What is/was the "Point of no return date" put out by the proponents of global warming?

Question

I would like to know this date, so I will know when human effected global warming will be over.

Answer 1

Hold on a few days.  The story on the front page today is that the scientific community is "rethinking" the concept.

Answer 2

They just want to scare everybody into a sense of emergency, so we can take actions that they believe is good for humanity regardless if global warming is true or not.  If the earth starts to cool then the ball game is over.

Answer 3

The point of no return is the "lag time" theory, that as we put pollution in the air today the atmosphere is affected later on down the road.  IF you knew anything about atmospheric science, you would understand this and things like when CFC's are released into the atmosphere they take up to 75 years to reach the stratosphere and do there damage for about another 75 years.  Thus that chemical has a life span of 150 years.  "Point of no return" is referring to the amounts were putting out there at one time, thus those in the future are going to pay heavily for it.  But I guess with this wall-street mentality of profit now and debts our children must pay later is then of no consequence to you.

Answer 4

several tipping points some time this century

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroo...

http://www.independent.co.uk/environment...

http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/105...

explanation of term

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/arc...

Answer 5

It does seem that I have heard several "Point of no return dates" mentioned in the past.

in 1998-9 I believe it was once mentioned to be as early as 2010 and another as late as 2050.

I seem to recall in the mid 1980's when this joke first really got a foothold that we were going to be in serious trouble by 2000.

Thinking about it that was the first time George W. Bush was elected.

OK maybe I just assumed they were talking about global warming at the time!

I do remember however that our sea levels were supposed to be rising at an extremely rapid rate and that between 2010 and 2020 London and most of the eastern United States seaboard would certainly be under at least 1 foot of water.

Well I'm still waiting!

Shouldn't we be seeing some indications by now even if it were going to be as late as 2050?

Oh we will still hear stories about how the maps are going to have to be rewritten because parts of Alaska are now permanently under water and the coastline has changed so drastically.

We won't hear about other parts of the world, (Scotland for example), where the sea is retreating.

The fact that all land masses are in constant motion and lift and dip says that an accurate measurement of sea level rise or fall could never be obtained since that would require a fixed reference point in which to measure from.

What I can say with complete certainty however, is that even if all of the polar icecaps were to melt completely, that ocean rise would be much closer to half an inch than the 20feet that some fanatics predict.