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Comments 55251 to 55300:

  1. Why Arctic sea ice shouldn't leave anyone cold
    sout @2, in the interests of accuracy, Alex showed a 2012 sea ice extent of just over 4 million km^2, close to its current value. The reconstruction, however, is of August average extent. To compare like with like, we should compare the modern August average extent, which is likely to be around 5 million km^2,or about five dashes above the position shown for 2012 in the graph.
  2. Why Arctic sea ice shouldn't leave anyone cold
    A good overview but a dire outlook, thank you anyway. I missed the connection between vanishing sea ice and a possible weakening of the Thermohaline Circulation with may in turn influence the gulf stream. Or is this out of the question?
  3. Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 17:25 PM on 26 August 2012
    Why Arctic sea ice shouldn't leave anyone cold
    In case any reader still thinks this is within the realms of 'normal' - Alex, in a comment on Neven's Arctic Sea Ice blog, updated Kinnard with 2012 ice extent and posted a link to this image: from Kinnard updated with 2012 data Quite a worry.
    Moderator Response: TC: Concern has been expressed privately among SkS authors about the potential for this graph to mislead the unwary. The key concern is that the original graph shows a 40 year running average of mean August extents, which the amended graph compares with the 2012 minimum (to date) extent. That is not an apples to apples comparison. Further discussion can be found below by Kar, Dana, and myself.

    This comment should not be interpreted as indicating we do not appreciate the efforts of Alex, Sou or Kar in preparing and displaying the graphs.
  4. Climate Change, Irreversibility, and Urgency
    The rapidity of Arctic sea ice loss and the awakening of a the methane "time bomb" across the once frozen regions of the NH is something the 2007 IPCC report didn't take into account at all. Limiting increase in global temps to 2C is out the window and 3C may be impossible to avoid now as well. Those fools who think that a melting Arctic is a great opportunity to plan for further fossil fuel extrapolation fail to understand the various stresses this will placec on a civilization needing to feed 7+ Billion humans.
  5. Why Arctic sea ice shouldn't leave anyone cold
    Neven never fails to amaze me in his broad comprehension of this subject and ability to put it into such well written postings. This post should be required reading for everyone in the world old enough to comprehend it. Can someone please translate this into a few key languages and get this spread to as many blogs around the web as possible!?
  6. Climate Change, Irreversibility, and Urgency
    Idunno. Thanks for the heads up. We had already noticed that thread going a bit feral. Sometimes not a good idea to get into some fights. Doug. No not much cause for optimism no. But a glimmer. A few things. The cost of solar PV cells is plummeting due to mass production in China. Here in Australia people are putting solar panels on new houses based on cost alone. The savings in energy demand mean we have managed to avoid needing to build a new FF power station. The huge decline in sea ice in the Arctic this year has been spectacular to watch and it ain't over yet. All the trend lines are still plummeting. Whats good about that? The silver lining is that if we are going to get far greater action then the mass population has to get behind the need for it. Paul Gilding in his book The Great Disruption had one chapter labelled "When the dam of Denial Breaks". And thats what we need. Dramatic events that will shake the world up and wake it up. The Arctic going ice free a few years earlier than was expected does't matter as much in terms of what the long term consequences of global warming will end up being. Just one brick in the wall falling into place a little earlier than though. But if that gets action happening faster it might be worth the price.
  7. Climate Change, Irreversibility, and Urgency
    idunno: ...a learned theological discussion of the state of John Cook's soul. Guaranteeing thereby that somebody is entertaining a desperate wish to avoid the actual topic of the Guardian article. Sadly pathetic. Meanwhile, back more or less on topic: Science adviser warns climate target 'out the window' Lack of phase coherence here. From the blog post above: "A failure to reduce carbon dioxide emissions significantly within the next decade will have large adverse effects on the climate that will be essentially irreversible on human timescales." I'd say that the situation in the Arctic is a "large adverse effect" and that it's "essentially irreversible on human timescales," or at least the timescale available to those of us reading this. What's our urgent action item in the Arctic? Engaging in a mad rush to extract for combustion the hydrocarbons newly available thanks to vanishing ice. Can anybody see a reason for optimism? I can't.
  8. How much has nuclear testing contributed to global warming?
    Where did this Einstinean idea originate from? I give our Lord Monckton the benefit of a doubt - I can't believe he'll stoop that low. Then again...
  9. Antarctica is gaining ice
    Lifted from The Conversation: "A 364-metre-long ice core record has revealed an unusual pattern of rapid warming across the Antarctic Peninsula over the past 100 years. An Australian National University research expedition produced findings dating back 15,000 years, resulting in the first comprehensive temperature record of the Antarctic Peninsula. Dr Nerilie Abram said the Antarctic Peninsula is one of the fastest warming places on Earth and the findings will allow researchers to compare recent and past temperatures in the region for the first time." More here.
  10. Climate Change, Irreversibility, and Urgency
    Just a brief, entirely off-topic, heads up... The Guardian's thread on sea ice appears to have been entirely highjacked, see pages 14-16 of comments, by a learned theological discussion of the state of John Cook's soul. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/aug/23/arctic-sea-ice-record-low?commentpage=16#start-of-comments I thought perhaps Mr Cook might like to be aware of this, and might even like to comment. I need hardly say that this is extremely sticky ground, and the potential for causing offence probably limitless, but... Please do feel free to remove this comment from this thread.
  11. Lindzen, Happer, and Cohen Wall Street Journal Rerun
    hey vrooomie , hmmm interesting I live and work in an environment where being homophobic is still ok and because I'm not out I get to see what people are really like and it isn't nice . So i guess my experience colours the way I interpret that paragraph . Suppose i just over reacted sorry Mod TC . Thanks vrooomie for the insights .
  12. Book review: Language Intelligence by Joe Romm
    Romm points out that when you're speaking to a critical audience, they're primed to reject facts that contradict their world view. We have to change or shake the world view before we get to facts. That's where priming and metaphor and repetition and stories and questions work. Want to see a good example? Study the entire lyrics of "Like a Rolling Stone." Romm uses some of it, but the whole song is a great tutorial. Most of Dylan's lyrics are easily available online.
  13. The Continuing Denial of the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change
    And, of course, I just discovered the link leading to the 'how to italicize schtuff', right after hitting 'send.' I'm just a geologist...;-)
  14. The Continuing Denial of the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change
    When a spade is a MOERRI Sorry, Bernard...couldn't resist! I agree wholeheartedly, and it's this--timidity, for lack of a better term--that science/scientists ofttimes exhibit that allow denialISTS [mod: if you wish, please italicize my caps; not sure how to code for italics] to win the day. I see it over on WUWT *all the time*, where they ~whinge and whine~ about having the terrible, dastardly ad hom term "denier" flung at them, in the same breath the astonishing attacks, verifiably ad homs, get flung at The Inconvenient Data and its Messengers.
  15. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    "Ostrichocracy." and the Great Myriad-Plethora Battle...this thread is not only informative, it's fun! To all who are arguing honestly (and I need not point out who isn't) thanks...I learn something new everyday. Sph...."DNFTO?" Terrell Owens is around, summweres?...;-)
  16. Lindzen, Happer, and Cohen Wall Street Journal Rerun
    Daved@40, I too, am somewhat sensitive to 'code' words that target the GLBT population (said from my ground of being, as a straight man) and I too, like a few commenters, do not read *into* steves's words an anti gay rant. The gay part was parenthetical to a single point, and having a large number of gay friends (even having been made an honorary lesbian, by a GLBT choir to which I once belonged!), I'd say accurate. In no way do I see in Steve's words an anti-gay rant and/or stand, only an observation upon post-modern societal norms, which seem to be quite accurate. I won't deign to speak for Steve--I'm sure he'll chime in soon--but the takeaway for me was the tendency, in this PNS world, to glorify the sizzle, and minimize the steak.
  17. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    85, Old Mole, You are repeating Dale's and many a climate ostrich's favorite line of defense, "it hasn't happened yet in a noticeable way, so we don't need to worry about it, ever." That doesn't require any further discussion or rebuttal. It is the ultimate climate ostrich stance, and I will again repeat my favorite parable: A manAn ostrich jumps from the top of a skyscraper. Every time he passes an open window, he is heard to say "so far, so good." Oh, and you might want to go back and read the many, many myriad links that I have provided. A fair number of them directly refute your statements and position.
  18. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Dale,
    Windy
    This has already been discussed (see inversions). I started out by stating that there are certain areas whose whether patterns lend themselves to dangerously high ozone levels (see comment 19).
    Heat == more pre-cursors (as well as faster reactions)
    Okay, I'll take one more stab at this. This is basic chemistry. First, your block analogy fails because there are far more blocks than one needs. Ozone (O3) levels are normally below 60 ppb. That's "parts per billion". The availability of oxygen (O2) in the atmosphere is 210000000 ppb. So you have 210,000,000 "blocks of O2" with which to build 60 "blocks of O3". There is no shortage of blocks, as in your analogy. Second, as I've already explained, everything is competing rates of reaction. If I can make ozone molecules faster than you can smash them, then the number of ozone molecules in the room increases. But it's not one person making ozone and one person smashing it, it's 210,000,000 million molecules of O2 per billion slamming into each other making ozone, and very, very few NO molecules slamming into those 60 ozone molecules and turning them back into O2. VOCs and other reactions turn more NO into NO2. This provides a lessened chance of breaking down O3 into O2, so your ozone smashing is inhibited (less NO mallets to go around). So if you add VOCs, there is less chance of breaking O3 down. If you increase temperatures, VOC reactions become more efficient, they remove even more NO, and the chances skew even further. Now here is the part you don't seem to get. In an atmospheric soup of billions of molecules, these reactions are happening constantly, myriad a plethora many times per second. Ozone is constantly being created and destroyed. How much ozone the atmosphere contains is a question of how fast all of those competing reactions are going. If ozone is being created more quickly, or is not destroyed as quickly, you get more ozone. This is all basic chemistry. If you cannot grasp this, you do not get a seat at the table. From here on out, I declare DNFTT (DNFTO).
  19. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Dale has big trouble with AND. In the case of trop ozone one needs: Heat and Light and an Inversion because it closes the reaction vessel. If you have a lot of wind it dilutes the reactants. There is another role that VOCs play, but it requires NO2, to generate OH which oxidizes the VOCs to forms which can create more NO2. That mechanism is a bit more complex, but it too increases with temperature. Simple stuff first.
  20. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    When people use the popular denial meme, "...life thrived in the Eocene" (or similar), I always like to remind them that it was only some types of life that thrived: like 30-foot snakes, predatory birds with 15-foot wings spans and giant reptiles. Land mammals -- including our own ancestors -- were generally small creatures not much bigger than domestic cats (small being apparently most suited to cope with the heat). [Google 'mammals of the Eocene' to read more.] Humans and other modern species with which we share planet Earth today, thrive best in the atmospheric CO2 concentration in which they evolved -- and to which we are slowly saying 'good bye'.
  21. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Old Mole, A quick Google gives this quote from a New York Times report on water use: "groundwater supplies in the Upper Ganges of India and Pakistan, the Central Valley of California and the North China plain are heavily overexploited, something that was already well known before". my emphasis The abstract of the study is here, but the article is behind a paywall. They mention only four aquifers in this part of the article and one is the central vally. Please provide a reference to support your wild claims that the central Vally aquifer is not overexploited. When you make unsupported wild claims like this people think you are just a troll. Please try to provide evidence to support your wild claims on the ozone thread also.
  22. How much has nuclear testing contributed to global warming?
    I found the answer to my post @15 and pointers to the interesting papers on another thread: http://www.skepticalscience.com/heatflow.html SkS is an excellent source of knowledge if you know how to search it...
    Moderator Response: TC: Link made live.
  23. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    "Be it the Central Valley of California or heavily populated N.W. India, sustained food production has become increasingly dependent on unsustainable pumping of groundwater because of diminishing availability of water from rainfall and glacier fed rivers." Another minor quibble ... farmers in the San Joaquin valley haven't been pumping much of their increasingly toxic ground water for about fifty years now. Water for irrigation is provided by the state and federal water projects, piping water from the Sacramento river and its tributaries several hundred miles south.
  24. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    "What is not known for certain is the effect of exposure to higher levels of ozone on a longer-term or permanent basis. It is reasonable to assume that those effects would be more severe than indicated at Table 2 – and fatal." No offense to you, but based on my experience as a guinea pig in the large scale laboratory experiment called the Los Angeles Basin in the late 1950's to the late 1960's, I would have to say it was not reasonable to assume any such thing. Let me refer you to a table put out by the South Coast Air Quality Management District: http://www.aqmd.gov/smog/o3trend.html It doesn't present any data prior to 1976 ... but although I can't present any confirming data at the moment, I would bet you paychecks that ozone levels were considerably worse prior to the passage of the Clean Air Act in 1970, the oil crisis of 1973 and the mandatory installation of catalytic converters in the 1975 model year Even so you will notice that in 1977 and 1978, the maximum eight hour readings, averaged over a basin encompassing several hundred square miles, was over 300 ppb. The hourly average could go as high as 450 ppb. The number of days when a health advisory was issued (over 150 ppb O3) was roughly half the year, every year. How much of a "longer-term basis" were you looking for? Yet I see no evidence of drastic changes in mortality figures that correspond to those highs ... higher, yes, but marginally so. I suggest that you would see similar results looking at the populations of Mexico City and Beijing today, since they are dealing with similar ozone levels now. In short, without rather more evidence from mortality data in the public record to support your claim, I think that "[i]t can kill us all and will do so if allowed to go unchecked." is exactly the sort of alarmism that the ostrichocracy is forever whining about, and does your argument for major changes in public policy no good at all. P.S. Sphaerica@38 'Plethora', and its evil twin, 'myriad' should be avoided like an invitation to a James Inhofe barbecue. Not only are they grossly overused, they lack any precision, and convey to the reader the meaning "a whole shitload, and don't I have an impressive vocabulary?", making you look a pedantic twit.
  25. The Continuing Denial of the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change
    Call me a traditionalist, but in my book one who denies a thing is a denier, pure and simple. And if that denial involves actively ignoring, dissembling, and/or otherwise misrepresenting pertinent content of the subject at hand, especially for the purposes of promoting to others the denialism of said subject, then that individual is a denialist. I'm all for enriching lexicons, but not for impoverishing them. As Tom Curtis notes, and as George Orwell classically described in his novel 1984, controlling language provides a tool for controlling thought - there's a decent little essay about it here. Allen Ginsberg observed a similar thing - "[w]hoever controls the language, the images, controls the race". So don't be afraid to recognise and announce a denier or a denialist when one ecncounters such. A spade is a spade, even when it demands to be called a manually-operated earth-restructuring/relocating implement.
  26. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    Thanks for this patient refutation of a veritable torrent of nonsense John. 'Early member of Greenpeace' - so what? What he's saying now is still nonsense.
  27. How much has nuclear testing contributed to global warming?
    [Snipped of topic comments]
    Moderator Response: TC: jmorpuss, Skeptical Science does not exist for your benefit, and nor do you have a special privilege to ignore the comments policy. If you wish to discuss the absurd theory that microwave transmissions cause global warming, you are entitled to do so where it is on topic, and not anywhere else.

    Please carefully peruse the comments policy before commenting there as well. If you do not have anything new to add to what you have already written, as appears to be the case, simply regurgitating the same tires arguments will result in your posts being deleted for failing to avoid excessive repetition, and sloganeering.
  28. Lindzen, Happer, and Cohen Wall Street Journal Rerun
    Well that whole Modern, post-WWII culture paragraph makes me feel that gays are having a bad effect on society and that they are part of the problem of our cultural shallowness leading to our willingness to to be duped by Monckton and friends . If steve had just said that the over exposure of gay men in TV and films most of which just follow the same old stereotypes , was an issue I would tend to agree , maybe he should have defined what he meant by gay (homosexual) effect on culture but I get the feeling the intent was to implicate the whole sector of society in the great moral decline of the west . I know I am trying to convince people here with probably 20 or 30 IQ points more than me . But basically I was offended and my poor language skill stop me present a decent cogent argument . so leave it at that then . To keep it on topic you don't need to post this . Thanks
  29. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    Thanks Tom. I think my original description is fair and accurate - Moore was an early member of GP and was involved with it at various levels 1971 through to 1986. I spent some time researching the background to this, as I always do when writing a piece for Skeptical Science, and much that gets read does not end up in the final edition (especially if a ~1000 word gish-gallop has to be reproduced in order to pick it apart).
  30. The Continuing Denial of the Scientific Consensus on Climate Change
    In the way that bovine means "like a cow", the word for "like an ostrich" is struthian (or struthious). May I suggest that when we encounter a climate, er, contrarian putting his head where the light of reason and empiricism does not shine, we now exclaim: "Struth!" (with apologies to our Australian friends).
  31. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    What you are saying to me Daniel, is that heat will create more ozone. An analogy. 5 blocks in a row and you move the first one to the back of the line repeatedly at the same speed. If heat speeds up this process, then you repeat this cycle quicker. What you're saying is that if you add heat, not only does the cycle speed up but suddenly there are 6 blocks. If heat creates more blocks scattered on the floor, as you speed up the first to back block cycle the chance of picking up another block is higher. So through a combination of moving faster and more blocks scattered on the floor, the CHANCE of picking up another block in the line increases. But just because there's more blocks on the floor doesn't guarantee you'll actually pick one up. And, if you don't even start the first to back block cycle you can scatter as many blocks as you want on the floor and you'll never pick them up. So heat !== more ozone. Heat == more pre-cursors (as well as faster reactions).
  32. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Dale is entitled to his own opinion but not his own facts. And the facts on this thread are inconveniently against him. The ostrichicity is palpable.
  33. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Hot and cloudy. Hot and windy. Not every hot day will result in high ozone levels. For instance here in Melbourne it's quite common in late Jan-Feb for the temp to be 40C+ with up to 100km/hr northerlies. We know these as our worst bushfire days. So whilst extra heat will result in more pre-cursors, that does not translate directly to increased ozone.
  34. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Dale, In actuality, if you look at Eli's equations, what you see is that VOCs facilitate the conversion of NO to NO2. This leaves less NO to convert O3 back to O2, which in turn shifts the balance towards increasing amounts of O3 (ozone). Everything (well, almost everything) in chemistry is competing rates of reaction. You have two (or more) reactions occurring in balance. In one direction you produce product, in the other product breaks down into reactants. When the system is in equilibrium, you have a concentration of products and reactants that is steady, because the competing reactions are balanced. If you unbalance the reactions (changing the rate in either direction) then the concentration of products changes as well. In our case, a reaction (dependent on temperature) changes the amount of one component of one reaction (the reaction that destroys ozone). This reduces the frequency of that reaction, thereby leaving more of the product of the other reaction (the reaction that creates ozone). The end result is more ozone with increasing temperatures.
  35. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Dale, I don't understand how you can say "increasing pre-cursors doesn't translate literally to increased ozone." Yes, it does, hence all of the statements that increased temperatures (from GW) will increase ground-level ozone.
  36. Lindzen, Happer, and Cohen Wall Street Journal Rerun
    Steve from Virginia , A humans sexual orientation in this case homosexual(gay) does not mean they are "pornographic, inconsequential and theatrical" or even responsible for the " 'girlish' and erratic, vamping " of society . Typical offensive stereotyping which I am surprised got through moderation ?? . It is easy to blame a small minority for the problems of society dealing with Global Warming but maybe you should look to the right wing religious side of politics whom have done more harm to our cause of stopping the looming disaster than anyone . Most people understand there is a problem but are just to busy or poor!! to make changes to their lives with kids, mortgages, work, bills, and this where the role of political leaders need to be strong and not just take the easy way out of accepting the views of a few wrong umm scientists ? or even non scientists (Monckton) . Also why cant I have a car if its powered from batteries charged from my solar panels ?, we don't have to go back to living like Hobbits you know . Well that's my rant . Great work everyone thanks , you all make climate science accessible for society .
    Moderator Response: TC: I do not read Steve from Virginia as saying that humans of homosexual orientation are pornographic, inconsequential, etc. Rather, I read him as saying that these are all distinct archetypes which are dominant in modern culture. Taking "pornographic", it is beyond question that pornographic imagery is a common feature in modern society in a way that it has not been in the modern west before. Full nudity can appear in adds on billboards or TV screens with no apparent concern for decorum. Recognizing this does not commit us to believing that all features of modern culture, the Olympic games, are pornographic in any way.

    Homosexual culture has also become a major feature of modern culture. Gay men, for example, appear to have been elevated as the doyens of style based solely on their sexuality. I doubt that the impact of homosexual orientations is yet commensurate with the actual homosexual presence in society; still less is it compensatory for the massive prejudice, and all to often persecution, against homosexuals that still exists.

    Read as such, there is nothing offensive or stereotyping about Steve from Virginia's comments. They do, however, push the border on relevance. As such, I ask him in future to be more direct in his style.
  37. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    To first order on the [VOC]/[NOx] ratio
  38. Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
    Andrew Revkin just featured The Escalator at the NY Times Dot Earth blog.
  39. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    I want to point out that I fully agreed with GW increasing the amount of pre-cursors ages ago. I also now accept that heat will increase the rate of the cycle. I'm going to write down how I understand it this morning, and feel free to comment, denigrate whatever. In the cycle of formation/destruction of ozone, heat speeds it up. However heat can't result in more ozone in this process (as in can't create more of something than the building blocks to make them). What heat does do however, is increase pre-cursors. But increasing pre-cursors doesn't translate literally to increased ozone. There's numerous conditions required for the ozone cycle to work which must be in place for the cycle to operate. Is that about right?
  40. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Composer99 @73, the word "denier" has been used in the English language since at least 1532 to mean "one who denies". It has never had any other meaning than that, either as to specific doctrine, belief or facts denied; or as to the psychological processes involved in the denial. It certainly does not derive its meaning form pop-psychology, nor from its very recent use to describe a particular form of denial. "Denialist" is a recent construction which I would consider far more offensive than denier, suggesting as it does that denial is some form of professional activity on the denier's behalf. My view on the use of the word "denier" is that: 1) Once you let a small group declare words off limits for political reasons, you have lost the battle with that group already, as they control the allowable forms of expression; 2) If somebody finds a word offensive, it is up to them to find a suitably descriptive, and non-tendentious substitute. I spent considerable time at WUWT at one stage encouraging them to do that, and it became quite clear that they generally insisted that the only acceptable word to describe them was "skeptic", with the implication that they held a virtue they patently fail to practice. 3) Finally, if a word is offensive because of the behaviour it describes (which appears to be the case), then the behaviour is itself far more offensive; so people who indulge in that behaviour have no grounds for complaint when it is accurately described.
  41. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    David Lewis @11, in Moore's own words, he was not a member of the Don't Make a Wave Committee until April 1971, after he had read about their planning "to sail a boat from Vancouver across the North Pacific to protest U.S. hydrogen bomb testing in Alaska". That is his description of his joining of Greenpeace from his book, "Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout". The relevant extract is reproduced below for your convenience: Now, as a matter of logic, Moore did not found an organization he read about in the Vancouver Sun. For him to become aware of it by reading about it, it needed to exist already. Moore did become a member of that committee very early in its existence (within 5-16 months of its formation), and did sail on the first protest voyage organized by the Don't Make a Wave Committee. He was also present the meeting of that committee when the vote was taken to change its name to Greenpeace, none of which makes him a co-founder of Greenpeace, whose organization existed before he joined. Your evidence to the contrary consists only of a quote which states:
    "In 1970, the Don't Make A Wave Committee was established; its sole objective was to stop a second nuclear weapons test at Amchitka Island in the Aleutians. The committee's founders and first members included: • Paul Cote, a law student at the University of British Columbia • Jim Bohlen, a former deep-sea diver and radar operator in the US Navy • Irving Stowe, a Quaker and Yale-educated lawyer • Patrick Moore, ecology student at the University of British Columbia • Bill Darnell, a social worker"
    (My emphasis) That quote is entirely consistent with Moore not being a co-founder of the Committee, but a first member (so long as that is interpreted as a member who joined within the first one or possibly two calendar years of formation). The dates however, make it entirely clear that he is the latter, not the former. If you object to revisionist history, then what you should object to is that which exaggerates Moore's role by claiming him as a co-founder. If Moore wanted to emphasize his early connection to Greenpeace accurately he would describe himself as a crew member of Greenpeace's first protest voyage, and as an early president of Greenpeace. But that would not give him an apparent right and authority to claim that Greenpeace has lost its way in the same way that claiming to be a co-founder does.
  42. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    I am surprised that my blog has attracted on-going comment and little if any of it related to the subject matter – effects of AGW on health. Commentary largely relates to the following statement: “If global temperatures rise more than 2°C, ozone concentration in the lower atmosphere is likely to rise above 100 ppb”. However this should be read in context. I am not asserting that ozone concentration near the surface will rise to >100 ppb but that if ambient temperature rises by more than 2°C, such an increase is likely. I accept that this claim is imprecise – deliberately so since I do not fully understand the complex photochemistry associated with formation (and destruction) of ozone in the lower troposphere. At comment 17, I tried to clarify that I was referring to regional concentration of ozone, noting that highest levels of O3 were to be expected where the precursors for it were highest. Elsewhere the blog refers to the harmful effects on health as a result of exposure for periods of 8 hours or more, so I am not talking about a persistent increase in O3 but a regional increase resulting in human exposure having adverse health effects. In some major cities there has been a trend to reduction in tropospheric O3 presumably as a result of public policy aimed at reducing the presence of precursors. In other major cities and surrounding areas, tropospheric O3 has been increasing and in some cases has exceeded 100 ppb. One should not be looking for a trend in the global concentration of tropospheric O3 but in the incidence of regional increase for periods of 8 hours or more. The IPCC reports (1) that there is a trend of regional increase in the incidence and frequency of dangerous levels of O3. Claims that It hasn’t happened yet despite an increase in temperature over recent decades (~0.6°C) does not appear to be a valid argument since (a) recent increases in temperature are still a long way from more than 2°C globally and (b) as noted above there have been regional increases for short periods where O3 concentrations have exceeded 100 ppb, levels that are harmful to human and some plant health, including food crops. An assertion made is that temperature does not affect O3 formation but given that the precursors include volatile organic compounds (VOC’s) the claim appears to be that temperature does not affect those substances. Yet VOC’s increasingly enter the atmosphere as ambient temperature rises(2). Rising temperature increases availability and reaction of O3 precursors to sunlight and both the volume and speed with which O3 is formed according to the Technical Appendix of Climate Change and Your Health(2). This is confirmed by the IPCC (3) and has been shown to produce harmful concentrations(4) of O3 in some regions. The chemistry involved is explained with admirable clarity by EliRabett at comment 53. 1. http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg2/index.php?idp=572 2. http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/global_warming/climate-and-ozone-pollution-tech-appendix.pdf 3. http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg2/index.php?idp=356 4. http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/wg2/index.php?idp=572
  43. Quantifying Extreme Heat Events
    vrooomie, James has not posted in this forum since January 14th, so it might be quite some time before you get a response...
  44. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Ah yes, FWIW since the 50s there have been numerous laws passed to limit surface ozone, and great technical progress in doing so. Now some, not Eli to be sure, might say that had something to do with the fact that ground level ozone has leveled off. Counterexamples can be found in any Chinese city. See Fallows, James.
  45. Quantifying Extreme Heat Events
    James@25, this silly shibboleth of science-one-does-like being called "religion" is a particualy bothersome one to me. Definition, from Dictionary.com: "re·li·gion   /rɪˈlɪdʒən/ Show Spelled[ri-lij-uhn] noun 1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, especially when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs. 2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion. 3. the body of persons adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices: a world council of religions. 4. the life or state of a monk, nun, etc.: to enter religion. 5. the practice of religious beliefs; ritual observance of faith" Please point out to me *which* of these generally-accepted definitions ANYTHING in the above referenced paper approaches "religion." When you do that, we can then discuss what, for me, is a matter of simple and purposefully-inflammatory rhetoric. Said another way; science not understood is not religion: it is just science that is beyond your pay grade, as many areas of science are to me. I don't accuse the watchmaker of sorcery or gbeing a religionist, just because I haven't an idea how a watch works: I trust in his/her ability to make watches, which is, last I checked, based on science, no?
  46. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    DL@15: "At this point it is hard for me to understand why it isn't a criminal offense to attempt to undermine climate science in the way Moore does, because of what is at stake." Perhaps it may be, if Michael Mann is successful in his lawsuit against the publication which publically, and with no shame, libeled and defamed him. I would welcome case law to that end, and then let Messrs. Monckton, Moore, McI, Watts, et al--the list is well known--be called into account for the damage they have done to legititmate climate scientists.
  47. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    Nothing excuses Moore's gibberish on climate science in my books. At this point it is hard for me to understand why it isn't a criminal offense to attempt to undermine climate science in the way Moore does, because of what is at stake. Just as it is a crime in some jurisdictions, i.e. Germany, to advocate hatred toward identifiable groups such as the Jews, because of the Holocaust, it will one day be a crime to encourage people to believe lies about what is happening to the planet. It took the deaths of millions for people to understand that such laws were necessary. There is only one planet.
  48. Global Warming - A Health Warning
    Composer@73, as long as the book, "Denialism" is out there, I have *no compunction* whatso-[self-snipped]-ever, using the term when I see someone comporting to the the well-defined actions that identify such behavior. Not speaking to their *character*, but rather, to their ~actions~. Fair deal.
  49. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    numerobis #10, If it rains from time to time....
  50. Unpicking a Gish-Gallop: former Greenpeace figure Patrick Moore on climate change
    David, I agree that revisionism is not good and I accept that people move on from one thing to another. Nevertheless, none of that excuses Moore's streaming invective of inaccurate to plain wrong long-debunked talking-points. A Gish-gallop it remains, period.

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