Arguments
Evidence for global warming
What the science says...
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Basic
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Intermediate
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There are many lines of independent empirical evidence for global warming, from accelerated ice loss from the Arctic to Antarctica to the poleward migration of plant and animal species across the globe. |
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Climate Myth...
It's not happening
"...these global warming studies that now we're seeing (are) a bunch of snake oil science." (Sarah Palin)
The evidence for global warming is being meticulously accumulated by scientists all over the world. This evidence includes the following independent observations that paint a consistent picture of global warming:
- Our planet is suffering an energy imbalance and is steadily accumulating heat (Hansen 2005, Murphy 2009, von Schuckmann 2009, Trenberth 2009)
- The height of the tropopause is increasing (Santer 2003, press release)
- Jet streams are moving poleward (Archer 2008, Seidel 2007, Fu 2006)
- The tropical belt is widening (Seidel 2007, Fu 2006)
- There is an increasing trend in record hot days versus record cold temperatures with currently twice as many record hot days than record cold temperatures (Meehle 2009, see press release).
- A shift towards earlier seasons (Stine 2009)
- Cooling and contraction of the upper atmosphere consistent with predicted effects of increasing greenhouse gases (Lastovicka 2008)
- Lake warming (Schneider & Hook 2010)
Ice Melt
- Arctic permafrost is warming at greater depths (Walsh 2009) and degrading (IPCC AR4, section 4.7.2.3)
- Global sea level rise is accelerating (Church 2006)
- Antarctic ice loss is accelerating (Velicogna 2009), even from East Antarctica which was previously thought to be too stable to lose ice mass (Chen 2009)
- Greenland ice loss is accelerating (Velicogna 2009, van den Broeke et al 2009)
- Glaciers are shrinking globally at an accelerating rate (WGMS 2008)
- Arctic sea-ice loss is accelerating with the loss rate exceeding model forecasts by around a factor of 3 (Stroeve 2007).
- Lake and river ice cover throughout the Northern Hemisphere are freezing later and breaking up earlier (Magnuson 2000, Hodgkins 2005)
Biological changes
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Animal and plant species are responding to earlier springs. Eg - earlier frog breeding, bird nesting, earlier flowering, earlier migration of birds and butterflies (Parmesan 2003)
- The distribution of tree lines, plants, birds, mammals, insects, fish, reptiles, marine invertebrates are shifting towards the poles (Parmesan 2003)
- Growing season is lengthening (Christidis 2007)
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Earlier emergence of Melbourne butterflies (Kearney 2010)
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Changes to physical and biological systems across the globe are consistent with warming temperatures (Rosenzweig 2008)
- Distribution of plants are shifting to higher elevations (Lenoir 2008)
- UK Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years (Amano 2010)
- Arctic phytoplankton blooming earlier in the year, affecting the food chain (Kahru 2010)
- Earlier emergence of Melbourne butterfly: 1.6 days per decade (Kearney 2010).
- Decline in lizard populations (Sinervo 2010)
- Drop in primary productivity due to unprecedented warming at Lake Tanganyika (Tierney 2010)
- Tropical reef corals are expanding poleward (Yamano 2011)
- Species are shrinking (Sheridan 2011)
Intermediate rebuttal written by John Cook
Last updated on 24 February 2018 by MichaelK. View Archives
On the comment stream at Alex Knapp's Forbes blog:
Daniel Fisher (Forbes staff): "I am not sure the debate is over whether the climate is warming – obviously it has been getting warmer since the last Ice Age, which was a very short time ago. The question is whether that increase is accelerating in a non-random way, and the acceleration is caused by the measured increase in atmospheric CO2. Does this new method help unravel that?"
Bob Tisdale: "That would be difficult to show for a couple of reasons. First, the hypothesis of manmade global warming is only supported by general circulation models, which are known to be imperfect representations of the Earth’s climate systems. Second, that hypothesis is not supported by NOAA’s satellite-era sea surface temperature data or by NOAA’s ocean heat content data since 1955."
Is Tisdale paid?
I think this answer ought to be updated with the more detailed graphic over here:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=8
59F tomorrow for Buffalo. 15F above the daily average. Should they now think that temperatures have risen >10 times faster than IPCC thinks? Fact is, winter is coming, and it gets cold and snows a lot in Buffalo in the winter almost every year. Sometimes it gets warm again.
Ironically, though, the large amounts of lake effect snow have been linked to the warming of the lake, resulting in more evaporation, convective lift and, therefore, snow than previously seen. It interacted with a large actic air mass, of the sort we've been seeing that last few years. That pattern has also been attributed to global warming, though the jury is still out.
I would like it very much is this type of article, or at least this one in specific, were updated with the latest numbers. In this new age of Trumpism, we need the best ammo available, please.
Dennis, NOAA maintain a "State of Climate". For global view, updated Oct 2016, see https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201610
I like that you devide and explain each indicator clearly. Every evidences are really make sense follow your claim, but I just wondering how can it happen because the weather is become really hot nowadays and seems going to be hotter and hotter? Also ice ages are become smaller than what it was. How can the result be the opposite with the indicators? Is it because of there areb still many factors going on?
Thank you XD
Please note: the basic version of this rebuttal has been updated on November 19, 2023 and now includes an "at a glance“ section at the top. To learn more about these updates and how you can help with evaluating their effectiveness, please check out the accompanying blog post @ https://sks.to/at-a-glance