UKC

https://news.sky.com/story/dont-buy-coastal-properties-un-scientists-issue-...

"Experts have warned against buying coastal properties as research shows there will be unprecedented ice melt in the next 30 years."

For saying it's all a figment of our imagination this is a pretty stark warning if your thinking of buy a new coastal property.

TWS

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

It's gonna be a good Golf Course, It's gonna be a Great Golf Course!  I'm buildin it near the sea because I can and my name is Cnut!

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/trump-golf-course-scotlan...

You know, The sea, it's a big thing - a great thing.  But I'm gonna build a Wall, an even bigger Wall.  And The Sea is gonna Pay for that Wall!

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Is this a proven fact?  It's undeniable that land ice is receding but does that contribute to sea level rise?  My understanding is that sea ice melting does not contribute because the water simply takes up the space that the ice previously occupied. This can be demonstrated by putting ice in a glass of water and waiting for it to melt.  The water level does not rise or is this oversimplifying matters? I'm not qualified to say this is wrong but IMO a degree of scepticism is healthy.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

Thermal expansion of the oceans alone  has contributed about half of the rises seen in the last 25 years or so.

In reply to GridNorth:

Yes

That's the difference between sea ice and land ice. 

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Then there's all those poor sods who have coastal properties that are also next to rivers that will soon flood with greater frequency and higher water levels. :/

In reply to GridNorth:

Broadly the mostly geography factors are...

Arctic ice is floating but if it melts the dark sea reflects less and increases solar heating.

Greenland ice, Antarctic ice and mountain glaciers are on land so melting raises sea level and exposed rock increases solar heating as it reflects less back into space.

Unfortunately an ice cube in a glass of water is an oversimplification.

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

Can you provide a source for that.  Not trying to be difficult, genuinely interested. Like I said I'm not qualified but I don't like to take headlining news at face value.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

This is true for ice melting that was previously floating on the sea - but not for ice that was on land.

And as mentioned by another poster, water expands as its heated (as long as it's above about 4°C to start with) - my understanding is that this is a significantly larger effect than the ice melt.

So yeah, rising sea levels are as close to fact as any predictions about the future can be.

I'd have thought that increased frequency of storms, and higher wave energy, would be other likely reasons why coastal dwelling is becoming unwise in many places in the medium term. But those are more just very likely to happen, rather than almost certain like sea level rise.

In reply to GridNorth:

Being as it hasn't happened yet then you could argue no, if you think that helps. 

I'm not an expert but I defer to those that are.

"The report, compiled by more than 100 leading climate scientists, calls for urgent, ambitious and coordinated action"

In reply to GridNorth:

It's as you said it. Melting sea ice does not contribute to sea level rise (beyond the effects of thermal expansion). Water entering the oceans from glaciers and other land ice - the vast ice plains of the Antarctic and Greenland - clearly does contribute to sea level rise. Why would it not do so? 

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

It's one thing being warned not to buy one, but it will become a much bigger problem for all concerned once banks stop lending on them. 

There are some old fisherman houses near Weybourne in Norfolk that no bank will lend on, (see links) The cliff is eroding at such a fast pace that banks will not touch them. Having said that though, I was chatting to a resident a while back who told me that these particular ones are in high demand still for cash buyers due to the beautiful location and the fact that they still have at least 50 years, maybe more before they fall into the sea.

https://www.alamy.com/costal-erosion-house-falling-of-cliff-weybourne-norfo...

In reply to GridNorth:

Try it yourself - float a big chunk of ice in a glass and mark the water level, then melt it and check; it won't have changed much.

Now try again with the chunk of ice sitting in a funnel above the glass, and see what has happened to the water level after it has melted.

(Although I suspect you can see what will happen without actually having to do it!)

In reply to GridNorth:

Sea ice (at least sea ice that has formed on the sea, such as the arctic sea ice) doesn't contribute to sea level rise.

Ice formed on land (either ice caps, glaciers or ice sheets that extend from the land onto the sea) that melts does indeed contribute to sea level rise. Greenland ice sheet melting is thought to be biggest likely source/driver of this sea level rise due to melting, at least in short to medium term.

Thermal expansion is another cause, as is isostatic changes in land height (quite often apparent in areas previously glaciated including the UK, as the crust rebounds from ice loading).   

Also, things like over pumping of groundwater can cause land levels to drop, at least on local scale. 

Essentially a complicated picture, and one that differs on a global to regional scale, but with a general trend towards rising sea levels. 

Good summary of current global/regional understanding here:

https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2018/02/WG1AR5_Chapter13_FINAL.pdf

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

What kind of idiot would listen to an unscientist? The clue is in the name.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Twenty odd years ago I lived in a lovely 18th century house in Anstruther. It was in a street that ran parallel to the sea. The street (George Street) was maybe a kilometer long. My house faced the sea and the ground floor was probably less than 2m above sea level, maybe less. On the other side of the road the houses' back gardens were separated from the sea by a brick wall, the base being less than a meter above the stoney beach.

I am really glad I moved house now and feel sad that many of the lovely old houses in the East Neuk villages of Anstruther, Pittenweem and Crail are likely to be claimed by the sea in the next century.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Could we not just take all the fish and other sea-life out?

Voila, sea level drops.

In reply to Sherlock:

and the warmer it gets, the more will evaporate...it's self correcting

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

We need to  drastically increase the sea's population of sponges - problem solved!

In reply to Bjartur i Sumarhus:  how many times should a house be flooded before its reasonable for insurance to be refused.?  

Anyone here own property in Fairbourne? Wales first climate refugees 

In reply to Removed User:

Christ, where will all those bloomin Fifers move to then - Falkland?

How much is sea level around Fife predicted to rise - 2m ??- I think your old house will be safe, although there may be the odd bit of flooding in winter storms

In reply to Bjartur i Sumarhus:

The banks could find they have a problem of their own - isn't pretty well the entire financial district in London rather close to the Thames, and on somewhat low-lying land - and that doesn't include their cellars, underground parking and so on.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Will Blackpool be OK?

In reply to The Lemming:

Its never been ok  

In reply to The Lemming:

https://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/news/how-rising-sea-level-threatens-reso...

TWS

In reply to subtle:

You beat me to it. 

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

How much water is there in the world?

youtube.com/watch?v=b3_Abb2Vqnc&

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Actually I've just had a great thought,  if we all start trying really very hard to grow gills we'll be pretty much sorted.

I'm thinking of the Mariner in "Waterworld" 

and Ian Brown's song "If Dolphins were Monkeys"

youtube.com/watch?v=LvA-3Jsaj6A&

You might have to listen to it in reverse to get the gills forming adequately.

;-D 

In reply to fred99:

ground floors are just reception anyway and they can be adapted to become docking parking for our schooners

In reply to subtle:

Would you buy a house that was likely to be flooded every winter or two?

In reply to Phil79:

http://www.picturesofengland.com/England/Cambridgeshire/Holme/pictures/1104...

While we piddle around with Brexit, this climate change stuff is being sidelined too much. It's not just a bit of a sea level rise, some holiday homes collapsing and  some floods but the potential to see hundreds of millions displaced from coastal areas in rich and poor countries alike. Never mind all the other impacts on ecosystems etc. 

Well done, Greta!

In reply to Sherlock:

Seems to me that we're already having a good go at that.....

In reply to earlsdonwhu:

Why, what has she done?

In reply to GridNorth:

You do know that the US Navy has big plans to relocate all its naval bases in the US because of rising sea levels. The US Navy has been addressing climate change for quite a few years as they have figured out its strategic impact.

In reply to Lusk:

San Joaquin Valley is probably the best known/studied one.

https://www.usgs.gov/centers/ca-water-ls/science/land-subsidence-san-joaqui...

In reply to Removed User:

And yet people do - not many empty houses in George St Anstruther - and when they do sell they are not exactly cheap

Nice part of the world though.

In reply to GridNorth:

According to the Wiki article: If the entire 2,850,000 km³ of the Greenland ice cap were to melt, the sea level would rise by 7,2m, and that's just Greenland ...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenland_ice_sheet

In reply to fred99:

I suspect every major stock exchange and financial district in the world is probably close to sea level?

London, New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai, etc.

Cities by the sea have historically been really handy......until they're not!

In reply to subtle:

Yes it's a nice spot in many ways.

It's significant that house prices for these properties haven't dropped much. I do think it's indicative that people still don't appreciate the possible effects of climate change.

In reply to McHeath:

Yes, unbelievable volumes of ice! Melting of the entire Antartic ice sheet would result in 50ish meter rise in sea level. 

In reply to GridNorth:

Yes. Water that was on land elsewhere ends up in the sea, everywhere. Put an ice cube on bottle top on a saucer if you want a graphic illustration, the saucer bottom is London/New York/Bangladesh, the bottle top is Greenland/Antarctica, the ice cube their glaciers.

Sea ice loss isn't the issue from a sea level perspective, it's the loss (or gain) of land ice that drives global sea level change.

Additionally there are local effects caused by ice accumulation/loss. For example as Greenland loses it's ice the sea will rise globally but then so too, unburdened by the mass of that departed ice will the crust forming the bedrock of Greenland which is effectively afloat on the plastic portion of earth's mantle, it bobs back up slowly, Greenland's beaches will be submerged then eventually climb back out of the flood. Google isostatic rebound if you're curious.

Always but this one is sufficiently easy to understand that scepticism quickly starts to look like denial. Our sea levels are rising globally, it's measurable and well documented.

jk

In reply to Removed User:

Not related to this but I did laugh at some of your pictures - Salisbury Craggs took me back, as did Mauchline Gorge - what a truly wonderful place that is

Sorry, back on thread again now.

In reply to jkarran:

I'm not in denial but when many of the loudest voices are contributing an order of magnitude more than I do with their lifestyle I tend to pause and think for a while.  And when these same people make predictions that turn out to be inaccurate or tell lies, I pause to think for a while. If we did a CO2 audit of the population I suspect I would be low on the scale by western standards.  I have no intention of freezing my family in winter while others trot around the globe in private jets preaching.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

Which of course has nothing to do with pretending you don't understand how melting ice caused by a warming atmosphere raises the sea level.

jk

In reply to GridNorth:

There are two separate things there. Sea level rise is real. NASA puts the rate of sea level rise at 3.3mm/year. 

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/

Your personal contribution to sea level rise is tiny, and no changes you make as an individual will make any difference. However, whether you do anything or not, sea level rise will continue for the foreseeable future. 

In reply to earlsdonwhu:

Isn't Brexit part of the solution? The fall in the pound has driven fuel prices up for transport and heating, then foreign holidays are more expensive, and food miles might reduce due to cost (or might not due to migrant labour).

Maybe it's not all bad.

In reply to GridNorth:

You're missing the point, which is that whatever our status in the contributory stakes, we have a moral duty to do what we can do. We need to be able to look children in the eye and say that we did.

Edit: I used to ponder about what other people were doing, and eventually concluded that wasn't the point, because it'd always be possible to see my own contribution as insignificant given the right perspective. 

Other opinions may exist.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

I have a house which is coastal. It's around 5m from and 5m above sea level. When I bought it 25 years ago I installed a high tide marker. This was just out of interest rather than scientific or defensive reasons. The highest tide I recorded in this time was around 3 years after I installed the marker which would be late 90's. This is the highest tide I have recorded and there is no appreciable change in average tide levels over this period. My house in is a sheltered bay on the west of Argyll. 

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

NASA have some pretty terrifying graphs of global average sea level rise from observed data:

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/

In reply to Le Sapeur:

Measuring how far the tide travels across a sloping beach surface or affixed to bedrock and marked with historic tide heights?

You'll have to check the exact rebound rate for your location, it's nowhere near as high as for Sweden/Finland but Scotland is still rebounding after the end of the last ice age, coincidentally at around the current rate of sea level rise. Potentially even accurately measuring mean sea level over a number of years you'll not see it change relative to the foreshore despite the fact the sea is filling up.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-glacial_rebound scroll down for UK map

jk

In reply to stevieb:

Perhaps not an entirely serious post?

Reducing consumption by driving up import prices and depressing the economy makes a temporary dent in our national carbon footprint but it also reduces our ability to invest in more complete solutions. By leaving a large bloc we also reduce our ability to collaborate more broadly to shift behaviour and effectively tax harmful emissions. For example taxing aviation fuel, a mandatory EU wide aviation fuel tax would see short haul operators within Europe unable to cost effectively hop via a tax haven every other leg for a top-up and long haul has to pay outbound at least.

Also the 'global Britain' version (other visions exist) envisages our most important 'local' trading partnership switch from trans-Channel to trans-Atlantic adding billions of air/sea miles per year to our imports and exports.

jk

In reply to Timmd:

I'm not missing the point if I'm doing whatever I can, which I am. But I am condemning those with influence and money who talk the talk but don't walk the walk. It's hypocracy of the worst kind with the consequence that some vulnerable people will take on board what they say and put themselves at risk by turning down the heating, as an example, whilst those doing the preaching continue to fly in their private jets.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

Fair enough. I should have probably said 'potentially missing the point' BTW.

In reply to wercat:

Trump having problems with autocorrect again?

In reply to GridNorth:

Are you vegan then? - that one change alone has as much impact as one international flight every couple of years.

In reply to SenzuBean:

No and I have no intention of being "guilted" into being one.

In reply to GridNorth:

Then it's bollocks that you're doing as much as you can (or anywhere close), and you should own your guilt.

In reply to SenzuBean:

OK I could probably do more. So what are you doing?

In reply to GridNorth:

This is fair enough, but it's pretty clear at this stage that while the answer to climate change may not be you personally freezing your family in winter, it also doesn't make much difference whether the insignificantly small number of people who are calling for large scale change from high profile stages are trotting around the globe in private jets either. Because there's only one of you, and only a few of them, and if your goal is something more than being the most self-righteous person in your local firestorm then the thing that we actually need is large scale change, probably driven by government action.

And similarly, if someone is standing on a high profile stage calling for large scale action, responding with "yeah well I wouldn't pay to much attention to them because I bet they don't lead as blameless a life as me" is basically diverting attention away from what they're promoting, which is the one thing that has a real chance of making the future a bit less horrific. It'd be nice if all activists and environmentalists were totally free from sin, if only because it heads off that sort of distraction, but the important thing is that what they're saying is absolutely correct.

Edit: sorry if that comes off as me ranting at you personally - it's not really, it's more of a response to a general tendency that I see a lot and which I find incredibly frustrating.

In reply to Removed User:

It's significant that house prices for these properties haven't dropped much. I do think it's indicative that people still don't appreciate the possible effects of climate change.

Unfortunately I think it'll take something very dramatic and close to home before people will really start to realize and take action. Given this countries temperate climate my bet it's going to be rising sea levels and a tidal surge up the Thames flooding central London. Of course, by then, it'll be to late, if it's not already.

In reply to GridNorth:

Vegan, no holiday flying (but currently due to a large swathe of close family living in Europe and us in NZ, have to compromise this to include visits to maintain family links).
Studying agroforestry systems in my spare time (a few years worth of this, including dozens and dozens of visits to various sites, orchards, arboreta and ecosystems around the places I've lived, to grow such a system to be able to feed my family in a sustainable manner, and to help other people do the same for their families. So quite a lot I think.

In reply to SenzuBean:

I would hazard a guess that your carbon footprint is greater than mine but that's irrelevant as I am not the one telling others how they should live.  I haven't been on a long haul flight this century and only two in the previous century.  The saying people in glass houses springs to mind.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

Every time you eat meat or dairy, you're using sometimes 35x more resources than I am - so it's death by a thousand cuts. You were the one who started criticizing people trying to make a difference - maybe grow some vegetables in your glass house - it'll be good for you and everyone.

In reply to SenzuBean:

Not sure when I criticised anyone for wanting to make a difference.  I respect that.  What I don't respect are hypocrites and people with money lecturing those with less money to change their ways, quite possibly to their detriment and disadvantage. With regards to eating meat many would disagree. One example here:

http://theconversation.com/yes-eating-meat-affects-the-environment-but-cows...

In reply to subtle:

Mauchline Gorge? I'd assumed that about 10 people had ever climbed there. Were you /are you in the Kyle ckub?

In reply to jkarran:

It's on a leg of a pier which is attached to the bedrock, but not marked with historic tides before 1994.

In reply to SenzuBean:

Coolio, I don't fly at all. I've been pondering getting wild venison posted to me as my meat source, it's arguably a bit of a fudge in the short term, when rewilding is possibly something we should be doing, but by the time that starts to take hold lab grown meat from cell cultures will potentially be available. 

In reply to SenzuBean:

Veganism pushes the killing to where it cannot be seen. Out of season food grown in heated greenhouses or flown in the huge airmiles, highly processed fake-meats - veganism has a lot of dirty secrets.

What few account for in pastoral farming is that the land can be shared with other flora and fauna, unlike arable farming which competes at the base of the food chain. Thus, pastoral farming gives an environmental dividend.

In reply to Phil79:

Not trying to say "I'm all right Jack" but I just checked on line and my house is 73.5 meters above the current sea level. I always knew buying a house on top of a hill was a good idea. 

It's accepted fact that ice reflects more heat than sea water and land. Where do solar panels land on the reflective scale? They are optimised to capture as much energy as possible from the sun so I would assume they are quite absorbent rather than reflective and the energy they produce ultimately ends up being dissapated as heat from the devices they power. 

Could all the solar farms that are springing up actually be accelerating global warming or is it off set by a reduction in fossil fuel use for a net benefit or am I just rambling crap and they reflect heat well whilst still capturing energy? 

In reply to Shani:

All that is performed for animal feed as well, times much more. Out of season food and food from the other side of the world are everyone's problems - not sure why you think to bring them up.

You can do this with agroforestry, and gain much higher yields, much lower inputs than silvopasture (more than twice as much carbon sequestration).

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Aliens coming to take Earth's water are a common theme in sci-fi films.   Perhaps we should get a "Water for Sale" sign up ?

In reply to David Riley:

They can have half of the population as well vacuum packed and garnished , ready for the trip home .

Did you ever watch "V" ?

PS:   did you get that wire out ?

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

No.  Did you have a particular group in mind ?

Yes.  The wire came out.

In reply to GridNorth:

You linked to a report by UN scientists. That's not "preaching", and I don't think scientists fly around in private jets.

Whilst scepticism is good, on what grounds do you have to be sceptical of a large number of serious scientists. Are you an expert in that field? Have you read large numbers of other experts opposing this, meaning there is an actual controversy and disagreement amongst those who really understand this stuff?

In reply to David Riley:

The Martians did that aeons ago - it didn't end well for them

In reply to David Riley:

The anti science, deeply dogmatic religious zealots for a  start 

Excellent to hear that.

In reply to seankenny:

Yes I have read a number of experts who do oppose this.  I have also seen some of the evidence questioned and debunked. The Michael Mann "hockey stick" for example and the claim that "97% of scientists agree statement" being examples.  I am not of course qualified to say either is true or false but I think a degree of scepticism is in order.

In reply to wercat:

Maybe taking this a bit too seriously.  However, anyone capable of taking the water would already know it was there.  But would not know we wanted to lose some.

In reply to GridNorth:

Have you also seen the debunking of the debunking? If so, what do you think of it and how do you decide what you believe?

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Ah, a contest.   Group A (science) put up a sign.   If answered Group B (religion) get eaten.

Group B pray for help from God.   If answered Group A go to Hell.

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

I believe in a healthy degree of scepticism.  I believe that we should be taking drastic action to help the environment.  I believe that governments should do more. I don't believe the wilder claims of environmentalists and I most certainly do not agree with using the fears, founded or unfounded, of a vulnerable young girl to promote them. I believe that climate change is occurring.  I don't know if this is cyclical or caused by CO2.  I'm still reading up on this. Some studies suggest that warming is causing increased CO2 and not the other way round. I don't believe that scaremongering will achieve much and may in fact cause some harm.  My 85 year old next door neighbour, for example, has been greatly influenced by the media coverage of this. She has turned vegan and says she will not turn on her heating this winter. I can't persuade her otherwise and I have grave concerns for her health over the coming months.

In reply to GridNorth:

No. You are not a sceptic, you are a denialist and saboteur of solutions.

CB

In reply to GridNorth:

I know very little of the detail about this, but this is on the wikipedia page:

"More than two dozen reconstructions, using various statistical methods and combinations of proxy records, have supported the broad consensus shown in the original 1998 hockey-stick graph, with variations in how flat the pre-20th century "shaft" appears.[12][17] The 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report cited 14 reconstructions, 10 of which covered 1,000 years or longer, to support its strengthened conclusion that it was likely that Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the 20th century were the highest in at least the past 1,300 years.[18] Over a dozen subsequent reconstructions, including Mann et al. 2008 and PAGES 2k Consortium 2013, have supported these general conclusions."

So why are you sceptical of the original findings, but not sceptical of the "debunkers"?

Okay, can you please list other scientific findings of which you're sceptical?

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Everyone thought Thanos was an evil mad man but his magic glove that randomly wipes out 1/2 of the population isn't a bad thing. We are massively over populated and the population is growing exponentially. Infant and child mortality rates are dropping and people are living longer, wars are fought more by small Mobile squads rather than hundreds of thousands of blokes facing off across battle fields. A nice painless random cull is the only way forward for the human race. 

In reply to Dax H:

Fixed that for you.

In reply to GridNorth:

I have to say, as a professional scientist, working for a leading government funded global environmental research centre (although I don't work in climate change) the 97% quote seems about right, the evidence for AGW is overwhelming and backed up by hard evidence, the 'debunking' of climate change science has been almost entirely debunked itself by experts. I'm not saying there are easy solutions or preaching how individuals should change there lifestyle but clinging on to a hope that's it's not our fault and it wont be that bad is denial.

Interestingly I generally work on adaptation to climate change, I know few people who work in mitigation, make of that what you will, but I wouldn't be buying a coastal property any time soon!

In reply to seankenny:

I am sceptical of the debunkers but I can only read so much at a time. My understanding, to date, of the hockey stick is that huge swathes of data were simply ignored and left out. I understand for example that temperatures were higher in the Roman period and 17th century. Indeed the 1990 IPCC UN Climate report reflected this but Mann ignored it.  According to writers of the time Vikings farmed the now frozen bits of Greenland and grapes were grown in England. The UN IPCC climatologist John Christie testified in 2011 that a small cohort of scientists misrepresented records by "a) promoting his own result of best estimate b) neglecting studies that contradicted his c) amputated anothers results so as to eliminate conflicting data and limit any serious attempt to expose the real uncertainties of these data"

Damned right I'm sceptical.

cb294: That's b*llocks and you know it. It's bullying, dismissive and shaming language. Unless you can respond in a similar manner to seankenny I will simply ignore you.

Following where this thread has gone, I found this to be a good read, from a genuinely thoughtful rational sceptic:

https://unherd.com/2019/09/why-climate-change-isnt-the-end-of-the-world/

It's a brief exploration of what we might be likely to see in terms of consequences to people, of how bad things might be compared to other threats facing us.

Note that he doesn't think there's much space for being sceptical that it's happening - just about the more extreme claims of utter disaster. And that's only if we (as a species) take serious action now, to stop it getting a lot worse.

In reply to GridNorth:

I don't want to get into a hockey stick debate but the evidence has moved on considerably in the last few years. Any major scientific research body will have a graph of average temperatures going back 10 thousand years or so, these tell you all you need to know, I am not aware of any credible study that refutes the fundamentals of these. Scepticism is healthy but denial of facts is not.

In reply to David Riley:

Since you're taking it too seriously, I will too: the last thing aliens coming to our solar system looking for water would be doing is dragging it up into space from the surface of a rocky planet.  It'd be a huge waste of energy when there are colossal blocks of ice (aka comets) already up there just loosely orbiting the sun, and vast oceans under the icy crusts of some of the moons of Jupiter and Saturn.

In reply to GridNorth:

So are you sceptical of the way climate change deniers used data?

And I hate to repeat myself, but which other scientific findings are you sceptical of?

In reply to deepsoup:

Quite. The hope would have to be that they'd like to help, but could only do so with permission.  Anyway water's no problem.  It's CO2 they really want.  Lovely stuff, come and get it.

In reply to GridNorth:

It's caused by CO2. If you're genuinely interested in reading about it, you might like to try this history of the discovery of global warming:

https://history.aip.org/climate/index.htm

That's definitely not correct. Do some simple thinking - we are burning millions of tonnes of fossil fuels every year. CO2 is a combustion product of burning fossil fuels - that's simple chemistry. Where do you think that CO2 is going if not into the atmosphere and the oceans?

Apply your scepticism in the other direction - if warming is causing increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, what is causing that warming? 

Rational discussion has proved to be of little worth thus far in the efforts to reduce the damage being done. The science has been known and settled for many years. Even the fossil fuel industries have known that burning fossils fuels would cause warming. Indeed, in the 1950s, the head of one of America's biggest coal companies knew enough to suggest that the atmosphere was deficient in CO2 and that more coal should be burned in order to increase temperatures. This was a echo of the proposal made at the end of the 19th century by Arrhenius who suggested that increasing levels of CO2 would result in raised temperatures. This in turn built on work by Fourier in 1800 and later by Tyndall. The science of global warming is not new, and yet the world has not reacted with the urgency that is required. You may not like the scaremongering, but being reasonable has not produced the required action. I would be interested in your thoughts as to how else to achieve suitable and appropriate action. 

In reply to David Riley:

I think there are two things on Earth that would seem to be extremely rare in the galaxy (unique as far as we know so far).  On the one hand we have culture - music, poetry, literature, a variety of amusingly bonkers religions etc..  and on the other we have a massive complicated eco-system involving millions of different species.

If the aliens are interested in the former, it might be worth their while trying to save our sorry arses.  If they're more interested in the latter it'd probably be easier just to cull the one species that's threatening all the others.. 

In reply to SenzuBean:

I bring them up because the simplistic narrative that veganism is better for the planet, is wrong.  

Yes, there are some good models of farming, but the best,/the most sustainable, require/involve at least some pastoralism.

In reply to seankenny:

If you don't understand that the main reason for humankind having such an effect on global warming is due to the fact that in my lifetime the population has virtually doubled then there really is no hope for you.

7+ billion people now, around 4 billion when I was born - just do the maths. That's an extra 3 1/2 billion or so needing food, water, housing, transport, electricity and so forth, and that doesn't include the waste that these extra people churn out, and with even less space to put it in.

In reply to GridNorth:

Whether you ignore me personally or not does not matter, I really could not care less. 

What I do care about, though, is that people like you are ignoring tens of thousands of climate scientist, regurgitating arguments by a small number of cranks that are largely, to use the words of Feynman, not even wrong, i.e. they are so baseless that one cannot argue against them using proper science.

You lot need dismissing and shaming, until you are again willing to engage in rational scientific discourse.

To add one more point, of course global warming causes increased atmospheric CO2 levels, mainly by CO2 release from thawing permafrost soils and drying peat bogs. This positive feedback dramatically exacerbates the problem. The "hockey stick" is mainly of historic interest as one of the first illustrations of the problem, the actual situation is much worse and by now much better documented.

CB

In reply to cb294:

People like me. You are arrogant, obnoxious, self righteous and offensive.  Questioning things is NOT denial.  I've already stated that we need to get things done.  Just crawl back into your corner get some manners and learn to read.

In reply to Dax H:

Population isn't growing exponentially, it has since the advent of significant public health interventions and industrial agriculture enjoyed a period of growth approximating exponential but most reasonable forecasts have it levelling off naturally around 10Bn without needing measures explicitly targeting population growth. Whether we need to gradually unwind from there or not is debatable.

jk

In reply to GridNorth:

Questioning things is one thing, giving the oxygen of attention to crackpot theories that fly in the face of established scientific consensus is effectively denial, as it interferes politically with the actions you claim to support.

A shame really, because I greatly respect what you post about your climbing, a field (unlike science) where you have vastly more experience than me.

CB

In reply to Shani:

In the context of the UK, the best case scenario would be almost everyone becoming vegan. It is better for the planet for a given individual in the UK to be vegan - what you seem to be arguing is that it's not perfect, which I agree with.

We're currently at the point where 96% of all mammals are humans or farm animals - if we ran headlong at veganism for the next 50 years we'd still be far away from the point where some pastoralism was necessary. It is for the best of the planet that we go as far in this direction as possible, as quickly as possible. Thankfully this is happening - anyone can watch the vegan section in the supermarkets growing before their eyes.

In reply to cb294:

I've been looking at my sources of information and I see that they are dated 2014/2015 so perhaps I am out of date but I am most certainly not in denial and I see no reason for offensive language when all I am doing is questioning.  At that time a lot of the outrageous claims were proving to be misplaced scare stories with predictions that did not materialise hence my scepticism. A bit like the predicted coming ice age 1970's which was presented in a similar alarmist manner in the 1970's. In any case it's becoming apparent that I need to re-visit my previous assumptions but I will continue to question headlining, scaremongering media reports and not take them at face value. Perhaps some of you should be doing the same.

Can someone bring me up to speed on the 97% of scientists headline. I read both sides of this specific argument in 2015 and came to the conclusion that the data this was based on was dubious at best. i.e. I was sceptical.

In reply to GridNorth:

If you really are interested, you should be doing that research yourself and not relying on others, because you don't know what vested interests they may have. 

I note with some disappointment that you have not made any effort to answer my earlier questions. 

In reply to GridNorth:

Data in 2015 was not dubious, it was conclusive, now it would say it was irrefutable. I've no idea where you found some credible sources in 2015 to say otherwise, that very much surprises me.

Again I say this as a scientist working for the a major environmental research body. anecdotally I have never met any professional scientists who don't agree with AGW, nor read any credible literature disputing it in the last 10 years. of course theres a lot of nutty bullshit on the internet from people trying to make a name for themselves, but you shouldn't believe everything you read on line...

There is of course debate around this science but interestingly it has moved from is it happening to it definitely is happening and what are the impacts over the last 20 years, unfortunately observations from the last few years suggest worst case scenarios are most likely. Unfortunately we wont know for sure until it's too late.

Ps this looks like its turning into a 'everyone have a go at grid north thread'  which I'm sorry about, but this a really important point which everyone needs to appreciate what the huge majority of modern expert thinking is and what it means for this planet 

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

You are of course quite right.

I know when people go into abusive mode, not you I hasten to add, I'm afraid my reasoning goes out of the window and I become all defensive and dare I say somewhat offended and flustered at being misunderstood, misinterpreted and abused. Apologies I'v forgotten what your questions were were.  In any case it would appear that my previous research is now out of date as I have acknowledged and to counter that I would say that my counter points do not get answered either. If you care to be more specific I will of course endeavour to answer you but I do not have the expertise to sound conclusive or convincing which is why I always attempt to frame my posts in a questioning way. 

I am not doubting that climate change is occurring but I am questioning the causes.  In 2015 outrageous predictions were being made by politicians and scientists, part of the 97%, who were on government grants and many of whom were not climate specialists or even in associated disciplines like geology.

It's become very politicised and that is what appears to be driving much of the research and the agenda. For every scientist that you can name who shows one set of results I can find another who shows the opposite. What is a layman supposed to make of that? 

In reply to ebdon:

Yes it's very hard to keep track so can we focus on one topic. In 2015 evidence suggested that Michael Mann had "frigged" the data to arrive at his hockey stick graph.  It was alleged that he discounted evidence that ran counter to his agenda.   I was under the impression that his credibility was severely damaged. Did he or did he not frig the data?

In reply to GridNorth:

My understanding (and I'm no expert in this) is that the 'hockey stick graph' was published in 1998 so is pretty outdated. I think the controversy I's over some minor points of statistical analysis whitch may or may not have been done very well (I don't think there's suggestions of being deliberately missleading more the maths was a bit off. I think the only reason it got so much publicity is that this is such a much discussed topic so people jumped all over it.

Either way it's very old study and I would say if you really want an idea of what's going on you need to look back over 10s of thousands of years not just a few thousand. But I would say that as I'm a geologist.

In reply to GridNorth:

My questions were direct and unambiguous:

Do some simple thinking - we are burning millions of tonnes of fossil fuels every year. CO2 is a combustion product of burning fossil fuels - that's simple chemistry. Where do you think that CO2 is going if not into the atmosphere and the oceans?

Apply your scepticism in the other direction - if warming is causing increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, what is causing that warming? 

I doubt that very much. The 97% that you keep referring to is a well-established consensus, arising from peer-reviewed analyses of published papers. Since you appear keen on skepticism, I refer you to this from the skepticalscience.com website:

https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-scientific-consensus-intermedia...

It has only become politicised because of the efforts of the fossil fuel industries who use their lobbying interests to ill-effect. The research has been going on for decades and has been taking us inexorably in the same direction. Your reference to government grants would seem to suggest some ulterior motives on their part, but you do not appear to be questioning the role of industrial vested interests - what is more likely to produce a skewed result, a government grant, or a grant from Exxon? 

You also mention geologists, as if their papers are not to be considered. There are a number of areas in which geology plays a role. Geologists will publish papers on CO2 storage, leaching of gases from rock, upswelling of gases from ocean floors, release of methane from permafrost, and so on. Dismissing geologists is an unwise position without some proper analysis. 

In reply to ebdon:

It may be an old study but like I said that is where and when my perceptions came from. My understanding is that Michael Mann omitted information that did not fit in with his agenda. Perhaps there is a debate to have over that as it's just conjecture about his motives but I saw enough "evidence" to convince me. As a none scientist can you appreciate my difficulties. Again my perception is that the science is being driven by political and commercial interests so getting at pure science can be difficult. Science that is discredited discredits science.  If you see what I mean. If no one has said that before I claim it as mine

In reply to GridNorth:

Do you genuinely believe the climate/earth science community is split 50 50 on the causes and consequences of climate change? You actually think can find and keep finding a credible researcher with a contrary opinion and comparable credentials to each and every one with the view that our greenhouse gas emissions are causing climate change and that the environmental and social consequences are going to be severe?

Without wishing to be excessively rude I'd suggest the layman should call 'bullshit!'.

jk

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

Not sure where I said geologists were not to be considered! To be clear I am not. With regard to your link it seems to be basing the 97% on papers that were already circulating and published by scientists with a commercial and political agenda.  In any case what has concensus to do with science? It could be scientists simply repeating what they have heard/read without critical analysis. In the 19th century many scientists, possibly also in excess of 90%, believed in eugenics.

In reply to jkarran:

I don't know, that's my point, I'm continually questioning but I suspect that if you were to find a scientist who claimed A I could find another equally qualified scientist who could disprove that claim. I can't of course comment on the bona fides of the individual but if I see NASA climatologist or geologist in their title I am inclined to take them seriously. I don't understand why so many of you are labelling me as a denier, I'm not.  To be clear there is an issue and we all have to find and contribute to a  solution.

In reply to GridNorth:

Here is the ultimate answer:

https://xkcd.com/1732/

Joking aside, the chart rather accurately and frighteningly illustrates the scale of the previous temperature deviations that are typically cited by climate deniers as evidence that fluctuations are only normal and not related to modern CO2 emissions.

The underlying data is all referenced in the IPCC report.

CB

In reply to GridNorth:

Yes, that's where the 97% figure you have been bandying about comes from. It does rather appear you don't really know what you're talking about. Where is there any mention of any commercial and political agenda?

And in the vague hope hope of getting you to actually answer some questions, I'll repeat them here, again:

We are burning millions of tonnes of fossil fuels every year. CO2 is a combustion product of burning fossil fuels - that's simple chemistry. Where do you think that CO2 is going if not into the atmosphere and the oceans?

Apply your scepticism in the other direction - if warming is causing increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, what is causing that warming? 

What is more likely to produce a skewed result, a government grant, or a grant from Exxon?

I would be grateful if you would do me the courtesy of actually answering these simple direct questions. If you don't have any answers to offer, a simple 'I don't know' will suffice. If nothing else, such answers will give an indication of your ability and willingness to engage critically with fundamental questions. 

In reply to GridNorth:

If you respect the position of NASA, you may find this interesting:

https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/

In reply to GridNorth:

I'm certain you could find one willing to have a good go.

My question though was whether we could keep doing that until we'd run out of scientists or would you run out at a handful. If it's the former then anthropogenic climate change is nowhere near being scientific orthodoxy. I'd bet the farm it's the latter if we were being rigorous about matching credentials, pitting equally qualified people and comparable quality studies against each other rather than professional scientists against right-wing media commentators and oil industry shills in white coats.

Because you're doing the deniers work for them. You think you're achieving balance by seeking or hearing out a pair of opposing opinions but what you're missing the thousands of professional scientists with corroborating data and work behind one of them and the well funded fossil fuel lobbyist skulking behind the other. This is the balance trap the BBC fell into for years and has been excoriated for.

Even if we accept the opposing view results from honest work it does happen that small, flawed or misunderstood experiments produce anomalous results. That's interesting and can lead to new knowledge one way or another but if logical/statistical/experimental errors can subsequently be identified and corrected or the anomaly disappears when the experiment is repeated then that's fine, the scientific method is designed to handle issues like that gracefully (if the implementation is imperfect) but the popular press will only ever run with the sensational contrary result, not the ensuing slog to better understand it and fit it into the wider body of work, debunking the debunking. Stories like that have a life of their own, people with interests keep pushing them back into circulation, people wanting to believe something other than the bleak reality cling to them.

jk

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Anyone else surprised that a rogue scientist hasn't released a deadly virus yet? A modified flu one? It must be getting more and more tempting.

In reply to GridNorth:

That is very much the point: You cannot.

This is good to hear, but what makes me (and I suspect others) so angry is that this continuous questioning* without looking at the relative expertise and accepting the scientific consensus is also deliberately used to seed doubts as to whether such a consensus exists. Unfortunately this seems to be a hallmark of our post truth age.

The important thing to keep in mind is that this "who needs experts" stance has dramatic consequences even if it drags out mitigation measures only by a few years or helps convince Trump to leave Kyoto/Paris. No one gives a shit about what flat earthers think, their particular idiocy is harmless. "Climate scepticism" or the anti vaxxer movement are most definitely not harmless.

CB

* "questioning" is actually the wrong term. For this, you would have to look at the data and models yourself, and use your own expertise to check whether the conclusions are valid!

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

Yes very interesting but at which point have I denied or questioned that the climate is changing? What I have questioned are some of the more dramatic claims made by the likes of Al Gore and based on computer modelling that may be questionable. Extreme weather events are getting worse.  Not supported by the data.  Polar bears will become extinct. Not supported by the data.

What many of you are too young to remember is that similar alarmist predictions about global freezing were also supported by a concensus that was somewhere up in the 80/90% mark.  FFS even Leonard Nimoy got involved in discussions about nuking the ice caps. That's where scaremongering can take you.  Once bitten twice shy as they say.

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

I think youd even struggle to get Exxon to produce anything that wasnt pretty alarming about the rate of current climate change these days. And if the likes of Exxon think that you have to ask yourself is this alarmist or the harsh reality we live in?

In reply to GridNorth:

No, you haven't mentioned Al Gore previously. You've questioned whether increased CO2 concentrations are responsible for increasing temperatures, without offering anything by way of explanation about how CO2 concentrations can be decoupled from increasing temperatures. You've referred to a suggestion that warming is causing the rise in CO2 without any evidence or without explanation as to the cause of that warming. 

I note you have not engaged with any of questions. I've tried, but I will withdraw now, to save wasting any more time. 

I'm 72. You may need to do a little research into the global freezing issue, as it's not really a comparable situation. You may be interested in this:

https://skepticalscience.com/70s-cooling-myth-tricks-part-I.html

In reply to ebdon:

Your operative words being 'these days'. Exxon have known about global warming for decades, and for decades they have funding denialists and lobbied against anything which remotely threatens their business regardless of the cost to the environment. They may be changing their tune now, but their efforts and those of other fossil fuel companies have been behind virtually all the denialist and anti-science propaganda of the past 40 years. 

In reply to Harry Jarvis:

I'm conceding ignorance and defeat and also withdrawing.  It's getting too much like hard work and taking up far too much of my time.  I'm 71 and relating what I remember from the 70's which, granted, may be wrong.

I'm not sure that I was promoting anything that required evidence, I thought I was questioning and putting forward an alternative view.  I apologise for not answering your specifics, you have remained courteous and helpful at all times but the sheer number of responses have become overwhelming and I can't keep up with it. Like you many of my points have also been conveniently ignored.

I don't know about you but this particular session has put me off commenting on anything controversial in future.  I think I'll stick to climbing, an area in which I do have some expertise.

Thank you for your contributions they have been helpful and put me on an alternative track with regard to investigating such matters.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

Your memory is not accurate - there was never a scientific consensus and you were mislead by sensationalist media: http://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/11584/1/2008bams2370%252E1.pdf

You may also remember if your memory is accurate, that Leonard Nimoy is an actor, not a scientist.

In reply to GridNorth:

Congratulations on hanging in there for so long.

I’m with you on being sceptical (about many areas of life) and don’t see why science should be any different. All scientists should question existing knowledge.

Sorry, I’m just too busy doing battle on other topics to really join in on this one.

In reply to SenzuBean:

Oh god I can't leave it alone.

Perhaps.  That's the point I've been trying to make.

Neither are Al Gore or Greta Thunberg, whats your point?

In reply to GridNorth:

Let me clarify - the scientific consensus, has always been on global warming (not cooling), for the last 50 years, in increasing amounts from a supermajority to what's now practical unanimity. Already in the 80s it was clear (see the article, just look at the pictures and read the conclusion).

My point is that we listen to the scientists - and what they say is that the climate is warming, and it's because of our extreme CO2 and methane emissions.
Those people also say to listen to the scientists (especially the latter).

I hope you can find some time to think further on this in a calm manner where you don't feel pressured one way or another, and to really question your contributions and those of your friends and family. My advice is to read the solutions required (ranked by impact): https://www.drawdown.org/solutions-summary-by-rank and consider which you can perform yourself.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Alternatively buy a house in the Midlands and wait

In reply to SenzuBean:

Nonsense. We've eaten meat from the dawn of our species. The strong recommendations around supplements for every vegan diet illustrate its nutritional deficiencies and how inappropriate it is for infants and the young, the elderly (who require higher protein to maintain muscle mass), if not those in between.

A growing 'vegan section' is just heavily processed junk food. Greenwashing it does nothing to improve it. It's benefits are not based in science. Good for profits mind.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

Peterborough is the place to invest for future seaview apartments.

In reply to GridNorth:

Just to start, Mr GN, that it’s good that you hang in there even if you’re being criticised. It’s rare to listen - good work.

However we need to think about this being sceptical business. Are you sceptical enough - of yourself?

Are you asking yourself questions like:

am I reading stuff which fits my political opinions and ignoring decent science which doesn’t?

am I taking too much account of one study, and going into too much depth on failures of method, rather than looking at a range of studies, which would average out biases and errors?

do I have the knowledge base to make sense of this? Can I understand the controversies and how serious they are?

am I judging non-scientific/non-expert voices for their politics rather than listening to what they are saying?

Being sceptical is hard. 

In reply to elsewhere:

What if the ice cube in a glass was in a plane with solar panels, on a treadmill in the ionosphere? 

In reply to baron:

Why should anybody who isn't a scientist, think that their scepticism is as well qualified as a scientist's?

This is why I generally say 'Don't ask me' about a lot of things, I know I don't know enough, or haven't looked into whatever it is enough. I'd be a chump to be a climate science sceptic without spending a long time going through a lot of data first. 

'I've no (well informed) idea' is probably the most honest thing a lot of us can say about a lot of things.

In reply to Timmd:

Google allows us all to have easy access to a wide range of information.

Do you think that all the contributors on this forum are experts in a wide range of subjects?

They might be but I’d guess it’s excellent googling skills that provide a great deal of the ‘in depth’ knowledge on this forum. That’s not to disparage those who are experts in their chosen or allotted field.

Being sceptical is an excellent characteristic to have as long as it’s not mistaken or replaced by cynicism.

In reply to baron:

Keeping on climate change, there is such a consensus now among scientist, that any scepticism is on thin ice (ha).

In reply to GridNorth:

Yes it is, if by worse one means that they're happening more frequently. 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180321130859.htm

In reply to Timmd:

While you wouldn’t gain any credibility for dismissing climate change out of hand it would seem reasonable to study the available data and research methods with a degree of scepticism otherwise we’d just be accepting anything that was presented to us. Peer review?

Climate change itself is a huge field to study with many interactions, positive and negative feedbacks and there will be areas that are far less understood than others. The complexity of these relationships makes it extremely difficult for someone not heavily involved in this field, an expert, to fully or even partly understand what is actually happening. As humans we can have both a mistrust of things we don’t understand and also of experts who could be telling us anything.

For example - wetlands are sometimes touted as a fine way of both capturing and storing carbon.

However, if you google wetlands, carbon and methane there are numerous studies with quite often different views depending upon the focus of the research being done. Armed only with a layman’s understanding of the subject (not a problem often encountered by the experts of UKC) which research should we believe?

New research throws up new understanding and sometimes new problems as well. Sometimes our existing knowledge proves to be incomplete or incorrect. Himalayan rock weathering anyone?

While the fundamentals of anthropogenic climate change are well known and understood there is a long way to go before we can claim to have a complete knowledge of all its processes and effects and so there is still room for scepticism as a tool in climate change research.

I think of scepticism as a form of humility, as a reminder that scientists are human and as such they can be fallible.

You will, I hope, note that nowhere in my post have I denied that climate change exists.

In reply to baron:

Do you feel qualified to assess research methods and data? What are the tools of your scepticism? 

Please tell us, away from climate change related stuff, what scientific findings you are sceptical of?

Why would an expert tell you “anything”? Is this just insecurity talking - you’re afraid that smarter people are out to make you look stupid? Or is it that you don’t believe people are ever interested in simply finding stuff out and communicating it? 

In reply to Shani:

From my friends who are vegan or have tried to be, some seem to find that they need to eat some animal fats to be happier and to have energy even while taking supplements, and others seem to be as healthy as can be with colour in their cheeks. 

Which foods do you mean?

In reply to Shani:

We also did all kinds of other things that are no longer necessary. It's been proven beyond the shadow of a doubt that it's no longer necessary. The only supplement that is required is B12 - the same thing we supplement (in the form of cobalt) to dairy and meat animals because they are also not nutritionally complete without it.

It's just coagulated beans and whatnot - no less healthy than proven carcinogens in red meat (heme) and dairy (oestrogen and breast cancer) products. If you read the ingredients to the majority of them, you'll find nothing that you don't already eat in other foods anyway (soy is omnipresent in most other foods).

In reply to seankenny:

I’ve got a PhD will that do?

Are you being sceptical?

In reply to Timmd:

The records indicate that they are more frequent in the Northern Hemisphere but less frequent in the southern hemisphere according to the Australian Bureau of Meteorology so it's a little misleading to suggest that they are more frequent overall.

In reply to baron:

If it's in art history, probably not. But more seriously, are you suffering from the Dunning Kruger effect? Also, you're an old guy. Has new stuff be discovered since your PhD that you're unaware of and don't understand?

My experience, working with "experts" in various organisations, is that most of them are motivated by a desire to get things right, as much because they don't want to look stupid. Sure, people are falliable, motivated by all sorts of often less than savoury motivations, but we know this and try - at our best - to iron this out. I suspect in general you subscribe to a Whiggish view of history which suggests we are pretty good at this, except in the case of climate change, in which you drop little questions like "Peer review?" What does this even mean - you think the peer review process has gone awry in climate science?

I think it's telling that neither you nor Grid North have answered my question about which other parts of science you are sceptical about. I mean, I suspect it's nothing, you don't strike me as anti-vaxxers, so then the question has to be: why do you believe everything else, but not this? Just what is it about climate change that is so wrong? My guess - and of course I may be wrong - is that you're both old right wing guys who've spent years intelletually immersed in climate change denial, imbibing the words of the likes of Nigel Lawson, a non-expert who both preaches and has probably been on the odd private jet (yeah, we saw how GN projected that onto people he doesn't like).

So the "scepticism" isn't scepticism at all, it's just a fall back position. And a comfortable one. If you genuinely thought that climate change was going to wreck terrible damage on the lives of your children and grandchildren, and that you'd supported people who tried to exacerbate the problem rather than deal with it, you'd be stricken with guilt. It would be horrible for you. Scepticism keeps you in a better place.

In reply to seankenny:

My PhD is science based.

I’m not a climate change denier, in fact I’ll publicly state here and now that it is happening but as a geologist I might get a little less excited about it than I should.

I think being sceptical encourages one to read around a subject, not to necessarily disprove something but to better understand it.

Did you read the bit about Himalayan rock weathering?

Something that apparently isn’t as well understood as was previously thought.

And something I wouldn’t have come across if I hadn’t been looking to research something else.

Just accepting something because it’s been studied before isn’t always a good idea.

The Internet now allows one access to a huge amount and range of information which was unimaginable in my university days.

It allows one to keep abreast of some of the new developments in ones field but it is possible to be swamped by the amount of information available.

Your analysis of me is way off the mark.

I can’t speak for GridNorth.

In reply to seankenny:

Well I'm sceptical about some of the more outlandish claims with regard to black holes and such like.  I was also rightly, as it turns out sceptical about us entering a new ice age.  The principles of Eugenics although condemned continued to have a scientific following into my lifetime, but the reason I am currently concentrating on climate change is a) because it is having a direct impact on us all b) It's cause has been commercialised and politicised c) The cure could be almost as painful as the disease d) A whole raft of people are making money and political gain out of ramping things up e) I disapprove of using a vulnerable young girl to front the climate change cause. d) I have read plenty of material that casts doubt on the issue. Lots of the "evidence" on this issue seems to be regurgitated headlines that have not undergone peer review.  e) Even many scientists, some of whom subscribed to the 97% claim have since admitted that when questioned they did not check and by their failure contributed to it.

I also get annoyed at the superior tone sometimes adopted by scientists who do not like their views being challenged.  They display an attitude that they are ALWAYS right and that we "unqualified " people should crawl back into out holes and keep out of it. Surely everyone has to concede that scientists often get things wrong.  That's why I am  a sceptic.

In line with baron's post my background is that I have a degree in Electrical Engineering as well as an OU degree in History.

In reply to GridNorth:

Neither of which amounts to much!

In reply to subtle:

Don't be such an arse. In the context of climate change of course not.  I admitted as much earlier so crawl back into your box and don't be so dismissive and insulting.  

In reply to GridNorth:

Meh, I may, or I may not - I'm just "sceptical" about the worth of of your degrees to a discussion about climate 

In reply to subtle:

Well thank you for your contribution.  I'll send you a card for your 13th birthday if you let me know when that is

In reply to baron:

Genuinely curious, what's it on?

You're a social animal too.

What about weathering in the Himalaya? It's not very helpful just to scatter odd words into a post with nothing more than a question mark to indicate what you mean or think.

jk

In reply to GridNorth:

Why thank you, that would be great - sent it to 

Subtle,

White Street,

Bristol

BS5 0TS

(its actually my birthday soon so best send it off this weekend to ensure it gets here in time)

In reply to jkarran:

Didn't he tell us earlier he's a Geologist?

In reply to jkarran:

It’s Geology based.

I’m a sad old man who should spend more time in the real world and less time on the Internet.

Sorry I threw that in as a response to another poster who was questioning my credibility.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/annals-of-glaciology/article/carbon...

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

As an example of two sides to every story I present the following:  youtube.com/watch?v=IatVKZZcPG0&

I wonder how many have just taken the original at face value just because of it's credentials.  Word of warning, it's quite upsetting. I look forward to the counter-counter arguments as suggested by seankelly. Indeed perhaps Sean would care to comment himself. After watching both of these I'm not sure how a layman is supposed to come to any conclusion. I do not know which is correct but my question would be why hasn't the second film had the same exposure as the first?

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

So the link is to a video by a Dr Susan Crockford. I've never heard of her, but it turns out she is the number one polar bear in trouble from climate change denialist.

According to a report in Vice:

"Nearly all of the denier blogs say that, contrary to the opinions of many scientists who study them, polar bears are doing fine. In fact, 80 percent of these blogs reference a single site, a blog by zoologist Susan Crockford, who has not published any peer-reviewed papers on polar bears.

“These bloggers hope to use polar bears to cast doubt on global warming itself,” said co-author Steven Amstrup, chief scientist for Polar Bears International, a conservation-focused organization. This is a deliberate tactic to sow confusion in the minds of the public about the climate change science, just as the tobacco industry did about the link between smoking and cancer, Amstrup said in an interview with Motherboard."

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/kzgq3y/climate-denier-blogs-spread-onlin...

So you're NOT a climate change denialist, but you find a cranky vid from someone who's a part of the online ecosystem of climate change denial? Well, that's a thing, isn't it?

In reply to seankenny:

I never mentioned Polar bears.  Did you watch it?  I'm doing what I said I do.  I hear an opinion and seek out the opposite opinion and view each on their own merits. Even a crank can have a valid opinion and everyone is biased in one direction or another. One mans crank is another mans genius. She appears to be a qualified crank if she has Doctor in front of her name which actually goes to prove my point you can't always trust scientists.

I don't know who is right and who is wrong but there is no denying the clip showed alternative explanations for why walrus's behave the way they do and does illustrate that not everything is as it seems.

In reply to GridNorth:

How about in the absolutely normal way a patient decides about medical treatment?

You inform yourself but you have the humility to broadly accept expertise or professional consensus and apply skepticism to your own opinions at least as much to your own thinking as you would to expert opinion.

In reply to GridNorth:

Opinions are not equal. Some are supported by evidence. Some aren't. It's extraordinary (or at least it should be) not to think skeptically enough to think is opinion is well founded and this other opinion isn't.

In reply to elsewhere:

Yes that was a silly thing to say.  I did form a conclusion which was that the original DA program was most probably manipulated to meet a certain agenda.  The video I presented challenged that view with the consequence that I am a sceptic in this instance. Not necessarily about the science but, at this point in time and with the evidence I have been presented with, most certainly about the presentation. 

In reply to SenzuBean:

Rubbish.

The only supplement that is required is B12 - the same thing we supplement (in the form of cobalt) to dairy and meat animals because they are also not nutritionally complete without it.

This contradicts your point above. 

These are the listed ingredients to a popular vegan food. Here's a question; can you tell what this food actually is?

Rehydrated textured SOYA protein (55%), water, red wine and shallot glaze (10%) (water, red wine, shallot, muscovado sugar, cornflour, concentrated carrot juice, balsamic vinegar, rapeseed oil, concentrated onion juice, concentrated leek juice, caramelised sugar syrup, salt, herbs, spices), onion purée (8%), natural flavouring, rapeseed oil, onion (2%), SOYA protein concentrate, chickpea flour, stabiliser: methyl cellulose; salt, malted BARLEY extract.

In reply to GridNorth:

This is just my point. You are NOT a sceptic! Believing everyone equally isn't being sceptical when some of those making one side of an argument are totally unqualified to do so. You talk above about peer review, the importance of scepticism for science, yet believe a video that's made by someone who's never published a piece of peer-reviewed research about polar bear behaviour (the piece claims polar bears are responsible for walrus deaths, not global warming). The video's author is roundly criticised by actual polar bear experts for her misleading and inaccurate work on the animals, which is used to push an anti-climate change line.

Here's a blog from the LSE looking into it:

http://www.lse.ac.uk/GranthamInstitute/news/climate-change-deniers-haul-out...

That you didn't detect anything cranky is because you're easily taken in by a slick, seeminly authorative video. Why wouldn't you be? You're old, you grew up in a time when to make such a film required resources and getting past gatekeepers who could remove the cranks. Those days are gone. Any crank can pull this stuff together with a little bit of cash (she gets a little bit of cash from an anti-climate change think tank in the US). It's easy to spin a few "facts" based on dubious sources into a new narrative that looks convincing to those who don't value expertise, qualifications, and scientific consensus. Which is of course a consensus built by scepticism, always liable to be corrected, but probably not by someone who knows very little about the subject.

If you were as sceptical as you think you are, you'd have found the alternative views about this person's work, and sussed out that they probably aren't worth listening to. But as I said, you're of the right. The right has spent years blathering total rubbish about climate change, so you're pump primed to believe this stuff. It no doubt feels right. Feels like there is a controversy. Feels like there is a cover-up, that someone out there is going to gain from this, and that you're the mark, the one they are after.

If you have those feelings, be sceptical of them.

In reply to seankenny:

I think that you make some valid points both about my limited, academic abilities and my age but do you honestly think that pointing them out to me in this manner, in a public forum warms me to either you or your cause. I know my limitations but for you to state them out loud is arrogant, smug, superior and offensive beyond measure.   FFS get over your selves this is meant to be a friendly forum for an exchange of casual views not a formal world changing paper presented to the ICC.

In reply to GridNorth: throwing your toys out of the pram when you're proven to be promoting deceptive nonsense isnt exactly encouraging anyone to warm to you. 

In reply to GridNorth:

It’s nothing to do with your academic abilities. I too lack the knowledge or experience to judge complex claims about climate or biology... I know really nothing about either. We are both equally at sea in this particular sphere.

And of course you hate me right now. You fell for a scammer that, like any successful con trick, appealed to your vanity as a sceptical no nonsense chap. I’m not expecting you to like me for bursting that bubble. 

As for the age thing, there’s a well known issue of older people falling for all sorts of crap on the internet because they are a bit too trusting.  

I’m sure you feel a bit silly, and that’s a shame. But you did wave your sceptic willy and then post a silly video which was easily seen through after five minutes reading. 

In reply to wbo2:

How have I thrown my toys out?  I've conceded that seankenny has made some valid points, I've admitted to my limited academic abilities and my age. I've also stated clearly that we need to take drastic action, but I draw the line at personal attacks. FFS what more do you want? If questioning one opinion and casually offering an alternative is "promoting deceptive nonsense" then we have different understandings of debate and free speech.

In reply to seankenny:

I don't hate you, I object to your personal comments. Now you are being condescending. 

In reply to wbo2:

I’m feeling a lot of warmth for GridNorth.

Can’t say the same for some other posters on this thread.

In reply to baron:

Thank you I have been feeling a little beleaguered even a little bullied. Your support is much appreciated. It's put me off posting on none climbing issues.  At least I have some expertise in that field so I may limit myself to those posts in future. My other failing is that I am too easily outraged and drawn in.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

It’s the internet.

It can do strange things to people. Myself included.

UKC would be a poorer place if people like yourself felt unable to add their thoughts,opinions and ideas.

Looking forward to reading many more contributions from you.

In reply to GridNorth:

Please don't be put off posting - guys like you and baron offer alternative views to the more shouty majority on here - and we need that - I sometimes pop up with mischief, none of it meant to be offensive (although I have a warped sense of humour),  my mischief is aimed at both sides of debate because I feel we need to debate to to challenge all our views and beliefs - we can all be wrong at some point.

Now, it's Friday, to avoid global warming/food miles I'm off to pour another glass of my home grown and produced rhubarb wine - although it is a tad strong tasting unfortunately 

In reply to GridNorth:

Look. You bigged yourself up as some kind of sceptic kick-ass but fell for some crazy blogger because it fitted in with the shit propaganda you’ve been fed for years. You’re critical of knowledge whilst pretending to welcome it. You claim you believe in climate change but are happy to believe the work of climate change deniers and spread their bollocks. You are happy to proclaim all this in public and whine about personal attacks when it’s reflected back.

Individually a bit sad, but, in your millions, a f*cking danger.

There... I don’t think that was condescending.

In reply to seankenny:

It wasn’t condescending it was unnecessary.

In reply to baron:

It was put bluntly. But it was pretty accurate though. 

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

And still unnecessary.

In reply to baron:

Why? You’re conservatives. You believe in personal responsibility. I think this faux scepticism is irresponsible, so I’m taking the best of conservative morality and applying it back to you guys. There are good arguments behind everything I’ve written, but take on my arguments rather than whining about how it’s so unfair people aren’t always nice to you. 

In reply to seankenny:

We’ve got people, quite rightly, complaining on other threads about the behaviour of politicians towards each other.

So when you ‘win’ an argument you should be magnanimous and treat the other person with some respect.

That’s not what you did.

In reply to baron:

I’ve read back over the thread. I’m afraid I disagree. GridNorth took a ‘i’m just a reasonable person exercising reasonable scepticism on a subject where there is reasonable grounds to be sceptical’ position; and then when presented with a tide of evidence that he was wrong, and that any space for reasonable scepticism disappeared a generation ago, he just dug in ever more intransigently, giving  away his real position as a denialist by the way he uncritically accepted denialist nonsense but refused to accept the overwhelming scientific consensus, including contributions by a real-life scientist with relevant knowledge.

Ps its a bit of a derail, but I saw this this evening, and thought it interesting bearing in mind our conversation earlier-

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/27/tories-dominic-cummin...

the last part sums up my feelings about the risks that are being enabled by people tolerating behaviour they don’t approve of in pursuance of a goal they want to achieve. But, not relevant to this thread, so just for info, not looking for reply here...

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

GridNorth was engaged in an internet debate on UKC.

Whatever the rights or wrongs of his ideas, views or opinions he deserves to be treated with some respect.

Sorry, didn’t see your link till after I’d posted.

I only read a bit of the article, sorry, it had too many modern words that I didn’t understand but I think I got the gist of it.

Johnson and Cummings might reap what they sow.

In reply to baron:

I always get the impression conservatives are the sort of people who feel respect should be earned. Things that indicate automatic respect, like the concept of human rights, they tend not to like. 

Conservatives also seem to love feisty writers who “say it like is is” on feminism and racism and being politically correct. 

I wish you guys could have the courage of your so-called convictions. Or have I mis-understood the conservative world view?

In reply to seankenny:

You don’t have a clue about me.

You think you do because you’ve read some of my posts on this forum.

You’re mistaking Conservatives for conservatives. 

Maybe you could use your ace googling skills to check out the difference.

While you’re there look up humility as well.

In reply to baron:

I think they were, for dozens of posts. 

However, there is a point where, when faced with someone who claims to be an impartial arbiter of evidence who in reality gives one side a free pass while ignoring the tsunami of evidence to the contrary, it starts to grate. 

I’ve had my wings clipped on here in the past, and in retrospect I had it coming. I took my medicine and learned from it. 

Re the article, the last 4 paras or so are the relevant ones. The gist being it’s not Cummings who will reap what he sows, it’s the parliamentary Conservative party. Be careful what you wish for, and remember, the abyss gazes also...

In reply to baron:

Erm, I deliberately used small-c conservative for a reason! 

You have as much chance to explain yourself on here as you like.... 

Look, I get that you feel poor old GN was hard done by. But he was called out as politely as possible, and then complained that people were nasty to him. Those very same people who bothered to debunk the crap posted by a man who claimed to be a die hard sceptic. I mean, come on, be a little robust, like you expect the Millennial kids to be.

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

As you know I’ve had my fair share of ill tempered arguments on this forum.

I’ve been wrong, bad mannered, insulting and, to my eternal shame, downright abusive.

In mitigation it’s always been, with one exception, towards those who are able and willing to give as good as they got. Combative might be a good description.

But I’d be mortified if I thought that my words had driven another member from this site.

We’ve done battle over Brexit for years on this forum and maybe we’ve become immune to the tone and language that we sometimes use.

Perhaps, in light of recent events in Parliament, we can adopt a more moderate approach towards our debates? While maintaining the passion and emotion as well.

I agree that it won’t be Cummings who suffers. The Conservatives deserve what they get.

In reply to seankenny:

I can be as robust as you like but you’ll have noticed that I’m not defending myself, I’m criticising your behaviour towards a person who was engaging you in a debate. It’s fine to criticise what somebody says but since when has becoming personal and using a persons age against them been acceptable?

If you consider your attitude towards GridNorth as being polite then that’s another word, besides humility, that you should look up.

In reply to baron:

Yes. That’s fair comment. Overall I don’t think we do too badly here, given how it seems to be in other corners of social media. But if we’re taking MPs to task over their behaviour we should expect the same from ourselves.

Anyhow, that’s it for my brief foray back here, for a while anyway- jobs to do, and once I start posting it’s very hard to stop- will need to cold turkey for a couple of days before I can trust myself to lurk again without quickly becoming embroiled in multiple threads...!

cheers

gregor 

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

Thanks

In reply to baron:

Other posters have above explained why Grid North elicited a feisty response. I’m going instead to deal with the age thing. I did not use an age-based insult, I simply said there was a problem with older people sourcing information from the internet.

This is a recognised phenomenon - see the article below - but one might have thought the true sceptic would have been aware of this...

I think it would be a shame if Grid North were not to post. But I also think it would be excellent if he didn’t post obvious bollocks.

“Older people are almost four times more likely to have shared fake news on Facebook than the younger generation, according to research published in the journal Science.

On average, American Facebook users over 65 shared nearly seven times as many articles from fake news domains as those aged between 18 and 29, researchers from NYU and Princeton found in the study, which also concluded sharing such false content was “a relatively rare activity”.”

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jan/10/older-people-more-likely...

In reply to seankenny:

If you don’t like reading ‘obvious bollocks’ then you’re going to be upset by many posts on UKC.

You’re doing  a Johnson when you could just apologise for your hurtful, unnecessary behaviour.

In reply to baron:

You would think that the days of "Evolution is a lie because God tells us so in the bible" preventing the search for truth were mostly over. But I think things have got a lot worse recently. Considering the actual question hardly happens. The messenger and the assumed message of the question are attacked from all sides by associating them with accepted 'badness'.

In reply to seankenny:

Interesting - is the result because of how the fake news sites target users, or because of the gullibility of some subsets of the population?

In reply to Dr.S at work:

I don’t know. Presumably a fake news site would want to target a gullible subset of the population to be successful? Or are they really that sophisticated? Again, I just can’t say. The study seems to look at who shares fake news, which is rare but the wrinklies do more often. 

In reply to baron:

People post all sorts of nonsense. Other people criticise it. Sounds like business as usual to me. 

I pointed out that Grid North was posting climate change denialism propaganda, against his stated position. I then made some gusses as to why that might be, none of which, you’ll note, was “well he’s a bloody fool”. I simply suggested that growing up in one environment made it very difficult to operate in a radically different one. 

That both you one-footers found this objectionable suggests that I hit a sore spot. 

In reply to seankenny:

I've calmed down and decided that this is too important to not debate.  Can we start again.

I believe climate change is happening, I also believe that everyone on the planet should be doing as much as they can to combat it. Governments, organisations and individuals.  Can I be any clearer than that?

I let myself get emotionally involved and defensive under a barrage of abuse. I'm not denying the scientific facts, I'm questioning them and what better place to seek out alternative views than to listen to someone with the opposite views. By sharing that alternative information I'm not promoting anything, I'm inviting others to also question. Silly me I thought that was a good thing. On that note why is denial information propaganda and pro climate change not. To just dismiss someone, as you did with the producer of the video I linked to merely because they hold a contradictory view is not a an argument about the facts which brings us onto what is possibly my biggest scepticism, the way those facts are sometimes presented.  The climate change environment at the moment is like medieval religion and anyone who does not accept the "accepted " status quo is a heretic and sometimes this forum feels like the Inquisition. I've asked before but did you watch that video or simply dismiss it because of it's origins?

From now on any responses that become personal will simply be ignored which again would be a shame as it stifles debate.

Al

In reply to seankenny:

Ok - but if we cannot answer that question then we don’t know if your assertion that old people are more gullible on the internet is true.

In reply to David Riley:to an extent- bug there is also a deal of rehashing and recirculating disproven material, usually for a political agenda.  What do you do with that?

In reply to wbo2:

Tackle the question.  Don't attempt to discredit the source of the "fake news" and the person repeating it.

In this case two items of conflict were :  Is the walrus population reducing or increasing ?  Do walrus's prefer to be on ice ?

In reply to seankenny:

Wrinklies, one footers? Your claims to not being offensive are looking a little pathetic but I will avoid the temptation to bring the debate down to your level. Take it from one who meets your criteria it is and extremely so.  You were much better when you presented facts, indeed I was taking on board many of your suggestions.

In reply to GridNorth:

I'm not denying the scientific facts about vaccines and autism, I'm questioning them and what better place to seek out alternative views than to listen to someone with the opposite views. By sharing that alternative information about vacciness and autism I'm not promoting anything, I'm inviting others to also question. Silly me I thought that was a good thing. On that note why is information linking vaccines and autism propaganda and pro-vaccines information not. To just dismiss someone, as you did with the producer of the video I linked to merely because they hold a contradictory view about whether vaccines cause autism is not a an argument about the facts which brings us onto what is possibly my biggest scepticism, the way those facts about vaccines are sometimes presented.  The pro-vaccines movement at the moment is like medieval religion.

In reply to GridNorth:

Unlike you, climate change deniers have replaced healthy skepticism* in science with gullibility about conspiracies.

Climate change is the opposite of religion because it has an overwhelming evidence base in which the inevitable incorrect bits get replaced by developing knowledge. 

It could all just be a leftist multi-generational conspiracy started by John Tyndal in 1859 but that seems unlikely compared to it being ordinary science. Definitely with political, international and economic impacts though.

*questioning and curiousity are integral to research and learning

In reply to seankenny:

No. My doctor for example seems pretty keen on evidence.

Eradication of smallpox and near eradication of polio (gone in most countries) is pretty good non religious evidence to me. 

We should ask antivaxxers if they have eliminated any diseases.

In reply to David Riley:that's easy to say, very hard to do as there a few subjects around where there are plenty of fake facts being thrown around.  Tell someone there are 'facts' are not so factual and you are immediately called a bad man. 

In reply to elsewhere:

Religion is not about evidence or lack of it.  But when people behave as sheep, judging the source of the evidence, and the number of devotees to it, rather than examining the actual evidence themselves. 

In reply to seankenny:

But surely still subject to questioning if additional evidence is presented.  Please get back to the subject in hand, Climate Change.

In reply to elsewhere:

Hold on a moment. Read my post and read the post it is replying to...

In reply to GridNorth:

Erm, weren’t we talking about epistemology?

In reply to seankenny:

Pro science is not like a medieval religion.

In reply to elsewhere:

I know it's not. Read Grid North's original post. Read my reworking of it.

In reply to David Riley:

I disagree. Religion is about faith and there is no evidence to examine. My religious upbringing and education never claimed there was evidence but did say it required faith.

However I may have missed something, is there some actual evidence for me to examine?

In reply to seankenny:

Those pro vaccine folk have without any doubt saved close members of your families lives and maybe even yours, without you even realising it. 

I'd look at what folk died from less than 200 years ago. 

In reply to summo:

Jesus f*cking Christ. I know this.

Read. The. Post. It. Was. Replying. To.

Look, let me spell it out to you guys.

Grid North wrote the following, about climate change:

I'm not denying the scientific facts, I'm questioning them and what better place to seek out alternative views than to listen to someone with the opposite views. By sharing that alternative information I'm not promoting anything, I'm inviting others to also question. Silly me I thought that was a good thing. On that note why is denial information propaganda and pro climate change not. To just dismiss someone, as you did with the producer of the video I linked to merely because they hold a contradictory view is not a an argument about the facts which brings us onto what is possibly my biggest scepticism, the way those facts are sometimes presented.  The climate change environment at the moment is like medieval religion

I then wrote my post.

Can you see what it is yet, kids?

In reply to seankenny:

I did.
You're coming across as one of these aggressive, arrogant, know-it-all types.
I've met this type before, not very nice people, I'd stop it now, you're not doing yourself any favours.

In reply to elsewhere:

I agree with you. "Religion is about faith and there is no evidence to examine." Just that lack of evidence is not what makes it religion."

In reply to Lusk:

Look, my point was this: if you replace climate change with autism, the post looks like a veiled apology for being an anti-vaxxer. And if you believe/trust/accept the science of vaccines, which I think we all do, then the post looks ridiculous.

So then the question becomes: why doesn't GN believe/trust/accept the science of climate change? Why is he so attatched to the hockey stick controversy, which is from 1998 and we've had an actual expert (I make no claims to expertise on this) come on and say the controversy is completely misguided.

My point in all this is to suggest that GN needs to be more sceptical of himself and the sources he uses to stoke up the climate change "debate".

I'm surprised people here took such an obvious rhetorical device so literally. I've written loads of posts defending the scientific consensus on climate change and you assume I'm an anti-vaxxer, simply because you've not read the post very carefully...

In reply to seankenny:

Let me try and clarify yet again where I'm coming from taking the DA film and the video I presented as an example of why I ask questions.  The DA video declared that receding ice was causing Walrus's to venture onto dry land because the ice was disappearing.  That seems to be undeniably true but the video goes on to suggest this was causing them to fall off cliffs and used emotive video to demonstrate this.  Again the root cause is true in as much as they would not be there if the ice was not receding but the alternative video suggests that the human activity occurring to make the film may also be contributing by panicking the Walrus's. This could also be true. Please note at all times and mostly throughout this thread I am questioning not declaring.

In reply to Chive Talkin\':

We are already in a situation where severe coastal/estuary flooding could and very likely will occur during the next decade. All it takes is strong on shore winds combined with an exceptionally high Spring tide following  a period of heavy rain resulting in heavily swollen rivers. Particularly vulnerable is the the east coast of the UK, the Thames estuary and London. The Thames barrier is now known to be inadequate, and unable to withstand an onslaught brought about by the above extreme factors all occurring together. It very nearly happened again just a year or so ago.

I am old enough to remember the East Coast floods - they were devastating. Significant coastal defence works took place following that disaster, but much of this work is half a century old and crumbling. The Environment Agency is struggling to keep up with repairs and new works and mean sea level is now higher than in was in the 1950s. 

It is no longer a matter of "if" the combination of factors I describe above occur, but it is now a certainty that it "will" occur, and rising sea levels are going to make events like this occur more and more frequently. 

There is no way I would now consider buying a property at low level near the sea, or on a river bank, particularly the Thames, which includes much of London and large areas of the Thames basin. This is an area I know well, but I am sure over areas like the Severn Basin are at similar severe risk and if I lived in those areas, I would hesitate to buy a property anywhere where there was even the remotest hint of flooding.

In reply to GridNorth:

So what you’re saying is, if I understand it correctly, as follows:

Hey! Someone is saying that naturalist and filmmaker David Attenborough claims to care about nature but actually he runs a team of careless, sensationalist chancers who kill the animals they are meant to be filming and then pass it off as  evidence for their pet theory. David Attenborough is a scam! At least, that’s what people are saying.

That appears to be the drift of it. 

In reply to seankenny:

Crikey you are beginning to sound like Cathy Newman interviewing  Jordan Peterson and just as ineffective.  You are paraphrasing in an attempt to belittle me.  Pathetic!

In reply to GridNorth:

Give it up mate.

It’s probably not in your nature but just for once let it go.

Don’t feed the energy monster.  

In reply to baron:

I think you are right.  The problem with people like this, apart from being extremely insensitive and offensive, is that their tactics have the opposite affect of their intentions. Instead of signing up to their cause I feel an overwhelming urge to find evidence against them.

Al

In reply to GridNorth:

It tends to be my ego that gets the better of me. I always tell myself to be less competitive but, as others on this forum will testify, all too often I don’t know when to quit.

I’m very good at giving advice and far less successful at taking it.

In reply to GridNorth:

So what exactly is the video saying, in your view? 

In reply to baron:

But do we deserve warped monstrosity which will fill the void they leave behind?

I always thought I'd enjoy watching the Conservative eat itself alive but the reality is its just ceding ground to worse extremists.

Jk

In reply to jkarran:

Yes, what’s that old saying about being careful  what you wish for?

It’s been said before but Brexit is a Pandora’s box.

Or a genie who’s not going back in the bottle.

In reply to jkarran:

I don't consider the incoming Labour government for the next 5 or 10 .years a monstrosity whatsoever.

In reply to Le Sapeur:

Does your tide gauge measure the half tide mark, because that's the important thing. As you'll no doubt know, atmospheric pressure raises sea level by ~10cm per 11mb drop in pressure. Your highest ever tide will almost certainly have occurred when low pressure happened to coincide with a big spring.

My house is theoretically below sealevel for a few hours every month, but the seawalls a mile away keep the reclaimed land dry.

In reply to Lusk:

The next government will be 'Conservative'. If we're lucky it'll be a short lived toothless minority snapped back to reality by a revitalised opposition freed of Corbyn's euro-ambivalence.

jk

In reply to SenzuBean:

A lot of this new veg*n food is rather unappetizing when you look beyond the greenwashed & health-ticked packaging. Highly processed formulations carry hidden environmental costs and questionable health benefits.

https://www.nutritionadvance.com/the-awesome-burger/