From: "roger" <diogenes.jones-AT-attbi.com> Subject: Re: Gulf Stream Date: Sat, 22 Feb 2003 06:17:54 -0800 hi jack and dave, this a fascinating subject. two profs at the univ of washington have started a whole field (trying to anyway) called 'astro-biology' that deals with the interaction of organic and non-organic systems. their latest book is called 'the life and death of planet earth' (i'll give away the ending: the sun blows up and we all die). i'll send the citation later today, but i saw them lecture the other week (did you catch it, josh?) and they rock. their concerns deal with the carbon cycle as a whole, and i can't recall if it discusses the possible shut-off of the gulf stream, but there is a fabulous discussion of Snowball earth vis-a-vis Hothosue earth. the cyclical ice age patterns and so forth. if i recall, the thrust of the argument is that earth is essentially 'middle-aged' and is currently relatively hospitable to multi-cellular critters like us; but most of the early history of life was microbial, and they claim it won't be too long until that condition prevails again. there's only so much carbon to recycle through the engine of plate tectonics and vulcanism. in other words, the carbon cycle we're familiar with (plants put it into the atmosphere and animals take it out) has a corollary in geological terms where tectonic subduction zones and volcanoes also cycle carbon into and out of the crust/upper mantel. there's only so much to play with and then it's back to low-energy, microbial life. interesting book, though i'll have to dig it out see if i recall right. the whole gulf stream issue is a great example of how counter-intuitive this all is: in the long run, we should burn as much fossil fuel as possible, because the real danger is a carbon deficit and snowball earth, BUT for the short-term we should NOT burn ANY fossil fuel because it raises global temps through the greenhouse effect and creates havoc. in fact, the whole gulf stream debate is predicated upon the supposition that raised greenhouse effect aside, the alteration of the oceanic thermostat (shut off of gulf stream for ex.) could lead to a DECREASE in global temps and maybe a new ice age. it's hard for a hairless monkey to know which way to jump. climbing a tree (or hiding under the sofa) just isn't the all-pupose survival strategy it used to be, alas. hey, isn't bart a meteorology type kind of guy? or used to be. roger > > On vrijdag, feb 21, 2003, at 10:46 Europe/Amsterdam, Dave Coull wrote: > > > You may not want to give up on the Gulf Stream, but all > > of us in these islands could find the Gulf Stream giving > > up on us. When I did a course in environmental science > > back in 1994 to 1996, this was being taught as a serious > > concern regarding global warming even then. More recently, > > scientists measuring the Gulf Stream say that it has > > definitely slowed down. > > Dave, > do you have any references on this? This has always been a private fear > of mine, > the gulf stream being the rather puny thing it is (on a global scale), > but I've > never managed to find any real meteorologists who had done research > into it. > -- > - Jack Jansen <Jack.Jansen-AT-oratrix.com> > http://www.cwi.nl/~jack - > - If I can't dance I don't want to be part of your revolution -- Emma > Goldman -
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