Global warming: More, bigger waves coming!

We are unreflective scholars of the divine!

You well know that our earth’s atmosphere is toasting up due an over-abundance of carbon emissions etc. and do you feel bad, resolute or resigned? I’m somewhere between resigned and indifferent. It is a bummer that we humans are such… consumers but it bothers me at an aesthetic level more than a ecological one. Like people who buy delightfully small homes in moderate climates then tear them down and build monstrosities.

Very gauche.

But at least as far as our surfing is concerned global warming holds promise or so declares The New York Times. In a review of four “ocean lifestyle” books the promise is clear. Future storms will be more severe and create more waves. And let’s read one review together?

But “debate rages,” the oceanographer Eelco J. Rohling writes in THE OCEANS: A Deep History (Princeton University, $29.95), “over whether we will see a stormier atmosphere in general, or perhaps fewer but bigger storms.”

But “debate rages,” the oceanographer Eelco J. Rohling writes in THE OCEANS: A Deep History (Princeton University, $29.95), “over whether we will see a stormier atmosphere in general, or perhaps fewer but bigger storms.”Paleoceanography, Rohling’s area of expertise, is the study of ancient oceans and ancient climates as they changed and developed together over geologic time. It involves analyzing data like layers of sediment taken from the seabed. Much alarming information can be learned this way, as Rohling demonstrates, about how today’s oceans are likely to respond to climate change — with greater acidification, sea-level rise, mass extinction and so forth. But because storms leave no geological record, the precise effect of global warming on hurricanes is harder to gauge.

Still, Rohling is confident that the combination of rising sea levels and some form of increased storm intensity “spells doom” for the world’s coastal regions. For surfers, rooting for hurricane swell may be increasingly difficult to rationalize.

Not difficult for me to rationalize. I’m a surfer! And so are you.

The same piece poetically declares.

In September, Hurricanes Irma and Maria posed this question with some vividness, producing the best run of swell seen in years along the East Coast while unleashing chaos and devastation down in the Caribbean. Surfers, to judge from the throngs who gleefully paddled out from Florida to New England, make for unreflective scholars of the divine.

Amen.

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Otto
Otto
8 years ago

I understand that. Do you havr math proving what it did and how it did it in the time it did relative to the volume of water it did it to.
What it did = increase in ocean temp (in °C)
How it did = temperature necessary
Time it did = time
Volume of water = whatever that is. I’m sure scientists have some number

Nick Carroll
Nick Carroll
8 years ago
Reply to  Otto

There’s a simpler way of clearing this up for you Otto. In the pot boiling scenario, the water heats from the pot base and circulates upward. In the oceans, sea surface temperatures are in general much much higher than deep ocean temperatures. This is because in general, heat is transferred into the oceans from the atmosphere. If the current global warming phase was being triggered by deep ocean warming via an increase in the Earth’s core temperature, you’d expect something of the opposite to be occurring. Along with a fucken Apocalypse of craziness via massively accelerated ocean currents, a serious increase in volcanic activity, earthquakes and god knows what the hell else.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago

Explain to me how the volume of water (which should be quantifiable) increased in temperature as much as it did during the time the atmospheric temp has been 15° C. I am specifically asking only about the ocean temp.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago

When you want to heat a pot of water and bring it to a boil, you do so by placing on top of a heat source (stove top, open fire). It’s the most efficient is it not? Now people that advocate global warming would argue that the increase in global sea temp is attributed to a warmer atmosphere caused by greenhouse gases. How long ago did that start? What is the estimated volume of oceanic water the world over? Would the atmosphere be scientifically able to do that. Or are the oceans sitting on a stove top with a burner that got turned up?

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago

It’s still just a theory, regardless of how much consensus there may be on it.
In there short term there is a little warming in some areas of the globe when compared to short-term baseline data. There is always climate change and what people don’t realize is we are still in an Ice Age here on Earth, albeit in the midst of a warm interglacial episode.
The background state of the planet is, and has been for a long time, Ice Age. Be thankful it’s warm now and not bitterly, miserably cold as it often is for tens of thousands of years at a time.

ricmatic
ricmatic
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

Any other theories you have an issue with? Evolution? Relativity? Gravity? Those poor 11,600 misguided fools huh?

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  ricmatic

Yeah, I do think they are misguided if they think you can accurately predict a incredibly complex system with horribly incomplete data. Especially when that incredibly complex system is not anywhere close to being understood in the first place.
They can hardly even predict the weather three days out.

ricmatic
ricmatic
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

The scientists are pointing out a problem. You’re claiming it doesn’t exist. Hope you’re right but you’re probably not.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  ricmatic

I think we’re both right. The end result of global warming will be another ice age eventually. I just think humans are arrogant to try and define generational blips in the incredibly vast scale of planetary mechanics.

Nick Carroll
Nick Carroll
8 years ago

Of all the insults the NYT has directed toward us, this surely is the worst. Scholars! Fuck off!!

SoCalGary
SoCalGary
8 years ago

I hate how these “scholars” and scientists use vague fuckery like “some form of increased storm intensity” to spread their gloom and doom. On the west coast, and California specifically, we all saw how global warming caused such a huge impact on storms this year. It sucked ass for 98% of the winter.

Eddie Haiku
Eddie Haiku
8 years ago

What Rohling neglects to address, is the impact of global warming on Sharks, Lairds and Kellys. By failing to address these deeply polarising topics, the author relegates this “manifesto of the deep” into the same discount bin as the graphic novel of, Dude, Where’s My Car? and the recently released, Can Craft Beer Save The Falling Surf Star?

20 mule team
20 mule team
8 years ago
Reply to  Eddie Haiku

Laird will deem the sharks “super food” and devour them all within a year. Kelly will be passive aggressive about it on Instagram. The world will rejoice.

Lemon Next to the Pie
Lemon Next to the Pie
8 years ago
Reply to  Eddie Haiku

Listen dude, we cant be “unreflective scholars of the divine” while contemplating the “manifesto of the deep” without entering into cognitive dissonance damaging our fragile psyches.

Eddie Haiku
Eddie Haiku
8 years ago

Yes, but “..there is always soma, delicious soma, half a gramme for a half-holiday, a gramme for a week-end, two grammes for a trip to the gorgeous East, three for a dark eternity on the moon…” …

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago

For a variety of reasons I think runaway global warming is total bs.
The climate has always changed and always will. Everything else is just weather.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

I would not be surprised to find evidence that the earth is heating from the inside out. Meaning more molten magma closer to Earth’s crust, therefore radiating more heat through fissures in the Earth’s crust and into the oceans the world over (which accounts for over 70%). More magma would lead to increase in plate tectonic activity, i.e. earthquakes, volcanoes etc. Heat radiation through the earth’s crust and into the oceans would increase sea temps leading to more evaporation at higher temps resulting in higher atmospheric temps. I’m sure at that point carbon emissions may have an appreciable effect but not totally convinced.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  Otto

I dunno about that one. The crust is generally far too thick to radiate any heat from within. Volcanoes cool the planet with the same gasses that supposedly heat the planet when released by humans. Haven’t quite been able to figure that one out.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

Have you figured out the one about greenhouse gases or heard how humans have been responsible for releasing tons of these gases into the atmosphere – or are you just easily persuaded by the misinformation from fossil fuel industries who have a clear profit motive to trick people?

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

Lol. The earth can handle CO2, in fact, it is absolutely crucial for all life on the planet. There are systems that mitigate CO2, it is not a pollutant.
What the earth can’t handle is the actual pollution – industrial chemicals, inorganic solvents, dioxins etc etc.
CO2 is not an issue. Industrial pollution and environmental destruction are.
If we all worried more about our chemical dependance rather than CO2 output we might start getting somewhere.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

Those of us with a brain can worry about both. Those like you without a brain who can only worry about 1 thing at a time can shut the fuck up.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

Great rebuttal.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

How the hell do you make it through each and every day lashing out at people that have opinions different than yours? You must be miserable.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Otto

Some people go to school for a very long time in order to obtain a license allowing them to be paid to lash out at people who have opinions different than their own – and not all of these people are miserable. Also note that if there were not people who lashed out at those with different opinions, we’d still have aerosol cans, asbestos and lead in our homes, slavery, and segregation.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

What trade school offers the shut the fuck up license you carry?

Don’t underestimate the educational attainments of commenters here pal. I got a sneaky suspicion this board is populated with an impressive array of academics. Don’t think you are the only one. That’s what makes your conduct deplorable.

Nick Carroll
Nick Carroll
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

what about Hitler, surely you should now be invoking Hitler.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Nick Carroll

I was invoking Gandhi who, like me, obtained a license allowing one to be paid to argue with others with whom they don’t agree. Hitler was a failed artist.

Captain Clark
Captain Clark
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

You should ask for your money back.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

You are so foolish to be afraid of addressing co2 at the expense of addressing other air pollution when clearly the Paris Climate accord and alleviating the health risk from pollution go hand-in-hand.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

Like I said before, it’s not the CO2 – its the other industrial pollutants that are the problem. Earth can deal with CO2. It has systems that deal with CO2.
Earth can’t deal with all the dioxins and heavy metals in the rivers. All the fracking in the water table etc etc etc.
It’s the environmental destruction that is the issue here. CO2 is trivial as it is such a crucial molecule for life to exist and there are vast planetary systems that deal with the CO2 cycle, it will balance itself out eventually.
You do realize that around 12,000 years ago the sea-level rose almost 700 feet in a little over a human lifetime right? There were no industrial revolutions going on back then were there?
Earth does what she wants and if it kills a few billion humans so be it! It’s out of our control.

Nick Carroll
Nick Carroll
8 years ago
Reply to  Otto

Umm that’s why oceans exist Otto. The heat inside the planet drove the water to the god damn surface. Christ we are such unreflective scholars of the divine.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago
Reply to  Nick Carroll

Yes. I just think that process, minus the water, has not stopped.

Weslley’s Secret Life - Wozzle
Weslley’s Secret Life - Wozzle
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

Sure, let’s all deny the science.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago

Theory. Deny the theory.

Audit In Progress
Audit In Progress
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

I don’t think you understand the scientific term “theory.” Gravity is also a theory, and it doesn’t exist any less because of that.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago

I totally understand and using the gravity comparison isn’t a very good one, as it’s not a question of proving whether the force exists, its proving what that force actually is. I tend to lean toward it being electromagnetism of some kind.

SoCalGary
SoCalGary
8 years ago

yeah, totally, the phrase “some form of increased storm intensity” is very, very scientific.

SoCalGary
SoCalGary
8 years ago

The human impact on the Earth is screwed up in many ways, but going from “Global Warming” to “Global Climate Change” to the latest from our “favorite” California Governor Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown stating that “Climate Disruption” will be so bad that three BILLION people will die from lethal “heat events.” Jumping around on terminology to fits ones theory does not create confidence in the cause.

Seas Nail
Seas Nail
8 years ago
Reply to  SoCalGary

https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Don’t forget that up until the late 80’s it was ‘global cooling’ and we were to prepare for the next ice age! We don’t know shit about what actually drives long-term climate change.

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

We used to think the earth was flat so let’s disregard our better informed judgment that the earth is round because of our stupidity in the past? That’s the rule you want to live by?

Moreton Bay Porridge
Moreton Bay Porridge
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

anyone here 2000 years old?

Manuka
Manuka
8 years ago
Reply to  Seas Nail

All I know is that climate change is an industry caching above the trillion.
Let milk that golden cow!!!

channelbottom
channelbottom
8 years ago
Reply to  Manuka

Yeah, cuz I’m always seeing dem Scientists rolling around with their bling.

Moreton Bay Porridge
Moreton Bay Porridge
8 years ago
Reply to  Manuka

…marketing?

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago

The predicted big waves from the bigger storms will all be swamped out by the constant high tide caused by the ocean level rise. Life will find a way to never be as we want.

PacificNorthPest
PacificNorthPest
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

I dunno Krypto, maybe the car park at your local break has the bathymetry of Pipeline if there was just 10 more feet of sea level!

SoCalGary
SoCalGary
8 years ago
Reply to  Krypto Jackson

So, once we have an actual measurable ocean level rise, the tides will, and as you state, cease to change from high to low and will only have “a constant high tide”?. WOW, that is way more than simple climate change, disruption, cooling/warming, whatever. That is an entire change to the structure and function of our entire universe. They moon will stop its orbit and the earth will no longer orbit the sun…. Cats and dogs living together… etc…

Krypto Jackson
Krypto Jackson
8 years ago
Reply to  SoCalGary

To be more precise, in the future we will have a higher low tide equating to our current high tide which in San Diego swamps out the surf, and then an even higher and swampier high tide where the waves will break even less frequently and perhaps directly onto sea walls, buildings, or cliffs in front of the ocean.

Karl Von Fanningstadt
Karl Von Fanningstadt
8 years ago

Unrelated to the article, but are you still rockin’ the Hitler ‘stache? If not, I think you should go full Johnny Ringo, getup and all… https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
… on second thought, you probably couldn’t pull it off. Soz, man.

ricmatic
ricmatic
8 years ago

In the top three westerns of all time.

Chas Smith
Chas Smith
8 years ago

I’m still rocking! And you are so right about the beauty of Johnny Ringo. Why couldn’t I pull? Not beautiful enough? Not crazy enough? Blonde? Other?

Karl Von Fanningstadt
Karl Von Fanningstadt
8 years ago
Reply to  Chas Smith

Some combination of those (no offense). Plus, I doubt your commitment to the sloped crown rodeo hat.

tony
tony
8 years ago
Reply to  Chas Smith

you’re a daisy if you do


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