Old Ag here. Not interested in a debate, but looking for facts.

First, apparently carbon dioxide is increasing as a percentage of our atmosphere to a value approaching 400 ppm. Should I question if such a small change could create all the weather related havoc that is being suggested? Or should I ask the ? is it something else that causes the weather to change?

Second, water vapor molecules are produced in larger quantities than carbon dioxide molecules when hydrocarbons are burned. Since water vapor is in excess of 20,000 ppm in the atmosphere and also considered a green house gas, Shouldn't there be more concern about water vapor than carbon dioxide? Also, what molecules are decreasing?

Third, it appears that water born plants are producing the oxygen we breath or the fiat majority of it. Evidently forests are a net neutral as regards to oxygen as dead trees and leaves consume all the oxygen that the forest produces in decomposition. What is wrong with cutting down trees to grow crops to feed people?

Has the theory of carbon dioxide being the cause of global warming been reproduced in the lab and replicated?

Just curious. I know the weather goes through cycles and is continually changes, but Al Gore might be a shyster. Science cause me to question Mr. Gore and his followers.

Hey, don't shoot me. I am an old Ag living on a ranch kind of bored watching a crew build fence. My sons will read this and threaten to take my phone away.

I don't have any of the answers to your questions, but the image of you sitting on a porch watching a fencing crew and typing that post just made me smile.

Hope you have a great day!

Signed,
Stuck in the city

The only thing in your post I am 100% sure of is that Al Gore is an absolute shyster.

Haven't you heard, don't use common sense or real science.

AggieGunslinger said:

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The only thing in your post I am 100% sure of is that Al Gore is an absolute shyster.

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I almost spit my coffee out I can see it

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coyote68 said:

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Old Ag here. Not interested in a debate, but looking for facts.

First, apparently carbon dioxide is increasing as a percentage of our atmosphere to a value approaching 400 ppm. Should I question if such a small change could create all the weather related havoc that is being suggested? Or should I ask the ? is it something else that causes the weather to change?

Second, water vapor molecules are produced in larger quantities than carbon dioxide molecules when hydrocarbons are burned. Since water vapor is in excess of 20,000 ppm in the atmosphere and also considered a green house gas, Shouldn't there be more concern about water vapor than carbon dioxide? Also, what molecules are decreasing?

Third, it appears that water born plants are producing the oxygen we breath or the fiat majority of it. Evidently forests are a net neutral as regards to oxygen as dead trees and leaves consume all the oxygen that the forest produces in decomposition. What is wrong with cutting down trees to grow crops to feed people?

Has the theory of carbon dioxide being the cause of global warming been reproduced in the lab and replicated?

Just curious. I know the weather goes through cycles and is continually changes, but Al Gore might be a shyster. Science cause me to question Mr. Gore and his followers.

Hey, don't shoot me. I am an old Ag living on a ranch kind of bored watching a crew build fence. My sons will read this and threaten to take my phone away.

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Alright, I will take a stab at this. I am an environmental scientist who does air emissions testing, so I guess I am more full of hot air than most.

First, co2 levels are high. No debate. Whether co2 is the direct cause of the crazy weather we have been seeing lately is very debatable. It is next to impossible to make a model that will take into account all the factors that influence our weather. Next, it is debatable whether the weather we are seeing is abnormal at all, or just a cycle that we haven't seen since we have been recording weather with some kind of accuracy. In my opinion, what we are seeing is just a cycle, and not influenced terribly by co2. When co2 levels get to a certain threshold level, we will see the algae in the oceans respond to balance out the atmosphere. I haven't seen evidence of this happening yet.
***This is not license to do whatever the hell we want. We certainly aren't helping things doing what we are doing, but how much harm can be direct pinned on us is tbd.

Second question, hell if I know. Water vapor isn't sexy and doesn't sell DVDs or lame movie tickets.

Third, if done responsibly, replacing forests with crops should not be a problem. The problem is that it is being done by uneducated morons. And the endangered species and special habitat and whatnot.

Mr. Gore might have had an agenda, but he did shine the light on some important issues that we are doing a better job on, but still have a way to go.

Flame away

Oh man, where is Dr. Calvin Parnell when you need him?

Looks like he retired after 42 years of teaching at A&M.

Good grief, and he started 6 years after I graduated. I hope all his post holes are in dirt and not in my rock. I still feel young. The beer bar will open promptly at 4 this afternoon. Gigem!

How long have we been " recording weather data with some accuracy". This is one of the things that bothers me about articles written about weather phenomena happening for the first time, i.e. the gulf not cooling down below a certain level this year. If a 1 degree swing in average Erath 2 temperature is a big deal how long have we had the technology to accurately, globally, measure Earth's temp with less than a degree of error, and were we even recording data globally when we got to that level.

NC

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/arctic-sea-ice/

Oh, I know he is retired. My question was more rhetorical. He would (does) have had some strongly-opinionated answers to your questions. And I tend agree with him.

AggieGunslinger said:

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How long have we been " recording weather data with some accuracy". This is one of the things that bothers me about articles written about weather phenomena happening for the first time, i.e. the gulf not cooling down below a certain level this year. If a 1 degree swing in average Erath 2 temperature is a big deal how long have we had the technology to accurately, globally, measure Earth's temp with less than a degree of error, and were we even recording data globally when we got to that level.

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Accurately? Around 1939 when we were preparing for WW2. Even before that, wasn't a lot of good data until after the 1900 Galveston Hurricane wiped the city off the map and weather became a priority. Most of the data before that often wasn't on calibrated instruments or taken regularly.

If you're talking global earth temp with less than a degree of error, you're now into the satellite age. Started in 1967, but they didn't really get good at temp readings from satellites until 1979.

SteveBott said:

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NC

https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/arctic-sea-ice/

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I see, but what is the cause. There have been past periods where carbon dioxide levels were half what they are now and the temperature was 10 degrees warmer.

Need to go dig a posthole. I have a baseball game to watch. The weather is a lot like baseball. The laws of physics always prevail.

I'm not an expert but as to your question about why CO2 gets more attention than water vapor despite the concentration being much lower is that different gases have varying degrees of "greenhousiness" for lack of a better term. Basically, every gas stays in the atmosphere for a different length of time and interacts with solar radiation in a different way. When you take all the different factors into account, the concentration of CO2 along with the properties of CO2 make it one of the more dangerous greenhouse gases, according to the prevailing scientific thought. Also note that water vapor as a whole has a big impact, but the human influence of adding water vapor to the atmosphere is relatively limited.

Sources:

http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/science/CO2-and-global-warming-faq.html#.WPpO3ogrIUE

https://www.thoughtco.com/worst-greenhouse-gases-606789

I can't address whether or not this is a cycle that will be balanced out or the beginning of a massive stuggle on planet earth.

coyote68 said:

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Old Ag here. Not interested in a debate, but looking for facts.

First, apparently carbon dioxide is increasing as a percentage of our atmosphere to a value approaching 400 ppm. Should I question if such a small change could create all the weather related havoc that is being suggested? Or should I ask the ? is it something else that causes the weather to change?

I don't think it's good to get too hung up on the numerical value of the concentration, but rather what the relative change over time is. Just as a really small concentration of H2S or cyanide is dangerous to a human, a fairly small concentration of CO2 can have large effects. There are however a huge number of factors that affect weather in general.

Second, water vapor molecules are produced in larger quantities than carbon dioxide molecules when hydrocarbons are burned. Since water vapor is in excess of 20,000 ppm in the atmosphere and also considered a green house gas, Shouldn't there be more concern about water vapor than carbon dioxide? Also, what molecules are decreasing?

I tried to address this in my earlier post. Water vapor does have a huge effect on the warming of the earth (and probably is a big reason that intelligent life exists), but the human impact on the concentration of water vapor in the atmosphere is pretty low I think.

Third, it appears that water born plants are producing the oxygen we breath or the fiat majority of it. Evidently forests are a net neutral as regards to oxygen as dead trees and leaves consume all the oxygen that the forest produces in decomposition. What is wrong with cutting down trees to grow crops to feed people?

Not sure that anyone would disagree about crops being more important than trees. I think deforestation issues are more related to either places like Haiti where deforestation reduces soil stability causing mudslides, or the Amazon rainforest where deforestation is also habitat destruction for a huge number of species. Whether or not it's OK to cause species to go extinct is up to the individual I suppose, so long as it doesn't get to the point of destroying our own food chain.

Has the theory of carbon dioxide being the cause of global warming been reproduced in the lab and replicated?

I don't think anyone has created a weather simulator that works exactly like earth, but you can see how CO2 can trap heat in a very simple lab experiment:

Just curious. I know the weather goes through cycles and is continually changes, but Al Gore might be a shyster. Science cause me to question Mr. Gore and his followers.

I don't trust ol Al farther than I can throw him, but I do believe in science.

Hey, don't shoot me. I am an old Ag living on a ranch kind of bored watching a crew build fence. My sons will read this and threaten to take my phone away.

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Your post got me thinking so I just wanted to take a stab at my thoughts on some more of the OP. See comments above.

Just discussing, but when humans burn hydrocarbons we add more water than carbon dioxide to the atmosphere . As we add more water to the atmosphere, the temperature rises and the atmosphere can and will hold more water vapor creating a repetive cycle which does not happen with CO2. Also, water vapor is much more effective at retaining heat in the earths atmosphere. There are approx 2500 water molecules per million and only appro 4 CO2 per million.

I can tell you it is hotter longer at my house than it was 40 years ago, but I am starting to question the science behind the CO3 being the culprit.

I want to explore this more, but baseball and beer are going to keep me cool this PM. Anyone ever drink Sol??

Not an expert and just did a quick google search, but it looks the atmosphere's carrying capacity of Water Vapor is controlled by Temperature, not the other way around.

Put another way, when the atmosphere gets too much water vapor, it rains. Concentrations have gone up over time due to warming caused by other greenhouse gases.

https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/climatescience/climatesciencenarratives/its-water-vapor-not-the-co2.html

I watched the heat trapping video. I can't see where it proves CO2 is trapping the heat. The candle is producing heat plus H2O plus CO2. The air inside the tube is going to gain heat from the candle regardless of the composition of the air. Kind of a head scratcher. The earth is still warming, but the candle isn't the answer.

I have to believe that we have exceeded the Earths carrying capacity. You can't have 7 billion human bodies eating breathing and pooping and not cause some global changes. Especially post-industrial revolution. I like this cartoon showing global temp over recent history.


Historical Temperature

Drillbit, good stuff. We are one asteroid or comet away from another ice age. It will happen sooner than later. There are too many of those things whizzing past the earth.

Drillbit4 said:

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I have to believe that we have exceeded the Earths carrying capacity. You can't have 7 billion human bodies eating breathing and pooping and not cause some global changes. Especially post-industrial revolution. I like this cartoon showing global temp over recent history.


Historical Temperature

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Nothing a good plague wouldn't fix. If only AC would quit working to stop them.

Some good info

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/48675