.
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Second paragraph starts with,
“In contrast, ocean warming plus added glacial meltwaters are estimated to have only added 0.06 inches per year to sea level from 1850 to 1990, punctuated by decades of that accelerated sea level rise (SLR) to 0.14 a year.”
Seriously Jim? What about since 1990?
Okay lets play this game:
The 140 year average SLR was 0.14 mm/year.
Why not mention the rate in 1990? 2.2 mm/year
What about since 1990?
GMSL rise from 1993 to 2009 was 3.2 ± 0.4 mm/year
Mr. Steele, what morally legitimate reason is there for hiding away these critically relevant numbers from your audience?
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Climate Change: Global Sea Level
Sea level has been rising over the past century, and the rate has increased in recent decades. In 2017, global mean sea level was 3 inches (77 millimeters) above the 1993 average—the highest annual average in the satellite record (1993-present). It was the sixth consecutive year, and the 22nd out of the last 24 years in which global mean sea level increased relative to the previous year.
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Global Sea Level Rise Accelerates Since 1990
By Alister Doyle, Reuters, July 1, 2017
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Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis
The Working Group I contribution to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provides a comprehensive assessment of the physical science basis of climate change since 2007 when the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) was released.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Sea-level rise caused by climate change and its implications for society
Proc Jpn Acad Ser B Phys Biol Sci. 2013 Jul 25; 89(7): 281–301.
doi: 10.2183/pjab.89.281
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Scientists say the rapid sinking of Louisiana’s coast already counts as a ‘worst case scenario’
A new paper, published Wednesday in the Geological Society of America’s bulletin GSA Today, includes an updated map of the Louisiana coastline and the rate at which it’s sinking into the sea, a process scientists call “subsidence,” which occurs in addition to the climate change-caused process of sea-level rise. The new map suggests that, on average, the Louisiana coast is sinking at a rate of about 9 millimeters, or just over a third of an inch, per year — a faster rate than previous studies have suggested, according to the authors. …
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New study finds sea level rise accelerating
By Katie Weeman, Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences,
and Patrick Lynch, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center - February 13, 2018
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Third paragraph begins with an example of the “libertarian” disregard for scale or accuracy.
“Better water management could minimize the primary causes of shrinking coastlines.”
What is this shrinking “coastlines”? The coastal margin shrinking? Beach property shrinking? Weren’t we discussing sea levels? It’s a vertical number with horizontal implications.
Such sloppiness exposes Steele’s slipshod attitude towards details and his disregard for clarity and serious constructive teaching.
“But, even if climate policies could reduce our carbon footprint, natural sea level rise that began in the 1800s will likely continue.”
Natural sea level rise? As a matter of fact, it’s all quite natural.
Increase our planet’s atmospheric insulation regulator from ~280 ppm in 1800s up to +410 ppm in 2019; it is certainly quite natural that our global heat and moisture distribution engine will gain heat; that heat will circulate through the entire geophysical engine, (though at different rates).
Increase our planet’s atmospheric insulation regulator from ~280 ppm in 1800s up to +410 ppm in 2019; it is certainly quite natural that our global heat and moisture distribution engine will gain heat; that heat will circulate through the entire geophysical engine, (though at different rates).
Naturally, that heat will permeate our cryosphere and this warming naturally causes increased melting, that water will naturally seek the oceans. Gravity, don’t you know.
It is true that sea level rise will continue for quite some time, that’s why everyone ought to be taking it more seriously today. Rather than playing disingenuous games aimed at confusion and inaction.
For the record, sea levels have been amazingly constant for better than 6,000 years and scientists have the evidence.
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In Search of Lost Time: Ancient Eclipses, Roman Fish Tanks and the Enigma of Global Sea Level Rise
Distinctive Voices - Jerry X. Mitrovica, Ph.D
Published on Aug 17, 2010
What do ancient eclipse records kept by Babylonian, Chinese, Arabic and Greek scholars, and fish tanks, built by wealthy Romans during 100BC - 100AD, contribute to our understanding of /modern climate change? Dr. Jerry X. Mitrovica will describe the important role these archaeological treasures have played in the understanding of sea-level rise and how they help scientists both "fingerprint" sources of recent sea level changes and make more accurate projections of future sea levels.
Jerry X. Mitrovica, Ph.D., is a Professor of Geophysics in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University, a Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, and the Director of the Earth Systems Evolution Program of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research.
(and much more)
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“To what degree rising CO2 concentrations are accelerating sea level rise is still debated.”
Debated? Sure, science is about a constant debate and struggling to refine numbers. It’s never 100% settled!
Steele’s disregard for the massiveness and the wondrous dynamic folds within folds of harmonic complexity within Earth’s heat and moisture distribution engine as it moves heat from the equator to the poles, makes him blind to a great deal. Expecting a perfect number reflects a deep cynicism, no wonder he gets so much wrong.
“Prominent climate scientist Dr. Michael Mann gives scant attention to the critical issue of sinking lands.”
Seriously!? Dr. Mann is a paleo-climate specialist, an expert statistician and he develops computer models to extract information from paleoclimate proxy data. He is no geologist, land subsidence is outside his expertise, so naturally he doesn’t write about it.
But to imply Dr. Mann doesn’t understand and acknowledge local elevation changes, their varied causes and their local impacts is ludicrous.
Here Steele demonstrated that “libertarian” dependence on creating enemies and demons through false narratives. While Dr. Mann has become a favored whipping boy for climate science contrarians, he’s actually a highly respected and productive authority in his field - as any good faith investigation reveals.
To quote Richard Littlemore :
“As reported by Joe Romm at Climate Progress, Mann has been the target of a host of allegations and attacks, many arising out of the iconic status of a graph (inset) that he created in a 1998 paper with Raymond Bradley and Malcolm Hughes, and others sourced in the emails that hackers stole in 2009 from the the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia.
As the NSF now reports, none of Mann’s critics ever showed the courage or conviction of actually laying a formal complaint before Penn State, where Mann is director of the Earth System Science Center.
But the allegations were so prominent in the blogosphere and in mainstream media that the university took it upon itself to conduct an investigation. The NSF then reviewed Penn State’s exculpatory findings, duplicating some parts of the investigation in greater detail.
The result? No shred of evidence exists to impugn Mann’s work. …”
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Federal Investigators Clear Climate Scientist, Again
The Inspector General of the National Science Foundation has closed its investigation into climatologist Michael Mann after failing to find any evidence of misconduct
- By Douglas Fischer, The Daily Climate on August 23, 2011
- https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/federal-investigators-clear-climate-scientist-michael-mann/
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National Science Foundation (NSF) inspector general: “Finding no research misconduct or other matter raised by the various regulations and laws discussed above, this case is closed.”
Two things we know with extremely high confidence:
- Recent warming is unprecedented in magnitude, speed, and cause (so the temperature history looks like a hockey stick).
- Michael Mann, the lead author on the original hockey stick paper, is one of the nation’s top climatologists and a source of first-rate analysis.
We know these things because both the hockey stick and Mann have been independently investigated and vindicated more times than any other facet of climate science or any other climate scientist.”
Recent studies vindicating the hockey stick:
- Temperatures of North Atlantic “are unprecedented over the past 2000 years and are presumably linked to the Arctic amplification of global warming” – Science (2011)
- GRL (2010): “We conclude that the 20th-century warming of the incoming intermediate North Atlantic water has had no equivalent during the last thousand years.”
- JGR (2010) [PDF]: “The last decades of the past millennium are characterized again by warm temperatures that seem to be unprecedented in the context of the last 1600 years.”
- Human-caused Arctic warming overtakes 2,000 years of natural cooling, “seminal” study finds (2009)
- Unprecedented warming in Lake Tanganyika and its impact on humanity (2010)
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“He prefers scary models supporting his theory regards a rising CO2 effect on sea level, “We’re talking about literally giving up on our coastal cities of the world and moving inland."
Another example of Jim Steele depending on The Lie to peddle his stories. It took a little poking around but I’ve discovered where that quote came from. Lets take a closer look at what Dr. Mann actually said, this time in context:
Hurricane Harvey And The New Normal, 09/01/2017
“… If we continue down the road we’re on and make no adjustments to climate change, Mann says, then these sorts of events could eventually become two-year or three-year events.
“In other words,” Mann said, “we get a Harvey-like event impacting the Gulf Coast, or a Sandy-like event impacting the New Jersey and New York City coast once every few years … Imagine having to deal with something like that every few years.”
At that point, Mann says, “we’re talking about the retreat from our coast lines. We’re talking about literally giving up on the major coastal cities of the world and moving inland.”
A two-pronged approach
So, what do we do? Mann suggests a two-pronged approach. …” link
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That so many right wingers are okay with such malicious and transparently dishonest manipulation of what other’s have said is hideous - and oh so self-destructive in the long run.
Incidentally, in the world of serious constructive scientific debates, misrepresenting your opponent’s position and evidence is a cardinal sin, even criminal !
If only we could hold Jim Steele and compatriots to such standards.
Ending that paragraph Steele mentions “Mann’s followers” - Me thinks a bit of projection going on there, specially when considering the blind worship we see coming out of Trump rallies.
Then there’s Steele’s own tendency to keep it within his echo chamber, broadcasting demands for debate, yet running away when challenged with a constructive debate.
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For the Record: Michael Mann’s professional record puts the lie to Jim Steele’s trash talk. Take a look:
Compare that to Mr. Steele’s scientific accomplishments.
(besides op-eds)
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Fourth paragraph first sentence,
“Intriguingly, San Francisco and North America’s west coasts have not experienced a rising sea level trend since the 1980s. “
Another Steele lie.
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Sea-Level Rise for the Coasts of California, Oregon, and Washington: Past, Present, and Future
Board on Earth Sciences and Resources and Ocean Studies Board Division on Earth and Life Studies
THE NATIONAL ACADEMIES PRESS Washington, D.C.
Sea level rose during the 20th century, and observations and projections suggest that it will rise at a higher rate during the 21st century. Rising seas increase the risk of coastal flooding, storm surge inundation, coastal erosion and shoreline retreat, and wetland loss. The cities and infrastructure that line many coasts are already vulnerable to damage from storms, which is likely to increase as sea level continues to rise and inundate areas further inland.
Global mean sea level is rising primarily because global temperatures are rising, causing ocean water to expand and land ice to melt. However, sea-level rise is not uniform; it varies from place to place.
Sea-level rise along the coasts of California, Oregon, and Washington (referred to hereafter as the U.S. west coast) depends on the global mean sea-level rise and also on regional factors, such as ocean and atmospheric circulation patterns in the northern Pacific Ocean, the gravitational and deformational effects of land ice mass changes, and tectonics along the coast.
The comparative importance of these factors determines whether local sea level is higher or lower than the global mean, and how fast it is changing. Such information has enormous implications for coastal planning. (https://www.nap.edu/read/13389/chapter/2)
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Rising Sea Levels Will Hit California Harder Than Other Places
By Anne C. Mulkern, E&E News on April 27, 2017
Melting ice sheets will cause higher sea-level rise in the state due to how the Earth rotates and gravitational pull on the waters
Melting ice sheets will cause higher sea-level rise in the state due to how the Earth rotates and gravitational pull on the waters
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Published on Jun 22, 2012
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Continuing the confusion,
“Equally curious, using the average estimates from all researchers, the 2007 Intergovernmental panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported known contributing factors only explained 4o% of 20th century sea level rise.”
Yo, this is 2019:
Antarctica losing six times more ice mass annually now than 40 years ago
Climate change-induced melting will raise global sea levels for decades to come
January 14, 2019 | University of California - Irvine
Eric Rignot, Jérémie Mouginot, Bernd Scheuchl, Michiel van den Broeke, Melchior J. van Wessem, and Mathieu Morlighem. Four decades of Antarctic Ice Sheet mass balance from 1979–2017. PNAS, January 14, 2019 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1812883116
Antarctica experienced a sixfold increase in yearly ice mass loss between 1979 and 2017, according to a new study. Glaciologists additionally found that the accelerated melting caused global sea levels to rise more than half an inch during that time.
The team was able to discern that between 1979 and 1990, Antarctica shed an average of 40 gigatons of ice mass annually. (A gigaton is 1 billion tons.) From 2009 to 2017, about 252 gigatons per year were lost.
The pace of melting rose dramatically over the four-decade period. From 1979 to 2001, it was an average of 48 gigatons annually per decade. The rate jumped 280 percent to 134 gigatons for 2001 to 2017.
What about the 2013 IPCC report Mr Steele? Jim, why you hiding that one?
What the new IPCC report says about sea level rise
Freya Roberts | October 3. 2013. 15:25
Scientists’ best guess on sea level rise this century has increased considerably on its last projections in 2007. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) now estimates seas will rise between 26 and 82 centimetres. So what’s changed?
Best estimates
Between 1901 and 2010, global sea levels rose by 19 centimetres – an average of about 1.7 millimetres per year. But looking at the last few decades, it’s clear sea level rise is speeding up. Between 1993 and 2010, sea levels rose by 3.2 mm per year – almost twice the long term average.
Under all scenarios, the expansion of water as it warms is the biggest cause of sea level rise – accounting for between 30 and 55 per cent of the increase. The oceans have absorbed more than 90 per cent of the heat trapped by greenhouse gas emissions since the 1970s. As temperatures rise, more heat will enter the sea, which means water will expand further.
Glacier melt is predicted to be the next biggest contributor to future sea level rise. Glacier melting is already speeding up and almost all the world’s glaciers are shrinking, says the IPCC. Under the highest emissions scenario, RCP8.5, ice loss from glaciers could drive sea levels up by as much as 16cm by the end of the century.
Melting of the Greenland ice sheet, including surface melt, is expected to be the next biggest driver of sea level rise. Like many other ice-covered regions, Greenland’s ice loss is speeding up. Between 1992 and 2001 the ice sheet was losing 34 billion tonnes of ice per year, but between 2002-2011 that increased six-fold to 215 billion tonnes per year. Under the highest emissions scenario RCP8.5, Greenland’s shrinking ice is expected to raise sea levels 12cm by the end of the century.
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Fifth paragraph supplies more gratuitous character assassination,
“So, does Mann’s disaster scenarios represent an extreme climate doomsday cult? Or is he offering sage scientific advice we should heed?”
“Cult” I have to wonder what possesses Jim Steele to issue such utterly malicious melodramatically claptrap?
Actually, he was a mathematical wunderkind and never stopped running, now he's a respected scientist at the top of his class.
I’ve gotten to know his record and even him a little through sporadic correspondences over the past decade - his responses are short, to the point and helpful. It doesn’t take long to realize what an incredibly conservative guarded fellow he is - nothing at all like the cartoon Steele and pals feel compelled to fabricate and broadcast.
Take a look at Dr. Mann’s professional accomplishments, it’s astounding, the man is too busy working, for the sort of games that consume Steele and the contrarian crowd. In his heart Mann wants to arrive at the most accurate answers possible.
The hysteria about his hockey stick's supposed fraud is nothing but disingenuous political theater. His team’s iconic ’98/99 papers weren’t perfect, pioneering science never is perfect!
But they were far more accurate than the slanderers would tell us. They prefer science rejection by rhetoric, slander and out and out thuggery, such as:
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Death threats, intimidation and abuse: climate change scientist Michael E. Mann counts the cost of honesty
Robin McKie | March 3, 2012
Research by Michael E. Mann confirmed the reality of global warming. Little did he know that it would also expose him to a vicious hate campaign
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I’m a scientist who has gotten death threats. I fear what may happen under Trump.
Michael E. Mann | December 16, 2016
My Penn State colleagues looked with horror at the police tape across my office door.
I had been opening mail at my desk that afternoon in August 2010 when a dusting of white powder fell from the folds of a letter. I dropped the letter, held my breath and slipped out the door as swiftly as I could, shutting it behind me. First I went to the bathroom to scrub my hands. Then I called the police.
It turned out to be cornstarch, not anthrax. And it was just one in a long series of threats I’ve received since the late 1990s, when my research illustrated the unprecedented nature of global warming, producing an upward-trending temperature curve whose shape has been likened to a hockey stick.
I’ve faced hostile investigations by politicians, demands for me to be fired from my job, threats against my life and even threats against my family. Those threats have diminished in recent years, as man-made climate change has become recognized as the overwhelming scientific consensus and as climate science has received the support of the federal government. But with the coming Trump administration, my colleagues and I are steeling ourselves for a renewed onslaught of intimidation, from inside and outside government. It would be bad for our work and bad for our planet. …
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This is the sort of outrageousness, that Jim Steele’s type of over-the-top and under-the-belt, lies and character assassination lead to.
Steele's rhetorical games are many things, but they have nothing to do with honest learning, or serious science!
I believe it’s a crime against our Democracy’s Free Speech Rights, which were about leveling the field of debate and enabling constructive debate, not today's alternate Hollywood based reality that libertarians and today’s faith-shackled GOP have become so dependent on.
We The People of the United States have a moral, ethical, and pragmatic right to learn what scientists have learned about this planet's biosphere, and climate engine without constant dishonest crossfire. We should not tolerate serious scientists constantly being drown out by amoral, ruthless and frankly ignorant arguments - that an astoundingly ruthless GOP PR factory repeats over and over again, without ever learning a damned thing from the evidence in front of us.
We The People of the United States have a moral, ethical, and pragmatic right to learn what scientists have learned about this planet's biosphere, and climate engine without constant dishonest crossfire. We should not tolerate serious scientists constantly being drown out by amoral, ruthless and frankly ignorant arguments - that an astoundingly ruthless GOP PR factory repeats over and over again, without ever learning a damned thing from the evidence in front of us.
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Sixth paragraph reads,
“Some researchers and politicians argue any accelerating rate of sea level rise must be the finger print of a human contribution as some models predict. But that is simply not true. In a 2007 peer reviewed paper, On the Decadal Rates of Sea Level Change During the Twentieth Century, researchers reported rates of sea level rise accelerated up to 0.2 inches/ year every 10 years, followed by a decade of deceleration. Sometimes sea levels fell. Some of Mann's followers believe it's impossible for sea levels to fall in an age of climate warming. But they are ill-informed.”
It’s easy to expose and clarify Steele’s fraud in this paragraph. Take a look at the paper itself,
“On the decadal rates of sea level change during the twentieth century,” S. J. Holgate, January 2007 - GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 34, L01602,http://www.joelschwartz.com/pdfs/Holgate.pdf
This is how Steele suggests you should think about sea level rise -
Rate Of Change:
See! No problem. Why worry!
But, serious people suggest this is the honest way to think about current sea level change -
Cumulative Sea Level Increase
Houston, we have a problem !
For more information about the complexity of ocean surface over time, here’s something interesting from the European Space Agency, among others:
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Chaotic ocean variability can mask regional sea level trends
Scientists February 15, 2019
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Seventh paragraph has Steele back in his What If World.
“During the last Ice Age, rainfall stored in ever-growing glaciers caused global sea level to fall by 400 feet. Although those melting glaciers then raised sea level back to its current level, sea levels have yet to fully recover.”
We are concerned with the current climate regime that human society evolved within. Not some hypothetical comparisons with some prehistoric period.
Besides, the record shows sea levels have been very stable for the past six thousand years of society building. That stability society has shattered.
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Post Glacial Sea Level Rise
Holocene Sea Level curve - Carleton.edu, Mikaidt
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Climate Change: Global Sea Level
Author:
August 1, 2018
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Single Image Proves Human-Caused Global Warming
John Englander | Apr 9, 2017
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Eighth paragraph brings up other factors that also impact sea level rise, such as groundwater pumping, or rainfall over landlocked regions. Finishing with,
“Analyses of global sea level change have yet to fully incorporate the fact that over 13 percent of earth's land surface consists of landlocked basins slowly supplying ancient groundwater to today’s oceans.”
In truth, Scientists have been aware of these additional factors (and more) and are doing their best to fully measure and understand them. Still it’s a huge planet and perfection hasn’t been achieved. But again, claiming, climate scientists ignore such details is simply maliciously false.
Steele’s tactic - Impossible Expectations, rather than any sincere effort to learn from the available information such as:
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Global depletion of groundwater resources
Geophysical Research Letters, October 26, 2010
Here we provide a global overview of groundwater depletion (here defined as abstraction in excess of recharge) by assessing groundwater recharge with a global hydrological model and subtracting estimates of groundwater abstraction.
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GROUNDWATER PUMPING LEADS TO SEA LEVEL RISE, CANCELS OUT EFFECT OF DAMS
May 8, 2012
“Past and future contribution of global groundwater depletion to sea-level rise”
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Groundwater Pumping Emerges As a Factor in Sea Level Rise, Study Says
YaleEnvironment 360 - May 9, 2012
By 2000, groundwater extraction resulted in a sea level rise of about 0.57 millimeters annually — compared with about 0.035 millimeters in 1990. According to the study, published in Geophysical Research Letters, by 2050 the pumping of groundwater worldwide could cause sea levels to rise about 0.8 millimeters annually.
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Connection of sea level and groundwater missing link in climate response
April 3, 2018 by A'ndrea Elyse Messer, Pennsylvania State University
Current estimates of sea-level rise by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change consider only the effect of melting ice sheets, thermal expansion and anthropogenic intervention in water storage on land. Li believes that the balance between groundwater and seawater should be considered because the amounts of sea-level rise or fall that can occur due to a shift from groundwater to seawater could be large.
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Scientists reveal substantial water loss in global landlocked regions
November 30, 2018 | Kansas State University
A new study reveals that water storage declines in global landlocked basins has aggravated local water stress and caused potential sea level rise.
Despite an observation period of 14 years, the endorheic water loss equals an additional sea level rise of 4 millimeters, the study found. The researchers said this impact is nontrivial. It accounts for approximately 10 percent of the observed sea level rise during the same period; compares to nearly half of the concurrent loss in mountain glaciers, excluding Greenland and Antarctica; and matches the entire contribution of global groundwater consumption.
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The above links and the dozens of others you can find yourself with a little good faith research underscore the point that scientists are well aware of the complexities that contrarians like to pretend they’ve discovered.
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Ninth paragraph begins,
"Since the 1990s, satellites likewise detected a 10 year cycle of accelerating and decelerating sea level rise."
FALSE! It is in fact the RATE of sea level rise that accelerates and decelerates!
As the above graphs reveals, short term rate fluctuations are chump change next to the reality of the accumulating accelerating sea level rise. On top of that as various links on this page attest to, scientists have a damned good handle on the various factors involved.
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Tenth and final paragraph starts out,
“There is still no consensus regarding Greenland and Antarctic contributions to sea level.”
That’s not true at all. The consensus is that the speed of Greenland and Antarctic melting is going from bad to worse!
Arriving at one perfect number that exactly quantifies the loss is beyond human abilities. But scientists are doing very well and they recognize (and acknowledge) their limitations, always struggling to improve.
But, using rhetorical gotchas Steele must laser focus on tiny and for the most part irrelevant uncertainties - that’s because his goal is to confuse and steer people away from the reality unfolding in front of our eyes. For example,
~~~~~~~
"Accelerating changes in ice mass within Greenland, and the ice sheet's sensitivity to atmospheric forcing,"
Michael Bevis el al., PNAS (2019).
Bevis' team used data from GRACE and from GPS stations scattered around Greenland's coast to identify changes in ice mass. The patterns they found show an alarming trend—by 2012, ice was being lost at nearly four times the rate that prevailed in 2003.
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Data from DRI ice core lab shows rapid melting of Greenland ice sheet
December 5, 2018
The study, titled "Nonlinear Rise in Greenland Runoff in Response to Post-industrial Arctic Warming", was published in the journal Nature in on December 5, 2018: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-018-0752-4. A detailed press release from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution is below.
“Surface melting across Greenland’s mile-thick ice sheet began increasing in the mid-19th century and then ramped up dramatically during the 20th and early 21st centuries, showing no signs of abating, according to new research published Dec. 5, 2018, in the journal Nature. The study provides new evidence of the impacts of climate change on Arctic melting and global sea level rise.
“Melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet has gone into overdrive. As a result, Greenland melt is adding to sea level more than any time during the last three and a half centuries, if not thousands of years,” said Luke Trusel, a glaciologist at Rowan University’s School of Earth & Environment and former post-doctoral scholar at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and lead author of the study. “And increasing melt began around the same time as we started altering the atmosphere in the mid-1800s.” …”
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350 years of Greenland ice melt reconstructed
Modern Greenland ice sheet melt unprecedented since age of industrialization.
Current melting at the surface of the Greenland ice sheet is unprecedented for at least the last three-and-a-half centuries. That is what a group of climate researchers from the US, Belgium and Utrecht report today in the journal Nature, based on melt records from three ice cores drilled in central west Greenland. Brice Noël, postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research of Utrecht University (IMAU), played an important role in the research by contributing an advanced polar climate model. “This model translates the local melt history stored in the ice cores to the whole of Greenland.”
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National Snow and Ice Data Center - Greenland Ice Sheet Today
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To help you visualize what’s happening check out these videos,
Older Arctic Sea Ice Disappearing
NASA Goddard | Published on Oct 28, 2016
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Snow over Antarctica Buffered Sea Level Rise during Last Century
It’s a complicated story, an introduction …
NASA Goddard | Published on Dec 13, 2018
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Antarctic ice loss 2002-2016
NASA Climate Change | Published on May 19, 2017
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Antarctica losing six times more ice mass annually now than 40 years ago
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Published on Jan 19, 2019
A pair of new studies released on Monday share a same ominous message -- that our planet's ice is melting at an alarming rate, which is bad news for global sea levels.
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Antarctic ice-sheet sensitivity to obliquity forcing enhanced through ocean connections
- January 2019 - R. H. Levy, S. R. Meyers, D. K. Kulhanek
Nature Geoscience, volume 12, pages132–137 (2019)
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Four decades of Antarctic Ice Sheet mass balance from 1979–2017
Eric Rignot, Jérémie Mouginot, Bernd Scheuchl, Michiel van den Broeke, Melchior J. van Wessem, and Mathieu Morlighem
PNAS January 22, 2019
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Catherine Walker: Global Warming and Changes in East Antarctic Glaciers
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Continuing,
“There is also significant debate in regards to what adjustments need to be applied to satellite data.However, that discussion must wait for part 2.”
Significant debate?
Halls of science are always filled with debate. Nothing in science is without thorough review and debate that honestly represents the evidence at hand and draws the best conclusions possible given the facts at hand.
Sadly, it's not in Steele's interest to try and see these scientists as serious professionals who have learned an awful lot over the decades and are focused on getting it right. Steele is all about morphing them into hapless cartoons character. It’s maliciously false!
Sadly, it's not in Steele's interest to try and see these scientists as serious professionals who have learned an awful lot over the decades and are focused on getting it right. Steele is all about morphing them into hapless cartoons character. It’s maliciously false!
Here I offer some links to self-education sources if you want to better understand why scientists must make various adjustments to the data, and how they quantify their own accuracy.
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Explainer: How data adjustments affect global temperature records
Zeke Hausfather | July 19, 2017
https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-how-data-adjustments-affect-global-temperature-records
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Thorough, not thoroughly fabricated: The truth about global temperature data
How thermometer and satellite data is adjusted and why it must be done.
Scott K. Johnson - 1/21/2016
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No climate conspiracy: NOAA temperature adjustments bring data closer to pristine
Dana Nuccitelli, February 8, 2016
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Now we’ve come full circle back to Mr. Steele’s useless punchline:
“wait at least 20 more years for more data before "giving up on our coastal cities of the world and moving inland.”
As if we haven’t squandered way the hell too much time already.
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{ You may have noticed I use the term “Malicious” repeatedly.
That is because there's a specific applicable legal definition attached to it,
take a look:
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