EnviroLink Forum

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With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

If the whole business of runaway warming is subjective, obscure and unprovable then why assert it? It seems the concept simply lends itself to the one criticism that seems to stick to a lot of folks associated with promoting concern for AGW; some seem to have an addiction to catastrophic scenarios beyond what the evidence presents.

Again, it doesn't have to be Wayne, but if anyone can steer me to scientifically sound evidence for a self-generated runaway scenario I'd be interested in seeing it. Wayne wants to make it about me but as far as evidence he comes up with nothing.

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"With every decision, think seven generations ahead of the consequences of your actions" Ute rule of life.
“We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children”― Chief Seattle
“Those Who Have the Privilege to Know Have the Duty to Act”…Albert Einstein

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

Since the sudden burst of methane is the scenario that is generally presented by the runaway catastrophe folks this link from the National Academy of Sciences that JE offered is interesting. They pretty much have warming causing methane to dribble out over a long period of time, consistent with a more normal feedback scenario, not a runaway scenario. Read it at your leisure.

http://www.pnas.org/content/106/49/20596.full

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

I agree with Dingo. Runaway warming would imply that the equilibrium climate sensitivity would be much higher than the accepted mainstream values between 1.5 and 4.5 K/doubling. Positive feedbacks eventually reach an equilibrium. Each additional "loop" becomes weaker than the positive feedback loop before it. If an initial increase of Carbon Dioxide caused 1.5 K of warming, and positive feedbacks from that initial warming caused an additional 0.8 K, then those additional positive feedbacks from the warming would cause an additional 0.4 K, and those would cause additional warming of 0.2 K, then 0.1 K, 0.05 K, 0.025 K etc. So even though net feedbacks are weakly to strongly positive in the climate system, runaway warming is unlikely. This is why we get a value between 1.5 to 4.5 K for ECS, and not infinity Kelvin.



And there are additional positive feedbacks that we have yet to uncover, like the permafrost feedback. But those would work in the same way as described above.

I don't like linking to blogs, but Skeptical Science has a really good article on why net positive feedback does not imply runaway warming.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/positiv ... vanced.htm

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein

_________________
With friends like Guido, you will not have enemies for long.

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none”
Arthur Schopenhauer

"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits."
Albert Einstein