I had no knowledge of the PETM prior, but it provides some interesting context from the cursory reading I did. It sounds like our global temperature is going up at about 22 times the rate it did then, which is a rather massive spike if I were to say so myself.

Comparing about 2860 years to the 130 in our time is a bit of a tough sell to anyone who doesn’t religiously believe that global warming doesn’t exist, if you ask me. I’m surprised that that isn’t cited more often.

The easiest answer to understand is this one, just taking decadal averages.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/image/s/a/Decadal-average-temperatures-ls2.jpg

Clear?

We can’t prove that nothing of the sort occurred in the Precambrian but it seems unlikely that the system was complex enough at that time to shift so rapidly.

So, yeah, probably this is unprecedented, with the PETM being the nearest precedent.

If anything similar happened at another time it would take some thousands of years to resolve, and would leave a PETM-like signature.

I’m not a stabbin’ hobo, I’m a singin’ hobo.

Personally, I really don’t care why you want to help reduce emissions, I am just more than happy to welcome you on to my team!  I have no doubt the presence of skeptics will make the alliance stronger.

In the case of AGW, it looks like both sides are being dishonest. Let’s see… One side claims that there is no global warming problem and the other side claims that it requires a rethink of capitalism. Clearly, the global warming problem is potentially real and requires deregulation of nuclear energy.

Who is claiming it requires a rethink of capitalism?  Links please.

What we have is a bunch of scientists publishing real data and theory about real stuff happening in the real world.  Then we have a bunch of politicians and fossil fuel industry flacks saying they’re wrong and a few of the most extreme environmentalists saying the sky is falling.  Presenting this mess as “both sides are being dishonest” is incredibly dishonest.

Probably easier than looking at each book and trying to determine if it’s worth putting into circulation – especially books like the aforementioned “Merchants of Doubt” which a librarian isn’t trained to know whether it’s a crackpot book or what.

Actually, this is exactly what librarians are trained to do.  Do you think library science programs consist of “Shelving 201″ and “Crowd Control: How to be stern without raising your voice”?

That’s even more likely to happen when the activists who supposedly believe, and act upon, the science are suggesting “You’ll need to start paying $5 or $6 a gallon for gas.  And double what you’re paying now for electricity.  And by the way, those less-developed countries – with which you are competing for jobs – don’t have to do any of this for years to come.”

Since SOPA is dead this won’t threaten BB’s existence (But hey – Since the British taxpayer already paid for it, it should be free anyway):

Standard Def BT
http://goo.gl/f2WPa

High Def BT
http://goo.gl/REicb

Filestoob:
http://goo.gl/9LPKH

check this clip

Well… if nothing else, I at least really enjoyed that clip! Amazing stuff. I’ve never seen that before. I’m going to have to watch the rest of it somewhere when I get a chance. Thanks!

The post is complaining about how shit WSJ is – why the hell would Cory link it? Are you incapable of operating a Google? How many complete morons must now be BB readers if 4 people “liked” your comment? 5?

Thanks for your valued input LUser 100. Don’t let the door hit your conspiracy-theorist ass on the way out.

The “appeal to authority” logical fallacy only applies when the authority being appealed to is in fact not an authority. Scientific concensus is the authority you smug MFer.

Anti: Judging by 44′s perviously stated position, I don’t think he’s very interested in science.

44: get off your high horse, bud. Cow was about as polite and apolitical as he could’ve been there and you still wanted to wave your dick around because his points were valid and made your position look stupid.

If you are interested in how accurate the models actually are, check this clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfN9F9dvjaQ

I haven’t read the comments yet but here’s to (foolishly?) hoping that there’s not some jackass playing the skeptic’s advocate. I live in Australia where the political Right is as retarded about climate change as their US counterparts, so the journalistic discourse here is very similar (trained, objective scientist Vs. paid liar for vested interests).

My dad (who is a fervent climate change denier) sent me a link to some skeptic asshole’s talk which supposedly would convince me why climate change is a farce. This presentation was funded and held for some mining lobby group and the speaker was an infamous piece of shit who has for years been making a living from industry groups with his denialist stance which is based on nothing but deception. Out of respect for my dad I listened to the painful entirety of this presentation – subsequent to which I debunked every single point the fool raised (with nothing more than about an hour of Googling) in an email to my dad. Suffice it to say my time listening to and rebutting the stupid presentation was wasted. Lucky I did it during work hours, I guess.

Sadly for some people it seems it’s more logical to trust their own (or some irrelevant talking head’s) best judgement rather than the best judgement of people who actually know what the fuck is going on.

How about you educate yourself instead of claiming that other people are too vague for you to understand? Hmm?

Actually, it doesn’t matter. We’ll get your kids.

You know what, if you don’t get it, too fucking bad. It’s real, we’re done indulging your bottomless passive aggressive ignorance,

“”the current rate of change is positively unprecedented in the history of the earth”

you need to:

1) define what period you *really* mean when you say “history of the earth”. We can all be guilty of approximation or hyperbole, so you don’t really mean *all* of history, but what period do you actually mean

2) define what period you consider has a rate of unprecedented warming, i.e. 5 years, 10 years, 50 years, 500 years, 5000 years. 

Without both of these clarifications, we can’t even discuss the claim you’re making.

So what two periods do you mean? Be specific.

Then, you make a general claim that “Pollen counts in arctic and antarctic ice records come to mind. Similarly when you get into the fossil record”

Please provide a link to the data (or paper) that you believe supports your contention that these proxies (or other proxies of your choosing) have the resolution to support the claim you’ve made – when you’ve clarified what that claim actually is.

Educate yourself, don’t bellow about how what you don’t know yet absolutely doesn’t exist and therefore justifies your ramblings which even you seem to admit are not well informed.

You’re being part of the problem. If you want to be part of the solution state your ignorance in the form of a question in future.

Models don’t tell us that. Fossils tell us that.

to look for evidence of similar fluctuations in the past is at the very least not a terrible idea.

Agreed. But, it’s already been looked at. My point is that doesn’t give cause for skepticism of the data at this point.

For example:
(you may have to copy & paste this link for it to jump)
http://boingboing.net/2012/01/28/wsjs-partisan-approach-to-cl.html#comment-423283381