Talk:Climate variability and change/Archive 2

message: I took it upon myself to rewrite this article to fulfill the promise of its introduction.  In other words, to make this article about climate change of all kinds and on all time scales, rather than a crude microcosm of the global warming debate.  I hope it can keep that focus.
:: Fantastic work, three cheers ... let us pray the focus remains  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.149.36.207 (talk) 07:50, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent Rewrite 

message: Anybody interested in this subject, please see my comment on Talk:global warming. I realise my thought on a possible merger with GW isn't likely to fly (though the amount of overlap should give pause for thought), but how about the rest of what I said, in terms of developing the topic structure? Anybody out there? Rd232 18:29, 16 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Developing a schema 

message: Could we add an external source for this comment in the article:
"More recently, plate motions have been implicated in the intensification of the present ice age when approximately ~3 million years ago, the North and South American plates collided to form the Isthmus of Panama and shut off direct mixing between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans."
Mccready 19:28, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  plate tectonics and climate change 

message: Under 'Human influences > fossil fuels' it says the CO2 levels are "projected to reach more than 560 ppm before the end of the next century." Of course what this means depends on when it was written. 'The next century' is not a very good wording. Which century is meant here? I suppose that a projection to the year 2200 would go too far and this is copied from a text written in the 20th century. DirkvdM 20:05, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  next century? 

message: Rd232 removed a version of this graph. I believe the graph has substantial merit, has a NPOV, is not original research, and does not imply anything about the relative proportion of the causes of the variation. I am asking third party climate bloggers to independently comment on it and will report the results back here and to Talk:Global_warming. I intend to replace the graph here after their review, unless any significant issues are raised. James P. S. 21:59, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extreme weather cost graph 

message: After some heavy vandalism, 72.1.206.14 tried to be constructive.  Obvious boundary-testing, but for the time being let him or her have their fairly accurate sentence, perhaps, even though it's kind of out of time-scale context there.  --James S. 21:44, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Vandal turned attempted contributor

message: 63.218.212.211  has re-inserted  (and I've re-removed):
: It has been argued (Veizer et al. 1999) that variations in greenhouse gas concentrations over tens of millions of years have not been well correlated to climate change, with perhaps plate tectonics playing a more dominant role. Others have argued that the climate record shows actually shows that carbon dioxide changes lag centuries behind temperature changes (Petit et al., 1999; Fischer et al., 1999; Mudelsee, 2001; Monnin et al., 2001; Caillon et al., 2003; Clarke, 2003). Therefore, they argue that temperature increases drive carbron dioxide increases. The carbon dioxide increases may amplify the warming, but these scientists argue that carbon dioxide increases do not cause the warming.
This text at the very best mixes up piles of timescales - Petit et al is presumably ice cores. Also the pile of refs, which aren't given, is suspicious, and appears to be from this. And I suspect the refs don't support the text, anyway.
She has also re-inserted the tell-tale skeptic Though rising carbon dioxide levels do not explain why temperatures increased until the 1940s and then fell though the 1970s, only to start increase again at the end of the 1970s.. To which the well-known answer is aerosols and natural variation. If that isn't in here somewhere, I suppose it should be.
William M. Connolley 15:30, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I've added some text to the page to try to address the tell-tale skeptic bit. To address an email question if questioning the unknowns of climate change makes that user a "tell-tale skeptic,"...: no, this is a misunderstanding. The point is, this isn't an unknown. Its something that fits well into the existing GHG theory. Pointing it out *as though* it was unknown; attempting to pretend that it doesn't fit into the theory; *that* is tell-tale. William M. Connolley 21:14, 31 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vezier, again 

message: In the section on Greenhouse gases it states:
:Radiative forcing by greenhouse gases is the primary force causing global warming
Isn't this the main controversy regarding global warming?  Few doubt that global warming is taking place or that greenhouse gases cause global warming.  What is not universally accepted is that the increase in greenhouse gases is and has been the primary cause.  Since this is the case, shouldn't this sentence be slightly less absolute and say something like "it is widely believed" or "most people believe"? –Shoaler (talk) 12:48, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Arguably its a fair shortest-possible summary, but yes you're right, it could be qualified a bit. global warming or attribution of recent climate change should have some suitable text. William M. Connolley 18:13, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

text: You are trying to keep this section concise.  I put in two images and minimal text on glacier changes.  However, I did not say anything about response times of glaciers to a climate change.  Or look at historically the variations of a specific glacier to many climate changes.  Thus, I am  curious do you want to focus on climate change responses in general or the current one in specific.Peltoms 15:20, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Err, sorry, I'm confused now. Is that in respect of what Shoaler said, or something else? William M. Connolley 16:24, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Non-climate factors driving climate

message: Hi, I notice that under the external links, the GreenFacts summary is given. Could we remove it, as it is rather under discussion, regarindg it's Sound science claims? Also, The IPCC, aswell as this article, already summarizes the reports, no need to list the 3rd organisation. 
Thanx -- 145.99.202.92 13:42, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I recall looking at it, and I had another look just now. It seems Fair Enough, on a brief scan through. William M. Connolley 14:19, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I just read there Chernobyl 'study', and it was rather advocative. --12:09, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Green Facts 

message: Note: This article has a small number of in-line citations for an article of its size and currently would not pass criteria 2b.
Members of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Good articles are in the process of doing a re-review of current Good Article listings to ensure compliance with the standards of the Good Article Criteria. (Discussion of the changes and re-review can be found here). A significant change to the GA criteria is the mandatory use of some sort of in-line citation (In accordance to WP:CITE) to be used in order for an article to pass the verification and reference criteria. It is recommended that the article's editors take a look at the inclusion of in-line citations as well as how the article stacks up against the rest of the Good Article criteria. GA reviewers will give you at least a week's time from the date of this notice to work on the in-line citations before doing a full re-review and deciding if the article still merits being considered a Good Article or would need to be de-listed. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us on the Good Article project talk page or you may contact me personally. On behalf of the Good Articles Project, I want to thank you for all the time and effort that you have put into working on this article and improving the overall quality of the Wikipedia project. Agne 00:39, 26 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  GA Re-Review and In-line citations 

message: I added a few sentences on the residence time of dust in the atmosphere, and an external link with more details.  KonaScout 18:45, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: ANd how does the irregular pattern pf ice melt affect the disrtibutition of earthquakes?—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 84.231.189.229 (talk • contribs) |nested=yes.
volcanoes also emitt (not only during eruptions) large quantities of CO2 and other, more potent greenhouse gases, like sulfurcompounds. i am completely missing this here, was it put somewhere else? 88.74.5.26 19:40, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Yes - thats because volcanic sources to sulfur and CO2 is neglible compared to antropogenic emissions  --Kim D. Petersen 23:52, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Volcanic eruptions 

message: User: 64.201.7.190 has added a merge tag to suggest merging climate change with global warming without any discussion. The merge suggestion also does not seem to be listed at  Wikipedia:Proposed mergers. I don't think this suggestion has any merrit - one article deals with climate change in general, the other one with the ongoing episode of (mostly) GHG driven global warming. Unless there is significant support, I'm going to remove the tags. --Stephan Schulz 22:03, 13 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: They are not synonyms, although they are used as such in some contexts.  But climate change is a much more general term, while global warming typically only refers to the current episode. While there is some overlap, the articles also cover different ground. --Stephan Schulz 06:16, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge with [[Global warming]] 

message: The "Variations in CO2, temperature and dust", "Phanerozoic Carbon Dioxide" and "Carbon Dioxide Variations" graphs have time increasing to the left on their x-axes, in opposition to convention and the rest of the graphs on the page. Could these be replotted? This was also an issue on the Global warming page, which has now been corrected. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dk2 (talk • contribs) 05:54, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That is the normal orientation for long-term paleo data often used in the scientific community.  Dragons flight 16:58, 12 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Consistent graph orientation 

message: The section titled "Evidence for Climatic Change" seems to be a bit out of place.  There are many, many tools for climate reconstruction (or more properly, paleoclimate proxies).  I could start filling out the list (off the top of my head, a few others are Dimethyl sulfide, Uk37', TEX-86, Ice core, Dendroclimatology, and Speleothem), but I think such a list would be overwhelming in the article.  What do other people think of not using a list and just discussing the idea of a paleoclimate proxy, then linking to Proxy (climate) and listing some of the major ones there?  It seems like such a random list (including beetles but not ice cores, for instance).  Thoughts or other ideas?  --TeaDrinker 08:06, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Evidence for Climatic Change 

message: Was about to add the link to the article, but the warning on it forced me to place this here . Shyamal 06:21, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's already being well covered at IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. --Spiffy sperry 21:03, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Link

message: *************************
An experiment that hints we are wrong on climate change
Times Online February 11, 2007
*************************
Compilations of weather satellite data by Danish National Space Center scientists indicate that cloudiness varies according to how many atomic particles are coming in from exploded stars, contradicting the theory that the rise in temperatures since the mid-20th century is due to man-made greenhouse gases. The sun's magnetic field bats away many...
http://www.kurzweilai.net/email/newsRedirect.html?newsID=6393&m=12472
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 81.149.36.207 (talk • contribs).
:I don't see the contradiction. Dfarrar 14:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Atomic particles

message: i suggest creating a new category with this name here and then merging global warming in popular culture into that. 88.74.5.26 19:47, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: qui tacet consentire videtur, so i acted and moved the text, somebody with an account canfix the links pls. tnx 88.74.5.26 23:24, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  There are established procedures for article deletions and mergers; see Wikipedia:Merging and moving pages.  I've reverted the merger pending outcome of the appropriate procedure for a merger. Raymond Arritt 23:33, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: okay, Ray, i did as you suggested 88.74.5.26 23:45, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: merged it. Kgs 19:05, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: References to climate change in popular culture may better be in the article "Climate change in popular culture", so this article better can focus on climate change in real life. J 1982 22:01, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: A standalone article "Climate change in popular culture" would be a stub. Other subjects also include the "... in popular culture" oder "... in fiction" as a subcatagory in the main article. Kgs 08:26, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  climate change in popular culture 

message: Please add this to external links: http://www.americaabroadmedia.org/climatechangemainpage.html
I submitted an external link  to www.exploringtime.org earlier today - the site is full of animations and scientific visualizations detailing climate change over time. You can also view  a 2 hour Discovery Science documentary on the site that deals with changes that occur over long and short time scales, like those that precipitate the formation of the universe and the changes in the global climate over time - many prominent modern scientists are featured within it discussing their research on paleoclimatology and glaciation. the site is US-viewable only.
:Looks like you added it to 12 pages - certainly fits the definition of WP:SPAM, and if you are associated with the site, violates other policies as well. Wikipedia is not a link farm, not even for relevant pages.  Add content, not just links. And the "US-viewable only" makes it even less useful.  Cheers Geologyguy 17:37, 16 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Unless the person writing the blog is an acknowledged expert in the field (which doesn't seem to be the case), I don't think it's sufficiently authoritative to merit inclusion here. See WP:EL, WP:SPS etc. Raymond Arritt 05:20, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  External link for discussion 

message: I came across the following while looking up something else in The Times online:
The Times, Tuesday, Dec 09, 1913; pg. 6; Issue 40390; col C "Is The Earth Drying Up?" Dr. Gregory On Changes In Palestine. 
Jackiespeel 17:42, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Another reference

message: From direct - for example, rice farming is a big contributor of methane to the atmosphere - to indirect - fresh fruit & vegetables are often imported using less than good emissions practices.
Singling out livestock as a contributor makes it look like that all other diets are always better even that's not the case: For example, biogas extracted from manure can be used to run cars or heat buildings even during winters, while that orange, tomato or mango you ate has to be transported near you from far away using fossil fuels - Maybe even as air freight. - G3, 09:28, 21 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  What about contributions by agriculture in general? 

message: In the "Greenhouse Gases" section under "Non-climate factors driving climate change" the sentence and reference (3rd paragraph) to Arthur B. Robinson's lecture is very dodgy. 1. It is placed immediately after the sentence stating atmospheric concentration of CO2, suggesting that he is disputing measured CO2 concentrations, which he is not. 2. In the lecture he says that it's based on referenced, peer-reviewed science, but then goes on to make many value judgements which cannot be backed up by any peer-reviewed data. For an example, see Figure 9 in the presentation, which he says himself has no figures, is an approximation, and therefore holds no scientific merit until a full study is conducted to assess the credibility of the claims. I'd like to call for this sentence to be removed on the grounds that it pits one persons value judgement-based arguments against the whole IPCC process of scientific literature review. EH 09:17, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, so I've removed him (and Clark). This isn't the place for a re-hash of the climate, it just needs a quick ref to the major theory and links William M. Connolley 09:22, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

text: Oh, but I'm not sure about Le Chat - is this the place for it? William M. Connolley 09:23, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

text: *While I agree that the actual wording removed may have been flawed, I am quite concerned that, by removing all reference to dissent here, you have removed a POV balance. Hence, in the absence of any mention of dissent of the theory that CO2 drives temperatures, the article is no longer NPOV. I'm also concerned that the IPCC's probability statement is omitted here and it is instead stated as if they consider it to be absolute fact, which they don't. --Athol Mullen 11:21, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I'd be happy if you added some probabilistic qualifier, and perhaps a link to global warming controversy for dissent William M. Connolley 11:27, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Questionable Reference 

message: Its defined as a variable atmosphere, yet the first topics discussed are:
1.1.1 Glaciation 
1.1.2 Ocean variability 
Perhaps I am ignorant of something, but that is why I came to the article.  The good news is that the paragraph under climate change factors is clear.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Karbinski (talk • contribs) 
Also in the introduction can somone try to define climate change more clearly- is it a man made phenomena or a natural one. It depends on what context you are looking at it. IF you are looking at it from a recent modern veiwpoint it refers to man made climate change, wheras if you are looking at it from a historiv viewpoint, it refers to natural climate change. Both are very different.
regards -anon124.168.115.172 23:49, 26 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  First paragraph must be wrong in defining climate change? 

message: Apologies to whoever has to deal with my erroneous external link changes. It's the first time I used Wikipedia and I thought trial and error was a good way to go, although obviosuly someone else to do the fixing, so apoloogies for that. I see now that I cannot promote my own website, whether it's for commerical or other reasons. I do see however that personal webpages can be linked if written by a "recognized authority", but that the writer should consider mentioning it on the talk page and let neutral and independent Wikipedia editors decide whether to add it. "Recognized authority" is of course a subjective matter. I certainly don't have the power to make decisions over climate change policy, but then I don't think that is a relevant criteria to use in this instance. I have worked as a climate change policy consultant however, where I was working on national and international climate change policy issues, so I do have experience of that working area (and much to critique it too). So I will leave it up to the editors to consider whether my climate change article is a relevant article to link to. 
Apologies again,
Cheers
Chris  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chris Flynn-Jones (talk • contribs) 07:06, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hi Chris. You're correct that to some extent "recognized authority" is subjective. For science-oriented articles this would usually mean that -- at a minimum -- the person has published a good number of articles on the topic in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Raymond Arritt 13:12, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links 

message: I can't add this in the main article, because my only source is a talk given by Tim Flannery on 27 September 2007. Tim mentioned that only the day before he had received the most recent results for atmospheric CO2 levels, and it was already up to 455 ppm! He also said that scientists had reviewed their estimate of CO2 in the atmosphere that would probably be the tipping point to (at human time scales) irreversible climate change - and they put it at 450 ppm. I wish womeone could prove both those wrong. Rolf Schmidt 04:28, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I suspect you misunderstood Flannery. 455 ppm is impossibly wrong for a present-day background value, and Flannery isn't an idiot. Maybe he was referring to values at a specific place or time rather than the background concentration. As for the "tipping point" business there are lots of different speculations. Raymond Arritt 04:57, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I think if you take equivalent CO2 from all the other GHGs you could get to 455 CO2(e). That ignores the -ve forcing from aerosols of course William M. Connolley 14:09, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, CO2-equivalent would make a lot more sense. Raymond Arritt 14:22, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Current atmospheric CO2 levels