Guest Post: Global Warming

Global Warming from Marine John McClain

Posted with permission

“In 1991, the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in the Philippines created a ‘black out’ which lasted a full year, with more than 40% drop in crop growth, the greatest threat of starvation in decades, and took seven years before Europe's agriculture was back to its normal productive levels, they being behind us with a cooler less agro-friendly climate….. The lead volcanologist investigating the eruption stated as a matter of fact, the eruption produced more "greenhouse gases", from CO2, sulfur dioxide, methane, general toxic gases mixed by 3000 degree plus exposure of magma to atmosphere, not even counting the greatest amount of solid material infused into our atmosphere, than man has produced since he began finding coals, and carrying them from nigh spot to night spot.  There was zero argument on the numbers, and when he factored in the amount of solid debris, the entire existence of man has no equaling impact on earth, except if we would have a nuclear exchange……When Mt. St. Helens blew its side out, the swath of horizontal destruction was something modern man had never witnessed before.  The calculations showed the "bubble" which allowed the major force exit sideways prevented it from surpassing Mt. Pinatubo by 20% or more in vertical launched gases, mass, and reduced its impact on the weather of the following decade by half, while devastating the landscape.  At the same time, it was again brought up, the simple fact this eruption out-produced man since his established use of fire. At the same time, the "Great Smokey Mountains" were brought up, along with the other half a dozen or so burning for an unknown time, exceeding 40,000 years, each of which produces more greenhouse gases than man's entire existence, and these continuing while the other four or five hundred volcano eruptions which have taken place during human history….There is no doubt man has had an impact on climate, but it has been far more in the matter of having from time to time, expanded the amount of agriculture production, which includes water tables and aquifers, and in expanding the agro-industry, we cause cloud formation, new rain patterns, and we've literally turned desert into productive land….. The return of Israel has shown the single greatest change in climate and landscape in "bite-sized consumable fact" of all our activity, and the lesson of 19th century England can easily school us on facts seldom ever openly considered.  The "London Fog" was famous for decades, and grew as the population grew, all the way until the price of coal was beat out by that of gas. The same or similar BTU's continued to be burned, but using natural gas ended the raw carbon, emitted by burning coal inefficiently on a grate with no draft to force complete burn, produced the carbon particles of soot, not a problem with a well-designed system used on large scale….. The fact is, a doubling of CO2 in a century takes it from 30 odd parts per million to forty, and has greater impact on the available CO2 for plant consumption than any other factoring.  At the same time, the claims are made regarding amounts of water vapor emitted, as combustion product, however history has shown this increases cloud cover, and rainfall, and is beneficial in food production, and increase in oxygen production, as only the commercial size agriculture model produces any similar volume of oxygen as the totally forested Americas and Europe did, before Europe was for all intents and purposes, denuded of forest, with regard to significant production of oxygen….. The single factor which has been entirely left out of the debate is the simple fact "change" is the sole factor we can count on as an absolute, it has continued from the expansion of time and space, no part of our universe is in stasis, and we utterly fail to factor in the abject lack of impact man has as a whole on anything at all.  It is suggested that if we managed to have an all-out war and wipe humanity off the earth, even "just close", it would have no notable impact on the earth fifty years later, except there would be little if any noticeable anthropomorphic evidence visible without exploration including denuding areas to see what had been torn apart and demolished by the mere growth of forest…. On the other hand, entomologists suggest if man could eliminate ants from the planet by a wave of the hand, chemicals, magic, any way at all, within months the entire world would be starving, man, animal, plants, everything outside of the ocean, as ants are the greatest factor in nitrogen intake for plants, they are a major factor in every aspect of nutrient exchange in the soil, and have an enormous impact in the "symbiotic relationships" between species such as the conifers, which produce an acidic soil condition, which is the natural need for hardwoods such as oak, maple, cherry, walnut, and this is one of the most common factors the ants exploit to "farm" at micro levels, creating a symbiotic relationship with other species as well, and their individual interaction with the plants….We have a greatly inflated picture of ourselves, and it is primarily because we are almost exclusive in our ability to look at ourselves and make some sense, logic, out of what we see, and act on it.  I've been studying this issue since the mid-sixties, when "global cooling", harbinger by the fact we went to Iceland to rescue two B-17's which had emergency landed there toward the end of the war, and two decades later, they were under fifty feet of ice, and an enormous effort was made to repair one and fly it out, while shipping the second home, and being fully successful.  We were entering a dramatic temperature change, some two degrees C down at the time, and was later accounted for by an understanding of the sun, the fact its surface is solid, and it has a "17 and a quarter year" day. Prior to this investigation, it was assumed the sun's surface was essentially equal in energy output in all directions, and subsequently, we've found there is a substantial difference in radiation from the differing face of the sun, and a major cyclic factor in climate, weather, and a host of other less easily seen factors….. I have only one final question for "climate debate" and it is this: if we are responsible for climate change to any significant degree, and we do make the planet uninhabitable for people, who seem to be among the most vulnerable to nature, and we wipe out mankind, who will be here to count, and to care?... In two centuries, we've consumed more coal, oil and wood in burning, than in all our years as a species, and the sum total doesn't measure up to the volume emitted by one "lit on fire by lightning" coal seam of the many burning around the world, and at the same time, we've recorded hundreds of volcanic eruptions, each of which equals the output of one such fire for a year, in its single eruption.  We are not even within an exponent of being significant in the actual science of climate, according to the facts present, and yet almost never even considered, much less "put on the table"….. Since 1971, I've not seen any actual accounting for any of these constants in any debate, scientific, political, public, government, they are only ever spoken of when the event commands attention, and even then, every effort is made to avoid putting in print, the facts put in public by the actual scientists actively evaluating and enumerating the sum total of what took place.  Climate change, as seen in the sixties, was uncomfortable to act on, deal with politically, and had the attention of the whole world, as we looked to see glaciers actually moving half a mile south in five years, and had "climate estimates" suggesting a coming century of cooling….. The discovery that vast expansion of north pole ice, the vast shift of ice mass from south pole to north was responsible, and a cyclic recurring element broke the climate of fear, and gave way to a new climate among politics, as it was seen as the means of increasing the impact of "popular politics", "the sole purpose of which is to keep the public alarmed at imaginary hobgoblins, and demanding to be saved from them by government", as H.L. Menken so well stated…. Today, we have the least "polar ice" since last record, in the 1420's, we have infomercials of pathetic polar bears, but totally ignored is the fact the mass of polar ice is at its greatest in decades, but "you can't count the south pole, because polar bears don't live there" I guess. The Chinese sailed a fleet of ships, "1000 miles north of north" in the 1420's, sailing all the way down our east coast, landing dozens of places, and with a Chinese admiral sailing upriver to retire at the headwaters at the foot of the Smokey's where artifacts of he and his chosen remain at "the Biltmore estates"…. We have only just acknowledged as a fact, we've got an active nuclear core in our own planet, and it isn't cooling, but remaining relatively even, as the forces driving it have been established over millions of years, as our planet "coalesced", and we are rank fools to imagine our tiny fires on the surface of the earth hold a candle to the enormous heat of everything more than ten miles down.  It is slightly possible man has a notable impact on climate, but to even get to such a state as being able to note it and take a crack at calculating it, we'd have to put the real science on the table, and throw out every single person who spoke one word that wasn't fully backed by evidence, and willing to be dissected to minutia.  The single most important factor of climate is what we allow politicians to do with claims unsupported, to alter our rights, and our livelihoods, when we have eight millennia of history of the value of the word of a political animal.”