Ecology and the Environment

On April 22nd and 23rd there will be a TV program called "Melting Point" on CNN. It will be on 7:00pm Eastern Time. The program will be about global warming. I think anyone who doesn't understand the problems of global warming should watch this. For more information, visit: http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/presents/index.melting.point.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_energy_budget#Incoming_power Perhaps the best site I have found yet that supports Climate Change theory. Basically says solar radiation is by far the dominant energy source, and that changes in albedo have been more significant than changes in solar radiation, and that the Earth's albedo has been siginificantly changed by changes in land use and the burning of fossil fuels. I am still a little fuzzy on the effects of carbon dioxide levels on humidity. I am guessing that global warming increases humidity and humidity increases global warming. Yes? So it is essentially another positive feedback. Are we running out of negativ…

does the heat generated from the greenhouse effect, escape out of the ozone hole and if so where would it escape to? we live in New Zealand and are wondering about this effect on our country. we think that we are in a bitter-sweet situation if heat is escaping through the ozone hole. we are damed if we do because we are less prone to the extreem weather patterns seen in america (katrina) and in asian countries etc because maybe the heat is escaping through this hole (which is above our country) and yet on the down side we also experience the highest rate of skin cancer. what do you say?.....

Darwin said he couldn't stand the sight of a peacock, and then he figured out that all that plumage was to impress the ladies that they must be a good catch because the could succeed not 'because' of their plumage, but 'despite' their plumage. If oversized houses and overpowered automobiles and other such behaviour are the plumage of modern man (and woman) have we much hope to ever learn to live sustainably? Are we predesposed to being self-destructive pyromaniacs that abuse our position on the top of the food chain? I think we have been predisposed to oversized houses for quite some time, but what other forms of plumage did we possess before overpowered automobil…

I live in Metro Detroit, Michigan. So far this January it's been around 15 degrees F above normal almost everyday. Is this happening everywhere? Please reply.

What is global warming theory?

The BBC is conducting a vast experiment in climate change and you can take part! Basically they need you to download the software that will allow you to run a weather model, to help predict what will happen to the weather in the future. The software runs in the background so you use your computer normally. Thousands of participants are needed in order to run as many models as possible, with each one being slightly different to take account of the millions of variables. Remember that 10,000 computers are equal to the worlds most powerful super computer and the beeb wants many more than this. So if you are serious about global warming now is your chance to help find ou…

hello while doing some research on the deep atlantic conveyor came across this site that maybe be of interest to those of you wondering about climatic change. educationally related and not to deep into the subject, it still gives a bit of information on a number of areas related to climate change. http://calspace.ucsd.edu/virtualmuseum/climatechange1/01_1.shtml so what is the deep atlantic conveyor, the site states it better, but basically it is a deep current that circulates between the americas and europe whereby cold-dense sea water is drawn downward in the north atlantic above england. then travels southerly along england and europe towards africa, ne…

considering that 1ml of sea water contains up to 1x10^8 virus particles [ref], is it concievable that these particles can be filtered out and used for their nutritional value?

what are some density dependent factors in the tundra? what are some density independent factors in the tundra?

http://livescience.com/forcesofnature/060316_hurricane_sst.html A study recently confirmed that warmer ocean temperatures are in fact making hurricanes stronger. And some of you doubted me...

I don't know how many here are following this but I've been waiting for these to become available in the US for about 6 months. Unfortunately I'm going to have to wait longer, but the UKer's here appear to be lucky enough to get one next month. Once thought to be long extinct, this ancient species was discovered endangered in Australia. Now, the Australians are selling as much of it as the can to try to keep its numbers up. Why would I want one? What's not to love? http://www.wollemipine.com/ It's ancient: It has strange bark: And you can tell by looking at it it's not your average pine: Here's a note on availability oustide of Australia: …

I suppose the title of this thread is somewhat misleading... Tectonics is responsible for earthquakes and tsunamis, right? And we all know the weather is responsible for hurricanes... I would like to know what the effect would be for the Earth if both the tectonic system and the weather (meterological?) system of the planet were "stopped". I'm guessing that erosion would become a major problem for the landmasses, but what other catastophic situations would arise if there was no tectonic plate movement (and thereby no earthquakes) and no weather system (so no storms or hurricanes or tornadoes etc.)?

Much has been made of the apparent 'holes' in the stratospheric polar ozone layer and the increased risk to people and animals of increased exposure to harmful solar ultraviolet radiation in the regions immediately beneath the 'holes'. Well let me see if I understand this. The ozone layer protects the Earth from a significant amount of harmful UV radiation. Ozone is a gas O3 composed of dimeric oxygen and free radical oxygen that is produced by... well by UV light acting on dimeric oxygen. So presumably the photons of UV light that hit oxygen molecules provide energy to disrupt the molecular bond and produce free radical atomic oxygen. This is pretty reactive stuff so…

I tried searching for this here, but couldn't seem to find anything. If there is another link please link me to it. A friend of mine told me that freon is too heavy to travel to the stratosphere and gave me this link. He is convinced that freon is not the problem and we threw away something cheap to buy something more expensive. (gas) http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/env99/env256.htm What is the real answer. Does freon get up there in quantitys enough to do damage? Bettina

This thread is for the discussion of the rainforest; conservation, the life in the rainforest, etc. I think the rainforest is an important topic, and shouldn't be ignored. Peace out, herpguy

I am currently researching ecotones and am considering the concept the ecotones may not actually exist (likewise for diversity), can anyone expand or ellaborate on this?

It recently came to my attention that all hurricanes north of the equator rotate counterclockwise, and all hurricanes below the equator rotate clockwise. A quick question, Why does this happen? Anyway, yesterday, I went to the Detroit Science Center and they had an artificial tornado, it was rotating counterclockwise. So I started thinking, is the rotation of tornados above the equator always counterclockwise, and the rotation of tornados below the equator always clockwise, just like hurricanes? Please reply. Thanks.

The measured increase in rate of global warming seems to me to be related to the expansion of the internet and specificly the explosion in the World Wide Web. Okay, but there does appear to me to be a case of many decapitated poultry in rapid motion (and I aint talking H5N1). Copernicus showed us that we are not the centre of the Universe. Why have we retreated back to placing ourselves there again. When I were a lad every schoolboy worth his salt knew about the 'greenhouse effect'. That was back - well almost to Copernicus actually. Yes our planetary twin Venus with its atmosphere of carbon dioxide (mainly). Now we measure increases in our tiny, tiny amount …

I'll tell you all now just in case I have more strange questions that I'm an author and am in the process of designing my own unique little world. What I need in this world of mine is for clouds to be a lot lower to the ground. I'm wondering if there is anything that would cause this to happen, or if there would be any side effects. Thanks!

Or did it just start since Bush got into power?

As you know, us humans have been dumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere for about 150 years. Now, larger hurricanes (even if they aren't triggered by global warming) are sucking up the water vapor resulting in less rain for the rainforest. Now, the rainforest is starting to release a lot of CO2 because many plants are beginning to die. Eventually, the rainforest will be releasing more CO2 than the oxygen it makes. It may seem like sci-fi but it's true.

Anyone know much about this? 1) Does it exist? 2) How would/does it work? 3) How close are we to achieving it at a reasonable (mass produceable) cost? 4) Give me some resources (preferably on the net, but also in print)? Wikipedia has nothing and the first two pages of Google have only a little.

Howdy, I have been off the forum for a gazillion years, what do y'all think of Peak Oil? Peak oil is essentially the idea that we will reach a point where half or over half our oil reserves will be depleted, and since the entire world runs off of oil, it will cause major problems. This makes perfect sense, because we only have a limited supply of oil in the world, and it's used to service many functions, primarily as our main source of power. What do y'all think of it?

Fred: Yes they are john. You coming out on your 4 wheeler this weekend? John:Of course I am Fred. You coming with me to watch the indie500?[/b] Fred:Yep. How was wakebaording last weekend? John:Great we wakeboarded all day long. Fred: Why is it SUV drivers are wastefull again? John:Oh..it's because the vehicles they drive require more gas to run on than my hybrid. We might both travel the same distance but the SUV driver has burned near twice as much gas as I have...thus being wastefull Fred:Why do they drive such big cars John? Just to be wastefull? or is it..........just................just.................just............ John ..Just because…