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"Temperatures are really decreasing, not increasing"





Brief Responses to Climate Change Denialism Statements

CPSG 200 Science & Global Change Sophomore Colloquium

Temperatures are really going down, not up

There has been speculation that global temperatures are actually decreasing over time instead of increasing. This could not be further from the truth. Currently we are generating greenhouse gases by burning fossil fuels at an alarming rate. These greenhouse gases are causing alarming changes to weather patterns and catalyses rising sea levels. In 1988, 1991-92, and 1998 there were notable drops in temperature, but the overall climate remained unchanged. Temperature finds a way to recover as it can be a little volatile from day to day, but climate follows a pattern. It then becomes a mistake to obtain climate data from day to day temperatures due to the introduction of noise. By averaging temperatures over a number of years, noise decreases and the overall trend exposes itself. The 2010s in particular have shown a record high in average temperatures with six out of the ten hottest recorded years coming from this decade. It has also been shown that 2016 was the hottest year on record, and 2018 is on its way to being the third hottest year recorded so far. The temperature trends have been evident in the sense that the amount of glacier ice has been decreasing over the years, and sea levels has been rising. Temperatures of the oceans have also been getting progressively warmer over the course of time. Overall the temperatures are really going up, not down. It is crucial to know that the temperatures are really increasing because this is such a critical piece in understanding what global warming really is and why we should care about it and do something about it.


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Contributed by: Paul Andorful, David Ahmed, Edmund Park

Last modified: 22 October 2018