Milton Banana wrote:
http://news.sciencemag.org/climate/2014 ... collapsingQuote:
One team combined data on the recent retreat of the 182,000-square-kilometer Thwaites Glacier with a model of the glacier’s dynamics to forecast its future. In a paper published online today in Science, they report that in as few as 2 centuries Thwaites Glacier’s outermost edge will recede past an underwater ridge now stalling its retreat. Their modeling suggests that the glacier will then cascade into rapid collapse
This is Dr. Ian Joughin's study from the University of Washington. No empirical measurements. A computer model. Epic fail folks. The great majority of these computer models end up greatly exaggerating whatever it is these people are desperate to prove. GIGO.
How do you have empirical measurements for the result of the glacier becoming ungrounded? The garbage in this seems to be your understanding of pretty much everything except your political agenda.
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The second study is done by Dr. Eric Rignot. What does he think of (and this was left out of the AP story) Dr. Joughin Study? Not much.
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Eric Rignot, a climate scientist at the University of California, Irvine, and the lead author of the GRL radar mapping study, is skeptical of Joughin’s timeline because the computer model used estimates of future melting rates instead of calculations based on physical processes such as changing sea temperatures. “These simulations ought to go to the next stage and include realistic ocean forcing,” he says. If they do, he says, they might predict an even more rapid retreat.
Realistic ocean forcings? I wonder what that means?
You do not know, but you are willing to make unfounded assumptions? I believe the terms you are seeking are "less conservative estimates".
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It is clearly left out of Joughin's study according to Dr. Rignot.
Which would indicate the more conservative estimates.
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Even though Rignot hopes for a more rapid retreat. That remark places him in an unpleasant light.
Hopes? Not getting any transferal from your views are we?
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Now this story brings in a third scientist. Dr. Richard Alley a Penn State glaciologist.
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Antarctic history confirms the danger, Alley says: Core samples drilled into the inland basins that connect Thwaites Glacier with its neighbors have revealed algae preserved beneath the ice sheet, a hint that seawater has filled the basins within the past 750,000 years. That past flooding shows that modest climate warming can cause the entire ice sheet to collapse. “The possibility that we have already committed to 3 or more meters of sea level rise from West Antarctica will be disquieting to many people, even if the rise waits centuries before arriving.”
Now this is interesting. No one has ever claimed ice has never melted at the south pole. No one. But, this glaciologist states that we will wait centuries before it arrives? My point exactly. It took thousands of years for this water to freeze, and its going to take thousands of years for it to melt.
So your understanding of math equals that of your understanding of science? Two centuries are two hundred years. Two hundred years is FAR less than thousands of years. Ice forming from the build up of snow takes much longer than melting of ice through contact with a warmer ocean current.
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This study was just release recently. Let's see how it stands up to the rigors of others in the scientific community. That is if the principle scientist is willing to share his data and methodology for others to review. Now Dr. Eric Rignot. Principle Scientist for Radar Science and Engineering Section for NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab is not a climatologist so I'm not sure why he's involved in any conclusion. He should be clearly involved for data gathering for how this study was done, but is not qualified to render any conclusion on climate.
The paper is not about climate conclusions, but of the impact of current trends on glacial ice.
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And, those here who latch onto a just release paper and claim it to be the gospel truth to fit their bias clearly don't understand how the scientific community works.
As if you do?

The scientific community works by looking at the research on the subject and comparing the results of different groups to see if similar conclusions are reached. In this case you have referenced other published papers reaching similar conclusions by different groups using similar sets of data. Thus, the reproducibility is already being documented.