1 hour ago, donsutherland1 said:

You objected to my description of "wildfire-swept France" with a map that was largely irrelevant to the issue at hand. The 2026 wildfire season has been very severe in France and also a bad one in the European Union.  

My providing information about France and the European Union to address the flaws in the chart that was used to object to my point about France does not argue that climate-change effects stop at the EU or that they exclude Russia. The posted chart was not appropriate for judging the severity of the fire season in France. 

More data are not automatically better if that additional data is irrelevant to the question at hand. Excluding the irrelevant data that had nothing to do with France wasn't "cherry picking." Including irrelevant data to dismiss the narrowly focused point concerning France creates a misleading picture.

Look at the context here though - the climate change discussion thread.

If this were a "weather events" thread - I would agree that there's no implication of a tie-in between the big France wildfire spike, and I wouldn't have made my point about having to look at the bigger picture.   

But since this is in fact a climate change discussion thread, and since there are lots of assertions out there that CC causes increase in wildfire activity - it seems reasonable that there's an assertion of implied tie-in with that set of stats that was posted; vis a vis France's big spike in wildfires being due to CC.   My point then of course being that no - it's not due to CC (the context of the thread), it's due to a localized weather event (and possibly other factors such as bad fire control management).

How about we look at *all* areas:

Africa:

Americas:

Asia:

Europe:

Oceania:

15 hours ago, donsutherland1 said:

Several things:

1) Your posted chart includes Russia. It has been an above average fire season in the European Union so far. As per Copernicus:

2) France is having its worst fire season (Copernicus) in some two decades:

3) Climate change has contributed through its impact on heat/drought, which increased the vapor pressure deficit (dried the vegetation). The impact of climate change--how much more likely, how much worse, etc.--the fires would have been has not yet been assessed in the attribution studies. It's had a contribution. The extent of the contribution remains to be determined.

4) Climate change is expected to lead to an increase in extreme wildfires.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41612-024-00575-8

 

So you're saying CC's effect are somehow limited to the EU, and do not include Russia?

Sorry - that's still cherry picking data.    

The more data you include, the better picture you get.   Stop excluding data that doesn't fit your narrative.

(Also Nature isn't exactly an unbiased reliable source.   Also - "is expected to"?   Since CC is already here - if it results in wildfire growth - shouldn't this already be happening?   Why would this need to be a prediction, rather than an observation?)

1 hour ago, GaWx said:

But wildfire stats, depending on what you examine, don’t necessarily show that wildfires have increased over the decades and in some cases have shown marked decreases. Some of that is likely due to better firefighting resources.

Indeed - not an expert on the subject but that's almost certainly the case.  Not just better firefighting equipment so much, but better detection and tracking methods (primarily satellite).   Of note is that, in the US at least, there are essentially no more manned fire towers - they're all just obsolete and for tourists these days.

That plus there are more people living in areas that used to be remote, thus it's less likely that given fire will grow to unmanageable size before it gets noticed.

To the subject at hand though - in general it's completely invalid to point to localized (time or region) flare-ups of wildfire activity and blame them on climate change, since the overall trend is downward.   MMGW deniers will point to this and assume / assert that the data cherry-picking is done for all data.   As such - my advice to anyone trying to use data to prove MMGW - don't use wildfire data, because it's not a valid indicator.

Re: "Wildfire swept" - I hope people don't think that's due to CC.   Because if so - look what Europe as a whole shows:

It's an extremely low wildfire year across Europe as a whole.

https://gwis.jrc.ec.europa.eu/apps/gwis.statistics/seasonaltrend

10 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Current State of Sea Ice Cover | Earth

OK thanks.

I see the description of the two: "Sea ice extent is the integral sum of the areas of all grid cells with at least 15% ice concentration, while sea ice area is the integral sum of the product of ice concentration and area of all grid cells with at least 15% ice concentration."

I *think* I get the distinction but not sure.   Is it the case that "extent" include 100% of every grid cell, for cells with > 15% concentration; whereas "area" includes only the area of ice itself within all those cells?

(thus why extent is larger than area)

(I had been using the NSIDC page which only shows extent - https://nsidc.org/sea-ice-today/sea-ice-tools/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph)

2 hours ago, TheClimateChanger said:

I was just pointing out that there are two different metrics commonly reported - actual area and extent (areal coverage of 15% or greater). Both values are reported.

Guess I haven't seen the other - the actual area thing.  Got a link?

I'm wondering how they would define that.   Presumably the 15% thing is because there's no well-defined line of the "edge of the ice" eventually the ice starts just breaking up into a bunch of floating icebergs, that extend out for hundreds or even thousands of miles (all the way down to Bermuda even sometimes); how would one measure the "area" of such a thing, especially on a daily basis?   Would they just sum up the total of the surface area of all icebergs?  (including "the big one in the middle")   That seems like an impossible task.

On 7/2/2026 at 1:50 PM, TheClimateChanger said:

Also note sea ice extent (coverage of 15% or greater) versus area.

Not sure what you mean.  There is no "versus".   It is area - that's what km^2 is.   The extent is the measure of the area - i.e. over how much area the ice extends, with coverage of 15% or greater.

Perhaps I'm missing something?

5 hours ago, GaWx said:

 
 Although US heat related deaths are rising and should continue to rise from GW, it’s true that far more people have died from cold than from heat (>10:1) and thus GW should in theory result in a net of fewer cold/heat related deaths there for a good while into the future. And this isn’t even taking into account any increases in food supply attributed to longer growing seasons and increased CO2 fertilization effect. So, CC clearly has some benefits regardless of the often emphasized harms that include rising sea levels, increased extreme flooding incidences, and more powerful tropical cyclone peaks/heavier rainfall from warmer temps holding more moisture and slower moving (on avg) TCs:

Heat- and Cold-Related Mortality Burden in the US From 2000 to 2020

The Yale University Institutional Review Board approved this case series

Findings  This case series of 54 223 429 deceased individuals found that both low and high temperatures were significantly associated with mortality burden, with low temperatures associated with more mean annual deaths (45 992) than high temperatures (3414). However, the burden from high temperatures increased by 53% from the 2000-2009 to 2010-2020 study periods.

 The annual mortality count attributable to low temperatures increased by 7% between the 2000-2009 and 2010-2020 study periods, from 44 278 to 47 551 annual deaths. However, the annual mortality count attributable to high temperatures increased by 53%, from 2670 to 4091 annual deaths.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2841063

One thing of note is that data doesn't take into account demographics.   Specifically:

 - The rate of change is not population-adjusted

 - It does not account for age

As our population ages (boomer bubble) the rate of deaths from both heat and cold, all other things being equal, are going to rise, since older people are more susceptible:

https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/out-cold-most-common-wintertime-injuries-warming-world

It's also very much a measurement problem.   Whether or not someone has died as a cold-driven or heat-driven factor is very subjective.   E.g. that same data shows a far lower number - and decreasing not increasing - for worldwide cold-related deaths:

35 minutes ago, Brewbeer said:

nice touch, but there are numerous and varied factors hat influence food production; specific evidence is required to conclude they are directly related 

 

Related how?   The data presented shows they very much are related, in time.

I didn't intend to address/imply a *causal* relationship - that increased CO2 / global warming actually causes increased food supplies.   While there is probably some driver there (e.g. myriads of data shows that higher levels of CO2 generally results in more plant growth, and warmer temperatures could open up new areas to agriculture that were previously too cold) - the main driver has been simply higher levels of production - more yield per acre.   As you say this is due to a myriad of factors including hybridization etc.    One big factor certainly has been mechanization - the development and more ubiquitous use of more efficient harvesting and processing tools (combines etc.), more efficient transportation (trucks, trains, ships, etc.) - things that rely on fossil fuels.

The main point of the data presented is to disprove the notion that climate change will not be causing "food shortages" - i.e. making food production trend downward relative to population.   There is zero evidence of that, as the data makes clear.

2 hours ago, Brewbeer said:

more people die from cold exposure per year than heat exposure, there isn't much to disagree about with that 

what we aren't going to agree on is that AGW is going to result in a neutral or net reduction in deaths, perhaps from believing that fewer people dying from cold exposure will more than make up for the greater number of people dying from heat related deaths ?

And this isn’t even taking into account any decreases in food supply attributed to changes in the locations of arable land and longer / more severe droughts disrupting water supplies.

 

 

As the planet's been warming food supplies have been going up.   Way up.

https://ourworldindata.org/data-insights/food-supplies-have-grown-even-faster-than-the-population-on-every-continent

Try again.

*Please* don't be so brainwashed by the scaremongers.   Look at the data behind the claims.   It simply does not support the claims of some growing apocalypse.

17 hours ago, Brewbeer said:

agree if we are referencing folks in the USA who have financial resources and air conditioning; elsewhere across the world?  too bad, so sad

Part of the means of having the resources to have AC is access to abundant inexpensive energy.   In less-wealthy countries that means one thing - fossil fuels.   

Deaths from heat are often caused by excessive strain from physical activity.   Activity that can be relieved by machines that are powered by fossil fuels.

But that aside - let me reiterate that more people die of cold than from heat each year.  You seem to be willfully ignoring that fact.

Holy moley - this thread is starting to get quite extremist, I have to say.

You folks do realize that a lot more people die of *cold* each year, than die of *heat* - right?   I don't think you really want to go where you're going.  

Let's be pragmatic here.   MMGW, while certainly an issue, is not a practical threat to human life, in any way, shape or form.   People are going to die from extreme heat waves - just as they have since the beginning of time.   As the planet warms *less* people will die (and have been dying) due to weather events, not more.

1 hour ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Ah yes, the famous 1919 heat wave where Orlando had 2 weeks more 90F days than anywhere else. The same year where Pensacola registered 4 days at or above 90F, Miami recorded 6 - yes 6, and Key West a paltry 21. These numbers are unthinkable today. Did you ever stop to think that perhaps century-old local observations, with questionable exposure, rooftop siting, nonstandard instruments, observer changes, missing data, and who knows what else, should not be treated as sacred, apples-to-apples climate records? Or do you just repeat the one raw number that flatters your narrative while ignoring the rest of the statewide data screaming that something may be off?

Orlando is the only one of those cities that's inland, and thus is by its nature hotter than almost every other Florida city.  Florida had almost no inland population then; so best comparison would be to some cities in Georgia.   (there wasn't a single city in FL off the coast - including Orlando - that was over 10k population)

(I used to live in FL, and noticed how the coast of FL rarely got into the 90's compared with inland; they got less 90+ degree days in fact than central NC where I had come from)

On 6/11/2026 at 3:00 PM, LongBeachSurfFreak said:

Exactly what predictions are failing, other then nonsense from Al Gore?


.

Google is your friend.

https://www.agweb.com/opinion/doomsday-addiction-celebrating-50-years-failed-climate-predictions

https://bradleyhook.com/why-extreme-climate-change-predictions-failed-what-we-can-do-now/

https://reason.com/2025/04/16/3-apocalyptic-climate-change-predictions-that-failed-to-come-true/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/11/25/why-everything-they-say-about-climate-change-is-wrong/

(does include some Al Gore stuff)

etc. etc.   Just search on "climate change failed predictions"

On 5/16/2026 at 2:17 AM, Silver Meteor said:

Some good replies on this one (especially the one about banks):

https://x.com/mazemoore/status/2055376238345076837

Wow.

But... he's a climate scientist with over 55 peer-reviewed publications!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_McPherson

Al Gore on steroids

On 5/11/2026 at 12:45 PM, TheClimateChanger said:

What are you talking about? Nobody is "having a discussion with AI"... I use it for assistance in creating an engaging headline, that's all. As Don pointed out, there is, in fact, evidence that it is better at that than a human. And I can say from my personal analytics, that this is certainly the case.

You said "I don't have time to write my own posts."    That sounds to me like the whole post, not just the headline.

Wait - so we're basically having discussion with AI, with TCC as a proxy?

No thanks.

Can we perhaps start a separate "No AI" thread?

22 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

https://www.weather.gov/buf/LakeTemp

OK thanks - that's the raw data at least.  Don't want to provide a link to a larger more readable version of your analysis?

13 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

NWS Buffalo.

Can you be more specific?    There's a ton of stuff on their site, and I'm not finding that.

https://www.weather.gov/buf/

There's a Rivers and Lakes page, but generally that just seems to have gauge data for water levels and flows - not seeing anything with regards to temperatures, including those charts.

On 5/2/2026 at 4:53 PM, TheClimateChanger said:

 

Any chance you could post a link to the data and/or a full-size pic of that?    Pretty hard to read as is.

On 4/29/2026 at 8:04 PM, TheClimateChanger said:

 

That sounds logical, but it’s not how the real Earth behaves.

A true global average does have a seasonal cycle, and it’s not a sampling problem—it’s physics.

The key issue is that the hemispheres aren’t equal. The Northern Hemisphere has a lot more land, and land heats and cools much faster than oceans. The Southern Hemisphere is mostly ocean, which responds slowly and dampens temperature swings. So when the Northern Hemisphere warms in summer, it pushes the global average up more strongly than the Southern Hemisphere can offset during its winter. The result is a real, global annual oscillation.

If both hemispheres were identical (same land/ocean mix, same heat capacity), then yes—your cancellation idea would work. But they’re not, so it doesn’t.

Also, every independent global dataset—NASA GISS, NOAA, HadCRUT—shows the same seasonal wiggle. That wouldn’t happen if it were just “Iowa with a fancy name.”

So the graph is doing two things at once:

• The up-and-down is the seasonal cycle (dominated by Northern Hemisphere land)
• The overall rise is the long-term warming trend

Seeing both together is exactly what you’d expect from a properly constructed global temperature record.

OK fair enough.  I see there are factors that result in differences between the hemispheres, though 3 degrees C (about what's shown on that chart) just seems like a bigger range than one would expect as variation.

It doesn't seem like the physics would be such that land-vs-water heating rates would be a factor - it should even out should it not?   Yes the land heats faster than water, but it also cools faster at night.   I could be wrong but I wouldn't think that the cause of heating faster during the day is due to higher level of actual heat absorption, but rather due to the higher level of thermal conductivity of the oceans (they absorb just as much heat - it just spreads out mostly across the depth vs remaining on the surface)

Biggest factor though would probably be Antarctica reflecting the energy from the sun back to space.

I see another factor is currents; one would think that factor would be minimal, as most currents don't cross the equator; though I know it's complex and there is some crossing.

4 hours ago, TheClimateChanger said:

Well, it’s clear that there’s a long-term warming trend on top of oscillations like El Niño–Southern Oscillation—and it’s especially noticeable over the past decade. ENSO explains short-term variability, not the rising baseline.

Yes I know.   I was talking about the annual seasonal fluctuations.

E.g. if you set up a series of sensors in Iowa and monitored them for 86 years you could show the same type of data, with the same chart showing the seasonal variability as well as a general yearly upward trend.   My point is that you wouldn't call that "global air surface temperature", because you're not measuring the whole globe with evenly-spread sensors - you're just measuring Iowa; and that explains why it goes up and down with the seasons - because all of your sensors are in the northern hemisphere.

If instead the data was actually the whole global temperature - you shouldn't see the seasonal up-and-down like that, because the temperature rise in the southern hemisphere in the winter should match the temperature rise in the northern hemisphere in the summer - because that's the way the seasons work on earth.

39 minutes ago, TheClimateChanger said:

I don't know. Recent heating seems to be overpowering any natural variability/oscillations. Obviously, not every year is warmer than the previous, but the change seems to be more pronounced over the past several years - and I would expect that trend to continue at least through next year with the likely strong El Nino. 

 

No offense but - seems like you ought to know such things if you're posting so much on the subject.   It's hard not to be skeptical of the data you post otherwise.

If it's just a general global singular heating trend - shouldn't we just cross 16C once or twice and be done with it, forever more above that level?   (Aside from ENSO, which would cause us to cross that level a couple of times during the transition)

On 4/24/2026 at 10:49 PM, TheClimateChanger said:

 

Hmm - this implies annual oscillation of the Earth's temperature, does it not?   I didn't think that was a thing.   I know there are oscillations, but they tend to be correlated with ENSO cycles and such, do they not?

IOW - seems to me this is just a subset of global mean temperature - e.g. the northern hemisphere only, is it not?