We have a cherry blossom tree. It bloomed a week earlier than last year. We’re not in Kyoto but I did notice and it’s a bit strange. I also noticed some other blossoming trees that typically bloom for about a week, went green after 3 days.
Longer periods can be called paleoclimate. As you may have noticed, most types of humans did not exist in previous climates, and we are unfamiliar with the conditions of those time periods, much less if we were to bring them upon ourselves in a period of time that isn't even capable of being shown on the chart you've chosen to use.
I'm just clarifying parent comment that "1200 years of data is climate" by saying that longer periods also are climate data. I could have posted a graph of the holocene as well (I don't know that it would materially change my point).
I made two points. The other was that we are in an ice age.
A better time range would be the average species lifespan of the plants and animals we eat. Too short a range highlights noise; too long a range highlights unrelated data.
Climate is also dimensional. Kyoto is a point. A point over time is a line, a line through a 3d set of data. That a single point is seeing an effect is interesting but not as significant as widespread changes. Only when multiple measurements create a 2d map of realtime data, which becomes a 3d bulk over time, should we draw conclusions. Sadly, that is also happening. But the later should be the topic of conversation, not a single very visible data point.
The single visible data point is interesting, as an illustration.
It doesn't prove climate change one way or the other, but that is a discussion that ceased to be meaningful decades ago. Climate change is real, it is significant, and it is caused by humans. Further arguments about that are a (deliberate) waste of time.
Having accepted that, and dismissed the time-wasters from the conversation, we can look around for things that we notice. One of them is the way it affects the times that trees bloom, giving us an opportunity to discuss the way that affects other aspects of the ecosystem.
That, in turn, helps inform conversation about just how important the consequences are. Unlike the fact of climate change, it's not obvious how much the consequences matter to us, and what should change to avoid them. That is a conversation worth having, but it has been impossible while we're still listening to people reciting decades-old falsehoods.
I had visited to see the cherry blossoms in 2017 and felt that we were going too early but actually made it for the peak. It’s scary how quickly the dates are shifting.
I wonder what impact the earlier blooms have on the trees over the coming years, as this does not seem to be natural.
A dataset curated by humans, spanning over a thousand years, is awe inspiring on its own. The first person to record their observation must have had no idea what they started. Are there others like this?
If only we had a plausible hypothesis that covered not only early blossoms in Kyoto, but hundreds of other observations in climate all in the direction of a rise in global temperature, be it in urbanized areas or in remote regions like Antarctica or glaciars... Damn scientist, they might be sleeping or something.
If these events where random noise then they would distribute in both sides of the climate models; We don’t observe that. Events only seem to match or be worse than expectations.
A 1,200 year time series.. that's definitely in the climate area.
Longer time series are indeed composed of many samples/anecdotes.
It doesn't prove climate change one way or the other, but that is a discussion that ceased to be meaningful decades ago. Climate change is real, it is significant, and it is caused by humans. Further arguments about that are a (deliberate) waste of time.
Having accepted that, and dismissed the time-wasters from the conversation, we can look around for things that we notice. One of them is the way it affects the times that trees bloom, giving us an opportunity to discuss the way that affects other aspects of the ecosystem.
That, in turn, helps inform conversation about just how important the consequences are. Unlike the fact of climate change, it's not obvious how much the consequences matter to us, and what should change to avoid them. That is a conversation worth having, but it has been impossible while we're still listening to people reciting decades-old falsehoods.
It was sad when I checked some time ago how many ancient Japanese companies have closed in tbe last 50 years.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47721771
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47811668
My average comment quality is pretty terrible, but these are on par.