copenlu/druid huggingface dataset:
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-08-19): Atmospheric CO2 concentrations rising faster today than the last 50,000 years, as accurately claimed in recent social media posts Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations and their current rate of increase is unprecedented in the last 50,000 years, based on ice core data. The highest increase in CO2 in that period occurred over the span of 50 years, but the same increase occurred in only the last five years – which is 10 times faster. As human emissions of CO2 increase, global temperatures rise in response through the greenhouse effect. [...] In May 2024, a number of articles and Facebook posts claimed that carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. So what sparked this claim?
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2023-05-11): Over the past 20,000 years or so, sea level has climbed some 400 feet (120 meters). As the climate warmed as part of a natural cycle, ice melted and glaciers retreated until ice sheets remained only at the poles and at the peaks of mountains. Early on, the sea rose rapidly, sometimes at rates greater than 10 feet (3 meters) per century, and then continued to grow in spurts of rapid sea level rise until about 7,000 years ago. Then, the climate stabilized and sea level rise slowed, holding largely steady for most of the last 2,000 years, based on records from corals and sediment cores. Now, however, sea level is on the rise again, rising faster now than it has in the past 6,000 years. The oldest tide gauges and coastal sediment preserved beneath swamps and marshes show that sea level began to rise around 1850, which is right around the time people started burning coal to propel steam engine trains, and it hasn't stopped since. The climate likely started warming as a part of a natural cycle, but the accelerated warming in the last two hundred years or so is due to a rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-05-14): A detailed analysis of ancient Antarctic ice has revealed that carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are rising 10 times faster than at any point in the past 50,000 years. [...] "Studying the past teaches us how today is different. The rate of CO2 change today really is unprecedented," says Kathleen Wendt, an assistant professor at Oregon State University's College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences and the study's lead author. "Our research identified the fastest rates of past natural CO2 rise ever observed, and the rate occurring today, largely driven by human emissions, is 10 times higher."
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2022-05-09): Past changes in Earth’s temperature happened very slowly, over hundreds of thousands of years. However, the recent warming trend is happening much faster than it ever has. Natural cycles of warming and cooling are not enough to explain the amount of warming we have experienced in such a short time—only human activities can account for it. Scientists worry that the climate is changing faster than some living things can adapt to it. [...] Since the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s and early 1800s, people have been releasing large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. That amount has skyrocketed in the past century. Greenhouse gas emissions increased 70 percent between 1970 and 2004. Emissions of carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas, rose by about 80 percent during that time. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today far exceeds the natural range seen over the last 650,000 years. [...] A sudden increase in the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does more than change Earth's temperature. A lot of the carbon dioxide in the air dissolves into seawater. There, it forms carbonic acid in a process called ocean acidification. Ocean acidification is making it hard for some sea creatures to build shells and skeletal structures. This could alter the ecological balance in the oceans and cause problems for fishing and tourism industries.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2023-03-09): The NSF-ICF reports that ice cores preserve evidence of much lower levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide than today. Since the start of the Pleistocene Epoch, roughly 2 million years ago, some periods in which glaciers retreated (called glaciations and interglacials) caused massive swings in carbon dioxide. For a period of at least 800,000 years, CO2 concentrations ranged from 180 to 300 parts per million, according to a high-resolution ice-core record from Antarctica. Since the start of the Industrial Age, however, human-caused greenhouse-gas emissions have steadily raised CO2 concentrations. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Global Monitoring Laboratory reports that, as of the week beginning February 26, 2023, CO2 emissions stood at 421.91 parts per million. [...] Paleoclimatology relies on ice cores but also tree rings, cores drilled from lake and ocean sediments, and fossils. Piecing together all the evidence produces a picture of a planet that was often much hotter than today, but was cooler than the present climate for most of the last 11,000 years. Ice cores also show that current carbon dioxide concentrations are now higher than they have been for hundreds of thousands of years, and the higher concentrations are driven by human burning of fossil fuels.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2009-09-01): Even if the Sun’s recent quietness—the 11-year cycle minimum in 2011 was the lowest in a century—were to turn into a multi-decade stretch of extremely low activity known as a Grand Solar Minimum, it wouldn’t overpower the amount of global warming projected for the coming century due to increasing greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, as long as atmospheric carbon dioxide remains above 300 parts per million, not even the next ice age, which Milankovitch theory predicts would begin 50,000 years from now, is likely to occur. [...] Another study estimated that at pre-industrial carbon dioxide levels, summer insolation at 65° North need only dip 0.75 standard deviations below the mean—about 15 Watts per square meter—for summers to be too cool to melt all the winter snow, a low that Milankovitch cycles predict we will next hit about 50,000 years from now. At 400 parts per million, summer insolation would need to fall twice as much—a low we will next see 125,000 years from now. At carbon dioxide levels above 560 parts per million, the study predicted, no Milankovitch variation within the next half million years will be low enough to trigger an ice age. [...] Shakun, J. D., Clark, P. U., He, F., Marcott, S. A., Mix, A. C., Liu, Z., Otto-Bliesner, B., Schmittner, A., & Bard, E. (2012). Global warming preceded by increasing carbon dioxide concentrations during the last deglaciation. Nature, 484(7392), 49–54. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature10915
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2023-12-28): CO2 and other greenhouse gases like methane and nitrous oxide are emitted when we burn fossil fuels, produce materials such as steel, cement, and plastics, and grow the food we eat. If we want to reduce these emissions, we need to transform our energy systems, industries, and food systems. [...] Emissions are still rising in many parts of the world. However, several countries have managed to cut their emissions in recent decades. With affordable low-carbon technologies, other countries can increase their living standards without the high-carbon pathway that rich countries followed in the past. [...] Lacis, A. A., Schmidt, G. A., Rind, D., & Ruedy, R. A. (2010). Atmospheric CO₂: Principal control knob governing Earth’s temperature. Science, 330(6002), 356-359.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2011-03-03): The ocean has absorbed about 30% of the anthropogenic carbon dioxide, resulting in ocean acidification and changes to carbonate chemistry that are unprecedented for at least the last 65 million years (high confidence). Risks have been identified for the survival, calcification, growth, development and abundance of a broad range of marine taxonomic groups, ranging from algae to fish, with substantial evidence of predictable trait-based sensitivities (high confidence). There are multiple lines of evidence that ocean warming and acidification corresponding to 1.5°C of global warming would impact a wide range of marine organisms and ecosystems, as well as sectors such as aquaculture and fisheries (high confidence). {3.3.10, 3.4.4} [...] Small Islands, and Coastal and Low-lying areas [...] Increased Reasons for Concern
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-05-15): A recent study conducted by scientists from Oregon State University and the University of St Andrews has revealed that the rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) increase is currently ten times faster than at any point in the past 50,000 years. [...] The study, published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), demonstrates that the rate of CO2 increase today is ten times higher than the previous natural rises observed in history and "largely driven by human emissions." [...] During the last ice age, there were instances where CO2 levels appeared to rise significantly higher than the average. However, previous measurements lacked the precision to reveal the full extent of these rapid changes. The recent study addressed this limitation by conducting detailed measurements during those periods, uncovering an unprecedented rate of CO2 increase. While natural rises in the past took about 7,000 years to achieve a magnitude similar to the current increase, today’s levels are surpassed within a mere five to six years.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-10-09): Today's world: Fastest rate of carbon dioxide rise over the last 50,000 years - Date: [...] - Today's rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide increase is 10 times faster than at any other point in the past 50,000 years, researchers have found through a detailed chemical analysis of ancient Antarctic ice. Today's rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide increase is 10 times faster than at any other point in the past 50,000 years, researchers have found through a detailed chemical analysis of ancient Antarctic ice.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2021-10-11): There is a well-known correlation between temperatures and CO2 concentrations over glacial periods. The figure below shows both temperatures (red line) – reconstructed from hydrogen isotope analysis – and atmospheric CO2 concentrations (blue line) from air bubbles trapped in Antarctic ice over the past 800,000 years. [...] Both the northern hemisphere and overall global temperatures actually lagged CO2; in other words, for the world as a whole, warming happened after atmospheric CO2 concentrations increased. The reasons for this are complex and are driven in part by changes in ocean currents as ice ages end. [...] While there is a clear relationship between CO2 and temperature over the past million years, it is difficult to extrapolate to future changes to the Earth’s climate. For example, at the end of the last ice age atmospheric CO2 concentrations increased by around 50% while global temperatures increased by around 4C. If CO2 were the only factor at work, this would imply a very high sensitivity of the climate to CO2 – around 8C per doubling CO2, far higher than current estimates based on climate models and other lines of evidence.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2008-07-01): The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in ocean water (y axis) depends on the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere (shaded curves) and the temperature of the water (x axis). This simplified graph shows that as atmospheric CO2 increases from pre-industrial levels (blue) to double (2X) the pre-industrial amounts (light green), the ocean CO2 concentration increases as well. However, as water temperature increases, its ability dissolve CO2 decreases. Global warming is expected to reduce the ocean’s ability to absorb CO2, leaving more in the atmosphere…which will lead to even higher temperatures. (Graph by Robert Simmon.) [...] When Le Quéré plugged atmospheric measurements from the Southern Ocean between 1981 and 2004 into her model, she was startled by the result—something far more interesting than the Antarctic Circumpolar Wave. "The Southern Ocean carbon sink has not changed at all in 25 years. That’s unexpected because carbon dioxide is increasing so fast in the atmosphere that you would expect the sink to increase as well," says Le Quéré. But it hadn’t. Instead, the Southern Ocean held steady, while atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations climbed. Why?
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2022-07-05): Antarctic ice cores show us that the concentration of CO2 was stable over the last millennium until the early 19th century. It then started to rise, and its concentration is now nearly 50% higher than it was before the industrial revolution (Fig. 2). Other measurements that can fingerprint the source of this CO2 (e.g. isotopic data) confirm that the increase must be due to emissions from fossil fuel usage and human-induced changes vegetation and soils. Measurements from older ice cores (discussed below) confirm that both the magnitude and rate of the recent increase are almost certainly unprecedented over the last 800,000 years (Fig. 2). The fastest natural increase measured in older ice cores is around 15ppm (parts per million) over about 200 years. For comparison, atmospheric CO2 is now rising 15ppm every 6 years. Methane (CH4), another important greenhouse gas, also shows an unprecedented increase in concentration over the last two centuries. Its concentration is now much more than double its pre-industrial level. This is mainly due to emissions from agricultural sources and fossil fuel production, that comes on top of natural emissions from wetlands and other sources. [...] - Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are now 50% higher than before the industrial revolution. This increase is due to fossil fuel usage and changes in land-use. - The magnitude and rate of the recent increase are almost certainly unprecedented over the last 800,000 years.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2023-09-01): "Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are increasing faster than the Southern Ocean can keep up." May 2024, AccessScience, McGraw Hill, https://doi.org/10.1036/1097-8542.aBR2405151. [...] Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are increasing faster than the Southern Ocean can keep up. McGraw Hill’s AccessScience; 2024. https://doi.org/10.1036/1097-8542.aBR2405151 [...] Through a chemical analysis of Antarctic ice, a group of scientists from Oregon State University has discovered that Earth’s current rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide increase is 10 times faster than it has been at any point in the past 50,000 years. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas; this molecule traps heat in the atmosphere and thus contributes to the warming of Earth’s climate. Atmospheric CO2 levels have fluctuated significantly throughout geologic time. However, accumulating evidence comparing the most notable past peak levels to current trends shows an upturn that threatens ecological disaster in coming decades and centuries. See also: Antarctica; Atmosphere; Carbon dioxide; Greenhouse effect
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-08-08): - CO2, by definition, has a GWP of 1 regardless of the time period used, because it is the gas being used as the reference. CO2 remains in the climate system for a very long time: CO2 emissions cause increases in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that will last thousands of years. [...] Explore the questions and answers below to learn more about global warming potentials (GWPs). [...] EPA and other organizations will update the GWP values they use occasionally. This change can be due to updated scientific estimates of the energy absorption or lifetime of the gases or to changing atmospheric concentrations of GHGs that result in a change in the energy absorption of 1 additional ton of a gas relative to another.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2009-01-01): Measurements from the pre-industrial revolution through to today match that prediction extremely well. Since the 1880s we have increased CO2 by about 50%, and temperatures have increased by 1.1°C. [...] What’s more, they showed that present levels of CO2 and methane in the atmosphere are above anything seen in the past 420,000 years. [...] Together Antarctic ice cores show us that the concentration of CO2 was stable over the last millennium until the early 19th century. It then started to rise, and its concentration is now nearly 50% higher than it was before the industrial revolution.
Claim: CO2 concentrations are increasing in Earth’s atmosphere faster than they have in the last 50,000 years. (Social media users, 2024-08-19)
Evidence (2024-04-11): Concentration, or abundance, is the amount of a particular gas in the air. Larger emissions of greenhouse gases lead to higher concentrations in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gas concentrations are measured in parts per million, parts per billion, and even parts per trillion. One part per million is equivalent to one drop of water diluted into about 13 gallons of liquid (roughly the fuel tank of a compact car). To learn more about the increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, visit the Climate Change Indicators: Atmospheric Concentrations of Greenhouse Gases page. [...] Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the primary greenhouse gas emitted through human activities. In 2022, CO2 accounted for 80% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. Carbon dioxide is naturally present in the atmosphere as part of the Earth's carbon cycle (the natural circulation of carbon among the atmosphere, oceans, soil, plants, and animals). Human activities are altering the carbon cycle–both by adding more CO2 to the atmosphere and by influencing the ability of natural sinks, like forests and soils, to remove and store CO2 from the atmosphere. While CO2 emissions come from a variety of natural sources, human-related emissions are responsible for the increase that has occurred in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution.2
Claim: Himalayan salt is the petrified blood and meat of ancient giants, as shown by the colors and appearance of these deposits. Evidence of these giants can also be seen in the shapes of rock formations. (Social media users, 2024-05-18)
Evidence (2024-05-18): Available scientific evidence shows that Himalayan salt comes from deposits in the Salt Range Formation, which formed around 545 million years ago through the evaporation of ancient seas. Scientists have analyzed the composition of these salt deposits and found that they are primarily composed of sodium chloride (NaCl), with some minor trace elements. There is no evidence that the deposits are remains of ‘giants’, nor that such a being existed on Earth.
Claim: Himalayan salt is the petrified blood and meat of ancient giants, as shown by the colors and appearance of these deposits. Evidence of these giants can also be seen in the shapes of rock formations. (Social media users, 2024-05-18)
Evidence (2024-05-29): Several videos have been posted on social media claiming that Himalayan salt is the ‘petrified blood and/or meat of ancient giants’. For example, a TikTok video making these claims was posted on Facebook 18 May 2024 and accumulated 385K views. An older TikTok video posted in 2022, linked here, gathered over 12.4 million views. And over a dozen videos with these claims were shared on TikTok between these dates. Given the recurring nature of these claims, we will investigate them below using available evidence. [...] Himalayan salt originates from deposits in the Salt Range Formation in the northern Punjab region of Pakistan (Figure 1)[1]. These salt deposits possess unique colors and patterns, due to their composition and the way in which they form. Although these characteristics are thoroughly explained by optical mineralogy and the salt’s composition, social media users claim that these visual traits are evidence that Himalayan salt is the petrified blood and/or meat of ‘ancient giants’. However, as we will explain below, this is inconsistent with available scientific evidence.
Claim: Himalayan salt is the petrified blood and meat of ancient giants, as shown by the colors and appearance of these deposits. Evidence of these giants can also be seen in the shapes of rock formations. (Social media users, 2024-05-18)
Evidence (2024-03-18): The Origin and Formation of Himalayan Salt Himalayan salt, renowned for its purity and exceptional qualities, traces its origins back millions of years. The geological process behind the formation of Himalayan salt deposits is a fascinating tale of ancient seas and tectonic activity. In the remote depths of time, the Indian subcontinent collided with the Asian landmass, giving rise to the majestic Himalayan mountain range. As the collision occurred, ancient seas that once covered the region began to recede, leaving vast salt deposits trapped within the Earth’s crust behind. [...] Mining Himalayan salt is a meticulous process that requires expertise and careful consideration of environmental factors. Various techniques are employed to extract this precious mineral from the depths of the Himalayan Mountains, ensuring its purity and quality.