"a giant ecological experiment in which organisms will increasingly interact with other organisms"

Couldn't that just be called "evolution"?

No

Algal Blooms in the Darling .......nothing new

No Q&A it is not evolution for evolution is always trending to a higher order. It must be only slime or a mutation.
Evolution is the result of the big bang without any inteligence in play at all. Purely random like gold lotto. After all evolutionists grandparents were monkeys and their great grandparents were a bit of slime.

The article is fine as far as it goes, but there is still that problem that temperatures have declined since around the turn of the century. There was a major increase in global temperatures between 1975 and 2000. (About - the official peak year on all temperature tracking sites is 1998, but on the Goddard site its 2005.) Mainstream scientific theory attributes that 25 year warming period to carbon. However, as is widely acknowledged, there has certainly been no increase since then, and a case for saying that temperatures have declined. The article talks about "projections" of temperature increases. Provided we are all clear its about projections then no harm is done.

Bizarre. This succinct little article clearly demonstrates some consequences of global warming that could have all kinds of ramifications for the ecology of human food sources, and so far what we have from the OLO denialist contingent is one comment that demonstrates a profund misunderstanding of the process of evolution, another that does the same but from a really dumb Creationist perspective, yet another that implies that the Darling has always been stuffed, and lastly one that blatantly denies the mountains of evidence for global warming.

There really is little point in discussing global warming and its quite horrendous implications at OLO.

Yep

Quote ;yet another that implies that the Darling has always been stuffed, and lastly one that blatantly denies the mountains of evidence for global warming.

Algal Blooms in the Darling , Wakool etc are not uncommon , you are attributing them to Global Warming.

After the 1956 floods huge lagoons left full by receding water levels led to algal blooms that killed millions of fish some people called them Chad . The fish initially came to the surface and gulped air then the Algae died (oxygen depletion ?) then very quickly the fish .

Do you think Global Warming started in 1956 ?

Shazbaz
ACC actually started 60k-40k years ago. But back then the impact was within the natural flexibility in the environment.
Since 1700 the ecological stress has progressively gotten faster there is evidence of this migrating species going higher climes since the late 1930. It wasn't until the late 1960's that man started to notice the trend as being measurable. It has continued to gather speed and now appears to be a collection of weird ecological events. No where in history has all the elements occurred at the same time without catastrophic consequences. Some are saying that some events are unique in the geological time line. The big conundrum is these events portend a series of collapses in habitats hence the environment. The outcome is currently disputed by some ( the same fear laden myopic reasoning that creates conspiracy theories) however it is indisputable that the changes are real and WILL be catastrophic.
Leaving the salient question what do we do about it currently very little. In the final shake out it matters very little what caused you to starve only that you are.

Clown fish
CJ is right the fact that you posed the question declare your lack of understanding of evolution. The salient issue here is the speed and the lack of new species to fill the gaps in the food web that concerns people like me. Many niches are just not being adequately functionally filled. Logic dictates that this indicate an unravelling of the web and therefore dire consequences.

I really think that Godwin's Law needs to be rigourously applied to the word "Denialist" and its permutations in any discussion on Climate Change.

Disagree in any way with the Human-Induced Climate Change orthodoxy and, bam!, you're a "denialist". No doubt you also eat kittens, too.

Read the article again, C J Morgan. What does it describe? Changes in environmental conditions leading to alterations in various ecological niches, with new species adapting to take advantage of the changed environment.

Sure sounds like evolution - or at least, adaptation - to me.

Except, of course, for the conceit that it's all the fault of us wicked humans.

CJ Morgan: It is indeed sad when a specialist lays out a bit of experience and this is interpreted according to the "big topics" of the day.
Curmudgeon: Where is this "widely acknowledged" evidence that cooling stopped in 2000? I read the scientific journals and I've seen no such thing. Perhaps the Right Wing magazines are not the best source on this issue? Maybe you should read some actual science done by actual scientists? Or would this be too biased for you?
Sadly, the creationists are getting ready for the Rapture and so couldn't give a hoot about the biosphere thingy.
Clownfish: Evolution is generally accepted to take place over many generations. Adaptation is impacted by the evolutionary past of a species, but the process of short term adaption is not the same as the process of evolution at all.
EG. A fish species that has spent many many generations in shallow, stagnant water may develop air-gulping as an adaption to the poorly oxygenated water. This is a long way from lungs, which is the permanent evolutionary change. We know that lungs came from swim bladders due to the genetics and the physiology of each (good argument against ID: Why the epiglottis?), but a fish adapting by gulping air is not necessarily on the path to evolving lungs. Evolution involves millions of breeding cycles, adaptation can be done by individuals.
The genuine fear is that human induced GW can and will change things so much, and so fast that many species cannot evolve, or adapt quickly enough. Plenty of cockroaches and slimes will survive, but not the sort of flora and fauna that humans can use or admire.
It is true to say that a big volcano would have the same effect. It is also true that we can see and choose, whilst the volcano cannot. We can potentially act as stewards of God's creatures instead of just the butchers or the blind recipients of nature's karma.

Ozandy - I was referring to the records kept by the temperature tracking sites themselves - they all compile graphs which show a distinct peak and downward slide since 2000.. all the graphs show this except the ones kept by the Goddard Institute, which shows temperatures level pegging..

There are five sites - Goddard, Hadley, NOAA, RSS and UAH.

This is very well known and has been discussed. It appears in the literature as attempts by scientists to modify IPCC forecats with climate cycles to accomodate the decline without losing the IPCC findings.. (see Keenlyside, check spelling, in letters Nature May 1 of last year). Otherwise the literature skates over this point or refers to acceleration in melting of glaciers ect.. not global temperatures..

Dear Ozandy,
Religious foke tend to follow their fathers example of intolerence to others point of view. It does not matter what their point of focus {belief} is, whether it is the church, even a particular verse in the bible, evolution or ciimate change believers, they are all off the mark and always put forward the countfeit point of view as the truth. Their way always leads to division and death. Religious wars eg. WW2 Ireland, Cosavo, Packastan, USSR and Afganastan to name a few in the last century. That is why we need Jesus for only in him can the truth be found. Only in him do we truely put aside our diferences and obey his command to love one another and serve our fellow man. As we have rejected him we are getting more gulible and believe anything.

CJ MOrgan
Someone is not slavishly following your god-like intelligence and so you have to leave OLO. Don't be such a mincer, as Julia Gillard would say!
I have always loved fishing and noticed changes every ten years or so. Species go up and others go down it is just nature. The Northern Species have been in retreat for fifteen thousand years, that is since the last Ice Age.
I remember an Australian fisherman saying how he caught fifteen tonnes of mullet in a small estuary and the next year nuthin! Never occurred to him he had caught so many it would take years to rebuild the numbers.
Global warming is the excuse for so many scientists to hold out there hand for our money! My prediction is that in ten years they will be telling us we are all going to starve just as they did in the 1970's.
Of course I can make any prediction about anything as long as the time line means I will be dead before then lol. Just like the greedy grasping scientists!

Curmudgeon,
There has been several papers this year show exta ordinary warming of the poles specifically the sth pole read http://www.realclimate.org/
Specifically the conversations between the climatologists about feb to march. They discuss the uneven warming,the polar melting and AWG in details. This site is largely for climatologists.

I suspect that at one time he was an honest person who tried to live an upright life. I think the power to sit in judgment upon others as a judge is ultimately corrupting. A judge can get to feel above the common herd. A possible remedy is to have judges sit for only short terms. The knowledge that a judge will in a short be dealing with lawyers appearing before him as one of their colleagues may have a restraining effect. Judges have been given long terms with the expectation that they will be insulated from politics. I think the result in many cases is that they may get corrupted due to their isolation and lack of accountability.

Oops.

Just to help CJ out with a fact. The greatest algal bloom in the Darling, since settlement occured in 1901, when most of the ricer turned toxic.

Millions of animals, wild & stock, died from drinking the water, as did many hundreds of humans. Those blooms since then have been minor events, compared to that one.

Of course, you would tell us it was because of the thousands of 4WDs driving up & down the river.

With the amount of evidence now available, only the stupid, the extremely lazy, or those with some axe to grind, can possible believe in AGW.

Which is it CJ? You don't sound like an axeman to me.

We are a group that is challenging the current paradigm in physics which is Quantum Mechanics and String Theory. There is a new Theory of Everything Breakthrough. It exposes the flaws in both Quantum Theory and String Theory. Please Help us set the physics community back on the right course and prove that Einstein was right! Visit our site The Theory of Super Relativity: http://www.superrelativity.org

Putting all the scientific stuff aside for a moment, I wonder what's more likely?

The notion that there is a world-wide plot by most of the governments of the developed world to further run down their economic (and electoral) prospects by invoking a host of punitive measures?
Add to this a never-ending list of reknowned scientists committing professional suicide by putting their names to such an evil scheme.

Or maybe there is actually some truth to the idea.

Although the risk of my house buring down is miniscule, I still take out fire insurance. Although the risk is low, the consequences of doing nothing can be very high so I continue to pay my premiums, even if the money can be used in other ways. Is this so wrong?

"Putting all the scientific stuff aside for a moment, I wonder what's more likely?

The notion that there is a world-wide plot by most of the governments of the developed world to further run down their economic (and electoral) prospects by invoking a host of punitive measures?
Add to this a never-ending list of reknowned scientists committing professional suicide by putting their names to such an evil scheme."

How about

a) The notion that scientists and the associated bureaucrats in the various funding bodies will put their funding and jobs at risk by denying the new orthodoxy:

vs.

b) The notion that governments will eagerly seize on and encourage a popular movement which promises to bring them new and sweeping powers of control and manipulation, regardless of the actual facts concerned.

Doesn't sound quite such a clear choice when you put it that way, does it? Remember the war on terror? The war on drugs? The war in Iraq? There was lots of 'evidence' to justify that too, I seem to recall. How many of the people who made money out of these misguided initiatives actually believed that they were based on reality, I wonder?

"Although the risk of my house burning down is miniscule, I still take out fire insurance. Although the risk is low, the consequences of doing nothing can be very high so I continue to pay my premiums, even if the money can be used in other ways. Is this so wrong?"

Fire insurance -- 0.5% of my annual income

Ultimate cost of useless global warming measures -- 5% of GDP? 10%?

Try a cost/benefit analysis.

Jon J: << The notion that governments will eagerly seize on and encourage a popular movement which promises to bring them new and sweeping powers of control and manipulation, regardless of the actual facts concerned. >>

Yup. Not only that, those evil governments have cunningly conscripted all those rainbow smelts, gizzard shads, phytoplankton and zooplankton to aid them in this vast conspiracy.

For those who don't understand evolution, here's a tip: the displacement of one existing species by another existing species due to ecological changes ain't it.

For those who've been babbling extraneously about blue-green algae blooms in the Darling, did you actually read the article? The algae to which Waldman refers are of completely different kinds. While blooms of blue-green algae in the Darling have increased over reason decades, this is most likely because of poor water management practices coupled with extended drought and longer periods of hot weather.

As for Godwin - who mentioned Hitler or Nazis? Denialism in this case refers to those deluded or ignorant people who stubbornly refuse to accept the vast weight of evidence that the global climate is warming, i.e. they are in 'denial'.

Like I said, there seems little point in trying to discuss global warming at OLO.

CJ Morgan said "...there seems little point in trying to discuss global warming at OLO"

That's because you refuse to discuss. Curmudgeon listed at least 5 sites and articles that represent a different point of view.

Did you discuss this? No.

Instead you infer that Curmudgeon is one of the "deluded or ignorant people who stubbornly refuse to accept the vast weight of evidence that the global climate is warming".

Maybe you should revisit your comment and say that there is no point discussing global warming with you.

The only thing that I believe is that no one really knows whats happening. It amazes me that they can't seem to accurately predict the weather 7 days from now, and yet people are willing to drop everything when the same people predict the weather 7 or even 70 years from now.

Okay, C J Morgan, I'll concede that my wording was flawed - perhaps I should better have put "the *processes* of evolution", referring *specifically* to the statement of "a giant ecological experiment".

My point was that the author seems to give the impression (perhaps I'm reading the article wrongly) that changes in ecologies are unprecedented and dreadful events, whereas surely the history of the earth shows that truly, "all is flux"?

Oh, and Ozandy, evolution need not always be something as spectacular as fish developing lungs. Yes, an individual adapting to a changed environment is not evolution, but surely changes in entire ecologies is at least part of the process of evolution (again, poor wording on my part)?

Deryck wrote: “It amazes me that they can't seem to accurately predict the weather 7 days from now, and yet people are willing to drop everything when the same people predict the weather 7 or even 70 years from now.”

Meteorology and Climatology are two very different fields.

The comparison is ridiculous.

Australian experts will tell us that clearance of the extensive forests of the basin accompanied European settlement. Large tracts of forest and native grasslands in the basin were converted to sheep and cattle grazing from mid-1800s onwards. Soils quickly succumbed to trampling and compaction by these grazing animals.

The clearance of native forests and conversion of native grasslands to pasture disturbed the delicate water table, and set in train a process which would result in the wide-spread problem of dryland salinity.

Prior to extensive water regulation, the natural nutrient load of the water bodies had already been significantly increased from paddle steamer debris, man-made sources of nutrients such as human and livestock sewage, chemicals, etc etc.

Algal blooms can lie dormant for years but will often re-emerge as a different algal species.

The boom and bust ecology of inland rivers does not equate with the economic gains and regular flows needed for irrigation. Now river regulation has affected the flow patterns of Australia’s rivers, reducing flow variability and often distorting seasonal events. For example, on the upper Murray River, we’ve captured snow-melt in spring and released it in the summer for irrigation, rather than leaving the water to flow through the system in the high spring flows needed for healthy animal and plant breeding cycles to be triggered.

For over half a century, man has polluted his life-sustaining waterways with toxic runoff from vast amounts of synthetic agricultural chemicals – many of these gender benders, which biomagnify in nature, so what can one expect now with the additional problem of a heated planet from centuries of man's indiscriminate emissions of ecologically fouling fossil fuels which kills thousands of humans every year?

And so with few regulatory endeavours to remediate past human errors, I expect, by moving on and leaving a mess, we will see similar consequences for marine life from man's necessity for water, extracted from an ever increasing ocean desalination industry around the globe to provide for an ever increasing human population.

How can human fouling of the planet's ecosystems be attributed to natural causes?

examinator - I know about the papers purporting to show warming at the poles and, sorry, my point still stands. The global temperatue tracks show temperatuers till declining, irrespective of what may be happening at the poles.
But in case the papers you refer to are not about extraordinary warming as such. The one in particular you are probably thinking of is 'Attribution of polar warming to human influence' (Nature Geoscience Online, October 30, 2008). It has nine authors led by Nathan P. Gillett of the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglica. The paper's main purpose is to show that industrial activity has had some influence on temperatues changes at the pole, and is a classic example of the use of models to try to prove a scientific proposition. It has been very strongly criticised both for its approach and use of data but, in any case, mostly certainly does not counter the problem (for AGWs) that global temperatures have been declining this century, not increasing..

"....mostly certainly does not counter the problem (for AGWs) that global temperatures have been declining this century, not increasing.."

Curmudgeon

Please provide the charts for the global annual combined land and ocean temperatures (and the source) relevant to the last say, fifty years.

Thank you

It is obvious that some critics of global warming have no expertise in climate-change time series or trend analysis; otherwise they wouldn’t be making such vacuous or outrageous claims.

I can only surmise they are genuinely ignorant of the science, or they are intentionally distorting and misrepresenting what has been published in reputable journals or recognised data-sets.

It would not surprise me if those making such outlandish claims have not even read the Keenlyside et al paper, let alone understood it.

Keenlyside, N. S., M. Latif, J. Jungclaus, L. Kornblueh, and E. Roeckner, 2008: Advancing Decadal-Scale Climate Prediction in the North Atlantic Sector. Nature, 453, 84-88.

The authors have said:

“Just to make things clear, we are not stating that anthropogenic climate change won’t be as bad as previously thought.”

Rache has made the obvious point here.

The following link is to an annex to a report by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It lists all of the authors to the 4th IPCC report, along with their university or government affiliations and the countries where these are located.

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-annexes.pdf

Most of the names are from the USA and Western Europe because that is where most of the science is being done, but there are a huge number of names from other countries as well. We are talking about a large number of scientists from different countries with different national interests, including countries like Finland, Russia, and Canada that would likely benefit from global warming. The scientists have different cultures, different religions, different political views, but the denialists are implying that some mastermind has got Srikanthan Ramachandran (India), Anna V. Mescherskaya (Russia), Daniel Olago (Kenya), G. Hilmar Gudmundsson (UK and Iceland), Chiu-Ying Lam (China), Ricardo Villalba (Argentina), and Fatemeh Rahimzadeh (Iran) (just to take some names selected at random) all singing from the same songbook.

Similarly, if governments want to frighten people to gain more power, they will, of course, select the most economically disruptive and damaging issue they can find, one that will seriously hurt the interests of their corporate elites, instead of just scaring people with bird flu or terrorism.

See also this report on a survey conducted by the earth science journal Eos last January, if some denialist wants to claim the preceding scientists were cherry-picked

http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

I mentioned Godwin's Law, C J Morgan, specifically in relation to the word "Denialist", because it has become a catch-all phrase for those folk who refuse to countenance any questioning of, or deviation from, what has become the dogma of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW).

It doesn't matter that that disagreement can range from stubborn - and probably foolish - denial that the climate is changing, to doubt about its claimed causes and consequences: Voice any doubt or skepticism and, not unlike Rik Mayall's pseudo-leftist student character in "The Young Ones" shouting "Fascist!", the pro-AGW lobby will immediately screech "Denialist!" - and the discussion is at an end.

So, no, there doesn't seem to be any point discussing climate change on OLO, because no-one is allowed to discuss anything, only nod their heads in sage agreement.

Oh, and for what it's worth: I don't deny that the climate is changing; it always has and it always will. What I *doubt* is that humans are causing it, that it can be stopped and that it will be the unmitigated disaster that worst-case computer projections suggest it may be.

Curmudgeon,
I bet you didn't read the paper or the comments because they explain the red herring you offered. Your entire mindset is based on weather and the word 'warming' not world climate change. The issue is where the warming is happening. The why its patchy is a temporary anomaly. Today the waters around the Antarctic are changing for the worse the tidal current will warm the pacific as it goes who know what the consequences will ultimately be Either way I'm more concerned about the security of food sources. Species depletions, pollution devastation of the environment etc.

I don't pretend to be an expert but given the wide agreement that is about amongst climatologists and the other sciences eg the author. The deniers have more difficulties across academic fields with their alternative explanations.

I think the author of this article has it right it is WCC and it isn’t explained by anything else other than anthropomorphic interferences. What it portends should prompt at least defences

Of course AGW is clearly a conspiracy by scientists throughout the world from different countries, cultures, education, experience, etc.

After all there are no vested interests by fossil fuel industries to spend dollars on 'denialism' is there?

Thanks to Q&A and Divergence for the links. I am disappointed that while Curmudgeon has alluded to the “global temperature declines” this century, in all his posts, he has been unable or unwilling to provide me with the charts I requested and since Curmudgeon has also failed to provide specific links to support his claims, I have endeavoured to find them myself – albeit in clumsy layman fashion.

I would appreciate Q&A’s and Divergence’s corrections to my assumptions (if necessary) on the following NOAA links, where I have failed to find evidence of global temperature “declines:”

The Annual Global Land Temperature Anomalies (degrees C)
The Annual Global Ocean Temperature Anomalies (degrees C)
The Annual Global (land and ocean combined) Anomalies (degrees C)

Go to:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/anomalies/index.php

“The Southern Oscillation and increasing GHGs continue to be, respectively, the dominant factors affecting interannual and decadal temperature change. Solar irradiance has a non-negligible effect on global temperature [see, e.g., ref. 7, which empirically estimates a somewhat larger solar cycle effect than that estimated by others who have teased a solar effect out of data with different methods].

"Given our expectation of the next El Niño beginning in 2009 or 2010, it still seems likely that a new global temperature record will be set within the next 1-2 years, despite the moderate negative effect of the reduced solar irradiance”:

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2008/

The cooling impacts during 2008 from La Nina's presence was exploited as proof the globe was cooling. One can only speculate on the argument deniers will use with the re-emergence of a fired-up El Nino.

I have concluded that there are many obstacles and complex climate variations for scientists to overcome before arriving at their final conclusions on the impacts of A/climate change. Nevertheless, I note that the reputable climate scientists generously share their findings with other eminent scientists which significantly contributes to the need for ethical reporting and the requirement to publish ongoing corrections:

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/OceanCooling/printall.php

I have also concluded that the cherry picking by many commentators is a result of chronic myopia, perpetuated by matters of self-interest.

Protagoras,

I plead guilty to being a scientist, but not in this field. Q&A and Suzanne Miranda are the experts here. I just find the suggestion that there is some kind of conspiracy or that dissenters from some climate change orthodoxy are being systematically shut up in every university or research establishment around the world too ridiculous for words. The very best way for a young scientist to make a name (and get grants) for himself or herself would be to thoroughly discredit anthropogenic global warming.

Roy Spencer's graph of global cooling in the past decade, is on Jennifer Marohasy's blog: http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/

Waldman's article seems to be based on a raft of assumptions. Let's see, there have been some changes - rainbow smelt have gone from the Hudson River in New York and another species has replaced it. This "regime shift" has a name because it's happened before. But this time Waldman attributes it to global warming, without a hint of doubt. Of course.

Waldman simply asserts that these changes are caused by global warming. He produces no evidence of causation - apart, apparently, from computer models - but "global weirding is already well under way." Right, thanks for the tip. He produces no evidence of when previous "regime shifts" might have happened in the Hudson River. Did the rainbow smelt he so admires replace some other species at some time, or were they just "always there"? And if regime shift has happened before, it obviously didn't do any harm. Things change. There was no day or state or condition to which we must all return.

The rainbow smelt haven't been seen in the Hudson River since 1998, he says - coincidentally, the year in which the COOLING began. Waldman says they went because the water was warming. He bases that assumption on a theory about temperature tolerance. Of course. That's the only possible explanation once you just KNOW the planet's warming.

Personally, I'm tired of reading crappy articles attributing anything and every thing to CO2 emissions, apparently in ignorance of the cooling of the past decade which has resulted in falling global average air and water temperatures, despite increasing emissions.

Any biologist or sociologist or epidemiologist can run a global warming scare and many frequently do. Hell, it's so easy even economists can do it, as Stern and Garnaut showed. Proving the case is not so easy.