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1. Charlie_Brown at 09:17 AM on 3 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray @ 202

   In so doing, you would be spreading misinformation and you would be misrepresenting my explanation. I don't take kindly to that. It is not temporary, and as I have already explained, it is not inaccurate.

2. Reed Coray at 08:29 AM on 3 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   What's the difference between "atmosphere permanently and completely traps" and "atmosphere traps?"  The definition of "trap" used as a verb is 

   1. Catch (an animal) in a trap. Synonyms: confine, cut off, corner, shut in, pen in, hem in, imprison, hold captive "a rat trapped in a barn“

   a) Prevent (someone) from escaping from a place. “Twenty workers were trapped by flames” Synonyms: snare, entrap, ensnare, lay a trap for 

   b) Have (something, typically a part of the body) held tightly by something so that it cannot move or be freed. “He had trapped his finger in a spring-loaded hinge”

   None of the above implies "permanently and completely" can't leave, they simply imply "can't leave."  Good luck finding a non-technical dictionary that has a word that whose definition contains the words "permenantly and completely traps." 

   Ask a random person on the street if there is difference between "can't leave" and "permanently and completely can't leave."  I think you're going to get a puzzled look.  

    

   In discussions of the greenhouse effect, most people do use "trap" in the sense you mean.  But the average person rarely enters into a greenhouse effect discussion.  So if you enter into a discussion of the geenhouse effect with the average person, he won't be aware of the subtle difference you imply. For example, if you pulled a coin out of your pocket and told the average person you have encased the coin in a substance that traps heat, I believe he's going to believe that heat can't leave the coin.  He's not going to ask you "Do you mean permanently and completely not leave the coin" or simply "not leave the coin?"

   When discussing something with the average person, assigning a meaning to a word that is deviates from the meanings commonly found in a generic dictionary is to confuse the person.  If you told some one you've wrapped a coin in a substance that "permanently and completely traps the heat in the coin," what would you say if his response was: Do you mean "permanently and completely trap" or "really permanently and really completely trap?"  

   In technical discussions with people knowledgeable in the field it may be okay to use words that have a subtle meaning, but to use those words in the sense of the subtle meaning in conversations with lay people is to muddle the discussion.  If you're trying to convince the average person that atmospheric greenhouse gases can trap heat and you don't qualify what you mean by trap with the caveat that "I don't mean "permenantly and completely", you're not communicating, you're obfuscating.  

   I think we've come to an impass.  Regarding the meaning of "trapping heat," nothing I say will change your mind, and nothing you say will change mine.  Stalemate.  I'll leave the decision as to who is right to the public, but know that every time I hear someone make the claim that greenhouse gases trap heat, I'm going add: "he/she doesn't mean the heat is permenantly and completely trapped, he/she means the heat is temporarily trapped."

3. Charlie_Brown at 07:52 AM on 3 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray @ 194
   1. No. See Charlie Brown @ 189.
   2. Not a fact. See #1.
   3. Not a fact. See #1.
   4. Yes.
   5. No. See #1.
   6. N/A. See #1.
   Agreed – your arguments about trapping heat can be dismissed.

   For further discussion – you say @195: “Those emissions may very well lead to increased global surface temperature. One thing I'm unsure about is "how big is the increase?". I say not “may” but “will.” The magnitude of the increase by increasing GHG emissions can be calculated with high accuracy. Also @ 182 you discuss ERE and conclude “to achieve a new ERE state when gases are added to the atmosphere, the temperature distribution within the system must change. One component of that temperature distribution is the Earth's surface temperature, which may go up or down.” When GHG are added to the atmosphere, the surface temperature will go up, not down.

   Re-read the Basic and Intermediate explanations, then check out this tool to help you with the calculations and your question of “how big is the increase.” Hint: the results are consistent with the science of forcings as described in IPCC WG1 AR5 Physical Science Basis Chap 8 Table 8.2.
   https://skepticalscience.com/Introducing-an-Atmospheric-Radiation-Model-to-Learn-About-Global-Warming.html

4. Bob Loblaw at 00:31 AM on 3 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray:

   Note that I have added moderator comments (green box) regarding site navigation to your comments #194, and 195. Please scroll back to read them. Hopefully they will help with site navigation.

5. Bob Loblaw at 00:02 AM on 3 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray @ 194: "If ... my arguments are flat wrong and can be dismissed out of hand."

   As Dikran points out explicitly, in #197: yes, your arguments are flat wrong.

   As I pointed out in #190: "Reed Coray has utterly failed to explain the distinction between his undesirable 'trap heat' and his preferred 'warm the Earth's surface'."

   Getting to definitions: heat = thermal energy. Average thermal energy is expressed by temperature. When thermal energy increases in an object, that object's temperature goes up - it "warms". When a system redistributes energy in a manner where some part of the system retains more thermal energy that before, it is perfectly reasonable to colloquially say "that part of the system has trapped heat".

   ...unless, as I pointed out in #188, "...you create such a strict literal meaning to the words 'trap heat' that is unjustified."

   As for my closing paragraph in # 190, which begins with "Reed Coray's argument is a pig in a poke.": I obtained that list of roughly equivalent phrases from Wiktionary. In addition to providing the meanings of words, Wiktionary (or many other dictionaries) will also provide a list of synonyms or "see also" references. In other words, it provides some of the function of a thesaurus. It also lets you search for the meaning of common phrases, rather than just single words.

   Try starting with its definition of "blow out of proportion". Follow the links under "Synonyms" and "See also". Then repeat with each of those listings to find additional similar phrases. You should be able to eventually find all the phrases I used at the end of #190.

   Are all those phrases identical? No. Do they have identical meaning? No. As you read the definitions/origins/explanations, you will see that there are subtle differences.

   ...but any one of them can be considered a reasonable description of what you have been doing in in an attempt to tar all of climate science over some misguided idea that "trap heat" is physically impossible. You even go as far as saying (in #187) that use of 'trap heat' "...is designed to mislead others and is spread with the intent to manipulate truth and facts".

   That's awfully thin ice you are skating on.

6. Dikran Marsupial at 16:55 PM on 2 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Thank you for posting the source for "adiabatic wall"

   "This almost ubiquitously used claim (“the Earth's surface is warmed by-heat-trapping greenhouse gases”) is invalid because heat cannot be trapped—i.e., an adiabatic wall does not exist in nature. "

   Thermodynamic Black bodies don't exist in nature either, nor Gaussian distributions, both are useful theoretical models that are often applied to natural phenomena though (knowing that they do not exactly represent the objects they model).  The analogy under discussion does not say that the atmosphere permanently and completely traps *all* heat, so trapping heat in the sense that an insulator "traps" some heat (or equivalently impedes it's escape) seems reasonable to me.  I think your objection is unreasonable pedantry.

7. Dikran Marsupial at 16:45 PM on 2 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray "In my opinion, most people who responded to my comments are missing the point I am trying to make. ... My point is that the claim: “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by trapping heat within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” is a denial of science."

   
   Several people, including myself have directly addressed that point.

   "(1) Does science preclude the existence of “trapped heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer."

   No, as I pointed out, blankets can be reasonably said to "trap" heat; thermos flasks can reasonably said to trap heat.

   
   "(2) Does the fact that “trapped heat” can’t exist, prohibit “trapping heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer."

   No, because the premise that '“trapped heat” can’t exist, prohibit' is false, see the answer to (1).

   
   (3) If “trapping heat” can’t exist, does the use of “trapping heat” in an argument mean the argument contains a logical fallacy? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.

   Again, "no" because the premise is false, see (1).

   
   (4) Does the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” use the phrase “trapping heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No”answer.

   Yes, but this is an unhelpful rhetorical question rather a truth seeking one.  I am answering it mostly to point out the rhetoric.  It isn't unreasonable as a very basic analogy.  The enhanced greenhouse effect does cause more energy to be returned to the surface rather than being radiated out to space, so it could be viewed as being (temorarily) "trapped".

   
   (5) Does the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” contain a logical fallacy? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.

   No - see answer to the previous question.  It is a reasonable analogy - the actual physical mechansism is a bit more complex than that, but it is a O.K. as a starting point for the layperson.
   

   (6) Does the fact that the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” contains a logical fallacy imply a denial of science? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.

   No, see answers to previous questions. (a) it is based on an incorrect premise (that heat cannot be trapped) and (b) it is a reasonable, but extremely basic, analogy that is a reasonable starting point for the layperson.

   There I have given direct answers to your questions.  The ball is now in your court to respond to them constructively (I would start with explaining how a thermos flask cannot be viewed as trapping heat - of course I had already made that point in an earlier comment).

8. Eclectic at 14:03 PM on 2 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Reed Coray  @ 194 / 195 :

   You have a major problem with your semantics.

   And you also have a logic problem ~ partly complicated by your original semantics problem.

   Possibly you have been confused by some of the faulty logic exhibited at the WUWT  website.   WUWT  Comments Sections show the pesence of a handful of logical scientific thinkers, interspersed with a whole chaff-bagful of crackpots and angry nutters.

   But the final responsibility rests on you to think clearly and logically.   Please look at the Big Picture and avoid nit-picking one or two pixels of the overall picture.

   Hint:  get away from the loose wordy terms of 19th-Century "thermodynamics" ~ and concentrate your attention on the real physics of atoms and photons.  (In other words, look at the real universe and not at the dictionary.)

9. Reed Coray at 11:42 AM on 2 April 2025
   Greenhouse effect has been falsified
   

   Bob when I googled "Adiabatic wall" I got the following.  I think the text came from Wikipedia (not that Wikipedia is a great source only that it didn't come from WUWT and/or Jo Nova.  see https://www.bing.com/search?q=adiabatic+wall&qs=AS&pq=adiabatic+wall&sc=10-14&cvid=78B3DD64803943E6B6458C617BB3F7EE&FORM=CHRDEF&sp=1&lq=0

    

   
   An adiabatic wall is a boundary that does not allow heat transfer between two thermodynamic systems. This means that there is no heat or mass transfer across the wall, making it a theoretical concept often considered as a perfect thermal insulator. In essence, any energy exchange occurring across an adiabatic wall is strictly in the form of work.
   
   

   So an Adiabatic Wall is "something that prevents the transfer of heat between two thermodynamic systems as in (1) the transfer of heat between the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system and (2) space.  Isn't this precisely what is meant by the phrase "trapping heat within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system?"  So the claim that the relationship between "Adiabatic" and "can't trap heat" may be garbled in Reed Coray's mind, doesn't hold water." 

   Your guess that "Reed Coray does not accept that human emissions of CO2 are leading to increased global surface temperatures" is wrong.  Those emissions may very well lead to increased global surface temperature.  One thing I'm unsure about is "how big is the increase?"

   In any event, the quality of my arguments is independent of where they came from.  The only thing that matters is their validity, not their source.  If one technique of "denial of science" is appeal to authority, then implying that authorities are not good authorities is a form of appealing to a bad authority.  

   Moderator Response:

   [BL] The web software here does not automatically create links. You can do this when posting a comment by selecting the "insert" tab, selecting the text you want to use for the link, and clicking on the icon that looks like a chain link. Add the URL in the dialog box.

   ...but posting links as a search is fraught with difficulty. There is no guarantee that another user will get the same search results that you get. If you found a source using a search engine, provide the direct link to the page you found, not the search that led you there.

10. nigelj at 11:09 AM on 2 April 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    OPOF @19

    "One question I have is what would be the ways to transition from what has developed – nearly 9 billion with a very inequitable distribution of harmfulness and wealth plus total impacts that are well beyond being sustainable - to 2 billion living as you see being a sustainable future?"

    Just on the population question, a global population of 2 billion is likely to happen naturally due to the demographic transition, where people have chosen to have small families because they no longer need large families. In half the world the fertility rate is already 2.1 so its below replacement levels, and some countries have shrinking populations. This is likely to spread to the other half.

    Of course none of this is guaranteed to happen, and it could be a very slow process. A fertility rate of 2.1 would lead to 2 billion people by about year 2700. A fertility rate of 1.5 by about 2050 which is plausible leads to 2 billion people by about 2200. I'm going by memory of a population calculator. Governmnets could speed it all up by ensuring women have good educations and human rights and contraceptives are easily and cheaply available, and not be tempted to panic and encourage shrinking populations to grow.

    "Any ‘total global population’ up to 9.5 billion can be sustainable. It is simply a matter of keeping the sum of everybody’s impacts below the sustainable limits (the planetary boundaries and regional impact limits)."

    It depends on how those planetary boundaries are defined and whether they are strong enough. I dont have the time right now to read the related studies, but my gut reaction is to be meaningful it would require policies of large reductions in consumption among high income people / countries and some reduction in consumption or only very slight increases in consumption in low income people / countries and this will all be very difficult to achieve. Therefore it makes sense to also aim to decrease the size of the global population in parallel. It may be easier getting the size of the population down. I doubt it would be any harder than reducing consumption levels. But essentially I think we need to try to do both as best we can, so decrease per capita levels of consumption and the size of the population.

    Financial and resource inequality is a separate issue. I cant see a solution to this other than some sort of wealth tax, and tax payer funded redistribution of financial resources and even this will have to be limited in scope, to be politically viable. But this has worked quite well in some European countries to keep poverty rates and inequality within reasonable boundaries.

    These policies are under attack by the populists and nationalists like Trump and their supporters. Hes trying to solve the low wage / inequality problem with tariffs but I cant see this working very well. Its most likely going to cause chaos, bring low wage assembly line jobs back to America, and cause inflation as experts have pointed out. It looks like the main beneficiaries of these policies would be billionaires, probably by design.

    We are trying to stop dangerous levels of climate change thus keeping warming under 2 degrees and preferably under 1.5 degrees. It seems a valid response and framing of the issue. I think the same should apply to other environmental problems and also social and economic problems. We need to define and stop dangerous problems and changes. Part of this environmentally is ensuring we dont cross planetary boundaries. I think this is all a  better approach than utopian style socio economic system solutions. But I could be wrong about that.

     

11. Reed Coray at 11:07 AM on 2 April 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Bob, I haven't gone away.  I apologize for the delay.  I've just struggled with the process of bringing up a window into which I can enter a comment.  It's only chance I have brought up some windows.  I think I've figured out how to do that, so I'll get to the questions as soon as I can. 

    Let's see if this comment gets inposted.

     

    In my opinion, most people who responded to my comments are missing the point I am trying to make. My point is NOT that the greenhouse effect isn’t real. [I believe the greenhouse effect is real in the sense that gases in the Earth’s atmosphere (called greenhouse gases) will absorb the energy in the infrared radiation (IR) emitted from the Earth’s surface and radiate a portion of that absorbed energy back to the Earth’s surface.] My point is that the claim: “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by trapping heat within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” is a denial of science.
    [Note: Any misunderstanding regarding the point I’m trying to make is my fault. I did, after all, post my original comment under the thread “falsifying the greenhouse effect.” I accept responsibility and apologize for any misunderstanding my choice of thread has caused.]
    Bob Loblaw wrote (01:05 AM on 31 March, 2025) “Reed Coray's argument is a pig in a poke. He's making a mountain out of a molehill. He's making a federal case out of a trivial issue. He's sweating the small stuff. He's blowing things out of proportion. It's a tempest in a teapot. It's much ado about nothing. He's giving us a song and dance. He's laying it on thick. [Aren't dictionaries fun?]”
    [In the spirit of Bob’s question “Aren’t dictionaries fun?” I mention that Bob left out the phrase “his arguments are mouse nuts.” Because of this oversight, I recommend someone buy Bob a new dictionary.]
    If atmospheric greenhouse gases can trap heat, then not only is it likely that all of Bob’s characterizations of my argument are appropriate, it’s worse than that--my arguments are flat wrong and can be dismissed out of hand.
    If, however as I believe is the case, science says that heat can’t be trapped,
    (1) Then the process of “trapping heat” doesn’t and can’t exist.
    (2) If the process of “trapping heat” can’t exist, then claiming that something can or will occur as a result of “trapping heat” is a logical fallacy.
    (3) Since the claim says that the Earth’s surface is warmed “by trapping heat in the Earrth/Earth-atmosphere system,” the claim contains a logical fallacy.
    If the above three-step logic is valid, then any global warming argument that uses the words “trapping heat” to represent a real-world phenomenon is an argument that contains a logical fallacy. No matter how closely the real-world phenomenon agrees with the meaning of “trapping heat,” the use of the phrase “trapping heat” is a logical fallacy The magnitude of the logical fallacy may play a minor role in determining the amount of temperature change the real-world process that is called “trapping heat” can cause, but no matter how small a logical fallacy is, it is still a logical fallacy.
    The SkS blog (a) implies that when discussing AGW, “denying science” is bad, and (b) claims that one technique used to “deny science” is to employ arguments that contain one or more logical fallacies. Thus, anyone who employs a logical fallacy is denying science.
    If the AGW community encourages people to point out skeptic arguments that deny science, shouldn’t the skeptic community encourage people to point out AGW arguments that deny science--no matter how insignificant that denial is (e.g., pig in a poke, making a mountain out of a molehill, making a federal case out of a trivial issue, sweating the small stuff, blowing things out of proportion, tempest in a teapot, much ado about nothing, giving a song and dance, and worrying about mouse nut)?. The phrase I think that applies to the above is: “What’s sauce for the goose, is sauce for the gander.” Bob, would you check to see if see if that phrase is in your dictionary?
    To end this comment, I pose six questions to all who are interested in this topic.
    (1) Does science preclude the existence of “trapped heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    (2) Does the fact that “trapped heat” can’t exist, prohibit “trapping heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    (3) If “trapping heat” can’t exist, does the use of “trapping heat” in an argument mean the argument contains a logical fallacy? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    (4) Does the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” use the phrase “trapping heat?” Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    (5) Does the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” contain a logical fallacy? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    (6) Does the fact that the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by ‘trapping heat’ within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” contains a logical fallacy imply a denial of science? Yes or No. If “No,” I’m interested in knowing the rationale behind your “No” answer.
    If you reach this point in this comment with all “Yes” answers, then we are in agreement—the claim “The presence of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the temperature of the Earth’s surface by trapping heat within the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system” is a denial of science.
    If you reach this point with one or more “No” answers, then we have identified the issue (or issues) that are worthy of further discussion.
    Thank you for your time.

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12. One Planet Only Forever at 08:12 AM on 2 April 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    nigelj,

    I agree that we substantially agree. One question I have is what would be the ways to transition from what has developed – nearly 9 billion with a very inequitable distribution of harmfulness and wealth plus total impacts that are well beyond being sustainable - to 2 billion living as you see being a sustainable future?

    I will also clarify my perspective. (As an engineer with an MBA this is like the way I deal with an engineering/business challenge):

    • What is the desired objective? All of humanity equitably (not equally) living Sustainably (into the very far future).
    • What is the starting point? Really important to understand that the current developed reality is very unsustainable, grossly inequitable, and in many ways getting worse (global warming and climate change impacts are getting worse until ghg levels, not just CO2, stop increasing)
    • What are the ways to help achieve the urgently required transition from the current developed very harmful unsustainable reality to humanity collectively equitably living sustainably for the millions of years this amazing planet could be lived on? (A related understanding: Humanity should not spread beyond this planet until this is figured out).

    Specifically regarding a Sustainable Global Population:

    • Any ‘total global population’ up to 9.5 billion can be sustainable. It is simply a matter of keeping the sum of everybody’s impacts below the sustainable limits (the planetary boundaries and regional impact limits).
    • There can be a diversity of ways to live within that total equitable sustainable population.
    • People who are more fortunate should be required to set the examples of ways to live less harmfully and more helpfully (live more sustainably) for Others to aspire to develop towards. Everyone less fortunate should be able to develop to the more fortunate ways of living without compromising the sustainable total impact.

    Regarding the corrections required related to global warming and climate change impacts:

    • It is unacceptable for there to be significant differences of the amount of harm that people benefit from.
    • Peer pressure will be required to ensure that all of the most fortunate compete to be ‘least harmful and most helpful to Others’ (having the evidence rationally prove things – Do not just accept proclamations that a person’s actions are less harmful and more helpful – No more Carbon Offset scams).
    • Without effective evidence-based peer pressure it is unlikely that sustainable living will develop as rapidly as is required to responsibly limit the harm done by currently developed unsustainable activities like fossil fuel use.

    That perspective allows, and should encourage, improvements through scientific investigation and development of technological improvements ‘governed by learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others’.

13. Bob Loblaw at 05:14 AM on 2 April 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    MAR @ 192:

    Unless Reed Caray returns to the discussion to clarify his position, we can only guess as to what he really means by any of that verbiage. As it is, it is mostly word salad.

    Adiabatic processes in the atmosphere relate to air rising or descending, where pressure changes lead to temperature changes without the addition or removal of heat. The temperature change is the result of doing work (rising air parcel expands in volume, pushing other air out of the way to do so), or having work done on it (descending air is surrounded by air at higher pressure, which compresses it).

    "Adiabatic" and "can't trap heat" may be garbled in Reed Coray's mind.

    Googling for "adiabatic wall" finds the term in use in situations of high velocity aerodynamics, but that has nothing to do with earth/atmosphere dynamics.

    Googling for "adiabatic wall Reed Coray" finds hits at WUWT and JoNova's web site, including comments that resemble his comments here. (I won't provide links - if you want to see them, ask Da Google.)

    My guess is that Reed Coray does not accept that human emissions of CO2 are leading to increased global surface temperatures. My guess is that his arguments only make sense to the regular denizens of places such as WUWT and JoNova.

14. MA Rodger at 19:39 PM on 1 April 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Dikran Marsupial @191,
    Despite all the words employed @180/182, the commenter Reed Coray does manage to avoid making clear if he/she agrees that adding GHGs will cause warming. Substantial doubt is also presented by saying "when gases are added ... Earth's surface temperature ... may go up or down" and that "your theoretical argument is nonsense ... if your theoretical estimate of Earth surface warming requires the existence of trapped heat."

    In my understanding, the pedantic objection to use of the term "heat" and the term "trapped heat" is entirely wrong. "Heat" is not a word which physics uses 'quantitavely' but it simply describes “the quality of being ho, of having htigh temperature.” And the greenhouse gas process does thus evidently "trap heat" in that the escape of energy (which would prevent the elevation of surface temperature) is a physical mechanism. Surface IR which would otherwise shoot off into space is "trapped" by the GHGs which itself shoots-off IR. And that GHG-emitted IR will itself be "trapped" by GHG, a "trapping" process which will exist until the emitted IR is clear of enough GHG to have a clear shot out to space.

    I noted the term "adiabatic wall" used @180 (not one I recall ever being used during any thermodynamics lecture I ever attended). Pedanticly the term is misused as it would not cause a planet to "heat" as it prevents all energy flows in both directions.

15. nigelj at 06:19 AM on 1 April 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    OPOF @17, good information. I will expand on what Im getting at. A very strict definition of sustainability - and being in perfect harmony with nature — means we would have to live like hunter gatherers or as close as possible. Ive seen an expert promote this. This means abandoning most industrial goods, huge reductions in energy use, stopping of all mining and abandoning of capitalism for some sort of shared ownership and adopting something like a strict form of organic farming. It would certainly require a global population towards the lower end of estimates of 500 million.

    Such a thing would certainly be in perfect harmony with nature or very close,  and would have a somewhat smaller environmental footprint, but it doesn't look practical or necessary to me and would be hard to live with and is unlikely to be adopted.

     Theres a sensible compromise solution probably around a global population of around 2 billion, renewable energy, and a moderate reduction in levels of consumption, the use of walkable cities and modestly sized homes, etc. This will still have quite a large environmental footprint and resource shortages may eventually emerge but I would argue its capable of being sustained for a long time with minimum environmental damage. I think we just have to be sure we dont cause some sort of mass extinction or dangerous changes like the decline of pollinating insects. It's all still asking a lot of people. Evan made some good points on this.

    In practical terms your preferred version of living sustainable living does seem roughly similar to mine anyway. So Im just sharing a perspective on the issue, not really arguing against you or your sources.

16. One Planet Only Forever at 05:21 AM on 1 April 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Evan and nigelj,

    Regarding a sustainable total global population.

    I will try to connect my comment to the problem of misleading marketing by people who want to benefit from harmful fossil fuel use.

    I agree that ‘capitalism’ is not the problem. The problem is ‘capitalism’ and other -isms not being effectively governed by learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. However, the capitalist systems do have the ‘problematic need’ for growth from increased population.

    My understanding, based on a diversity of expert evaluations, is that many more than 80 million people can live sustainably on this amazing planet. The Wikipedia item for Sustainable Population is helpful. It includes the following: “Estimates [for a sustainable human population of Earth] vary widely, with estimates based on different figures ranging from 0.65 billion people [8 x 80 million] to 9.8 billion [almost 2 x 5 billion], with 8 billion people being a typical estimate.” Admittedly, some people would enjoy compromising what is considered to be acceptable ways of living so that fewer people can enjoy being more harmful than they ‘need to be’ (as long as they are among the fewer living that way).

    The massive range of results summarized in the Wikipedia presentation is understandably largely due to ‘different ways of living’ being the basis for the different evaluations – which leads to the following question:

    Should developed ways of living that require a reduction of the total population for those ways of living to be sustainably aspired to, and developed towards, be considered to be ‘superior or advanced ways of living’?

    Desires for ‘less sustainable, more harmful, ways of living’ being manufactured by the actions of people competing for perceptions of superiority is a serious problem. It is particularly challenging to solve that problem while justifiably respecting the freedom of each person to believe and do as they please.

    That leads to understanding that ‘personal vehicle driven urban sprawl development’ would mean a ‘lower sustainable total population’ than ‘more walkable higher density urban development with effective public transportation’ (refer to the recent SkS posting “Do Americans really want urban sprawl?”). Also, ‘modern rural living’ (with significant personal vehicle use to ‘enjoy life’) means an even lower total sustainable population.

    In many regions of the planet capitalism appears to have manufactured/ developed desires and aspirations that are contrary to ‘more sustainable ways of living’ (that aligns with the quote shared by prove we are smart @7). A lack of responsible governing to develop sustainable improvements of ways of living, ways that would allow a larger number of people to enjoy living that way, is the problem.

    The Planetary Boundaries evaluation by the Stockholm Resiliency Centre indicates that the current developed total impacts of the total global population significantly exceed many measures of sustainability. An obvious understanding is that reducing the number of less harmful people will not solve the current developed problem. The number of ‘most harmful people’ needs to be reduced. More harmful, less sustainable, ways of living and obtaining benefit need to be corrected or be justifiably restricted to benefit only the people who ‘legitimately need to temporarily benefit from more harmful actions’.

17. Dikran Marsupial at 22:32 PM on 31 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray You write "heat cannot be trapped".  Would you complain if you heard someone claiming that "blankets trap heat, so you feel warmer under a blanket"?  How about someone that says a thermos flask traps heat and keeps my tea warm for longer?

    Most would regard such a complaint to be unhelpful pedantry.  It is not an unreasonable way of looking at it.  The air under the blanket absorbs some of the heat from your body and returns it via condiction and radiation.  The blanket prevents convection - it "traps" the air, and hence "traps" the heat with it.

    Note that even in physics terminology is used "incorrectly".  For instance in thermodynamics, heat does not actually "flow" - that is just a metaphor (a remenant from caloric theory?).  Does that cause problems for physicists?  No, because they know that bidirectional transfers of energy appear to us as a "flow" of heat because we generally only observe the overall outcome.

    Pedantry is rarely useful - better to look for the value in analogies and metaphors, and gradually work towards understanding the physics directly as your frame of reference exapnds.

    Direct question for Reed Coray: Do you agree with the physics of the enhanced greenhouse effect, that have been well understood by physicists for over a century?  "Yes" or "No" - if "no" then demonstrate excatly where the theory is incorrect.

18. Evan at 20:28 PM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Eric@15, agree that climate response is not constant and that we need to consider long-term effects. However, my understanding from James Hansen is that the long-term climate sensitivity is higher than the commonly accepted value of 3, not lower (read here). An ECS value of 3 is bad enough. Higher values associated with longer-term feedbacks don't improve the picture.

    But my point is this. Through the effect of Milankovitch cycles, the orbits of Saturn and Jupiter trigger complex feedback processes that cause CO2 to vary about 100 ppm over 100,000-year cycles (i.e., ice-age cycles). This results in sea level changes of 400 ft. This suggests that our biosphere is in a very delicate balance. Given that atmospheric CO2 concentrations have been 300 ppm or lower for 100's of thousands of years, given that CO2 is currently at 420 ppm and increasing at a rate of 2.5 ppm/year suggests we are in deep trouble. All of this discussion of proxies and whether we should use TCS or ECS seems to me to be a distraction from the central point that we are actively pushing nature way, way out of balance.

    And we keep pushing.

19. Eric (skeptic) at 13:26 PM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Thanks Evan for #11, I see your point.  However my understanding is that climate sensitivity is not constant.  This paper dspace.library.uu.nl/bitstream/handle/1874/358482/1.pdf?sequence=1 shows most of the factors affecting climate sensitivity in fig 1.  The pertinent ones are decade time frames since we are comparing decades of human-created CO2 to past natural rises in CO2.  Also we need to consider TCR rather than ECS with all the long term feedbacks: www.gfdl.noaa.gov/blog_held/3-transient-vs-equilibrium-climate-responses/   In short, variations in dust, vegetation and carbon cycle between the current time and the Eemian could result in a different transient or equilibrium climate sensivity.

    That may make it difficult to compare the current rise in CO2 and Eemian (and prior) rates of rise in CO2 as proxies for rates of temperature rise.  However getting back to nigelj #5, reiterated in #12, the rise from the LGM to the present (the chart linked by OPOF) that makes the present magnitude and rate unique in 24k years.

20. nigelj at 07:00 AM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Evan @ 9, agreed. We would have to live very simply with little technology, and with a very small global population to be truly in harmony with nature. However I dont believe we have to be in perfect harmony with nature. We just have to ensure we aren't causing massive problems like climate change, the decline of pollinating insects, toxic pollution, needless waste, extravagant consumption levels like living in exceesively large homes. Sudies suggest an optimal global population is around 2 - 5 billion. Its all a  compromise, but I'm ok with the fact its a compromise solution. Utopian solutions don't work anyway.

21. Evan at 05:57 AM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    nigel@12, I won't argue your points except to note the following.

    My view of why we keep focusing on temperature reconstructions is to convince non-scientists that the current rate of warming really is unprecendented over a period of time we care about, and really is something we should be worried about.

    But for anybody who appreciates climate science and the link between atmospheric CO2 concentrations and the coming climate "attractions", CO2 increasing at 2.5 ppm/year is about 200 times higher than it was coming out of the last deglaciation, when rates were more like 1 ppm/100 years. So let's round it off and just say that currently CO2 concentrations are increasing about 100 times faster than they were during the last deglaciation.

    The ice-core data shows that over the last 400,000 years or more, CO2 has stayed within the range of 180 to 300 ppm. That we have increased CO2 by 100 ppm since the start of the Keeling Curve measurements, the fact that we are now at 420 ppm, and the fact that CO2 is currently increasing, on average, by 2.5 ppm/yr, should be all that anybody needs to know to understand that we are in deep doodoo. At least anybody who respects what climate science tells us about the link between CO2 concentrations and warming.

22. nigelj at 05:35 AM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Evan @ 5,

    "Nigelj@4, I'm sure you're aware that using ice-core data, we have sufficient data going back more than a million years to say that the current warming is unprecedented back that far."

    I was quoting from NASAs website and other studies I recall that the recent rate of warming is unprecedented in 10,000 years being the later part of the warming period coming out of the last glaciation. This period was very stable with just very slight warming.

    However OPOF posts a more recent source I hadnt seen that the warming is unprecedented in 24,000 years being the full warming period coming out of the glaciation, so on that basis warming is very probably unprecedented in 2.6 million years ie: since the start of the most recent glaciation.

    My understanding is we cant be certain warming is unprecedented going back tens of millions of year because of a lack of enough data. There could be a century buried away with high rates of warming of 1 degree or more per century, because we dont have enough data to be certain otherwise. This seems to be the point Eric is making.

    The graph posted by OPOF going back about 30,000 years has error bars that seem to indicate its extremely unlikely there was a single century over the last 24,000 years with rates of warming of 1.5 degrees or more. Eric might want to look at the graph. I also think its obvious from the graph that warming since the industrial revolution is rapid compared to the post glacial warming and that is the main point rather than nit picking too much, along with the fact that the rapid warming currently is hard for species to adapt to.

    I agree with the rest of the points you made.

23. Evan at 04:33 AM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Eric@10, yes, the ice cores give temperatures at just a single location. However, because CO2 is a long-lived greenhouse gas, we can use the CO2 record from a single ice core to reasonably represent the global CO2 concentration at any given time. Link the measured CO2 concentration to the science that relates atmospheric CO2 concentration to atmospheric temperature (i.e., the climate sensitivity), and we can use a single ice core to infer global temperatures. Because we have multiple ice cores dating back 400,000 years or so, we know with reasonably high confidence the temperature profile quite a ways back.

    But the real point is that at a current rate of warming of 0.2C/decade, we are warming so much faster than any of the ice-core data sets record, that we are clearly warming at an unprecendented rate compared to the warming over the last 400,000 years or so. And unprecendented does not mean a factor of 2 or 3, but more like a factor of 100 or so. In short, we are warming so much faster than Earth has in the recent past, that it really is not productive to argue about semantics.

    We are in deep trouble, and we have plenty of data sets with which to compare to support that claim. No, I have not provided links, but you seem very well informed about the history and science of ice cores (that is meant as a compliment), so that I assume you understand what I mean by CO2 being a long-lived greenhouse gas that distributes itself uniformly over the Earth.

    If you contest the science that links CO2 to warming, then I will rest, because it is science that provides the critical link between what we can measure very well (i.e., CO2 concentrations from ice cores) and global temperatures.

24. Eric (skeptic) at 03:06 AM on 31 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Evan, your comment #3 is valid, that the effects matter more than the magnitude of warming or the rate of warming.  But then in comment #5 you make a million year claim about warming (rate or magnitude or both).  That claim is based on a single location using a single ice core, and there are many counterexamples like this:sa.indiaenvironmentportal.org.in/files/Evidence%20for%20warmer%20interglacials%20in%20East%20Antarctic.pdf

    I have some issues with Holocene reconstructions that nigelj is alluding to in #4 but those quibbles (regarding spatial and temporal resolution) are not pertinent to the curve argument that this posting is about.

    In general longer term claims like Post made (Post authors, not the scientists) such the 450 million year curve compared to present rate of warming are abstractions.  They sound impressive until they are given a bit of scrutiny and then are very easily dismissed.  Instead I would use a combo of your #3 and nigelj's #4.

25. Bob Loblaw at 01:05 AM on 31 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Charlie_Brown @ 189:

    That's a useful addition to the discussion. Humpty Dumpty may hold the point of view that "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less”, but in communications it is desirable that people agree on meanings. And when you start to run into technical jargon, there can be a barrier to understanding if the audience is not familiar with the jargon. You then need to explain that jargon in words that the audience does understand. That explanation can vary widely, depending on the background of the audience.

    Even an object as familiar as a dictionary needs to follow this rule: you can't explain the meaning of words by using the same words. When trying to explain what a frobnitz gleabinator is, you can't just tell someone "that's a device that will gleabinate your frobnitz". If they don't know what a frobnitz is, or what gleabinating does, they are still lost.

    (Homework: try grabbing your favourite dictionary and looking up the word "dictionary", to see how it manages to avoid a circular reference.)

    (Homework 2: if you don't know what a "circular reference" is, try looking it up under "reference, circular".)

    Reed Coray has utterly failed to explain the distinction between his undesirable "trap heat" and his preferred "warm the Earth's surface". To a lay person, these look pretty much the same. Well, to pretty much anyone, I expect they mean pretty much the same thing. Unless Reed Coray can provide a reasonable explanation of the difference, he is (as I said before) just playing word games.

    The OP even goes into the inaccuracies of the term "greenhouse". (You need to read the Intermediate tab to see it.) It mentions the role of blocking convection rather than radiation in the glass greenhouse. It does not mention that plastic greenhouses can do this just as well - even though they are transparent to IR. It also doesn't point out that glass (or plastic) greenhouses also only work because they let sunlight in - just as the atmosphere does. A "greenhouse" that does not have a clear roof is just a house - and doesn't heat up the same way a greenhouse does (even though a house does block convection).

    In spite of the differences between a glass greenhouse and the atmospheric "greenhouse" effect, both require the use of the physics of radiation transfer and the physics of convection in explaining how they cause warming. The analogy (look that up in your dictionary!) is useful, although the two situations are not identical.

    Reed Coray's argument is a pig in a poke. He's making a mountain out of a molehill. He's making a federal case out of a trivial issue. He's sweating the small stuff. He's blowing things out of proportion. It's a tempest in a teapot. It's much ado about nothing. He's giving us a song and dance. He's laying it on thick. [Aren't dictionaries fun?]

26. Evan at 22:17 PM on 30 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    prove we are smart@7

    I do not disagree with your assessment that our capitalistic desires drive overconsumption.

    But I think that even if you removed the capitalistic drive for overconsumption, there would remain a problem of nearly insurmountable size. Our natural, healthy desires to feed, clothe and shelter ourselves and to look after our children would be enough to cause environmental stress. It is a personal opinion, but I think that if we removed our insatiable capitalistic desires, AND turned down the global population from over 8 billion to something like 80 million, that then, and only then could we live in harmony with nature.

    I feel this way because I am trying to live a sustainable life, but I am nowhere near sustainability and I don't know how to get there. Many of the things that make life worth living, such as hobbies and getting together with friends, increases GHG emissions. Should I give up that which makes life rich and fulfilling in the pursuit of reducing GHG emissions? Shall I become a hermit to reduce GHG emissions? Even writing this comment incurs GHG emissions.  Every time I refresh my browser to read the responses to my comments I incur GHG emissions.

    There are no easy answers.

27. One Planet Only Forever at 14:28 PM on 30 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    I am not surprised that the paper’s presentation of 485 million years of temperature history was irrationally misinterpreted. Some people desperately seek any excuse to maintain their harmfully incorrect beliefs about climate science, and many other matters. They can be especially desperate to prolong or increase the benefits they can get from delaying the ‘responsible, ethical and moral’ corrections of harmful developed human beliefs and behaviour that climate science has identified.

    The fact that human civilization has only existed in the last 10,000 years (less than 0.002% of the length of the chart) has to be ignored by some people to maintain their desired misunderstandings.

    It took me less than a minute to find the following Phys.org report from 2021: Global temperatures over last 24,000 years show today's warming 'unprecedented'. It presents details of the temperatures in that tiny right-hand end of the misunderstood chart from the 485-million-year paper. (Note that the title includes a term that some people attempt to claim does not apply to the results of modern-day human impacts on the planet).

    Undeniably, many people are easily tempted to believe misunderstandings about research results like this report. And, unfortunately, some people are so passionately emotionally invested in their misunderstandings that they powerfully resist attempts to get them to care to learn that their beliefs are ‘harmfully incorrect’.

    Harmfully misleading pursuers of popularity and profit like Joe Rogan (and like Musk, and Trump, and all the people who bought memberships in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Cult) are unlikely to be influenced by efforts to get them to learn that their preferred beliefs are harmful incorrect. They will behave like the following quote from this re-posted Climate Brink story.

    The furor over the graph reached its apogee in January when Joe Rogan showed it in a podcast interview with Mel Gibson, saying that “If you believe these silly people, way before human beings had ever existed, there's always this rise and fall. And this idea that the whole thing is based on carbon emissions from human beings is total bullshit. It's not true. Right. We might be having an effect, but we're having a small effect, a very small effect.”

    It is tempting to say that ‘all people in a democracy’ are to blame for the results of their collective leadership elections. But that is disrespectful of everyone who tried to help others learn to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. And it excuses the harmful misleading actions of the likes of Joe Rogan (and the likes of Donald Trump and Elon Musk).

    It is important to understand that ‘pure democracy’ would result in the interests of ‘the controlling majority’ being justified regardless of the undeniable harms caused by those interests. Regardless of the socioeconomic-political system, there is a significant risk of harmful abusive actions dominating (winning) unless everyone is effectively governed by learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others.

    Ideally everyone would responsibly self-govern to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. But there will always be some people who need to be ‘governed by Others’.

28. Charlie_Brown at 11:56 AM on 30 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray @ 180 writes: “This almost ubiquitously used claim (“the Earth's surface is warmed by-heat-trapping greenhouse gases”) is invalid because heat cannot be trapped—i.e., an adiabatic wall does not exist in nature. If heat can’t be trapped, any and all claims that rely on the existence of heat-trapping material or trapped heat constitute misinformation.” In my opinion, those two sentences are misinformation. It sets up a hurdle for GHG theory to be described with technical accuracy with a few words, or else it is “invalid.” I believe my comments are consistent with others. I intend to be reinforcing and apologize if they are repetitive.

    It not possible to convey the concept of how increasing GHG concentration “traps heat” with technical accuracy to those who do not understand fundamental principles of an energy balance, the atmospheric profile, and radiant energy transfer. For the lay person, “traps heat” is sufficiently descriptive. Technically it is not inaccurate, so it is not “untrue.” A “trap” does not have to be an adiabatic wall. Maybe one could say partial trap. It can be accurately described as a partial radiant energy trap. Let’s not get lost in the semantics of dictionary definition. I prefer to add a few words: “Increasing GHG behaves as a cold trap for certain wavelengths of infrared energy that reduces energy loss to space and upsetting the steady state energy balance.” It could be shortened to “It is a cold trap that reduces energy loss to space.”

    Reed Coray’s short description @182 “Surface Warming Occurs To Establish Energy Rate Equilibrium (ERE) Within The Earth/Earth-atmosphere System” also is incomplete. It leaves out the role of increasing GHG as well as the cold layer at the top of the radiant atmosphere.

    Another short description I use is that it is a 3-step process: 1) Increasing GHG reduces energy loss to space. 2) Energy accumulates in the global system. 3) Surface temperature increases until radiant energy balance is restored.

    Global warming theory should be described at the appropriate level for the audience to understand the overarching concept. It bothers me when someone says they believe in global warming, because it is not a belief, it is based on fundamental physics. If someone wants more information to better understand the concepts without understanding the physics, it should be provided. The audience does not need to know all the technical details to know that global warming theory is solid science. I find the technical details to be fascinating, so I am happy to dig into them and share the knowledge at whatever level the listener would like to engage.

29. prove we are smart at 09:29 AM on 30 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    "The root of the problem still lies with us and the choices we make." and there's the crux of the issue- You would surely think where are the mass protests against this guaranteed existential threat from a too rapidly ever warming planet? The increasing instability to our food and water systems- the insurance/financial- political- pandemics and on and on. The flora and fauna are victims as too the human pollutors.

    People dont want to lose their choices- the cars we drive, with the increasing "features"-the ailes in supermarkets for toothpastes or pet food or breakfast cereal-the endless fashion loop of clothing-the overwhelming desire for your children to become adults with a good job and a comfortable lifestyle and on and on.      I cannot remember where I copied this next quote from but it describes some of my thoughts..

    "Capitalism is not about a natural supply and demand. Capitalism is about MANUFACTURED demand, for which those who manufacture such demand, also "happen" to have a supply. There is little demand for weapons until the capitalists manufacture an international conflict. Most individuals don't need the vast majority of things they are told they should buy, so capitalists manufacture an insecurity in them so they feel inadequate without these trinkets.Bingo. And that "manufactured demand" is not only putting us in danger of serious military conflict, it's also RUINING the planet because we arent managing finite resources smartly.

     

     

     

     

30. Evan at 21:25 PM on 29 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Nigelj@4, we love to rail at politicians, but remember that in countries with freely-elected leaders, we elect these people. The root of the problem still lies with us and the choices we make.

31. Evan at 21:24 PM on 29 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Nigelj@4, I'm sure you're aware that using ice-core data, we have sufficient data going back more than a million years to say that the current warming is unprecedented back that far.

    The reason that is important is that coming out of ice-age cycles (i.e., during deglaciation), warming occurs at a rate to which most of the biosphere can adapt. With the current warming occurring about 100 times faster than that deglaciation rate, many species will not be able to adapt fast enough. The faster we change temperature, the more stress it puts on the biosphere.

32. One Planet Only Forever at 06:30 AM on 29 March 2025
    China will need 10,000GW of wind and solar by 2060
    

    wilddouglascounty,

    Good questions.

    I am a civil/structural engineer with an MBA. I have confidence in the use of models to analyze and evaluate plans. The same is done for engineered items and business opportunities. Today’s socioeconomic models are quite advanced. My university engineering education in the 1970s included a course on ‘Technology and Society’ where we used socioeconomic computer analysis models to investigate different approaches to socioeconomic development (using ‘state-of-the-art’ keyboards with dot-matrix printers as the interface devices).

    My main question is: What specific monitoring will be performed to ensure that things happen as planned? When planning structures and business opportunities the model analysis is important. But it is more important to monitor, and enforce corrections as required, to ensure that the plan is being diligently and successfully turned into the desired reality. The article mentions the need for a ‘new legal system’. ‘New legal systems’ do not guarantee effective monitoring and correction (evading legal consequences is a proven ‘strategy for success’).

    Indeed, it is challenging for Western socioeconomic political systems (systems based fundamentally on competition for profit and popularity with freedom of actions) to produce a collaboratively developed plan that is effectively monitored and corrected as required to ensure that ‘the desired result’ develops. It is especially difficult if the path to the desired result could be ‘less profitable or less popular’. But that monitoring and enforcement of compliance can also be hard to do in a socioeconomic system like the one in China that interacts with the world system (It is not an isolated stand-alone system).

    The following additional questions came to mind as I read the article:

    The plan is stated to be ‘net-zero’ before 2060. But the plan still has a significant amount of fossil fuel use in 2060. What is the plan to effectively neutralize the energy system emissions in 2060 (to be ‘net-zero’)? Note that CCS reduces ghg impacts, but does not make them zero. What are the plans for neutralizing ghg impacts of other activities in China like agriculture (also needed for China to be net-zero)?

    A significant challenge for effectively limiting harm done by activities under the control of China’s leadership, or any other leadership group, is: Getting all of the most powerful and influential players to learn to be less harmful and more helpful to Others even if that 'learning' compromises their potential opportunity for benefit.

33. nigelj at 05:35 AM on 29 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    I agree with Eric that we dont have enough data points hundreds of millions of years ago to know if there was a single century or two of warming of several degrees. However the current rate of warming is unprecedented in the last 2,000 years and probably the last 10,000 years. We have enough fine grain detail and data points to know this and numerous studies on it. And its the stability of this period that human civilisation developed within. Billions people and their agiculture and infrastructure are most likely very reliant on this relative stability.

    This is all being put at risk by politicians and other people that deny the climate problem and place their personal and unlimited wealth accumulation and tax cuts for millionaires and already profitable corporations above literally all other considerations. If this isn't an addiction, then what is?

34. Bob Loblaw at 04:41 AM on 29 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray @ 187:

    Your assertion that you "can't trap heat" and that using the phrase "trap heat" is  "not true" only makes sense if you create such a strict literal meaning to the words "trap heat" that is unjustified. In that context, nothing at all anyone ever says anywhere is "true".

    ...and I repeat what I said in #185: you are arguing a point that is barely mentioned in the OP. It seems as though you want to ignore the rest of the OP. You're just playing word games.

    You also have ignored the part where I say that such simple explanations represent a starting point for further discussion/explanation. Such as the discussion and explanation that is contained in the rest of the OP.

    Your accusations of an "intent to manipulate truth and facts" are unfounded, unsupported, and against the Comments Policy of this site. You are now cherry picking one phrase you want to use to attack the science, and using that to claim some grand conspiracy to deceive. You have now hit two more techniques of climate denial:

    

35. Reed Coray at 03:37 AM on 29 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Bob Loblaw at 00:12 AM on 29 March 2025

    You wrote: " Every simple explanation leaves something out, and therefore may be subject to misunderstanding (especially if someone is determined to misunderstand or misrepresent it)"  

    It is true that simple explanations "leave things out," and are therefore susceptible to misintrepretation. But why include in a simple explanation something that isn't true?  Doing that makes it more likely that the simple explanation will be misintrepreted.  

    For example, why not shorten your Earth surface warming simple explanation to: "atmospheric greenhouse gases act to warm the Earth's surface?"  That's an even simpler explanation and doesn't contain a statement that isn't true.  What does the caveat "trapping heat" add to the simple explanation other than make it more likely to be misintrepreted?   

    If your answer is that it makes it more likely that a reader will accept the greenhouse effect theory because he is familiar with connotations of the word "trap," then not only is your simple explanation misinformation, it is disinformation--i.e., information that is designed to mislead others and is spread with the intent to manipulate truth and facts.

36. One Planet Only Forever at 03:00 AM on 29 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray @182,

    As Bob Loblaw suspects, you have not answered my question.

    In addition to the responses by Bob Loblaw and Eclectic, I observe that even the detailed explanation you provided is incomplete. It should address the source of energy input to the earth-atmosphere system and what happens to that energy within the system.

    A significant percentage of incoming (entering – and there is a reason I bold this term) solar energy passes through the ‘greenhouse gases’ in the atmosphere and is absorbed or reflected by the features of the ‘surface of the planet’. The reflected solar radiation exits out to space through the atmosphere as easily as it entered. However, absorbed energy gets re-emitted in a form that is different from the solar radiation that enters the system. And the greenhouse gases make it harder for the energy emitted by the surface features to exit the system (leave out to space). Simply, and fairly accurately, greenhouse gases allow entry of the solar energy down to the surface but block the exit of heat emitted by the warmed surface back out to space.

    The current on-line Oxford definition of the verb ‘trap’ is: catch (an animal) in a trap.

    The related noun ‘trap’ is defined as: a device or enclosure designed to catch and retain animals, typically by allowing entry but not exit ...

    Try to be more helpful and careful. “The Earth's surface is warmed by heat-trapping greenhouse gases” seems to be an accurate ‘easily understood’ description of the result of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Trying to claim that the statement is a form of misinformation does not help improve efforts to increase public awareness and understanding of the problem. And that type of ‘poorly justified claim-making’ could be understood to be a form of misinformation (something that Bob Loblaw also noted in a different way).

37. Bob Loblaw at 00:32 AM on 29 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    It's also worth noting that the word "trap" is barely used at all in the OP that we are commenting on. In the Basic tab, it appears twice. Once in relation to comparing the earth (with an atmosphere) to the moon (no atmosphere), and once in relation to the atmosphere trapping radiation. In the Intermediate tab, the word "trap" does not appear in the OP at all.

    Reed Coray's complaint about overly-simplified explanations of "trapping heat" seem rather oddly placed under a blog post that gives a lengthy discussion of the greenhouse effect (which is of itself a poor term, as is explained in the OP!). Complaining that something should not be done when it does not occur in the OP starts to look like someone is complaining just for the sake of complaining.

    The comments section here is intended to discuss the science presented in the original posts. This is explained at the top of the Comments Policy. As a new user, it behooves Reed Coray to actually read the posts he wants to comment on.

38. Bob Loblaw at 00:12 AM on 29 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray @ 180, 182...

    Well, I'm pretty sure that OPOF's request for an easily understood term is not answered by an "explanation" that take some 270 words...

    ...but you harp on the claim that "heat can't be trapped". You go into a long monologue about the dynamics of energy transfer, the concept of dynamic equilibrium (although you do not use the word dynamic), etc. And you complain that simple explanations can be misleading or represent misinformation.

    I hate to break it to you, but every simple explanation ever offered on any subject will require leaving out details. Any analogy offered to help explain a complex system to someone unfamiliar with those details wlil only be able to represent part of that complex system - the analogy will be similar in some respects, and wlll differ in others. The "simple explanation" will always be a starting point for a more detailed explanation.

    For example, the "can't trap heat" argument could also be applied to any other system where energy is being added and temperature is rising. Let's take a pot on a stove, or a house heated by a furnace. Putting a lid on the pot makes the temperature rise faster. Closing the windows in the house makes the house get warmer (for the same furnace output). In each case, there is more thermal energy (AKA "heat") in the pot or house. In each case, a simplified description is that adding the lid or closing the windows "traps heat". In each case, there is more to it, but in each case the "traps heat" explanation is a reasonable starting point.

    You admit that "an easily understood term" may not be possible. Yet you criticize the use of simplified explanations because they are incomplete. Every simple explanation is incomplete. Every simple explanation leaves something out, and therefore may be subject to misunderstanding (especially if someone is determined to misunderstand or misrepresent it). The same applies to complex explanations - also subject to leaving things out, possible misunderstanding or misrepresentation (especially if someone is determined to misunderstand or misrepresent it).

    By setting a standard of "simple is misleading because it is simple", you are requesting perfection in the simplified presentation. This is what is known as setting impossible expectations, which is an unreasonable position to take. It is also a common one in the climate change discussion space:

    

     

    Methinks thou doth protest too much.

39. Evan at 20:38 PM on 28 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Eric@2, whether the label "unprecedented warming" is or is not warranted is kind of like debating whether the Category 5 Hurricane that just wiped out your town was or was not a hurricane of unprecedented strength. The current warming of 0.2C/decade (read here) is likely incompatible with organized human civilization and the well being of Earth's rich biodiversity. Let's not spend too much time debating terms and instead figure out what to do to slow down the rate of warming.

40. Eclectic at 13:23 PM on 28 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    @ 180 / 182 :

    Whoa !   Whoa there, Reed Corey.

    Please remember the KISS principle.

    You say:  "to explain ... warming to the general public ..." .  But explaining to the general public ~ is not going to happen if a reference to the topic of climate change goes on to a multi-paragraph declaration of complex atmospheric physics.  That would be tiresome and insulting to the general public.

    "We the people" deserve a simple one-liner description (wherever that is appropriate).   A "greenhouse effect trapping heat"  is a fair enough and accurate enough description for those of us who use colloquial English.   It is a reasonable analogy, for practical purposes.

    Sure, in a scientific discussion by experts and would-be experts, you can bring in topics like lapse rates; thermalizations; entropy; heat balance; infra-red radiation; etcetera.   But in common sense parlance, "trapping" heat by means of a pane of glass or a wool blanket ~ is not a misleading or dishonest analogy.

    Those who choose to go deeper into the semantics and the physics . . . are free to do so, at their leisure.   However, for public discussion of the practical politics of countering the modern rapid global warming ~ simplicity is a courtesy and a duty.

41. Eric (skeptic) at 13:13 PM on 28 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    I knew which graph just from the title after I commented on the original Washpost article here: www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/09/19/earth-temperature-global-warming-planet/?commentID=3e500d42-0006-4924-a353-36bd06f848fb I won't repeat all my critiques, but here's the most important one: the paper doesn't support the claim of unprecedented warming. That was invented by the Post authors.   That's particularly obvious after reading the supplemental: www.science.org/doi/suppl/10.1126/science.adk3705/suppl_file/science.adk3705_sm.pdf  The data points for rapid transitions are much too sparse to compare to a century or so of manmade warming.

42. Reed Coray at 11:51 AM on 28 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    One Planet Only Forever at 04:48 AM on 28 March 2025

    
    "You wrote: Just one question ...

    
    What 'easily understood term' do you suggest should be used to name what happens when the increased concentration of certain types of molecules in the atmosphere results in an increased temperature at the surface of the planet?"

    
    My answer is: "I'm not sure an 'easily understood term' exists, but if I had to pick one it would be 'Surface Warming Occurs To Establish Energy Rate Equilibrium (ERE) Within The Earth/Earth-atmosphere System.'

    
    A System is in ERE if the rate energy enters the system (or any sub-element of the system) is equal to the rate energy leaves the system (or the designated sub-element) adding. The temperature distribution of a system in ERE does not have to be uniform. The only requirement for ERE is that energy (which in the case of the Earth's surface is heat) neither accumulates nor decreases within the system or any sub-volume of the system.

    
    Adding material (e.g., gases) to a system in ERE will likely cause temperature changes within the system. Eventually these temperature changes will reach a new ERE steady state.

    
    In the case of the Earth/Earth-atmosphere system, to achieve a new ERE state when gases are added to the atmosphere, the temperature distribution within the system must change. One component of that temperature distribution is the Earth's surface temperature, which may go up or down. The direction and amount of temperature change can be determined either experimentally or theoretically.

    
    If your theoretical estimate of Earth surface warming requires the existence of 'trapped heat' (i.e., your theoretical argument is that Earth surface warming will occur because some gases 'trap heat' within the lower troposphere), then your theoretical argument is nonsense because heat can't be trapped.

    
    As I said, I'm not sure an 'easily understood term' exists for Earth surface temperature change. Because of this, I don’t like simple explanations. They are too likely to be mislead.

    
    Reed Coray

     

43. One Planet Only Forever at 04:48 AM on 28 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    Reed Coray @180,

    Just one question ...

    What 'easily understood term' do you suggest should be used to name what happens when the increased concentration of certain types of molecules in the atmosphere results in an increased temperature at the surface of the planet?

44. Reed Coray at 04:11 AM on 28 March 2025
    Greenhouse effect has been falsified
    

    An argument used to explain Earth-surface/Earth-lower-troposphere warming to the general public is that some gases (called greenhouse gases) in the Earth's atmosphere "trap heat" thereby increasing temperature.  In the public's mind, "trapping heat" goes hand-in-hand with increasing temperature and so the phrase serves its intended purpose: make it believable to the public that atmospheric greenhouse gases will warm the Earth's surface.

    This almost ubiquitously used claim (“the Earth's surface is warmed by-heat-trapping greenhouse gases”) is invalid because heat cannot be trapped—i.e., an adiabatic wall does not exist in nature. If heat can’t be trapped, any and all claims that rely on the existence of heat-trapping material or trapped heat constitute misinformation.
    
    

    I believe the phrases "trapped heat" and "heat trapping" are used to incorrectly explain a physical process in a way that will resonate with the general public.  Imagine the effect on the general public if in all articles that mention "heat trapping," after every appearance of the phrase ("heat trapping" or "trapped heat") a parenthetical qualifier followed that said "heat cannot be trapped, but we use 'trapped heat' because it 'kind of' describes what is going on."  Do you think such a qualifying caveat would have any effect on the public's acceptance of the greenhouse gas theory of warming?

45. Evan at 20:30 PM on 26 March 2025
    Climate skeptics have new favorite graph; it shows the opposite of what they claim
    

    Great article!

    The analogy I like to use to explain why the rate of warming is important is Speed Kills.

    When exiting a freeway, you slow down from 60 mph (100 kmh) to rest in about 30 sec. This is a nice, reasonable rate of change. What happens if you speed up that rate of change by a factor of 100?

    Moderator Response:

    [BL] Link fixed...

46. wilddouglascounty at 23:18 PM on 25 March 2025
    China will need 10,000GW of wind and solar by 2060
    

    So China is taking a low/no carbon future seriously, if we are to take this at face value. Meanwhile, fossil fuel interests seem to be creating a pushback to such low carbon futures in many countries in the West. China is doing these responsible steps in the context of a command and control economy and a surveillance state that has questionable human rights. Can the western states provide a viable pathway to a low carbon future that does not involve these "features?"

    The institutions of science clearly can operate in both scenarios; can western democracies evade the authoritarian impulses that seem to be driving them toward protecting the status quo? Can they generate good science, integrate with other disciplines to develop and partner with manufactures of low carbon technologies that also protect the environmental diversity that is essential for the functioning of the biosphere in addition to slowing/reversing the forces that are driving our climate upwards?  These are the questions that come up in my mind. How about you?

47. One Planet Only Forever at 06:34 AM on 22 March 2025
    Do Americans really want urban sprawl?
    

    nigelj @9,

    As Eric (Skeptic) has mentioned there is complexity and nuance on many aspects of this matter.

    It is probably more accurate to say “...highrise apartment living ( define it as anything above about 7 floors) will have to be very high quality and thus quite expensive to entice some middle class people away from suburban living, with its privacy and your own garden etc. Some [p]eople put considerable value on that.”

    Many people ‘need’ less expensive ways of living. In the case of ‘car sprawl based development’ a lot of what was built is of little use to those people, but they pay for it because they have ‘no real choice’. Offering those people the choice of smaller less expensive housing - like affordable, but well-built, apartments that are 7 stories or less - could make ‘single family homes with big yards’ less valued if there were more lower cost alternatives.

    In addition to opposition to actions that would reduce potential benefit from more fossil fuel use, the 'loss of potential value' of already built single family homes with yards would explain the misleading misunderstanding fuelled opposition to the Glenmore Landing development by councillors for other areas of Calgary (refer back to my comment @6).

    Note that the council member for the community that the Glenmore Landing development affected, where it would be built, supported the development because her community member feedback was Not-NIMBY. The community supported the development. Other council members opposed it, and they repeated misleading misunderstandings as the reason for their opposition.

48. One Planet Only Forever at 05:52 AM on 22 March 2025
    Do Americans really want urban sprawl?
    

    Eric (skeptic) @7,

    Thanks for the response. I generally agree with your observations. However, there are some minor clarifications I would make.

    Regarding $10,000 per year for car ownership:

    The energy costs are indeed highly variable. However, they are only a part of the costs. A fuller understanding of the costs of car ownership is presented by RateHub.ca - What is the total cost of ownership for a car? That evaluation concludes that the average cost in Canada is $1370 per month = $16,500 Cdn per year (~ $11,500 US). The costs include the following in addition to annual fuel and maintenance costs:

    • Vehicle purchase costs (loan interest or lease costs) and depreciation of value at end of use considerations
    • Non-annual maintenance (items like tire replacement, brake and timing belt replacement, specialty fluid flushes and replacement)
    • Licensing/registration
    • Parking (at work or at an apartment)
    • Insurance (a significant part of the cost)

    Regarding roads:

    ‘Car sprawl’ cities cover larger areas per capita (they have lower population density). That requires more length of roads and other public systems per capita. Calgary has 1.4 million people living on 825 square km. For comparison, Copenhagen, considered to be reasonably walkable, is 1.4 million living on 180 square km. The length of public infrastructure items in Copenhagen is likely about 1/4 the lengths (and costs) required by Calgary.

    Regarding ‘Investors’ vs ‘Speculators’:

    People who buy a property that they do not intend to live in can be called ‘investors’ or ‘speculators’. The same goes for people buying stocks or being venture capitalists. They are ‘investors who are speculating’ about the amount of benefit they will get from their actions. That is different from someone who ‘invests’ in a fixed interest deposit - no speculation in that action, except for speculating that it will be better than ‘riskier’ investment options. Note that the 2008/9 financial crisis was due to speculation that home-buying with balloon mortgages would be a good investment.

    Regarding sustainability of the condos being built:

    The consequences of the temptation to save money on the initial build is a concern. But the shoe-boxes in question wold be the same problem even if they are better-built than the average new high-rise building.

    Regarding having to use a car to get a loaf of bread or a coffee:

    The point being made is that in a walkable community you can walk to get a small amount of groceries. And there would be a local coffee shop (or two) you can walk to for a visit with friends (and you could walk to your friend’s place for a visit). Being able to walk to a diversity of shops and services, and even walk to work, would be possible in a walkable community.

49. nigelj at 05:21 AM on 22 March 2025
    Do Americans really want urban sprawl?
    

    OPOF @6,  I will clarify what I mean about highrise living in a walkable city needing to be expensive. I just suspect highrise apartment living ( define it as anything above about 7 floors) will have to be very high quality and thus quite expensive to entice middle class people away from suburban living, with its privacy and your own garden etc. People put considerable value on that. So it might be so expensive it doesnt attract very many people even if they save on car running costs and can walk to most things.

    As you say converting cities to be walkable in a meanigful way is also going to be expensive and this adds to the cost problem. And it will have to be meaningful. People are mostly not going to move and sell the car just so they can walk to get a coffee. Most things will have to be within walking distance, including most work, shops, and services. And it will need very high density living and highrise apartments otherise too many shops would be needed to be economically viable. Its obvious.

    But its good some places are experimenting with walkable city living, and we will see how things develop and whether it attracts enough people. I like the idea in principle. I live ten minutes walk from the local shops and its great. I hope it would work, but we also need some healthy scepticism.

50. Mara at 01:47 AM on 22 March 2025
    Climate Fresk - a neat way to make the complexity of climate change less puzzling
    

    Hello, great summary. The Climate Fresk has been so successful that many other workshops were launched to introduce people to sysemis topics using the same approach - nearly 200 to date. I created the Energy Transition Fresk (only available in French for now), which was really challenging to design as the topic has so many componants.

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