TEDxUIUC - Donald Wuebbles - The Science of Climate Change

[@jsfbay1]

I love that I got served an ad from Exon Mobile before I could watch this video.

[@jakelagoni9045]

There's times in the geologic past where CO2 was 4000 ppm, so 400 is not unusual in the geologic past. He states it is higher "than anytime in the past". Not true. Why all the red lines at the end of the graph (right side), and not explained what they mean. I would guess it is from a different data set or interpolated or something ... not fair in science.

[@beingaware8542]

Oh when was the 4000 ppm?

[@timobrienwells]

Funny how he considers 'peer review' to be so important, yet he somehow neglected to mention that fully a third of the citations in the 2007 IPCC report were from non-peer reviewed sources. Maybe it just slipped his mind.

[@timobrienwells]

Lets look at his temperature graph going back to 1850.He says "we think" the temp rise from 1910 to 1940 was mostly natural. There you have it folks. They "think"!! The fact is they don't know why there was an increase from 1910 to 1940, and in the very same way they also don't know what caused the increase in temps from 1975 to 1998.They "assume", without any direct evidence, that CO2 was the cause. Looking more closely at the 1910 to 1940 period, you may have noticed that the amount of the increase and the rate of the increase is roughly the same as that of 1975 to 1998.This suggests that the same natural cause was probably at work. Next he claims that the slight cooling from 1940 to 1975[65??],is due to aerosols. This fits the narrative very nicely, and what a pity there is not a shred of observational evidence to prove it. What about the slight cooling from 1880 to 1910?Aerosols again or 'mostly natural'? And what about the current pause in temps from 2001 to 2014,which has even been acknowledged in the last IPCC report? Does the good professor have a convenient ad hoc explanation for that?

[@robertbernal8666]

I "think" you don't know what you're talking about, therefore you don't? Not really, but that's what you basically said about the speaker. CO2 is an infrared absorber - you can't deny physics! However... DON'T let friends follow environmentalists, either - they want limitation and use the fact of excess CO2 as an excuse to limit everybody else's energy or standard of living (No wonder there are soooo many deniers - I can't really blame 'em)! They hate industrialism - the very industrialism necessary for humanity to develop global prosperity. Excess CO2 can be seen as a kind of engineering challenge. The principle of Occam's razor states that usually, the most simple outcome is correct. So, is it that there is a giant conspiracy of literally tens of thousands of scientists fabricating a big lie for governments to use, to control people. Or There are millions of people who want to cash in on the principle of fossil fueled pollution (including government)?

[@timobrienwells]

Robert Bernal Yes CO2 is an infrared absorber, but that does not demonstrate that it has produced the mild, [and intermitant] warming that we have observed.CO2 is a relatively weak GHG, as much of it's absorption spectrum overlaps with that of water vapor . It should be responsible for some of the warming, but we don't know how much. On geologic time scales CO2 has never controlled the climate to any great degree. The evidence suggests that any extra warming that we may get from added CO2 will not only not be dangerous, but will more than likely be beneficial.

[@robertbernal8666]

I believe large amounts of CO2 is linked to ocean anoxic events (past die-offs), that water vapor is not as prevalent at the upper boundaries of the atmosphere and that "some" warming will definitely occur. There is no reason to continue to convert hydrocarbons into excess CO2 - it just "might" be painful to future, especially if ocean acidification (at the surface) causes trouble. We have the technology to do better than merely burning stuff - advanced nuclear load following energy from molten salt reactors. Solar and wind too (I guess).

[@jakelagoni9045]

I remember times when I was unprepared or unsure of what I was presenting and me thinks I presented as poorly as he has here. For example, how can the graph at 11:40 be taken seriously. It says the graph is temps as compared to 1961-91, so shouldn't those 30 years show as zero by definition?? Plus it looks all wrong as almost ALL proxie records show the Medieval Warm Period as warmer than today's temps. Cherry picked, manipulated data in my opinion.

[@RobetPaulG]

I find such dishonesty to be repugnant. Makes me think less of U of I. Wonder if he was one of those predicting cooling in the 70s. Disgusting.