How do you teach your kids to approach learning? Do you want them to have an inquiring mind, letting it lead them broader and deeper into the information? Have they become predisposed to an answer or point of view? Or do they have a mindset that is predetermined about a subject, and they only want validation of that opinion?
I confess that I exhibit all three characteristics. If I know little or nothing about a subject, I am inquiring. Suppose I have some new information that I believe, but I want to make certain it is true. In that case, I am predisposed to read more information that confirms it and fewer articles that refute it. Then there is that set-in-stone conviction that nothing will shake my belief, like my faith in salvation through Jesus Christ. I do not want to read any opposing viewpoints. It would be a waste of time.
You may have observed from previous blog posts of mine that I do not believe that climate change is caused significantly by human activity. I do believe climate change is real, but that it is a natural and ongoing process. I do not advocate reducing the population by abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, or other extreme measures that are increasing in popularity. I certainly do not think we should stop using fossil fuels. I consider them God’s gifts to be used with good stewardship.
So, that pretty much sets you up for what started my choice of subjects today. I received a copy of Scientific American with a spectacular cover saying “MELTDOWN” in front of what I suppose was ice in Antarctica, fronted by water. That led to what seemed like it would be an interesting article about an Antarctica glacier that could be poised to slide into the sea. It was titled “The Coming Collapse,” with an indicator above it reading “Climate Change.” This topic falls into the “predisposed” category for me. I knew this article would probably show me the dangers of climate change. I was not disappointed. (Let me state in advance that all quotes in italics are my emphases for you.)
On the first page I read:
The ice shelf acts as a dam, slowing its parent glacier’s flow into the ocean. If the shelf were to fall apart, the glacier’s slide into the sea would greatly accelerate. The Thwaites Glacier itself holds enough ice to raise the global sea level by 65 centimeters (about two feet). The loss of the Thwaites Glacier would in turn destabilize much of the rest of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, with enough ice to raise sea levels by 3.2 meters—more than 10 feet.
So you can see the author, who was embedded with the scientific research team, is setting you up for fear and possible panic. (I’ll start worrying—maybe—when former president Barack Obama and all his wealthy neighbors sell their oceanfront properties.) And this new article follows one in SA in February 2019 with the headline “Are Antarctica’s Glaciers Collapsing? Rapid glacier retreat could put coastlines underwater sooner than anticipated.”
Several pages into “The Coming Collapse” article is an illustration of “Forces Breaking the Ice Shelf.” In one of the explanatory bubbles titled “Melting” it says, “Ocean water, warming from climate change, gradually melts the ice shelf’s underside.” The question immediately entered my mind, “What makes them so certain it’s because of climate change?” They were starting a scientific research expedition with a predetermined position.
The author continues:
The first couple of days were relatively warm. Our boots plunged deeply into the slushy snow, and puddles of meltwater pooled up along the tents. A series of giant ice cliffs, eight kilometers away, were visible to the south. Those upheavals marked the zone where the ice cracked and flexed as it transitioned from a grounded glacier into a floating ice shelf.
That sounds warm, all right. I decided to check on temperatures in Antarctica at wattsupwiththat.com.
Climate data shows no recent warming in Antarctica, instead a slight cooling
Below is a plot from a resource we have not used before on WUWT, “RIMFROST“. It depicts the average temperatures for all weather stations in Antarctica. Note that there is some recent cooling in contrast to a steady warming since about 1959. (Emphasis mine.)
Data and plot provided by http://rimfrost.no
Contrast that with claims by Michael Mann, Eric Steig, and others who used statistical tricks to make Antarctica warm up. Fortunately, it wasn’t just falsified by climate skeptics, but rebutted in peer review too.
On that same website page was the following:
As indicated, this graph depicts temperatures at the South Pole (UAH V6 stands for University of Alabama at Huntsville Version 6) from 1978 to 2018. Except in fairly regular peaks, where is the warming? The comment beneath the graph states, “No warming has occurred on the South Pole from 1978 to 2019 according to satellite data (UAH V6). The linear trend is flat!”
Back to the article. Here is a quote:
More surprising, Pettit [Erin Pettit, a glaciologist at Oregon State University in Corvallis] found that the shelf’s underside—a place that human eyes had never seen—looked strangely ordered, as if it had somehow been sculpted intentionally. The underside was corrugated with a series of trenches that ran perpendicular to the direction of ice flow, like waves offshore from a beach. “these things are huge, “ Pettit told me. Oddest of all, the trench walls weren’t smooth, as one might expect of melting ice. They were stair-stepped terraces.
Compare that to a Cornwall Alliance article from 2014, which reads in part:
But what about the ice sheet? It is firmly attached to a bowl-like platform of bedrock that would be submerged under water but for the presence of the ice. The weight of more than mile-thick ice impedes the “collapse” (calving icebergs) at the edges. A succession of submarine ridges in the path of potential melting blocks entry of seawater beneath the “grounded” ice. [If in 2014 they knew of a “succession of ridges,”why was she surprised in 2019?]
Imminent melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet is thus open to question. Clearly, this entity existed between and during earlier glacial periods, the latest ending some 10,000 years ago. A small ice shelf along the side of the northward extending Antarctic Peninsula melted 6,000 years ago, then reconstituted.
Pessimism over a disappearing ice sheet may, like rumors of Mark Twain’s premature demise, prove exaggerated. It’s worth noting that subsequent cool-downs followed each warming pulse during the modern post-glacial period. The British Antarctic Survey reports occasions of partial melting, then re-establishment of Antarctica’s ice shelves several times from 8,000 years B.C. forward.
This may be a good place to stop for this week. Perhaps I’ll continue with it in my next post. But if it does nothing else, I hope this post convinces you to drill it into your kids’ skulls that they shouldn’t take much of anything at face value. They need to learn how to do research—and do it—before being swayed, convinced, indoctrinated, by what their textbooks and other materials in school may say. You can find out more about what your kids are being taught in school about climate change in my book Who’s Got Dibs on Your Kids?.
Let me give you a challenge for your kids, depending on their age, of course.
- Does anything in this article make you believe the ice shelf will collapse and the glacier will move to raise the sea level greatly?
- Can you find any reason other than climate change that can cause the oceans to warm?
- What are the estimates of when the sea level rising will occur?
- Based on what your read in this article and from your research, do you think ending the use of fossil fuels will stop the movement of the glacier?
I must add that this article in Scientific American is very interesting. Following the tracks has been even more thought-provoking. I am still in the predisposed category, but I have at least a partially open mind.
Just remember, God Rules!