All This Crazy Weather Global Warming?

[heydude]

Is all the recent crazy weather global warming?

Record tornados. Record Snow. Record Heat. Record Wild Fires. Record Hurricanes. etc. etc.

As I understand Global Warming, it leads to an increase in all types of weather (not just every place all of a sudden being hotter). It leads to an increase in energy and activity, which means all types of weather become more extreme. So, it also means more winter storms, etc.

But, all I ever hear on the news is that we are having "record" this or that.....but no explanation as to if global warming is causing it.

[Alan]

Since the planet hasn't appreciably warmed over the past decade, it's hard to blame it on Global Warming. Stick with Climate Change, it's vague enough to cover everything.

[loosechickens]

Scientists say that the scientific fact of global warming exists, and does cause wilder swings in weather, but there is no way to link a specific instance of violent or unusual weather to global warming, just as we know that cigarettes are causing cancer, but cannot say with specificity that any specific case of lung cancer is caused by cigarettes. Make sense?

[CathyA]

I imagine there have always been these fluctuations on the earth, but man wasn't here to experience them or record them. Man has a hard time adjusting to these changes because its not what he planned on. I think other animals/organisms just go with the flow. But with man, its a huge deal because his possessions are damaged/destroyed or his crops are flooded, or he's too cold or too hot. Its sort of like with great floods and hurricanes........if man hadn't built homes so close to these areas, it wouldn't be a problem.
Man has been on the earth such a small amount of time. We view everything through a magnifying glass.

[Zigzagman]

It doesn't really matter, does it? From what I've seen us humans will never give up our consumption oriented society in favor of sustainability. From an evolution perspective I wonder what the long term consequences will be? Extinction or some sort of species that resembles a cookie monster?

Peace

[Glo]

I think its cyclical. In our area, we are tying records in the 1930s and 40s.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Yes, I think so. I'm not super hopeful of the possibility of things changing. Consumptive society well ... humans were not always so consumptive, so I don't think it's just human nature. But it does seem to be some kind of inevitability of the way things are now. Path dependence of some decisions made collectively long ago (for instance cars over public transit) that it would take a lot more commitment than seems to exist to ever break out of (of course if oil becomes scarce ....).

[benhyr]

From an evolution perspective I wonder what the long term consequences will be?

We're all gonna die.

But, seriously, the caldera that is Yellowstone is overdue to explode. Now, if that hits before we either destroy the planet ourselves or get off the planet, I guess we'll have to see.

[loosechickens]

Personally, since it looks as though we don't have the collective will to really address this issue, I've come to recognize that we probably will continue as we are doing until we can't do that any more, then change will happen, because it must. In the process, we will have made earth inhospitable to our species and many others, but waiting in the wings will be other forms of life just ready and willing to thrive under the new conditions.

Kind of like how when the dinosaurs were wiped out, mammals finally got their chance to come out and play.......maybe ****roaches are about to get their turn at dominance.............

I guess what I'm saying is that in a cosmic sense, the earth will keep trundling along (barring some catastrophy such as the sun exploding), and humans will eventually just be another one of many millions of extinct species, long forgotten.

[redfox]

Alan, you think the climate change is vague?!? The science is quite strong. What's vague about it to you?