Warmest Year on Record?

Question

In another question, the user Benjamin, said that 2008 will be the warmest year ever.

I would like to see how he can think that when it's started out to be the coldest year on record for the last 100 years. There's been record snow-fall and snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere.

How does the record cold play into that claim of 2008 being the warmest year ever?

I, by the way, believe global warming is a hoax. But I want to hear opinions on this.

Answer 1

I read somewhere that it's been the coldest winter in 14 years. That's a big difference. Also, it's not the coldest YEAR, but the coldest WINTER in 14 year.

Yes, taking global warming into consideration it's been unusually cold, due to the El Nina, but in Sweden where I live I heard that it's still been the 3rd warmest winter ever measured.

Non of this (your state or my country) really matters, because it's the GLOBAL average and the long term trend that matters and the trend is still showing warming. Sorry.

This was used earlier in a question from a denier as "proof" that there is no global warming. Please read it carefully. It's important!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/natur...

Answer 2

At the very least, you shouldn't simply state you believe Global Warming is a hoax, you sound more like you just don't know, maybe you hope it's a hoax (me too, that would truly be 'convenient'), but, that just not how it's been shaping up, year after year, from more and more research and evidence.  But I see where you are coming from.  It's easy to be confused when you still have people trying to convince you it's not real, or a conspiracy, etc.  If enough heat on the subject can be stirred up, it ultimately slows down any policies which would otherwise be adopted sooner.  More than skeptics, Industry and Oil want to get all they can before it's all over, that's all it is... aside from that, there are a lot of misconceptions which can be confusing also.  For one, if you believe the Earth is only 6 - 10 thousand years old, it's easy to see why this is hard to imagine, but aside from that, assuming you are an intellectual, we'll be serious.

For example, in the US, the warmest year on record before the 2000s was during the mid 30s due to some freak anomalies.  But note - that was in the US, not the world.  

In 2006, US temps soared to a new (but since disputed) all time record high (NOAA).  At the same time, 2006 was the global highest average mean temperature ever recorded as well.  In fact, quite a number of record temperature spikes have occurred, a record of them in itself, over the past 20 years.  

It's definitely warmer and the weather is definitely going through some big changes as each decade passes.  But you ask, is it Global Warming?  I think it's unfair for anyone to say that Global Warming is simply a hoax, even the most stubborn and well paid GW skeptic admits that the climate is changing, and none ignorant enough to say it's cooling, they would be immediately discredited.

You will see Liss, anytime we have record temperatures, we'll also have record droughts as well as floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones, more than usual, higher intensity, all around the world including places we haven't even seen them before (i.e. Southern Hemisphere).  We will have more fires, more insect devastation to forests and crops, more spreading of diseases, higher introduction of new diseases, more famine, more pot holes, more snow storms (yes, when the weather is popping up and down over the threshold optimum for snow instead of just staying too cold like it normally would, it will either rain or snow more.  

For example, we've had a relatively warmer winter in the North East, and at the same time, broken records for snowfall everywhere... this is a result of the changing climate, or climate change, which does happen throughout time, but nothing in nature is causing it to happen today.  

In fact, we know that from what is know as Global Dimming (particles and gasses as a result of pollution or cloud formation, etc. in the atmosphere which are less transparent, thus acting as a shade or tint, thus reducing the amount of light that reaches earth, thus reducing the amount of heat radiated), the amount of Global Warming is actually worse than what is being observed and reported, so when there are places that are particular clear of these Global Dimming gasses, etc. these areas will be much warmer than other areas.

All these things and more, influenced by natural *and now* because of the recent super human boom in industry and population, anthropogenic causes (in the last 150 years, we went from millions to billions of people, burned a trillion barrels of oil, deforested billions of acres of forests (if you ever fly over Europe, like Belgium for example, you'll notice the only thing which resembles patches of forests are just clusters of *re-grown* trees), the list is endless...).  

So of course we are having an impact on this entire planet, the oceans, what lives in the oceans, the coral reefs, the beaches, the glaciers, the fresh water lakes and rivers, the forests, all the world's natural resources are being harvested for our consumption, and it is not stopping... we will double the world population again in our lifetime, and we will continue to hunt, to encroach, to consume, to alter the landscape (which any geologist can tell you, planetary erosion from anthropogenic causes now trumps that of all natural causes combined... that's a staggering fact to consider).  

You honestly feel that humans aren't doing *anything*, and never will?  How much do you have to over-feed the fish before you start killing them?  There is a point when things are too much for the system and we are at that point now.

Global Warming is not disputed; it is an accepted fact among most all the world's scientists today.  In fact, more scientists accept global warming than they do the theory of relativity.  Never before has there been a scientific consensus as heavily endorced as that of accepting the recent climate change is real, it is influenced by man, and our activities, left uncheck, will only further accelerate the planet into an irreversible path to planetary global warming.  

We are terraforming our own planet, slowly but surely (and not slowly at all on the geological scale, but rather super extremely fast, faster than nature has ever been known to do).

BTW - Carbon Dioxide (CO2), yes, it is a part of our lives we exhale it, plants breath it, oceans sink it (and expel it, like a big conveyor loop), but things involving plants and animals which add and remove CO2 from the atmosphere, including what's already in the oceans, and atmosphere, from the periodic volcano eruption and so on, is all a part of a closed cycle, relatively unchanged for thousands of years.  

The recent spikes in GHGs (Green House Gasses, especially CO2) are clearly from human activities, most notably since the start of the Industrial Revolution.  And CO2 levels are higher today, than they have been for millions of years.  

No, CO2 doesn't historically, typically, *drive* temperature, but if too much is introduced to our environment over a set period of time, the sink starts to fill up, and the levels CO2 from fossil fuel burning (note - fossil fuels are not part of our current atmospheric environment - carbon which is buried miles below us, and then extracted by us, burnt and created into Carbon Dioxide gas by us, ADDS to the existing, natural levels of CO2) and Global Warming feedback loops (i.e. melting and releasing of frozen methane deposits and hydrates, less reflective snow and ice revealing more sunlight absorbing/heat producing surfaces) will rise exponentially.  What took a thousand years to wipe out nearly every species on the planet once could occur in hundreds of years this time around AT THE CURRENT RATE.  This is why it is important to do all that is possible NOW and for now on, to curb devastating climate change.

I wouldn't hang so much on what 2008 is going to bring, worry about what the next time we have el Nino, what that will bring.

Answer 3

I have lived through threats of Nuclear Winter and Global Warming - often the warnings have come from the same scientists!  

Now "Climate Change" is the new buzz word!  Our earth has had "Climate Changes" tens of thousands of times over the past million years - none of it caused by human beings!  

Is this the coldest winter - who knows how cold winter was 100 years ago?  How accurate were the thermometers?   How about 3000 years ago?  We do know that N. America was covered by ice 20,000 years ago - our last big "Ice Age!"  (And that ice just melted all by itself without any help from human beings!)

Global Warming is one big con job!   The earth will undergo various climate changes with or without human beings being living on our world - climate change is a normal occurrence!

Answer 4

I think that you need to improve your reading comprehension. What I said was, "Even with the La Nina, 2008 will become ONE of the warmest years on record."[1]

When I said that, I was referring to a BBC article that reported that the Hadley Centre estimates that 2008 will about 0.4C above the 1961-1990 average. Or in other words, the Hadley Centre believes that 2008, while will be cooler than recent years, "is still forecast to be one of the top-ten warmest years [on record]."[2]

Question for Dr Jello: If no one can predict, or understand the future, then how come we know when tomorrow’s high tide will come? Or the next day's high tide? Or the day's after that?

Answer 5

Doomsday has been called off.

Answer 6

I'm sorry I couldnt answer your question!

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=U-3RLx_4Y5...

Watch it.

For more information visit my latest questions I posted.

SPEAD THE WORD!

Answer 7

You raised a very good point.

Whenever it is unseasonably warm, all we here about how this is the affect of global warming, but when it's unseasonably cold, we hear nothing.  It's very disingenuous.

Here's a link to close to 300 links related to this topic.

http://schnittshow.newsradio610.com/glob...

Answer 8

2008 will almost certainly not be the warmest year on record.  The Hadley Centre predicted last year that 2008 and 2009 would be cool years (relative to recent years) due to La Nina, but that between 2010 and 2015, we'll probably have at least 2 years break the temperature record.

Answer 9

For 2008 to be the warmest year on record is only an estimate, so why are you getting so upset about this?  

What we have seen is the record highs for most given areas are starting to group closer to the present, rather than being spread out over hundreds of years.  If 2008 does become the hottest year, it is a definite sign something is not right. But today we don't need scientific data to determine if the earth is warming, we have empirical evidence of the polar caps shrinking, more than has ever happened in the last 650,000 years, this is way off the normal cycle "skeptics"  like to claim the earth is in.

Also global warming is the experimental process we are conducting on planet earth, climate change is the end result.  This will mean that the weather (which is driven by uneven heating of the earths surface, which has been in balance for the last post 65 million years) will be more violent and have colder winters, ice storms in places that never get them etc.

Bottom line, when you are putting carbon back into the atmosphere that had been stored for 400 million years, don't you think something is going to happen? The carbon you breath out is part of the normal photosynthesis cycle where plants take in CO2 and expel oxygen.  Fossil fuels, mostly were giant plants that removed the carbon from the atmosphere and became buried for one reason or another. Thus this carbon was removed prior to the onset of evolution of hominids and is not part of any current cycle, except the one where modern man is a polluter.

Answer 10

According to the raw data from the Hadley Centre, 2008 is shaping up to be below the steady (or very slightly declining) temperature we have seen over the past 10 years since 1998. But in all fairness, it is only the early part of the year with the winter season not yet over, so the yearly value will probably not be much less than recent years.

Oh, and I love Bob’s tautology. How can it be wrong? Either it will or won’t be colder. That's like saying "Either it will or it won’t rain today." Classic believer reasoning.

EDIT: To all who gave this answer a thumbs down, do you have a problem with facts? I cited the Hadley Centre – one of the data sources the believers love. I looked at and plotted THEIR ACTUAL values – not MY values - and qualified my statement to say that the temperature trend is heading for SLIGHTLY below what it has been, I did not say at any point that the 0.6° C rise in the 20th century was fully recovered, or that we are not still at a relatively high point in modern history. I suggest you analyze the data yourself to see what the trend is – that’s why I provided the link.

And sorry for pissing in Bob’s cornflakes by pointing out a logical flaw, but I’m tired of this believer rhetoric “if it’s hot or cold - it’s AGW. If there’s a flood or drought - it’s global warming. If the ice melts or recovers - it’s AGW. If you got a hemorrhoid, it’s global warming.” AGW is the one-size-fits-all calamity explanation.

Answer 11

i heard on the bbc world service last night that this la nina has been the strongest for 30 years, and it is expected to hang on for another few months yet. this too;

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7329...

however, it is, as usual these days, predicted to be warmer than the 30 yr. average overall;

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/worl...

i have no doubt we will have one or two real scorchers to come in a couple of few years though, when we get the next el nino.

awww ((((richard))))!

i opened it if that's any consolation. i really love graphs.

the correlation between high temp. years and el nino events is even stronger for the low latitude readings, thats a new thing for me, ta!

Answer 12

No one knows.  These are just guesses.  No one can predict the future.

People get science any mysticism mixed up far too often.

Answer 13

It may or not be the warmest year on record.  But it's pretty sure to be the year with the warmest "5-year average" which is a better measure of climate (as opposed to weather).  DATA here:

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2007/

discussed in detail, with confirmation, at:

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/01/24/g...

EDIT - it wasn't even close to the coldest winter in 100 years.  It was below average.

This below average weather also happened in 1982, 1991-1992, 1999-2000.  EVERY TIME global warming came back stronger than ever.  Proof.

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2007/

discussed in detail, with confirmation, at:

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2008/01/24/g...

As long as we keep making greenhouse gases in enormous amounts, global warming will dominate in the long run.  It's simple physics.

http://earthguide.ucsd.edu/earthguide/di...

Answer 14

How can 2008 be the coldest year on record for the last 100 years when it's only April?

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

As you can see on the graph from NASA, there were many more years colder before 1993. Do you understand how to read a graph? And since we are debating global warming, refer to the GLOBAL temperatures.

EDIT - Liss, congratulations! It's been cold in your state. There is a reason why we don't refer to it as {YourState} Warming. Also, I see you are more interested in opinion rather than fact, so you probably didn't even open my link.

littlerobbergirl - thanks for looking at my graph, glad you like it!     :-)

Answer 15

the warmest year on record, AS PROVEN BY FACTS, is 1934, before the majority of Co2 began to enter the atmosphere,

man made global warming=WRONG AND DISPROVED TIME AND TIME AGAIN.