As wholesome as anything Intergovernmental can be - the clue's in the first word!!

When one considers some of the powerful vested interests involved in agreeing content/signing off reports e.g. the Saudis and the Chinese, it does make one wonder if things have been deliberately downplayed - particularly given the way some things are panning out or have been revised to likely be way worse than IPCC worst-case scenarios.

That's the problem you see: unless you are an adherant of global conspiracy theories, the possibility exists that the IPCC could be off the mark, but in the opposite direction to the one normally touted by the anti-camp

Cheers - John

So the world really could end in 2012 then?

http://rockblogs.psu.edu/climate/2010/10/a-new-kind-of-vicious-crime-against-humanity-the-fossil-fuel-industrys-disinformation-campaign-on-cl.html

Hmmm, very interesting? We've seen other 'crimes against humanity' pursued I wonder if the Exon Mobile Exec's are worried though?

Shocking but not new.

I wonder if this will generate the same level of self-righteous indignation as the alleged data tampering incidents from the usual suspects.

Probably not.

Ocean deep water circulation was discussed here, only a few days ago -

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-11/uadb-ecc110310.php

The Atlantic Ocean circulation (termed meridional overturning circulation, MOC) is an important component of the climate system. Warm currents, such as the Gulf Stream, transport energy from the tropics to the subpolar North Atlantic and influence regional weather and climate patterns. Once they arrive in the North the currents cool, their waters sink and with them they transfer carbon from the atmosphere to the abyss. These processes are important for climate but the way the Atlantic MOC responds to climate change is not well known yet.

and...

The study shows that the ocean circulation was very different in the past and that there was a period when the flow of deep waters in the Atlantic was reversed. This happened when the climate of the North Atlantic region was substantially colder and deep convection was weakened. At that time the balance of seawater density between the North and South Atlantic was shifted in such a way that deep water convection was stronger in the South Polar Ocean. Recent computer models simulate a reversal of the deep Atlantic circulation under such conditions while it is only now with the new data generated by UAB scientists and their colleagues from Seville and the UK that the details of the circulation reversal become apparent. This situation occurred during the ice age 20,000 years ago. Although this was far back in time the results are relevant for our climate today and in the near future. The new study shows that the Atlantic MOC in the past was very sensitive to changes in the salt balance of Atlantic Ocean currents. Similar changes in seawater salt concentration are expected to occur in the North Atlantic in the course of climate warming over the next 100 years. Therefore the data to be published in Nature offer the climate modelling community the opportunity to calibrate their models and improve their capacity to predict reliably future ocean and climate changes.

You really have to worry about the people who think the scare stories up.
Perhaps this is where the Exxon millions go, it would be difficult to imagine a more effective way to ridicule the hoax.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UNXv6IUhC4

Interesting. I assume your point is that the climate system is a complex one and we still have things to learn.

As you have put this under the 'Hoax' thread I assume its another side swipe about AGW.  I don't think it changes the fact that we need to curb GHGs, does it?  Or do you think perhaps that until we know absolutely everything we should do nothing?

I'm glad little things amuse you Robert.  I found it a waste of time personally and only vaguely funny - but then I was laughing at the makers and not with them.

It must be awfully difficult, feeling obliged to believe all the stories they highlight?
Then even worse, you have to come on forums like this and try to convince everyone they are carefully done scientic studies - that deserves a medal.

The oceans are crucial to the AGW debate. The oceans act like a giant flywheel to the climate/weather system and there is much that we don't know about them. And central to this, is that mixing may well be greater than 'thought' and as such 'the missing heat' of AGW is being spread far and wide - but of course, this can't be found.

The more we know about the system the better are our chances to determine outcomes.

I'm all for better control of the excesses of the consumer society providers, but, the chosen battle ground is not one that I can agree with.

http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/gsl/views/policy_statements/climatechange

Looks like my brethren in the B.G.S. are not holding back on their understanding of the greater impacts of our tinkering.

I found it very sad that so much has been been put at the door of AGW. The bandwagon has greatly mixed the real suspects and possibilities with utter rubbish and you can't blame the sceptics for that.

The makers of the sequence have made a compilation of what is being blamed on AGW and if political capital is being made of this by detracting from the real possibilities/consequences of AGW, then responsibility for this lies with the many silly claims/forecasts of the scientists, reported in the articles.

Just to lighten the mood, the video reminded me of the classic Russel Howard Cancer song...

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTu7GLfrmUI

Well i liked it anyway!

Thanks.

That last statement strikes a chord.  Something has been bothering me about the sort of nonsense trotted out by Stephen and a few others about the constant battle against nature and how the progress we have made has to be better and right.  Then I think about unnecessary low-cost flights, multiple TV sets, unrestrained consumerism and all the other nonsense of our modern age... Which aspects of our progress are necessary and which frivolous and how much better would our effect on the environment be if we pursued a different path?

Careful G.T.W.! You'll end labelled as someone who wants us back in the stone age....LOL

Sadly consumerism relies upon our personal addiction to it and we cannot un-invent the wheel. The savings we would make , as a planet, if we all lived more like our Grannies/Great Grannies but that would mean giving up 'stuff' and who would pursue policies that impoverished what folk now 'expect' in the developed world.

I mean , what ever happened to "mend and make do"? "Bin it and buy new" is todays mantra.....Ho Hum

Good morning Gray-Wolf

An interesting point.... As you may know or suspect, my concern is that as a species we will be headed backwards unless we take action to change the way we are heading.   Collectively we are taking the planet for granted and at some point, on the current trends, we will exceed one threshold or another (food, water, climate change, eco-system collapse etc) and be forced to change instead of being able to control our own destiny.

I am with you in being able to recall the 'mend and make do' era - just.  Unfortunately now too much is made not to last, to perpetuate the consumerism machine.  On top of that globalisation means the cost of making new (in e.g. China) is less than the cost of repair (in e.g. the West).

Hi again G.T.W.!

If I recall rightly part of that which caused the 'Wall street crash' were white goods made to last? Without the second world war there'd have been no "mend and make do" (I believe) and it was merely a prop during the war and austerity years to make us all feel 'involved'.

As with others recently the 'black dog' has me today and I can not see any voluntary move towards reducing our consumerism (token 'greening' of it yes but abandonment? no).

I'd refer you back to the "Giddens Paradox" to highlight my fears;

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/11/01-8

sadly I'm with prof G. on this and without a quantifiable crisis in the faces of Joe Public (highlighting the destruction ahead of us if we maintain our current course) we (Joe P.) will not engage with any measures that impoverish us.

If we look at the money our greedy bankers cost us ,in terms of what we could have used all that money in terms of our futures sake, you might see more clearly what Global priorities appear to be?

This is slightly steering off topic. I'm afraid that wanting more and taking more is human nature and there is nothing we can do about that. Nobody can stop progress and like all things, a date of expiry applies to the planet too. Live and be happy

Agreed but its not our planet and therefore should not be our decision when we reach the expiry date. 

Expiry date seems to be another end-of-days notion.
It won't expire, just evolve.
It is our planet, by the way.
Well no one else has a better claim anyhow.

Err, no it isn't.  On what basis do you claim ownership?

As the apparently superior race do we not have any stewardship responsibility for the other species here?  If not, how about enlightened self-interest, because if we continue to damage the eco-system we will threaten our own existence.  I assume this has occurred to you?   You can have all the technological progress you want but if we cannot live with nature what is our future?

Whose is it then? Nothing else has a consciousness capable of claiming ownership let alone being capable of understanding that there is a planet. You may think that the Earth belongs to all life, but as a human you are the only living thing able to make such a claim (should you so wish!) The Earth is ours, however briefly, because we are the only species that are able to give it meaning.

Hello NS, I think we've been here before haven't we?

There are so many points to challenge in your short post...

1. Whose is it then? Simple, it belongs to all living things on the planet.
2. How do you know that nothing else has a consciousness? 
3. It is not about being able to perceive that there is a planet or being capable of making such a claim.  it was only a few tens of generations ago that man began to realise that there was a planet, so this is not a permanent state of affairs
4. I don't understand the last sentence at all.  You imply that becauses something can be given 'meaning' then it can be 'claimed' - sorry, I really don't know where to start to demolish this.

On the simplest level, as the supposedly most advanced species do we not have a duty to act responsibly towards the planet?  We only have the one and if we mess it up all species suffer.  Does not our 'higher intelligence' confer respoonsibilities?

On another level, if we are so wise do we not appreciate our dependency on a healthy and sustainable eco-system?  If we destroy too much we risk damaging that upon which we depend for our existence.   We are behaving like 'cut and burn' peasants, intent on short-term survival without regard for the longer term.   Fortunately for our ancestors there was another patch of ground somewhere to start again - we have but one Planet Earth.

What the human race was able to do when it numbered a few hundred million is altogether different to what it can afford to do when we are pushing through 7 billion and those 7 billion are consuming more per capita than ever before.

I think I have posed this to you before.   There must be a point when this cannot be sustained, so what is that point and when do we reach it? 

We cannot continue as we are - yet we seem incapable of change until it becomes unavoidable.  The latter carries consequences because there will be a lot of collateral damage if we wait until we have to change our ways.