Raiden

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPRd5GT0v0I

Last year "ranked as the warmest year on record, together with 2005 and 1998,"

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=8199849

Seems like it to me, especially when you also consider this statement:

"That exceeded 2005 levels by 0.01 C (0.02 F) and was 0.02 C (0.05 F) above the 1998 mark, but within a margin of error that made the difference between the three years statistically insignificant", according to the WMO.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8195495/debris...

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/breaking/7873...

It has been some time since I learned about this and it is something that I personally haven't seen shot down. From what I remember there were computer models which had detected a 'hotspot'. This was supposed to be proof that the current global warming was caused by humans. To provide actual emperical evidence of this some special weather balloons (which had thermometers) were used and it seemed many considered this to be the 'smoking gun'. I think they were also called radiosones or something but anyway it turned out no actual hotspot was found from these.

I had seen an attempt or two to try and discredit the findings but I thought they were poor. One of them was that 'we needed more/lacked data'. I found this quite laughable at the time really because the balloons were basically conclusive proof that one could see with their own eyes and even a layman could understand. While more data is important I didn't really hear about a whole lot being conducted (but that is natural considering I don't follow every single piece of the details). I recall something about using 'wind shear' as another method but I don't recall if they actually did find anything useful. I had also heard some people say that the thermometers were the true gauge to find this hotspot in the end because they are built to find temperature (and this hotspot) after all.

So basically my question is the following - has the hotspot been found and if it still hasn't then doesn't this deal a big blow to the theory of an anthropogenic cause to the current global warming?

I asked a similar question last time but felt the answers didn't really address what I was asking. Not only that but there was only four responses (with only two being useful). Anyway, if you want to read the contents then here it is:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=201001...

The talk seemed to focus on CO2 emissions or that we are able to account for volcanoes in the oceans but with no details on the big question....how? Perhaps I missed something in some of the articles I've been reviewing (in the previous question and others I've been looking at) but I don't believe so. Anyway (as stated in my previous question) I have heard over the years how we can barely explore our oceans. If this is the case then how do we know where all undersea volcanoes are?

From what I've read there seems to be alot of uncertainies and estimations with hard facts still being uncovered. Is there lacking data? Are many volcanoes unaccounted for? Do they know where they all are? How? It opens up interesting questions if there is unknowns. Apparently undersea ones don't have much atmospheric affect but IF there are many others that are unknown then the effect they have could possibly be alot more?

The reason I ask this is based on the debate between Ian Pilmer and George Monbiot. If you haven't seen it you can view here:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2009/12/15/277290...

The only thing that I want to focus on in this question is the discussion about volcanoes that occurred. Basically, Ian Pilmer had claimed there are undersea volcanoes that we don't account for (according to him - 85%) and George Monbiot (along with Tony Jones) say this isn't true because the US Geological Survey has apparently accounted for every single one of them.

I find myself sceptical of this because as far as I am aware (and have heard over the years) humans have barely explored the world oceans. There are many hurdles that we are yet to overcome and one big one that comes to my mind (among others) is....water pressure. Now basically, what I am saying is if this is still true to this day then how has the US Geological Survey been able to reach their conclusion?

The ocean is a big place and I am sure that it and volcanoes are fields that would take many years of study. So I ain't very knowledgeable on this which is why I am pretty much asking what method has the US Geological Survey used? Could it be/is it flawed? If it is then this opens up some interesting questions. But these are the problems I am having. What methods do they use? Are they able to detect every single undersea volcano without actually having to go under the water and deal with the problems associated with that?

I am a little out of date but as far as I know the only real knowledge we have on this is that they originally showed up on some Russian server for a short time. To be honest I seem to be getting the impression that the two extreme sides on the issue of Anthropogenic Global Warming (so called "alarmists" and "deniers") are more often than not choosing one of the possibilities I mentioned in my question that is more favourable to them and siding with that.

The more honest people that I see talking are saying that it is a possibility that it could be either and we shouldn't be jumping to conclusions. There are also other people who seem honest that say that a whistleblower WOULD be more likely BUT we can't know for sure and that hacking is a possibility. Even all the media coverage I have seen on this seems to state as an absolute fact it was the result of hacking the East Anglia university but never actually state the proof for this.

So in short, what is the REAL truth? Do we actually know the cause of the leakage? What evidence do you have?