How Global Warming Works

It's a confusing part of climate change when it seems winter is as cold as ever, but as global temperatures creep ever so slightly higher, a cascade of catastrophic events will almost surely follow. The ball is in humanity's court.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you Should Know from House Stuff Works
dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
And there's the Chipper Cheery, Charles W. Chuck Bryant, how Deep.
And there's Jerry over there. Say hi, Jerry, you know what?

(00:25):
How are you doing? Man? I'm well, sir, how are you?
I'm pretty well myself. I'm feeling all right. Feel a
little fit, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um. You're a little sweaty
as you can tell. But I'm all right. It's gross,
it is. I don't smell dowey. Okay, good so, friends, listeners,

(00:48):
country man, Uh, you're gonna notice a little something different
in this week's feed Tomorrow. This bears a little explanation.
We are dropping episodes one and two of my new
movie interview show movie Crush Do Do Do. We're dropping
those into the Stuff you Should Know feed. Uh, something
we've never done here at the network, but we're gonna

(01:10):
I guess I'm the lab rat on this one. The
guinea pig, the guinea pig. Yeah, I guess either one right.
The guinea pig doesn't die, the lab rat dies, Yeah,
I guess. So let's go with the guinea pig for sure.
That all right. Well either way, we are dropping those
into the stuff you should know feed uh, and we
wanted to alert you so when you saw all these

(01:30):
new things, you didn't rebel against us like everyone hated
YouTube when they delivered the World Free album, right right, Yeah,
I mean this is like, this is not just it's
not a You two album, it's your new show. It's
more important than any You two album. Well you know
I appreciate that. Uh so, yeah, that's why they're there.
An Episode one is uh the Great Janet Varney with

(01:52):
we talked about the movie Tron and um, that's the
nature of the show as I talked to people about
their favorite movie. And episode two is uh tig Nataro
talking about the movie Mask and that one is a
very special episode and I'll tease it with this. We
recorded that interview or conversation rather seconds after she got

(02:15):
the call that she was cancer free at the five
year mark. Oh wow. So uh she started crying at
the beginning, and I didn't know what was going on.
I gave her some time. I was freaking out, and
it turned out to be good news. But and I
explained that all the the onset of the episode, but
it turned out to be a very special experience. Man, Chuck,

(02:37):
your like Barbara Walters, I didn't get it out of her.
It was just weird timing. But anyway, those are in there,
and uh, it won't happen every week, but I would
love for you to subscribe. Well, yeah, that's the way
to get it, right, Yeah, just subscribe anywhere you you
listen to podcasts. These are a couple of gifts a
little Jim, that's right, and I appreciate your support on it. Yeah,

(02:58):
well where to go, man can gratulations. I speak for
me and the rest of the world when I say
we are looking forward to this, Thanks dude. And you
know I'm gonna have you on as a guess. That's
gonna be very strange and awesome. Yeah, I think it'll
be neat. I'll start crying to do you know what
your favorite movie is that you would pick? I got
a couple I think I could choose from. Sure, all right,
we'll hold on to that then, okay, and we'll just

(03:20):
we'll just pick that up later. Okay. Well, congrats again, man,
thanks pal. Shall we warm the globe? Yeah? All right,
so Chuck, um, I don't know if you've heard about
this term recently, but it's been in the news lately. Uh,
global warming, Are you familiar? It does ring a bell? Okay, well,

(03:42):
just in case you For those people who aren't aware
of global warming, global warming is what we're talking about today,
And UM, A lot of people confuse it or use
it interchangeably with climate change, and it turns out that's
not actually fully accurate. Global warming is a symptom of
climate change as a whole. Climate change is a whole

(04:04):
bunch of differences to the Earth's climate. Will get into
what climate is in a second, um, and one of
those is global warming. Also things like extreme weather events,
increased drought, increased temperatures, um, sea level rises, all these
things put together, that's climate change, right, or the results
of climate change, and global warming is one of them.

(04:26):
So global warming is climate change, but not all climate
change is global warming. It just wanted to make sure
we got that out of the way to begin with.
Like the square rectangle thing, which I can still never
keep straight well, and I think the what like every
square is not a rectangle but every rectangles square or
the reverse of that, whichever it is. I've never heard
that before. I even ace geometry the second time I

(04:48):
took it. It was clearly class that didn't care about squares. Yeah,
I guess not. I mean they always talked about rectangles,
but squares were never brought up. Yeah, I think it's
you know, I'm not going to take myself ahold there.
That's probably so global warming if you want just a
kind of a straight up definition is uh. The science

(05:10):
community defines it as this, and they should know. It's
a significant increase in the climatic temperature over a short,
relatively short period of time as a result of activities
of humans. And by increase in short, we're talking like
one degree celsius in a couple of hundred years. Is

(05:33):
global warming, right, Because the effects of climate are so
pronounced on such a like with just small incremental changes,
that that that that that is climate change, something that
if you just look at it on paper, you're like,
that's nothing. Who cares about one degree? Actually, the point

(05:54):
of global warming is that when you have these these
this increase in global temperatures, a whole basket of events
starts to take place. That's climate change. Like global warming
is related to climate change, right, it can trigger other
climate changes. That's right. And Uh, you hear a lot
of people talk about you hear a lot of numb

(06:14):
skulls talking about weather as if it is climate, like, uh,
a very harsh winter might come, and they'll say you
have global warming. Right, that's a great numb skull. Uh,
it's not the same thing. Whether is is local, it's
short term. Climate is long term. Um, it's not even

(06:34):
like the weather over a period of a year or
even a couple of years. We're talking about predictable, generally
predictable average weather conditions in a region over a long,
long period of time. So you can safely say in
Green Bay, Wisconsin, it is cold in the wintertime. That
is the climate of Green Bay and that Midwestern region

(06:57):
as a whole. Right, But if it snows in February
February of you know, next year, on a Tuesday, then
that's just the weather. Yeah. Or if it's snows in
Miami once, then that's not a reputation of what climate
change means. That is a weird anomaly and those happen. Yeah,

(07:20):
And um, this is a this is a grabster and
strickling code joint, by the way, So that's why it
popped off the page if you noticed. But um, one
of the things they wisely pick point out is what
you just said that, Yes, some some weather anomaly happens
like that, even if it happened three years in a row.
I think a lot of scientists would pay attention to

(07:41):
why it snowed in Miami three years in a row.
But if it went back to normal or something like
that like that, that that would not necessarily be climate change.
That's just a weird occurrence. Right. Climate change is this
this change in predictable changes, and that can take like
thousands and ten thousands of years sometimes most times under

(08:03):
natural circumstances. And here's where we come to the current
use for global warming. Right, global warming can can happen
by itself naturally. The Earth um basically as it in
its current present state, swings back and forth between glacial
periods and interglacial periods, so cool periods and warm periods,

(08:23):
And for an ice age to occur, um, the global
temperature only needs to drop by about five degrees celsius
on average, and all of a sudden we're in an
ice age. Right. Yeah, that doesn't mean the entire Earth
is a big round cube, round cube. Wow, that's like
a square rectangle, but not at all the same. Well,
you know when you go to a fancy cocktail bar
and they have those awesome round I want to say

(08:45):
ice cubes again, ice spheres. Uh, that's not what the
Earth looks like necessarily during an ice age. No, no, no,
it's just much cooler and like because it's cooler by
say five degrees celsius um. Like, a lot of stuff changes.
It's the same thing as global warming, but on the
opposite end, right, Like you have changes in migration patterns,

(09:09):
you have changes in habitat for animals. Some things go
extinct during the transition um, sea levels change, A lot
of stuff happens, right, So this is part of the
normal process of the Earth. But the Earth's kind of
got it, like, hey, hey, I've got this under control.
I don't need any help from you humans and I
when I do do this, this is the Earth talking

(09:31):
and first person. When I do change from a glacial
period to a warm period, it takes many tens and
tens of thousands of years. Right you humans here again,
this is still me, the Earth. You humans are really
messing with my program here and accelerating the process. And
you know what, I'll even give you a clue as

(09:53):
to what you're doing that's making it so bad carbon
dioxide emissions. Bam, said the Earth and dropped its microphone.
I walked away. Yeah, and then it went back and
picked up his mic and said, and maybe stop littering. Yeah,
and then it dropped the mic again. Yeh Uh. We
should talk a minute about a wonderful group called the
i p c C, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Yes,

(10:16):
a lot of very smart people there. Oh mann, Can
I just say it's to me, the i p c
C is one of the coolest things humanity has ever
come up with, because it's it's the world coming together
saying we've got a real problem on our hands. Let's
get our smartest people together and create a database here
of of good science. Yeah, and those people are specifically

(10:38):
about actually more scientists from around the world meeting together
in places like Paris, because why not, right. Uh, they
did this about ten years ago and came up with
a lot of um, well, sort of a lot of
distressing observations. Uh, we'll just tick through a few of

(10:58):
these um as far as timp trick goes, and um,
you know, like we said, like one degree celsias can
make a big swing, and what kind of changes we
see on the planet. Between nineteen o one and two
thousand the Earth warmed point six degrees. Uh so that's

(11:18):
if you if you adjust that to nineteen o six
to two thousand six, it climbs up to point seven
four degrees, So about three quarters of a degree in
temperature rise during that one year period, right, And there's
a lot. It is a lot. And so a lot
of people say, well, you guys just said the Earth
tends to do this on its own, maybe that's it. Well, actually, no,

(11:40):
there's a lot of science that the I p c
C Has been able to come up with that shows
pretty clearly that this is human cause stuff that's actually
creating this increase in temperature. And again it seems to
come back to carbon dioxide. Yeah. Should we took over
a few of these other observations, Yeah, for sure. Um

(12:01):
let me see, here's a good one. The ocean's temperature
has increased to at least depths of almost ten thousand
feet down. The oceans temperature has increased. Not a good thing,
because that's how um like, what glaciers tend to melt
is from underneath, that's right. What else? Uh, Westerly winds

(12:23):
have been growing stronger, droughts have become more intense, have
lasted longer, covered bigger swaths of land. Uh. What else
here Precipitation is increased in the Eastern America's, Northern Europe,
parts of Asia, but it's decreased elsewhere. Yeah, And that's
I mean, we'll get into this a little bit. A

(12:43):
little bit of global warming can mean longer growing and
better growing seasons in some parts of the world, but
devastating to other parts of the world. I guess I
let the cat out of the bag there, but we'll
go over that again later. Uh. And how how about
this on the warming trend of the last fifty years
is about double of the last one hundred years. So

(13:04):
what that means is the rate is increasing. The rate
of warming is increasing. Yeah, actually so the I think
the I p c C has determined that each of
the past forty years has been warmer than the average
temperature of the twentieth century, and that two thousand and
sixteen was the hottest year on record, and the twelve
warmest years on record have occurred since. Dude, you should

(13:29):
see the the UM we'll get into some of the
charts that that you can find. And again, like if
you're even remotely interested in this, like just go look
up the I P. C. C S stuff, and some
of it, like you you have to be a climatologist
to understand what in the name of God they're talking about.
But other stuff, if especially if you read like executive

(13:51):
summaries of studies and reports and stuff like that's meant
to for like a non scientists specifically often like policymaker
to read and understand, right, so the average person can
understand that UM. And they have some really great stuff
that's showing like all of the changes that the world
is going through thanks to these increases in the global temperature.

(14:14):
And again, some of the charts that they have are
just stunning when you see them, because it's like going
along fine, going along fine, everything's fine, and then oh
my god, what the hell just happened? Basically that was
the Industrial revolution? It was. But also one of the
things that they found recently, especially in the last like
three or four years, I believe, is that UM is

(14:37):
that I think you're like what you were saying, the
increase in global temperatures, but also again, the increasing carbon
dioxide UM has really shot up over the last like
fifty years, like from from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.
I think they usually start that about seventeen fifty two
maybe the latest up to like nineteen fi ft or

(15:00):
so in nineteen sixty, like there's a pretty surprising increase,
but it is just skyrocketed in the last like fifty
or sixty years. So um, they're they're seeing like this.
This the science is bearing out the the kind of
the general theory of global warming, which we should probably
talk about this this theory of global warming, right because

(15:21):
like we said, it's not just um human cause a
human cause mechanism, Like basically it's an already existing natural,
natural mechanism that basically keeps the earth nice and toasty
for um life and water keeps us from being Mars.
But we have we have started messing with it big

(15:43):
time because of our our contributions to this normal cycle. Yeah,
so should we talk about the greenhouse effect a little bit? Yeah,
the greenhouse effect is literally what keeps us from being Mars. Um.
It is a good thing when it occurs naturally because
as like you said, it keeps us on, you know,
it makes earth habitable and lovely and nice for the

(16:05):
last part, so they strickling in the grabster. I'm not
sure who came up with the car analogy, but it's
a pretty good one. If you go into your car
on a hot summer day and you get in, your
car's been sitting out the sun for a little while,
it's a lot hotter than it is outside. Um, it's
kind of a no brainer. But you might not have
thought about why that happens. Um, it's not magic. What's

(16:27):
happening is the the sun that's coming in through your
car windows gets absorbed by the interior of your car,
whether it's your seats or the dashboard or basically kind
of everything in the car absorbs that heat, and that
heat is then eventually emitted back out and radiated out
from the seats and things like that. But it's at

(16:50):
a different wavelength than that initial sunlight that came in,
so some of it might get back out of the window,
but most of it stays kind of trapped in that car.
So the end result of the net net, as they
would say in a corporate meeting, is that there's less
energy going out than than coming in. Right, So your
car is gonna get hotter. So pretend your car is

(17:12):
the planet Earth basically, which would be great, and the
windshield is the atmosphere, right. So, um, that's the greenhouse
effect in a nutshell as it as it relates to
the actual Earth. UM. About seventy of the solar energy
that is directed towards Earth right, stays on the planet, right,

(17:33):
And instead of being absorbed by car seats and floor
mats and stuff like that, it gets absorbed by the
ocean or land, or plants or you. Right. And so
about thirty percent of that stuff that that didn't make
it through it was reflected back by clouds, particles in

(17:54):
the atmosphere, a bunch of other stuff. Right. But as
you're sitting there getting warm by the sun, you actually
have the potential to re emit that heat, and so
that stuff starts to go back through the atmosphere out
of space. Some of that stuff makes it out into space,
but there are other particles that take that that um

(18:14):
solar energy, usually in the form of heat, and absorb it.
And when they absorb it, they re emit heat and
then they direct it back down to Earth and the
process continues. And in some of that some cases, some
of the stuff that they re emit, they end up
reabsorbing themselves, so that there is um more heat that's
being trapped and sustained on Earth than is being allowed

(18:37):
to escape back into space at any given time. Right
and again, um, this this is what this is like
a positive feedback cycle that that creates the atmosphere. It
also sustains the atmosphere. It also keeps water here on Earth. Um.
Because water tends to heat up and rise, but then

(18:58):
it will it will cool off in the atmosphere and
fall back down as precipitation. And as long as it
can fall back down in the atmosphere and nucleate around
some of these particles that are trapped in the atmosphere,
we've got water here on Earth, that's right. So it's
all thanks to the wonderful, glorious greenhouse effect. Yeah, so

(19:18):
that that feels like a good place to pause. Let
people let that soak in a minute, like a hot
sun on a black car seat, like a warm chutney
on your forehead. O God, And we'll be back a
little bit to talk about the these gases in the
atmosphere that we're talking about here. All right, So we're back.

(20:05):
I think everyone probably understands the greenhouse effect if you
remember your hot car. It's kind of a nice easy
way to think about it. So when you were explaining
the more like the Earth's version of that with uh
getting absorbed hitting things in the atmosphere, we're talking largely
about three things carbon dioxide, methane gas, actually four things, uh,

(20:31):
nitrous oxide, and water vapor. And there are a lot
of others, but as far as like stuff that that
really has the biggest impact on on global warming, it's
these guys. Yeah, so we'll start with CEO two excess.
So when you hear about most often carbon emissions gets
all all the glory in the headlines these days. Carbon

(20:52):
c O two is colorless. It's gas. It is a
byproduct of uh, the combustion of organic stuff. UH, and
it makes up a very small part of the Earth's
atmosphere point zero four percent. And most of it that's
up there was has been there for a long long time.
It's from uh volcanic activity. However, UH we are pumping

(21:14):
lots and lots of c O two additional c O
two UH. And remember there's a delicate balance going on
there as it is so like you said, Mother Earth
doesn't need us adding to this, and we have been
adding c O two like it's Gangbusters. Yeah. So like
that that you remember when I was talking about how
water water turns into vapor and rises and falls back down.

(21:35):
That's the rain cycle. There's also a carbon cycle where
carbon molecules just kind of go back and forth between
the atmosphere and the earth. And apparently every year two
hundred and thirty giga tons of carbon are released into
the atmosphere from the Earth, from plants, from rocks, from us,
and then about the same amount another two d and

(21:57):
thirty giga tons comes back down and it's locked into
Earth from the atmosphere. Right, And it's like you said, Chuck,
like a pretty pretty nice balanced the Earth that's got this,
Please don't mess with it. But when we take carbon
and unlock it from these carbon sinks, like you know,
we bust up rocks and mining operations, we burn fossil
fuels that have carbon locked into them. Um, we cut

(22:20):
down trees and burn those things as fuel that releases
more carbon and it messes up that delicate um pretty
much even exchange between the atmosphere and the earth. Yeah,
and that's a big problem because carbon has a knack
for absorbing infrared radiation, so that energy that escapes the atmosphere,
that that's the form that it comes in. So all

(22:42):
this extra CEO two means basically like your card, just
an overall increase in temperature, right, And and so not
only does it um absorb infrared heat and hang onto it,
it um it, there's a lot of it there. We
just finally, in the first time in the history of
the human race, all of humanity, not since the Industrial Revolution,

(23:05):
but ever since humans have been around the Earth reached
UM four hundred parts per million, meaning that out of
every million molecules that you just snatch out of the
air and count, you're gonna come up with four hundred
of those as carbon atoms, right, or carbon dioxide molecules.
So that's new. That's that's a big deal. And the

(23:28):
problem with that is is not just that there's a
lot of carbon dioxide in there, but it's like you said,
the more carbon dioxide there is, the more radiative heat
that comes back down to Earth that doesn't escape into space,
and the higher the global temperature gets. Yeah, and just
to into perspective, four hundred parts per million now, and
that's two thousand seventeen numbers, I guess. I think in

(23:51):
two thousand fifteen we hit four hundred and we're up
to like four hundred and four now. So that pre
Industrial Revolution was about out two d and eight parts
per million, So it has swelled by about a hundred
and twenty four parts per million since uh, the Industrial Revolution,
which is pretty staggering. Yeah, and there's apparently a way

(24:12):
that you can tell when you're actually measuring the carbon
dioxide molecules themselves where they came from and ones that
are introduced into the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels have
a specific signature that we can detect, and we have
seen that as the global temperature has increased and more

(24:32):
and more um carbon dioxide has been introduced into the
atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution, so too has the concentration
of that specific type of carbon dioxide. So there's a
strong correlation between the the fossil fuel burn carbon dioxide
that we humans have putting in the air with rising
global temperatures. All Right, moving on to nitrous oxide into

(24:57):
a which we did a whole podcast on this, right, Yeah,
that was a good one. That was a great one. Uh,
mainly because of that tank that we had here in
the in the studio, I know, like we're method podcasters.
That was that definitely enhanced the whole thing. So into
oh is another greenhouse gas super important, and we are
not releasing like human activity is not releasing nearly as

(25:20):
much as we are CEO two. But um n O
two or I'm sorry, into oh absorbs a lot more energy,
like two hundred and seventy times as much as CEO two.
So that makes it, uh something we really need to
pay attention to, and we are paying attention to it.
It just doesn't get all the headlines. No, it definitely doesn't,
just because there's so so much less of it, right

(25:42):
and um Whereas it takes like ten tens of thousands
of years for you know, the of any given carbon
dioxide emission to leave the atmosphere, it takes about a
hundred and fourteen years for a full emission of UM
nitrous oxide to leave the atmosphere. Yeah, as far as
man maid, it's uh. It is also a byproduct of
combustion and UM a lot of fertilizer, nitrogen fertilizer that

(26:06):
they use on crops as releases the in two oh
into the atmosphere as well. See to me, all you
have to do is like seed the atmosphere with a
bunch of hippies and let them huff all the nitrous
oxide right out of it. Problem solved because you've also
gotten Riddish concert in the sky. Exactly what else we
have methane? Methane is a big one, and this is

(26:28):
super overlooked, but I remember hearing about this when people
first started realizing, like, oh, that's a really big problem.
It's um. It's there's very little amount of it, whereas
like there's four hundred and four parts per million of
carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. These days we can measure
about one point seven parts per million of methane. But

(26:49):
it uh absorbs in amidst thermal energy like gang Busters
as well, um far more than C O two UM.
I think about twenty times more. And is there's a
lot of different places where it comes from. Like when
we um mind coal, it releases methane. When are ample
herds of livestock fart um, they release methane. No joke.

(27:14):
That's actually a huge contributor of greenhouse gases. Yeah, we
talked about that, like I feel like years ago in
another episode. Surely we have another one, Chuck, was do
you remember our plasma waste incineration episode? Well, remember one
of the things we talked about is that the average
landfill gives off methane UM. And that's a huge problem too.

(27:36):
So like if you go to a landfill and you
see that there's flames around it, they're actually burning that
stuff off because the CEO too it releases after it's burned,
is actually preferable in that case to the methane just
being allowed to escape. It is bad news. Um. And
there are scientists who have even posited that maybe, like

(27:58):
you know, tens and hundreds of thousand of years ago,
that large scale venting a methane into the atmosphere, like
if a if a big block of ice cracked open
and unlocked a big methane uh bubble from from under
the ocean, that could have caused like maybe a mass extinction,

(28:18):
like because it was released so quickly into the atmosphere. Yeah,
like like we're doing now basically, yeah, on a slower basis.
I don't think anyone's saying that's gonna happen, No, no,
I don't know. I don't know. I think like that
is a concern that as arctis Arctic ice melts, that
methane bubbles could be released, which would just be a
nightmare on top of a catastrophe. That's right. Um. There's

(28:40):
another problem with methane too, that in the atmosphere it
frequently converts to CEO two, so it just not only
contributes itself, it also contributes to the CEO two emission problem.
There's also Chuck another thing um called short lived climate
pollutants s l cps. They don't get a lot of

(29:00):
press either, but a lot of people think that if
we focused on these we could really see some real
results in the short term. Supposedly s l cps account
for something like thirty of global warming. But they are
um particles like black carbon. Methane counts as one of
them um hydro chlorofluora carbons um. And they can live

(29:27):
in the atmosphere from say like days two tens of
years and then they go away. Um. And if we
really cut down on some of those emissions, it would
we would see the effects of that very quickly. Wow. Yeah,
So speaking of effects, I guess we should kind of
talk about what this all could mean and does mean

(29:48):
and is meaning. Uh. Number one, we can talk a
little bit about sea level or sea levels UM. Glaciers
and ice shelves are melting all around the world and
losing large chunks of ice like this can accelerate this
warming because there's less of the Sun's energy. You know,
we talked earlier about it being reflected by ice sheets

(30:10):
and things like that these reflective surfaces. Less reflective surface
means less is getting reflected away. So just at like
the very base level, that's gonna be uh an increase
in temperature. Yes, Also, depending on where the glacier is UM,
it could contribute to UM two sea level increases too,

(30:31):
as we'll talk about. Yeah, I mean, we might as
well hit that, huh Okay, So if um One of
the things that I learned from this that I just
absolutely did not know but makes total sense is that
the Arctic sea ice, if it melts, it will contribute
zero to a sea level increase. Yeah. Interesting, I had
no idea, but it makes total sense because it turns

(30:53):
out that Arctic sea ice in particular floats on the sea,
so it's already in the sea and it's our already
contributed to the sea level rise. If anything, If that stuff,
if we went through an ice age and all that
stuff frozen into basically a frozen land mass, then you'd
see a sea level decrease. But the way it is
right now, there wouldn't be a sea level rise if

(31:14):
it melts completely. Um, there are other places around Earth
where the glaciers and ice caps are basically land masses,
and if they did melt, then you would see a
sea level rise just from that melted water. Right, Yeah,
I mean that we're talking about Antarctica there, and the
likelihood of Antarctica filling out is not great, which is good, Well,

(31:38):
not all of it, but there's certainly parts of it could,
yeah for sure. And then same with Greenland too. We
have Greenland's a problem because it is much closer to
the equator, so temperatures are higher there anyway, It's not
like negative thirty seven degrees on average like it is
an Antarctica. So I feel like I have to say
that so specifically are Yeah, and the other problem too

(32:03):
with um, with this this loss of ice, like people
might say like no, it's crazy, Like there's I see
plenty of glaciers there's still but if every season a
little more melts off then is replenished by snowfall in
the winter, you have a net loss of ice. And
then over time, if you look at it on a
scale of a decade or two decades or three decades,

(32:24):
that's a substantial amount of lost ice and that is
what increases the sea level that leads to sea level rise. Yeah, so,
as far as I p c c can is concerned,
they estimate that sea levels rose about little over six
and a half inches in the twentieth century. Uh. Doesn't

(32:46):
sound like much, but it is a lot. Like sea
level rise in low lying coastal areas can mean pretty
bad flooding at just mirror inches. Uh. They proposed that
if things continue to go this way, Uh, they could
rise by as much as almost two ft by the year.
And brother, if that happens, we're gonna have to redraw

(33:08):
the world map. That's true. I was looking, I was like,
how how high is Miami Beach. Miami Beach is apparently
just under four ft above sea level. New Orleans is
um like zero feet. I think it's it's maybe at
two ft. Basically, there's a lot of coastal city Singapore, Um,
I think Copenhagen, they're all they're all like very um,

(33:33):
very close to sea level or just slightly above sea level.
And so yeah, two ft rise. I know, the Maldives
is frequently mentioned as like being under real threat from
sea level rise. But if even if you don't necessarily
live in a coastal area that's two ft, you know,
just two ft above sea level, consider this. If the

(33:54):
sea level rose just six inches, like they were saying,
that means that when you have extre dream weather events
which go hand in hand with global warming and are
part of climate change, where it rains really hard and
there's more like more major flooding than before, then it's
already working with an extra six inches than any flood
that you've been used to before. So the floods are

(34:17):
much more extensive. And that's a really good example of
how interconnected this this the global climate system is where
if one thing gets messed up a little bit, it
has all these other widespread effects around the world on
on regions too. Yeah, because I think they found that
there are not necessarily more frequent uh like tropical storms

(34:37):
and hurricanes and things, but there they are becoming much
more intense, and that's that's the issue at hand. Yeah,
and that one in particular has to do with the
surface temperature of the oceans increasing as the temperature of
the world increases, because that's where those storms, hurricanes and
cyclones get their their energy from, is from the warm
surface of the sea. So if it's warm that that's

(35:00):
you'll see them like hit land and like loose steam.
And then when they go back over the ocean, they'll
start to like re gather their strength. That's because they're
over warm water again and that's where that's where they
get it all from. Yeah. Plus there is I don't
think we mentioned this yet about the density of water. No, no,
and I don't want to go anywhere near you take
this one. Well, very simply, water is most dense at

(35:25):
four degrease celsius. So that's it's kind of a homeostasis
of of where it needs to be. Anything above or
below that temperature and the density is going to decrease.
So the overall temperature of the water is going to
increase naturally and this is not like human cause, um,
but that will also cause the oceans to rise something
that's just a natural thing. Right, Well said all right

(35:49):
with market right there. I'm glad you mentioned that though,
because you don't see that really ever, Like no one
ever mentions like, oh yeah, water is just gonna expand
as it warms. You know, I've never thought about that
one anither cools, I think, right, yeah, or cool. It's
a weird weird thing, weird weird material. So let's take
another break and we'll get back to explaining why global

(36:12):
warming is a real pain, alright, Chuck. So we talked

(36:42):
about the ice caps melting, we talked about glaciers melting,
we talked about sea level rise. There's also I mean,
people are out there saying like that's great, but how
does it impact may human That's what I want to
know about. Well, there's tons of ways because as as
technologically clever as we humans are, we are extraordinarily dependent

(37:04):
on the earth. So as these this climate change happens
due to global warming, um, we're going to see all
sorts of problems. And we already are starting to see problems. Yeah.
So we did mention earlier that if you live in
a temperate area, if you've got like four kind of
lovely seasons, like let's say Atlanta, Georgia, for instance, you

(37:24):
may have a longer growing season, you might have a
bit more rain. It might be actually good for the
crops here in Georgia in some ways, but other parts
of the world, less temperate zones are gonna see big
temperature increases, way less rain and longer droughts, worst droughts,
bigger deserts. Uh, it's it's not going to be so

(37:45):
good for those places. No. They apparently have found that
every trillion tons of um c O two it contributed
to the atmosphere raises the global temperature average by about
through three quarters of a degree celsius. And then they
went and correlated that that um each one degree celsius

(38:06):
increase in temperature equals an evaporative increase of about seven
to here on planet Earth in the soil. Right, So
as temperatures increase, there's going to be um less water
in the soil, which affects crops and leads to things
like droughts and even desertification as well. But in Man,

(38:27):
every time I throw out one of these terms, I'm like,
we did an episode on that, with an episode on
that and droughts. Um. Yeah, we've been dancing around this
one for a while. We have. I'm glad we finally
tackled that. Man. You're doing great. By the way, well,
hold on, hold on. So is as the water evaporates
from the soiling, goes up and is locked into the atmosphere. Um. Again,

(38:48):
it's eventually going to come down, and when it does,
you're going to have far more severe flooding and precipitation
than you would have normally when it was just going up,
been coming down and going up and coming down like
on its normal cycle. So that's one way that it
can affect you. Because while it's turning to droughts, you
got wildfires. And then when the soil gets degraded and

(39:11):
there's suddenly a lot of rain, you've got flooding. And
people get carried away in their cars because they think
they can drive across a flowing river. Uh, that's not
funny at all, by the way, I guess not just
the way you put it was, um. So one of
the other devastating effects, and this one is UM kind
of tougher to predict because we've don't haven't really seen

(39:33):
what can happen with our living human eyeballs, but ecosystems, UM,
and I think we did, did we do own ecosystems
as a whole or just have we talked about it
forever and everything. I think it's just popped up in
so many of them. It seems like that. Yeah, we
definitely covered coral reefs and things like that. We're talking
about living ecosystems, and we all know they're very delicate,
and the delicate balance of the ecosystem is what makes

(39:56):
it worse. And we've talked to add nauseum over the
past nine years about how little, just little things can
happen in the ecosystem that will create this chain reaction.
It's all interconnected, and we don't know what might happen
in terms of global warming in our living ecosystem. Sure,

(40:16):
some animals might adapt, h some might move um, but
there would also be you know, massive amounts of extinction. Um.
Coral reefs are already dying. We're seeing that with our eyeballs.
Forests are dying off and turning to grassland. And it's
not just like, oh, well there they go. Uh, now

(40:37):
we have grassland instead of a forest. Let's make some
hochulis skirts again. It's just it's it's that that domino
effect that we're gonna see it's just no one knows
what it's going to mean in the end. It's really troubling. Yeah,
and I was, um, I was, I was like, well,
how are ecosystems interconnected? I know they are, but how

(40:59):
so I looked up an example and UM found salmon.
So salmon are born in like little streams and they
end up like traveling down into bigger streams than eventually
rivers and then estuaries, and then they actually go and
mature out in the ocean, which I hadn't really thought of,
and then when it's time for them to go breed,
they swim back upstream, back into the rivers, back in

(41:20):
back into the streams themselves. Actually they go back to
where they were born to breed and then die. And
as they're doing it, they're basically acting as nutrient transport
systems between all these different ecosystems each step of the way.
It's like a seed being scattered in the wind, Yeah,
very much so, but a see that can actually come
back home and bring all the nutrients that it gathered,

(41:41):
like out in the ocean back into its home ecosystem
where it was born. So it's pretty interesting. And I mean,
like that's just a great example. Let's just salmon, you know. So, Yeah,
the ecosystems are very much connected, so if something happens
with one, it's going to have an effect on all
the other ones. And like you said, some things will survive,
some things won't. But the the the thing that I

(42:03):
think most of us here on Earth are agreeing to
agree about is we should probably do something to stop
those extinctions as best we can, even if we'll probably survive,
you know. Yeah, And you know, we're this is a
very USA centric show for the most part. Exces's where
we're based. We try to think outside that, uh that

(42:25):
box as much as we can. And in the case
of global warming, it is the poorest nations of the
world are the ones that are going to be hit
the hardest. They're the ones in uh a lot of
times in the in the less temperate zones that are
going to be hit with more devastating uh crop loss.
But crop loss is going to be a big deal
all over the world. That already is um There's something

(42:47):
called the Carnegie Institution that estimates about five billion dollars
in crop losses per year due to global warming is
already going on right now, and farmers are seeing a
decrease of about forty million metric ton of wheat, barley, corn,
other cereal grains every year. So just one degree fahrenheit

(43:07):
an average temper of an increase could result in three
uh drop in crop yields. Right, So it's a it's
a global issue. Sure, some of the poorest nations might
be affected earliest in the worst, but it is going
to touch every nation. It definitely will. It doesn't necessarily
have to be the poorest nations. UM. It can be
the poorest people of rich nations, and it can be

(43:30):
people who are very rich who end up living in
areas that are hit like UM, Houston saw a lot
of increase in water borne illnesses because of the flooding
from Hurricane Harvey. UM. That's that's something that they otherwise
wouldn't have had to have dealt with. UM. There's there's
like that whole crop lost thing and starvation that it

(43:51):
leads to. Like, there's a lot of ways people can
be affected. And just like salmon like work, we're connected
to other people as well, even if they're on the
other side out of the world and you know we're
not really talking to them or don't really know them personally,
we're still connected to them. So if they suffer a
crop loss, it will affect us all, and if they
die of starvation, it ends up affecting us all. Yeah this, Um,

(44:14):
I really like this uh computer model thing? Did you
see that? Yes, that was pretty pretty cut and dry,
you know. Yes, So the I p c C. They
used a computer model and what they did was they
tried to simulate climate change. And what they found was
the only models, the only models that looked like today's

(44:35):
climate that equalled, hey, well, this looks like what's going
on today were models that included the human contribution to
global warming. When they did not plug in the human contribution,
the answer that it spit out was no, that climate
doesn't look like what's going on right now. So that
is basically proof that humans are contributing to this. Right

(45:00):
that combined with you know, the signature of the carbon
dioxide from fossil fuel burning, um, all that jazz. Yes,
you're like, and we should probably get to this part.
Like there's there's a um, there's a tendency among naysayers
to be like, you know, there's not even like scientific consensus.
They're not a percent certain that it's it's it's us

(45:23):
creating this global warming, right, And so science has really
kind of taking it upon itself in the last like
decade or so to address this and say, yes, that's true.
There's basically no such thing as settled science. But there
is so been so much like we've made it our
business to create and conduct so much research and study

(45:46):
all of this so closely over the last like ten
fift twenty years that we have basically come up with
a scientific consensus that basically, if you take any scientists
down the street, there was pretty close to a chance
that that person is going to say, yes, climate change
is real, Yes global warming is happening, and yes humans

(46:08):
are causing it, right, yeah, because they use words differently
than we use words. And you sent in this great
article certainty versus uncertainty colon understanding scientific terms about climate change.
You know, it's smart when there's a colon. Uh. And
for the average Joe or Jane walking around the street,
if you say the word uncertain, that means, well, you

(46:29):
just don't know. Scientists when they use the word uncertain,
they mean how well you might know something or not right.
So that's a big difference. It sounds like word games,
But there is no very rarely is there absolute certainty
in science. So their job is to research and research
and limit that uncertainty as much as possible. Now, and

(46:51):
that uncertainty and their public broadcasting of that uncertainty has
been used against him. It's been hijacked and used against
them to fight do doing anything about climate change. Right,
So so they have started to use especially UM. If
you go through like the I p c cs, like
policy maker executive summaries, everything that they're stating they will

(47:12):
put like how confident they are that what they what
they're they're saying is true. They have a structure to
that now, right, And so most of the stuff that
they're they're UM releasing as in their reports has something
like um a nine chance or greater of being correct.
So they call it like a very likely outcome or

(47:34):
a very high confidence. And I've even seen something called
an extremely high confidence which indicates or greater and then
the come on which is or greater. Yeah, so they're
the there are five points which they have quote very
high confidence end quote about or even greater, so at

(47:56):
least or greater certainty that the following he introduced warming
influences physical and biological systems everywhere. Sea levels are rising,
glaciers and perma frost are shrinking, oceans are becoming more acidic,
and ranges of plants and animals are shifting. So that's
between nine certainty on those things. Yeah, they also say

(48:18):
they're they're they're comfortable saying with certainty that the burning
of fossil fuels and the clearing of forests release carbon
dioxide into the atmosphere. They say, there's no uncertainty about that.
They also say that they've learned that carbon dioxide and
other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere trap heat through the
greenhouse effect. They say, again, there is no uncertainty about this,

(48:40):
and that the Earth is warming because these gases are
being released faster than they can be absorbed by natural processes.
And then they say it's very likely greater than probability
that human activities are the main reason for the world's
temperature increase in the past fifty years in particular. And
so they're they're saying, like, we are scientists, we're the

(49:00):
ones who are studying this. No, we're not a hot
We can't say with unequivocal certainty that this is the case.
But what really, people, what more do you need? Like
we have studied this so closely, we are so close
to certainty that that like, what's the problem here, Let's
just get on board. And there was actually a study

(49:22):
um done in two thousand seven by this economist um.
It made the news, uh, made the news cycle. His
name as Dr Peter Cigaris, and he basically said, if
you look at the cost of doing something and the
cost of doing nothing, statistically speaking, it makes way more

(49:44):
sense to take steps to mitigate climate change and be
wrong about the fact that it was us humans than
it would to take no steps at all, um and
be wrong about actually, no, it actually was us humans.
I mean, that's where I get. I don't want to
get too much on a soapbox, but I get angry

(50:05):
that there are people out there that say, well, you're
not there's that ten percent or less chance. So let's
just gamble humanity, the future of humankind on that ten
percent or less chance, because we don't want to get
with the program and get behind green initiatives because there's
a chance you're not certain. I just I don't know

(50:29):
that short sight, and it's just staggering to me. Well,
plus also that it's been proven. Um. I've mentioned that
book before, the merchants of doubt that think tanks have
been set up to basically influence public thought and point
out like scientists aren't certain, sciences are a hund percent certain,
and they're not looking out for you or the earth
or your family. They're looking out for their business interests.

(50:52):
Because it's the fossil fuel industry. They're they're they're the
ones who are who benefit the most from not taking
apps against climate change. Um. But even if you look
at um, some of the some of these fossil fuel
industry companies, UM, they they're they're like, no, we should
probably do something. We can figure this out. Even some

(51:13):
of them are saying this now. And as of two
thousand fourteen, So Chuck, speaking of two fourteen, there was
um uh something big that happened, the Paris Accords. Yes,
and in two thousand fourteen, I think a hundred and
nine countries came together and said, you know what, we're

(51:34):
going to do something. We're going to do everything we
can to keep the global average temperature from increasing two
degrees above normal two degrees celsius. I should say, because
that that was kind of a largely agreed upon tipping
point that there would be a lot more extreme weather,
sea level rise, we would feel the effects of climate
change from a two degree celsius increase in global temperature.

(51:58):
And so they took us really interesting approach where they said, Um,
instead of us coming up with a multi government group
that decrease stuff, we're going to just decentralize the whole thing.
And how about every country come up with what their
country can do on their own to fight to fight

(52:19):
um global warming, and then we'll bring them all together
and everybody will take a pledge and we'll go do it.
And it was hugely successful, like, out of a hundred
and nine countries, a hundred and sixty eight have ratified it.
And the US had had a pretty good plan as well. Um,
I think we were going to we were going to

(52:40):
pledge that we would reduce our climate emissions something like
by which would be a huge significant UM contribution to
fighting global warming. But we got pulled out of that one,
I think in in two thousand seventeen. It's correct. So now, um,

(53:01):
the rest of the world seems to be carrying on
without us, UH, fighting climate change through their own decentralized plans.
But that's where the United States stands right now. We
have said, um, we're not going to be taking part
in that. That's right. But that's not to say that
the citizens of the United States can't do everything they
can on their own in their own lives by doing

(53:22):
some of the following things. UM. First and foremost decreasing
our carbon footprint. UM. And I'm gonna put out a
call for us right now to go ahead and do
one soon ish on carbon offsets because we're a few
years into a few years down the road from when
carbon offsets first became a thing, and it's much more

(53:43):
understood now. Didn't we do one on those? I don't
think so we did. We've done them on stand Oh
I know what it was. We talked about that kind
of cap and trade scheme in the Acid Rain. Yeah, yeah,
we should do one a carbon offsets, so because they're
much better understood now and that you pretty clear now
like the best ways to go about doing something like that.

(54:04):
So we're not gonna cover it too much here, but uh,
you can buy carbon offsets look for future podcasts. Um.
But reducing your carbon footprint is the biggest thing I mean,
it's really simple. Um, the stuff that generates the greenhouse gases,
if we create less of it, that's a good thing.
So you're doing that on a local level can make
a big impact of a lot of people are doing that. Um.

(54:26):
Using less energy obviously is a just a sort of
a no brainer. UM. And it's just period in life,
like just being less wasteful, whether it's water or your
your lights that you're turning on, or riding your bike
instead of driving your car, like, all of that makes
a big difference. And but and with electricity in particular,

(54:47):
one thing we always mentioned, always mentioned is that even
though it seems like your light bulb is fine, it's
getting its power most likely from burning coal. So so
is that electric car it you bought. Yeah, and your
electric car is only as good as uh, the energy
that it's where it gets his energy from. Um. And

(55:10):
we can that's a whole rabbit hole into itself. Hybrids
and electric cars and how green they are. But um,
the research I did today roundly says that in the end,
a hybrid, an electric car is has a much smaller
carbon footprint than a combustion engine. And I know about
the batteries and I know where they get this stuff,

(55:32):
and this is considering all the costs that go into
making these cars and what happens these cars over the years.
There are a lot of smart people that put this
all together, and it's still a better option than you know,
a combustion gas engine. But that's you know, I'm not
here to say go out and get a hybrid or
electric car. That's up to you. Well, that that kind
of raises. One of the issues too, is like it

(55:55):
can be expensive to be eco friendly, you know, which
really sucks, but also save money though you yeah, in
the end, um, it's just the upfront costs are are
sometimes you know, greater, which is the problem for you know,
for people who can't afford like a more expensive car.
Is the same thing with like food, you know, like
the better your food, the more expensive it is, which

(56:16):
sucks too. Yeah, but you can use less energy in
your home and pay less of a energy bill. Yeah no, No,
there's plenty things things you can do, like it doesn't
cost anything to recycle, you know, yeah, exactly, and all
this stuff like recycling you think, well, I mean, I
know that's good because there's no trash, but no trash
means it's not going to that landfill, and that means

(56:36):
it's not releasing bad gases into the atmosphere. So this
all affects your carbon footprint, recycling to how long you
take a shower because you're using hot water and that
water has to be heated somehow. Yep. And I mean
if this has become like an issue for you, then
then make it one of the things you vote on
to like, vote for people who care about this, and
will um make sure that that regulations they're put into

(57:00):
place that fight climate change. It's a big one. There
are politicians out there that care very much about this. Yeah.
I remember after we pulled out of the Paris Accord,
like a few cities said we're still doing this. We're
gonna stick to it regardless. Um. Yeah, you can do it.
Your city can do it, other people can do it.
The rest of the world doing it except for Nicaragua

(57:24):
and Syria. I remember, correctly, you remember, Um, if you
want to know more about global warming, just step outside. Uh.
And since I said that, it's time for listener mate,
I'm gonna call this so smart. I don't get it.
But remember during the Buildering podcast, we've read a listener

(57:44):
mail about we asked why you get sleepy when you read? Yes, well,
we had a chiropractor right in and he says, he
is the answer. And I don't know if this is
right or not, but it's it certainly sounds good to me.
So is a chiropractor. And he studied UH functional neurology
in school, and he said, the answer is that when

(58:05):
you're reading, your eyes move laterally as they scan the page.
This involves the lateral rectus muscle of the eye, which
is innervated by the six cranial nerve the abductions. So
the abductions originates in the ponds in the brainstem. And
what happens is that as you activate this nerve through reading,

(58:27):
you also activate the ponto madullary reticular formation or p
m r F. One job of the PMF is to
dampen the sympathetic response of the intero medio lateral cell
column in the spinal cord, which activates the sympathetic nervous system.
In short reading, dampens the sympathetic response and relaxes you.

(58:51):
I think that's the takeaway. I hope you find this interesting.
Love your podcast, use a lot of your knowledge to UH.
You teach for Tribua Tuesday that my coworkers I play
at my clinic and that is from Dr Michael Hilton
in good old Washington, d C. Nice for the district.
Thanks Dr Michael the chiropractor from DC. That's right. Uh.

(59:15):
If you want to get in touch with us, like
Dr Michael did, you can tweet to us at josh
um Clark or s y s K podcast both me
and Chucker on Facebook, and you can go to our
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You can send us an email the Stuff podcast at
how stuff Works dot com and has always joined us

(59:35):
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