Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 252 posts

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#11

Post by knowaveragejoe »

flubert wrote: post #7
oolongCat wrote: post #6

I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…

>I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. You can sense a 0.23 degree F average temperature difference? Or maybe you are unhelpfully confusing weather with climate?

Or, he could be observing that there were noticeably more noticeably hotter days last summer.

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#12

Post by Afforess »

flubert wrote: post #7
oolongCat wrote: post #6

I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…

>I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. You can sense a 0.23 degree F average temperature difference? Or maybe you are unhelpfully confusing weather with climate?

As you helpfully state, it is a 0.23F average temperature difference. That could mean the temperature was significantly warmer for a large period of time, then somewhat cooler. Depending on the magnitude, the temperature could have varied widely, but only increased 0.23F, on average.

So it could be incredibly easy to sense.

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#13

Post by mikeash »

flubert wrote: post #7
oolongCat wrote: post #6

I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…

>I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. You can sense a 0.23 degree F average temperature difference? Or maybe you are unhelpfully confusing weather with climate?

0.23F was the global average difference. Different regions experience different deltas, some negative, some much more positive.

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#14

Post by schintan »

ergothus wrote: post #3

Okay - help someone that doesn't truly understand this. Earth's surface can gain heat through 4 ways I can think of (and this is just what I can think of and is likely wrong): 1) Geothermal brings more heat from core/mantle up. I don't think this is currently any larger than normal, nor do I imagine this varies much. 2) Oceans can give up heat they are storing and provide it on the surface. I don't know if El Nino is…

Interesting analysis of the effects of various factors :http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-whats-warming-the-wor...

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#16

Post by Afforess »

ergothus wrote: post #3

Okay - help someone that doesn't truly understand this. Earth's surface can gain heat through 4 ways I can think of (and this is just what I can think of and is likely wrong): 1) Geothermal brings more heat from core/mantle up. I don't think this is currently any larger than normal, nor do I imagine this varies much. 2) Oceans can give up heat they are storing and provide it on the surface. I don't know if El Nino is…

The Earth can only "gain" heat through #3, solar radiation. The other 3 items you list can store and release heat at a later time, but they can not generate more heat than they already possess now. (This is not strictly true, conversion of mass to energy, e=mc^2, means that nuclear and fusion energy could create new heat at the expense of matter, but we generally assume that on planets, this is negligible.)

So if people talk about "El Nino" increasing the temperature for the year, this is only possible because previous "La Nina" cycles decreased the temperature by an equivalent amount in previous years, and the oceans are returning the heat to the atmosphere.

Geothermal energy was stored back during the formation of the planet and there is generally just enough to keep the planet a few degrees above absolute zero. The energy released is highly variable though, volcanoes can release lots on one particular day, but then diminished activity for years follows.

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#18

Post by at-fates-hands »

oolongCat wrote: post #6

I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. Its funny how people you would consider uneducated and poor in my country would understand that there is clearly something going wrong with the world around us, while some people with lots of money, influence and education choose to believe that this is all a conspiracy by a foreign government. It's just nuts, really, something is…

>> It's just nuts, really, something is terribly wrong with our world, and we need to fix it.

You should probably start with developing countries like China and India. The US has been actively reducing its carbon footprint for a while now:

Energy related carbon emissions in the United States declined by 12% between 2005 and 2012, back to a level not seen since 1994.

Per capita emissions fell 17% over the same period, and are now at their lowest level in 50 years.

This decline in emissions occurred across the US economy, with the switch from coal to natural gas in the power sector responsible for just 35-40% of the drop.

http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/us-carbon-emissions-decline

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#19

Post by kevhito »

ergothus wrote: post #3

Okay - help someone that doesn't truly understand this. Earth's surface can gain heat through 4 ways I can think of (and this is just what I can think of and is likely wrong): 1) Geothermal brings more heat from core/mantle up. I don't think this is currently any larger than normal, nor do I imagine this varies much. 2) Oceans can give up heat they are storing and provide it on the surface. I don't know if El Nino is…

The actual quote was: “A lot of times, you actually look at these numbers, when you break a record, you break it by a few hundredths of a degree,"

So it's not clear if only record-setting years have small variation, or whether year-to-year is also very small variation.

Re: 2015 “smashed” 2014’s global temperature record

#20

Post by md224 »

knowaveragejoe wrote: post #11
flubert wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I live in one of those "Record Warmest" boxes, it really was hot during the past year. You can sense a 0.23 degree F average temperature difference? Or maybe you are unhelpfully confusing weather with climate?

Or, he could be observing that there were noticeably more noticeably hotter days last summer.

The problem is extrapolating from local weather to "climate change is real!" or "climate change is a lie!"

We mock idiotic politicians who use snowstorms to "debunk" global warming; we should hold the other side to the same standard.

Post reply on HN