[FRIAM] More questions on climate change

[David Breecker]

I can only offer this anecdote in response:  at a presenation by  
LANL's Rajan Gupta on the consequences of warming, he was asked:  
"What happens if the permafrost starts to melt?"

His highly technical and scientific reply:  "We're screwed."
db


On Aug 13, 2007, at 4:24 PM, Robert Cordingley wrote:

> Since there's been a fair amount of climate change discussion here...
>
> Does anyone know of, or has anyone seen reports on the rate of CO2  
> release that _results_ from global warming, as tundra melt and  
> decomposes, as sea waters warm and are able to dissolve less gases,  
> etc.?  How does that rate compare with anthropogenic atmospheric  
> CO2?  Is it possible the CO2 levels might be intrinsically unstable  
> until we reach some new higher plateau?  I think Al Gore's  
> presentation refers to a possible threshold (of no return) - same  
> thing.
>
> There was an interesting NOVA Science Now on PBS (http:// 
> www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/3318/01.html) that described a  
> theory/hypothesis of the cause of the Permian mass extinction 250  
> million years ago and linked it to volcanism/CO2/warming and  
> anaerobic seas that generated large quantities of the toxic H2S  
> (there is an anaerobic lake in central NY state, as an example).   
> It didn't say how the seas returned to their aerobic state and the  
> website says it's a puzzle requiring more research.  Lee Kump had a  
> computer model of the extinction that included the life forms of  
> the time to explain how it all came about.
>
> If anyone has references to readings on either of these subjects  
> I'd be grateful.
>
> Thanks,
> Robert C.
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

dba | David Breecker Associates, Inc.
Santa Fe: 505-690-2335
Abiquiu:   505-685-4891
www.BreeckerAssociates.com



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20070813/812d24db/attachment.html