Another definition of irony

Let me see if I understand this correctly, the experts who are predicting the climate change and how it will affect us in the future were not able to predict that the ice was much thicker today than they thought it was?

Propaganda:
"the entire North 'polarized' cap will disappear in 5 years" - Al Gore 2008

Reality:
Antarctic sea ice hit 35-year record high - Sep 2013
Arctic Ice Area Highest In Seven Years – Blows Away The Record For Ice Growth - Sep 2013

"The scientific reality is that on virtually every claim — from A-Z — the claims of the promoters of man-made climate fears are failing, and in many instances the claims are moving in the opposite direction. The global warming movement is suffering the scientific death of a thousand cuts." - Marc Morano testimony to the US Congress 5/13

(If you're into this sort of thing, I'd recommend reading Morano's written testimony)
http://www.climatedepot.com/2013/05/31/submitted-written-testimony-of-climate-depots-marc-morano-at-congressional-hearing-on-climate-change-the-origins-and-response-to-climate-change/

Come on Tony, it's Climate Change, the fact that there is so much ice is proof that the climate is changing,,,,, 

Have you been living under a rock?

If you're into this sort of thing, I'd recommend you not listen to Al Gore who's on the dire end of things or Marc Marano who's a political scientist who heads a climate change denial website getting funding from Exxon and Chevron.  His testimony is complete bunk - sentence after sentence of misinterpretation, cherry picking and selective omission - he makes Al Gore look like neutral and level headed. 

As for your so-called 'reality', it's nothing but more cherry picking and incorrect interpretations:

Antarctic sea ice hit 35-year record high - Sep 2013

"Antarctic sea ice has shown long term growth since satellites began measurements in 1979. This is an observation that has been often cited as proof against global warming. However, rarely is the question raised: why is Antarctic sea ice increasing? The implicit assumption is it must be cooling around Antarctica. This is decidedly not the case. In fact, the Southern Ocean has been warming faster than the rest of the world's oceans. Globally from 1955 to 1995, oceans have been warming at 0.1°C per decade. In contrast, the Southern Ocean has been warming at 0.17°C per decade. Not only is the Southern Ocean warming, it is warming faster than the global trend. (from here)

Figure 3: Surface air temperature over the ice-covered areas of the Southern Ocean (top).Sea ice extent, observed by satellite (bottom). (Zhang 2007)

If the Southern Ocean is warming, why is Antarctic sea ice increasing? There are several contributing factors. One is the drop in ozone levels over Antarctica. The hole in the ozone layer above the South Pole has caused cooling in the stratosphere (Gillet 2003). This strengthens the cyclonic winds that circle the Antarctic continent (Thompson 2002). The wind pushes sea ice around, creating areas of open water known as polynyas. More polynyas lead to increased sea ice production (Turner 2009).

Another contributor is changes in ocean circulation. The Southern Ocean consists of a layer of cold water near the surface and a layer of warmer water below. Water from the warmer layer rises up to the surface, melting sea ice. However, as air temperatures warm, the amount of rain and snowfall also increases. This freshens the surface waters, leading to a surface layer less dense than the saltier, warmer water below. The layers become more stratified and mix less. Less heat is transported upwards from the deeper, warmer layer. Hence less sea ice is melted (Zhang 2007). An increase in melting of Antarctic land ice will also contribute to the increased sea ice production (Bintanga et al. 2013).

In summary, Antarctic sea ice is a complex and unique phenomenon. The simplistic interpretation that it must be cooling around Antarctica is decidedly not the case. Warming is happening - how it affects specific regions is complicated."

And if you look at Antarctic land ice, it's decreasing to the tune of about 70 giga-tons per year (70,000,000,000 tons).  That's a lot, although somehow Marano forgot to mention it in his testimony.

Arctic Ice Area Highest In Seven Years – Blows Away The Record For Ice Growth - Sep 2013

The reason there was a record for ice growth is that last year blew away the record for smallest amount of ice extent ever - a return anywhere close to the overall trend of a decrease of 13% per year was going to be an 'improvement'.  But if you look at the overall trend, not some cherry picked and misinterpreted claims, arctic ice extent is unmistakably decreasing.

And not only that, if you actually care about what's happening instead of misrepresenting facts, the important metric for the arctic is ice volume, not ice extent.  Multi-year ice is much thicker and locks up much more water and most importantly hangs around much longer.  You can have a huge extent of ice area, but if it's all thin, single year ice that just froze that winter (low in volume), it will all melt away much more easily too next summer when it gets warm again.  And guess what, multi-year ice is disappearing and volume is decreasing at a high rate too.  If you think 'record ice growth' and the 'highest extent in 7 years' means everything is hunky dory Al Gore has an internet he'd like to sell you.

But.....I mean......what about the baby seals?

I mean, so I've heard.

Dang Nabbit!  I do loves me some SCIENCE. 

If the AGW scientists are so smart and able to predict the future 5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 years out, how is it that they weren't able to predict that the ice would be too thick to travel through right now?

I thought this was funny.....then I realized you might NOT have been joking.   You were joking, right?

I thought it was funny to but I wasn't joking.

Okay, fair enough.

I will ask in a different manner, if they can measure the Co2 in the atmosphere and tell how much is "man made" and draw conclusions which have forced Billions of dollars of regulations on our nation, shouldn't they be able to tell how thick the ice is they are trying to go through?

Just sayin

Okay, fair enough.

I will ask in a different manner, if they can measure the Co2 in the atmosphere and tell how much is "man made" and draw conclusions which have forced Billions of dollars of regulations on our nation, shouldn't they be able to tell how thick the ice is they are trying to go through?

Just sayin

Edited to Add,,,, Apparently the BT interweb gods thought this was worth repeating.

I get what you're saying - why should we believe scientists when they say the earth will be warmer in 50 years when they can't even predict the weather tomorrow?  I suppose I could point out the multiple lines of independent evidence, the many many many many physical changes we're already seeing and on on.  But if you're starting at the end (regulations bad!) and working backwards (no climate change means no need for regulations, so that must mean since regs are bad, there's no cc!!) than it probably won't matter what evidence there is.

I don't know what your source is for the billion of $ of regs climate change mitigation is putting on our nation, I've never heard that before, but I will point out that the science itself is neutral on it.  The atmosphere doesn't care how we reduce GHG concentrations, just that they go down.  That could be through regs or market forces or Exxon brand de-CO2'er.  If you ask just about any scientist they'll say they don't really care how GHGs go down (that's for the politicians to worry about), just that they go down - their conclusions that the earth is warming don't say anything about how to go about reducing emissions, just that they need to be reduced.  Sure regs or however we choose to deal with the problem will cost money, but what's left out is that inaction will cost money too.  It already is and you're paying for it right this second as a taxpayer, insurance buyer, etc.  And the longer we wait to take responsibility for our actions, not only will the costs be higher, but the mitigation  - the regulations / taxes / de-CO2er, however we finally decide to deal with it - needed to reduce GHGs to a safe level (let alone deal with the impacts) will be much more distasteful too.  If you don't like government involvement now just wait until we put off the problem for so long that our only option is huge government interventions.  That's what will be truly scary and that's the path the science tells us we're on.

Come ON, Drew!

Whats all these facts and science and research data.  Shucks! Next you'll be trying to convince folks the earth isn't really flat. 

I think you're thinking of primate change, not climate change.  You know, evolution.  Everyone knows Darwin was just in it for the grant money and the tiny finches which he used for the secret ingredient in Papa Darwin's Evolution Stew - now with carrots. 

No, I'm asking why I should believe someone can predict the future climate and that polar icecaps are deteriorating when they can't even tell how thick the ice is that they are trying to navigate through today. 

How thick the ice is today isn't a prediction of weather is it? 

Speaking of irony,,,,,, How long did the scientific community hold onto the earth is flat before finding out they were wrong?

Because they don't have to know the exact thickness of every square inch of polar ice coverage in order to measure the trend in overall ice coverage.   The same way they can talk to only 1500 people in a political poll and get a general sense of the political trends in the country.  

You can't tell how any one person will respond to the poll, but you can get a great idea about how a larger group will respond to the poll, on average.