Warming, Anyone?

So it was 80 degrees yesterday. Yesterday was also October 23. That's unusual. But it hasn't been unusual for this fall in Washington, DC. When I went apple picking a few weeks ago, it was incredibly hot -- summerish -- not good weather for a classic fall activity. But they said the orchard was going to be closed for further picking after that weekend, because thanks to the massive drought sweeping the southeastern US, the trees were going to be no good after that. The good news, though, was that the bizarre weather meant this might be the best year ever for Virginia wines.

Meanwhile, much of California appears to be on fire as drought conditions and unusual winds make it more difficult than it's usually been to contain the wildfires. Watching displaced people taking shelter in Qualcomm Stadium one wonders if this -- huddled masses of American refugees in NFL stadiums -- won't be the iconic image of the Bush years. One also wonders if it'll be the iconic image of the American future.

No doubt one can't scientifically prove that Katrina wouldn't have been so bad, or that yesterday's weather would have been more pleasant, or that orchards in Maryland would be healthier, or southern Californians safer from fire if only the Kyoto Protocol had been ratified seven or eight years ago. The weather is just too hard to model in detail. But this seems certain to be the kind of thing we can expect more and more of in years to come if the planet keeps getting warmer, a stark reminder that while the price of building a low carbon economy may be high, doing nothing is hardly a cost-free alternative.

Comments

Don't fall into the same trap as the flat-earth Cons do (remember those numbskulls who complained about how cold it was when Al Gore spoke in NY this winter?). Weather is not the same as climate. It may be unseasonably warm or unseasonably cold on a particular day or for a particular season, but climate change can only be evaluated by looking at trends over decades, centuries and millenia.

Posted by HS | October 24, 2007 5:06 PM

Kind of a silly non-scientific post of the type that Matt would surely make fun of comming from a Republican.

Posted by Dave | October 24, 2007 5:08 PM

Which was not the point being made, HS. Read the last sentence again.

Posted by strannix | October 24, 2007 5:08 PM

The San Diego fires are the worst in at least 37 years I have lived here. Definitely not an airtight proof of global warming, but surely an anomalous weather or even climatic condition.

Posted by gregor | October 24, 2007 5:17 PM

At some point, enough anecdotes become data, and year after year of weird weather everywhere ought eventually to convice people that there is something wrong with the weather

Posted by rea | October 24, 2007 5:30 PM

strannix,

The last paragraph doesn't salvage it. It's not that the science can't produce detailed enough estimates, it's that stochastic and cyclical variations in weather are known to dwarf the contributions of climate change to the kind of accute events that Matt describes and the effect on local climates isn't consistent.

The indications Matt uses even contradict each other - increased storm frequency and activity in the Atlantic would result in more precipitation on the southern end of the east coast, especially during this time of the year.

Posted by MattXIV | October 24, 2007 5:30 PM

The San Diego fires are the worst in at least 37 years I have lived here.

For whatever it's worth: California's fire-management policy might be contributive to the severity of present wildfires. Most of the areas now aflame used to burn fairly regularly with no drastic consequences, but as development has expanded into those areas over the last few decades, naturally occurring fires have been suppressed. This increases the available tinder and when conditions are right for a major fire, tends to make it really major (as at present.)

My point here is that humans have found plenty of ways to screw up the environment that don't necessarily correlate directly with global warming.

Posted by James Gary | October 24, 2007 5:31 PM

Shorter Matt:
We are so screwed.

Posted by bobbo | October 24, 2007 5:34 PM

MattXIV-

I just read it as saying, "Man, environmental disasters sure are costly and disruptive. People tend to ignore this when arguing against carbon reduction measures."

He's clearly not saying that global warming must be real because California is on fire or that the southeast can expect more droughts because if we don't do anything.

Posted by strannix | October 24, 2007 5:58 PM

Note that the preferred moniker of scientists, "global climate change" (instead of global warming), could mean more extreme weather of both kinds, i.e. hotter in some places, colder in others, worse storms in others.

Posted by bob | October 24, 2007 6:11 PM

strannix,

He's clearly not saying that global warming must be real because California is on fire or that the southeast can expect more droughts because if we don't do anything.

Actually the later half of that sentence is exactly what Matt said.

But this seems certain to be the kind of thing we can expect more and more of in years to come if the planet keeps getting warmer

The point is that this "kind of thing" are not what we should "expect more and more of" because the kind of events cited will not have a strong causitive relationship with a rise in the global mean temperature.

Posted by MattXIV | October 24, 2007 6:57 PM

I read "kind of thing" to mean environmental disasters in general, not the given examples specifically. But, I guess you read it to mean "these things specifically", which I guess is your prerogative.

Posted by strannix | October 24, 2007 7:05 PM

Meanwhile, much of California appears to be on fire as drought conditions and unusual winds make it more difficult than it's usually been to contain the wildfires.

Isn't SoCal a desert? Is it that surprising to have drought conditions in the desert? Aren't the winds called the Santa Anna winds? Hardly unusual.

No doubt one can't scientifically prove that Katrina wouldn't have been so bad, or that yesterday's weather would have been more pleasant, or that orchards in Maryland would be healthier, or southern Californians safer from fire if only the Kyoto Protocol had been ratified seven or eight years ago.

Ummmm, what is the cost of a less pleasant yesterday? While the Maryland orchard might have been less productive this year, perhaps an apple orchard in Vermont has been more productive with a longer season. Katrina was not that powerful of a hurricane, the real cost associated with it was the failure of the man-made levees. And as James Gary notes, the lack of clearing tinder may be the ultimate cause of the severity of the California fires. I think it's ridiculous to blame any of this on a failure to ratify Kyoto. Opportunistic absurdity on this level does more harm than good. It makes me skeptical of the claims made about the dangers of climate change.

Posted by Just Karl | October 24, 2007 7:13 PM

Matt,

Giant fires are a routine fact of life out in Southern California. There was an equally massive set of fires in 1889. There were similar fires all through my youth. There's a whole subgenre of literature about fires and other seemingly apocalyptic threats to LA.

The difference is that lots of people live in the sage brush covered hills now, so fires are a bigger deal, because more homes and lives are threatened.

If you want a policy response, think about population control, which means immigration control. And, by the way, the easiest way to produce less carbon in the future is to admit fewer Third World immigrants into the U.S., so it all fits together.

Posted by Steve Sailer | October 24, 2007 7:17 PM

"Isn't SoCal a desert? Is it that surprising to have drought conditions in the desert? Aren't the winds called the Santa Anna winds? Hardly unusual."

Here's a pretty little map of the % of normal rainfall over the state over the past year (7/1/06 - 6/30/07). Note that San Diego got 36% of its normal rainfall and LA only 21%, and some places in the SW corner even less (the far NW is another story).

Land use and development issues surely play a role, but when rainfall drops down to a third of its usual level, in an already dry and presumably fire-prone environment - well, anybody notice that most of the West's been exploding into flame at some point over the last few years?

Posted by Dan S. | October 24, 2007 7:40 PM

No doubt one can't scientifically prove that Katrina wouldn't have been so bad

Truly epic LOLs MattY, thanks for that. Of course, *arsonists* and *overgrown hillsides* due in some cases to improper management have absolutely nothing to do with it. But, it's one of those things that we'll never know for sure.

While I'm still laughing, feel free to sign the petition.

Posted by TLB | October 24, 2007 7:40 PM

Steve Sailer, always the hare-mongering moron. Welcome, hate-monger.

Posted by Jennifer | October 24, 2007 7:44 PM

Just an interesting bit of history on the general matter:

Native Americans Were First Land Managers of California’s Coastal Ranges

While it is known that pre-Columbian peoples of North America used fire as a tool to manage natural resources, scientists have long debated the impact of this usage of fire on the landscape. According to a recent USGS study published in the Journal of Biogeography, evidence exists that Native Americans significantly altered vegetation distribution in the coastal ranges of California with the widespread use of fire long before Euro-American colonization.

“By subsidizing natural fires, these first land managers living in the coastal ranges of California were able to thin out or displace shrublands, possibly changing one-quarter or more of the landscape from shrubland to grassland,” said Dr. Jon E. Keeley, a research ecologist at the USGS Western Ecological Research Center in Three Rivers, Calif.

According to Keeley’s research, colonial Spanish missionaries arriving in California in 1769 found a landscape already primed for the introduction of agriculture and animal husbandry, management practices begun by the Spanish and perpetuated by Mexican and American settlers.

“Chaparral shrublands have long been the natural vegetation on this landscape, forming dense, impenetrable stands,” said Keeley. “For a region with a large Native American population, chaparral stands offered limited food resources. Additionally, undisturbed shrublands would have made local travel difficult, harbored predators like grizzly bears, siphoned off precious water resources and presented a fire hazard during fall when Santa Ana winds prevail.”

Repeated burning beyond the tolerance of chaparral shrubs to regenerate, however, favored the establishment of grasses and forbs, more useful and nutritious for humans than the shrubs, said Keeley. Success at fire management of California landscapes may have been among the factors explaining the typical lack of agriculture in most California Indian tribes, which stands in marked contrast to other North American Indian tribes.

The native plant foods produced from burning shrublands were diverse, said Keeley. Around 5,000 years ago, Native Americans of coastal California began to rely more and more on native seeds. By the time of European contact, they were using 100-200 plant species, with seeds of native grasses, forbs and acorns as food staples throughout the region. Burning not only made these kinds of plant species available, but also opened up the landscape for deer, rabbits, quail and mourning doves, which became important staples in their diet.

Keeley evaluated potential patterns of burning by Native Americans by examining historical documents, cultural accounts, archaeological records and contemporary land management practices. He related patterns of vegetation distribution in the region to environmental factors and the ability of the dominant shrub vegetation to recover from different fire frequencies.

Fire starts from lightning in coastal shrublands are among the lowest in the western United States, with few or none indicated in fire records for most areas, said Keeley. For example, no lightning-ignited fires for the Santa Monica Mountains of southern California were reported over a 60-year period. Unlike the interior mountains of California, where lightning ignitions increase with elevation, coastal foothills are cool enough in summer to inhibit the development of lightning storms, and too moist for lightning ignitions from winter weather fronts. The frequency of natural lightning-ignited fires on these landscapes was low, perhaps fewer than one per 100 years.

From the USGS.

Posted by El Cid | October 24, 2007 7:59 PM

Watch for pro sports teams to start using this as an argument when they demand new stadiums: The current stadium is inadequate as shelter in time of emergency! We need a new one, with skyboxes!

Posted by Jon H | October 24, 2007 8:24 PM

The idea that Katrina or the current fires in southern California have anything to do with ratification or non-ratification of the Kyoto Protocol is utterly absurd.

Posted by Mixner | October 24, 2007 9:01 PM

Anyway, Matt, now that you are in Mr. Science Guy mode talking about global climate change, when are you going to talk about the James Watson Witch Hunt? Or is that a little too humiliating for the "pro-science" "reality-based community?"

Posted by Steve Sailer | October 24, 2007 9:07 PM

Goddamn it, I've had enough of this shit. Steve, and any of you other racist/sexist/etc. hatemongering bastards who might be reading - just shut the fuck up already. Crawl back into your fucking little holes. We don't want you here. Go away.

[takes deep breath]

Well, no, I don't really feel any better. But it has to be said.

Posted by Dan S. | October 24, 2007 9:32 PM

I grew up in the LA area; catastrophic brush fires were an annual occurrence. My mother - full of omens and portents - warned us periodically that the canyon behind our house ("the barranca") would one day go up in flames; it never did.

But as the region gets more densely populated the annual catastrophic brush fires get more catastrophic. Anyone who has lived for even a brief time in San Diego County recently and driven at rush hour knows what I'm talking about.

PS I live in the mountains northeast of Sacramento. This is a big state. The fires are something we hear about. They're happening in a different part of the world.

Posted by Linus | October 24, 2007 10:51 PM

Speak for your self, Dan S. If you want to go somewhere where everyone has the same opinions and no dissent is tolerated, try DailyKos.

Posted by Fred | October 24, 2007 11:05 PM

"Steve Sailer, always the hare-mongering moron. Welcome, hate-monger."

"Goddamn it, I've had enough of this shit. Steve, and any of you other racist/sexist/etc. hatemongering bastards who might be reading - just shut the fuck up already. Crawl back into your fucking little holes. We don't want you here. Go away."

I always get a kick out of how the people who accuse me of "hate-mongering" (or, in the case of Jennifer, "hare-mongering") are so brimming with uncontrollable hatred themselves.

Anyway, it would be fun to see a discussion of what the "reality-based community" thinks of the James D. Watson Ritual Humiliation Ceremony now going on worldwide.

Posted by Steve Sailer | October 24, 2007 11:15 PM

Shut up,
Go away.

Posted by Dan S. | October 25, 2007 12:17 AM

"If you want to go somewhere where everyone has the same opinions and no dissent is tolerated"

Sorry, 2003 is so over . . .

Anyway, dissent's fine. It's racist bullshit that I'm objecting to.

Posted by Dan S. | October 25, 2007 12:23 AM

I think hate-monger is not so much the right term for Steve Sailer as freak is. This is, after all, the same man who blamed the Iraq war on, all things, political correctness.

Posted by Peter H | October 25, 2007 12:29 AM

I think hate-monger is not so much the right term for Steve Sailer as freak is. This is, after all, the same man who blamed the Iraq war on, all things, political correctness.

Posted by Peter H | October 25, 2007 12:29 AM

Dan S,

No, you go away, you insufferable bore.

Posted by Jeff | October 25, 2007 12:46 AM

Peter H.:

Political correctness? Please explain. Thanks.

Posted by Raheem | October 25, 2007 1:01 AM

As I wrote:

Why are we in Iraq? There are many reasons, almost all of them bad.

But the one that deserves recounting is this: supporters of the war successfully bullied many skeptics into silence by declaring that anyone who doubted that Iraqis were ready for democracy was a racist.

Thus in a February 2003 speech to the American Enterprise Institute, George W. Bush said:

"There was a time when many said that the cultures of Japan and Germany were incapable of sustaining democratic values. Well, they were wrong. Some say the same of Iraq today. They are mistaken. [Applause] … It is presumptuous and insulting to suggest that a whole region of the world—or the one-fifth of humanity that is Muslim—is somehow untouched by the most basic aspirations of life."

Similarly, in August 2003, the Daily Telegraph summarized a speech by then-National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice to the National Association of Black Journalists: "Critics of US policy are racist, says Rice" [By David Rennie]. An extract:

"Black Americans should stand by others seeking freedom today, she went on, and shun the 'condescending' argument that some races or nations were not interested in or ready for Western freedoms. 'We've heard that argument before. And we, more than any, as a people, should be ready to reject it,' she said. 'That view was wrong in 1963 in Birmingham and it is wrong in 2003 in Baghdad and in the rest of the Middle East.'"

So supporters of the invasion intimidated onlookers by insinuating that unbelievers in the bright promise of Arab democracy were despicable bigots. Then they went on to spout even more bizarre nonsense about how Iraqis, a population notorious even among Arabs for their self-destructive homicidal lunacy, were practically New Hampshireites in their readiness for self-rule.

For example, Mr. Bush told the AEI:

"The nation of Iraq—with its proud heritage, abundant resources and skilled and educated people—is fully capable of moving toward democracy and living in freedom [Applause]."

Are Iraqis "skilled and educated?" The literacy rate in Iraq is 40.4%, according to Mr. Bush's own CIA.

In April 2002, popular columnist Mark Steyn had asserted:

"The Iraqi people are secular, tolerant, literate, the antithesis of those wacky fundamentalists in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. ... Once you've got rid of the ruling gang, it's the West's best shot at incubating a reasonably non-insane polity." [ Say Goodbye, Yasser Arafat, Spectator, April 6, 2002]

Likewise, the Wall Street Journal Editorial Board called that month for conquering Iraq on the grounds that

"This is why we believe the best chance for peace in Palestine, and for stability throughout the entire Middle East, goes through Baghdad. Iraq is a serious country with a proud history …"[Arabs and Democracy| Forget peace for now. Liberate Iraq and all else will follow, April 3, 2002]

To anyone who knew anything about Iraq, a ludicrous country with a shameful history, this was obvious tripe.

As I responded in April 2002:

"Iraq? A proud history? … Iraq has a proud history of backstabbing and cowardice… This delusion could have disastrous consequences after an American invasion. … We could easily shatter Iraq into three or more pieces, but if we invade with the notion of making Iraq into a model nation-state, we're going need more than all the king's horses and all the king's men to put Humpty-Dumpty together again."

Yet political correctness is so pervasive in this country that offering an uncharitable evaluation of a people is normally just not done—even when it could help save America from starting a disastrous war.

There's nothing more improper these days than recounting a stereotype—even though the reason it is a stereotype is that it is statistically true.

Posted by Steve Sailer | October 25, 2007 1:43 AM

I am of course not saying that was the only reason -- I've personally written about another half dozen bad reasons why we were invading, back when Matt Yglesias was cheering the Iraq Attaq on. But political correctness -- the assumption that Iraqis _must_ be just like the Germans and the Japanese -- was particularly insidious because you aren't even allowed to question it in public unless you are willing to end up like James Watson or Larry Summers.

Posted by Steve Sailer | October 25, 2007 2:56 AM

Speaking of hare mongering Steve, what's the latest with your kid's rabbit? Has the hawk's aerial counterinsurgency campaign paid dividends yet?

Posted by beowulf | October 25, 2007 3:15 AM

Mr. Sailer's seriousness aside, does he really think that dementedly racist people, regardless of whether they were awarded Nobel Prizes (in part, of course, for stealing other people's work) should go utterly uncriticised we they spew their racism while brandishing their prizes?

Posted by MFB | October 25, 2007 6:55 AM

Jeff - "insufferable bore" may well be an unfortunately accurate description, but it's one I'd take any day over "shit-lined bigot".

Posted by Dan S. | October 25, 2007 7:01 AM

Re Steve Sailor

Mr. Sailor has apparently fallen for the bullshit put out by the supporters of the Iraq adventure. The reason for the said adventure was oil. Iraq has the second largest proven oil reserves in the world and the administration, particularly Mr. Cheney, was determined that a government allied with the US should control those reserves. All the other rationalizations, democracy, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, WMDs, etc. are pure tuna fish.

Posted by SLC | October 25, 2007 9:07 AM

Good job on the OT flame war, guys. Special mention to Steve "Regenerates 3 HP/Round" Sailer for his persistent attempts to hijack.

At the risk of being schoolmarmish, I'll say (again) that this kind of crap renders the comments sections unreadable.

Posted by James Gary | October 25, 2007 9:08 AM

If we really want to send the message that racists aren't welcome, we could just ignore Steve Sailer. Of course, then he gets into conversations with himself, but at least that's funny to watch.

Posted by too many steves | October 25, 2007 11:56 AM

Time has an article on the fire and its possible causes. Certainly land use seems to play a very real role - they note that "in California, where the population has more than tripled since 1950, in excess of 50% of new housing has been built in a severe-fire zone," and that this sort of patchy settlement is worse than forest alone. But they also point out that both weather and arguably climate surely must have been - and will be - major factors:

" . . the overwhelming majority of climate models point to more of these extreme conditions in the already dry Southwest as the planet warms. A study . . .found that as temperatures increased in the West, which is now 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit (almost 1 degree Celsius) warmer than it was in 1987, so did the length of the wildfire season and the size and duration of the average fire . . .

. . . The situation was worsened by a relatively wet winter in 2004-05, which let trees and scrub grow densely, followed by extremely dry weather since, which turned the vegetation to still more fuel. In fact, this past year has seen the worst drought in Los Angeles' recorded history . . .

. . . Few scientists expect dry areas like the Southwest to do anything but grow dryer still. The past several years have been among the dryest on record in the West, leaving the Colorado River — which supplies water to 30 million people — at its lowest level in 85 years of measurements."

Popular science reporting caveats, of course, but still . . .

Posted by Dan S. | October 25, 2007 12:10 PM