Alaskan glaciers melting 100 times faster than previously thought(nationalgeographic.com) |
Alaskan glaciers melting 100 times faster than previously thought(nationalgeographic.com) |
The takeaways are not that all glaciers are melting faster but that this kind of glacier is melting faster and that similar underwater measurement now needs to be done on other types of glaciers (notably valley glaciers).
Most Alaskan glaciers don't end in the ocean, which is one significant factor. For Greenland where many do the ocean water is quite a bit colder - "water in LeConte Bay is warm relative to the ice, and even other fjords around the world."
Of course, further studies may end up being done without unemployed University of Alaska researchers[0][1].
https://science.sciencemag.org/cgi/doi/10.1126/science.aax35...
People should try reading the actual science instead of some journalist's cherry-picked take on the science. It's also interesting that Disney ("evil media corporation") now controls NatGeo.
As Bill Gates recently noted, climate alarmists are more of a problem than the "deniers." Here's a story from the BBC this week titled, Climate change: 12 years to save the planet? Make that 18 months:
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48964736
This is getting ridiculous. The submitter, in this case, appears to have issues with civility, and is obsessively submitting climate related articles for an account that's less than 60 days.
It's weird how the deadline for point of no return is being pushed ahead every few years.
1. https://www.cnsnews.com/blog/annabel-scott/gore-dodges-fact-...
Ah yes, looking into it further, here is the claim: "25-50 years are needed for Earth’s surface temperature to reach 60 percent of its equilibrium response"
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/early/2005/04/28/...
PEW put out a practical plan to address the issue a couple months ago that actually goes through the trade-offs, and then makes recommendations.
I even have the Unpaywall extension installed (http://unpaywall.org), precisely to avoid this situation, but unfortunately the extension wasn't able to find a free version of this article.
This is one reason Open Access publishing is so crucially important to the public discourse. "Alternate facts" will win if people can read them for free but must pay to read peer-reviewed science.
Whether or not you think National Geographic has mischaracterized the science in this instance, I hope we can all agree that access to the original source would help everyone get their facts straight.
(I was once talking to a friend over beers, ranting about some politics I was unhappy about. And he asked me: So what are you doing about it? Of course, I wasn't doing anything besides complaining, and this made something click in my head. All of my self-important opinions were worth nothing if I couldn't be bothered to do anything about them. I think about this a lot and it has changed the way I see the world.)
P.S. the thing about what a single person can do is just so much, for a real impact it really needs governments to set policies which causes fundamental change. Does the government continue to build motorways, does the government sets up an environment which is benefitial for investments in renewable energy or in coal. all this has a much bigger influence then my personal decisions.
Vote! While there are some things I can do personally (some I do, others I can improve on) the largest changes will be politically driven, so I'll vote for parties the promise the best policies to reduce emissions, whatever they may be.
When you have major political parties lined with deniers it's not a hard decision with pros and cons to weight up.
Even if disaster is inevitable, there are degrees of disaster and even individual actions can reduce suffering later.
The biggest thing I see everyone getting wrong about the environment is that acting on one's environmental values is a burden or chore. I used to think so, but found doing so improved my life, despite my expectations before acting.
Flying less, cutting out animal food, avoiding packaged food, etc. . . Now that I do them, I wish I had changed earlier.
Exactly what history shows this? Every major case of social change I can think of (civil rights, women's rights, labor rights, what environmental regulations we have) has happened through mass movements not independent individual choices.
The time is for collective action on this. @GretaThunberg has been quite articulate about the need for immediate systemic change not just personal choices. Also, great news today, thanks to action on the part of @sunrisemvmt CNN will host a climate-focused Democratic primary debate. Movements can change what is "possible".
https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-other-greenhouse-gas-emis...
There's only one solution that is known to be practical and based on non speculative approaches: nuclear fission power. And we have to do it globally. Even if emissions in the West drop to zero yesterday, it won't matter.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_adaptation_in_N...
Wait, you mean you actually have to validate assumptions against actual measurement to make accurate conclusions? Who knew?