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Albatross at 04:26 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
Geologist@3, "I strongly object to characterizing Bob Carter as a fake climate expert." That is not a "characterization" but a statement of fact. Also, the reality is that it is Carter who is characterizing himself in the media as something that he is clearly not. James Cook University does not list him as a "climate expert" or "paleoclimatologist", and even Carter's online bio states that: "He is a palaeontologist, stratigrapher, marine geologist..." Regardless, as this post demonstrates, Carter's claims are at complete odds with the data, the science and the facts. Sadly, this behaviour is par for the course for most "skeptics". -
Steve Case at 04:23 AM on 29 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Daniel Bailey #17, What I amply demonstrated with all of the data 1900-2011 not merely 1970-2005 is that rainfall in East Australia has trended upwards contrary to Muonconter's post. I object to your assertions without supportive basis. -
Clyde at 04:12 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
This question may have been answered before. I'm new to the site & not real smart on the science. Why is it that folks who critique AGW are dismissed if their not experts in climate science, but we should just accept a climate scientist's work on models when their not experts in computer modeling? Have a nice day. -
Rob Honeycutt at 04:11 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
I find it fascinating how Carter avoids citations. The piece that I wrote on Carter points out where he does use a citation but in relation to nothing found in the the actual paper being cited! Worse than that, the paper he cites directly contradicts the claim he's making. It seems to me that Carter employs the same technique that Monckton relies on: Say whatever you like and assume that the people you're trying to convince are never going to check your facts. -
dana1981 at 03:43 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
Geologist - while Carter has a couple of papers related to paleoclimate, he is certainly not a climate expert, as is evidenced by his constantly incorrect claims on the subject. -
michael sweet at 03:28 AM on 29 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
bath ed, Do you have similar maps that show where wheat is grown in Australia?Moderator Response: TC: Wheat is grown in Australia in both winter rainfall, and summer rainfall regions, with different times of planting. Consequently I cannot see how your request can be on topic. If you have a specific on topic point to make, then make it. Otherwise discussion of wheat growing in Australia is off topic on this thread. -
Rob Honeycutt at 03:21 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
Geologist... An "expert" would suggest someone has specific expertise in the field, someone who can impart accurate information. Carter makes so many incredibly elemental errors in regards to climate change it is a stretch to call him an expert. Carter is a stratigrapher and a mining expert, but with regards to climate, I would suggest, he is less informed than a large number of readers of SkS and therefore not an expert. Carter can call himself whatever he likes. He can call himself the Queen of England if he likes, but that doesn't make it so. -
Geologist at 03:02 AM on 29 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
I strongly object to characterizing Bob Carter as a fake climate expert. The field of paleoclimate is rather wide and much of the IODP research (International Ocean Drilling Program), where Bob Carter has been involved and published (eg. Carter 2005, Land et al. 2010), can very well be included. In my opinion he is perfectly entitled to call himself a peloclimatologist and even if you prefer a stricter definition it is still highly unfair to call him a fake expert. That of course makes it worse that he is arguing such nonsense. -
Bernard J. at 02:52 AM on 29 May 20122012 SkS Weekly Digest #21
I'm loathe to draw attention to this on the more focussed threads, but I thought that there might be a few folk here with a perverse fascination for how Tim Curtin is currently butchering over at Deltoid the fundamental physics of Tyndall and Arrhenius. It truly has to be seen to be believed, and even then it's difficult. I keep trying to put fingers to keyboard to address the pseudoscience, but it's as futile an exercise as is harvesting a vineyard one grape at a time. Strong, strong, strong keyboard/beverage warning - you'll discover that greenhouse gases aren't, and that nitrogen and oxygen are. -
Daniel Bailey at 02:25 AM on 29 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Once again, we see amply demonstrated the factual impoverishment of denial's meritless arguments. Devoid of supportive basis, denial relies upon strawman arguments, goalpost shifting and the ol' reliable misdirection ploy to advance their agenda. -
bath_ed at 01:54 AM on 29 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve Case @ 15: This article is about declining rainfall due to weakening/poleward retreat of the westerlies affecting the winter rainfall region of South Africa and by analogy Australia. The winter rainfall regions of Australia, like South Africa are in the far south on west facing coasts. You can see them and their relative small size here shown in blue and blue-grey:
Eastern Australia is a red herring as it doesn't get its rainfall from the westerlies and therefore is of little relevance to the issue.
Here are the winter rainfall zones of southern Africa, (top left) with estimated distributions in past glacial periods. Note how they were more extensive when the Earth was cooler:-
Moderator Response: [Sph] Image widths adjusted. Please remember to keep images to 450 pixels wide or less. -
DSL at 01:41 AM on 29 May 2012Why I care about climate change
Agreed Billy52, but what do you suggest should be done? Deniers will always set the agenda for discussion if they are provided the means to pursue their agenda effectively. As long as 1) the general public does not understand how its opinions are formed, 2) opinion-makers are given scientific authority on par with the consensus understanding of working scientists, and 3) we live in something that resembles a democracy, where the education of the public is essential to the ethical/moral success of the democracy, then the deniers will always set the agenda for discussion. As it is, all one needs to do is sound sciency enough for the general reader to be dulled toward fact-checking, and one can then claim just about anything and have it believed. The comment streams on news sites are evidence of that. Despite Dan Kahan's findings, I am still convinced that one the roots of the problem is comprehension. Undoubtedly, one's cultural surround makes strong and persistent demands on one's set of beliefs, and Kahan's study confirms this for climate risk:CCT [Kahan's cultural cognition theory] posits that people who subscribe to a hierarchical, individualistic world-view—one that ties authority to conspicuous social rankings and eschews collective interference with the decisions of individuals possessing such authority—tend to be sceptical of environmental risks.
And, according to the results of Kahan's study, that stands fairly well for people who have the proven technical skill to understand the science. However, I posit that few people are capable of totally ignoring evidence-based reasoning. Cultural factors may severely delay understanding (and effectively prevent it, given the circumstances and issue), but eventually some minds are, in fact, changed. I've seen it happen on this website. One of my jobs as an educator is to reveal to individuals explicitly the cultural factors that influence those individuals. For me, that is the first role of higher education toward young people stepping into their adulthoods. Once the mechanism is revealed, competing epistemologies are truly on level playing ground, and science is pretty strong. However, the effectiveness of this revelation is diminished by the force with which the message is delivered. You can lead the horse to water, but if you try to force it to drink, it'll die of thirst first. The only force I apply in this "debate" is gently telling people to put up or shut up. I ask people how their beliefs were formed, and then I ask them to come discuss the science with an open mind. Invite deniers to ask questions and engage in open discussion (or be revealed as uncritical and gullible) on a site like SkS (where commenters, more than at any other site, are allowed to speak without being subject to intimidation). I think John's methodology with the site is effective in that respect, as it allows people to approach the science via their own beliefs, rather than being confronted by an unfamiliar staging. Unfortunately, though, learning through open discussion seems like a painfully slow process, and most people aren't allowed (explicitly or implicitly) to engage in that type of learning (and even when they are, the death of the humanities in higher education will eventually remove or severely diminish the opportunity). In my more cynical moments, I think it's all a waste of time, and that people aren't going to truly believe until it bites them in the posterior on a regular basis. -
muoncounter at 01:19 AM on 29 May 2012CO2 was higher in the past
Responding to a comment here: The geocraft cartoon graph rises again, with its ominous "... consternation of global warming proponents". And once again, there is no such consternation. The timing of high CO2 and glacial stage onset is critical - and that was always very tough to do on samples that are 450 M yrs old. So one has to wonder about the accuracy of the chronology shown on the geocraft cartoon. Especially in light of Saltzman 2005: ... the evidence suggests that the ice began to build up some 10 million years earlier than when volcanoes began pumping the atmosphere full of the CO2 that ended the Ordovician ice age. Abstract here. Young et al 2010 adds more to this consternation-busting line of research: The integrated datasets are consistent with increasing pCO2 levels in response to ice-sheet expansion that reduced silicate weathering. Ultimately, the time period of elevated pCO2 levels is followed by geologic evidence of deglaciation. -- emphasis added Full paper pdf here. -
Steve Case at 01:12 AM on 29 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
#14 muoncounter, The graphs you picked to illustrate your point all end at 2005, over six years ago. And they show East Australia getting drier. So I thought I'd take a look at East AU and see if I could find up-to-date data and I found this page. So I graphed out the precipitation for East Australia for 1900-2011, 1950-2011,
1970-2011 and 1970-2005 and it looks like this:
Looks like precipitation is up overall in East Australia since 1900, but because of some spikes mid-century trends with start points at those times show a decline and if 2005 is picked as an end point, the decline becomes quite exaggerated.
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DSL at 00:34 AM on 29 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
curiousd, I'll second what michael sweet says: there is a wide range of opinion on the subject of mitigation/adaptation strategies. My opinion changes frequently, unfortunately. And it's very difficult to assess the science and economic analysis surrounding renewables, nuclear, and various mitigation schemes. Where CO2 is concerned, look at three papers: 1. Foster & Rahmstorf (2011) (discussed here by one of the authors), which removes solar, volcanic, and ENSO effects from the recent surface temp record to see what sort of trend might be left over. 2. Lacis et al. (2010) or Schmidt et al. (2010), which discuss the role of CO2 as the primary "control knob" of climate. 3. Puckrin et al. (2004), which compares modeled and observed radiative flux for various GHGs, including water vapor. Any further responses on the subject of "CO2 was higher in the past" really do need to go here. As for CO2 being the driver of climate, responses should go here. Any responses will be seen, since many (most?) of the regular posters check the recent comments thread regularly. -
Billy52 at 00:26 AM on 29 May 2012Why I care about climate change
I enjoy this site and you've assembled an impressive collection of sound arguments countering those promoted by the climate change deniers. But I question whether the "climate debate" is a proper focus for efforts to mitigate catastrophic climate change. In a world where average temperatures are 2 to 6 degrees C. higher than today, what difference will it make who was right or who was wrong about the climate? I don't believe deniers should be the ones setting the agenda for discussion. -
muoncounter at 23:21 PM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
The 'wet get wetter, dry get dryer' means that if you look at too large an area, you're averaging together drought and flooding: Trends in annual total rainfall for three time periods, 1900-2005, 1950-2005 and 1970-2005
-- source (2006)
It is clearly incorrect to look only at continent-wide averages.
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michael sweet at 23:15 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
curiousd, Welcome to Skeptical Science, As you thought, there has been a lot of discussion of nuclear power and a variety of opinions expressed. You should use the search button in the upper left corner to locate the threads you are interested in. My favorite is the thread on renewable baseload power, where nuclear was often discussed. This is a hot button issue and you are likely to see lot of difference of opinion. If you have substantial references to contribute the discussion will be better than if you just state your opinion. At 211, why do you suggest the two options are different? CO2 is the dominant factor, but there are a number of other factors, especially on a short term basis. -
bath_ed at 22:52 PM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve Case @ 4: The clue is semi-arid winter rainfall regions that the article speaks of. In South Africa (and Australia too I believe) there is a strong distinction between the winter rainfall regions of the far west and south west and the rest of the country which receives most of its rain in the summer. It is also important to note that the winter rainfall zones are small compared with the summer rainfall zones, so any rainfall trend for the whole country is going to be dominated by the summer rainfall regions; rainfall in the Western Cape has declined in recent decades. In the winter rainfall regions, rain is brought by the westerlies and cold fronts rather like in the Atlantic edge of Western Europe. Unlike Atlantic Europe, the southern tip of Africa is at a sufficiently low latitude that it only gets the westerlies in the winter and in the summer they retreat further south, while Atlantic Europe being nearer the pole stays in their path all year. Rainfall in the rest of South Africa (and Australia) has little to do with Atlantic (Indian Ocean) westerlies and falls mainly in the summer, which makes an enormous difference to the vegetation, agriculture and appearance of the country. You will find that in January the region surrounding Cape Town will typically be parched and brown while Johannesburg, Pretoria etc are green. By July the situation is reversed. Going back to the plants of the area, I believe sadly that they may be especially vulnerable to any changes. This winter-rainfall zone supports the Cape Floristic Kingdom, by far the smallest of the world's six floristic kingdoms. Covering only 0.5% of Africa it contains 20% of the continent's plant species and more than all of North America. As well as occupying such a small area, many of the plants had the misfortune of growing on land suitable for growing wheat and other crops, or land now taken for urban development. Some now grow only at a single site or a handful of sites, or even only in cultivation. Given this, it would be difficult for them to shift ranges in response to drying. -
curiousd at 22:47 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
As a Newbie here, I must say this is a wonderful site for learning about climate change science. Is it fair game to discuss, in this same site, remediation, or "What best to do about AGW?" I suspect here there would be more contention amongst site members. I happen to be of the opinion that expanding nuclear power and using that power to generate hydrogen would at the least buy time, and should be part of the remediation mix, but I am not sure if SkS is a proper forum to discuss this?Moderator Response: [DB] Please refrain from all-caps usage (cf Comments Policy), except in the case of acronyms. Convert all-caps to bold or underline for emphasis instead. -
curiousd at 21:34 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
Thank you DSL and Tom Curtis. May I summarize your positions thus? If I were to use a "take home message" for undergraduate non science majors, I gather the message from DSL is: "Although CO2 is a key factor in controlling the climate, it would be a mistake to think it's the only factor" Whereas the message from Richard Alley would seem to be that, if one takes the most recent results into account, the CO2 level is, if not the only factor, surely the dominant factor. -
Tom Curtis at 20:33 PM on 28 May 2012Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Carbon500 @67, Beck took a large number of historical CO2 measurements from a large number of sites, including sites contaminated by local emissions of CO2. He made no effort at quality control, and treated contaminated samples as though they measured background CO2 levels. That makes his paper worse than useless, the reason, no doubt, it was published in Energy and Environment rather than in a scientific journal. -
Carbon500 at 19:48 PM on 28 May 2012Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Regarding CO2 measurement prior to Mauna Lau: Ernst-Georg Beck’s ‘180 Years of Atmospheric CO2 Gas Analysis by Chemical Methods’ in Energy and Environment, Vol. 18 No. 2, 2007 will no doubt be of interest to some. -
chriskoz at 19:39 PM on 28 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
This time around, Carter's Gish Gallop does not include some of his stronger claims from some 1y ago: e.g."CO2 is elixir of life, and the base of most of the food chains on our planet". At least I don't see that in this article. Does it mean that Carter softened his stance or climbed couple of rungs on the ladder of denial (as Mike Mann would say) comparing to that summary? -
chriskoz at 19:17 PM on 28 May 20122012 SkS Weekly Digest #21
I'd like to know what changes have been made to the commant policy. To be honest I haven't looked at the policy page before (cause I'm getting away with my comments so far) but just in case I want to know what recent changes made the moderator's life easier. The moderation cannot be disputed, so I'm not looking to judge it, just asking what was changed & why. -
jsam at 16:16 PM on 28 May 2012The Last Interglacial - An Analogue for the Future?
Typo alert "preceeding" should be "preceding". -
Tom Curtis at 15:41 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
curiousd @208, the short of it is that that persons geology is indeed out of date. Specifically, he used rather inexact proxies in the form of biological markers and stomata in fossil leaves to calculate both CO2 levels and temperatures. On top of that, he ignores the fact that geological strata going that far back typically have resolutions of around 5 - 10 million years. In other words, using typical strata it would be impossible to distinguish geologically between the Holocene, and the Last Glacial Maximum. More recently, a number of high resolution strata have been found which enable a more detailed examination of the record. The situation in 2006 was summarized by Dana Royer (PDF). Since then, even the few exceptions to no glaciation without low CO2 found by Royer have been found, with higher resolution data, to not be exceptions (although in some cases the interpretation of the data is still in dispute). Richard Alley gave an excellent presentation of the current information at the 2009 Fall meeting of the AGU. -
DSL at 14:29 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
Hi, curiousd-- Check out this SkS article and post any further questions or comments there. The short of it: the sun was much less active during that period. -
curiousd at 14:15 PM on 28 May 2012Newcomers, Start Here
I have been teaching an elementary Physics of Environment college course for many years and agree that the scientific case for AGW is overwhelming. But one of the more apparently effective global warming skeptic internet posts can be found at http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html This person claims that "The Carboniferous Period and the Ordovician Period were the only geological periods during the Paleozoic Era when global temperatures were as low as they are today. To the consternation of global warming proponents, the Late Ordovician Period was also an Ice Age while at the same time CO2 concentrations then were nearly 12 times higher than today-- 4400 ppm." Has anyone else here looked at this? Maybe this guy's geology is out of date? I am not a geologist and I don't have expertise in the area of ancient temperatures versus CO2 levels. -
Bert from Eltham at 13:15 PM on 28 May 2012Bob Carter's Financial Post Gish Gallop of Scientific Denial
[snip]Moderator Response: [KC] Please no accusations of deception, whatever the source. The rest of your comment may have overstepped the ad-hominem criterion, although a more experienced moderator may overrule me on that. -
Bob Lacatena at 11:37 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
9, Steve Case, Your argument has been proven to be invalid. Regardless of what you believe or want to believe, the facts in this case seem clear. -
scaddenp at 11:10 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
"I know what the catechism is, I just don't believe it" Then you had better try harder in presenting us with some credible evidence why you don't (aside from ideology), rather presenting in effect disinformation. -
Tom Curtis at 10:45 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve Case @9, let me remind you that the hypothesis you were testing was:'Theoretical climate models have shown that global warming could push storm tracks southward "and away from the mainlands of southern Africa, South America and Australia"'.
Regardless of whether you believe it or not, there was no justification for using data which is dominated by northern, monsoonal rainfalls when testing a hypothesis about a shift of the prevailing westerlies further south. -
Steve Case at 10:04 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Scaddenp #8 Yes, I know what thecatechismis, I just don't believe it.Moderator Response: [Sph] Please review the comments policy. Subtle efforts to violate it are still efforts to violate it. -
scaddenp at 09:57 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve, I would also note that you know about prediction of wet getting wetter and dry getting drier, because you were informed about it here. Did this slip your mind when you decided to show rainfall for all of Australia? -
Tom Curtis at 08:12 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve Case @4, coming as I do from Australia, and in particular from Queensland where most rain falls during the summer months, I cannot help noticing that not all of Australia is "the semi-arid winter rainfall regions of ...Australia", and have to wonder why you plotted rainfall for the whole of Australia rather than just for the relevant region. The relevant region is, of course, Southern Australia, particularly South Western Australia, which is not influenced by the complicating factor of ENSO:
As noted, in South Eastern Australia, the picture is complicated by ENSO oscillations. In particular, heaving flooding over the last two summer/spring seasons in Victoria related to the most recent La Nina have resulted in a slight positive trend, although there is still a clear decline over the last 30 years:
However, the declining trend is clear in Winter:
and Autumn:
Of course, South Eastern Australia is not semi-arid, so technically does not come under the prediction in the paper.
Given that monsoons are predicted to increase in strength with increased warming, and that averaging across monsoonal,and winter rainfall regions precipitation is predicted to increase; I again have to wonder why you are quoting an area which includes monsoonal rainfall as a counter example to a claim about semi-arid areas with predominantly winter rainfall.
All images from the Bureau of Meteorology, where you can play around with the graphing tool to get a more detailed picture.
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vrooomie at 07:48 AM on 28 May 2012If you want them to remember, tell a story
"From race car mechanic to geologist?? I'll bet THAT'S a good story in itself!" jimpsey and funglestrumpet, if only you knew! To not crud up the comments section too badly, email me and I'll be happy to tell you how I went from "cars to karst" (I'm STEALING that) and how it was all by accident. Literally...:P) -
scaddenp at 07:05 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
Steve see here for how to do hyperlinks. As to rainfall total map of Australia, you will note the prediction is for the north to get a lot wetter. I dont think this is inconsistent. In a warming world, you should get more rainfall, but this is expected to be much heavier in many existing wet regions while many dry regions get drier. -
Steve Case at 06:42 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
I don't know why my links don't work, here's the one for the data: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/rain03.txt and the web page: http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/rain.shtml -
Steve Case at 06:34 AM on 28 May 2012Dead Ahead: Less Rainfall for Drought-Sensitive Southern Hemisphere Regions?
The article says: Theoretical climate models have shown that global warming could push storm tracks southward "and away from the mainlands of ...Australia," said Stager. "The same also appears to be true for the semi-arid winter rainfall regions of ...Australia ... "When it comes to climate change, there's more to consider than warming alone," he said. "In places like these, increasing drought could bring far-reaching challenges." After a very short Google search I found this page and the data. And a few minutes to plot it out I get:
Why should I believe that "Global Warming" is going to lead to Australian drought when the last 100 years of rising temperatures appears to have done the opposite? In fact, the trend shows a little acceleration.
Moderator Response: [DB] Fixed formatting issues. -
Daniel Bailey at 06:04 AM on 28 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
"there is something very child-like about the way Climate Scientists believe almost anything they are told - so longs as it's scary enough!"
Actually, there is something very child-like about the way deniers like Justin disbelieve almost anything they are told (told, because they refuse to do the hard work and learn about things for themselves) - because it's "too scary" and therefore cannot be true!Moderator Response: TC: We now have seven responses to Justin's comments. Any further responses prior to his responding to these comments will be deleted based on the "no dogpiling" clause of the comments policy. I request that those who have already responded to Justin not respond to remarks by Justin directed specifically at other people, should he respond, on the same basis. Thank you. -
Stephen Baines at 03:34 AM on 28 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Justin You state. "...something very child-like about the way Climate Scientists believe almost anything they are told - so longs as it's scary enough!" This makes no sense on the face of it. If the level of "scary" was all the climate scientists pay attention to, why do they discount runaway greenhouse to venus conditions, or 25m sea-level rise before 2100? Why do they put an upper limit on effects of a doubling of CO2 at all? Why do they still discuss contentious issues like the effect of warming on hurricane and tornado frequency and intensity? Or the effect of clouds as feedbacks? The irony is that the scenario you are implicitly promoting is far scarier to me than any scenario proposed by mainstream climate science. It presupposes that we as a society (that you and I belong to) cannot assess and respond rationally to future threats. Such cynicism dooms us to suffer the consequences of such threats, no matter what they be. It presumes, since no one can be trusted, the world will be fine no matter what anyone tells you. You also brought up the WMD debacle. You could not have chosen a more different case to climate science. The WMD issues was one that, by it's very nature, involved very little hard evidence, a lot of conjecture based on past events and a short time line set in part by political contingencies. Climate science, by contrast, has accumulated a ocean of direct measurements and theoretical understanding over 150 years, and contues to do so on a daily basis. Ignoring that evidence on the principle that noone can be trusted and all will be fine is just as childlike, in my view, as believing that everything that is scary is true. -
muoncounter at 23:15 PM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Perhaps Justin has a point. 'Heat-seeking missiles' could just a means for 'scientists' at 'the Pentagon' to get rich at public expense. As if this is really the 'heat signature' of an engine that such technology exploits:
-- source
Or this could be a necessary counter-measure:
-- source
And it's not just the Pentagon. Even the Australian Air Force is in on it.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 20:33 PM on 27 May 2012Modeled and Observed Ocean Heat Content - Is There a Discrepancy?
Gavin's final comment on his post is interesting: "Analyses of the CMIP5 models will provide some insight here since the historical simulations have been extended to 2012 (including the last solar minimum), and have updated aerosol emissions. Watch this space." So instead of just extrapolating from 2003 with CMIP3, it will now be modelled out to 2012 with CMIP5. Watch that space. -
DSL at 12:41 PM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Justin, I suspect you're just passing through and won't actually respond to any of the comments here. If so, too bad. Nevertheless, you give us a good chance to do follow-up on the video for the sake of the general public stopping by SkS. Thank you. Essentially, the video is saying that the basic science of so-called "greenhouse gases" has been independently tested by organizations that have no reason to take a side in the climate "debate." Indeed, they were testing the science when there was no debate. Why should we believe the Pentagon? Because their air-to-air missiles are pretty effective pieces of engineering, engineering that had to overcome interference from atmospheric CO2. Of course, in general, if you don't have the time, energy, means, or training to come to an understanding of the science yourself, it's not a terrible idea to trust large, successful institutions that are preparing for events decades from now. Insurance companies and the US armed services, without much fanfare, are both gearing up for a warmer Earth. -
Bob Loblaw at 12:18 PM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Justin: Accept it [climate science] because the Pentagon thinks it is true? No. Reject it [climate science] because is a socialist plot? Well, is the Pentagon normally considered a source of socialist thinking? It the Pentagon in on "the hoax"? Do we assume that climate science is wrong because the Pentagon thinks it is right? You may think so, but I accept the science on climate and human-induced warming, and if I agreed with that because I agreed with the commo/pinko/anti-capitalist "agenda", then I would certainly be surprised to hear that the Pentagon agreed with me.... ...so perhaps the fact that the Pentagon shares some of my views is because we share some connection to reality, rather than we've been drinking the same Kool-aid... Please wait while I remove my tin-foil hat... -
dana1981 at 12:11 PM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Justin, Alley is asking us to believe the basic atmospheric physics behind anthropogenic global warming because it's long-established science. He's just giving the history behind that science because it might make climate ostriches more able to pull their heads out of the sand to know that these scientific principles were discovered by the military during defense research. Your rejection of the science based on a rather silly attack on the Pentagon demonstrates that it will take a lot to get some ostriches to pull their heads out. -
Bob Loblaw at 12:00 PM on 27 May 2012The human fingerprint in the seasons
SRJ: Just a brief comment to supplemet Sphaerica's comments. You said "[is] Modtran is too simple to this? , and the answer is "yes". Modtran does radiation calculations. The atmospheric temperature profile responds to the entire energy transfer, of which radiation is only a part - an important part, but only a part. To complete the energy transfer, you need to look at - vertical transfer of thermal energy - vertical transfer of "latent heat" (condensation/evaporation, related to vapour transport) - horizontal transfer of the same (because you're only looking at one point in the atmosphere, not the global total) The key statement of Sphaerica's is "the convective transport of heat and moisture not only upward, but also poleward." Motran is not a climate model, is is a radiative transfer model. Only one part of a climate model. -
Bob Lacatena at 11:31 AM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Justin, Perhaps you should actually listen to the video and comment on what it says, rather than what you'd like to rant about. When you're done doing that, actually go study the science and understand the sound basis for it. Deniers will continue to dismiss the claims put forward by anyone not because of how they are put forward, but because they cannot overcome the core (child-like) reflex that causes their brains to malfunction and to reject evidence and logic in favor of conspiracy theories and any bizarre idea that points somewhere else, anywhere but towards real climate science. -
Justin at 11:13 AM on 27 May 2012Richard Alley's Air Force Ostrich
Is he being serious? Is Richard Alley asking us to believe in stuff because the Pentagon says its true? The Pentagon? Since when has the Pentagon or any other military organisations in the world, given us the truth? Have he forgotten about Iraq's WMD? How can anyone write a book or a blog based on this type of infantile story-telling? A lot of people believe in UFOs, including the US military. It doesn't mean it has any sound basis in science. We deniers will continue to dismiss the claims put forward by people like Richard Alley because there is something very child-like about the way Climate Scientists believe almost anything they are told - so longs as it's scary enough!
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