Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to Fine. Now draw those lines on the graphs, and tell me what you see.

re: Fine. Now draw those lines on the graphs, and tell me what you see.
pwokenyaw — (archived)

I see decreasing trends in the 50s and early 80's, you're right. The paper has an explanation:

"the large decrease in ocean heat content starting
around 1980 suggests that internal variability of the Earth
system significantly affects Earth’s heat balance on decadal
time-scales."

I would also note that AGW effect would be much weaker in the 1950-1970 period than it is today and will be in the future.

Don't forget the conclusion of the paper you cite to:

"In terms of the causes of the increase in ocean heat
content we believe that the long-term trend as seen in these
records is due to the increase of greenhouse gases in the
Earth’s atmosphere [Levitus et al., 2001]. In fact, estimates
of the net radiative forcing of the Earth system [Hansen
et al., 1997] suggest the possibility that we may be under-estimating
ocean warming. "

If you're trying to find long-term trends, the longer period of measurement (50 years here) is more reliable than a shorter period. If you're suggesting this just APPEARS to be an off-scale trend that is part of a century-plus oscillation, maybe you're right, but it's just one more in the mountain of "coincidences" that happen to look like anthro GW. I don't think they're coincidental any more.

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