[Coral-List] Don't be such a scientist
Ulf Erlingsson
ceo at lindorm.com
Tue Jan 10 09:19:21 EST 2012
Steve,
Argument #2 in the link you gave is invalid and the similitude with climate / weather is flawed. At any rate the planet is facing serious problems and IMHO it is very irresponsible to cry wolf over something that is so self-serving as this for the scientists involved.
Respectfully,
Ulf Erlingsson
On 2012-01-09, at 15:49, Steve Mussman wrote:
> Gene,
>
> With all due respect there are sources and there are . . . . sources.
> I'm not a scientist, but I know enough to question sources of information.
> I can find sites that claim that cigarette smoking is beneficial, but
> that doesn't mean that one should give credence to this perspective.
> Proclaiming rising atmospheric CO2 levels and current rates of ocean
> acidification to be a good thing is reprehensible in my view.
>
> Here is a alternate perspective that deserves serious consideration
> based on the credibility of the author and the list of sources cited.
>
> http://www.skepticalscience.com/ocean-acid.html
>
>
> Respectfully yours,
> Steve Mussman
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Eugene Shinn <eshinn at marine.usf.edu>
>> Sent: Jan 9, 2012 10:39 AM
>> To: coral-list at coral.aoml.noaa.gov
>> Subject: [Coral-List] Don't be such a scientist
>>
>> I missed the 60 minutes program because I was at sea when it aired. I
>> nevertheless wonder if they discussed any of the scientific issues
>> presented in the WSJ (below). or the lengthy technical presentation
>> at http://co2science.org/subject/o/acidificationphenom.php. Gene
>>
>>>> Source: WSJ
>>>> [SPPI Note: More in-depth papers on this issue can be found at the
>>>> SPPI website:
>>>> C02 Science's Ocean Acidification Database
>>>> Quantifying the Effects of Ocean Acidification on Marine Organisms
>>>> Effects of Ocean Acidification on Marine Ecosystems
>>>> Answers to a Fisherman's Testimony about Ocean Acidification
>>>> EPA's Role in Protecting Ocean Health Should Focus on the
>>>> "Here-and-Now" Threats
>>>> See also CO2 Science website for reviewed papers on the topic
>>>>
>>>> ***************************
>>>> WSJ text beings here:
>>>> Coral reefs around the world are suffering badly from overfishing
>>>> and various forms of pollution. Yet many experts argue that the
>>>> greatest threat to them is the acidification of the oceans from the
>>>> dissolving of man-made carbon dioxide emissions.
>>>>
>>>> The effect of acidification, according to J.E.N. Veron, an
>>>> Australian coral scientist, will be "nothing less than
>>>> catastrophic.... What were once thriving coral gardens that
>>>> supported the greatest biodiversity of the marine realm will become
>>>> red-black bacterial slime, and they will stay that way."
>>>> Humans have placed marine life under pressure, but the chief
>>>> culprits are overfishing and pollution.
>>>>
>>>> This is a common view. The Natural Resources Defense Council has
>>>> called ocean acidification "the scariest environmental problem
>>>> you've never heard of." Sigourney Weaver, who narrated a film about
>>>> the issue, said that "the scientists are freaked out." The head of
>>>> the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration calls it global
>>>> warming's "equally evil twin."
>>>>
>>>> But do the scientific data support such alarm? Last month
>>>> scientists at San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography and
>>>> other authors published a study showing how much the pH level
>>>> (measuring alkalinity versus acidity) varies naturally between
>>>> parts of the ocean and at different times of the day, month and
>>>> year.
>>>>
>>>> "On both a monthly and annual scale, even the most stable open
>>>> ocean sites see pH changes many times larger than the annual rate
>>>> of acidification," say the authors of the study, adding that
>>>> because good instruments to measure ocean pH have only recently
>>>> been deployed, "this variation has been under-appreciated." Over
>>>> coral reefs, the pH decline between dusk and dawn is almost half as
>>>> much as the decrease in average pH expected over the next 100
>>>> years. The noise is greater than the signal.
>>>>
>>>> Another recent study, by scientists from the U.K., Hawaii and
>>>> Massachusetts, concluded that "marine and freshwater assemblages
>>>> have always experienced variable pH conditions," and that "in many
>>>> freshwater lakes, pH changes that are orders of magnitude greater
>>>> than those projected for the 22nd-century oceans can occur over
>>>> periods of hours."
>>>>
>>>> This adds to other hints that the ocean-acidification problem may
>>>> have been exaggerated. For a start, the ocean is alkaline and in no
>>>> danger of becoming acid (despite headlines like that from Reuters
>>>> in 2009: "Climate Change Turning Seas Acid"). If the average pH of
>>>> the ocean drops to 7.8 from 8.1 by 2100 as predicted, it will still
>>>> be well above seven, the neutral point where alkalinity becomes
>>>> acidity.
>>>>
>>>> The central concern is that lower pH will make it harder for
>>>> corals, clams and other "calcifier" creatures to make calcium
>>>> carbonate skeletons and shells. Yet this concern also may be
>>>> overstated. Off Papua New Guinea and the Italian island of Ischia,
>>>> where natural carbon-dioxide bubbles from volcanic vents make the
>>>> sea less alkaline, and off the Yucatan, where underwater springs
>>>> make seawater actually acidic, studies have shown that at least
>>>> some kinds of calcifiers still thrive-at least as far down as pH
>>>> 7.8.
>>>>
>>>> In a recent experiment in the Mediterranean, reported in Nature
>>>> Climate Change, corals and mollusks were transplanted to lower pH
>>>> sites, where they proved "able to calcify and grow at even faster
>>>> than normal rates when exposed to the high [carbon-dioxide] levels
>>>> projected for the next 300 years." In any case, freshwater mussels
>>>> thrive in Scottish rivers, where the pH is as low as five.
>>>>
>>>> Laboratory experiments find that more marine creatures thrive than
>>>> suffer when carbon dioxide lowers the pH level to 7.8. This is
>>>> because the carbon dioxide dissolves mainly as bicarbonate, which
>>>> many calcifiers use as raw material for carbonate.
>>>>
>>>> Human beings have indeed placed marine ecosystems under terrible
>>>> pressure, but the chief culprits are overfishing and pollution. By
>>>> comparison, a very slow reduction in the alkalinity of the oceans,
>>>> well within the range of natural variation, is a modest threat, and
>>>> it certainly does not merit apocalyptic headlines.
>>>>
>>>> ******************************
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>>
>> No Rocks, No Water, No Ecosystem (EAS)
>> ------------------------------------ -----------------------------------
>> E. A. Shinn, Courtesy Professor
>> University of South Florida
>> College of Marine Science Room 221A
>> 140 Seventh Avenue South
>> St. Petersburg, FL 33701
>> <eshinn at marine.usf.edu>
>> Tel 727 553-1158----------------------------------
>> -----------------------------------
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