Global Warming/Strange Weather Patterns

You are right about some things. As the polar ice caps melt, carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas, is released that was dissolved in the water before it originally froze. This is compounded by melting permafrost - as it warms, decomposition accelerates, releasing even more carbon dioxide. Also, nutrients are released from the decaying permafrost, which accelerate both decomposition rates and plant growth.A professor I once had, Dr. Schuur, recently co-led some research about this very subject. You can read an article about it here:http://www.napa.ufl.edu/2004news/arctictundra.htm

quote:

---

Peter Vitousek, a professor of biological sciences at Stanford University, said the research is important. It’s long been thought that global warming would have two opposing effects on arctic soils, he said. First, it would increase the breakdown of soil organic matter, releasing carbon dioxide (the major cause of warming) to the atmosphere -- but second, this breakdown of soil organic matter would liberate nutrients from the soil and enhance rates of plant growth, thereby removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

​

"This work demonstrated beautifully that there is another, even stronger, effect -- an increase in nutrients also enhances the breakdown or soil organic matter," he said. "Now we know that the overall effect of warming -- which is already with us, especially in the Arctic -- will be to release carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, enhancing the likelihood of further warming.

---

The Antarctic ice cap is melting. I think that some parts of it haven't melted yet, and they very well may be becoming thicker. The edges, however, are melting at an alarming rate.Here is a BBC article about it. A team of scientists working for the British Antarctic Survey has reported that the ice on the Antarctic peninsula is melting at a faster rate than before, and warmer waters are eroding the ice sheet at West Antarctica from below. The sea level worldwide is rising at a rate of about 2mm per year, and 15% of this increase is caused by melting Antarctic ice. Also, several large chunks of ice have broken off in recent years, including one the size of Long Island that was made the Astronomy Picture of the Day today.BBC NEWS | UK | Antarctic's ice 'melting faster' APOD: 2005 February 23 - Voyage of an Antarctic Iceberg

Of course its only a tiny portion of the polar cap, what do you expect? The whole thing to melt all at once? That much ice at any temperature would take a long time to melt, and much of Antarctica is still more than cold enough to be frozen.We know that glaciers are melting, and we know the sea level is rising slowly, and the climate has gotten slightly warmer and atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are rising. We also know that internal combustion, deforestation, and other processes produce greenhouse gases, and that these have been going on for over a hundred years, during which time, all these other things have occured. It seems reasonable to me to take precautions to ensure that we are not damaging the Earth's climate in ways that may negatively influence us.I admit that I don't know everything and no one does. But when a large amount of evidence accumulates, pointing to climate change, it is worth looking into.