DISCUSS: Do you think it's getting warmer?

While I only own property in Alaska (don't live there year-round) and can only report on what I have encountered the few times I have been there, I will say the weather was not what I had expected. Last summer, it was 85 degrees, hot, and dry and this year it rained nearly every day and was in the 60s. After talking to some of the folks who have lived in the area for about 40 years, I am convinced the weather has been changing. They reported that temps used to get to -40 in the winter on a fairly regular basis, but now it rarely gets to -20. Climate is definitely wonky.

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8 October 4, 2006 - 4:15pm | tamelenjones

global warming

global warming=better than the alternative. our glaciers have been retreating for over one hundred years so how can you blame the industrial revolution or anything we do today as the cause of this warming trend. One volcano can equal mankinds btu output of the last thousand years and there are far more factors involved in the climate of earth that we do not understand at this time. Frankly global warming is perpetuated as an issue by people seeking funding.

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7 October 4, 2006 - 1:22pm | mike45

maybe - maybe not

Does the average Joe know how multi-decade thermal cycles affect the weather? ...no

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6 October 4, 2006 - 11:30am | alaskapat528

I want to know...

A few days ago there was an article re the earth's temperature a million years ago. Now I want to know just HOW they even begin to surmise what the temp was that long ago. Hardly credible now isn't it. Also, what happened that caused the Ice Age? Must have been the human race at that time too huh.

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5 October 4, 2006 - 11:15am | dave13

Do you think it's getting warmer?

Alaska weather seems to run in twenty year cycles. I don't think it is getting warmer. The weather was like this twenty years ago!

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4 October 4, 2006 - 9:45am | clare

The science says so

Not only do we have our own intuition to go on (why is it pouring rain in December?), the science overwhelmingly suggests that global warming is happening. I think there is about one scientist left who disagrees and it turns out, he got his funding from Exxon Mobile.

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3 October 4, 2006 - 9:24am | meshkin

Climate change

I am old enough to remember the time of global cooling in the middle '70s. Climate always changes. Crops used to grow in Greenland. We are now supposed to be coming out of an ice age. It should be warming.
There are many websites like these: http://epw.senate.gov/speechitem.cfm?party=rep&id=263759

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm

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2 October 4, 2006 - 9:08am | tkelley

Portage Glacier Retreat - 100 year difference

Last weekend I re-created a photo of Portage Glacier from about 100 years ago. Take a look at the two photos at the top of this web page and draw your own conclusion:

http://www.outlookalaska.com/PortagePhotoRecreate/

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1 October 4, 2006 - 8:21am | LutherH

i used to

i thought it was, then we had this summer. and then if next year it's even colder, will people rise up to support the polluting factories so that they can save us from an ice age?

it's always something, i don't want the end of the world to come b/c I use plastic bags at the grocery story, but maybe I've just seen it too many times to care anymore...

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DISCUSS: Do you think it's getting warmer?

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