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Grazza

Deadly Heatwave and Global Warming

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I've just read this, which puts a whole new slant on the recent spell of hot weather Europe has been experiencing. Someone recently mentioned a simple but significant fact to me: once the air temperature gets above the human body's normal temperature, it becomes extremely dangerous, and every extra degree becomes critical.

I have always considered the main danger associated with global warming to be that dramatic changes in the weather systems could be caused by a relatively small change in the average temperature (mathematically speaking, it is a chaotic system), and been exasperated when people just shrug off global warming, assuming that the only consequence will be an overall slight increase in temperatures.

However, recent events suggest that even non-catastrophic (I mean that in the mathematical sense) climate change can have deadly consequences. Perhaps the trend will be that whenever temperatures peak each summer, there will be a spate of deaths in countries where hitherto the temperatures have never had such extremes.

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Even up here in the North, the heat has been pretty bad this summer. At the peak, it was so hot that I had to shut the computer down during day time to prevent from overheating (yeah, my cooling sucks, but 30°C room temperature is hard to work around).

I haven't heard any reports of people dying, but it's definitely been troublesome for the infirm.

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If only hemp were legalized.. as it would become a much bigger cash crop than timber, and thus clear cutting would be a time waister more than anything else.

Edit: No, I don't smoke pot.

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Well, I've managed to stay inside nearly all summer. I live over in the midwest of the U.S. where the heat has been most unbearable this summer. To me it feels the same as it always has though. The temperatures over here have been about the same for a great while.

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Melfice said:

Well, I've managed to stay inside nearly all summer. I live over in the midwest of the U.S. where the heat has been most unbearable this summer. To me it feels the same as it always has though. The temperatures over here have been about the same for a great while.


Yeah, this place sucks.. I live in New England and it feels like Thailand outside.. and no Thai love houses in sight! If it's gonna be this hot, I want my god-damn Thai Love House.

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IT was pretty damn hot this summer, but I think that has passed. Last summer was pretty bad too. Combine that with the fact we had a hot Winter, and its kinda like having a year-long summer. Hell, last winter all the trees lost their leaves in December and started budding again the week after. Even they were confused.

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It's not been that bad over here in NC.....mainly because all it wants to do is rain and rain and rain, and then rain some more, but I suppose that can't be helped.

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Heh, you'd think rain would be nice over here. But when it stops and you go outside you feel like you're about to suffocate when you first walk outside because it turns so damned humid.

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I live in Europe and it has been pretty fucking hot lately. A lot of previous weather-records were broken. Today and yesterday were okay though. There's a lot of wind, so you hardly feel the sun burning at all. At nights the heat is frustrating, it makes it really hard for me to get some sleep.

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Hmm, I thought someone would point out the absurdity of the mention of my computer problem in the context of thousands of people dying :P

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It's fucking hot here too. Really fucking hot. I have a fan in the computer room, which I alternate between here and my room. My God, it's still unbearable.

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It's been raining almost constantly here, but the temperatures have generally been around the low 80s. I don't mind the rain, since I'd rather have a little too much rain than be in a drought like last year.

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The weather here doesn't know what it wants. If it's not raining it's searing hot. If it's not hot it's flooding... and hot.

We can all help to solve the problem by pitching in for a jumbo box of Midol for Mother nature.

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DooMBoy said:

It's not been that bad over here in NC.....mainly because all it wants to do is rain and rain and rain, and then rain some more, but I suppose that can't be helped.

Well that is how it is SUPPOSED to be here, but we havent had a good week-long rainstorm in about a year, I do believe. Just a shower or two every week if we're lucky. :/

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How many of you Europeans have air conditioning in your home or car? I haven't been back to Sweden for a while, but from what I know no one has AC in their home but most newer cars have it. I'm curious about how common AC is in other parts of Europe.

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No AC here, not in any of the cars either actually, despite that the newest one was purchased less than three years ago.

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It's really hot here, but last summer was shit, we had hardly any sunshine, was mostly rain.

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This, without a doubt, has been the strangest year ever for New Jersey. I'll start at September. Starts off normal, but stays warm through January. Then around February, a freakin' blizard! Snows consistently through May, then the fun begins in June. Alternating days of 60 degrees F to the next day, 90! Finally stabalizes in late June, 80-ish average temperature, sometimes springtime weather. Then towards middle-to-end July, rain, rain, and more rain! My backyard is littered with mushrooms (one was at least 9 inches wide), and now as of this week, average summer, verging on heat-wave temperature.

Heh, I may have gotten that wrong, it has been awhile, after all. :)

I don't really think global warming is that big a problem. Climates change naturally. Though I do agree that pollution isn't helping things. We definately need to move to hydrogen-fuel cell tech, ASAP.

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The weather is definitely getting more screwy. One day last week I had could have been described as a mini-hurricane in my part of the UK (my street became a river and a supermarket had part of it's roof cave in) but it was hot and sunny before and after it, whereas down south the record high temperature was being broken - 38ºC (100ºF) in some parts.

Grimm said:

Though I do agree that pollution isn't helping things. We definately need to move to hydrogen-fuel cell tech, ASAP.


Agreed, but there's one problem - the oil companies are invincible (if they collapse, so does the stock market and world economy), in control of the world and ruthlessly stifle any attempt to bring an alternative car engine onto the market. Hydrogen fuel cells have been around for decades - anyone wonder why no-one has made them cheaper to make and usable in cars, lorries etc. yet?

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On this side of the equator, this winter is colder this year then it was last year... but it's still warmer then it should be for this time of year.

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I read somewhere that global warming could counter-intuitively trigger a sort of ice age. I totally forget the idea behind it though... it had something to do with water current changing due to glacier melting or something I think.

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w M w said:

I read somewhere that global warming could counter-intuitively trigger a sort of ice age. I totally forget the idea behind it though... it had something to do with water current changing due to glacier melting or something I think.

Well on Futurama, they had global warming, but the nuclear winter cancelled it out.

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w M w said:

I read somewhere that global warming could counter-intuitively trigger a sort of ice age. I totally forget the idea behind it though... it had something to do with water current changing due to glacier melting or something I think.

The overall concept is that weather systems are chaotic in nature, and so a small change in conditions can trigger major changes in behaviour, and these changes could take just about any form: wetter, drier, a lot colder, a lot warmer, or just screw things around totally.

I'm not too sure about specific theories (though a quick Google search found, e.g., this), but one alarming idea is that the Gulf Stream might break down, with disastrous consequences for northern Europe.

It's always irritated me that it is called "Global Warming", since too many people just think "Oh, well, slap on a bit more sun creme". Instead, "Global Cocking-Up of the Weather System" would be a better term.

Another link.

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I know it's bad that people are dying from this 'heatwave', but we get these kinds of temperatures every summer. Tell them to stay away from here in summer.

It sucks, damned fluctuating environmental conditions.

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Heh, really haven't noticed any differences down here. Of course, I live in South Texas, around Brownsville, and we have the distinction of being one of the hottest areas of the country. I mean, hell, our summer consists of three months of higher than 100 degrees. Spring and fall are in the 80s and 90s, and winter occasionally the low (not high) will drop to the 40s. It really sucks, and the area is practically a desert on top of that. We never get any rain. I feel bad for the rest of the world, though.

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Agreed, but there's one problem - the oil companies are invincible (if they collapse, so does the stock market and world economy), in control of the world and ruthlessly stifle any attempt to bring an alternative car engine onto the market. Hydrogen fuel cells have been around for decades - anyone wonder why no-one has made them cheaper to make and usable in cars, lorries etc. yet?


Agreement//consensus. We've got a big freaking problem on our hands, a damnned if you do, damnned if you don't situation. The only way it could really be achieved is a slow introduction, and given the fucked-up nature of politics, even that's unlikely.

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the_Danarchist said:

Well on Futurama, they had global warming, but the nuclear winter cancelled it out.

Et tu dannyboy? heh.

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There are alternative fuel cars on the market. Part of the problem is they either won't work efficiently or it's just not cheap getting the fuel. Hydrogen would work decently if it was easy to get. It could be mined like natural gas but there's no infrastructure. If any of our scientist guys here (Alberta is a HUGE exporter of oil, gas and coal) have success extracting hydrogen from oil cheaply then we're set. There's also work on making no-emissions coal burning plants but that will take years.

The secret is to make everyone in cities take buses and avoid using air conditioners. It's not likely to happen though.

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here in Georgia, its been the same as it always has been. about 40-30 degrees in the winter (this last one was SHORT as hell tho), and about 90+ and humid as fuck in the summer.
its so humid here u could walk outside and drown breathing.

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