Scientific confusion
Sep. 14th, 2006 06:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
muck_a_luckI was reading this article about El Nino, and I was sad to see this:
OK. Dude. I have an issue with this: "Maybe the new climate state will not require an El Nino." As if there is an absolute climate state that maintains itself for some external reason. Nope. The earth happens to have climate states. They may be "self maintaining" to the extent that, oh, continental placement directs ocean currents, or air movement is affected by mountain ranges, but none of this is absolute and the planet doesn't care. El Nino does not occur because the northern regions are cold and need warming. El Nino occurs because the tropical regions are warm and give off heat. And they stop because they have released enough of the excess heat that they dissipate. El Nino is part of the current status quo, and in that respect is sort of "required" to maintain it. But it is not like the planet is sitting there thinking, "Wow, now that I'm more uniformly warm, I don't require an El Nino weather pattern any more."
So sad to see a scientist let his anthromorphological constructs run away with him.
- "El Nino is a natural phenomenon that transports heat out of the Tropics and gives it away so we maintain some kind of climatic equilibrium," Kousky said. [Mr. Kousky is "an El Nino expert at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration." - CK]
"If we alter the normal temperature distribution due to global warming, the whole globe will warm up. Maybe the new climate state will not require an El Nino. Another possibility is that we could go into a perpetual El Nino."
OK. Dude. I have an issue with this: "Maybe the new climate state will not require an El Nino." As if there is an absolute climate state that maintains itself for some external reason. Nope. The earth happens to have climate states. They may be "self maintaining" to the extent that, oh, continental placement directs ocean currents, or air movement is affected by mountain ranges, but none of this is absolute and the planet doesn't care. El Nino does not occur because the northern regions are cold and need warming. El Nino occurs because the tropical regions are warm and give off heat. And they stop because they have released enough of the excess heat that they dissipate. El Nino is part of the current status quo, and in that respect is sort of "required" to maintain it. But it is not like the planet is sitting there thinking, "Wow, now that I'm more uniformly warm, I don't require an El Nino weather pattern any more."
So sad to see a scientist let his anthromorphological constructs run away with him.
