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Re: population growth & physics ed



Leigh Palmer says:

Leigh Palmer says:
...
It should always be pointed out that the rise in carbon dioxide levels
over the years of monitoring has been very much larger than the rise in
temperature over the same period.
...

Relative to what? ... I don't know how to interpret this statement.

Relative to the initial temperature and concentartion at the beginning of
the monitoring period. Sorry, I thought that would be clear from context.
The (relative) increase in temperature is only about 0.02%, and the CO2
concentration has increased by about 14% since 1958 (see, for example,
http://www.science.uwaterloo.ca/earth/waton/mauna.html).


Argh! Someday I'll learn to write clear email messages. You are correct
that what you say above was clear from context. What I *meant* to ask
was...

What conclusion can be drawn from the relative increases in temperature and
CO2? One implication might be that, because the relative CO2 rise is much
larger, therefore the CO2 is not likely to be the cause of the temperature
rise.
But, of course, that logic is faulty. Even if the relationship were as
simple as T = T_0 + k *(CO2 conc), proper choices of T_0 and k could mean
that the temperature rise is *entirely* due to the CO2, regardless of what
the relative increases are.

The relative increases are an interesting fact, but in the absence of other
information, I don't see how that fact contributes to thinking critically
about global warming. I therefore wasn't clear why you felt it "should
always be pointed out".

--
--James McLean
jmclean@chem.ucsd.edu
post doc
UCSD

P.S. interesting that the CO2 concentration shown in the http site you
mention shows an annual cycle. Does anyone know why this is? Possibly
aphelion and perihelion?