PowerSwitch

I was giving a talk to a small (14) group meeting of the International Women's Association last night about Transition Towns, Global Warming and Peak Oil. I used a little device at the start to gauge where the people were at. I gave each of them a slip of paper like this:



and asked them to mark the number on the 1 to 10 scale that best represented their view, using the text as a rough guide. The papers were then collected, the numbers added up and a mean score calculated. It was about 4 with no person marking 8,9 or 10.

I'd be interested if anyone else might like to try this out. (You might like to think of an improved set of words.)

Is it worth putting up here as a poll?

There again, we all know the number 10s here.

There'd be a few tens and a load of ones. We're a pretty unrepresentative bunch.

I would vote for number 7.

After all we have had 3 poor summers in a row. The winter before last was quite cool, last winter was freezing (a technical term) - the coldest in 30 or 40 years depending on who is commenting.

It has been cold (compared to average conditions) since the middle of December 2009! And the rest of May is looking poor too.....

This week, many inland areas are due to get frost for 5 nights in a row - in May! This is almost unprecedented.

It is hard to accept the Global Warming story, when one experiences a different reality.

But then again I come from N Ireland and we rarely get any good/ hot weather! I would love some global warming to arrive over here, but it ain't happened yet despite the hype. Shall I keep hoping? Or just conclude it ain't going to happen?

Just because we get a spell of cold weather caused by a temporary lack of solar output or volcanoes or sulphur emissions from Chinese power stations doesn't mean that the rise in CO2 content of the atmosphere isn't still causing a warming trend in the background.

How do we know how low the temperatures would have gone had we not had the increased insulation from all that extra CO2 keeping us warm?

Good questionnaire, Biff.

I think Snowhope was just being a bit Irish. He knows full well that March global surface temperature was the highest for any March in the record and 2009 was, within the statistical error margin, the warmest year and that the decade just ended was the warmest decade.

snow hope wrote:I would vote for number 7.

After all we have had 3 poor summers in a row. The winter before last was quite cool, last winter was freezing (a technical term) - the coldest in 30 or 40 years depending on who is commenting.

It has been cold (compared to average conditions) since the middle of December 2009! And the rest of May is looking poor too.....

This week, many inland areas are due to get frost for 5 nights in a row - in May! This is almost unprecedented.

It is hard to accept the Global Warming story, when one experiences a different reality.

But then again I come from N Ireland and we rarely get any good/ hot weather! I would love some global warming to arrive over here, but it ain't happened yet despite the hype. Shall I keep hoping? Or just conclude it ain't going to happen?

Climate change means, amongst other things, unpredictable and extreme weather events.

Careful what you wish for.

hehe - I wish for summer to start some time soon........

More seriously, will my fruit trees (which have blossomed in the last week) be affected by the night frosts which are forecast for this week?

snow hope wrote:hehe - I wish for summer to start some time soon........

In this country we usually have warm south-westerlies which bring rain; the alternative seems to be cold northerlies with plenty of sunshine but no heat or moisture.

I'd prefer the former, for that is what has made this land what it is and I like what it is.

snow hope wrote:More seriously, will my fruit trees (which have blossomed in the last week) be affected by the night frosts which are forecast for this week?

If/when we do get permanent changes in the climate, I could say your fruit trees would be the least of your worries, but I won't!

As the climate changes, so do the climate-tolerant species. So diversity is the key; some will survive, some won't. Look at your man in the Austrian mountains, Hans Seppler (name?). That's his formula and it works.

emordnilap wrote:Hans Seppler (name?)

Sepp Holzer

JohnB wrote:

emordnilap wrote:Hans Seppler (name?)

Sepp Holzer

emordnilap wrote:

JohnB wrote:

emordnilap wrote:Hans Seppler (name?)

Sepp Holzer

You got the initials right, allbeit in the wrong order!

Actually, I only got two letters wrong and missed one out. Not bad for someone with a memory like...err, one of those things you sift flour with.

To misquote Eric Morecambe, "you used all the right letters, but not necessarily in the right order"