Ice Age the media tried to pass on us but the Republican leadership didn't use for fear

"Telltale signs are everywhere —from the unexpected persistence and thickness of pack ice in the waters around Iceland to the southward migration of a warmth-loving creature like the armadillo from the Midwest.Since the 1940s the mean global temperature has dropped about 2.7° F. Although that figure is at best an estimate, it is supported by other convincing data. When Climatologist George J. Kukla of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Geological Observatory and his wife Helena analyzed satellite weather data for the Northern Hemisphere, they found that the area of the ice and snow cover had suddenly increased by 12% in 1971 and the increase has persisted ever since. Areas of Baffin Island in the Canadian Arctic, for example, were once totally free of any snow in summer; now they are covered year round."

TIME Magazine Archive Article -- Another Ice Age? -- Jun. 24, 1974
TIME MAGAZINE ^| June 24, 1974/2006 | Time Magazine

 

Want to think of me as a right wing nut or a person who just doesn't get it, well here is more on media trying to push an ice age in the seventies. I posted what most liberals would think is respectable news sources.

The Earth’s Cooling Climate,” Science News, November 15, 1969.

• “Colder Winters Held Dawn of New Ice Age,” Washington Post, January 11, 1970.
  
• “Science: Another Ice Age?” Time Magazine, June 24, 1974.
  
• “The Ice Age Cometh!” Science News, March 1, 1975.
  
• “The Cooling World,” Newsweek, April 28, 1975.
  
• “Scientists Ask Why World Climate is Changing; Major Cooling May Be Ahead,” New York Times, May 21, 1975.
  
• “In the Grip of a New Ice Age?” International Wildlife July-August, 1975.
  
• “A Major Cooling Widely Considered to Be Inevitable,” New York Times, September 14, 1975.
  
• “Variations in the Earth’s Orbit, Pacemaker of the Ice Ages,” Science magazine, December 10, 1976.

 

Indeed.. and there's a cold front moving into my area of the country next week. Time for the sweaters, hot chocolate and fireplace. I love January.

 

I remember the Ice Age fears from when I was a child. I remember the acid rain scares, too. There are a lot of people my age who refuse to get upset about "global warming" because Chicken Little has run around twice already and the sky still hasn't fallen.

Coin, you can keep January and your cold fronts. *shiver*

 

I got you loud and clear, but not all of that Chicken Little stuff. When rivers catch fire and entire lakes are off limits for fishing, something is wrong. Both have since been fixed. I am just glad they did not go as far as some of the Russian problems.

 

I agree that there was a problem, but there was talk of near-global deforestation due to acid rain. As has become common, the media grabbed a real problem and blew it out of all realistic proportions. At one point, scare-mongers predicted our flesh eventually melting from our bones when we walked outside in the rain.

 

Kind of hard to convince me we aren't experiencing something along the lines of a globl warm trend when it is almost 60 degrees in Chicago in January today.

 

But that's not how global warming is supposed to work, Moen. According to all of the apologists, global warming releases more moisture into the air, resulting in more snow or rain during the winter. That is why the South has had several very cold winters recently, despite claims of global warming. Your 60 degrees? That's just an aberration.

 

That is called weather. Global warming involves climate. They are not the same thing what-so-ever.

 

"Man, too, may be somewhat responsible for the cooling trend. The University of Wisconsin's Reid A. Bryson and other climatologists suggest that dust and other particles released into the atmosphere as a result of farming and fuel burning may be blocking more and more sunlight from reaching and heating the surface of the earth."
TIME Magazine Archive Article -- Another Ice Age? -- Jun. 24, 1974
TIME MAGAZINE ^| June 24, 1974

 

Has anyone ever considered that there might be a bit of truth to ALL the arguments? That just maybe mankind does have a small affect in these matters?

Seriously folks, I'm curious.

Has smog ever been an issue anywhere? Any industrial pollution?

I grew up about 10 miles from Gary, IN when the steel mills were going strong. If the wind blew the right direction we could smell it. We called it "Gary air". It was horrible.

I'm not raising this question to cause a stink. Pun intended unfortunately but one way or another I DO think we have an influence on our atmosphere.

As a species it would seem we've been doing so for a long time. As we multiply and do so it would seem to have a bigger effect. How big of an effect and how it affects is a big question. How one wants to interpret it or ridicule it is one's own business.

We could be cooling our atmosphere or warming it or even keeping it the same. One fact remaiins in my opinion. We ARE polluting it. The land, the sea and the air. Call it progress if you will.

Call me a tree hugger if you want and I don't even have children to worry about in this matter. It's just a fact to me.

Sorry if I "invaded" your thread Andy but I'd love to hear what people have to say on this matter and why.

Are we polluting our planet?

 

I am sure we are - to some extent. Questions is how much. How about this?
<for some reason, it won't let me post the picture - message is too long?>
Captions is This is what Donora looked like at noon on Oct. 29, 1948, as a deadly smog created by a temperature inversion and industrial plant emissions enveloped the town.
http://www.donorasmog.com/newsarticles_files/articlecleanairislegacy.htm
That is what lead to Andy's impending ice age. Oh, BTW, it started in the late 1800's, so it also brought about
the global warming of the 1930's and the dust bowl. So what have we learned about mans effect on the weather from this? I give!

 

I was wondering if anyone remembered the old 'looming ice age' hysteria and I remember the Cold War sustained panic about the Russians. I was one of those kids taught to hide under their desk when the bomb hit. As I have said, we are the disaster animal and if there isn't one handy, we'll invent one.

 

And to think, I just complimented you one your great memory - or maybe I was being a bit facetious. You think that maybe that was the case?

 

"rethink the parameters of free speech," Rep. James Clyburn. You consider this a valuable quote. How far do you want to rethink it? Into nullity?

 

A good read rlm but really scary.

 

1971... 1974... 1969... 1948...

...the stone-age climate-predicting-wise compared to today.

Computer advancements have given scientists the ability to analyze immense amounts of data, data not so easily available in any of the years you've quoted from. Remote measurements of real-time conditions are a click away today, in 1974 it would have taken multiple expeditions to dozens of nearlly-inaccessible areas over a period of months just to gather enough data that a modern laptop computer can gather in a few nanoseconds...and that laptop keeps gathering info, more than could have been imagined possible in 1974, even with the best computers of the day, no punchcards needed today, no 5.25" floppies.

We have an insane amount of information today, real-time information, that scientist would have killed for in 1974.