Anyone else concerned w/wacky winter weather?

Oh, I love An Inconvenient Truth. I have watched it four times now and learned something new every time. I think it is fascinating how scientists have used isotopes of oxygen trapped in ice cores to analyze temperatures/ CO2 concentrations back through 7 ice ages.

I am jealous of Liane's bike ride... I woke up this morning hoping to bike in to work, only to hear reports of a freezing rain/ snow on its way toward us. After I got to work (a middle school), the district decided to close.
 
Toni - we got snow here in Austin today and are expecting more this afternoon and overnight. Maybe it will get to you soon. :) Be safe!!
 
I also was intrigued by "An Inconvenient Truth". Only time will tell if it is truth.

Until then, DH and I are planning a vacation this year to Canada to see glaciers before they're all gone.
 
The Weather Channel explained that this years wacky weather is El Nino and in their words NOT global warming.

I fully believe in global warming. We are in what geologists call the Fourth Interglacial Period. All of this has happened before without man-made greenhouse gases. That means our planet is probably on a cycle much like the tides. Can we stop global warming? Doubtful. Can we reverse it? Doubtful. The only debate to me is if we are accelerating it or not. I'm a Boy Scout leader and a "Scotsman" to boot, should we be thrifty and conserve energy and natural resources where we can? Absolutely.

Mt St Helens, Mt Pinatubo and all those other volcanoes are doing a number on the weather as well. Mr Gore and his crew should protest them sometime. I wonder who's got more hot air?
 
Global warming is a leftist hippie pinko commie liberal tree-hugging, grass-eating, hemp-wearing media conspiracy, and I'm a card carrying member.


:p Hee-hee.

Susan L.G.
 
While I do believe that global warming exists, I believe what we're seeing is the result of a global tilt. The best way to describe it is by comparing the earth to a spinning top. The longer a top spins, the more likely it is to wobble as its center of gravity is affected. With the earth, you have to remember that the interior of the planet is FLUID. It is constantly roiling and churning in our earth's core, and the density of all that matter is not constant. As it shifts, and as the land masses floating on top of the molten core move, it's easy to see how our planet can become "out of balance" and start to wobble on its axis. This wobble, even if it is only "slight", would cause a polar tilt that would affect our weather patterns.

I've heard scientists agree with this theory, but I haven't done any extensive research myself. The long and short, though, is that we are far too loose with our planet. We need to take better care of it, polar tilt or not.
 
We need to remember that our planet has existed here millions of years longer than we have and isn't even close to resembling what it looked like in the beginning of its existence. We seem to think that our planet is a stationary device that never changes. What we need to realize is that we are just visitors and get only a pinprick's glimpse of time in the grand scheme of earth's existence and evolvement. Our continents continue to move, the molten core continues to find ways of escaping through the earth's crust to generate new land mass above or below the sea, and this pushes older land mass into the core to become molten...our planet is constantly recycling itself and is not a static thing. It is fluid and changing and in constant movement. As such, it has patterns that we can't fully understand and can only observe. I wouldn't be surprised if the Midwest one day became the new tropics and Florida became desert terrain and Arizona became swampland.

We do not control the earth. It controls us. Mankind needs to realize that.
 
Interesting discussion and thoughts...

"While I do believe that global warming exists, I believe what we're seeing is the result of a global tilt. The best way to describe it is by comparing the earth to a spinning top. The longer a top spins, the more likely it is to wobble as its center of gravity is affected. With the earth, you have to remember that the interior of the planet is FLUID. It is constantly roiling and churning in our earth's core, and the density of all that matter is not constant. As it shifts, and as the land masses floating on top of the molten core move, it's easy to see how our planet can become "out of balance" and start to wobble on its axis. This wobble, even if it is only "slight", would cause a polar tilt that would affect our weather patterns."

You know Catwoman, it is so funny that you say that because DH and I were just talking about that this weekend lol. We can make all kinds of observations and what not, but the past two years have been very strange in Indiana, even FOR Indiana. This year on the shortest day of the year the sun went down just a little before 6 when it used to go down not long after the kids, or just DD at the time, got home from school (around 5). The summer this year was nowhere near as hot as it used to be (how many days over 90 did we hit?) our past two falls and springs have been so much less extreme than usual, we didn't get the March and April snow that we almost always get, you get my drift. We weren't wondering if it didn't have something to do with the tsunami since all this started happening not long after. I remember hearing on the news that some scientists believe that a quake of that magnitude could shift the tilt of the axis.

Who knows what is going on in the Earth's core, jet streams and currents and who can REALLY measure it? At one time the Nile in Egypt was lush and tropical, Iceland was nothing but ice and Greenland was green. Earth is going to keep on changing, and I think that some people would like to think that we have the power to control it but we really don't. Of course, with saying that I don't think that emitting tons of pollution into the environment helps anyone. ;)

Missy
 
way too cold for Texas! december i went to a festival and the zoo. the wheather was perfect-in the 80's. even laid out in the spa outside. year before last year it was too cold to go to the festival. so i guess that meens the weather is unpredictable. maybe this december it will cold.

laura
 
Well, the prediction is that in several years Florida's coasts will be under water due to global warming. I'm in the higher territory of Central Florida so I guess that means I'll own oceanfront property! I'm trying to find the silver lining.
 
Hi mnglamourgirl,

In addition to being a fanatical Cathe fan, I work on a community site that offers information on global warming and related issues.

Here's a video that might help you take action http://community.gaiam.com/gaiam/p/GlobalWarmingHowtoBePartoftheSolution.html

... and a discussion forum on climate change in which you could post your question:
http://community.gaiam.com/gaiam/p/id/THR00095.html


We just launched and have not begun marketing the site yet, so traffic is still very light. In a few months the activity will be much more brisk.

Thanks; hope this was helpful.
 
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