General AGW discussion thread [Archive] - Page 2

William

2009-Jan-30, 03:42 PM

Something other than the well-known fact that drier regions get colder at night than those with higher humidity?

Yes, I am looking for evidence of a change in the troposphere which would reduce high level clouds. The effect of reduction in high level clouds would be increased cooling at night.

This is the news report which started the discussions. The region where the snow occurred is near a desert where the temperature can reach 50C.

One of the members of a climate forum - where this climate event has discussed - has a son in Iraq. His son said that the nights in Iraq were frigging cold and both soldiers and locals complained as to the severity of the cold. The locals noted that the cooling at night was not normal.

http://www.metimes.com/Politics/2009/01/25/uae_mountain_covered_in_rare_snow/afp/
January 25, 2009

DUBAI (AFP) A blanket of snow has covered a mountain in a part of the United Arab Emirates, a rare phenomenon for the desert Gulf country, according to local media report.

"Although limited snowfall was recorded on the mountain some years back, for the first time the peak of the mountain was fully covered in snow," it said.

Local authorities said temperatures plunged to minus 3 degrees Celsius (26.6 Fahrenheit) on Friday and again to below zero on Saturday, The National newspaper reported.

Major Said al-Yamahi of Ras al-Khaimah police told the newspaper that an area of five square kilometres (almost two square miles) was covered in snow.
The emirates of Abu Dhabi and Dubai also had heavy rains on Friday and Saturday, in a spell of rare chilly weather in a desert state where summer temperatures can reach 50 Celcius (122 Fahrenheit).

This is new.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jan/30/syria.israelandthepalestinians

Snow storm blankets Middle East January 30, 2009

In Jerusalem, dozens of people bundled up in warm clothing and played in the snow at Gan Sacher, the city's central park, where a snowman-building contest was planned.

The Israeli weather service said up to 20cm (8in) of snow had fallen in Jerusalem. More was expected tomorrow morning.

In Ramallah, residents were surprised to see snow when they woke up.
The storm disrupted power supplies in most Lebanese towns and villages, compounding existing power shortages. Portions of the Beirut-Damascus highway linking Lebanon with Syria were closed.

In Syria, temperatures dipped below freezing and snow blanketed the hills overlooking Damascus.

William

2009-Jan-30, 04:41 PM

As I said a single unusually cold year does not prove a trend, however trends and abrupt changes begin with an unusually cold year.

From a mechanism standpoint something must have changed to create the conditions for wide spread unusually cold weather phenomena.

January 29, 2009

More than a million wait in icy darkness across US

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Well over a million people shivered in ice-bound homes across the country Wednesday, waiting for warmer weather and for utility crews to restring power lines brought down by a storm that killed 23 as it took a snowy, icy journey from the Southern Plains to the East Coast....

But with temperatures plunging, utility officials warned that it could be mid-February before electricity is restored to some of the hardest-hit places. The worst of the power failures were in Kentucky, Arkansas and Ohio....

Just getting to their source was difficult for utility crews. Ice-encrusted tree limbs and power lines blocked glazed roads, and cracking limbs pierced the air like popping gunfire as they snapped.

On Wednesday night, President Barack Obama declared federal emergencies in Arkansas and Kentucky, clearing the way for the two states to receive federal aid.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090129/ap_on_re_us/winter_storm_46

And the winter of 2008 there was record snow although the winter of 2009 is colder.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/02/us/02snow.html

July 2, 2008 But huge amounts of snow still blanket the Northern Rockies high country, in part because of record snowfalls in Montana this year, so the opening will not take place until Wednesday, the latest on record by a day, except for World War II when the road was not plowed at all.

January, 2009
In the US Mid West there is roughly 4 feet of snow on the ground. High winds blow the snow filling in the roads. Snow plough operators must plough and re-plough the roads to maintain access. Deer move along the roads because the snow is too deep in the fields for them to travel.

jlhredshift

2009-Jan-30, 04:47 PM

There is an old saying us Midwesterner's have, I am originally from Illinois, "It's gotta warm up to snow."

Warren Platts

2009-Jan-30, 05:41 PM

lomiller1

2009-Jan-30, 05:51 PM

I find it interesting that two reports of human impact on the world climate during the Little Ice Age suggest that the sixteen million people in Latin America and the one hundred sixty three million people in Europe had such a huge effect. The five hundred million people in Asia and the one hundred or so million people in Africa and all the rest of the worlds population were doing what?

That’s a red herring. It’s not total population that changes climate it’s changes in population and changes in behavior. If you are going to hypothesize that Asia or Africa should have been having an impact as well you need to show changes in population patterns and how those changes impacted atmospheric CO2 levels. You haven’t given any evidence of either.

jlhredshift

2009-Jan-30, 05:58 PM

Interesting thread on the impact and the Younger Dryas. :) So what do think: the impact could have caused humans to die back. Slash and burn farming and game management would decline precipitously, reforestation would occur on a massive scale locking up CO2, thus eventually causing cooling even in the Antarctic.

They were not farmers of any scale. They were either living on the coast surviving primarily on a marine diet or they were nomadic and living the hunter gathering mode of existence. The onset was extremely rapid. There is little evidence of any large population at all. They were few and far between at the time of the "event". The Clovis people and 34 genre of mega fauna disappeared. Glaciers readvanced in places and receded in others. The few humans in North America had nothing to do with the onset or recovery, they were the victims of it, whatever it was.

lomiller1

2009-Jan-30, 06:05 PM

I will admit to any bias I might have about the younger Dryas, but I would like to see the same analysis applied to that climatic event as has been applied elsewhere in this thread excluding the theories of Firestone et al.

I’m not sure why you keep going back to that. No one has suggested we know everything there is to know about every climatic variation that has ever happened, nor is such an understanding required for scientists to have a high level of certainty about the causes of the current climate changes.

If you want some insight into the science and the debate around the Younger Dryas I suggest Realclimate. One thing to consider is that the Younger Dryas doesn’t seem to be a unique event, it’s part of a well documented string of similar events known as Dansgaard-Oeschger events.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/01/the-younger-dryas-comet-impact-hypothesis-gem-of-an-idea-or-fools-gold/

jlhredshift

2009-Jan-30, 06:20 PM

William

2009-Jan-30, 07:01 PM

I’m not sure why you keep going back to that. No one has suggested we know everything there is to know about every climatic variation that has ever happened, nor is such an understanding required for scientists to have a high level of certainty about the causes of the current climate changes.

If you want some insight into the science and the debate around the Younger Dryas I suggest Realclimate. One thing to consider is that the Younger Dryas doesn’t seem to be a unique event, it’s part of a well documented string of similar events known as Dansgaard-Oeschger events.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/01/the-younger-dryas-comet-impact-hypothesis-gem-of-an-idea-or-fools-gold/

lomiller1,
The cause of past cyclic abrupt climate change is not known. As Wally Broecker stated the discovery of abrupt climate change was a complete surprise to paleo climatologists.

Wally suggested changes to the North Atlantic drift current as a possible driver, however, detailed analysis indicates there are a number of events where there is not even correlation with a change to the North Atlantic drift current and the climate event. (There are cases in the past where there were massive injections of fresh water into the Atlantic and no change in climate and abrupt climate changes where there is no reason for the Atlantic drift current to have changed. In the case of the massive Younger Dryas climate change, the fresh water melt pulse occurred more than a thousand years before the Younger Dryas cooling. The planet remained cold after the Younger Dryas cooling event for a thousand years. There is no mechanism to keep the drift current off.)

A second problem with Wally's suggestion is there is no mechanism to force the drift current on or off during the glacial period. (i.e. There are no melt water pulses during the glacial phase. Also if you look at the cooling there are saw tooth drops, periods where the mechanism is blocked which clearly have nothing to do with the Atlantic Drift current.)

A third problem with the drift current suggested hypothesis (i.e. Data, analysis, and logic disproves the North Atlantic Drift current hypothesis) is that its affect on planetary climate is a factor of 10 less than what is required to create the abrupt climate changes.

Think of the temperature difference of the West and East Coast of North America. (West coast of North America is warmer than the East Coast of North America.) There is no North Atlantic Drift current to keep the West Coast of North America warm.

The prevailing west to east planetary winds (In the Northern Hemisphere) take the summer heat that is stored in the ocean which makes the West Coast of North America warmer than the East Coast of North America. That is the same reason why the UK and Europe is warmer than the East Coast of North America.

The glacial/interglacial cycle and the abrupt climate changes requires a massive planetary forcing mechanism. A massive external planetary forcing mechanism would explain the observations. (i.e. The massive external planetary temperature forcing mechanism causes the planet to warm and cool.)

William

2009-Feb-01, 04:26 AM

A fellow from Australia noted that there were exceptionally cold nights this summer, in Scoresby which is a suburb of Melbourne.

I see there were some local news reports of frozen water meters during the 2008 Australian winter.

Any comments from other Australians?

The very hot weather in Melbourne he said was due to North to South winds which brings hot dry air from the central Australian desert region. He noted that there is correlation with sunspot minimums and a desert high pressure which creates the hot North to South winds.

I believe last year the Australian Open tennis players complained about exceptionally cold nights during the tournament.

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/dwo/200901/html/IDCJDW3072.200901.shtml

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoresby,_Victoria

Scoresby, Suburb of Melbourne

This is the Melbourne data converted to Fahrenheit, minimum, maximum temperature per day, January 1st to 31, 2009

Jan.2009
____Min., Max.

1___52, 64
2___47, 63
3___38, 70
4___44, 84
5___50, 84
6___55, 88
7___60, 71
8___ 54, 67
9___ 45, 71
10__ 49, 79
11__ 55, 78
12__ 48, 77
13__ 54, 97
14__ 72, 94
15__ 59, 75
16__ 57, 68
17__ 55, 70
18__ 44, 82
19__ 51, 98
20__ 64, 104
21__ 56, 85
22__ 60, 95
23__ 48, 89
24__ 60, 73
25__ 46, 85
26__ 49, 81
27__ 57, 99
28__ 57, 109
29__ 85, 111
30__ 72, 110
31__ 67, 92

mugaliens

2009-Feb-02, 12:49 PM

There is an old saying us Midwesterner's have, I am originally from Illinois, "It's gotta warm up to snow."

That's because days which are very cold are the result of cold, dry, and clear (non-moisture-laden) air coming down from Canad in conjuction with high pressure systems. The clear skies allow what little heat is captured during the day to radiate back into space.

During moisture-laden low-pressure systems, however, the blanket holds in surface temps, and the convective activity that results mixes the moisture-laden air with cooler air, causing snow.

Thus, you Midwesterners are right! It does have to warm up to snow!

Stroller

2009-Feb-03, 07:53 AM

Clearly, along with a great many other things (http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm)
Record snows are caused by global warming. :)

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 12:30 PM

Clearly, along with a great many other things (http://www.numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm)
Record snows are caused by global warming. :)

Nice list. Did they include the kitchen sink or did I miss that.:lol:

To build ice sheets the weather pattern has to be conducive to northern snows.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 03:09 PM

They [Native Americans] were not farmers of any scale. They were either living on the coast surviving primarily on a marine diet or they were nomadic and living the hunter gathering mode of existence. . . .
Nevertheless, fire was a major tool used to Native Americans to clear land for a variety of reasons. A major population decline among the Clovis would have the same effect of causing reforestation and declines in CO2 levels as did the small pox epidemic during the Little Ice Age.

cf. Introduction to aboriginal fire use in North America (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5413/is_200007/ai_n21459640/pg_1?tag=content;col1) :)

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 03:44 PM

Nevertheless, fire was a major tool used to Native Americans to clear land for a variety of reasons. A major population decline among the Clovis would have the same effect of causing reforestation and declines in CO2 levels as did the small pox epidemic during the Little Ice Age.

cf. Introduction to aboriginal fire use in North America (http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5413/is_200007/ai_n21459640/pg_1?tag=content;col1) :)

For the last 2000 years there would have been adequate population to do substantial burning, but even then there were less than two million before 1750 and until the sixteenth century they had no horses.

Thirteen thousand years ago there was not a large population in North America. Evidence of the Clovis people is widespread and sparse and are not contemporaneous within human lifetimes in general. They did not have bows and arrows or horses. They were paleolithic hunter gatherers. They sometimes buried there dead with respect. It was a cooler drier climate conducive to Woolly Mammoth. No big tribes or settlements. I think that it is possible that wildfire was more of a threat than a tool. Any escape would be on foot.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 05:01 PM

For the last 2000 years there would have been adequate population to do substantial burning, but even then there were less than two million before 1750 and until the sixteenth century they had no horses.

Thirteen thousand years ago there was not a large population in North America. Evidence of the Clovis people is widespread and sparse and are not contemporaneous within human lifetimes in general. They did not have bows and arrows or horses. They were paleolithic hunter gatherers. They sometimes buried there dead with respect. It was a cooler drier climate conducive to Woolly Mammoth. No big tribes or settlements. I think that it is possible that wildfire was more of a threat than a tool. Any escape would be on foot.Tenochtitlan itself had about 2 million people: that's more than Paris or London at the time. Your estimate is off by at least an order of magnitude.

As for bows and arrows--you don't need a bow and arrow to start a fire. The same incentives for starting wildfires would have existed for the Clovis, as it did for modern Native Americans. They were paleolithic hunter gatherers (whose stone craftsmanship remains unmatched), but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see for oneself that fire = more grass = more game.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 05:14 PM

Tenochtitlan itself had about 2 million people: that's more than Paris or London at the time. Your estimate is off by at least an order of magnitude.

As for bows and arrows--you don't need a bow and arrow to start a fire. The same incentives for starting wildfires would have existed for the Clovis, as it did for modern Native Americans. They were paleolithic hunter gatherers (whose stone craftsmanship remains unmatched), but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see for oneself that fire = more grass = more game.

My bold

I'm sorry, I can't dispute your conjecture due to lack of evidence when it comes to the culture and thinking of the Clovis people.

Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenochtitlan)

The most common estimates put the population at over 200,000 people. One of the few comprehensive academic surveys of Mesoamerican city and town sizes arrived at a population of 212,500 living on 13.5 square kilometres,[4] although some popular sources put the number as high as 350,000.[5]

Edit to add: Tenochtitlan and the Clovis are seperated in time by ten thousand years.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 06:36 PM

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 07:04 PM

OK you win. It was 200,000 people in Tenochtitlan. Still, a widely repeated number is that the total number of Aztecs was 20 million. This wiki article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_history_of_American_indigenous_peoples# Depopulation_from_disease) says that perhaps there were 100 million people in the Americas before the arrival of European colonizers. You cut them down by 80%-90%, it's bound to have widespread ecological effects that will be felt by the atmospheric CO2 content.

My friend, it is not about winning. It is about learning and understanding and none of us know it all. As an unscientific survey I will mention that a kilometer of ice stood where we are standing (northeast Ohio) 20kya, whenever the subject of global warming comes up. Very few were aware of that fact. Some say, "well, that was a long time ago" and some say "that wasn't very long ago" and my niece (17) says "that's just crazy". Nowhere else in the course of day to day activities could I have a conversation about Tenochtitlan other than this board and people like you. Thank you.

You cut them down by 80%-90%, it's bound to have widespread ecological effects that will be felt by the atmospheric CO2 content.

Yeah, well, I don't know that, but since you are not putting hard numbers to it, maybe to some degree, that is unknown to me.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 08:13 PM

My friend, it is not about winning. It is about learning and understanding and none of us know it all. As an unscientific survey I will mention that a kilometer of ice stood where we are standing (northeast Ohio) 20kya, whenever the subject of global warming comes up. Very few were aware of that fact. Some say, "well, that was a long time ago" and some say "that wasn't very long ago" and my niece (17) says "that's just crazy". Nowhere else in the course of day to day activities could I have a conversation about Tenochtitlan other than this board and people like you. Thank you.It is hard to believe that much of the country was covered in ice year-round. A little less so for me--I grew up at the base of the terminal moraine of the Pinedale Glaciation in its type locality. Not hard to miss that! For the midwest, it's better to look at a map that shows the Ohio River. . . . People need to realize that ice ages have been the typical climate for the last couple of million years.

Be careful what you wish for! ;)

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 09:20 PM

It is hard to believe that much of the country was covered in ice year-round. A little less so for me--I grew up at the base of the terminal moraine of the Pinedale Glaciation in its type locality. Not hard to miss that! For the midwest, it's better to look at a map that shows the Ohio River. . . . People need to realize that ice ages have been the typical climate for the last couple of million years.

Be careful what you wish for! ;)

The chronology of the ice ages of the last 2mya or so is still fraught with uncertainties and debate. The total number of major advances and retreats have not been settled and the local variations are milieu. The causes are conjectured but certainly not worked out. To get a sense of the debate I would refer you to a Talk Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Timeline_of_glaciation#Disputed)page where this is partially being addressed as to the state of our knowledge. Several of the references therein are very enlightening.

An example would be that the terms Kansasian and Nebraskaian glaciations are archaic and are now referred to as pre-Illinoian and have been assigned up to seven stages. Humans have only existed in the ice age regime of this planet. The people living on Long Island New York have built their houses on a terminal moraine. Paleo Americans lived on an ocean shore west of Seattle that is now under four hundred plus feet of water.

(The following will get me burned at the stake) Finally, how anyone can wake up one morning and think "I want the climate to stay just like it is today and I'm going to make it happen" is beyond me. Do the best you can to be responsible to your children and neighbors(the whole world) and try not to step on any of Swift's frogs (metaphor).

mugaliens

2009-Feb-03, 10:09 PM

Paleo Americans lived on an ocean shore west of Seattle that is now under four hundred plus feet of water.

And look how utterly disasterous that global warming has been for us in this century! Death, disease, famine, runaway warming, massive starvation...

:think:

Waitaminute...

:shifty:

(The following will get me burned at the stake)

You, too?

Finally, how anyone can wake up one morning and think "I want the climate to stay just like it is today and I'm going to make it happen" is beyond me.

Yep.

Do the best you can to be responsible to your children and neighbors(the whole world).

Yep.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 10:12 PM

Don't forget Swift's frogs!!!!

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 10:13 PM

(The following will get me burned at the stake) Finally, how anyone can wake up one morning and think "I want the climate to stay just like it is today and I'm going to make it happen" is beyond me.
That is what we should strive for though! If the climate really is sensitive to CO2 and if humans really have been playing a 1st-order role in determining CO2 levels, then it really is possible for humans to control the global average temperature. That's why I'm skeptical of proposals to stop the growth of atmospheric CO2 levels. If we are otherwise in a natural cooling trend, stopping CO2 growth could set us on the fast track to the next ice age. :(

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 10:18 PM

That is what we should strive for though! If the climate really is sensitive to CO2 and if humans really have been playing a 1st-order role in determining CO2 levels, then it really is possible for humans to control the global average temperature. That's why I'm skeptical of proposals to stop the growth of atmospheric CO2 levels. If we are otherwise in a natural cooling trend, stopping CO2 growth could set us on the fast track to the next ice age. :(

Unless the cycle of glaciations has changed from 100ky back to 40ky cycle, we are still in the warming part of the cycle.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 10:23 PM

Yeah, but aren't the interglacial periods on the order of 104 years? It's been about that long since the last major ice age (Wisconsin/Pinedale).

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 10:26 PM

Yeah, but aren't the interglacial periods on the order of 104 years? It's been about that long since the last major ice age (Wisconsin/Pinedale).

That my friend is what we do not know for sure. Are the cycles regular enough to anticipate? Do we really understand all the parameters that interrelate?

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 10:36 PM

I agree. . . .

So when in doubt, what is the best course of action? Do nothing, or so I would think! :D

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 10:43 PM

I agree. . . .

So when in doubt, what is the best course of action? Do nothing, or so I would think! :D

There is a scene in ID4 when they are in the Mother ship and the aliens are opening the window. If the alein is a metaphor for government then Goldblum's line is what we should do.

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 10:51 PM

"Let's get outta here!"?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 10:52 PM

"Let's get outta here!"?

That's not bad, but no.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-03, 11:02 PM

That's not bad, but no.

Tried to find a youtube clip to no avail.

"HIDE"

Warren Platts

2009-Feb-03, 11:27 PM

"HIDE"

:lol:

mugaliens

2009-Feb-04, 09:56 PM

I thought it had something to do with "sending that thing right up..."

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-07, 05:26 AM

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-07, 06:48 AM

More fun with Inhofe's list of 650. It includes Erich Roeckner, a climate modeler at the Max Planck Institute who is on record as saying, "Humans have had a large one-of-a-kind influence on the climate... Weather situations in which extreme floods occur will increase," - Deutsche Welle in 2004. And "Our research pointed to rapid global warming and the shifting of climate zones," - ABC News in 2005.

Another shining example of incompetence/dishonesty, take your pick. I'll also mention that Inhofe can't seem to count as there are actually 604 names on his list of 650.

Stroller

2009-Feb-07, 12:10 PM

I don't think this link has been posted. This is to an article on a survey that found 97% of climatologists who regularly publish on climate change agree that human activity has had a significant effect on mean global temperature:

http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf
A few observations.

The question as put was:

2. Do you think human activity is a significant
contributing factor in changing
mean global temperatures?

The word 'significant' is not defined and could be taken to mean anything from 'measurable' to 'potentially catastrophic'.

It is notable that the survey was limited to earth scientists. Perhaps solar scientists and other contributors to the interdisciplinary enterprise of climatology could have been consulted too?

96% of respondants were from northern continental America.

The study states that 56% of the public believe climate change is influenced by humans. In the UK, the number is now below 50% according to latest surveys.

Another survey of the public provides some more insights into current attitudes here:

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/issues2/articles/23_fear_global_warming_will_end_world_soon

Gillianren

2009-Feb-07, 08:20 PM

The study states that 56% of the public believe climate change is influenced by humans. In the UK, the number is now below 50% according to latest surveys.

So? How many of them have access to and understanding of the same data climatologists are using?

mugaliens

2009-Feb-07, 10:38 PM

So? How many of them have access to and understanding of the same data climatologists are using?

The issue here is that the public generally tends to believe media-hyped information provided it's backed up by scientific studies and the scientific community as a whole.

The public's waning belief in AGW is due to two factors. First, it's no longer breaking news, so that effect on mass perception has seriously dwindled. Second, they're much more aware of both the dissent in the scientific community regarding AGW, as well as the fact that the pro-AGW camps continue to hype AGW with catastrophic/doomsday scenarios while minimizing either the credibility or the size of the dissent.

That's just bad science, and over time people will continue to sharpen their focus at seeing it for what it is, and the reverse will continue to happen: the credibility of the AGW camp will continue to diminish.

parejkoj

2009-Feb-08, 12:37 AM

mugaliens

2009-Feb-08, 01:23 AM

There is effectively zero dissent in the climate science community that the climate is warming and that anthropogenic greenhouse gasses are the primary driver of that warming. Period. End of story.

No. And restating that even more emphatically won't make it any more true.

If you want to claim that there is no consensus...

Why would I claim that? Of course there's a consensus, and the majority opinion is just as you stated. My point and that of many others is that's not the only consensus out there, as there are two camps.

I could understand why you believe there is no dissent if you've either never met the other side, or if you or others in your camp dismiss the dissenting opinion out of hand because it doesn't agree with yours - it's group dynamics 101. The That doesn't mean the outcome is the most correct.

Truths:

1. Global warming is real.

2. Human production of CO2 and other greenhouse gases has risen sharply over the last 100 years.

3. There is good correlation between our production of greenhouse gases and recent global warming.

But those aren't the only truths. There are others, presented on this board many times, and known and accepted in the other camp, the one you dismiss so heartily that you honestly believe "there is no dissent."

I've looked deeply (as deep as I can without having earned a degree in climatology) into both camps. But I do not believe, as many do, that "the truth lies somewhere in the middle." That's what's usually said by those who either have only scratched the surface, or those who are, for whatever reason, reluctant to take a stand for what's right.

What I believe about the issue isn't material to this thread (I've posted it elsewhere on this board many times). What's important is that I'm not only comfortable with my conclusions, having examined the claims from all camps (as there are several, not just two), but I'm keep a wide open mind, as the nature of science is that information is always being updated and consensus usually changes to keep up, albeit somewhat belatedly.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-08, 01:51 AM

My point and that of many others is that's not the only consensus out there, as there are two camps.

And one camp is 97 times bigger than the other.

http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

orionjim

2009-Feb-08, 04:45 AM

And one camp is 97 times bigger than the other.

http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

Let’s see…. They solicited 10,257 “Earth Scientists” and got 3,146 replies and their “Consensus” is based on this less than one third reply.

They didn’t even reach consensus among the selected 10,257 they started with!

I know you are going to tell me that they had consensus among the less than one third that replied, but what does that mean? What if only five replied, could you still claim consensus?

Using the logic these guys used I could just as easily conclude that the two thirds that didn’t reply are skeptical of manmade global warming.

And what about the rest of the scientific community? If you are claiming a scientific consensus wouldn’t you want other types of scientists involved?

You just made mugs point for him!

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-08, 06:31 AM

Hello Orionjim. I don't know what you are saying. Are you saying that you think that a disbelief in AGW is correlated with not particpating in surveys? If so, why do you think that?

Or are you saying that you don't think that surveys are a valid instrument for gathering information? For example do you think that the US Current Population Survey can't be used to determine if employment has risen or decreased?

Note that in none of my posts in this thread have I used the word consensus.

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 10:52 AM

Note that in none of my posts in this thread have I used the word consensus.

True, but you did say this:

This is (a link) to an article on a survey that found 97% of climatologists who regularly publish on climate change agree that human activity has had a significant effect on mean global temperature:

When more correctly you should have said:
This is (a link) to an article on a survey that found 97% of earth scientists who responded and who regularly publish on climate change agree that human activity has had a significant effect on mean global temperature.

Can you see why the bolded corrections might be important?

I think it is fairly likely that in the current academic climate, those who disagree with the theory of AGW keep their heads down to avoid difficulties over funding and tenure. It would appear possible that they are in the majority.

And as I pointed out earlier, excluding scientists from other disciplines relevant to the debate will skew the results too.

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 10:58 AM

So? How many of them have access to and understanding of the same data climatologists are using?

1) Since the study linked to by Ronald Brak saw fit to include the results of a survey of the general public, maybe you should direct your point to them.

2) Why should members of the public not be rightly skeptical of the claims of the AGW camp when their grandees say things like this?

"We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest."
- Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports

Clearly, when top climatologists advise their colleages to eschew the data and their scientific integrity in order to 'be effective' the public doesn't need access to the data to be able to see they are being conned.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-08, 11:07 AM

Can you see why the bolded corrections might be important?

No. Please explain why they might be important.

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 11:11 AM

No. Please explain why they might be important.

Try maintaining your span of attention long enough to read the two following sentences in my original reply.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-08, 11:24 AM

Try maintaining your span of attention long enough to read the two following sentences in my reply.

I still don't understand. Are you saying that climatologists will either lie or not respond to an anonymous survey because they believe it will affect their funding and or tenure? Are you saying that disbelief in AGW and and paronoia are correlated? Or are you saying that disbelief in AGW and lack of moral fibre are correlated? Or both?

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 11:41 AM

I still don't understand. Are you saying that climatologists will either lie or not respond to an anonymous survey because they believe it will affect their funding and or tenure? Are you saying that disbelief in AGW and and paronoia are correlated? Or are you saying that disbelief in AGW and lack of moral fibre are correlated? Or both?

Neither. Nothing which goes through a university network is anonymous. It is very observable that a significant number of academics and department chiefs 'come out' against AGW when they retire though, as Hansen's boss recently did:

"My own belief concerning anthropogenic climate change is that the models do not realistically simulate the climate system because there are many very important sub-grid scale processes that the models either replicate poorly or completely omit,” ... “Furthermore, some scientists have manipulated the observed data to justify their model results. In doing so, they neither explain what they have modified in the observations, nor explain how they did it. They have resisted making their work transparent so that it can be replicated independently by other scientists. This is clearly contrary to how science should be done." - Dr John S. Theon: former Chief of the Climate Processes Research Program at NASA Headquarters and former Chief of the Atmospheric Dynamics & Radiation Branch

On the issue of moral fibre, I await your response to the Schneider quote in my other post with interest.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-08, 12:03 PM

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 12:46 PM

Stoller, is the following correct?

1. You believe that surveys in a universtity can't be anonymous.

2. Doctor Theron who retired in 1994 was James Hanson's boss.

3. That a very large number, possibly a majority, of climate scientists do not believe in anthropgenic global warming but are keeping quiet because they are afraid that speaking up will affect their funding and or tenure.

Is all this correct?

No. You have misinterpreted/exaggerated parts of what I wrote. It's a common prelude to a straw man - pin the tail on the donkey manouvre though, so nice try.

1) All employees sign contracts stating that their use of the internet in their place of work can and will be monitored.

2)I don't know who Doctor Theron is, but the Dr John Theon I quoted says this about his relationship to Hansen:

“As Chief of several of NASA Headquarters’ programs (1982-94), an SES position, I was responsible for all weather and climate research in the entire agency, including the research work by James Hansen, Roy Spencer, Joanne Simpson, and several hundred other scientists at NASA field centers, in academia, and in the private sector who worked on climate research,” ... “This required a thorough understanding of the state of the science. I have kept up with climate science since retiring by reading books and journal articles,” ... "I was, in effect, Hansen’s supervisor because I had to justify his funding, allocate his resources, and evaluate his results,”

If I used the word 'boss' loosely, I hope the above clarifies the professional relationship between Theon and Hansen to your satisfaction.

3) I didn't speculate on the number, though as only ~30% of those polled responded, it would seem that logic dictates that it is at least a possibility that a majority of those polled disagreed, but didn't respond.

Now, since you have tried to set yourelf up as crossexamining lawyer with me in the dock, and I have played along by giving honest answers to your three questions, I'd like you to answer my three if you would like to play fair.

1) Do you think Stephen Schneider is advocating good scientific practice in the quote below:

"We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest."

2) Do you agree that Dr John S Theon was a very senior scientist, above Hansen in NASA's organisational structure, in a good position to have an excellent overview of the development of AGW theory and practice during his tenure. If not, why not?

3) Do you think online polls are more relevant to the debate about the correctness or otherwise of AGW theory than the scientific validity of the methodology and data practices of it's proponents? Corollary: Dr Theon makes some very strong statements in regard to this issue, what is your take on them?

the models do not realistically simulate the climate system because there are many very important sub-grid scale processes that the models either replicate poorly or completely omit,” ... “Furthermore, some scientists have manipulated the observed data to justify their model results. In doing so, they neither explain what they have modified in the observations, nor explain how they did it. They have resisted making their work transparent so that it can be replicated independently by other scientists. This is clearly contrary to how science should be done.

William

2009-Feb-08, 03:22 PM

What dissent?

There is effectively zero dissent in the climate science community that the climate is warming and that anthropogenic greenhouse gasses are the primary driver of that warming. Period. End of story.

1. Inhofe's (http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2008/12/how_many_inhofes_list_compared.php) list (http://www.thedailygreen.com/environmental-news/latest/inhofe-global-warming-deniers-scientists-46011008) is (http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2008/12/so_whos_on_inhofes_list_and_th.php) completely (http://greenfyre.wordpress.com/2008/12/14/inhofes-mauvais-blague/) dishonest (http://climateprogress.org/2008/01/16/more-on-the-laughable-padded-inhofe-400/) and meaningless.

2. There has been no valid response to Naomi Oreske's Science article on the consensus in the climate science community (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sci;306/5702/1686). If you want to claim that there is no consensus, you should be able to craft a useful response to her paper.

In reply to Parejkoj

“Super Global Warming Hypothesis”

Science is the discussion of observations and analysis. Stating that all righting thinking people believe “X” indicates that you have not read the papers which shows the “Super Global Warming” hypothesis is not correct.

There is not disagreement that there was warming in the 20th century. The disagreement is concerning the basic science and assumptions used in the climate models.

The models assume massive positive feedback to the 0.7C calculated direct warming due to a doubling of CO2 to achieve a predicted warming of 3C to 7C.

There are observations and analysis that shows there is negative feedback rather than positive feedback. 70% of the planet is covered with water. The planet’s response when it warms is to produce more clouds. If negative feed is used in the climate models rather than massive positive feedback the response to a doubling of CO2 is 0.5C to 0.7C, not 3C to 7C.

The second issue is that scientific analysis clearly shows life thrives with a warmer planet with more CO2. As the planet warms there is more not less precipitation.

To intelligently discuss these issues one needs to separate the issues of reducing consumption, over population, and creating and protecting wild life sanctuaries from increasing “CO2”. The objective is to protect the environment not to reduce CO2.

Increasing CO2 helps the environment.

The “Super Global Warming Hypothesis” is not support by the data or analysis.

Do Scientists disagree with the Super Global Warming Hypothesis?

Yes.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/01/27/james-hansens-former-nasa-supervisor-declares-himself-a-skeptic-says-hansen-embarrassed-nasa-was-never-muzzled/

orionjim

2009-Feb-08, 04:32 PM

Hello Orionjim. I don't know what you are saying. Are you saying that you think that a disbelief in AGW is correlated with not particpating in surveys? If so, why do you think that?
...

I don’t know why 70% of the people that received the survey did not respond, nor do you or do the people that sent out the survey. When you say that one camp is 97 times bigger than the other then you are implying you know that the 70% of the people that didn’t reply would have the same percentage response as those that did reply. I have no idea what gives you the right to make that claim.

Whatever gives you the right to make that claim should give me the right to make the opposite claim. And we both know that each others claim is nonsense.

...
Or are you saying that you don't think that surveys are a valid instrument for gathering information? For example do you think that the US Current Population Survey can't be used to determine if employment has risen or decreased?
...

No, surveys are valid if you take a random sample from a population and calculate error bars based on that sample size. But the sample taken in the study you referenced was not random. And to extrapolate results like you did to imply that these results fit the whole is wrong.

...
Note that in none of my posts in this thread have I used the word consensus.

The title of the link you posted in #281 was:
Examining the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change

parejkoj

2009-Feb-08, 07:44 PM

More on disagreement within the climate science community and "Heresy." (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/01/consensus-as-the-new-heresy/#more-386) More on the problem of "Climate Porn" in the media. (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/08/the-missing-repertoire/)

Gavin on John Theon's comments (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/01/warm-reception-to-antarctic-warming-story/#comment-110819).

Following the mainstream media's (or even the blogosphere's) coverage of climate science, and following the peer-reviewed science are different things. This is true for all topics in science. If there really is some "other camp," then why aren't they publishing in the peer-reviewed literature?

Also, anyone who claims that climate scientists would "keep quiet" about their disagreement with the consensus view out of some kind of fear have no idea how academia works.

chrissy

2009-Feb-08, 07:58 PM

Try maintaining your span of attention long enough to read the two following sentences in my original reply.

Please use a bit more civil decorum Stroller when replying to other members.

chrissy

Stroller

2009-Feb-08, 08:30 PM

Willdo, sorry about that Ronald.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-08, 11:31 PM

No. Please explain why they might be important.

The statistical term for it is "cherry picking (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherry_picking)," and it's a source of bias in the sample (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biased_sample).

When I first learned how to use statistics, I thought scientists would be better at it than anyone, as it's so critical to obtaining accurate results. As the years passed, I saw that scientists are generally pretty good with statistics, but their ability tends to vary, occasionally quite a lot, and unfortunately, sometimes well into negative territory. Most people aren't even aware when they misuse statistics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misuse_of_statistics).

Just as spotlighting is "fallacious since the mere fact that someone or something attracts the most attention or coverage in the media does not mean that it automatically represents the whole population," "Cherry picking is the act of pointing at individual cases or data that seem to confirm a particular position, while ignoring a significant portion of related cases or data that may contradict that position.."

Thus, when only a third of the people to whom a survey is sent respond, and you report the results as "97% of respondants attest to X," you're also saying, without actually saying it, that the other 2/3 rds of those solicited who did not respond might have responses which range from nearly identical to almost totally opposed.

In other words, you don't know. You don't know because they didn't respond.

Thus, it's fallacious to throw around a figure of 97% as if it represented all climatologists when it most certainly does not.

All you can say from what you do know (1/3rd responded, and 97% of those responders support the hypothesis) is that the total response ranged from 32.33% to 99.00%.

Now - one can infer some reasonable assumptions based on what we do know. For example, we can infer that if everyone had responded, the figure would have been closer to 97% than 32.33%. But we can also infer from the reasonable assumption that the response rate would have been higher among those who were more interested, perhaps "passionate," about AGW, and thus the total response rate would have been somewhat less, perhaps significantly less, than 97%.

If the response rate had been 100%, I'd have to say the response agreeing with AGW would have been closer to 80%.

But again, that's just an intelligent guess based upon what is known. I'm willing to bet it's closer to the truth than the 97% figure arrived at through the incorrect use of statistics.

parejkoj

2009-Feb-09, 12:55 AM

Again, where are these climate scientists who disagree with the IPCC report publishing?

William

2009-Feb-09, 01:50 AM

Again, where are these climate scientists who disagree with the IPCC report publishing?

Here are a few of papers that challenge the "Super Global Warming Hypothesis". As I said, the science indicates that the majority of the 20th century warming was not due to CO2 and that CO2 warming from a doubling of CO2 levels from the 280 ppm base will be 0.5C to 0.7C, not 3C to 7C.

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0477(2001)082%3C0417%3ADTEHAA%3E2.3.CO%3B2&ct=1

Does the Earth Have an Adaptive Infrared Iris?
Richard Lindzen, Ming-Dah Chou, and Arthur Y. Hou

The calculations show that such a change in the Tropics could lead to a negative feedback in the global climate, with a feedback factor of about –1.1, which if correct, would more than cancel all the positive feedbacks in the more sensitive current climate models. Even if regions of high humidity were not coupled to cloudiness, the feedback factor due to the clouds alone would still amount to about –0.45, which would cancel model water vapor feedback in almost all models. This new mechanism would, in effect, constitute an adaptive infrared iris that opens and closes in order to control the Outgoing Longwave Radiation in response to changes in surface temperature in a manner similar to the way in which an eye's iris opens and closes in response to changing light levels. Not surprisingly, for upper–level clouds, their infrared effect dominates their shortwave effect. Preliminary attempts to replicate observations with GCMs suggest that models lack such a negative cloud/moist areal feedback.

http://icecap.us/images/uploads/DOUGLASPAPER.pdf

A comparison of tropical temperature trends with model predictions by D. Douglass, J. Christy, B. Pearson, and S. Singer

We have tested the proposition that greenhouse model simulations and trend observations can be reconciled. Our conclusion is that the present evidence, with the application of a robust statistical test, supports rejection of this proposition. (The use of tropical tropospheric temperature trends as a metric for this test is important, as this region represents the CEL and provides a clear signature of the trajectory of the climate system under enhanced greenhouse forcing.) On the whole, the evidence indicates that model trends in the troposphere are very likely inconsistent with observations that indicate that, since 1979, there is no significant long-term amplification factor relative to the surface.

http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapacity.pdf

Heat Capacity, Time Constant, and Sensitivity of Earth’s Climate System by Stephen Schwartz

The equilibrium sensitivity of Earth's climate is determined as the quotient of the relaxation time constant of the system and the pertinent global heat capacity. The heat capacity of the global ocean, obtained from regression of ocean heat content vs. global mean surface temperature, GMST, is 14 ± 6 W yr m-2 K-1, equivalent to 110 m of ocean water; other sinks raise the effective planetary heat capacity to 17 ± 7 W yr m-2 K-1 (all uncertainties are 1-sigma estimates). The time constant pertinent to changes in GMST is determined from autocorrelation of that quantity over 1880-2004 to be 5 ± 1 yr. The resultant equilibrium climate sensitivity, 0.30 ± 0.14 K/(W m-2), corresponds to an equilibrium temperature increase for doubled CO2 of 1.1 ± 0.5 K. The short time constant implies that GMST is in near equilibrium with applied forcings and hence that net climate forcing over the twentieth century can be obtained from the observed temperature increase over this period, 0.57 ± 0.08 K, as 1.9 ± 0.9 W m-2. For this forcing considered the sum of radiative forcing by incremental greenhouse gases, 2.2 ± 0.3 W m-2, and other forcings, other forcing agents, mainly incremental tropospheric aerosols, are inferred to have exerted only a slight forcing over the twentieth century of -0.3 ± 1.0 W m-2.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-09, 02:44 AM

Hi Stoller

No. You have misinterpreted/exaggerated parts of what I wrote. It's a common prelude to a straw man - pin the tail on the donkey manouvre though, so nice try.

1) All employees sign contracts stating that their use of the internet in their place of work can and will be monitored.

So you think that universities monitor staff emails in order to find their position on global warming and this information then affects tenure and funding decisions? How do universities go about this? Even with automation it would be a big job and it would need qualified people to go through the emails that the automated system flagged in order to evaluate them. Universities around here at least just don't have the funding or staff assigned for this task. And I don't understand who would be doing this and what would be their motivation? Would it be the administration staff? The Dean? Universities generally have a lot of departments and I find it hard to believe they'd want to put all this effort into monitoring and forcing compliance on one issue. And then there's the whole ethical and legal issues. And just how would this information enter into tenure and funding decisions? I don't understand at which point information from spied on emails would enter the process. I just find this whole idea unbelievable.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-09, 02:51 AM

Gillianren

2009-Feb-09, 05:38 AM

Stroller

2009-Feb-09, 12:31 PM

Hi Stoller

So you think that universities monitor staff emails

I simply pointed out that everyones contract includes a statement that their internet use can and will be monitored. Nothing more, nothing less.

I'd be really grateful if you'd stop telling me what I think and answer the questions I put in return for answering yours. Otherwise some observers (including me) might think you were just avoiding the substantive issues with obfuscation and nitpicking.

It'd be nice if you'd take the trouble to get my login name right too.

Thanks

Stroller

2009-Feb-09, 12:38 PM

I'm confused. Under the last administration, the government didn't want to acknowledge AGW. Wouldn't there have been more grant money available from the US government, at least, for those denying it? And it's not as though you can deny tenure to someone who already has it, which I'm sure quite a lot of people in related fields have. So what's the problem with coming forward and saying it isn't real in that, well, climate?

No need for govt grants, as every alarmist knows, climate skeptics are well paid by BIG OIL. (http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=5180)

In fact, there are a lot of pre-eminent scientists in very high positions at academic and other scientific institutions who disagree with AGW theory, and say so. After the death threats recieved by Tim Ball (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1545134/Scientists-threatened-for-%27climate-denial%27.html), there are many others who avoid the hassle.

Stroller

2009-Feb-09, 12:56 PM

Orionjim, Mugaliens, I understand that I can't say that one camp is 97 times larger than the other. I was just attempting to draw attention to the apparent size difference between the two "camps." I should that said something along the lines of, "According to this survey, one camp is apparently 97 times larger."
You still don't seem to get the point that since only ~30% responded, you can't draw any such conclusion. In any case, the way you get from '97% of those who responded' to 'this camp is 97 times larger than that camp' demonstrates that you have a poor understanding of the most basic arithmetic, let alone statistics.

In fact it's worse than this. On revisiting the paper, I note that the 97% figure only applies to a tiny subset of those polled (75 people, those who listed climate science as their area of expertise and who also have published more than 50% of their recent peer-reviewed papers on the subject of climate change and who responded affirmatively to question 2). Not only can you not do the math, you can't even correctly read the data.

You are Michael Mann and I claim my five free dendrochronologies.

I will further admit that I got the 97 times figure just from eyeballing the graph. If someone wants they can put a ruler against their computer screen and come up with a better figure.
To repeat your own phrase, this statement seems to be "eminently mockable".

In deference to Chrissy, I'll resist. :silenced:

Gillianren

2009-Feb-09, 06:21 PM

In fact, there are a lot of pre-eminent scientists in very high positions at academic and other scientific institutions who disagree with AGW theory, and say so. After the death threats recieved by Tim Ball (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1545134/Scientists-threatened-for-%27climate-denial%27.html), there are many others who avoid the hassle.

You know, I'd like some evidence about those death threats. I'd also like some evidence that those scientists are in relevant fields--as has no doubt been mentioned, creationists pull up lists of "pre-eminent scientists" who don't agree with evolution, too, and we all know how valid they are.

Further, that first site you linked to went on about governmental insistence that we accept AGW, which you should know was not the case in the US for eight years.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-09, 08:18 PM

You know, I'd like some evidence about those death threats. I'd also like some evidence that those scientists are in relevant fields--as has no doubt been mentioned, creationists pull up lists of "pre-eminent scientists" who don't agree with evolution, too, and we all know how valid they are.

Further, that first site you linked to went on about governmental insistence that we accept AGW, which you should know was not the case in the US for eight years.

My bold. So it is now?

I am uncomfortable anytime there is "governmental insistence that we accept" any idea and particularly if it is used as a justification for social change to give the government more power over peoples' lives when the science is suggestive but not conclusive.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-09, 09:25 PM

My bold. So it is now?

So far as I know, the current administration plans to listen to scientists, not lobbyists, on the subject. However, so far as I know, the current administration does not yet have an official policy regarding AGW.

I am uncomfortable anytime there is "governmental insistence that we accept" any idea and particularly if it is used as a justification for social change to give the government more power over peoples' lives when the science is suggestive but not conclusive.

Science is never conclusive. We know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. We know we're putting an awful lot of it into the atmosphere. Doesn't it simply make sense to not do that so much?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-09, 09:47 PM

Science is never conclusive. We know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. We know we're putting an awful lot of it into the atmosphere. Doesn't it simply make sense to not do that so much?

Currently, you have that choice for you. No, it does not make sense, simply. Maybe it would make sense simply, to force all residents within one hundred miles of an active volcanoe to relocate. (rhetorical statement)

Gillianren

2009-Feb-09, 09:56 PM

No, it does not make sense, simply.

Why not?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-09, 10:00 PM

Why not?

For the same reason that:

Maybe it would make sense simply, to force all residents within one hundred miles of an active volcanoe to relocate. (rhetorical statement)

doesn't make sense, simply.

dgavin

2009-Feb-09, 10:02 PM

Currently, you have that choice for you. No, it does not make sense, simply. Maybe it would make sense simply, to force all residents within one hundred miles of an active volcanoe to relocate. (rhetorical statement)

There is a big difference between not forcing people to evacuate a volcano, where the damage is localized, then there is in continuing to pump out a known green house gas without restraints.

And then being in denail about it's effects since the 1970's. . .even though many the predications that came out of the theory made back then have happened.

Stroller

2009-Feb-09, 10:13 PM

You know, I'd like some evidence about those death threats. I'd also like some evidence that those scientists are in relevant fields

Well I know I'm not going to be the one emailing Tim Ball on that particular issue. Why doon't you ask him for proof seeing as you are the one doubting his word.

Relevant fields: well, climate science is pretty interdisciplinary. It's also pretty new, 'climatologist' isn't in most dictionaries yet.

Sorry for the big list, but here's a few of the scientists:

Dr. Edward Wegman--former chairman of the Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics of the National Academy of Sciences--demolishes the famous "hockey stick" graph that launched the global warming panic.

Dr. David Bromwich--president of the International Commission on Polar Meteorology--says "it's hard to see a global warming signal from the mainland of Antarctica right now."

Prof. Paul Reiter--Chief of Insects and Infectious Diseases at the famed Pasteur Institute--says "no major scientist with any long record in this field" accepts Al Gore's claim that global warming spreads mosquito-borne diseases.

Prof. Hendrik Tennekes--director of research, Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute--states "there exists no sound theoretical framework for climate predictability studies" used for global warming forecasts.

Dr. Christopher Landsea--past chairman of the American Meteorological Society's Committee on Tropical Meteorology and Tropical Cyclones--says "there are no known scientific studies that show a conclusive physical link between global warming and observed hurricane frequency and intensity."

Dr. Antonino Zichichi--one of the world's foremost physicists, former president of the European Physical Society, who discovered nuclear antimatter--calls global warming models "incoherent and invalid."

Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski--world-renowned expert on the ancient ice cores used in climate research--says the U.N. "based its global-warming hypothesis on arbitrary assumptions and these assumptions, it is now clear, are false."

Prof. Tom V. Segalstad--head of the Geological Museum, University of Oslo--says "most leading geologists" know the U.N.'s views "of Earth processes are implausible."

Dr. Syun-Ichi Akasofu--founding director of the International Arctic Research Center, twice named one of the "1,000 Most Cited Scientists," says much "Arctic warming during the last half of the last century is due to natural change."

Dr. Claude Allegre--member, U.S. National Academy of Sciences and French Academy of Science, he was among the first to sound the alarm on the dangers of global warming. His view now: "The cause of this climate change is unknown."

Dr. Richard Lindzen--Professor of Meteorology at M.I.T., member, the National Research Council Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, says global warming alarmists "are trumpeting catastrophes that couldn't happen even if the models were right."

Dr. Habibullo Abdussamatov--head of the space research laboratory of the Russian Academy of Science's Pulkovo Observatory and of the International Space Station's Astrometria project says "the common view that man's industrial activity is a deciding factor in global warming has emerged from a misinterpretation of cause and effect relations."

Dr. Richard Tol--Principal researcher at the Institute for Environmental Studies at Vrije Universiteit, and Adjunct Professor at the Center for Integrated Study of the Human Dimensions of Global Change, at Carnegie Mellon University, calls the most influential global warming report of all time "preposterous . . . alarmist and incompetent."

Dr. Sami Solanki--director and scientific member at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany, who argues that changes in the Sun's state, not human activity, may be the principal cause of global warming: "The sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures."

Prof. Freeman Dyson--one of the world's most eminent physicists says the models used to justify global warming alarmism are "full of fudge factors" and "do not begin to describe the real world."

Dr. Eigils Friis-Christensen--director of the Danish National Space Centre, vice-president of the International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy, who argues that changes in the Sun's behavior could account for most of the warming attributed by the UN to man-made CO2.

Swift

2009-Feb-09, 10:14 PM

Currently, you have that choice for you. No, it does not make sense, simply. Maybe it would make sense simply, to force all residents within one hundred miles of an active volcanoe to relocate. (rhetorical statement)
Maybe it does, particularly if they are going to demand FEMA's assistance if and when the volcano blows up. But that's a different story and maybe not the right analogy.

Here's my 2 cents, all in my humble opinion.

First, there is the pure science of global warming, which scientists, and BAUTers can debate forever, as more and more data is collected.

The dataset may never be perfect, because you have to do such science differently than, for example chemistry (my favorite). If I'm doing an experiment in the lab, I can do a classic one, where I control all the variables, change one at a time, do a "control", etc.

But, since we have no "control" Earth, we can't do things that way. So the science of global warming will never be as "pure" as a laboratory experiment.

Now, if there were no potential social/economic/etc. consequences of global warming, the data collection and the scientific debate could go on forever and hardly anyone would care.

The problem is there are many potential social/economic/etc. consequence, the kind of things governments have to worry about. And, if the the models are correct, we need to start doing something about it NOW.

So, the governments of the world have to make decisions now, based on the best available data and models.

I don't think global warming is the only example of this. Especially when the issue involves human health and safety, for example, governments often act before they have all the data and have completely proven something. Should the FDA wait to close down that peanut plant with the salmonella until they are absolutely sure it is the cause of the problem?

To be honest, I'm not sure I understand the fuss. Lots of the things that are proposed to prevent or decrease future global warming are pretty good ideas anyway, such as increased energy efficiency and alternative energy sources.

Stroller

2009-Feb-09, 10:51 PM

So 'climatology' is a soft science with 'hard science' pretensions.

It claims that it's models have 'skill', though they haven't made any successful predictions.

It claims to have identified causitive principles for corrrelations, but seems unable to prove them without recourse to what Dr John Theon refers to as the 'manipulation of data to fit theory'.

And on the strength of this, populations are carbon taxed, and world leaders are exhorted to embrace technologies sold by those who promulgate a storyline.

I welcome swift's post. let the debate on the substantive issues begin.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-09, 10:54 PM

There is a big difference between not forcing people to evacuate a volcano, where the damage is localized, then there is in continuing to pump out a known green house gas without restraints.

And then being in denial about it's effects since the 1970's. . .even though many the predications that came out of the theory made back then have happened.

Sea level rise is the ultimate measurement of GW. From 15kya to 5kya it rose approximately 450 feet world wide. As the ice ran out it took more and more energy to further melt glacial ice and the rate of sea level rise slowed. During that period the proxies for temperature and CO2 tell us that it was cooler and lower PPM of CO2 than it is now, yet the ice melted. A great deal of ground formerly covered by ice was exposed and released its methane, yet CO2 remained below today's levels. Solar forcing, Milankovitch cycles and sunspot activity, waxed and waned. Plate tectonics puts greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. There is nothing simple about any of this. The Earth is not a one issue subject.

As a thought experiment lets say that it was crucial for the survival of mankind that sea level rise, say, thirty feet in twenty years. Could you devise a plan that would assure that happening. I know some people would answer in the affirmative, but I am certainly not sure.

Finally, I am not in denial, I just do not see it as a crisis. It also concerns me that the subject could be used for non altruistic political purposes and preemptive reduction of freedoms without proper cause.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-09, 10:56 PM

To be honest, I'm not sure I understand the fuss. Lots of the things that are proposed to prevent or decrease future global warming are pretty good ideas anyway, such as increased energy efficiency and alternative energy sources.

Agreed

dgavin

2009-Feb-09, 11:54 PM

Sea level rise is the ultimate measurement of GW. From 15kya to 5kya it rose approximately 450 feet world wide. As the ice ran out it took more and more energy to further melt glacial ice and the rate of sea level rise slowed. During that period the proxies for temperature and CO2 tell us that it was cooler and lower PPM of CO2 than it is now, yet the ice melted. A great deal of ground formerly covered by ice was exposed and released its methane, yet CO2 remained below today's levels. Solar forcing, Milankovitch cycles and sunspot activity, waxed and waned. Plate tectonics puts greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. There is nothing simple about any of this. The Earth is not a one issue subject.

As a thought experiment lets say that it was crucial for the survival of mankind that sea level rise, say, thirty feet in twenty years. Could you devise a plan that would assure that happening. I know some people would answer in the affirmative, but I am certainly not sure.

Finally, I am not in denial, I just do not see it as a crisis. It also concerns me that the subject could be used for non altruistic political purposes and preemptive reduction of freedoms without proper cause.

Definately right, it's not a simple subject.

However unlike a poster before this said, Global Warming definatley has predictions, and most of them have come to pass. As Far back as the early 70's was when science began looking at it as a real issue, but most others ignored it back then.

The problem were getting into now is that groups of folks are coming out with thier own 'explainations' of the predictions that have occured, attempting to derail a very sound science, thats is not new science by a long shot.

Bascialy these so called sceptics, or debunkers, or what ever they call themselves... They are manufacturing explainations to fit observations, that have already been covered as prediction in an existing scientific theroy. With the intention of discrediting that theroy because they don't like it. I don't consider that science, I consider that hackery.

There are definately many other factors involved in climate shifts. However mankind is a contributor to the current climate shift, and no amout of gain saying is really going to change that fact.

Could it be used as a political manuver somehow? Sure it could. So could half a hundred other issues I could come up with. Just because something -might- be used in that manner doesn't mean it should be disreguarded or ignored. Or debunked in an unethical manner.

I'm not saying that you are doing these things jlhredshift. Quite the contrary you seem to just have a good amount of healthy sceptisism about it.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-10, 12:03 AM

Well I know I'm not going to be the one emailing Tim Ball on that particular issue. Why doon't you ask him for proof seeing as you are the one doubting his word.

He's the one presenting it as fact.

Dr. Edward Wegman--former chairman of the Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics of the National Academy of Sciences--demolishes the famous "hockey stick" graph that launched the global warming panic.

From Dr. Wegman--"We were not asked to assess the reality of global warming and indeed this is not an area of our expertise."

Dr. David Bromwich--president of the International Commission on Polar Meteorology--says "it's hard to see a global warming signal from the mainland of Antarctica right now."

The only David Bromwich Wikipedia has heard of is an English professor. I was able to Google the one you're referencing, and he seems to have strong credentials. You've also taken his quote out of context. "It's hard to see a global warming signal from the mainland of Antarctica right now... Part of the reason is that there is a lot of variability there. It's very hard in these polar latitudes to demonstrate a global warming signal. This is in marked contrast to the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula that is one of the most rapidly warming parts of the Earth... The best we can say right now is that the climate models are somewhat inconsistent with the evidence that we have for the last 50 years from continental Antarctica... We're looking for a small signal that represents the impact of human activity and it is hard to find it at the moment." Note that this is specifically in reference to continental Antarctica, not global warming in general.

Prof. Paul Reiter--Chief of Insects and Infectious Diseases at the famed Pasteur Institute--says "no major scientist with any long record in this field" accepts Al Gore's claim that global warming spreads mosquito-borne diseases.

Which is irrelevant to global warming as a concept.

Prof. Hendrik Tennekes--director of research, Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute--states "there exists no sound theoretical framework for climate predictability studies" used for global warming forecasts.

That's one.

Dr. Christopher Landsea--past chairman of the American Meteorological Society's Committee on Tropical Meteorology and Tropical Cyclones--says "there are no known scientific studies that show a conclusive physical link between global warming and observed hurricane frequency and intensity."

Which does not deny global warming as a concept.

Dr. Antonino Zichichi--one of the world's foremost physicists, former president of the European Physical Society, who discovered nuclear antimatter--calls global warming models "incoherent and invalid."

Physics? I fail to see how that's a relevant field.

Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski--world-renowned expert on the ancient ice cores used in climate research--says the U.N. "based its global-warming hypothesis on arbitrary assumptions and these assumptions, it is now clear, are false."

For one, he, too, is a physicist. For another, he's hardly uncontroversial. Are you aware of his stance on leaded gasoline?

Prof. Tom V. Segalstad--head of the Geological Museum, University of Oslo--says "most leading geologists" know the U.N.'s views "of Earth processes are implausible."

Has he surveyed them, or is he stating his own opinion as fact?

Dr. Syun-Ichi Akasofu--founding director of the International Arctic Research Center, twice named one of the "1,000 Most Cited Scientists," says much "Arctic warming during the last half of the last century is due to natural change."

First, his frequently cited work is on aurorae, not global warming. However, that's two.

Dr. Claude Allegre--member, U.S. National Academy of Sciences and French Academy of Science, he was among the first to sound the alarm on the dangers of global warming. His view now: "The cause of this climate change is unknown."

He's also a geochemist.

Dr. Richard Lindzen--Professor of Meteorology at M.I.T., member, the National Research Council Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, says global warming alarmists "are trumpeting catastrophes that couldn't happen even if the models were right."

Yes. He also says that the health risks of smoking are overrated. Regardless, he said the whole of the IPCC summary was "an admirable description of research activities in climate science."

Dr. Habibullo Abdussamatov--head of the space research laboratory of the Russian Academy of Science's Pulkovo Observatory and of the International Space Station's Astrometria project says "the common view that man's industrial activity is a deciding factor in global warming has emerged from a misinterpretation of cause and effect relations."

He doesn't accept the possibility of a greenhouse effect at all, manmade or otherwise.

Dr. Richard Tol--Principal researcher at the Institute for Environmental Studies at Vrije Universiteit, and Adjunct Professor at the Center for Integrated Study of the Human Dimensions of Global Change, at Carnegie Mellon University, calls the most influential global warming report of all time "preposterous . . . alarmist and incompetent."

However, he does accept AGW. Besides, he's an economist.

Dr. Sami Solanki--director and scientific member at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany, who argues that changes in the Sun's state, not human activity, may be the principal cause of global warming: "The sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures."

"Since about 1980, while the total solar radiation, its ultraviolet component, and the cosmic ray intensity all exhibit the 11-year solar periodicity, there has otherwise been no significant increase in their values. In contrast, the Earth has warmed up considerably within this time period. This means that the Sun is not the cause of the present global warming."

Prof. Freeman Dyson--one of the world's most eminent physicists says the models used to justify global warming alarmism are "full of fudge factors" and "do not begin to describe the real world."

"One of the main causes of warming is the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere resulting from our burning of fossil fuels such as oil and coal and natural gas."

Dr. Eigils Friis-Christensen--director of the Danish National Space Centre, vice-president of the International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy, who argues that changes in the Sun's behavior could account for most of the warming attributed by the UN to man-made CO2.

No, he doesn't. He was quoted out of context by the makers of The Great Global Warming Swindle and is very upset about the whole thing. He speculated so at one time, but no longer does.

I didn't take more than a couple of minutes to research anyone on your list.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-10, 12:21 AM

I simply pointed out that everyones contract includes a statement that their internet use can and will be monitored. Nothing more, nothing less.

Okay, so do you think that climatologists who don't believe in the existance of AGW didn't reply to the survey because they thought it could affect their tenure or funding?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 12:28 AM

There are definately many other factors involved in climate shifts. However mankind is a contributor to the current climate shift, and no amout of gain saying is really going to change that fact.

I agree with this and the discussion is about the amount of effect that contribution is having and searching for ways to quantify the impact of all relevant factors. I will admit a bias towards learning the causal reasons for the varying ice ages and how they interrelate. We are still in an ice age cycle, but exactly where (I've seen the charts and calculations). How did it begin. Antarctica at the south pole and the formation of circumpolar circulation definitely had an impact. Moisture had to be transported to the arctic polar regions to build the ice sheets that are now still melting. Those ancient weather patterns waxed and waned as well. The climate driven paleometeorology is not fully understood. The years of cold summers and even colder winters. Did the most snow fall in spring as the tropics warmed and due to continued cold fail to melt, or did they primarily fall during the winter?

Questions followed by more questions, we have work to do.

(There is nothing that would make me happier than keeping politicians out of this.)

parejkoj

2009-Feb-10, 12:33 AM

Thank you, Gillianren: you did what I was planning to do, but you did a much better job of it. Summary: most of the people on that list are either quoted out of context, not an expert in the field of climate science, or talking about some detail and not whether anthropogenic CO2 is the primary driver of the observed warming (which, I suppose, is basically being quoted out of context).

I'm also rather confused by people who say "we can't let the government control what we do!" Try walking down your street at 2am with a boombox blaring as loud as possible: you'll be stopped by a *government agent* (oh noes!). Or try dumping mercury, PCBs, DDT, etc. into your local river (of course, if you are powerful enough, you can do this until said river eventually catches fire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuyahoga_River)). Government regulations to prevent people from ruining the "Commons" are both commonplace and necessary (the improvement in air quality in LA since the 70s due to emissions restrictions is another good example). We might disagree about their implementation (and note that I have advocated no such regulations so far on this board!), but claiming that "behavior regulation" by the government is inherently bad is just disingenuous.

I will eventually (ha!) respond to William's linked papers.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 12:48 AM

We might disagree about their implementation (and note that I have advocated no such regulations so far on this board!), but claiming that "behavior regulation" by the government is inherently bad is just disingenuous.

My bold.

I am curious, who are you quoting?

lomiller1

2009-Feb-10, 01:06 AM

No. And restating that even more emphatically won't make it any more true.

Please back up your claim there is dissent with peer reviewed literature. One or two discredited papers don’t count.
Seriously. do you honestly believe peer reviewed literature is "bad science" while advertising induced political driven public opinion is "good science"?

Gillianren

2009-Feb-10, 01:06 AM

Thank you, Gillianren: you did what I was planning to do, but you did a much better job of it.

You're quite welcome. I've done it before for other silly lists, simply because of how often I find them to be similarly inaccurate.

Summary: most of the people on that list are either quoted out of context, not an expert in the field of climate science, or talking about some detail and not whether anthropogenic CO2 is the primary driver of the observed warming (which, I suppose, is basically being quoted out of context).

At least one person on the list has also been shown to take money from certain oil interests, though I left that out as argumentative. I also didn't feel I needed it to invalidate the majority of the list.

parejkoj

2009-Feb-10, 01:13 AM

I am curious, who are you quoting?

Not quoting someone per se, but paraphrasing a sentiment most recently expressed by you:

I am uncomfortable anytime there is "governmental insistence that we accept" any idea and particularly if it is used as a justification for social change to give the government more power over peoples' lives when the science is suggestive but not conclusive.

Besides, as Gillianren noted, until recently in the United States there has been exactly the opposite of "governmental insistence that we accept" the role of anthropogenic CO2 as a primary driver of the current warming.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-10, 01:22 AM

1) Since the study linked to by Ronald Brak saw fit to include the results of a survey of the general public, maybe you should direct your point to them.

2) Why should members of the public not be rightly skeptical of the claims of the AGW camp when their grandees say things like this?

Appeal to public opinion is a logical fallacy. Appeal to legitimate experts is not. Note the survey said

This is (a link) to an article on a survey that found 97% of earth scientists who responded and who regularly publish on climate change agree that human activity has had a significant effect on mean global temperature.

Clearly, when top climatologists advise their colleages to eschew the data and their scientific integrity in order to 'be effective' the public doesn't need access to the data to be able to see they are being conned.

If you are going to make the extraordinary claim of fraud and massive conspiracy in the scientific community you should back it up with some evidence.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 01:24 AM

Not quoting someone per se, but paraphrasing a sentiment most recently expressed by you:

I see. You definitely misunderstand me. Bad paraphrase. I try very hard to say exactly what I mean. Shortening or changing the words I carefully choose generally would not convey what I am saying. Words mean things, and I try to use them properly. Though, if I err, I will gladly change my error when pointed out to me.

Besides, as Gillianren noted, until recently in the United States there has been exactly the opposite of "governmental insistence that we accept" the role of anthropogenic CO2 as a primary driver of the current warming.

Yes, non interference.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-10, 01:28 AM

In fact, there are a lot of pre-eminent scientists in very high positions at academic and other scientific institutions who disagree with AGW theory, and say so. After the death threats recieved by Tim Ball (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1545134/Scientists-threatened-for-%27climate-denial%27.html), there are many others who avoid the hassle.

Did you just call Tim Ball preeminent scientist? He’s a retired professor of geography from an undergraduate university. I.E. his sole qualification is that he taught geography 101 to first and second year university students. The closest he’s ever come to publishing a paper on clime is a paper he wrote in the 70’s on the migration patters of Canada Geese.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-10, 01:49 AM

I will admit a bias towards learning the causal reasons for the varying ice ages and how they interrelate. We are still in an ice age cycle, but exactly where (I've seen the charts and calculations). How did it begin. Antarctica at the south pole and the formation of circumpolar circulation definitely had an impact.

The short answer seems to be changes in CO2 levels, albeit much more gradual changes then were are seeing today.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080827163818.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090108111419.htm

parejkoj

2009-Feb-10, 01:49 AM

I see. You definitely misunderstand me. Bad paraphrase. I try very hard to say exactly what I mean. Shortening or changing the words I carefully choose generally would not convey what I am saying. Words mean things, and I try to use them properly. Though, if I err, I will gladly change my error when pointed out to me.

My apologies: I was paraphrasing based on what I thought you meant. That being the case, I'm apparently rather unclear on what you meant. Would you rephrase it please, or tell me how my interpretation was incorrect?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 02:04 AM

The short answer seems to be changes in CO2 levels, albeit much more gradual changes then were are seeing today.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080827163818.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090108111419.htm

Link #1:

Dr Alan Haywood from the University of Leeds added: "So why did elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations fall to levels similar to the pre-industrial era? That is the million dollar question which researchers will no doubt be trying to answer during the next few years.

You bet it is. Could it have been the diatoms from link #2?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 02:14 AM

My apologies: I was paraphrasing based on what I thought you meant. That being the case, I'm apparently rather unclear on what you meant. Would you rephrase it please, or tell me how my interpretation was incorrect?

Thank you.
I said:

It also concerns me that the subject could be used for non altruistic political purposes and preemptive reduction of freedoms without proper cause.

Of course the subject is climate change and the operative phrase is "political purposes"; i.e. not for purposes of affecting climate change. That is as far as I am willing to go under the rules of this board.

William

2009-Feb-10, 02:38 AM

science.larc.nasa.gov/ceres/STM/2006-10/0610261650Tak.pdf

"Ocean heat content anomaly cooling in 2004 and 2005 exceeds space/time sampling noise estimates for 0-750m depths by a factor of 3 (1.7 vs. sqrt(0.42 + 0.42) = 0.56 Wm-2)

• Net Radiation changes in CERES (Ed3) is expected to show CERES at - 0.1 Wm-2 vs. Ocean data of -1.7 Wm-2

• GRACE data show no accelerated glacial ice mass loss in 2004/2005 relative to 2000/2003; glacial ice mass loss can’t explain the recent ocean water contraction (cooling)"

As I said the ocean appears to be cooling. Why?

It appears there is another climate forcing function. What could it be?

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-10, 02:54 AM

science.larc.nasa.gov/ceres/STM/2006-10/0610261650Tak.pdf

As I said the ocean appears to be cooling. Why?

It appears there is another climate forcing function. What could it be?

From Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palimpsest)
Palimpsest is beginning to be used by Glaciologists to describe contradicting glacial flow indicators, usually consisiting of smaller indicators (ie striae) overprinted upon larger features (ie stoss and lee topography, drumlins, etc).

Ebb and flow, two years is too short, but interesting for sure.

William

2009-Feb-10, 02:59 AM

There is obviously some major climate forcing function that creates the ice epochs. What is curious is that the scientific evidence shows CO2 is a minor forcing factor, when the mechanism reaches saturation.

What is curious is what is the mechanism that is increasing or decreasing atmospheric CO2.

What is unusual for this period of time is how low CO2 levels are relative to past levels, from the standpoint of the amount of CO2 required to support planet life.

CO2 levels during the glacial period are low enough that some plants cannot survive. Vast areas of the planet are turned to desert in the glacial period. A cold planet is a dry planet.

As I said from an environmental standpoint a warmer planet with more CO2 supports a larger, more diverse biosphere.

Look at the different in animal size from the past to the present.

http://www.pnas.org/content/99/7/4167.full.pdf+html

Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels for the last 500 million years by Daniel H. Rothman

4. The gray bars at the top of Fig. 4 correspond to the periods when the global climate was cool; the intervening white space corresponds to the warm modes (18). The most recent cool period corresponds to relatively low CO2 levels, as is widely expected (30). However, no correspondence between pCO2 and climate is evident in the remainder of the record, in part because the apparent 100 My cycle of the pCO2 record does not match the longer climatic cycle. The lack of correlation remains if one calculates the change in average global surface temperature resulting from changes in pCO2 and the solar constant using energy-balance arguments (7, 26).

Superficially, this observation would seem to imply that pCO2 does not exert dominant control on Earth’s climate at time scales greater than about 10 My. A wealth of evidence, however, suggests that pCO2 exerts at least some control [see Crowley and Berner (30) for a recent review]. Fig. 4 cannot by itself refute this assumption. Instead, it simply shows that the ‘‘null hypothesis’’ that pCO2 and climate are unrelated cannot be rejected on the basis of this evidence alone.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-10, 06:51 AM

As I said the ocean appears to be cooling. Why?

As you've been told, it turned out to be measurement error.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/OceanCooling/

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-10, 08:17 AM

I'd be really grateful if you'd stop telling me what I think and answer the questions I put in return for answering yours. Otherwise some observers (including me) might think you were just avoiding the substantive issues with obfuscation and nitpicking.
Recently, in another thread (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/76506-another-catastrophie-due-global-warming-13.html), I asked Stroller to answer my questions, here's the reply (no answers were ever given):

You are not my inquisitor, this is not an ATM thread and I am under no obligation to dance to your tune. I will pick up on the points which interest me, ignore rhetoric and obfuscation, and generally exercise my free will.

Stroller

2009-Feb-10, 08:41 AM

dgavin:

However unlike a poster before this said, Global Warming definatley has predictions, and most of them have come to pass. As Far back as the early 70's was when science began looking at it as a real issue, but most others ignored it back then.
Please can we have some examples. Bear in mind this is a debate on AGW not just changes in temperature which are not unprecedented, and which fall within natural variation.

Ronald Bark:

Okay, so do you think that climatologists who don't believe in the existance of AGW didn't reply to the survey because....
Speculations on a postcard please.
I note that of all respondents 82% agreed with Q2. Wouldn't this mean that amongst respondents The 'AGW camp' is closer to 5 times larger than the 'skeptic camp' than it is to 97 times larger as you claimed using faulty math?

Gillianren:

He's the one presenting it as fact.
You're the one doubting his honesty

Gillianren:

From Dr. Wegman--"We were not asked to assess the reality of global warming and indeed this is not an area of our expertise."

To Quote Lawrence Solomon (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/02/06/mann-s-conclusions-not-to-be-believed.aspx):
"Wegman assembled a panel of blue-chip statisticians, all of whom worked pro bono for the Barton committee, and for good measure the panel subjected its work to top level reviewers, such as the Board of the American Statistical Association. The Wegman panel’s findings? Mann’s critics were entirely in the right, Mann lacked the statistical knowledge to do the work he had taken on, and Mann’s work had not been subjected to a credible peer-review process."

Gillianren:

Note that this is specifically in reference to continental Antarctica, not global warming in general.
Note that the quote I supplied didn't address global warming in general, but the lack of a signal in Antarctica. The context you supplied confirms this.

Gillianren:

Physics? I fail to see how that's a relevant field
Ah. Maybe this explains Swifts observations then. 'Climatologists' such as Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen play fast and loose with the physics of thermodynamical processes, but physicists are to be ruled out of court if they criticise because they are not 'climatologists'.

Isn't James Hansen qualified as an astronomer? Do you think that astronomy is a relevant field?
How many universities offer degree courses in 'climatology'?
What is your specialisation/qualification which enables you to determine which other fields of study are relevant or not?

Gillianren:

Are you aware of his stance on leaded gasoline?
What has this to do with AGW theory? Or the price of fish?

Parejkoj:

most of the people on that list are either quoted out of context, not an expert in the field of climate science, or talking about some detail and not whether anthropogenic CO2 is the primary driver of the observed warming
If you are in agreement with me that we should be discussing the substantive issues, I'm right with you.

lomiller1:

do you honestly believe peer reviewed literature is "bad science" while advertising induced political driven public opinion is "good science"?
An excellent question. We should consult IPCC lead author Stephen Schneider on this issue:

We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest.

It would seem that this leading light of the 'AGW camp' does think this is what 'climatologists' should be doing. Do you think Stephen Schneider is advocating 'good science' here by your definition of it?

lomiller1:

If you are going to make the extraordinary claim of fraud and massive conspiracy in the scientific community you should back it up with some evidence.

That's not any claim I've made, those are the words you are trying to put in my mouth. Both fraud and conspiracy imply an intent to decieve. Stephen Schneider is definitely coming close to advocating it.

Anyway, thanks for the invitation to concentrate on the substantive issues, and produce evidence and example. I will try to pursue the issues in further posts during the debate now we have dealt with some of the ephemera.

Stroller

2009-Feb-10, 09:40 AM

As you've been told, it turned out to be measurement error.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/OceanCooling/

From the report:
“In this analysis, we focused on 1961-2003 because it is the time period highlighted as being an important, unresolved issue in the last IPCC report [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report],” said Domingues, “but also because the problems with the newest Argo data—the problems that Josh Willis found as well as other problems we have identified—haven’t been totally solved. For the most recent years [2003-2007], the sea level budget once again does not close. Our team is still working on that problem.”

The problem being that the data doesn't fit the Team's AGW theory.

For some excellent work on SST's and other oceanography issues, I recommend a visit to Bob Tisdales excellent site. (http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/)

--
If you torture the data enough it will confess
Even to crimes it did not commit.

Stroller

2009-Feb-10, 09:58 AM

Recently, in another thread (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/76506-another-catastrophie-due-global-warming-13.html), I asked Stroller to answer my questions, here's the reply (no answers were ever given):

You quote one line from my reply, why not the rest, where I did address your concerns, if not all of your specific lawyer like questions?

Originally Posted by Ari Jokimaki View Post
Also, as you can see from above quote, Palle et al say that there is no significant changes in Earth's reflectance between years 2000-2007.

Stroller:
True, but they also say, right up at the top of the paper:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Palle et al
Earthshine and FD analyses show contemporaneous and
climatologically significant increases in the Earth's reflectance from the out-
set of our earthshine measurements beginning in late 1998 roughly until mid-
2000. After that and to-date, all three show a roughly constant terrestrial
albedo, except for the FD data in the most recent years.
Using satellite cloud data and Earth reflectance models, we also show that
the decadal scale changes in Earth's reflectance measured by earthshine are
reliable, and caused by changes in the properties of clouds rather than any
spurious signal, such as changes in the Sun-Earth-Moon geometry.

Originally Posted by Ari Jokimaki View Post
you blame this "trend" in albedo of recent cold weather, but actually you don't have proof which is causing which.

Stroller:
I do hope I'll see you levelling this logic at others who believe co2 causes changes in temperature when the evidence is that rises in temperature precede changes in co2 levels every time.
The earthshine data shows an increase in albedo from late 1998 to 2000, and continuing higher levels since, despite recommenced warming between 2001-2005. Concomitantly, we have seen sea surface temperatures falling since 2003.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadsst2gl/from:2003
And global average lower tropospheric temperatures falling at a rate of over 1C per decade since 2005
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah...rom:2005/trend

So to recap. Albedo increases from the point where earthshine measurements bigin in 1998 to 2000 and stays higher.
Several years later, sea and atmospheric temperatures start to fall.

Perhaps now you can see why I concieve of the chain of cause and effect as being that changes in albedo cause changes in temperature. It's a no brainer really. The sun provides ~1365watts/m^2 through a clear sky. An increase in cloud albedo of ~2% is going to reduce that. We can follow up the question of how much by, but 2% of 1365watts/m^2 is 26watts/m^2. It's very likely it isn't this simple though, so I take your point about their figure of 2watts/m^2, which is a little more than the ~1.7watts/m^2 the IPCC attribute to Anthropogenic global warming.

Originally Posted by Ari Jokimaki View Post
So, earthshine data is from a single station only with large error bars.

Stroller:
Not all of the data no.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Project Earthshine
Earthshine results will improve in precision and coverage with the remotely operated station in the Canaries. Two stations give a global coverage. The project also has intermittent ongoing earthshine data from the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory using a calibrated telescope that requires an observer.

Error bars. Sure. I assume you'll also be reminding Swift about the error bars associated with the extrapolated, interpolated, and massaged with a 'new statistical technique' data used to torture a 50 year warming trend out of a 20 year cooling antarctic. Two years ago antarctic sea ice was at it's greatest extent since records began. I assume no-one is going to try to say this was composed of calved ivcebergs from a rapidly melting antarctic continent. :)

Gillianren

2009-Feb-10, 07:22 PM

You're the one doubting his honesty

You do realize that, in science, the one presenting the thesis is the one who must demonstrate it, right? If he's been threatened, it is his responsibility to show that, not mine to show that he is not.

To Quote Lawrence Solomon (http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/02/06/mann-s-conclusions-not-to-be-believed.aspx):
"Wegman assembled a panel of blue-chip statisticians, all of whom worked pro bono for the Barton committee, and for good measure the panel subjected its work to top level reviewers, such as the Board of the American Statistical Association. The Wegman panel’s findings? Mann’s critics were entirely in the right, Mann lacked the statistical knowledge to do the work he had taken on, and Mann’s work had not been subjected to a credible peer-review process."

But that doesn't mean that AGW isn't a fact. It just means that that particular statistical model is flawed.

Note that the quote I supplied didn't address global warming in general, but the lack of a signal in Antarctica. The context you supplied confirms this.

Sigh. He says, in the context I provided, that other places in Antarctica are definitely warming. He says that it's hard to determine anything in continental Antarctica. Either way, it is not a claim that there is no such thing as AGW.

Ah. Maybe this explains Swifts observations then. 'Climatologists' such as Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen play fast and loose with the physics of thermodynamical processes, but physicists are to be ruled out of court if they criticise because they are not 'climatologists'.

Can you show evidence that the aspect of physics he studies is relevant? There's more to the study of climatology than thermodynamics. Why is the study of antimatter relevant to the study of climate?

Isn't James Hansen qualified as an astronomer? Do you think that astronomy is a relevant field?
How many universities offer degree courses in 'climatology'?
What is your specialisation/qualification which enables you to determine which other fields of study are relevant or not?

In this case, simple logic will suffice. Studying antimatter does not give one the expertise to model climate systems. It will do very well to study antimatter, and it's true that his work is admired in that field. It's just not relevant to the study of the climate. And, again, you have brought him forward; it is your responsibility to show that there is a reason to expect him to know anything in the field.

What has this to do with AGW theory? Or the price of fish?

It casts doubt on his reliability regarding scientific theory. It's true that there are scientists who show crackpottery in one field and are completely reliable in another, even within their own specialization, but crackpottery in one field also does still cast doubt on reliability in another.

I notice that you fail to acknowledge all the other places--such as the economist you cited--where your experts aren't, or where they didn't say what you said they did.

Stroller

2009-Feb-10, 09:07 PM

Thanks for your reply Gillianren. Could you cover these two points as well?

How many universities offer degree courses in 'climatology'?
What is your specialisation/qualification which enables you to determine which other fields of study are relevant or not?

Gillianren

2009-Feb-10, 09:49 PM

dgavin

2009-Feb-10, 10:11 PM

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 12:05 AM

What's yours? You bring them up as experts; you show that their expertise is relevant.
I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours. :)

'Climatology' is an interdisciplinary enterprise involving physicists, chemists, statisticians, oceanographers, atmospheric scientists and fluid dynamicists to name a few. There is no 'climatology' degree on offer.

Any of the scientists I cited in the list could have taken sufficient interest in sections of the literature which would have made them sufficiently able to validly comment on aspects of AGW theory.

"Wegman assembled a panel of blue-chip statisticians, all of whom worked pro bono for the Barton committee, and for good measure the panel subjected its work to top level reviewers, such as the Board of the American Statistical Association. The Wegman panel’s findings? Mann’s critics were entirely in the right, Mann lacked the statistical knowledge to do the work he had taken on, and Mann’s work had not been subjected to a credible peer-review process."

But that doesn't mean that AGW isn't a fact. It just means that that particular statistical model is flawed.

Thankyou. This is more important than you'd first think. For example, Mann's discredited statistical methods were re-employed recently in Steig et al's (Mann was one of the et al) antarctic warming paper, Nature's recent cover story.

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 12:19 AM

Stroller, instead of quoting your long post about earth albedo being constant from 2000-2007.

How can any scientist get an constant data Reading on albedo, without ignoring data from both the polar caps sizes being reduced significantly during that time frame?

It just doesn't add up. If your going to look at the Albedo of a planet, it need to be both from the cloud cover, and from the reflectivity of the surface. Sounds like they are only looking at half the picture.

The earthshine project measures total earth albedo including clouds, ice, snow, sand, foliage, sea and everything else, whatever state of growth or recession they are in. How does it do this? By measuring the total amount of light the earth is reflecting from the sun onto the moon.

The antarctic icecap hasn't reduced in the last 20 years. In fact, antarctic sea ice was at a record extent two years ago. The big 'bergs which break off the Larsen shelf don't melt overnight either.

Scientists are beginning to see that the poles temperatures oscillate relative to each other. When the arctic gets warmer, the antarctic gets colder, and vise versa. This has been to some extent masked by the general upward trend in global temperature during the last 30 years. The very recent rises in antarctic temperature measured at a few stations may be an indicator that the arctic ice will begin to recover. 2008 arctic summer ice extent was greater than 2007's. 2009 winter ice is thicker, and will melt more slowly. I predict 2009 summer ice will be significantly greater in extent than 2008.

How's the list of successful AGW predictions since the '70's coming along by the way? :)

Gillianren

2009-Feb-11, 12:57 AM

I'll show you mine if you'll show me yours. :)

You're the one claiming that all these fields are relevant. It's your responsibility to show that you have the education to know that.

'Climatology' is an interdisciplinary enterprise involving physicists, chemists, statisticians, oceanographers, atmospheric scientists and fluid dynamicists to name a few. There is no 'climatology' degree on offer.

Perhaps not. But you'll note that "economists" are not in that list.

Any of the scientists I cited in the list could have taken sufficient interest in sections of the literature which would have made them sufficiently able to validly comment on aspects of AGW theory.

Could have. But you have not shown that they did. Further, it was very apparent that more than a few of those quotes were taken out of context, and that the people stating those things do not agree with you. You didn't take the time to check that, did you?

mugaliens

2009-Feb-11, 01:20 AM

I just find this whole idea unbelievable.

And illegal. Even the federal government needs a court order to go snooping around through the files on an employee's computer. This includes GS, NAF, and military employees, among others.

Ronald Brak

2009-Feb-11, 01:26 AM

Speculations on a postcard please.
I note that of all respondents 82% agreed with Q2. Wouldn't this mean that amongst respondents The 'AGW camp' is closer to 5 times larger than the 'skeptic camp' than it is to 97 times larger as you claimed using faulty math?

Do you think that climatologists who don't believe in the existance of AGW didn't reply to the survey because they thought it could affect their tenure or funding?

lomiller1

2009-Feb-11, 06:01 AM

Stroller, what you should be offering up is some real papers that support your position, not quote mining performed by political think tanks. Also, you make accusations of scientific fraud from people you were perfectly happy to quote when you thought they supported your position.

Just a few notes on Wegmans discredited report. Wegman’s commission was sponsored by two Republicans that receive much of their financing from oil interests.

I.E. it was a political report not a scientific one and Wegman’s credibility has suffered for being involved. FYI Wegman conveniently forgot to check and see if the “errors” he was pointing out would have changed the papers result. It’s been amply demonstrated they do not. Peer reviewed analysis if the original paper and a dozen or so similar reconstitutions that have been carried out since demonstrate that beyond doubt.

Once again for emphasis. If you had papers supporting your position you wouldn’t need to try and argue the your experts credentials are valid. At the Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen have dozens of papers with hundreds of citations published in high impact journals on the topic of climate. How many of the “experts” you hold up even have a single paper to their name, let alone one that is extensively cited.

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 07:26 AM

You're the one claiming that all these fields are relevant. It's your responsibility to show that you have the education to know that.

Read it again. I made no such claim. You stated that physics wasn't a relevant field concerning 'climatology'. Which is a fairly astonishing statement. Maybe this is why so much of the AGW 'science' is wrong.

Perhaps not. But you'll note that "economists" are not in that list.

You'll note at the end of the list of relevant fields I said "to name a few". There is no reason in principle why an economist with a sound grip of statistics wouldn't be able to demonstrate flaws in the statistical methods used in a published climate paper. Indeed this has happened already.

Could have. But you have not shown that they did. Further, it was very apparent that more than a few of those quotes were taken out of context, and that the people stating those things do not agree with you. You didn't take the time to check that, did you?
No. I think all this is secondary to the science, so I didn't spend any time other than googling up a list of contrarian views. I agree some of your points on some of them probably have merit. Things are never clear cut after all. Some scientists may agree a priori with AGW theory whilst disagreeing with aspects that their specialism allows them to have a more certain view about etc.

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 07:28 AM

Do you think that climatologists who don't believe in the existance of AGW didn't reply to the survey because they thought it could affect their tenure or funding?
Speculations on a postcard please.
I note that of all respondents 82% agreed with Q2. Wouldn't this mean that amongst respondents The 'AGW camp' is closer to 5 times larger than the 'skeptic camp' than it is to 97 times larger as you claimed using faulty math?

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 08:06 AM

Wegman conveniently forgot to check and see if the “errors” he was pointing out would have changed the papers result. It’s been amply demonstrated they do not. Peer reviewed analysis if the original paper and a dozen or so similar reconstitutions that have been carried out since demonstrate that beyond doubt.
As Wegman pointed out, the peer review process lacked credibility (due to the fact that it was more pal review than peer review). The dozen or so similar reconstructions you refer to are so similar they use the same 25 year old flawed bristlecone pine data. Amman and Wahl did not succeed in demonstrating anything 'amply'. They denied others the chance to replicate their data by refusing to release source material for well over a year, and when they finally did, it was a web of self referential nonsense. The whole sorry saga is well documented on climate audit and there is a good summary/chronology on Bishop Hill's blog.

Once again for emphasis. If you had papers supporting your position you wouldn’t need to try and argue the your experts credentials are valid. At the Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen have dozens of papers with hundreds of citations published in high impact journals on the topic of climate. How many of the “experts” you hold up even have a single paper to their name, let alone one that is extensively cited.
There are many papers which contain real world observations which cast doubt on aspects of AGW theory. Gavin Schmidt and James Hansen have lots of papers about computer models published in high impact journals but these computer models have so far shown very little skill in predicting climate change. As Dr John S Theon said:
"the models do not realistically simulate the climate system because there are many very important sub-grid scale processes that the models either replicate poorly or completely omit......Furthermore, some scientists have manipulated the observed data to justify their model results. In doing so, they neither explain what they have modified in the observations, nor explain how they did it. They have resisted making their work transparent so that it can be replicated independently by other scientists. This is clearly contrary to how science should be done."

The 'high impact journals' to which you refer are bringing discredit on themselves by failing to properly review and test the submissions made by AGW proponents. Indeed they dismissed the only reviewer who ever asked for the data so he could replicate the claims made. These same journals repeadedly use reviewers who are part of a relatively small group of pro AGW "experts" who recommend the rejection of papers containing data which is inimical to AGW theory. The process of peer review and journal publication has become tainted by partisan interests and thus they are skewed. Therefore, appeals to who has peer reviewed papers published and who has been featured on the cover of Nature prove nothing except the bias that has crept in.

It saddens me to see science debased and dragged into a political and propagandist role in this way. But after all, they are just following the direction recommended by Lead IPCC author Stephen Schneider:

"We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest."

The fact that you repeatedly gloss over this statement and instead accuse those who doubt AGW theory of being politically motivated, "in the pay of big oil" etc clearly demonstrates that you are not interested in making a fair assessment of the real state of affairs.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-11, 01:51 PM

orionjim

2009-Feb-11, 04:05 PM

complete quote (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/11/the-false-objectivity-of-balance/langswitch_lang/fr)

"On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but - which means that we must include all the doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands, and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we’d like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climatic change. To do that we need to get some broadbased support, to capture the public’s imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This ‘double ethical bind’ we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both. "

What they are defining is the difference between science and politics. And as they say there is a big difference between the two, one is driven by facts and the other by personal beliefs and desires.

The point I think worth making is BAUT is supposed to be a science driven site and not political. People that find such satisfaction in quoting from realclimate need to examine that what they are posting is real science or real politics, because as they say one is based on fact and the other on personal belief and could be lies because they feel it’s important.

Your post should be a disclaimer that is added to anyone’s post that references realclimate.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-11, 05:59 PM

Read it again. I made no such claim. You stated that physics wasn't a relevant field concerning 'climatology'. Which is a fairly astonishing statement. Maybe this is why so much of the AGW 'science' is wrong.

You brought them forward as experts. You explain how the study of antimatter is relevant to the study of climate patterns.

You'll note at the end of the list of relevant fields I said "to name a few". There is no reason in principle why an economist with a sound grip of statistics wouldn't be able to demonstrate flaws in the statistical methods used in a published climate paper. Indeed this has happened already.

You have not demonstrated that. You've said, "Look! This economist disagrees with AGW!" You've never brought forward a reason that we should trust that economist. The person to whom you are doubtless referring, without an understanding of what he himself was doing, wasn't an economist. He was a statistician. That's different.

No. I think all this is secondary to the science, so I didn't spend any time other than googling up a list of contrarian views. I agree some of your points on some of them probably have merit. Things are never clear cut after all. Some scientists may agree a priori with AGW theory whilst disagreeing with aspects that their specialism allows them to have a more certain view about etc.

You're the one who says there are prominent scientists in relevant fields who disagree. You're the one who brought forth the list. I went through the list. I found that many of the people you had selected either directly contradicted what you said they believed or else were in fields that I, for one, could not see the relevancy of. Several others are considered . . . let us say "a little out there." Several said that their one aspect was slightly misrepresented, or even grossly misreprensented, but that it didn't necessarily invalidate the whole model. You are the one using the term "a priori"; you show that it isn't based on current observations.

Stroller

2009-Feb-11, 10:14 PM

explain how the study of antimatter is relevant to the study of climate patterns.

Stop trying to shift the goalposts Gillian. Up there ^ you said:

:
Physics? I fail to see how that's a relevant field

Which is what makes me doubt your proficiency to make judgements about which fields are relevant to climate science.

You have not demonstrated that. You've said, "Look! This economist disagrees with AGW!" You've never brought forward a reason that we should trust that economist. The person to whom you are doubtless referring, without an understanding of what he himself was doing, wasn't an economist. He was a statistician. That's different.

Well since you know who we're talking about (apparently), I don't need to comment further.

Several said that their one aspect was slightly misrepresented, or even grossly misreprensented, but that it didn't necessarily invalidate the whole model. You are the one using the term "a priori"; you show that it isn't based on current observations.

Another invitation to finally get around to the science. Thanks.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-12, 01:05 AM

What they are defining is the difference between science and politics. And as they say there is a big difference between the two, one is driven by facts and the other by personal beliefs and desires.

The point I think worth making is BAUT is supposed to be a science driven site and not political. People that find such satisfaction in quoting from realclimate need to examine that what they are posting is real science or real politics, because as they say one is based on fact and the other on personal belief and could be lies because they feel it’s important.

Your post should be a disclaimer that is added to anyone’s post that references realclimate.I don't understand why my post should be a disclaimer of realclimate. All of the realclimate articles include links or references to the studies. So they are discussing the science and not the politics.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-12, 03:13 AM

Stop trying to shift the goalposts Gillian. Up there ^ you said:

Which is what makes me doubt your proficiency to make judgements about which fields are relevant to climate science.

Fair. I made too broad a statement. That still doesn't make the study of antimatter relevant to climate patterns, no matter how much you want it to.

dgavin

2009-Feb-12, 06:26 AM

How's the list of successful AGW predictions since the '70's coming along by the way? :)

These are some of the predictions I remembered from a Nova show, that aired around '77 (Back then the PBS/Nova was heavily funded by people from Oregon, so some of the science included local things)

1. Changes in Ocean Currents
2. Loss of Permanent Glaciers on mountains
3. Loss of Polar Ice
4. Specifically for Oregon, less rain fall, hotter and longer summers. Harsher winters.
5. Increase in strength/harshness of winter storms in some areas.
6. Increase in strength of typhoons and hurricanes.

And the outcomes now from then.

1. Happened, Gulf current at 1/12 of it's normal flow for over two years now.
2. Happened, all cascade range mountains that used be be covered in year around permanent glaciers, now are almost bare by the end of summer. Other areas in world also have also seen this effect. Snow packs in the cascades that were typically in the range of 12 to 28 feet, are now typically 8 to 16 feet. There hasn't been an over 20 foot snow pack since 1983.
3. Happened/ing, Arctic ice cap size reduced by almost 1/3 of its area since first satellite photos, North pole has seen Ocean exposed in areas during it's summer months. Antarctica and Greenland also losing ice at an increasing rate.
4. Happened. In last 30 years Oregon alone has had droughts in 22 of those years. From 1845-1970 average of highest summer temperatures was 80. Last ten years the Average of highest temperatures was 89.
5. Happening in some localized regions, but not concrete, more data over time needed
6. Too soon to tell, more data over time needed.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-12, 07:06 AM

As Wegman pointed out, the peer review process lacked credibility

So now we have it, you think peer review lacks credibility and can be ignored in favor of blogs and politically sponsored “reports”. Sorry to inform you this won’t fly in a real science forum.

The dozen or so similar reconstructions you refer to are so similar they use the same 25 year old flawed bristlecone pine data.

Wegman has zero credentials to evaluate whether or not the bristlecone pines are a suitable proxy or not beyond evaluating their fit with the know climate record. Something he failed to do, and we now know that they do in fact track very nicely with the know temperature record.

All you are doing is saying you don’t like what the data says so you want new data that agrees with your opinion.

There are many papers which contain real world observations which cast doubt on aspects of AGW theory.

The show us some. Quote mining papers that don’t support you doesn’t qualify.

As Dr John S Theon said:

Yet again you cite an “expert” with no actual credentials.

Here is what you get when you do a Google Scholar search for John S Theon and the word “climate”
http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=John+S+Theon+&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

2 articles and not a single cited paper that even include the word climate.

The 'high impact journals' to which you refer are bringing discredit on themselves by failing to properly review and test the submissions made by AGW proponents.

IOW you are spouting the same “the scientific establishment won’t listen to us” line every tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist resorts to when it’s pointed out the science doesn’t support their pet theory.

Here are some quotes from Gerald North who chaired the NRC investigation into the issue the Wegman vs Mann argument regarding his testimony before congress when he presented that report. (bolding is mine)

Gerald North:
The Mann et al study of 1999 draws conclusions that are more optimistic about our ability to estimate paleotemperatures than we would. We say that the averages over three decades are likely to be the warmest in the last 400 years. We also say that the average over the last three decades are plausibly the warmest over the last 1000 years. The statements by Mann et al. were a bit stronger than these. However, if you look at reconstructions of later reports by other investigators, you will find that they generally fall within the error bars of Mann et al., especially if you place error bars on the other studies comparable to those in the Mann et al. study.

I believe the peer review system works well, but it sometimes slips. In the case of the Mann et al. papers [bI think the papers were properly accepted by the journals.[/b]

lomiller1

2009-Feb-12, 07:20 AM

The point I think worth making is BAUT is supposed to be a science driven site and not political. People that find such satisfaction in quoting from realclimate need to examine that what they are posting is real science or real politics,

Let's take a look at the contributors are realclimate shall we...

Gavin Schmidt

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=GA+Schmidt&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Rasmus Benestad

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=RE+Benestad&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Ray Pierrehumbert

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=Pierrehumbert&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Stefan Rahmstorf

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=Rahmstorf&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

William Connolley

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=WM+Connolley&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Caspar Ammann

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=Ammann&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Michael Mann

http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=ME+Mann&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

Eric Steig
http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=EJ+Steig&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off

That’s a lot a papers and a lot of citations. Any one of them has had more citations on the topic then all the denialists listed thus far combined. Somehow though you want to convince yourself they aren’t really scientists but politicians?

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 08:22 AM

These are some of the predictions I remembered from a Nova show, that aired around '77 (Back then the PBS/Nova was heavily funded by people from Oregon, so some of the science included local things)

1. Changes in Ocean Currents
2. Loss of Permanent Glaciers on mountains
3. Loss of Polar Ice
4. Specifically for Oregon, less rain fall, hotter and longer summers. Harsher winters.
5. Increase in strength/harshness of winter storms in some areas.
6. Increase in strength of typhoons and hurricanes.

And the outcomes now from then.

1. Happened, Gulf current at 1/12 of it's normal flow for over two years now.
2. Happened, all cascade range mountains that used be be covered in year around permanent glaciers, now are almost bare by the end of summer. Other areas in world also have also seen this effect. Snow packs in the cascades that were typically in the range of 12 to 28 feet, are now typically 8 to 16 feet. There hasn't been an over 20 foot snow pack since 1983.
3. Happened/ing, Arctic ice cap size reduced by almost 1/3 of its area since first satellite photos, North pole has seen Ocean exposed in areas during it's summer months. Antarctica and Greenland also losing ice at an increasing rate.
4. Happened. In last 30 years Oregon alone has had droughts in 22 of those years. From 1845-1970 average of highest summer temperatures was 80. Last ten years the Average of highest temperatures was 89.
5. Happening in some localized regions, but not concrete, more data over time needed
6. Too soon to tell, more data over time needed.

Hi dgavin, thanks for this. Let's take a look.

1)from wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shutdown_of_thermohaline_circulation):
The NewScientist.com news service[9] reported on 30 November 2005 that the National Oceanography Centre in the UK found a 30% reduction in the warm currents that carry water north from the Gulf Stream from the last such measurement in 1992. The authors note that currently the observed changes are "uncomfortably close" to the uncertainties in the measurements. However, the North Atlantic is currently warmer than in the earlier measurements.[10] This suggests that either the circulation is not weakening, or that, even if it is weakening, the weakening is not having the hypothesised cooling effect, or that other factors are able to overwhelm any cooling.

I read recently that the flow rate has taken a sharp upturn again in the last year, but I haven't found the reference yet. I'll revisit this if i find it.

2) There is no doubt we've had a warm spell, though this winter is the coldest in western europe and Canada/Alaska for many a long year. We'll have to wait and see if ths is just a temporary respite from global warming as the AGW theorists believe, or whether it's the start of a long term cooldown as the 'natural variation' camp believes.

3) Arctic ice cap reduced by a third. Hmmm. I think maybe you are referring to the minimum ice extent at the peak of the meltoff which is reached around early september. 2007 was several million square km below the 30 year average, though 2008 wasn't as bad, and 2009 winter ice is significantly thicker according to readings, which should make the 2009 summer ice slower to melt. I predict a big improvement this year. We only have a relatively short period of accurate records, though we do know the arctic has suffered big meltbacks in the past, from archeological evidence and written maritime logs. Thus it's not 'unprecedented' and is not therefore proof of a link between co2 and warming.

This just in from the UK MET office:
“Recent headlines have proclaimed that Arctic summer sea ice has decreased so much in the past few years that it has reached a tipping point and will disappear very quickly. The truth is that there is little evidence to support this. Indeed, the record-breaking losses in the past couple of years could easily be due to natural fluctuations in the weather, with summer sea ice increasing again over the next few years. This diverts attention from the real, longer-term issues. For example, recent results from the Met Office do show that there is a detectable human impact in the long-term decline in sea ice over the past 30 years, and all the evidence points to a complete loss of summer sea ice much later this century."

I personally take the "recent results" bit with a pinch of salt, as it relies on model output, not observation.
So there you have it, global warming catastrophe postponed until "much later this century" :)
Notice also how it's "recent headlines" which are to blame for the tipping point nonsense, not the MET or climate scientists.....

4)As you say, local stuff. There's an interesting article here (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/10/floridatrend-its-hot-but-dont-blame-global-warming/) with details of a study of local change in Florida.

5)In southern Victoria in Australia, they have been suffering a 7 year droubt. less than a thousand miles away, northern Victoria has been flooding. Go figure. Thing is, big variations in quite proximate locations have always been a feature of our ever changing cllimate as far as we can tell. So far, I don't think anyone has presented any convincing evidence that global warming of a degree or so over 100 years has made a big difference to that.

6) The last two seasons have been very quiet. Possibly due to tropical oceanic cooling, which has been going on for a while now.

Cheers

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-12, 09:15 AM

You quote one line from my reply, why not the rest, where I did address your concerns, if not all of your specific lawyer like questions?
Rest of your post had nothing to do with the unanswered questions (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/76506-another-catastrophie-due-global-warming-12.html#post1416312), which anyone reviewing that discussion can easily see. Why would you say that you have answered my questions when it's so obviously false thing to say?

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 09:24 AM

So now we have it, you think peer review lacks credibility and can be ignored in favor of blogs and politically sponsored “reports”. Sorry to inform you this won’t fly in a real science forum.

I think it lacks credibility when it's performed by a mutually supportive clique with an agenda - yes.

Wegman has zero credentials to evaluate whether or not the bristlecone pines are a suitable proxy or not beyond evaluating their fit with the know climate record. Something he failed to do, and we now know that they do in fact track very nicely with the know temperature record.

You demonstrate a nice lack of understanding of the issues of selectivity in paleoclimatological study. And in any case bristlecones don't track well with the modern instrumental record. Furthermore, the effects of changes in temperature and changes in other climate variables affecting tree growth are not seperated by the data. Anyone genuinely interested in the issue can read up on this stuff at climateaudit.org

All you are doing is saying you don’t like what the data says so you want new data that agrees with your opinion.

The fact that this could easily be found nicely demonstrates the valuelessness of Mann's study.

Here is what you get when you do a Google Scholar search for John S Theon and the word “climate”
http://scholar.google.ca/scholar?as_q=climate&num=10&btnG=Search+Scholar&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_occt=any&as_sauthors=John+S+Theon+&as_publication=&as_ylo=&as_yhi=&as_allsubj=all&hl=en&lr=&safe=off
2 articles and not a single cited paper that even include the word climate.

This doesn't make John Theon's criticisms of the methodology and data manipulation less valid.

The 'high impact journals' to which you refer are bringing discredit on themselves by failing to properly review and test the submissions made by AGW proponents. Indeed they dismissed the only reviewer who ever asked for the data so he could replicate the claims made. These same journals repeadedly use reviewers who are part of a relatively small group of pro AGW "experts" who recommend the rejection of papers containing data which is inimical to AGW theory. The process of peer review and journal publication has become tainted by partisan interests and thus they are skewed. Therefore, appeals to who has peer reviewed papers published and who has been featured on the cover of Nature prove nothing except the bias that has crept in.

IOW you are spouting the same “the scientific establishment won’t listen to us” line every tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist resorts to when it’s pointed out the science doesn’t support their pet theory.

No I'm not. I'm commenting on the review processes.

Incidentally, I think your tone is uncivil and I hope you get a ticking off from Chrissy.

Here are some quotes from Gerald North who chaired the NRC investigation into the issue the Wegman vs Mann argument regarding his testimony before congress when he presented that report. (bolding is mine)

And here are a few more:

http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/StupakResponse.pdf
"The atmospheric science community, while heavily using statistical methods, is remarkably disconnected from the mainstream community of statisticians"

"We explicitly looked at the first principal component of the
North American Tree Ring series and demonstrated that the hockey stick
shows up when the data are decentered, but not when properly centered.
We also demonstrated the same effect with the digitized version of the
1990 IPCC curve."

"Most proxies do not contain the hockeystick
signal. The MBH98 methodology puts undue emphasis on those
proxies that do exhibit the hockey-stick shape and this is the fundamental
flaw. Indeed, it is not clear that the hockey-stick shape is even a
temperature signal because all the confounding variables have not been
removed."

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 09:29 AM

Fair. I made too broad a statement. That still doesn't make the study of antimatter relevant to climate patterns, no matter how much you want it to.
Thank you for your honesty.

Why would the fact that the person in question is renowned for his antimatter theory make you think that's all he has to bring to bear on an opinion regarding AGW theory? His qualification would have been in physics, not antimatter, since it's obvious that no university was offering degree courses in antimatter theory before he invented it.

Your objection seems to be tilted towards a perception that the compiler of the list used his renown as some sort of 'trump card' to bolster the importance of this person's opinion, wheras their intention may have been more to show the originality of his thinking, or simply that he is a respected scientist.

In the context of the present discussion I would be more interested in the content of his objections to AGW theory than trying to dismiss him on the basis of what he is famous for. Unfortunately, the compiler of the list doesn't include these details in the list, although he elucidates the issues elsewhere in the book the list comes from.

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 09:41 AM

Rest of your post had nothing to do with the unanswered questions (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/76506-another-catastrophie-due-global-warming-12.html#post1416312), which anyone reviewing that discussion can easily see. Why would you say that you have answered my questions when it's so obviously false thing to say?
Hi Ari, my apologies.

My interest in cloud levels in specific areas such as the eastern pacific is the subject of ongoing study, and it would be premature to try to convince you of anything at this stage. I probably shouldn't therefore have raised the issue, as I am unable to answer your acute and specific questions on this matter at this time.

My general response to your questions and specifically to your point above is that I'm more interested in the results of techniques which do show some success in measuring albedo, than I am in arguing the toss over studies which don't, or which are muddied and contentious. This is why I 'moved on' to the issues around the earthshine project data in the post you quoted from. Again, my apologies if this doesn't meet your standards of discourse, but I feel disadvantaged by the paucity of the available data in this field of enquiry.

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 02:53 PM

Ok dgavin, my turn :)

This from Roger Pielke Sr at http://climatesci.org/2009/02/09/update-on-a-comparison-of-upper-ocean-heat-content-changes-with-the-giss-model-predictions/

The observed best estimates of the observed heating and the Hansen et al prediction in Joules in the upper 700m of the ocean are given below:

OBSERVED BEST ESTIMATE OF ACCUMULATION Of JOULES [assuming a baseline of zero at the end of 2002].

2003 ~0 Joules
2004 ~0 Joules
2005 ~0 Joules
2006 ~0 Joules
2007 ~0 Joules
2008 ~0 Joules
2009 ——
2010 ——
2011 ——
2012 ——

HANSEN PREDICTION OF The ACCUMULATION OF JOULES [ at a rate of 0.60 Watts per meter squared] assuming a baseline of zero at the end of 2002].

2003 ~0.98 * 10** 22 Joules
2004 ~1.96 * 10** 22 Joules
2005 ~2.94 * 10** 22 Joules
2006 ~3.92 * 10** 22 Joules
2007 ~4.90 * 10** 22 Joules
2008 ~5.88 * 10** 22 Joules
2009 ~6.86 * 10** 22 Joules
2010 ~7.84 * 10** 22 Joules
2011 ~8.82 * 10** 22 Joules
2012 ~9.80 * 10** 22 Joules

Thus, according to the GISS model predictions, there should be approximately 5.88 * 10**22 Joules more heat in the upper 700 meters of the global ocean at the end of 2008 than were present at the beginning of 2003.

For the observations to come into agreement with the GISS model prediction by the end of 2012, for example, there would have to be an accumulation 9.8 * 10** 22 Joules of heat over just the next four years. This requires a heating rate over the next 4 years into the upper 700 meters of the ocean of 2.45 * 10**22 Joules per year, which corresponds to a radiative imbalance of ~1.50 Watts per square meter.

This rate of heating would have to be about 2 1/2 times higher than the 0.60 Watts per meter squared that Jim Hansen reported for the period 1993 to 2003.

While the time period for this descrepancy with the GISS model is relatively short, the question should be asked as to the number of years required to reject this model as having global warming predictive skill, if this large difference between the observations and the GISS model persists.

Click Ticker

2009-Feb-12, 03:17 PM

I really think that it's time the whole "global warming" debate was scrapped in favor of a good old fashioned "polution" debate. In the 60's and 70's, a lot of progress was made in cleaning up rivers, streams, etc. on the basis of reducing polution. No alarming "global climate change" threats needed.

In my laymen's estimation, setting things on fire and breathing in the fumes can't be good for you. Part of the reason I don't smoke. So doing what we can to reduce the amount of "fumes" released into the atmosphere would be a good thing. So let's just work toward that end, without trying to scare everyone into accomplishing a goal that seems so big that it's not worth trying.

If you put me in front of a 10 million piece puzzle - I'm not even going to start it (I might even get annoyed with the request). Give me a 1,000 piece puzzle - and I get it done.

orionjim

2009-Feb-12, 06:17 PM

I don't understand why my post should be a disclaimer of realclimate. All of the realclimate articles include links or references to the studies. So they are discussing the science and not the politics.

Sorry, nothing personal. The quote you posted was more complete than Stroller’s. Actually the link you provided has a second paragraph that gives more information that readers should be aware of.

[Misquoters] also omit my solutions to the double ethical bind: (1) use metaphors that succinctly convey both urgency and uncertainty, and (2) produce an inventory of written products from editorials to articles to books, so that those who want to know more about an author’s views on both the caveats and the risks have a hierarchy of detailed written sources to which they can turn. […]

Basically I interpret what Schneider as saying as the science of global warming is in the studies and peer reviewed papers. Articles, blogs and books are fair game to be political.

The problem with this is the readers need to understand the difference. I have yet to see an article that states this is not science this is politics.

Jim

Gillianren

2009-Feb-12, 06:22 PM

Why would the fact that the person in question is renowned for his antimatter theory make you think that's all he has to bring to bear on an opinion regarding AGW theory?

Why would you think he has more?

Yes, thermodynamics is important in the study of climate and weather. However, physics is a very broad discipline. I took a solid year of physics in high school (though under rather unusual circumstances), and we never actually got to thermodynamics. Mostly, we studied optics and electrical conductivity. By the time you reach graduate level, you probably aren't focusing very much on things not relevant to your specific field. Now, it's entirely possible that your anti-matter physicist studies AGW in his spare time. However, the very fact that he's prominent in the field of anti-matter does not mean that he has any special qualifications to expound on the truth or falsity of AGW.

orionjim

2009-Feb-12, 06:32 PM

Let's take a look at the contributors are realclimate shall we...

[List of realclimate contributors …]

That’s a lot a papers and a lot of citations. Any one of them has had more citations on the topic then all the denialists listed thus far combined. Somehow though you want to convince yourself they aren’t really scientists but politicians?

No; I think you are trying to convince yourself that I’m trying to convince myself they aren’t really scientists but politicians.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-12, 06:42 PM

I think it (peer review) lacks credibility when it's performed by a mutually supportive clique with an agenda - yes.

That sounds suspiciously like a rationalization for ignoring any peer review that doesn’t fit your political beliefs.

My challenge to you remains. Support your position with peer reviewed papers, instead of trying to justify ignoring what's actually in the peer reviewed literature.

And in any case bristlecones don't track well with the modern instrumental record.

Incorrect. These large scale climate reconstructions use linear regression or similar techniques to compare proxies to the last ~150 years of measured temperatures. That is split into two, one for calibrating the proxy against know temperatures, the other half for validating the final results. Any proxy that doesn’t match with the last 150 years will be filtered at this point, the fact is that the bristlecone pines always seem to survive this step. In any case you get the same results even if you don’t use them.

Furthermore, the effects of changes in temperature and changes in other climate variables affecting tree growth are not seperated by the data.

You may want to research what PCA does. Not that this is an issue since PCA has been superseded in newer studies, but separating causes in noisy data is precisely why techniques like PCA are used.

This doesn't make John Theon's criticisms of the methodology and data manipulation less valid.

In fact it does. Appeal to authority is a logical fallacy if the person you are citing isn’t a legitimate expert. Theon's publication record clearly shows he is not.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-12, 06:49 PM

No; I think you are trying to convince yourself that I’m trying to convince myself they aren’t really scientists but politicians.

:confused:

You suggested the contributors at realclimate are politically motivated when in fact they have all published extensively on the topic and received many citations to their published work. You should either support or drop the rather exceptional claim you are making.

These are people who can legitimately be called experts in this field. What possible justification can there be for ignoring them while accepting random comments from non-experts like Theon?

orionjim

2009-Feb-12, 07:39 PM

:confused:

You suggested the contributors at realclimate are politically motivated when in fact they have all published extensively on the topic and received many citations to their published work. You should either support or drop the rather exceptional claim you are making.

These are people who can legitimately be called experts in this field. What possible justification can there be for ignoring them while accepting random comments from non-experts like Theon?

I am paraphrasing what Gavin at realclimate posted on Stephen Schneider and the dilemma faced by climatologists.

You should really view the link in Klausnh's post.

I don’t question any of the science done; but I also know that a scientist can have political views and I also understand that the scientist is also allowed to express these political views. The science is recorded in their studies and peer reviewed papers. The political views can appear anywhere else, and this is a problem for the reader.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-12, 08:45 PM

I am paraphrasing what Gavin at realclimate posted on Stephen Schneider and the dilemma faced by climatologists.

You should really view the link in Klausnh's post.

I don’t question any of the science done; but I also know that a scientist can have political views and I also understand that the scientist is also allowed to express these political views. The science is recorded in their studies and peer reviewed papers. The political views can appear anywhere else, and this is a problem for the reader.Gavin's response:

[Response: Oh please… Selective mis-quotations of that interview have been contrarian fodder for years and are a complete distortion of what was said and what Schneider’s position is. The full quote and Schneider’s respsonse to the issue are easily available (here) and continued use of this ridiculous canard can only be interpreted as a deliberate attempt to mislead. Just to make it perfectly clear the full quote is:
(schneider's complete comment)
Schneider also made it abundantly clear that this bind should be tackled directly by any scientist dealing with the media:
(schneider's complete comment)
Hopefully forums like RealClimate make it easier to put sound-bites in context with all the caveats and problems. We are not here however just to be used for talking-point jousting. -gavin]
mine

What did Gavin write that makes you think that a link to RC needs a disclaimer?

orionjim

2009-Feb-12, 09:29 PM

gavin's response:

...

what did gavin write that makes you think that a link to rc needs a disclaimer?

Well, you left out the paragraph I was talking about...

schneider also made it abundantly clear that this bind should be tackled directly by any scientist dealing with the media:

[misquoters] also omit my solutions to the double ethical bind: (1) use metaphors that succinctly convey both urgency and uncertainty, and (2) produce an inventory of written products from editorials to articles to books, so that those who want to know more about an author’s views on both the caveats and the risks have a hierarchy of detailed written sources to which they can turn. what i was telling the discover interviewer, of course, was my disdain for a soundbite-communications process that imposes the double ethical bind on all who venture into the popular media. To twist my openly stated and serious objections to the soundbite process into some kind of advocacy of exaggeration is a clear distortion. Moreover, not only do i disapprove of the “ends justify the means” philosophy of which i am accused, but, in fact have actively campaigned against it in myriad speeches and writings. Instead, i repeatedly advocate that scientists explicitly warn their audiences that “what to do” is a value choice as opposed to “what can happen” and “what are the odds,” which are scientific issues.

mybold

Gavin was only quoting Schneider; it was what Schneider was saying that he was defending.

Now we have the whole quote; both paragraphs (and Gavin's comment between them.) Now what am I leaving out? He is saying concerned scientist are in a double bind and is suggesting a way to handle it.

What people need to understand is there is science and politics, there is a place for science and a place for politics.

What am I saying that is different than Schneider?

Shouldn't the casual reader be aware of this dilemma? I think they should.

Stroller

2009-Feb-12, 11:01 PM

Why would you think he has more?

Yes, thermodynamics is important in the study of climate and weather. However, physics is a very broad discipline. I took a solid year of physics in high school (though under rather unusual circumstances), and we never actually got to thermodynamics. Mostly, we studied optics and electrical conductivity. By the time you reach graduate level, you probably aren't focusing very much on things not relevant to your specific field. Now, it's entirely possible that your anti-matter physicist studies AGW in his spare time. However, the very fact that he's prominent in the field of anti-matter does not mean that he has any special qualifications to expound on the truth or falsity of AGW.

Well, he got a bit beyond undergrad physics.

Professor Antonino Zichichi is Emeritus Professor of Advanced Physics at the University of Bologna, past President of the Italian National Institute for Nuclear and Subnuclear Physics, past President of the European Physical Society, past President of the NATO Science Committee for Disarmament Technology, President of the World Federation of Scientists, President of the “Enrico Fermi Centre”.

I was going to list his journal publications, but it runs to 88 pages and over 700 items (http://www.ccsem.infn.it/em/zichichi/AZ_publication_list.pdf),

Perusing some of them, it seems he may know a thing or two about the radiative properties of particles and molecules. Is that relevant enough for you?

e.g.

643. MEASUREMENT OF THE NEUTRON FLUX PRODUCED BY COSMIC RAY MUONS WITH
LVD AT GRAN SASSO
LVD Collaboration: Aglietta, … and A. Zichichi
In “Salt Lake City 1999, Cosmic ray, vol. 2” 44-4. [hep-ex/9905047]
644. MUON ASTRONOMY WITH LVD DETECTOR
LVD Collaboration: Aglietta, … and A. Zichichi
In “Salt Lake City 1999, Cosmic ray, vol. 7” 222-22. [hep-ex/9905048]
645. FORMATION OF THE ��c IN TWO PHOTON COLLISIONS AT LEP
L3 Collaboration: M. Acciarri, ... and A. Zichichi
Physics Letters B461, 155-166, 1999. [hep-ex/9909008]
646. SEARCH FOR STANDARD MODEL HIGGS BOSON IN e+e�� INTERACTIONS AT = 189
GeV
L3 Collaboration: M. Acciarri, ... and A. Zichichi
Physics Letters B461, 376-386, 1999. [hep-ex/9909004]
647. SEARCH FOR ANTI-HELIUM IN COSMIC RAYS
AMS Collaboration: J. Alcaraz, … and A. Zichichi
Physics Letters B461, 387-396, 1999. [hep-ex/0002048]

He has written ten books on a range of scientific social and historical subjects including:

Il Vero e il Falso
passeggiando tra le Stelle e a casa nostra
Il Saggiatore 2003

Galilei, divin uomo
Il Saggiatore 2001

Subnuclear Physics
The first 50 years: Highlights from Erice to ELN
Università e Accademia delle Scienze di Bologna 1998, tre edizioni; World Scientific 2001

Creativity in Science
World Scientific 1996, tre edizioni;
tradotto in russo e pubblicato da YPCC, Mosca 2001

So yes, I'd say he is pretty well qualified to assess the claims of astronomer-turned-climatologist James Hanson and his cabal of climate catastrophists when he characterises their global warming models as "incoherent and invalid."

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-12, 11:41 PM

Gillianren

2009-Feb-12, 11:51 PM

Well, he got a bit beyond undergrad physics.

Wow. That's exactly my point. I believe what I said was that, the higher you got in physics, the more specialized your field was.

Perusing some of them, it seems he may know a thing or two about the radiative properties of particles and molecules. Is that relevant enough for you?

Particles and molecules don't necessarily share the same properties as larger systems. It's a different kind of physics.

Stroller

2009-Feb-13, 12:14 AM

Wow. That's exactly my point. I believe what I said was that, the higher you got in physics, the more specialized your field was.

Particles and molecules don't necessarily share the same properties as larger systems. It's a different kind of physics.

Lol. Thanks Gillian, best laugh I've had all night.

Of course, man made co2 is different too. Well it'd have to be to be producing the effects the climate crew say it is. Except if you take a quick look at my failed climate model #1 post, you'll see it isn't working out as predicted.

Cheers

Klausnh

2009-Feb-13, 01:45 AM

Well, you left out the paragraph I was talking about...

mybold

Gavin was only quoting Schneider; it was what Schneider was saying that he was defending.

Now we have the whole quote; both paragraphs (and Gavin's comment between them.) Now what am I leaving out? He is saying concerned scientist are in a double bind and is suggesting a way to handle it.

What people need to understand is there is science and politics, there is a place for science and a place for politics.

What am I saying that is different than Schneider?

Shouldn't the casual reader be aware of this dilemma? I think they should.
Now I got it. Thanks. I was confused by your use of the word "disclaimer". I think RC and many of its readers are aware of the political / scientific differences. The contrarian (spell check does not recognize the word, but I'm hesitant to use the word "denier") sites are the ones which often confuse the scientific with the political.

William

2009-Feb-13, 04:14 AM

So the Arctic sea ice has recovered, 13.9 x10^6 square kilometres of the Northern Ocean is covered with ice, February 12, 2009. This is approaching the 2002 record for this period of time.

And more ice I would assume is a better world.

Cold, barren, lifeless. Has anyone travelled on a glacier? Imagine Canada, the Northern US States, and Northern Europe covered with a 3 kilometer thick sheet of ice. -40C? -50C?

http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm#top

I see no one has responded to the links to papers that fundamentally challenge the basis of the AWG hypothesis.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-10.html#post1430212

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-12.html#post1431153

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-13.html#post1433275

Perhaps someone could explain why a colder world with less CO2 is a better world.

What specifically is the concern? Doe this planet have two massive ice sheets on both poles? Glacial/interglacial cycle?

Gillianren

2009-Feb-13, 04:49 AM

Lol. Thanks Gillian, best laugh I've had all night.

Of course, man made co2 is different too. Well it'd have to be to be producing the effects the climate crew say it is. Except if you take a quick look at my failed climate model #1 post, you'll see it isn't working out as predicted.

Cheers

In order to properly model climates, you need to know how the whole picture works, not just individual molecules. Do you understand that?

Torsten

2009-Feb-13, 05:33 AM

So the Arctic sea ice has recovered, 13.9 x10^6 square kilometres of the Northern Ocean is covered with ice, February 12, 2009. This is approaching the 2002 record for this period of time.

http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm#top

How do you figure "2002 record for this period of time"? The IARC-JAXA dataset you linked only started in June 2002.

But since you've chosen to compare today's value to a recent year, let's look at the values that are actually in their csv file for February 12:

2003 14,185,156
2004 14,121,406
2005 13,442,969
2006 13,553,438
2007 13,709,375
2008 14,137,344
2009 13,927,813

Today's value is less than for the same date last year.

How about comparing it to a longer record: http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/sea.ice.anomaly.timeseries.jpg. Click to enlarge it, scroll left-right to compare today with 2002, or earlier years. Hint: It's less than in 2002.

Or compare this winter's freeze-up progress to the 1979-2000 average and the record breaking 2007: http://www.nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png. (Archive of chart as it appeared today here (http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh315/TKphotofolder/BAUT/N_timeseries_20090212.png).)

Stroller

2009-Feb-13, 08:37 AM

In order to properly model climates, you need to know how the whole picture works, not just individual molecules. Do you understand that?
Yes.

My turn to ask a couple of questions:

do you think you've demonstrated Antonio Zichichi doesn't?

Have you checked to see whether Hansen and the climate crew have modelled 'the whole picture' and correctly parameterized those variables they have included (Co2, aerosols, water vapour, solar radiation) and provided a sufficient and correct assessment of the relative unimportance of those variables they haven't included (GCRs/variable cloud cover, convective columns, gleissberg cycles, GLAAM, kelvin waves, subsurface oceanic heat stores, the global electrical circuit, bow shocks on the ionosphere longterm changes in the AA index and the solar wind....)?

if you take a quick look at my failed climate model #1 post, you'll see it isn't working out as predicted.
Ignored.

Stroller

2009-Feb-13, 11:16 AM

These large scale climate reconstructions use linear regression or similar techniques to compare proxies to the last ~150 years of measured temperatures. That is split into two, one for calibrating the proxy against know temperatures, the other half for validating the final results. Any proxy that doesn’t match with the last 150 years will be filtered at this point, the fact is that the bristlecone pines always seem to survive this step. In any case you get the same results even if you don’t use them.

There has been a more recent study of Bristlecones which shows substantially different results. Mann however, prefers to stick with the 25 year old data from Graybill.

http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/Bristlecones/bristlecones.html

This casts sufficient doubt on the Mann reconstruction to set the bells ringing in the heads of all but the most stoical of alarmists.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-13, 03:30 PM

So the Arctic sea ice has recovered, 13.9 x10^6 square kilometres of the Northern Ocean is covered with ice, February 12, 2009. This is approaching the 2002 record for this period of time.

While current sea ice levels are~14 million Km^2 you are completely misrepresenting where this fits in historical context. Current arctic sea ice levels are right in line with the record low year of 2006-2007.

http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png

lomiller1

2009-Feb-13, 03:36 PM

GCRs/variable cloud cover, convective columns, gleissberg cycles, GLAAM, kelvin waves, subsurface oceanic heat stores, the global electrical circuit, bow shocks on the ionosphere longterm changes in the AA index and the solar wind....

Models don’t need to include every effect they include the major effects if you want to claim any of these things is a meaningful omission then you need to show that omission has a measurable effect on the outcome. If you are not prepared to do this you don't have a case.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-13, 03:43 PM

There has been a more recent study of Bristlecones which shows substantially different results. Mann however, prefers to stick with the 25 year old data from Graybill.

http://meteo.lcd.lu/globalwarming/Bristlecones/bristlecones.html

This casts sufficient doubt on the Mann reconstruction to set the bells ringing in the heads of all but the most stoical of alarmists.

You realize you are linking to a blog citing a paper that was never published and never subject to peer review and thereof can’t reasonably be cited in any major scientific work.

While the graduate thesis is an essential step for any student it’s a very rare one that has any impact on mainstream science. If this particular one they are referencing was of such import it could have and should have been published in a journal. It wasn’t, which tells me it’s similar to the other million or so graduate thesis written in the last decade and has no particular impact.

Stroller

2009-Feb-13, 03:50 PM

You realize you are linking to a blog citing a paper that was never published and never subject to peer review and thereof can’t reasonably be cited in any major scientific work.

While the graduate thesis is an essential step for any student it’s a very rare one that has any impact on mainstream science. If this particular one they are referencing was of such import it could have and should have been published in a journal. It wasn’t, which tells me it’s similar to the other million or so graduate thesis written in the last decade and has no particular impact.

Clearly, you are one of the most stoical of alarmists. :)

Stroller

2009-Feb-13, 04:00 PM

Models don’t need to include every effect they include the major effects if you want to claim any of these things is a meaningful omission then you need to show that omission has a measurable effect on the outcome. If you are not prepared to do this you don't have a case.

Ah, you warmists always put the burden of proof on the coolists, but given the abject failure of the models to match observation (an example is given in my post 'AGW prediction failure #1' above) the burden is in fact on those proposing the theory.

Since far more heat is transported in and through the troposphere (bypassing virtually all the effective co2 layer) by convection than by radiation, it is clearly a major failing of the models that it isn't included in any way which sufficiently approximates reality to get a meaningful result.

William

2009-Feb-13, 04:23 PM

How do you figure "2002 record for this period of time"? The IARC-JAXA dataset you linked only started in June 2002.

But since you've chosen to compare today's value to a recent year, let's look at the values that are actually in their csv file for February 12:

2003 14,185,156
2004 14,121,406
2005 13,442,969
2006 13,553,438
2007 13,709,375
2008 14,137,344
2009 13,927,813

Today's value is less than for the same date last year.

How about comparing it to a longer record: http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/sea.ice.anomaly.timeseries.jpg. Click to enlarge it, scroll left-right to compare today with 2002, or earlier years. Hint: It's less than in 2002.

Or compare this winter's freeze-up progress to the 1979-2000 average and the record breaking 2007: http://www.nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png. (Archive of chart as it appeared today here (http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh315/TKphotofolder/BAUT/N_timeseries_20090212.png).)

So Arctic Sea Ice February 12, 2009 is ahead of this time for 2005, 2006, and 2007. The ice is also thicker, due to a lack of snow cover when it formed and very cold Arctic temperatures. Is that something that is environmentally desirable?

Is a cooling planet good for the biosphere? CO2 levels are at there lowest level in roughly 500 million years. The low levels of CO2 is causing desertification.

There are ice sheets on both poles and we are at the end of the interglacial period. The paleoclimatic record shows a series of abrupt cooling periods. The interglacial periods end abruptly, not gradually. (i.e. The massive external event occurs which causes the planet to abruptly cool and the glacial cycle returns.)

What specifically is your concern due to a warmer planet with more CO2? Increasing CO2 levels is one of the few anthropomorphic changes which are beneficial.

My point is the scientific evidence shows the 20th century warming was not due to increasing CO2. The CO2 mechanism is saturated.

Quite obviously the planet has started to cool.

orionjim

2009-Feb-13, 04:28 PM

Models don’t need to include every effect they include the major effects if you want to claim any of these things is a meaningful omission then you need to show that omission has a measurable effect on the outcome. If you are not prepared to do this you don't have a case.

Excuse me - Stroller is defining factors not effects. An effect is the result of the change of a factor or factors has on this result. And no it’s not Stroller’s job to define the effect these factors have, it is the modeler’s job. The modeler needs to convince people their model has value, to do this they need to show they have at least considered the different factors and accounted for them. If they haven’t done this then their model is useless.

Good grief, at least get the terminology right.

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-13, 05:26 PM

This from Roger Pielke Sr at http://climatesci.org/2009/02/09/update-on-a-comparison-of-upper-ocean-heat-content-changes-with-the-giss-model-predictions/

The observed best estimates of the observed heating and the Hansen et al prediction in Joules in the upper 700m of the ocean are given below:

....

While the time period for this descrepancy with the GISS model is relatively short, the question should be asked as to the number of years required to reject this model as having global warming predictive skill, if this large difference between the observations and the GISS model persists.
Care must currently be taken when citing ocean heat content data, see Willis et al. (2008) (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/people/lyman/Pdf/hc_bias_jtech_v1.pdf). They find some errors from ocean heat content data:

These systematic data errors are significantly larger than sampling errors in recent years, and are the dominant sources of error in recent estimates of globally integrated upper-ocean heat content variability.
See also figure 2 which is only local analysis, but see the temperature anomaly when non-affected data is used (left panel, red line); at least in this location the temperature anomaly turns positive between 2003 and 2007. Supporting that view, Gille (2008) (http://www-pord.ucsd.edu/~sgille/pub_dir/i1520-0442-21-18-4749.pdf) finds oceans warming during the 2000s (see figure 6b) in Southern Hemisphere oceans.

I would also like to point out an issue mentioned in AchutaRao et al. (2007) (http://meteora.ucsd.edu/~pierce/papers/AchutaRal_et_al_PNAS_2007_oc_heat_content.pdf). In their introduction they say:

Although observational estimates of OHC change given in the 2005 World Ocean Atlas (WOA-2005) (1) are based on millions of individual temperature measurements, these measurements are unevenly distributed in space and time. Until recently, many portions of the global ocean were poorly sampled. To reconstruct the true (but unknown) four-dimensional structure of global ocean temperature and OHC changes, it is necessary to ‘‘infill’’ missing data.
And:

Because there is no unique solution to the infilling problem, and in view of concerns that previously applied statistical infilling approaches may alter ocean temperature variability (7, 16), it is preferable to restrict comparisons of modeled and observed variability to the actually observed portions of the ocean and, hence, to volume-averaged ocean temperature rather than OHC.

Also, on those "predictions", it is ridiculous to emphasize few years when "decadal means" are in question. When decadal mean expectation is 0.6 W/(m2), it doesn't mean that every year should fulfill that expectation. I wonder what purpose it serves to make a whole blog-entry on issue that is hardly even worth brief mention in passing.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-13, 06:27 PM

Yes.

My turn to ask a couple of questions:

do you think you've demonstrated Antonio Zichichi doesn't?

I don't have to. You have brought him up. It is up to you to demonstrate that he does. I really don't understand why you're having such a difficult time with this.

Have you checked to see whether Hansen and the climate crew have modelled 'the whole picture' and correctly parameterized those variables they have included (Co2, aerosols, water vapour, solar radiation) and provided a sufficient and correct assessment of the relative unimportance of those variables they haven't included (GCRs/variable cloud cover, convective columns, gleissberg cycles, GLAAM, kelvin waves, subsurface oceanic heat stores, the global electrical circuit, bow shocks on the ionosphere longterm changes in the AA index and the solar wind....)?

No. But I'm pretty sure they're not using the study of antimatter to do it.

Ignored.

Just as you ignroed all the people listed that you cited who don't agree with you. Well done.

It should be noted that I am not really taking any particular stand, here. I am mostly just commenting on what seems dishonest to me--a list of scientists to prove your point who either don't agree with you or have not been demonstrated to have relevant experience. "He's really good in field X so he must know all about field Y" is not a demonstration of anything.

William

2009-Feb-13, 07:35 PM

Higher CO2 levels results in more efficient use of water by plants which enables C3 type plants to survive in regions with less water. Increasing CO2 will result in a larger, more productive biosphere.

The GWG fight has no scientific, environmental, or economic logic. Higher levels of CO2 are not an environmental problem.

As is typical, people become engaged in a fight, selecting a side based on emotion rather than science and logic.

It is assumed the issue is how to protect and strengthen the biosphere, not to sequester CO2 or trade CO2.

As it appears the planet is about to abruptly cool, those on the side of the biosphere should be advocating global warming.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/09/high-co2-boosts-plant-respiration-potentially-affecting-climate-and-crops/

High CO2 boosts plant respiration, potentially affecting climate and crops

The results were striking. At least 90 different genes coding the majority of enzymes in the cascade of chemical reactions that govern respiration were switched on (expressed) at higher levels in the soybeans grown at high CO2 levels. This explained how the plants were able to use the increased supply of sugars from stimulated photosynthesis under high CO2 conditions to produce energy, Leakey said. The rate of respiration increased 37 percent at the elevated CO2 levels. The enhanced respiration is likely to support greater transport of sugars from leaves to other growing parts of the plant, including the seeds, Leakey said. “The expression of over 600 genes was altered by elevated CO2 in total, which will help us to understand how the response is regulated and also hopefully produce crops that will perform better in the future,” he said.

Stroller

2009-Feb-14, 11:15 AM

My challenge to you remains. Support your position with peer reviewed papers, instead of trying to justify ignoring what's actually in the peer reviewed literature.

You may want to research what PCA does. Not that this is an issue since PCA has been superseded in newer studies, but separating causes in noisy data is precisely why techniques like PCA are used.

http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~jsmerdon/papers/2008_JC_Smerdonetal.pdf

"Mann et al 2005 attempted to test the R05 RegEM method using pseudoproxies derived from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Climate System Model (CSM) 1.4 millennial integration… Mann et al 2005 did not actually test the Rutherford et al 2005 technique, which was later shown to fail appropriate pseudoproxy tests (Smerdon and Kaplan 2007). The basis of the criticism by Smerdon and Kaplan (2007) focused on a critical difference between the standardization procedures used in the M05 and R05 studies (here we define the standardization of a time series as both the subtraction of the mean and division by the standard deviation over a specific time interval). Their principal conclusions were as follows: 1) the standardization scheme in M05 used information during the reconstruction interval, a luxury that is only possible in the pseudoclimate of a numerical model simulation and not in actual reconstructions of the earth’s climate; 2) when the appropriate pseudoproxy test of the R05 method was performed (i.e., the data matrix was standardized only during the calibration interval), biases and variance losses throughout the reconstruction interval; and 3) the similarity between the R05 and Mann et al. (1998) reconstructions, in light of the demonstrated
problems with the R05 technique, suggests that both reconstructions may suffer from warm biases and variance losses."

My bold

Stroller

2009-Feb-14, 12:14 PM

Hi Ari, my apologies.

My interest in cloud levels in specific areas such as the eastern pacific is the subject of ongoing study, and it would be premature to try to convince you of anything at this stage. I probably shouldn't therefore have raised the issue, as I am unable to answer your acute and specific questions on this matter at this time.

My general response to your questions and specifically to your point above is that I'm more interested in the results of techniques which do show some success in measuring albedo, than I am in arguing the toss over studies which don't, or which are muddied and contentious. This is why I 'moved on' to the issues around the earthshine project data in the post you quoted from. Again, my apologies if this doesn't meet your standards of discourse, but I feel disadvantaged by the paucity of the available data in this field of enquiry.

Hi Again Ari, just an additional note. The following is a graph correlating cloud cover and nino SST anomaly:

http://1.2.3.10/bmi/i43.tinypic.com/nq73sz.jpg

It's from this article by Bob Tisdale:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/02/recharging-pacific-warm-pool-part-2.html

Cheers

Stroller

2009-Feb-14, 12:33 PM

I am mostly just commenting on what seems dishonest to me--a list of scientists to prove your point who either don't agree with you or have not been demonstrated to have relevant experience.

I already told you previously that I simply googled a list in response to your request to show that scientists who disagree with AGW have expertise in relevant fields, and that I hadn't paused to check them out because to me, it's a peripheral issue which I didn't want to spend too much time on, as the science holds more interest for me.

Nonetheless, your comment that physics isn't relevant to climate science took me aback.

To start bandying words like "dishonest" around therefore seems to me to be, well, dishonest. And uncivil. Unfortunately, Chrissy seems to have taken a break.

I think I'll leave it at that, because to me, it doesn't seem like a conversation worth wasting more time on, or getting upset about accusations of dishonesty over.

Stroller

2009-Feb-14, 01:35 PM

Also, on those "predictions", it is ridiculous to emphasize few years when "decadal means" are in question. When decadal mean expectation is 0.6 W/(m2), it doesn't mean that every year should fulfill that expectation. I wonder what purpose it serves to make a whole blog-entry on issue that is hardly even worth brief mention in passing.

I think Pielke's point is that there are are not just the odd year here or there which doesn't show the expected warming, but six years in a row. And that the warming which would be required to bring observation back into line with the model projection this far into the decade would be several times the projected decadal forcing.

You are correct to point out the uncertainties in the data, and the issue of infilled data, and I'm sure you would be just as quick to admonish Eric Steig et al in their antarctic warming paper which featured on the front cover of 'Nature' the other month on the same issues.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-14, 06:39 PM

I already told you previously that I simply googled a list in response to your request to show that scientists who disagree with AGW have expertise in relevant fields, and that I hadn't paused to check them out because to me, it's a peripheral issue which I didn't want to spend too much time on, as the science holds more interest for me.

But it's a vital aspect of the quality of the science at hand! Again, as mentioned repeatedly and ignored by you, half the people on your list don't disagree with AGW. If they, whom you acknowledge are people with expertise in relevant fields, see the merit in the science, what's your level of expertise to disagree with them?

ETA--For heaven's sake, you don't even seem to know enough about science to know that you must defend your own proposition, and that it's not my job to show your experts appear not to be relevant. It's yours to show that they are.

Stroller

2009-Feb-14, 10:48 PM

as mentioned repeatedly and ignored by you, half the people on your list don't disagree with AGW. If they, whom you acknowledge are people with expertise in relevant fields, see the merit in the science, what's your level of expertise to disagree with them?

Let's take one of the people you must be including in your "half the people on the list".

My list said:

Dr. Eigils Friis-Christensen--director of the Danish National Space Centre, vice-president of the International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy, who argues that changes in the Sun's behavior could account for most of the warming attributed by the UN to man-made CO2.

And you replied:

"No, he doesn't. He was quoted out of context by the makers of The Great Global Warming Swindle and is very upset about the whole thing. He speculated so at one time, but no longer does.

I didn't take more than a couple of minutes to research anyone on your list."

This much is obvious. It only took me a minute to find
Friis-Christensen and Lassen's paper responding to Frolich and Lockwood. (http://www.spacecenter.dk/publications/scientific-report-series/Scient_No._3.pdf)

"These authors accept that "there is considerable evidence
for solar influence on Earth's pre-industrial climate and
the Sun may well have been a factor in post-industrial
climate change in the first half of the last century." But
they argue that this historical link between the Sun and
climate came to an end about 20 years ago. Here we
rebut their argument comprehensively"

So, far from "speculating at one time, but no longer does", here he is with a published paper comprehensively rebutting a couple of pro AGW scientists in 2007.

Lets take another:

My list said:
Prof. Freeman Dyson--one of the world's most eminent physicists says the models used to justify global warming alarmism are "full of fudge factors" and "do not begin to describe the real world."

And you came back with this alleged quote:
"One of the main causes of warming is the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere resulting from our burning of fossil fuels such as oil and coal and natural gas."

Here he is expressing his views a year and a half ago:

HERETICAL THOUGHTS ABOUT SCIENCE AND SOCIETY (http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/dysonf07/dysonf07_index.html) [8.8.07]
By Freeman Dyson
"My first heresy says that all the fuss about global warming is grossly exaggerated. Here I am opposing the holy brotherhood of climate model experts and the crowd of deluded citizens who believe the numbers predicted by the computer models. Of course, they say, I have no degree in meteorology and I am therefore not qualified to speak. But I have studied the climate models and I know what they can do. The models solve the equations of fluid dynamics, and they do a very good job of describing the fluid motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. They do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry and the biology of fields and farms and forests. They do not begin to describe the real world that we live in. The real world is muddy and messy and full of things that we do not yet understand. It is much easier for a scientist to sit in an air-conditioned building and run computer models, than to put on winter clothes and measure what is really happening outside in the swamps and the clouds. That is why the climate model experts end up believing their own models."

I think an apology for the accusation of dishonesty might be in order.
Please provide a link to your alleged quote of Freeman Dyson.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-14, 11:02 PM

Stroller

2009-Feb-15, 12:55 AM

Good find Mugs, Chris field is one of the stanford global-warming-alarm! team headed up by Stephen Schneider. They both flew to Oslo for the Goracle's Nobel Prizegiving ceremony. Wonder what the carbon footprint of that little junket was....

Klausnh

2009-Feb-15, 04:11 AM

I found this recent article (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090214/sc_afp/usclimatewarming_20090214150716) rather interesting.

You know what? With the recent undercurrents questioning AGW, this appears to be an attempt to reignite mass hysteria.

"'Could' raise temperatures even more..."

"...'could' be released..."

"...'could' increase the concentration..."

"We now know that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought." - Field

What they do not appear to know, is how woefully inadequate our efforts would be in terms of halting, much less reversing, even if we reduced all anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions to pre-1800 levels. Of course, that would require many thousands of times more money than the sum total of the current economic bailout plan...You do realize your "could" statements were made by the author of the article and not the scientists, right?

The scientist quotes were ""We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected," said Chris Field, who was a coordinating lead author of the report."

""We don't want to cross a critical threshold where this massive release of carbon starts to run on autopilot," said Field, a professor of biology and of environmental Earth system science at Stanford University."

"As the Earth warms, it generates faster winds over the oceans surrounding Antarctica," Field explained.

"These winds essentially blow the surface water out of the way, allowing water with higher concentrations of CO2 to rise to the surface. This higher-CO2 water is closer to CO2-saturated, so it takes up less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."

"We now know that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought."

No doubt in that statement.

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-15, 08:08 AM

The following is a graph correlating cloud cover and nino SST anomaly:

http://1.2.3.10/bmi/i43.tinypic.com/nq73sz.jpg

It's from this article by Bob Tisdale:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/...ol-part-2.html
This is only local stuff. Everybody knows cloud cover changes have an effect to the climate, and other way around, so it is not surprising that you can see correlations in local conditions. There still aren't any evidence of substantial global cloud cover changes. Note also that there is once again ISCCP cloud cover data used in the blog entry you gave and in Pavlakis et al. which the blog entry cited. As I have pointed out before, ISCCP data has artefacts which makes it appear as if there would be a long time decreasing cloud cover trend Evan et al. (2007) (http://www.aos.wisc.edu/~dvimont/Papers/Evan_etal_GL028083.pdf).

I think Pielke's point is that there are are not just the odd year here or there which doesn't show the expected warming, but six years in a row. And that the warming which would be required to bring observation back into line with the model projection this far into the decade would be several times the projected decadal forcing.
But "decadal mean" doesn't mean that every decade has to have exactly that rate. If one decade has 0.2 W/(m2), another decade could have 1.0 W/(m2) giving you a mean of 0.6 W/(m2). These are not weather predictions.

You are correct to point out the uncertainties in the data, and the issue of infilled data, and I'm sure you would be just as quick to admonish Eric Steig et al in their antarctic warming paper which featured on the front cover of 'Nature' the other month on the same issues.
I don't remember the specific method they used and I don't have the paper here right now. But I remember that climate sceptic community made a very big deal - in a very rude manner - on some minor mistakes in that work, which didn't have any effect to paper's outcome. Mistakes do happen even to climate scientists, but it appears that climate sceptics are expecting them to be perfect. On Antarctic warming one has to remember that there are other papers giving same results as well, such as Gillett et al. (2008) (http://www.cccma.ec.gc.ca/papers/ngillett/PDFS/ngeo338.pdf), who don't do infilling of the missing data:

We use the CRUTEM3 (refs 9,10) near-surface temperature data set, which consists of land station temperature observations gridded on a 5 [degrees] x 5 [degrees] grid, with no infilling of missing data.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-15, 10:19 AM

I think an apology for the accusation of dishonesty might be in order.
Please provide a link to your alleged quote of Freeman Dyson.

If you hadn't admitted that you yourself hadn't really looked into your quotes, you might get it. But you didn't, and you admit that. As to my "alleged" Freeman Dyson quote, it took the extraordinarily difficult task of looking on Wikipedia on the Freeman Dyson page under "global warming." He does agree that the extent to which it may be happening may be exaggerated, but he clearly doesn't believe that it doesn't happen at all.

Stroller

2009-Feb-15, 10:34 AM

I think an apology for the accusation of dishonesty might be in order.

If you hadn't admitted that you yourself hadn't really looked into your quotes, you might get it. But you didn't, and you admit that. As to my "alleged" Freeman Dyson quote, it took the extraordinarily difficult task of looking on Wikipedia on the Freeman Dyson page under "global warming." He does agree that the extent to which it may be happening may be exaggerated, but he clearly doesn't believe that it doesn't happen at all.

I didn't look into the quotes because I am already aware of the views of most of the scientists included in the list, and saw no inconsistency. It's turning out that I was right.

You are clearly not aware of the controversy surrounding wikipedia's coverage of climate science and AGW, and the fact that their senior editor William Connolly is one of the realclimate team, hardly an impartial player in the wikipedia system. Maybe you are also ignorant of the fact that anyone can edit a wiki page, and all sorts of lies, misquotes and biased comment is regularly seen, particularly on the bio pages of scientists who disagree with the wild claims of AGW scientists.

"I didn't take more than a couple of minutes to research anyone on your list."
"I fail to see how physics is a relevant field"

Your research is sloppy, your gullibility is obvious, and your accusation of dishonesty on my part is incorrect.
You have taken incorrect primary data, extrapolated a false conclusion, and then tell me it's my job to disprove it.
You would make an excellent AGW scientist.

From your .sig
"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Yeah, Riiiiight.

I have emailed Professor Dyson to ask for clarification of your "quote".

Stroller

2009-Feb-15, 10:51 AM

This is only local stuff. Everybody knows cloud cover changes have an effect to the climate, and other way around, so it is not surprising that you can see correlations in local conditions. There still aren't any evidence of substantial global cloud cover changes. Note also that there is once again ISCCP cloud cover data used in the blog entry you gave and in Pavlakis et al. which the blog entry cited. As I have pointed out before, ISCCP data has artefacts which makes it appear as if there would be a long time decreasing cloud cover trend Evan et al. (2007) (http://www.aos.wisc.edu/~dvimont/Papers/Evan_etal_GL028083.pdf).
Hi Ari. I agree the close correlation is not global, but calling the western pacific ocean 'local' is stretching it a bit. It's an enourmous 'locality' in an area of the planet which is key to the temperature changes we see in the global record. Enso leads, global average temperature follows. We covered the Evan et al paper and the ISCCP data in the other thread where we discussed this, so I won't repeat that here, though as I said above, I accept your points regarding uncertainties.

But "decadal mean" doesn't mean that every decade has to have exactly that rate. If one decade has 0.2 W/(m2), another decade could have 1.0 W/(m2) giving you a mean of 0.6 W/(m2). These are not weather predictions.
Ok, so really this comes back to Pielke's question at the end of his piece:
How long do we have to wait before the model is falsified? If your answer is "another decade", so be it. We can agree to disagree. It didn't take two decades for Hansen to get the Global-Warming-Alarm! nonsense going in the first place did it?

I don't remember the specific method they used and I don't have the paper here right now. But I remember that climate sceptic community made a very big deal - in a very rude manner - on some minor mistakes in that work, which didn't have any effect to paper's outcome. Mistakes do happen even to climate scientists, but it appears that climate sceptics are expecting them to be perfect. On Antarctic warming one has to remember that there are other papers giving same results as well, such as Gillett et al. (2008) (http://www.cccma.ec.gc.ca/papers/ngillett/PDFS/ngeo338.pdf), who don't do infilling of the missing data:
I think the rudeness was started by Eric Steig, when he responded to a polite request for the data and intermediate computations and code, so that a replication study could be done, by telling the statistician concerned not to contact him in future. The specific method used is a modified version of the Mannomatic sausage machine which churns out hockey stick shaped graphs even when fed with random data. The infilled data was created by back extrapolating the satellite data which started in 1979 to the 1950's.

Stroller

2009-Feb-15, 11:11 AM

You do realize your "could" statements were made by the author of the article and not the scientists, right?

The scientist quotes were ""We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected," said Chris Field, who was a coordinating lead author of the report."

""We don't want to cross a critical threshold where this massive release of carbon starts to run on autopilot," said Field, a professor of biology and of environmental Earth system science at Stanford University."

"As the Earth warms, it generates faster winds over the oceans surrounding Antarctica," Field explained.

"These winds essentially blow the surface water out of the way, allowing water with higher concentrations of CO2 to rise to the surface. This higher-CO2 water is closer to CO2-saturated, so it takes up less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."

"We now know that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought."

No doubt in that statement.

Clearly, even the usually compliant members of the society of environmental journalists are finding the latest hysteria whipping frenzy a bit much and felt the need to add some caveat phraseology.

The article is also under discussion here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/14/the-bbc-attempts-to-patch-up-the-cracks

And here:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/BBC_IPCC_Field.htm

Where Field's claims about falling wheat yields due to warming are debunked.

This piece by Vicky Pope, The UK met office's climate change dep head is worth a read.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2009/pr20090211.html
Dr Vicky Pope, Met Office Head of Climate Change, calls on scientists and the media to ‘rein in’ some of their assertions about climate change.
She says: “News headlines vie for attention and it is easy for scientists to grab this attention by linking climate change to the latest extreme weather event or apocalyptic prediction.

Something of a sea change in Vicky's views.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-16, 12:07 AM

I think an apology for the accusation of dishonesty might be in order.

When you stop showing dishonesty, I will apologize for saying you've shown it.

I didn't look into the quotes because I am already aware of the views of most of the scientists included in the list, and saw no inconsistency. It's turning out that I was right.

That's funny, given the sheer number of direct contradictions I was able to find in about two minutes of Googling, including the quote you'd taken completely out of context, which you are still pretending the context of does not exist.

You are clearly not aware of the controversy surrounding wikipedia's coverage of climate science and AGW, and the fact that their senior editor William Connolly is one of the realclimate team, hardly an impartial player in the wikipedia system. Maybe you are also ignorant of the fact that anyone can edit a wiki page, and all sorts of lies, misquotes and biased comment is regularly seen, particularly on the bio pages of scientists who disagree with the wild claims of AGW scientists.

I am not ignorant of that fact. I will, however, remind you that studies have regularly shown that Wikipedia is actually a very reliable source of information. I do not tend to use it as a primary source, but that doesn't mean I'm going to discount it entirely. Further, the Dyson quote on that page comes from the exact same paper as yours, readable at http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/dysonf07/dysonf07_index.html.

There is no doubt that parts of the world are getting warmer, but the warming is not global. I am not saying that the warming does not cause problems. Obviously it does. Obviously we should be trying to understand it better.

He does go on to say that he feels it to be greatly exaggerated and that resources taken up with studying it should go to other sources, but he does say, several times, in that same paper, that he believes AGW to be real.

"I fail to see how physics is a relevant field"

Which I retracted, yet you still use to tar me. Further, you still haven't shown that your physicist has done any study in that particular field. I have not disputed that he does fine work in researching antimatter. However, I would say that perhaps 90% of physics does not involve the kind of systems modeling that is needed to study climatology. A lot of physics is very specific, and being proficient in one aspect of it still doesn't make you proficient in another.

Your research is sloppy, your gullibility is obvious, and your accusation of dishonesty on my part is incorrect.
You have taken incorrect primary data, extrapolated a false conclusion, and then tell me it's my job to disprove it.
You would make an excellent AGW scientist.

You have presented people as experts. It is your job to show that they are experts. It is not mine to show that they are not. This is very basic stuff, here. I admit freely that I didn't do much in-depth research to disprove your claims, but I found them arguments from authority, not real science. In order to make an argument from authority, which you were clearly trying to do, you must be able to show that your authority is relevant. I pointed out places where your authorities were not relevant or else disagreed with you. You have ignored most of those points. You have focused on irrelevant aspects of others. You are cherry-picking.

korjik

2009-Feb-16, 12:20 AM

Could maybe Dyson's view be that he dosent really know, but that what he has seen dosent support hysteria?

Klausnh

2009-Feb-16, 12:54 AM

Clearly, even the usually compliant members of the society of environmental journalists are finding the latest hysteria whipping frenzy a bit much and felt the need to add some caveat phraseology.

The article is also under discussion here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/14/the-bbc-attempts-to-patch-up-the-cracksCriticism of the BBC. Not relevant to the science.

And here:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/BBC_IPCC_Field.htm

Where Field's claims about falling wheat yields due to warming are debunked.
No. One example of one's states yield of one crop on a blog does not debunk a peer reviewed paper.
(EDIT added)
Also if you do a temperature graph of Kansas in the spring and summer, when wheat is planted, you'll see that temperature has not increased in the the spring or summer. {/EDIT)
And towards the end the article ibecomes deceptive. Field's study was on yields. Graphs at the bottom of the page were on production. Field's study ended in 2002. Graphs at the bottom of the blog start in 2000 so they cannot "contradict Field’s alarmist claims".

This piece by Vicky Pope, The UK met office's climate change dep head is worth a read.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2009/pr20090211.html
Dr Vicky Pope, Met Office Head of Climate Change, calls on scientists and the media to ‘rein in’ some of their assertions about climate change.
She says: “News headlines vie for attention and it is easy for scientists to grab this attention by linking climate change to the latest extreme weather event or apocalyptic prediction.

Something of a sea change in Vicky's views.
I find that link extremely ironic. She is correct. When debating climate change the science is what should be discussed, not the opinions of scientists. Who here has been using blogs and opinion pieces as evidence against global warming and who, here, has been using peer-reviewed articles as evidence for human contributions to global climate change?

Torsten

2009-Feb-16, 01:11 AM

So Arctic Sea Ice February 12, 2009 is ahead of this time for 2005, 2006, and 2007. The ice is also thicker, due to a lack of snow cover when it formed and very cold Arctic temperatures. Is that something that is environmentally desirable?

Is a cooling planet good for the biosphere? CO2 levels are at there lowest level in roughly 500 million years. The low levels of CO2 is causing desertification.

There are ice sheets on both poles and we are at the end of the interglacial period. The paleoclimatic record shows a series of abrupt cooling periods. The interglacial periods end abruptly, not gradually. (i.e. The massive external event occurs which causes the planet to abruptly cool and the glacial cycle returns.)

What specifically is your concern due to a warmer planet with more CO2? Increasing CO2 levels is one of the few anthropomorphic changes which are beneficial.

My point is the scientific evidence shows the 20th century warming was not due to increasing CO2. The CO2 mechanism is saturated.

Quite obviously the planet has started to cool.

William:
I pointed out an simple error in your statement, and suggested that if you are going to compare years, perhaps a longer record would be appropriate. As you keep posting errors that are so simple to see, you will keep being told about them. Of course, I expect this sort of exchange works in both directions. It's too bad that the raw, daily extent data on that site don't go back further in time. Then we could do some really interesting playing with it.

I'm also interested in seeing some of the ice thickness data. I downloaded some of the recent data from the Canadian Arctic. They have people go out on the ice at a number of sites at more-or-less weekly intervals and auger through it to measure its thickness. But the data are tedious (for me) to work with because of missing weeks, and having to interpolate to bring data to a constant date within a year. I also saw a series of charts from the floating buoys program, and the charts do not make sense to me. They seem to indicate in some cases that the ice instantly became about 1.6 m thick back in the autumn, and of course that makes no sense when I compare it to the auger-derived measurements, so it is clearly my misunderstanding. I haven't found current data from the underwater sonar site(s). So, where did you get your information about ice thickness for this winter?

But why are you asking me about the environmental desirability of thick ice? And what do CO2 levels in the Cambrium have to do with the functioning of ecosystems as they exist today? Does my challenging your claim automatically put me in the camp of alarmists? What if I thought the Milankovich factors were pointing at an imminent change towards a glacial period? Should that silence me from challenging a false claim when I think I see one?

When you write "Increasing CO2 levels is one of the few anthropomorphic (sic) changes which are beneficial," I roll my eyes. Beneficial to whom? All I will say on this is that I am sure of one thing: You are not in any position to declare that increasing CO2 concentrations is unequivacally beneficial.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-16, 05:30 AM

Could maybe Dyson's view be that he dosent really know, but that what he has seen dosent support hysteria?

Entirely possible. Now, I cannot say what study Dyson has put into it, to be sure--quantum field theory is actually pretty much exactly one of the aspects of physics I didn't think terribly relevant to climate modeling, given issues of scale--but that did seem to be what most of those out-of-context quotes implied.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-16, 07:18 AM

http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~jsmerdon/papers/2008_JC_Smerdonetal.pdf

Interesting article about the error treatment in one of Mann’s recent paper but it hardly supports your accusation of academic fraud it doesn’t challenge the paper as a whole, merely the certainly assigned to the conclusions.

Oh, and you didn’t seem to read it before posting the link. When it says there is a the “possibility of warm bias” in the reconstruction you need to remember that current temperatures are not reconstructed, only past temperatures. IOW past temperatures are reconstructed as warmer then they really were, so the temperature increase the reconstruction shows is smaller then what really occurred. This is yet another example of a paper that doesn’t say what you purported it to.

This much is obvious. It only took me a minute to find
Friis-Christensen and Lassen's paper responding to Frolich and Lockwood. (http://www.spacecenter.dk/publications/scientific-report-series/Scient_No._3.pdf)

You have crossed over into an ATM topic (an unpublished paper by Svensmark and Friis-Christensen attempting to defend the former’s cosmic ray hypothesis as viable). I won’t spend much time rebutting, save to give you a few links on recent research.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080403083932.htm

New research has dealt a blow to the skeptics who argue that climate change is all due to cosmic rays rather than to man-made greenhouse gases. The new evidence shows no reliable connection between the cosmic ray intensity and cloud cover.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081217075138.htm

A new study supports earlier findings by stating that changes in cosmic rays most likely do not contribute to climate change. It is sometimes claimed that changes in radiation from space, so-called galactic cosmic rays, can be one of the causes of global warming. A new study, investigating the effect of cosmic rays on clouds, concludes that the likelihood of this is very small.

lomiller1

2009-Feb-16, 07:24 AM

Excuse me - Stroller is defining factors not effects. An effect is the result of the change of a factor or factors has on this result. And no it’s not Stroller’s job to define the effect these factors have, it is the modeler’s job.

It’s the molders job to include the relevant effects; they have no responsibility to include every trivial effect that can be dreamed up by quacks on the internet. Anyone who thinks a relevant effect has been missed must first show what that effect is it is and show it’s relevant before then can expect it to be addressed.

This is how all science is performed. You can never ever disprove every other possibility, but you can and do disprove the ones people have raised legitimate questions about.

Stroller

2009-Feb-16, 07:36 AM

When you write "Increasing CO2 levels is one of the few anthropomorphic (sic) changes which are beneficial," I roll my eyes. Beneficial to whom? All I will say on this is that I am sure of one thing: You are not in any position to declare that increasing CO2 concentrations is unequivacally beneficial.

The Freeman Dyson piece Gillian and I have been bickering about contains this gem:

"if the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is allowed to continue, shall we arrive at a climate similar to the climate of six thousand years ago when the Sahara was wet? Second, if we could choose between the climate of today with a dry Sahara and the climate of six thousand years ago with a wet Sahara, should we prefer the climate of today? My second heresy answers yes to the first question and no to the second. It says that the warm climate of six thousand years ago with the wet Sahara is to be preferred, and that increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may help to bring it back. I am not saying that this heresy is true. I am only saying that it will not do us any harm to think about it."

The whole article is well worth a read.
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/dysonf07/dysonf07_index.html

Stroller

2009-Feb-16, 08:16 AM

When you stop showing dishonesty, I will apologize for saying you've shown it.
I have been honest. I originally said:
"In fact, there are a lot of pre-eminent scientists in very high positions at academic and other scientific institutions who disagree with AGW theory, and say so."

and you said:
"I'd like some evidence that those scientists are in relevant fields"

And so I googled a list and you came back with:

"I fail to see how physics is a relevant field." which you have since retracted.

So we disagree about the relevance of fields, not whether I'm honest. I asked you whether you thought astronomy was a relevant field, but you ignored that question. What about biology and ecology?

including the quote you'd taken completely out of context, which you are still pretending the context of does not exist.

Sorry, I've lost track, which quote?

He does go on to say that he feels it to be greatly exaggerated and that resources taken up with studying it should go to other sources, but he does say, several times, in that same paper, that he believes AGW to be real.

He also says in the quote on the list that the models are "full of fudge factors" and "don't begin to descibe the real world" A damning endictment of the science of AGW whatever his gut feeling about the causes of warming, the anthropogenic component of which he believes is "greatly exaggerated".

Overall then, he far more disagrees with AGW science than supports it. So, along with Christensen, you were wrong to include him in your "half the people on the list". Go on, admit it.

In return I'll give you Richard Tol, he shouldn't have been on the list. As you pointed out, he's an economist.
I'll note however, that he says
"Tol and Yohe (2006)
argue that vulnerability to climate
change is not constant, and that Stern
et al. (2006) may therefore have overestimated
the impacts of climate change."

I'll further note he is talking about economic impacts. Tol is a forward thinker, and realizes humans are adaptable.

I have not disputed that he does fine work in researching antimatter. However, I would say that perhaps 90% of physics does not involve the kind of systems modeling that is needed to study climatology. A lot of physics is very specific, and being proficient in one aspect of it still doesn't make you proficient in another.

Antonio Zuchichi doesn't merely research it Gillian, he originated the entire field! You don't get to be the president of the world federation of scientists by being a researcher. :)
A quick look at the bibliogaphies I provided will tell you there is far more to his expertise than particle physics. In any case, being able to see that the models used by AGW proponents are 'full of fudge factors" and "don't begin to describe the real world", or as Zuchcichi put it, are "incoherent and invalid" is not exactly rocket science. It's obvious to anyone with more than half a brain who examines them critically.

I pointed out places where your authorities were not relevant or else disagreed with you. You have ignored most of those points.
Relevance is a matter of debate, you already retracted your claim that physics isn't relevant (though you cling to the idea that the specialism a physicist goes into somehow prevents him from being able to think generally or critically), and I debunked the first two claims of disagreement I picked, Christenson and Dyson. So five to go, if I can work out who on the list they are. Perhaps you can help out there.

Stroller

2009-Feb-16, 09:43 AM

Models don’t need to include every effect they include the major effects

Originally Posted by orionjim View Post
Excuse me - Stroller is defining factors not effects.

It’s the molders job to include the relevant effects;
The ability to miss the point is strong in some.

I like "molders" though, I may re-use that one. :)

"And you'll be stuffed into my mold,
Until the rights to you are sold"
- Frank Zappa -

they have no responsibility to include every trivial effect that can be dreamed up by quacks on the internet. Anyone who thinks a relevant effect has been missed must first show what that effect is it is and show it’s relevant before then can expect it to be addressed.

You seem to have smartly bypassed this one. But I suppose doing that sort of thing is to be expected of internet windbags.

Since far more heat is transported in and through the troposphere (bypassing virtually all the effective co2 layer) by convection rather than by radiation, it is clearly a major failing of the models that it isn't included in any way which sufficiently approximates reality to get a meaningful result.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-16, 09:58 AM

"As the Earth warms, it generates faster winds over the oceans surrounding Antarctica," Field explained.

"These winds essentially blow the surface water out of the way, allowing water with higher concentrations of CO2 to rise to the surface. This higher-CO2 water is closer to CO2-saturated, so it takes up less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."

I recall, quite distinctly, from my oceanography 4000-level class as a part of my aerospace and ocean engineering degree, that wind was only one factor in upwelling. Thermohaline circulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermohaline_circulation), while partially driven by wind, is also called the ocean conveyor bellt, as well as the meridional overturning circulation (MOC), and is also driven by temperature and salinity.

Furthermore, changes in the thermohaline circulation have significant impacts on the Earth's radiation budget. As winds increase, the circulation increases. Surface ocean temperatures will cool, due to the upwelling of deep, cold waters, resulting in less cloud cover, and greater permitivity of the Earth's atmosphere to outgoing radiation. Even though the oceanic heat sink will be slighty cooler on the surface (warmer all around), the reduced cloud cover overcompensates and allows for greater radiative cooling from the oceans, thereby providing the balance to slight overall increase in temperature (despite the slightly cooler surface temps because of the winds).

It's one of the key stabilizers of our climate, and is a principle reason why the Earth has not encountered runaway global warming in the past, despite having once had a much greater concentration of CO2.

The Earth's temperature is in a locus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory), people. It's a stable minima, not an unstable maxima. Push it one way, and it will tend to return. Shove the snot out of it one way, and it will still tend to return. Drop-kick it one way and it will still tend to return! Chuck Norris roundhouse kick it and you'll wind up with another asteroid belt (hey, even the Earth has it's limits... :))

Change the conditions and you'll change the locus, but you will not get "runaway global warming." These are either fearmongering tactics (intentional) or the result of a clear misunderstanding of systems theory. I know of their qualifications. I also know the proof is in the pudding (historical record), and that our early atmosphere wasn't warmer because of the higher concentration of CO2 so much as it was due to the much-thicker and atmosphere we had back then, which was much more laden with moisture.

"We now know that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought."

No. He believes that. He doesn't know that, and will never know that unless it were to come to pass. The pudding says otherwise.

No doubt in that statement. :doh:

Perhaps in your mind... :rolleyes:

orionjim

2009-Feb-16, 06:03 PM

It’s the molders job to include the relevant effects; they have no responsibility to include every trivial effect that can be dreamed up by quacks on the internet. Anyone who thinks a relevant effect has been missed must first show what that effect is it is and show it’s relevant before then can expect it to be addressed.

This is how all science is performed. You can never ever disprove every other possibility, but you can and do disprove the ones people have raised legitimate questions about.

You need to get the terminology right to even begin to understand my reply:

The effect(s) is/are the output of the model. The modeler has a list of factors (inputs) that they can change that in turn change the effect(s) coming out of the model. These effects come from calculations based on some theory (with underlying physics to support them) that turns these factor values to effect values. The theory includes the factors to include and the formula(s) to calculate the effects based on the settings of the factors.

The modeler also has a list of factors that are not included in the math of their model. These are real world factors that the modeler knows may or may not influence the effect(s) coming out of the model. What does the modeler do?

a) Ignore these factors
b) Note that these factors are not included
c) Include these factors
d) Devise a way to include them by creating blocks that allow them to induce a large amount of (statistical) noise into the model
If you choose a) or b) you have a pretty weak model. I think c) is a better answer but could make the model too complex. If c) is out of the question then d) is the best answer.

Now back to your reply. I am going to change the word effect(s) to factor(s) and then reply.

It’s the molders job to include the relevant factors…

I agree, but the question is how do they know which ones are relevant? The answer is they don’t, but they may have a theory. If it is a theory that is driving their work, should they only select the factors that fit their theory? In other words; is their purpose to prove to everyone else that their theory is right by only considering what they think is important? Is this science?

...
They have no responsibility to include every trivial Factor that can be dreamed up by quacks on the internet
...

So what gives them the right to cherry pick trivial Factors like co2; which based on the list of greenhouse Factor values it comes in as trivial when compared to others. In other words who defines what trivial is? And remember the effect is defined by the formula the modeler uses, that converts something from trivial to having a big effect.

...
Anyone who thinks a relevant Factor has been missed must first show what that Factor is and show it’s relevant before then can expect it to be addressed.
...

Sorry. The modeler is trying to convince the world their model is right. The biggest thing a modeler has to show is that they have considered all potential factors; when they do this the effects they show means that their model has value.

...
This is how all science is performed. You can never ever disprove every other possibility, but you can and do disprove the ones people have raised legitimate questions about.
...

And who defines what legitimate questions are? Some of the greatest leaps in science have come from people that were outside the (from the terminology of climatologists) peer group.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-16, 07:24 PM

And so I googled a list

Which is part of my problem, frankly. You Googled a list. I Googled information that indicated that you hadn't even really read your own links. I mean, after all, you say in your previous post that we are "bickering" over an article which you had not, in fact, yourself read. This was obvious, because you huffily declared you were going to e-mail Dyson himself for provenance. Do you know how I found it? I followed the references on the Wikipedia page.

So we disagree about the relevance of fields, not whether I'm honest. I asked you whether you thought astronomy was a relevant field, but you ignored that question. What about biology and ecology?

No. Astronomy is not a relevant field unless the astronomer can show that there is an astronomical cause; all such attempts have either been wrong or simply had flawed methodology. Biology may or may not be relevant; if your whole knowledge is, for example, the lifespan of a single insect, you're just not going to have the broad information to know how the climate will change--just how climate change will or will not influence the insect you research. Again, with ecology, it depends on how broad or narrow your focus is. Generally speaking, entire fields cannot, as a whole, be said to be relevant; there are exceptions, but by and large, you must look at what, specifically, the person is studying.

Sorry, I've lost track, which quote?

The one you cited as proof that Antarctica is not warming which, if taken in context, actually states that warming is happening, but that the signal-to-noise ration on the continent makes tracking it difficult, as opposed to the peninsula where it's extremely obvious.

He also says in the quote on the list that the models are "full of fudge factors" and "don't begin to descibe the real world" A damning endictment of the science of AGW whatever his gut feeling about the causes of warming, the anthropogenic component of which he believes is "greatly exaggerated".

Ah, yes; yes, he does. However, you were using him as someone who didn't believe in it at all, and you got very upset that a quote from him was provided saying that he did accept AGW. You may not be happy about what he said; I may not be sure he's done enough research to be trusted on the subject. However, if he is to be cited as a source, we must both accept the words he actually wrote.

Overall then, he far more disagrees with AGW science than supports it. So, along with Christensen, you were wrong to include him in your "half the people on the list". Go on, admit it.

No. You said he did not accept it at all. You were wrong. You hadn't even looked to find out that you were wrong. Again, when it was pointed out that, however loosely, he does accept the evidence (or at least some of it) for AGW, you claimed that it wasn't true. In fact, it felt to me as though you were implying that I had made it up--or, failing that, someone at Wikipedia had. You were wrong.

In return I'll give you Richard Tol, he shouldn't have been on the list. As you pointed out, he's an economist.
I'll note however, that he says
"Tol and Yohe (2006)
argue that vulnerability to climate
change is not constant, and that Stern
et al. (2006) may therefore have overestimated
the impacts of climate change."

I'll further note he is talking about economic impacts. Tol is a forward thinker, and realizes humans are adaptable.

But how qualified is he to know what adaptations we'll have to make? Being adaptable won't entirely help is the amount of arable land in the world is no longer enough to sustain the population.

Antonio Zuchichi doesn't merely research it Gillian, he originated the entire field! You don't get to be the president of the world federation of scientists by being a researcher. :)
A quick look at the bibliogaphies I provided will tell you there is far more to his expertise than particle physics. In any case, being able to see that the models used by AGW proponents are 'full of fudge factors" and "don't begin to describe the real world", or as Zuchcichi put it, are "incoherent and invalid" is not exactly rocket science. It's obvious to anyone with more than half a brain who examines them critically.

How does he know? Is he qualified to determine what those fudge factors are? Of course it's not rocket science; rocket science isn't relevant. However, you must admit that some knowledge is required to understand the models in the first place.

Relevance is a matter of debate, you already retracted your claim that physics isn't relevant (though you cling to the idea that the specialism a physicist goes into somehow prevents him from being able to think generally or critically), and I debunked the first two claims of disagreement I picked, Christenson and Dyson. So five to go, if I can work out who on the list they are. Perhaps you can help out there.

No. I don't say that specialization prevents someone from thinking generally or critically, ye Gods. What I said is that, the farther advanced you get into a particular field, the less time you spend researching outside that field. It isn't just true in physics. It's true in any field. There are still generalists, but by and large, you get informed about what you put work into. Dyson and Zuchichi are not in fields where research into global warming is a natural part of their work. In both cases, any work studying AGW will take time out of the work for which they are famed. I'm not saying they aren't taking the time. I'm saying that it is your obligation, having brought them into debate, to show that they are.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-17, 12:59 AM

I recall, quite distinctly, from my oceanography 4000-level class as a part of my aerospace and ocean engineering degree, that wind was only one factor in upwelling. Thermohaline circulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermohaline_circulation), while partially driven by wind, is also called the ocean conveyor bellt, as well as the meridional overturning circulation (MOC), and is also driven by temperature and salinity.

Furthermore, changes in the thermohaline circulation have significant impacts on the Earth's radiation budget. As winds increase, the circulation increases. Surface ocean temperatures will cool, due to the upwelling of deep, cold waters, resulting in less cloud cover, and greater permitivity of the Earth's atmosphere to outgoing radiation. Even though the oceanic heat sink will be slighty cooler on the surface (warmer all around), the reduced cloud cover overcompensates and allows for greater radiative cooling from the oceans, thereby providing the balance to slight overall increase in temperature (despite the slightly cooler surface temps because of the winds).Not sure what you're trying to state with this. I don't see Field saying that winds are the only factor.

It's one of the key stabilizers of our climate, and is a principle reason why the Earth has not encountered runaway global warming in the past, despite having once had a much greater concentration of CO2.

The Earth's temperature is in a locus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory), people. It's a stable minima, not an unstable maxima. Push it one way, and it will tend to return. Shove the snot out of it one way, and it will still tend to return. Drop-kick it one way and it will still tend to return! Chuck Norris roundhouse kick it and you'll wind up with another asteroid belt (hey, even the Earth has it's limits... :))

Change the conditions and you'll change the locus, but you will not get "runaway global warming." These are either fearmongering tactics (intentional) or the result of a clear misunderstanding of systems theory. I know of their qualifications. I also know the proof is in the pudding (historical record), and that our early atmosphere wasn't warmer because of the higher concentration of CO2 so much as it was due to the much-thicker and atmosphere we had back then, which was much more laden with moisture.You know this how?

No. He believes that. He doesn't know that, and will never know that unless it were to come to pass. The pudding says otherwise.

:doh:

Perhaps in your mind... :rolleyes:To believe something is to accept it on faith.
We believe in God, but have no evidence.
We believe in Santa Claus but have no evidence.
We believe UFOs are extraterrestial but have no evidence.

To know something is to accept the evidence presented.
We know that space-time is expanding because we have evidence and models based on that evidence.
We know that night follows day because we have evidence and models based on that evidence.
Field knows "that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought" because ""We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected,"

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-17, 01:14 AM

Field knows "that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought" because ""We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected,"

My bold.

If this board was WIKI the bolded phrase would have in superscript "cite needed."

Mixing some facts (?) with conjecture does not make the conjecture fact.

Sounds like :eek: to me!

lomiller1

2009-Feb-17, 07:47 AM

a) Ignore these factors
b) Note that these factors are not included
c) Include these factors
d) Devise a way to include them by creating blocks that allow them to induce a large amount of (statistical) noise into the model

Please at least try to pay attention. The modeler is under no obligation to explain ever random influence quackes can post on the internet. No scientist is ever expected to explain every random influence quackes post on the internet. What they are expected to explain is the influences where someone has made a sound case they could be important.

Stroller, came up with a random list he insists molders need to “explain” even though he couldn’t justify any reason any of them may be important. This is about as scientific and ID proponents demanding an “explanation” for every gap in the fossil record. It isn’t science it’s quackery plain and simple.

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-17, 08:23 AM

I agree the close correlation is not global, but calling the western pacific ocean 'local' is stretching it a bit.
It is not even close to global, so it is local.

It's an enourmous 'locality' in an area of the planet which is key to the temperature changes we see in the global record. Enso leads, global average temperature follows.
Prove it.

One thing you don't get from ENSO or other oscillations is steadily growing trend that lasts several decades seen in global temperature.

It didn't take two decades for Hansen to get the Global-Warming-Alarm! nonsense going in the first place did it?
Do you wish to discuss politics or science? This statement of yours sounds awful lot like political propaganda.

There is a known mechanism for global warming, but there is no reasons to expect significant cooling currently.

I think the rudeness was started by Eric Steig, when he responded to a polite request for the data and intermediate computations and code, so that a replication study could be done, by telling the statistician concerned not to contact him in future.
Well, I think that when these contacts routinely end up with accusations of dishonesty towards climate scientists, I really can't blame them. If climate sceptic community doesn't want to approach the question scientifically (i.e. publish the relevant arguments in scientific media instead of blogs), then it is perfectly fine to just ignore them.

The specific method used is a modified version of the Mannomatic sausage machine which churns out hockey stick shaped graphs even when fed with random data.
Where is the "hockey stick shaped graph" in Steig et al. then?

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 08:42 AM

I recall, quite distinctly, from my oceanography 4000-level class as a part of my aerospace and ocean engineering degree, that wind was only one factor in upwelling. Thermohaline circulation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermohaline_circulation), while partially driven by wind, is also called the ocean conveyor bellt, as well as the meridional overturning circulation (MOC), and is also driven by temperature and salinity.

Furthermore, changes in the thermohaline circulation have significant impacts on the Earth's radiation budget. As winds increase, the circulation increases. Surface ocean temperatures will cool, due to the upwelling of deep, cold waters, resulting in less cloud cover, and greater permitivity of the Earth's atmosphere to outgoing radiation. Even though the oceanic heat sink will be slighty cooler on the surface (warmer all around), the reduced cloud cover overcompensates and allows for greater radiative cooling from the oceans, thereby providing the balance to slight overall increase in temperature (despite the slightly cooler surface temps because of the winds).

It's one of the key stabilizers of our climate, and is a principle reason why the Earth has not encountered runaway global warming in the past, despite having once had a much greater concentration of CO2.

The Earth's temperature is in a locus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory), people. It's a stable minima, not an unstable maxima. Push it one way, and it will tend to return. Shove the snot out of it one way, and it will still tend to return. Drop-kick it one way and it will still tend to return! Chuck Norris roundhouse kick it and you'll wind up with another asteroid belt (hey, even the Earth has it's limits... :))

Change the conditions and you'll change the locus, but you will not get "runaway global warming." These are either fearmongering tactics (intentional) or the result of a clear misunderstanding of systems theory. I know of their qualifications. I also know the proof is in the pudding (historical record), and that our early atmosphere wasn't warmer because of the higher concentration of CO2 so much as it was due to the much-thicker and atmosphere we had back then, which was much more laden with moisture.

Interesting and informative post mugs.
One thing that struck me, is that during the last 500M years, the sun has increased it's output by 3%. That's a heck of a lot more energy coming earths way. The average solar cycle makes a difference of approx 0.1C to global average temp from max to min over 5.5 years (http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1964/to:2009/mean:43/detrend:0.7/offset:0.35/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1965/to:2009/mean:12/scale:0.001). During that time the suns output is varying something like 0.1%, equivalent to around 1.36W/m^2 on the ground.

So a 3% change is around 40 watts per square metre, an enormous change in earth's energy budget. There must be enormous negative feedbacks in the climatic system to accomodate such change and yet keep earth's temperature within a liveable range of 12C or so. In fact, co2 has fallen from around 8000ppm 500M years ago to about 250ppm just before the present period of warming at the end of the little ice age. A lot of it is bound up in calcinous rocks formed from sedimented sea animal shells.

Earth has had to throw off a duvet to stay cool enough.

This must have had big consequences for the ocean circulations.

In any case, it makes it apparent that the present warming episode is tiny blip compared with the way earth has dealt with other changes to the environment in the past through negative feedback mechanisms. I just hope there's enough co2 can be liberated to warm things up again after the next major league volcano goes off.

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 09:08 AM

It is not even close to global, so it is local.
One thing you don't get from ENSO or other oscillations is steadily growing trend that lasts several decades seen in global temperature.

http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/ is a good place to start reading about this stuff. Bob has shown how during a positive phase of the pacific decadal oscillation, el ninos produce upward step changes in SST's. There's your upward trend, but trather than a steady climb, in step with co2, it's a series of discrete steps, in step with ENSO events. If you look around Bob's site, you'll also find the proof for the way el ninos effects ripple through the worlds oceans and affect global average temperature a while later.

Prove it

I'm not going to play your courtroom games, so if you're interested, you can go and read for yourself, and if you are just out to play prosecutor, you can remain in ignorance. Your call.

Do you wish to discuss politics or science? This statement of yours sounds awful lot like political propaganda.

You think that's political propaganda? Try this latest piece (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/15/james-hansen-power-plants-coal) from astronomer-turned-climatologist James Hanson. Or this piece (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7890988.stm) from biologist-turned-climatologist Chris Field.

There is a known mechanism for global warming, but there is no reasons to expect significant cooling currently.

Please could you cite proof that a trace gas, the changes in concentration of which always lag behind changes in temperature, is a 'known mechanism' for anthropogenic global warming.

For imminent cooling, check de Jager's latest peer reviewed paper on projected solar activity, or look outside your window.

If climate sceptic community doesn't want to approach the question scientifically (i.e. publish the relevant arguments in scientific media instead of blogs), then it is perfectly fine to just ignore them.

It's not a question of 'want to'. The journals have developed a warm bias, and it's extremely difficult to get papers published which conflict with the party line. One of the prominent journals, Climatic Change has as it's editor none other than Stephen Schneider. need I say more? Blogs like climate audit do however, have effective 'peer review' happening out in the open where all can see the process and contribute. Hanson and the climate catastrophe caballeros have abandoned real scientific debate and hide in their cloistered and censored domains, emerging only to write unsupported propaganda pieces in the mainstream media. True science is having to go 'open source' and will no doubt produce something better, faster and free in due course. :)
If you insist on an appeal to the authority of journal publication before being prepared to consider scientific output, this is really just the equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and chanting:
"Lah lah lah lah, we're not listening."

Where is the "hockey stick shaped graph" in Steig et al. then?
I did say modified. The Steig et al paper is currently under review at climate audit. Errors have been found. Despite initial protestations that this did not affect the result, Steig has recast the final curve and it is different to the original.
The Steig method eschews the need for spatial weighting in their data handling methods through some handwaving. This introduces a bias through the fact that there is a large concentration of temperature measuring stations on the tip of the antarctic peninsula, by far the warmest spot on the continent. A new study (http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/02/15/aws-gridded-reconstruction/) has been done which properly weights the station data by area. Surprisingly, the warming suddenly looks much more localized. The result is that the continent wide trend turns out to be around half of what Steig et al claim.

Steig is currently refusing to release the code for replication purposes. What does he have to hide?
It took a couple of years to get Amman and Wahl to finally produce the goods, and when they did, it proved their results were insignificant, due to the error bars revealed. read all about it (http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2008/8/11/caspar-and-the-jesus-paper.html) on Bishop Hills blog.

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 09:42 AM

Please at least try to pay attention. The modeler is under no obligation to explain ever random influence quackes can post on the internet. No scientist is ever expected to explain every random influence quackes post on the internet. What they are expected to explain is the influences where someone has made a sound case they could be important.

Stroller, came up with a random list he insists molders need to “explain” even though he couldn’t justify any reason any of them may be important. This is about as scientific and ID proponents demanding an “explanation” for every gap in the fossil record. It isn’t science it’s quackery plain and simple.

Wow, those dang molders are at it again. :)

Since far more heat is transported in and through the troposphere (bypassing virtually all the effective co2 layer) by convection rather than by radiation, it is clearly a major failing of the models that it isn't included in any way which sufficiently approximates reality to get a meaningful result.
3rd time lucky.
Though I fear lomiller1 is having enough difficulty approximating reality at the moment anyway.

antoniseb

2009-Feb-17, 10:50 AM

A few years ago, this topic was a problem for the forum. Every time the subject came up, debate became heated, and nothing was resolved. The fact is that this subject has been very politicized, and it is near impossible for lay-people to discuss it without simply parroting one or another side's political talking points.

Looking at this thread, I'm inclined to think we need another moratorium on this topic for a while. With luck more definitive science will trump the social ambiguity soon.

Do you have a strong opinion about this moratorium? Please start a thread in About BAUT if you want to discuss it.

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 12:07 PM

Which is part of my problem, frankly. You Googled a list.
Mea culpa.

No. Astronomy is not a relevant field unless the astronomer can show that there is an astronomical cause.

That's James Hanson out of the running then

Generally speaking, entire fields cannot, as a whole, be said to be relevant;

Whoops, there go the rest of the climate catastrophe caballeros.

The one you cited as proof that Antarctica is not warming which, if taken in context, actually states that warming is happening, but that the signal-to-noise ration on the continent makes tracking it difficult, as opposed to the peninsula where it's extremely obvious.

See my comments regarding Steig et al at the bottom of my reply to Ari, and the link to a new study, which halves Steigs warming estimate.

You may not be happy about what he (Freeman Dyson) said; I may not be sure he's done enough research to be trusted on the subject. However, if he is to be cited as a source, we must both accept the words he actually wrote.

Indeed, and since you are so keen to establish context, you'll agree that the context of the remark you quoted establishes Freeman Dyson as an AGW sceptic not one of your "half the list".

No. You said he did not accept it at all. You were wrong. You ....You were wrong.

Give it up Gillian, Freeman Dyson is an AGW sceptic, no amount of prevarication and bluster will change that. I note you didn't contest Christensen. You got him wrong.

But how qualified is he to know what adaptations we'll have to make? Being adaptable won't entirely help is the amount of arable land in the world is no longer enough to sustain the population.

Are you an expert in a relevant field to prognosticate about arable land? Why wouldn't there be enough? Food production can be made far more efficient, and the IPCC has revised it's sea level change prediction to less than two feet in 40 years as the worst case scenario. The rate of increase in levels has been falling since the oceans stopped warming in 2003.

Dyson and Zuchichi are not in fields where research into global warming is a natural part of their work. In both cases, any work studying AGW will take time out of the work for which they are famed. I'm not saying they aren't taking the time. I'm saying that it is your obligation, having brought them into debate, to show that they are.

With them being such well qualified scientists, I doubt they'd shoot their mouths off in public if they felt they hadn't looked at the issue closely enough to form a valid opinion.

How does he know? Is he qualified to determine what those fudge factors are? Of course it's not rocket science; rocket science isn't relevant. However, you must admit that some knowledge is required to understand the models in the first place.

Sure, some knowledge is required, but not so much it can't be understood by the president of the world federation of scientists in his spare time, or a competent science journalist, or even by me, a lowly graduate of the history and philosophy of science with an HNC in engineering.

Climate science is far too important to be left to climatologists

-With apologies to M. Clemenceau.- :)

--
You can torture the data until it confesses
Even to crimes it did not commit.

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 12:22 PM

Antoniseb, apologies, I posted that final missive before I saw your post.

I'll desist.

Stroller

2009-Feb-17, 12:33 PM

Do you have a strong opinion about this moratorium? Please start a thread in About BAUT if you want to discuss it.

I tried but got this:

"You may not post new threads"

Anyway, I'm off to do some voluntary work for the rest of the week so you won't have to put up with my keenness to debate this topic for a while at least.

Cheers

Stroller

Gillianren

2009-Feb-17, 06:35 PM

That's James Hanson out of the running then

If he has done the study in his time outside his study of astronomy--I haven't looked him up; I am not, despite what you think, actually arguing in favour of AGW--then fine. If he has done that work, he is an expert. However, I would expect anyone bringing him up as an expert to show that he had done that work.

Whoops, there go the rest of the climate catastrophe caballeros.

Again, if they have done the work, that's what's relevant, not what field they started in. But they have to have done the work.

Indeed, and since you are so keen to establish context, you'll agree that the context of the remark you quoted establishes Freeman Dyson as an AGW sceptic not one of your "half the list".

Sure, he's a skeptic; I don't dispute that. However, he said, despite your denial, that anthropogenic climate change happens. He doesn't think it's global. He doesn't think it's a catastrophe. But he does think it happens, and you said he didn't.

Give it up Gillian, Freeman Dyson is an AGW sceptic, no amount of prevarication and bluster will change that. I note you didn't contest Christensen. You got him wrong.

I'd have to spend more time studying than I really feel like right now. I have read that he has changed his stance. However, as I recall from what I read--it was a couple of days ago--it's another case of not believing the projections but accepting that it does happen. I could be wrong. If I am, so be it; you've got another one. But I'm keeping Freeman Dyson, or rather splitting him, because he did not say what you imply he does. Yes, he doubts the universality of it, though I'm rather curious as to why--given that the atmosphere is everywhere--but he acknowledges that it does change temperature in some places.

Are you an expert in a relevant field to prognosticate about arable land? Why wouldn't there be enough? Food production can be made far more efficient, and the IPCC has revised it's sea level change prediction to less than two feet in 40 years as the worst case scenario. The rate of increase in levels has been falling since the oceans stopped warming in 2003.

No, I'm not. It's true. I'm going on what I've heard. But if it's true, how does he expect humans to adapt? How does he know what humans are going to have to adapt to? Sure, we--like any other species--can adapt, if it's possible for us to do so given any particular change to our environment.

With them being such well qualified scientists, I doubt they'd shoot their mouths off in public if they felt they hadn't looked at the issue closely enough to form a valid opinion.

You'd be amazed at what well-qualified scientists will shoot their mouths off about.

Sure, some knowledge is required, but not so much it can't be understood by the president of the world federation of scientists in his spare time, or a competent science journalist, or even by me, a lowly graduate of the history and philosophy of science with an HNC in engineering.

Frankly, I find that unlikely. Dyson, as you are so fond of quoting, believes that the systems are insanely complex and that not all variables are taken into account. If that's true, it should take serious study to come to a conclusion. If not, Dyson is using faulty reasoning.

Climate science is far too important to be left to climatologists

-With apologies to M. Clemenceau.- :)

--
You can torture the data until it confesses
Even to crimes it did not commit.

So engineering is to important to be left to engineers as well? We're going to throw out what the people who've put the most work into it have said, because your quantum physicists disagree?

William

2009-Feb-17, 07:32 PM

Good News!!!

More Arctic Sea Ice.

14,089,688 km^2.

http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm#top

Stroller

2009-Feb-18, 10:51 AM

If he (Jim Hansen) has done the study in his time outside his study of astronomy--I haven't looked him up.... I would expect anyone bringing him up as an expert to show that he had done that work.
Jim Hansen is alarmist in chief Gillian. Clicky (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/15/james-hansen-power-plants-coal)

You'd be amazed at what well-qualified scientists will shoot their mouths off about.
Never a truer word spoken.

clicky (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/17/william-schlesinger-on-ipcc-something-on-the-order-of-20-percent-have-had-some-dealing-with-climate/#more-5697)
During the question and answer session of last week’s William Schlesinger/John Christy global warming debate, (alarmist) Schlesinger was asked how many members of United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were actual climate scientists. It is well known that many, if not most, of its members are not scientists at all. Its president, for example, is an economist. Rajendra Pachauri, Chairman of the IPCC - trained initially as a railway engineer.

This question came after Schlesinger had cited the IPCC as an authority for his position. His answer was quite telling.

First he broadened it to include not just climate scientists but also those who have had “some dealing with the climate.” His complete answer was that he thought, “something on the order of 20 percent have had some dealing with climate.” In other words, even IPCC worshiper Schlesinger now acknowledges that 80 percent of the IPCC membership had absolutely no dealing with the climate as part of their academic studies.

Sorry for the brief reply - using a smartphone.

Stroller

2009-Feb-18, 11:16 AM

Hey Ari.
Trade winds drive Enso and the global temp 3 months later. (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/17/the-trade-winds-drive-the-enso/)

Coupled with Bob Tisdale’s work on the links between El Nino and upward step changes in temp, and his work on the correlation of cloud cover and SST’s, we have a nice group of variables to play with. Toss GLAAM (Global Atmospheric Angular Momentum) into the mix, and it’s relationship with LOD (Length of Day) and the earth’s magnetic index, and we’re getting somewhere at last.

Gillianren

2009-Feb-18, 06:20 PM

Jim Hansen is alarmist in chief Gillian. Clicky (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/feb/15/james-hansen-power-plants-coal)

Which says not a word about his qualifications, which I believe was the subject in question. He is, however, best known for work in climatology, unlike your physicists. I don't know if he's right; I believe your assumption that he is wrong has more to do with your own opinions than his qualifications.

Never a truer word spoken.

So the AGW experts are "shooting their mouths off" and yours aren't. Check.

orionjim

2009-Feb-18, 06:34 PM

Please at least try to pay attention. The modeler is under no obligation to explain ever random influence quackes can post on the internet. No scientist is ever expected to explain every random influence quackes post on the internet. What they are expected to explain is the influences where someone has made a sound case they could be important.

...

Oh I am paying attention.

You really underestimate the difficult job modelers have. Not only do they need to include the list of factors or parameters they and their friends feel are important, they also need to include the ones that, yes, the quacks on the internet suggest. But that isn’t the hard part, what they also need to account for are the ones nobody has even thought about. Mother Nature is cruel, but since they are trying to describe and predict what she does they must include the unknowns.

How do they do this? I gave you the answer in my last post. It was d). This is called “Robust Design”. The following quote came from this paper (http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/schmidt_04/).

Sorry, it’s not peer reviewed.

The italics are what you are talking about and the bold is what I’m trying to explain to you.

Given the nature of parameterizations among other features, a climate model depends on several expert judgment calls.
Thus, each model will have its own unique details. However, much of the large-scale behavior projected by climate models is robust in that it does not depend significantly on the specifics of parameterization and spatial representation.

Sorry, but you need to do some homework.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-18, 10:50 PM

I don't see Field saying that winds are the only factor.

(ahem):

Originally Posted by Klausnh http://www.bautforum.com/images/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-post1435087.html#post1435087)
"As the Earth warms, it generates faster winds over the oceans surrounding Antarctica," Field explained.

"These winds essentially blow the surface water out of the way, allowing water with higher concentrations of CO2 to rise to the surface. This higher-CO2 water is closer to CO2-saturated, so it takes up less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."

You know this how?

Know which how? I made 15 distinct statements in the three paragraphs you quoted and to which you responded. To which of the 15 are you referring?

Field knows "that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought" because ""We now have data showing that from 2000 to 2007, greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected,"

Thank you for providing this wonderfully clear demonstration of how easy it is for anyone, really, to inadvertantly fall into the "correlation implies causation" trap endemic with Stats 101 students.

The data showing that from 2000 t 2007 greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected does not:

1. Prove those greenhouse gases were actually emitted by humans (this has merely been assumed (1), as they were reasonably steady before, so we again assume (2) we much be the culprit...)

2. Prove temperature rise was caused by the increase in greenhouse gases. It may very well be that the increase in temperature lead to a rise in the greenhouse gases, or that there is a third, as of yet unknown causative factor for both.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-18, 11:08 PM

Interesting and informative post mugs.

I try...

In fact, co2 has fallen from around 8000ppm 500M years ago to about 250ppm just before the present period of warming at the end of the little ice age. A lot of it is bound up in calcinous rocks formed from sedimented sea animal shells.

And with 10% of the coral reefs ("aragonite (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aragonite)" aka CaCO3) having been killed in the last 50 years primarily to pollution, overfishing, with only a quarter in "good" condition, and 3/4 in "poor to fair" condition, according to the 2003 Johns Hopkins study... :doh: That's one less carbon sink! Perhaps that's why the CO2 levels are rising so fast... :think: pollution... :think:

Yet, if that were true, then any time in the past any action which caused coral reefs to die, we'd have seen runaway temps. But we don't. So there must be, as Stroller mentioned, other mechanisms which support a strong, stabilizing locus.

I just hope there's enough co2 can be liberated to warm things up again after the next major league volcano goes off.

After half the population freezes, someone will invent a way to convert electricity and dead coral reefs into massive outpourings of CO2 into Earth's atmosphere to save the day!

Disclaimer: It's late, and the last bit was an attempt at humor. The rest was not. If you're having a difficult time discerning the difference, you're as tired as I am and you need to do the same thing I'm going to do in a <yaaawwwwnnnn!> minute, which is go to bed.

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-19, 10:00 AM

It seems that others didn't take antoniseb's hint, so I'll also respond at least this one time.

http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/ is a good place to start reading about this stuff. Bob has shown how during a positive phase of the pacific decadal oscillation, el ninos produce upward step changes in SST's. There's your upward trend, but trather than a steady climb, in step with co2, it's a series of discrete steps, in step with ENSO events. If you look around Bob's site, you'll also find the proof for the way el ninos effects ripple through the worlds oceans and affect global average temperature a while later.
These are - once again - local stuff highlighted by climate sceptics. And once again, we get blog reference for an issue which is extensively studied in real science literature. The linked "study" suggests that:

The step changes DO appear in the “global” SST anomaly dataset between 60S and 65N as shown in Figure 2:
I don't see "step changes" in figure 2. I see a steady warming trend coupled with strong chaotic variations, and as this is local diagram, it is no surprise that ENSO would show up there strongly. I wonder what is the reason for using the word "global" here, perhaps an effort to mislead readers (perhaps hoping that not everyone understands that "between 60S and 65N" is not global). That makes me wonder if we can trust anything in that page? (This is really the problem with material that has not been peer reviewed, you would need to check everything yourself.) And no, I won't "look around Bob's site" any more without specific references.

Tsonis et al. (2005) (http://mailer.fsu.edu/~jelsner/PDF/Research/TsonisElsnerHuntJagger2005.pdf) suggest that "in a warming climate El Nino events will be more frequent than La Nina events" meaning that warming climate would drive El Ninos and not the other way around. Lean & Rind (2008) (http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2008/2008_Lean_Rind.pdf) show that ENSO doesn't produce any substantial rising long time global temperature trend (see figure 2, ENSO trend is practically zero).

I'm not going to play your courtroom games, so if you're interested, you can go and read for yourself, and if you are just out to play prosecutor, you can remain in ignorance. Your call.
This seems to be a trend here; climate sceptic makes claims and when they are asked to back them up reactions like this occur.

You think that's political propaganda? Try this latest piece from astronomer-turned-climatologist James Hanson. Or this piece from biologist-turned-climatologist Chris Field.
These don't make your actions here any less propaganda.

Please could you cite proof that a trace gas, the changes in concentration of which always lag behind changes in temperature, is a 'known mechanism' for anthropogenic global warming.
This in same post where you refuse to back up your own claims...

I think you should start with this one (http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~rtp1/ClimateBook/ClimateBook.html).

For imminent cooling,...
Irrelevant.

It's not a question of 'want to'. The journals have developed a warm bias, and it's extremely difficult to get papers published which conflict with the party line.
Prove it. (Critical papers get published all the time.)

Blogs like climate audit do however, have effective 'peer review' happening out in the open where all can see the process and contribute.
Nonsense. Here's a climate audit blog entry (http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1142) that makes a big deal about differences between GISS temperature diagrams from 2000 and 2007. It says:

One wonders exactly what adjustments have been performed by CRU and others...
Now look Hansen et al. (2001) (http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2001/2001_Hansen_etal.pdf) plate 2 a and c (page 18 of PDF). Compare plate 2 a to climate audit figure 1, they are practically identical. Compare plate 2 c to climate audit figure 2 (unmarked, the one below figure 1), they are almost identical. This means that almost all changes between those 2000 and 2007 figures have been described in Hansen et al. (2001). The paper is easily found from GISS Surface Temperature Analysis frontpage (http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/) and some more minor corrections are described there as well. How it is possible that McIntyre has missed this? Only possibility is that he didn't study the issue at all. So, there's your "effective peer review". Most of the "peers" who read climate audit simply are not looking for mistakes from climate audit texts. This one is really grand mistake, making a conclusion and documenting it without studying the issue. Now, climate sceptics seem to be really keen on making accusations of fraud when mistakes have been found from the works of Mann, Hansen, Steig,... perhaps you now show your objectivity and do the same for McIntyre?

If you insist on an appeal to the authority of journal publication before being prepared to consider scientific output,...
That's rubbish. It has nothing to do with appealing to authority, I just rather read trustworthy sources, that's all. It takes too much time to walk through all the nonsense in climate sceptic blogs in order to try to extract if there possibly might be something real there (in my experience there almost never is). Those writings are also decoreted with insulting remarks and fraud innuendo which makes them really unpleasant to read. Your writings are a prime example of that kind of thing:

Jim Hansen is alarmist in chief Gillian.

(alarmist) Schlesinger...

Stroller

2009-Feb-19, 11:15 AM

Hansen and Schlesinger go well beyond the data in the public statements they make.

But I agree Ari, that is politics, and we need to look at all of the available science. Including the talented work being researched and published beyond the portals of peer preened paperdom. The link I gave you yesterday has graphs showing an undisputedly close correlation between trade winds, tropical SST's and global temperature. Take the blinkers off and stop trying to impersonate all three wise monkeys at once! :)

We will only achieve better science through honest data handling and co-operation, not through denial of the correlations and the deliberate wrong reading of cause and effect.

I'll leave it there and hope Antoniseb will open an "about baut" thread so we can discuss how to discuss.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-19, 01:59 PM

My bold.

If this board was WIKI the bolded phrase would have in superscript "cite needed."

Mixing some facts (?) with conjecture does not make the conjecture fact.

Sounds like :eek: to me!

Well, if a problem becomes larger wouldn't you expect it to be more difficult to deal with?

orionjim

2009-Feb-19, 05:19 PM

...

I'll leave it there and hope Antoniseb will open an "about baut" thread so we can discuss how to discuss.

I opened a thread in Forum Introductions and Feedback.

I think this is the appropriate place.

Jim

William

2009-Feb-19, 07:26 PM

For those of you noted there were mysterious missing patches of sea ice in the arctic shown on the cryosphere site, the problem appears to be solved.

http://igloo.atmos.uiuc.edu/cgi-bin/test/print.sh?fm=02&fd=18&fy=2008&sm=02&sd=18&sy=2009

February 17, 2009 - The SSMI sensor seems to be acting up and dropping data swaths from time to time in recent days. Missing swaths will appear on these images as a missing data in the southern latitudes. If this persists for more than a few weeks, we will start to fill in these missing data swaths with the ice concentration from the previous day. Note - these missing swaths do not affect the timeseries or any other plots on the Cryosphere Today as they are comprised of moving averages of at least three days.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/18/nsidc-satellite-sea-ice-sensor-has-catastrophic-failure-data-faulty-for-the-last-45-days/

Today NSIDC announced they had discovered the reason why. The sensor on the Defense eteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) satellite they use had degraded and now apparently failed to the point of being unusable. Compounding the bad news they discovered it had been in slow decline for almost two months, which caused a bias in the arctic sea ice data that underestimated the total sea ice by 500,000 square kilometers. This will likely affect the January NSIDC sea ice totals.

I believe the Japanese arctic analysis is using a different satellite.
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/en/home/seaice_extent.htm#top

Current Arctic Sea ice: 14,200,000 km^2.

Stroller

2009-Feb-20, 10:24 AM

Just as a place marker for where the state of the global temperature is, and where the prediction resulting from using the parameters of GISS model E stand in relation to it, I'd like to post this graph:
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/2107/modeleextraev0.png
Graph of GISS model E parameters against global temperature. (http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/2107/modeleextraev0.png)
Hopefully, this will give us an idea of how the model counterbalances GHG's and non-GHG's to arrive at an accurate hindcast. This graph runs the model parameters forwards from 2003 to 2013, so we can see what a decadal change will look like if the model is approximating what will happen.

Note to mods: The graph is under 27kb, I hope that's ok.

cope

2009-Feb-20, 02:12 PM

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-20, 02:52 PM

Well, if a problem becomes larger wouldn't you expect it to be more difficult to deal with?

No, because I do not agree with your premise that climate change is a problem. I agree that we must be having an effect on climate change, but it will change no matter what we do. No crisis exits, but be nice and pick up your trash (metaphor).

Stroller

2009-Feb-20, 08:20 PM

Stroller,

Your graphic is from Bill Illis. That much I was able to determine. I might be wrong but it seems that these are graphs he has generated using the GISS climate modeling program with inputs of his own choosing.

Other than his few topics posted at WUWT, I can't seem to find out much about this fellow and that is after 30 minutes of googling.

Can you suggest why his is a voice we should pay attention to?

Thanks.
The graph in question:
http://1.2.3.13/bmi/img175.imageshack.us/img175/2107/modeleextraev0.png
http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/2...leextraev0.png

Hi cope. I think Bill has simply used the data from the GISS site.
He says this in the comments on that thread:

The data comes from a page GISS put up for Model E (and I have to give GISS a big thumbs up on this one since it is relatively easy to use compared to some of the other climate model sites I’ve been to.)

I didn’t run any models or use the code, I just downloaded the info from the site.

http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelE/transient/climsim.html

So anyone who thinks he may have fiddled, fudged, or omitted data can just click on the link, download the data, and generate the graph for themselves.

He does say elsewhere on the thread that he has created his own reconstruction which fits the historical data better:

Actual Model E hindcast versus GISS’ temperature anomaly, R^2 0.544

http://img355.imageshack.us/img355/9043/modelehindcastoz1.png

You can compare Model E’s hindcast to the simple model I built (R^2 0.713) using the ENSO, AMO and only about half the GHG impact they have built in. (There are no aerosols or volcano impacts built into this model.)

http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/7785/finalgissmodelns3.png

He further comments that the effects of volcanos and other aerosols are already in the SST data he used for the ENSO and AMO to some extent. His most recent post adds a lot more links to data.
Hope this clarifies it for you.
Anyone who wants to read the thread (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/19/short-term-trends-from-giss-model-e-the-model-would-be-off-by-about-015c-in-the-first-five-years/) can find it here, it's ongoing.

You asked whether he's a 'voice that should be listened to'. I note he is not making any claims, he's just presenting some data for your consideration.

Cheers

cope

2009-Feb-21, 12:38 AM

Thanks, Stroller, got it.

I got confused because I could not find any other sources that made these predictions with the data. I am not computer savvy enough to do the same myself so I was just wondering.

I will keep an eye open.

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-21, 07:50 AM

The data showing that from 2000 t 2007 greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected does not:

1. Prove those greenhouse gases were actually emitted by humans (this has merely been assumed (1), as they were reasonably steady before, so we again assume (2) we much be the culprit...)
Amount of anthropogenic greenhouse gases in atmosphere is not assumed, it is measured (Quay et al., 1992) (http://www.whoi.edu/cms/files/kcasciotti/2006/11/Quay1992_15383.pdf):

The delta-13C value of atmospheric CO2 is decreasing because CO2 input from fossil fuel combustion and deforestation has a delta-13C value about 20 per mil lower than the delta-13C value of atmospheric CO2.
...
Direct measurements show that the delta-13C value of atmospheric CO2 decreased from -7.5 per mil in 1978 to -7.8 per mil in 1988 (1).

Here's just one more recent example of such measurements (Pataki et al., 2006) (http://www.ehleringer.net/Jim/Publications/349.pdf).

The data showing that from 2000 t 2007 greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected does not:

2. Prove temperature rise was caused by the increase in greenhouse gases. It may very well be that the increase in temperature lead to a rise in the greenhouse gases, or that there is a third, as of yet unknown causative factor for both.
It is known from laboratory experiments that greenhouse gases absorb infrared light. It is known also from laboratory experiments that increasing greenhouse gas concentration increases the amount of absorbed energy. (These statements are really just standard textbook stuff, and have been that for decades.) What would prevent greenhouse gases from doing the same thing in the atmosphere? I note that for example CO2 absorption spectrum has been measured from Earth's atmosphere, see for example Harries et al. (2008, >11MB PDF) (http://www.adgb.df.unibo.it/Members/tmaestri/articles/FIR%20Final%20pub%20version%202007RG000233.pdf), especially figures 25 and 26 (showing CO2 absorption band at wavenumber 667 cm-1).

We are also quite close to measuring the greenhouse gas forcing directly, see for example:

Clerbaux et al. (2003) (http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/3/2027/2003/acpd-3-2027-2003.pdf)
Philipona et al. (2004) (ftp://ftp.etl.noaa.gov/user/cfairall/wcrp_wgsf/pubs/philipona_ASRB_grl.pdf)
Griggs & Harries (2004) (http://www.ggy.bris.ac.uk/staff/personal/JennyGriggs/paper_4.pdf)
Dürr (2004) (http://e-collection.ethbib.ethz.ch/eserv/eth:27515/eth-27515-02.pdf)

mugaliens

2009-Feb-21, 12:24 PM

Stroller,

Your graphic is from Bill Illis. That much I was able to determine. I might be wrong but it seems that these are graphs he has generated using the GISS climate modeling program with inputs of his own choosing.

Other than his few topics posted at WUWT, I can't seem to find out much about this fellow and that is after 30 minutes of googling.

Hi, Cope!

Here's something to think about - it's from Wikipedia:

Ad hominem argument is most commonly used to refer specifically to the ad hominem abusive, or argumentum ad personam, which consists of criticizing or attacking the person who proposed the argument (personal attack) in an attempt to discredit the argument. It is also used when an opponent is unable to find fault with an argument, yet for various reasons, the opponent disagrees with it.

So, if I may clarify by way of paraphrase, your attacking Stroller directly is the result of your being "unable to find fault with Stroller's argument..."

Is that about right?

If not, how about we refrain from any further off-topic approaches and get back to the discussion as hand, which involves the pros/cons of of scientists (not merely the 650 mentioned in the OP) who disagree with the AGW hypothesis?

Speaking of which (the OP), have you heard the one about former NASA astronaut and Apollo 17 Moon walker Harrison Schmitt, a geologist and former Senator from New Mexico who both resigned from The Planetary Scoeity after the group blamed global warming on human activity? He and 70 other skeptics are scheduled to speak next month at the International Conference on Climate Change in New York.

No?

Well, you can read all about it, here (http://green.foxnews.com/2009/02/16/ex-astronaut-global-warming-is-bunk/), on that very well-known corporation's pro-green website, which states:

Schmitt said he’s heartened that the upcoming conference is made up of scientists who haven’t been manipulated by politics. Of the global warming debate, he said: “It’s one of the few times you’ve seen a sizable portion of scientists who ought to be objective take a political position and it’s coloring their objectivity.”

Former astronaut/moonwalker/Senator Schmitt also said, “They’ve seen too many of their colleagues lose grant funding when they haven’t gone along with the so-called political consensus that we’re in a human-caused global warming."

MAN!!! When I made a nearly identical comment here on BAUT several months back, I got more than one warning and came close to being banned!

Speaking of which, there seems to be a rapidly-growing repressive undercurrent along these lines on this website, one contrary to objective scientific discovery, and one which will most certainly not serve either science or the public if it's allowed to continue. Many scientists believe AGW is real. Many do not. Before we commit trillions of dollars towards trying to fix something that we may not even have caused (and may be utterly powerless to stop), it behooves us all to slow down and continue to examine all sides, particularly when well-known and highly respected scientists who do not believe in AGW continue to come forward and provide the details supporting their beliefs.

Thank you.

ToSeek

2009-Feb-22, 07:51 AM

I tried but got this:

"You may not post new threads"

Anyway, I'm off to do some voluntary work for the rest of the week so you won't have to put up with my keenness to debate this topic for a while at least.

Cheers

Stroller

For future reference, there are two sections in "About BAUT". The first one is reserved for official stuff, so threads there can only be started by moderators and admins. The second section is open to anyone.

ToSeek

2009-Feb-22, 08:00 AM

Former astronaut/moonwalker/Senator Schmitt also said, “They’ve seen too many of their colleagues lose grant funding when they haven’t gone along with the so-called political consensus that we’re in a human-caused global warming."

MAN!!! When I made a nearly identical comment here on BAUT several months back, I got more than one warning and came close to being banned!

And if Schmitt had made the same comments on this forum, he would have received similar treatment since it's pretty much an ad hominem argument rather than a scientific one.

Stroller

2009-Feb-22, 12:58 PM

Amount of anthropogenic greenhouse gases in atmosphere is not assumed, it is measured (Quay et al., 1992) (http://www.whoi.edu/cms/files/kcasciotti/2006/11/Quay1992_15383.pdf):

The quay et al paper is interesting, but has some limitations worth noting.

It's data comes from a small number of locations spanning a limited area covering 1/6 of the earths circumference, and from 29N to 50S.

It takes no account of the increase in atmospheric co2 due to increasing temperature. The solubility of co2 in sea water drops as the temperature rises.

On closer reading, the paper relies on an estimation that the turnover in d13C in woody plants is around 30 years. It has recently been shown that trees are getting bigger as a result of increased co2 levels. They have been starved of it for a long time, and are lapping it up. Commercial greenhouse growers use a level of co2 three times higher than atmospheric in order to increase yields.

Therefore the change in the ratios of the carbon isotopes attributed to human emitted co2 is overestimated

94% of the carbon in the atmosphere has the same isotopic signature as the natural background.
6% signals an organic origin, fossil fuels included.
Half of that organic source, 3% is what the IPCC itself says man is contributing.

Here's just one more recent example of such measurements (Pataki et al., 2006) (http://www.ehleringer.net/Jim/Publications/349.pdf).
This paper deals with the difference between petroleum and natural gas in a single location near a major source of human emitted co2.

It is local and irrelevant.

It is known from laboratory experiments that greenhouse gases absorb infrared light. It is known also from laboratory experiments that increasing greenhouse gas concentration increases the amount of absorbed energy. (These statements are really just standard textbook stuff, and have been that for decades.) What would prevent greenhouse gases from doing the same thing in the atmosphere? I note that for example CO2 absorption spectrum has been measured from Earth's atmosphere, see for example Harries et al. (2008, >11MB PDF) (http://www.adgb.df.unibo.it/Members/tmaestri/articles/FIR%20Final%20pub%20version%202007RG000233.pdf), especially figures 25 and 26 (showing CO2 absorption band at wavenumber 667 cm-1).
If we compare the amount of energy absorbed by the oceans directly from the sun with the amount of longwave outgoing radiation (infrared) energy absorbed by co2 compared to water vapour, we can see this is also irrelevant in terms of the effect of backradiation from increased co2 in the atmosphere to the surface. The convection of heat through the effective co2 layer is ignored by models.

We are also quite close to measuring the greenhouse gas forcing directly, see for example:

Clerbaux et al. (2003) (http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/3/2027/2003/acpd-3-2027-2003.pdf)
Philipona et al. (2004) (ftp://ftp.etl.noaa.gov/user/cfairall/wcrp_wgsf/pubs/philipona_ASRB_grl.pdf)
Griggs & Harries (2004) (http://www.ggy.bris.ac.uk/staff/personal/JennyGriggs/paper_4.pdf)
Dürr (2004) (http://e-collection.ethbib.ethz.ch/eserv/eth:27515/eth-27515-02.pdf)

How does being able to measure co2 levels better (e.g. with the advent of satellite data from AIRS) enable us to measure the alleged 'forcing' directly?

Stroller

2009-Feb-22, 01:06 PM

“I was at my home at 14.00 August 11, 2008, and my outside temperature registered 91°F . Then it started to cloud up and by 16.30 there was a thunder shower. The temperature dropped to 71°F . Where did all the heat go? It went 5.5 miles up, where the temperature is usually about –55°F (as trans-Atlantic pilots like to report) and subsequently out into space, carried there by the powerful heat carrying capability of liquid water when it turns into vapor and consumes 972 Btus per pound and then back into liquid, releasing that latent heat of vaporization into space as thermal radiation. This happens almost every day in the summer in the temperate zones and all the time in the tropics, and it’s not taken into account in the AGW computer models, because models can’t model rain, clouds, lightning, storms and hurricanes very well at all, because it’s too complicated and chaotic. AGW computer models also don’t model ocean current oscillations, which are major factors in effecting the Earth’s heat balance. This is why myopic atmospheric science projections are getting so far away from the observed global temperatures, since the Pacific Decadal Oscillation switched to it’s cold phase in late 2006.”

From http://ccd4e.org/drpierre_latour_and_jeff_temple/

This is a valuable document, because it lays the arguments and objections out side by side, enabling the reader to deconstruct the opposing positions.

Quite a lot of it strays into the realm of politics, which we shouldn't discuss here.

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-22, 06:33 PM

because models can’t model rain, clouds, lightning, storms and hurricanes very well at all, because it’s too complicated and chaotic

AKA, weather = climate, which is false.

William

2009-Feb-22, 07:17 PM

The Global warming argument appears to be in direct conflict with mainstream science and logic.

Can someone supporting the AGW position, address these logical problems with AGW?

Data and analysis appears to support the assertions that:

1) The CO2 mechanism saturates.
2) The planet has negative rather than positive feedback to a temperature forcing factor. (i.e. The planet's response is to dampen or resist the forcing change.)
3) Civilization flourishes when the planet has been warmer. There was in the past been a cycle of warming and coolings of the planet.
4) Plants starved due to the extremely low CO2 levels during the glacial phases of the glacial/interglacial cycle that began roughly 1.4 million years ago. CO2 levels during the glacial phase are the lowest in 500 million years. An increase in CO2 results in less desertification. An increase in CO2 is positive for the biosphere not negative.
5) The interglacial portion of the glacial/interglacial cycle is short (15 kyr to 20 kyr and ends abruptly.) The glacial phase is roughly 100 kyr in duration.

The following is some data to support assertions 1, 2, and 3.

1) There are multiple incidents of very long periods when the planetary temperature has not correlated changes in CO2 levels. During those periods the planet has been cold when CO2 levels were high and hot when CO2 levels were low. This evidence and analysis would support the assertion that the CO2 mechanism saturates.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-12.html#post1431153

2) There is current data and analysis that shows the tropical troposphere has not warmed which would support the assertion that the CO2 mechanism saturates and that the planetary was negative forcing to an increase in planetary forcing not positive as proposed by the IPCC. A very large positive feedback is required to multiple the small theoretical warming due to an increase in CO2.

There is also analysis of step cooling caused by volcanic activity that supports the assertion that the planet has negative not positive feedback to forcing change.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/82256-man-made-global-warming-skeptism-650-a-10.html#post1430212

3) There is evidence in the planetary proxy data of a cycle of warming and cooling in addition to the abrupt climate change events.

The last warming period is called the “Climate Optimum” by paleo-climatologists. During the warm period civilization flourished.

The last cooling event is called the “Little Ice Age” by paleo-climatologists.

During the cold period there was widespread famine.

http://video.aol.com/video-detail/little-ice-age-big-chill-part-2-of-11/3662936794

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-22, 07:20 PM

Hey, a human being cannot survive without water. Ergo, it defies all mainstream science and rationality to suggest that if a man's head is forced underwater, he will drown.

nauthiz

2009-Feb-22, 07:24 PM

This happens almost every day in the summer in the temperate zones and all the time in the tropics, and it’s not taken into account in the AGW computer models, because models can’t model rain, clouds, lightning, storms and hurricanes very well at all, because it’s too complicated and chaotic. AGW computer models also don’t model ocean current oscillations, which are major factors in effecting the Earth’s heat balance.

From what I gather, the presumption is that many large-scale phenomena supervene on smaller-scale phenomena, and this means that you don't have to precisely model a lot of small-scale details as long as there's something to take their net effect into account. In the simplest case, this might just be a fudge factor.

It's a pretty common thing to do in modeling. For example, a lot of fluid dynamics models use fairly coarse-grained statistics, and and cosmological simulations make all sorts of shortcuts for the sake of computational efficiency. It's not really considered a problem as long as the researchers are mindful of the fact that it's going to have a detrimental effect on the model's precision and accuracy and make sure that the inaccuracies in question are small enough that the model's predictions are still useful.

The major climate modeling teams right now do seem to be doing that. When I've seen datasets generated by the models, pretty wide error margins are reported. Presumably these error bars are meant to reflect the net effect of all the places where the model falls short of being a 100% accurate simulation of an entire planet. Furthermore, the teams generally do extensive sanity checks by running the model against input data taken from history, and verifying that the predictions matched what really happened. The data I've looked at from those sanity checks is generally pretty impressive - no, the predictions don't perfectly track what really happened, but it's within the error bars, which is all that's ever promised.

The upshot of all this is, it seems to me like the modeling teams have made a very compelling, empirically-bound case that their climate simulations do work as advertised. That said, I'm open to criticism of the models, but given that the evidence in support of them is couched in quite a lot of math, I'd want the criticisms to be couched in a lot of math, too. I realize that there are all sorts of things that aren't modeled precisely in the simulations, but nobody ever advertised otherwise, so that's not particularly exciting news to me.

What would be interesting, though, would be if someone were to show me an independent analysis of all the known or potential inaccuracies in a model which shows that the model's predictive power isn't quite what it's supposed to be. What would be compelling evidence to me against AGW is if this numerical analysis shows that the model is so inaccurate that its predictions can no longer be considered useful evidence in support of the AGW hypothesis.

mugaliens

2009-Feb-22, 09:07 PM

And if Schmitt had made the same comments on this forum, he would have received similar treatment since it's pretty much an ad hominem argument rather than a scientific one.

"Ad hom?" It's an observation of impediments to objective discovery, not an "attack on any person who proposed the argument." As a former US Senator, Schmitt is well-versed on on how various organizations and institutions, including scientific ones (http://www.bautforum.com/space-exploration/83512-new-nasa-chief.html), work in the upper levels. The loss of grant funding wasn't a scientific response to the objections that were raised, a fact which Schmitt merely noted.

Schmitt isn't only interested in fighting the AGW mindset. He's equally interested in combatting the manipulative tactics common to all administrations who're faced with a threat to it's existence. "Circling the wagons" is a common response tactic and is as old as the use of wagons. Noting the use of that most common of administrative tactics isn't ad hom in the least sense of the term.

Speaking of age, Hannibal would have said, "Circle the elephants!"

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-23, 07:48 AM

The quay et al paper is interesting, but has some limitations worth noting.
It doesn't matter. It is an old paper which just provides an example that we are actually measuring these things, not merely assuming like mugaliens claimed. I provided the relevant quote in my post. That quote refers to Keeling et al. (1989) where the actual atmospheric measurements were discussed, but I didn't find that paper online.

This paper deals with the difference between petroleum and natural gas in a single location near a major source of human emitted co2.

It is local and irrelevant.
It is another example that we can indeed measure these things. It also shows that we can measure anthropogenic greenhouse gas amounts with high resolution so it's very relevant. Also, I didn't even try to make any global arguments based on this paper.

If we compare the amount of energy absorbed by the oceans directly from the sun with the amount of longwave outgoing radiation (infrared) energy absorbed by co2 compared to water vapour, we can see this is also irrelevant in terms of the effect of backradiation from increased co2 in the atmosphere to the surface. The convection of heat through the effective co2 layer is ignored by models.
What studies have shown these things you claim?

The fact that water vapour is strong absorber doesn't reduce the amount of CO2 absorption. Neither does that convection thing (which also needs reference to a proper study).

How does being able to measure co2 levels better (e.g. with the advent of satellite data from AIRS) enable us to measure the alleged 'forcing' directly?
Where did I claim that?

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-23, 08:26 AM

This is a valuable document,...

AGW computer models also don’t model ocean current oscillations,...
Meehl et al. (1998) - The Asian–Australian Monsoon and El Nino–Southern Oscillation in the NCAR Climate System Model (http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/ccr/publications/meehl_csm1.pdf)
Timmermann et al. (1999) - Increased El Nino frequency in a climate model forced by future greenhouse warming (http://iprc.soest.hawaii.edu/~axel/nature.pdf)
Wittenberg et al. (2006) - GFDL’s CM2 Global Coupled Climate Models. Part III: Tropical Pacific Climate and ENSO (http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/reference/bibliography/2006/atw0601.pdf)

Just to give a few random examples of models modelling ocean current oscillations, there are plenty of papers discussing oscillations in models. These I found by googling only a couple of minutes. This shows the level of the claims of climate sceptics, they are just plain lies.

Stroller

2009-Feb-23, 09:18 AM

AKA, weather = climate, which is false.
The following sentence goes on:
"AGW computer models also don’t model ocean current oscillations, which are major factors in effecting the Earth’s heat balance. "

And that certainly is true. A lot of the 'accelerated warming' of the last 20 years is down to the positive phase of the the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation.

See ongoing discussion here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/22/the-impact-of-the-north-atlantic-and-volcanic-aerosols-on-short-term-global-sst-trends/

If that's weather, then so is the global warming alarm.

Stroller

2009-Feb-23, 09:22 AM

This shows the level of the claims of climate sceptics, they are just plain lies.

Hey, moderators! Please ask Ari to moderate his tone.

The point is Ari, the GCM's used to generate the climate predictions promulgated by the IPCC don't include them.

Stroller

2009-Feb-23, 09:28 AM

How does being able to measure co2 levels better (e.g. with the advent of satellite data from AIRS) enable us to measure the alleged 'forcing' directly?
Where did I claim that?

Here:

Originally Posted by Ari Jokimaki View Post
We are also quite close to measuring the greenhouse gas forcing directly, see for example:

Clerbaux et al. (2003)
Philipona et al. (2004)
Griggs & Harries (2004)
Dürr (2004)

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-23, 12:53 PM

Hey, moderators! Please ask Ari to moderate his tone.

For the record, I tend to agree with Ari, based on my experience with these debates.

Stroller

2009-Feb-23, 01:34 PM

For the record, I tend to agree with Ari, based on my experience with these debates.
That's fine, just please be civil about it.

So, what about the ocean circulations and the fact that most of the 'recent acceleration in global warming' is accounted for by the positive phase of the atlantic multidecadal (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/02/22/the-impact-of-the-north-atlantic-and-volcanic-aerosols-on-short-term-global-sst-trends/) oscillation?

Or do you prefer to avoid new conflicting evidence and rest with your preconceptions? That wouldn't be scientific would it?
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-23, 01:36 PM

That's fine, just please be civil about it.

[...]

Or do you prefer to avoid new conflicting evidence and rest with your preconceptions?

I fail to see why his statement was any less civil than your own.

Also, for the record: If you really want the moderators to act on a post, it's generally better to report the post, instead of playing wannabe-moderator by guessing whether it's actionable or not.

As for your challenge to me, it's all Greek to me. I fail to see why accepting that carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane as global warming gasses is a "preconception", though, any more than accepting that Venus is a burning furnace thanks to its mostly-carbon dioxide atmosphere is.

Stroller

2009-Feb-23, 02:29 PM

As for your challenge to me, it's all Greek to me. I fail to see why accepting that carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane as global warming gasses is a "preconception", though, any more than accepting that Venus is a burning furnace thanks to its mostly-carbon dioxide atmosphere is.

I don't dispute that greenhouse gases play a vital role in keeping our planet warm enough for us to live on it, just that an increase in co2 is anything to get alarmed about. My point is that the IPCC are twisting the facts when they say that the recent warming is due mostly to human emitted co2. It isn't.

Venus is a fair bit closer to the sun than earth is, and has a much different geophysical makeup and history. It's a bit of a joke to compare them really.

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-23, 03:13 PM

I don't dispute that greenhouse gases play a vital role in keeping our planet warm enough for us to live on it, just that an increase in co2 is anything to get alarmed about.
Your grammar seems to suggest that you do think that it's something to get alarmed about, and indeed, you would be right. There is such thing as "too much of a good thing"; the difference between a desert and a tropical paradise is only a few degrees of average temperature, and lack of seasonal variation. Warmer is not necessarily better.

My point is that the IPCC are twisting the facts when they say that the recent warming is due mostly to human emitted co2. It isn't.And I have yet to agree with this.

Venus is a fair bit closer to the sun than earth is,Nothing to do with it; it's not close enough for the sun to be a much larger influence on Venus than on Earth. You should know this, my lad, you're on an astronomy board!

and has a much different geophysical makeup and history. It's a bit of a joke to compare them really.
Not really. As Carl Sagan has noted, Venus is a lot like a pressure cooker, with a majority carbon dioxide atmosphere.

You're welcome to refute this, but I doubt that you can on this section; because as far as I know, what you're suggesting is ATM!

Venus has an extremely dense atmosphere, which consists mainly of carbon dioxide and a small amount of nitrogen. The atmospheric mass is 93 times that of Earth's atmosphere while the pressure at the planet's surface is about 92 times that at Earth's surface—a pressure equivalent to that at a depth of nearly 1 kilometer under Earth's oceans. The density at the surface is 65 kg/m³ (6.5% that of water). The enormously CO2-rich atmosphere, along with thick clouds of sulfur dioxide, generates the strongest greenhouse effect in the solar system, creating surface temperatures of over 460 °C.[21] This makes Venus's surface hotter than Mercury's which has a minimum surface temperature of -220 °C and maximum surface temperature of 420 °C, even though Venus is nearly twice Mercury's distance from the Sun and receives only 25% of Mercury's solar irradiance. Because of the lack of any moisture on Venus, there is almost no relative humidity (no more than 1%) on the surface, creating a heat index of 450 °C to 480 °C.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus

Now, it's unlikely we'll ever get to the point of Venus -- we'd be long dead before that ever occurred, and we don't have the sulfur -- but denying that global warming gasses can increase to the point where it can make life less-than-comfortable to downright hazardous on Earth, sounds ATM as well.

publiusr

2009-Feb-23, 11:28 PM

Now I seem to remember--from the book TERRAFORMING if I recall correctly-- that if you were to replace Venus CO2 with water vapor--that Venus would actually get hotter, with water vapor being a more severe greenhouse gas.

Now, seeing that--if all the automabiles on the planet were to instantly become hydrogen equipped, would the temps actually go up?

Now I'm thinking that the hydrologic cycle works faster than the carbon cycle--meaning that excess wator vapor rains out faster than the plants or the oceans can absorb. And you would just be getting out the same mass as you put in with hydrogen, where as the carbon--which allows fossil fuels to retain energy density with carbons promiscuity--will mix with a lot more air--meaning that fossil fuels will make more greenhouse emissions in total than would hydrogen, even if that is better at retaining heat.

With fossil fuels, you are basically restoring buried biomass to the surface area of the planet at least. With hydrogen, there is nothing to add to global dimming as a counter...and it takes a lot of energy to produce hydrogen.

So could all this amount to a wash?

We have as much CO2 as Venus--its just that we are standing on it. You'd have to vaporize miles of carbonate rock, limestone--stop Earths rotation--and shove us towards the sun to turn us into Venus.

SolusLupus

2009-Feb-24, 01:12 AM

I'm not talking about turning us into Venus. Venus is simply proof that, quite frankly, carbon dioxide CAN be a greenhouse gas, and that there's absolutely nothing controversial about this simple fact.

As it is, we don't have to go far to the point of Venus before life becomes almost unsuitable or uncomfortable for life on Earth.

Klausnh

2009-Feb-24, 02:08 AM

(ahem):

"As the Earth warms, it generates faster winds over the oceans surrounding Antarctica," Field explained.

"These winds essentially blow the surface water out of the way, allowing water with higher concentrations of CO2 to rise to the surface. This higher-CO2 water is closer to CO2-saturated, so it takes up less carbon dioxide from the atmosphere."

My reading comprehension skills must need some work so could you explain how Field's statements imply that the wind is the only factor? I read it as and explanation of wind influence on CO2.

Thank you for providing this wonderfully clear demonstration of how easy it is for anyone, really, to inadvertantly fall into the "correlation implies causation" trap endemic with Stats 101 students.

The data showing that from 2000 t 2007 greenhouse gas emissions increased far more rapidly than we expected does not:

1. Prove those greenhouse gases were actually emitted by humans (this has merely been assumed (1), as they were reasonably steady before, so we again assume (2) we much be the culprit...)

2. Prove temperature rise was caused by the increase in greenhouse gases. It may very well be that the increase in temperature lead to a rise in the greenhouse gases, or that there is a third, as of yet unknown causative factor for both.
The article was not an attempt to prove human influence on climate change nor an attempt to
"1. Prove those greenhouse gases were actually emitted by humans (this has merely been assumed (1), as they were reasonably steady before, so we again assume (2) we much be the culprit...)

2. Prove temperature rise was caused by the increase in greenhouse gases. It may very well be that the increase in temperature lead to a rise in the greenhouse gases, or that there is a third, as of yet unknown causative factor for both. "

Do you expect every article on global warming to include proof? The article was about Climate change even worse than predicted: expert.
So his quotes are based on the climate researcher's evidence and acceptance of human influence on climate change.
Does every article on the Big Bang require proof because a few cosmologists don't accept the evidence?

Klausnh

2009-Feb-24, 02:14 AM

No, because I do not agree with your premise that climate change is a problem. I agree that we must be having an effect on climate change, but it will change no matter what we do. No crisis exits, but be nice and pick up your trash (metaphor).
It's not my premise, but the premise of scientists much more knowledgeable than I. The evidence disagrees with your opinion CC is not a problem.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-24, 03:11 AM

It's not my premise, but the premise of scientists much more knowledgeable than I. The evidence disagrees with your opinion CC is not a problem.

Their conclusion of the evidence disagrees with mine.

Edit to add: I can afford to be a contrairian because my funding does not depend on anyone but me.

jlhredshift

2009-Feb-24, 03:55 AM

FYI:

"Satellite sensor errors cause data outage (http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2009/021809.html)"

Ari Jokimaki

2009-Feb-24, 06:58 AM

The point is Ari, the GCM's used to generate the climate predictions promulgated by the IPCC don't include them.
Original claim talked about AGW computer models in general, IPCC was not mentioned. But it doesn't matter because IPCC AR4 models are able to model oscillations, see for example Guilyardi (2006) (http://www.met.rdg.ac.uk/~ericg/publications/Guilyardi_CD06.pdf) and Saji et al. (2006) (http://iprc.soest.hawaii.edu/~xie/io-cmip.pdf). Your "point" is yet another example of false things presented as facts by you.

This claim by Stroller is especially strange because oscillations in IPCC-models are explained in... well, where else than IPCC reports (http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/ar4-wg1.htm). See chapter 8.4 in the linked IPCC AR4. Wouldn't that be the first place to look if someone would suspect that IPCC models don't have oscillations, and would like to check the situation? But it seems that in the world of climate scepticism we don't check our claims before making them.

Here:
No. I didn't say anything about measuring CO2 levels there, or about AIRS. I pointed out some papers where direct measuring of greenhouse gas forcing is being discussed, and in some cases there were even first local measurements made with results matching quite well to our theories about greenhouse gases.

My point is that the IPCC are twisting the facts...
Well, we have seen how your "facts" have turned out here recently... twisted.